She seemed to add this as an after-thought, and the faintest smile curled Monsieur Urbain's lips as he heard her. "No danger, dear Comtesse," he felt inclined to say. "My boy's heart is in the woods and fields--and he is discreet, too. You might even trust him for five minutes with that beautiful, silent girl of yours."

Had Madame de Sainfoy made some miscalculation as to her daughter's hours of study? or was it Helene's own mistake? or had the sunshine and the waving woods, the barking of dogs, the chattering of workmen, all the flood of new life outside old Lancilly, made it impossible to sit reading in a chilly, thick-walled room and tempted the girl irresistibly to break her mother's strict rules. However it may have happened--when Angelot and Riette, laughing and talking, entered the wood beyond the chateau, not only square Sophie and tall Lucie and their fat little governess, but Mademoiselle Helene herself, were found wandering along the soft path, through the glimmering maze of green flicked with gold.

Sophie and Lucie were good-natured girls, enchanted to see the new little cousin. They admired her dark eyes, the delicate smallness of her frame, a contrast with their own more solid fairness. In their family, Helene had taken all the beauty; there was not much left for them, but they were honest girls and knew how to admire. Riette on her side, untroubled with any shyness or self-consciousness, quite innocent of the facts that her dress was old-fashioned and her education more than defective, was delighted to improve her acquaintance with the new cousins. She could tell them a thousand things they did not know. To begin with, Lancilly itself, the woods, the walled gardens and courts, even the staircases and galleries of the house--all was more familiar to her than to them. She and Angelot had found Lancilly a splendid playground, ever since she was old enough to walk so far; they had spent many happy hours there in digging out rabbits, catching rats, birds-nesting, playing _cache-cache_, and other charming employments.

She enlarged on these in the astonished ears of Sophie and Lucie, walking between them with linked arms, pulling them on with a dancing step, while they listened, fascinated, to the gay little spirit who led them where she pleased. It did not seem so certain, to look at the three young girls, that Madame de Sainfoy was right as to influence. But no political talk, no party secrets, escaped from the loyal lips of Riette.

A word of warning from Angelot--a word which her father would not have dreamed of saying--had closed her mouth on subjects such as these. She could be friendly with her cousins, yet true to her father's friends.

"Let us go to the great garden," she said. "Have you seen the sundial, and the fish-ponds? You don't know the way? Ah, my dear children, but what discoveries you are going to make!"

"Sophie--Lucie--where are you going? Come back, come back!" cried Mademoiselle Moineau, who was pacing slowly behind with Angelot and Helene.

But Sophie and Lucie could not stop if they wished it; an impetuous little whirlwind was carrying them along.

"To the garden--to the garden!" they called out as they fled.

Mademoiselle Moineau was distracted. She was fat, she was no longer young; she could not race after the rebellious children; and even if she could, it was impossible to leave Helene and Angelot alone in the wood.

"Where are they going?" she said helplessly to the young man.

He explained amiably that they were perfectly safe with his little cousin, who knew every corner of the place, and while Mademoiselle Moineau groaned, and begged that he would show her the way to the garden, he ventured a look and smile at Helene. A sudden brightness came into her face, and she laughed softly. "Henriette might be your little sister," she said. "You are all alike, I think--at least monsieur your uncle, and madame your mother, and Henriette, and you--"

"Yes--I've often thought Uncle Joseph ought to be my mother's brother, not my father's," said Angelot.

He dared not trust himself to look very hard at Helene. He kept his lightness of tone and manner, the friendly ease which was natural to him, though his pulses were beating hard from her nearness, and though her gentle air of intimacy gave him almost a pang of pa.s.sionate joy. How sweet she was, how simple, when for a moment she forgot the mysterious sadness which seemed sometimes to veil her whole nature! Angelot knew that she liked and trusted him, the strange young country cousin who looked younger than he was. She thought him a friendly boy, perhaps. Her eyes, when she looked at him, seemed to smile divinely; they were no longer doubtful and questioning, as at first. He longed to kneel down on the pine-needles and kiss the hem of her gown; he longed, he, the careless sportsman, the philosopher's son, to lay his life at her feet, to do what she pleased with. But Mademoiselle Moineau was there.

