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Marie, a novel by Laura E. Richards |
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Chapter 4. Possession |
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_ CHAPTER IV. POSSESSION Jacques De Arthenay went home that night like a man possessed. He was furious with himself, with the strange woman who had thus set his sober thoughts in a whirl, with the very children in the street who had laughed and danced and encouraged her in her sinful music, to her own peril and theirs. He thought it was only anger that so held his mind; yet once in his house, seated on the little stool before his fire, he found himself still in the street, still looking down into that lovely childish face that lifted itself so innocently to his, still smitten to the heart by the beauty of it, and by the fear that he saw in it of his own stern aspect. He had never looked upon any woman before. He had been proud of it,--proud of his strength and cleverness, that needed no meddlesome female creature coming in between him and his business, between him and his religion. He had not let his hair and beard grow, knowing nothing of such practices, but in heart he had been a Nazarite from his youth up,--serving God in his harsh, unloving way; loving God, as he thought; certainly loving nothing else, if it were not the dumb creatures, to whom he was always kind and just. And now--what had happened to him? He asked himself the question sternly, sitting there before the cheerful blaze, yet neither seeing nor feeling it. The answer seemed to cry itself in his ears, to write itself before his eyes in letters of fire. The thing had happened that happens in the story books, that really comes to pass once in a hundred years, they say. He had seen the one woman in the world that he wanted for his own, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish. She was a stranger, a vagabond, trading in iniquity, and gaining her bread by the corruption of souls of men and children; and he loved her, he longed for her, and the world meant nothing to him henceforth unless he could have her. He put the thought away from him like a snake, but it came back and curled round his heart, and made him cold and then hot and then cold again. Was he not a professing Christian, bound by the strictest ties? Yes! How she looked, standing there with the children about her, the little slender figure swaying to and fro to the music, the pretty head bent down so lovingly, the dark eyes looking here and there, bright and shy, like those of a wild creature so gentle in its nature that it knew no fear. But he had taught her fear! yes, he saw it grow under his eyes, just as the love grew in his own heart at the same moment. Love! what sort of word was that for him to be using, even in his mind? To-morrow she would be gone, this wandering fiddler, and all this would be forgotten in a day, for he had the new cattle to see to, and a hundred things of importance. But was anything else of importance save just this one girl? and if he should let her go on her way, out into the world again, to certain perdition, would not the guilt be partly his? He, who saw and knew the perils and pitfalls, might he not snatch this child from the fire and save her soul alive?--No! he would begone, as soon as morning came, and take this sinful body of his away from temptation. How soon would Abby get through her morning work, so that he might with some fair pretext go to the house to see how the stranger had slept, and how she had fared? It would be cowardly to drop the burden on Abby's shoulders, she only a woman like the rest of them, even if she had somewhat more sense. So Jacques De Arthenay sat by his fire till it was cold and dead, a miserable and a wrathful man; and he too slept little that night. But Marie slept long and peacefully in Sister Lizzie's bed, and looked so pretty in her sleep that Abby came three times to wake her, and three times went away again, unable to spoil so perfect a picture. At last, however, the dark eyes opened of their own accord, and Marie began to chirp and twitter, like a bird at daybreak in its nest; only instead of daybreak, it was eight o'clock in the morning, a most shocking hour for anybody to be getting up. But Abby had been in the habit of spoiling her sister, who had a theory that she was never able to do anything early in the morning, and so it was much more considerate for her to stay in bed and keep out of Abby's way. This is a comfortable theory. "I suppose you've been an early riser, though?" said Abby, as she poured the coffee, looking meanwhile approvingly at the figure of her guest, neatly attired in a pink and white print gown, which fitted her in a truly astonishing manner, proving, Abby thought in her simple way, that it had really been a "leading,"--her bringing the stranger home last night. "Oh, but