“No,” and she shook her head more sadly than before.
“And what makes you think that I am telling a lie?”
“Because the ring is large enough to go over two of my fingers.” And Thibault’s finger would certainly have made two of Agnelette’s.
“If it is too large, Agnelette,” he said, “we can have it made smaller.”
“Goodbye, Monsieur Thibault.”
“What! Goodbye?”
“Yes.”
“You are going to leave me?”
“Yes, I am going.”
“And why, Agnelette?”
“Because I do not love liars.”
Thibault tried to think of some vow he could make to reassure Agnelette, but in vain.
“Listen,” said Agnelette, with tears in her eyes, for it was not without a great effort of self-control that she was turning away, “if that ring is really meant for me. …”
“Agnelette, I swear to you that it is.”
“Well then, give it me to keep till our wedding day, and on that day I will give it back to you, that you may have it blessed.”
“I will give it you with all my heart,” replied Thibault, “but I want to see it on your pretty hand. You were right in saying that it was too large for you, and I am going into Villers-Cotterets today, we will take the measure of your finger, and I will get Monsieur Dugué, the goldsmith there, to alter it for us.”
The smile returned to Agnelette’s face and her tears were dried up at once. She put out her little hand; Thibault took it between his own, turned it over and looked at it, first on the back and then on the palm, and stooping, kissed it.
“Oh!” said Agnelette, “you should not kiss my hand, Monsieur Thibault, it is not pretty enough.”
“Give me something else then to kiss.” And Agnelette lifted her face that he might kiss her on the forehead.
“And now,” she said joyously, and with childish eagerness, “let me see the ring.”
Thibault drew off the ring, and laughing, tried to put it on Agnelette’s thumb; but, to his great astonishment, he could not get it over the joint. “Well, well,” he exclaimed, “who would ever have thought such a thing?”
Agnelette began to laugh. “It is funny, isn’t it!” she said.
Then Thibault tried to pass it over the first finger, but with the same result as when he put it on the thumb. He next tried the middle finger, but the ring seemed to grow smaller and smaller, as if fearing to sully this virgin hand; then the third finger, the same on which he wore it himself, but it was equally impossible to get it on. And as he made these vain attempts to fit the ring, Thibault felt Agnelette’s hand trembling more and more violently within his own, while the sweat fell from his own brow, as if he were engaged in the most arduous work; there was something diabolic at the bottom of it, as he knew quite well. At last he came to the little finger and endeavoured to pass the ring over it. This little finger, so small and transparent, that the ring should have hung as loosely upon it as a bracelet on one of Thibault’s, this little finger, in spite of all Agnelette’s efforts, refused to pass through the ring. “Ah! my God, Monsieur Thibault,” cried the child “what does this mean?”
“Ring of the Devil, return to the Devil!” cried Thibault, flinging the ring against a rock, in the hope that it would be broken. As it struck the rock, it emitted flame; then it rebounded, and in rebounding, fitted itself on to Thibault’s finger. Agnelette who saw this strange evolution of the ring, looked at Thibault in horrified amazement. “Well,” he said, trying to brave it out, “what is the matter?”
Agnelette did not answer, but as she continued to look at Thibault, her eye grew more and more wild and frightened. Thibault could not think what she was looking at, but slowly lifting her hand and pointing with her finger at Thibault’s head, she said, “Oh! Monsieur Thibault, Monsieur Thibault, what have you got there?”
“Where?” asked Thibault.
“There! there!” cried Agnelette, growing paler and paler.
“Well, but where?” cried the shoemaker, stamping with his foot. “Tell me what you see.”
But instead of replying, Agnelette covered her face with her hands, and uttering a cry of terror, turned and fled with all her might.
Thibault, stunned by what had happened, did not even attempt to follow her; he stood rooted to the spot, unable to move or speak, as if thunderstruck.
What had Agnelette seen that had alarmed her so? What was it that she pointed to with her finger? Had God branded him, as He branded the first murderer? And why not? Had not he, like Cain, killed a man? and in the last sermon he had heard at Oigny had not the preacher said that all men were brothers? Thibault felt wild with misgivings; what had so terrified Agnelette? That he must find out without delay. At first he thought he would go into the town of Bourg-Fontaine and look at himself in a glass. But then, supposing the fatal mark was upon him, and others, besides Agnelette, were to see it! No, he must think of some other way of finding out. He could, of course, pull his hat over his brow, and run back to Oigny, where he had a fragment of mirror in which he could see himself; but Oigny was a long way off. Then he remembered that only a few paces from where he stood, there was a spring as transparent as crystal, which fed the pond near Baisemont, and those at Bourg; he would be able to see himself in that as clearly as in the finest mirror from Saint-Gobain. So Thibault went to the side of the stream and, kneeling down, looked at himself. He saw the same eyes, the same nose, and the same mouth, and not even the slightest little mark upon the forehead—he drew a breath of relief. But still, there must have been something. Agnelette had certainly not taken fright