yes," Marie answered. "I help always Old Billy wiz the dogs first, they must be exercise, and do their tricks, and then they are feed. So hungry they are, the dogs! It make very hard not first to feed them, _hein_?" "Is--William--feeble?" Abby inquired, with some hesitation. "Feeble, no!" said Marie, with a little laugh. "But old, you know, and when he is too much drunk it take away his mind; so then I help him, that Le Boss does not find out that and beat him. For he is good, you see, Old Billy, and we make comrades togezzer always." "Dear me!" said Abby, doubtfully. "It don't seem as if you ought to be going with--with that kind of person, Maree. We don't associate with drinking men, here in these parts. I don't know how it is where you come from." Oh, there, Marie said, it was different. There the drink did not make men crazy. This was a country where the devil had so much power, you see, that it made it hard for poor folks like Old Billy, who would do well enough in her country, and at the worst take a little too much at a feast or a wedding. But in those cases, the saints took very good care that nothing should happen to them. She did not know what the saints did in this country, or indeed, if there were any. "Oh, Maree!" cried Abby, scandalised. "I guess I wouldn't talk like that, if I was you. You--you, ain't a papist, are you,--a Catholic?" Oh, no! Mere Jeanne was of the Reformed religion, and had brought Marie up so. It was a misfortune, Madame the Countess always said; but Marie preferred to be as Mere Jeanne had been. The Catholic girls in the village said that Mere Jeanne had gone straight to the pit, but that proved that they were ignorant entirely of the things of religion. Why, Le Boss was a Catholic, he; and everybody knew that he had the evil eye, and that it was not safe to come near him without making the horns. "For the land's sake!" cried Abby Rock, dropping her dish-cloth into the sink, "what are you talking about, child?" "But, the horns!" Marie answered innocently. "When a person has the evil eye, you not make at him the horns, so way?" and she held out the index and little finger of her right hand, bending the other fingers down. "So!" she said; "when they so are held, the evil eye has no power. What you do here to stop him?" "We don't believe in any such a thing!" Abby replied, with, some severity. "Why, Maree, them's all the same as heathen notions, like witchcraft and such. We don't hold by none of those things in this country at all, and I guess you'd better not talk about 'em." Marie's eyes opened wide. "But," she said, "_c'est une chose_,--it is a thing that all know. As for Le Boss, you know--listen!" she came nearer to Abby, and lowered her voice. "One night Old Billy forgot to do, I know not what, but somesing. So when Le Boss found it out, he look at him, so,"--drawing her brows down and frowning horribly, with the effect of looking like an enraged kitten,--"and say noasing at all. You see?" "Well," replied Abby. "I suppose mebbe he thought it was an accident, and might have happened to any one." "Not--at--all!" cried Marie, with dramatic emphasis, throwing out her hand with a solemn gesture. "What happen that same night? Old Billy fall down the bank and break his leg!" She paused, and nodded like a little mandarin, to point the moral of her tale. "Maree!" remonstrated Abby Rock, "don't tell me you believe such foolishness as that! He'd have fallen down all the same if nobody had looked anigh him. Why, good land! I never heard of such notions." "So it is!" Marie insisted. "Le Boss look at him, and he break his leg. I see the break! Anozer day," she continued, "Coco, he is a boy that makes tumble, and he was hungry, and he took a don't from the table to eat it--" "Took a what?" asked Abby. "A don't, what you call. Round, wiz a hole to put your finger!" explained Marie. "Only in America they make zem. Not of such things in Bretagne, never. Coco took the don't, and Le Boss catch him, and look at him again, so! Well, yes! in two hour he is sick, that boy, and after zat for a week. A-a-a-h! yes, Le Boss! only at me he not dare to look, for I have the charm, and he know that, and he is afraid. Aha, yes, he is afraid of Marie too, when he wish to make devil work. "And here," she cried, turning suddenly upon Abby, "you say you have no such thing, Abiroc,"--this was the name she had given her hostess,--"and here, too, is the evil eye, first what I see in this place, except the dear little children. A man yesterday came while I played, and looked--but, frightful! Ah!" she started from her seat by the window, and retreated hastily to the corner. "He comes, the same man! Put me away, Abiroc! put me away! He is bad, he is wicked! I die if he look at me!" and she ran hastily out of the room, just as Jacques De Arthenay entered it. _ |
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