They walked on in the vast old precincts of Lancilly, following the children. It was all deep shade, with occasional patches of sunshine; great forest trees, wide-spreading, stretched their arms across sandy tracks, once roads, that wandered away at the back of the chateau: through the leaves they could see mountains of grey moss-stained roof and the peaked top of the old _colombier_. All the yards and buildings were now between them and the house itself. Along by a crumbling wall, once white, and roofed with tiles, they came to the broken-down gate of the garden. It was not much better than a wilderness; yet there were loaded fruit-trees, peaches, plums, figs, vines weighed down with ma.s.ses of small sweet grapes, against the ancient trellis of the wall.

Everywhere a forest of weeds; the once regular paths covered with burnt gra.s.s and stones and rubbish; the fountain choked and dry.

Mademoiselle Moineau groaned many times as she hobbled along; the walking was rough, the way seemed endless, and the garden, when they reached it, a sun-baked desert. Angelot guided them to the very middle, where the old sundial was, and while he showed it to Helene, the little governess sat down on a stone bench that encircled a large mulberry tree, the only shady place in the garden. They could hear the children's voices not far off. Helene sat down near Mademoiselle Moineau. Angelot went away and came back with a leaf filled with fruit, to which Helene helped herself with a smile. As he was going to hand it to Mademoiselle Moineau, she put out a hand to stop him.

"She is asleep," she whispered.

It was true. The warmth, the fatigue, the sudden rest and silence, had been too much for the little lady, who was growing old. Her eyes were shut, her hands were folded, her chin had sunk upon her chest; and even as Angelot stared in unbelieving joy, a distinct snore set Helene suddenly laughing.

"I must wake her," she said softly. "We must go, we must find the children."

"Oh no, no!" he murmured. "Let the poor thing rest--see how tired she is! The children are safe--you can hear them. Do not be so cruel to her--and to me."

"_I_ cruel?" said Helene; and she added half to herself--"No--other people are cruel--not I."

Angelot did not understand her. She looked up at him rather dreamily, as he stood before her. Perhaps the gulf of impossibility between them kept her, brought up and strictly sheltered as she had been, from realising the meaning of the young man's face. It was very grave; Angelot had never before felt so utterly in earnest. His eyes were no longer sleepy, for all the strength of his nature, the new pa.s.sion that possessed him, was shining in them. It was a beautiful, daring face, so attractive that Helene gazed for a speechless moment or two before she understood that the beauty and life and daring were all for her. Then the pale girl flushed a little and dropped her eyes. She had had compliments enough in Paris, had been told of her loveliness, but never with silent speech such as this. This conquest, though only of a young cousin, had something different, something new. Helene, hopeless and tired at nineteen, confessed to herself that this Angelot was adorable. With a sort of desperation she gave herself up to the moment's enjoyment, and said no more about waking Mademoiselle Moineau, who snored on peacefully, or about finding the children. She allowed Angelot to sit down on her other side, and listened to him with a sweet surprise as he murmured in her ear--"Who is cruel, then, tell me! No, you are not, you are an angel--but who are you thinking of?"

"No one in particular, I suppose," the girl answered. "Life itself is cruel--cruel and sad. You do not find it so?"

"Life seems to me the most glorious happiness--at this moment, certainly."

"Ah, you must not say those things. Let us wake Mademoiselle Moineau."

"No," Angelot said. "Not till you have told me why you find life sad."

"Because I do not see anything bright in it. Books tell one that youth is so happy, so gay--and as for me, ever since I was a child, I have had nothing but weariness. All that travelling about, that banishment from one's own country--ill tempers, discontent, narrow ways, hard lessons--straps and backboards because I was not strong--loneliness, not a friend of my own age--and then this horrible Paris--and things that might have happened there, if my father had not saved me--" She stopped, with a little catch in her breath, and Angelot understood, remembering the Prefect's talk at Les Chouettes, a few days before.

This was the girl they talked of sacrificing in a political marriage.

"But now that you are here--now that you have come home, you will be happy?" he said, and his voice shook a little.

"Perhaps--I hope so. Oh, you must not take me too much in earnest,"

Helene said, and there was an almost imploring look in her eyes. She added quickly--"I hope I shall often see madame your mother. What a beautiful face she has--and I am sure she is good and happy."

This was a fine subject for Angelot. He talked of his mother, her religion, her charity, her heroism, while Helene listened and asked childish questions about the life at La Mariniere, to which her evening visit had attracted her strangely. And the minutes flew on, and these two cousins forgot the outside world and all its considerations in each other's eyes, and the shadows lengthened, till at last the children's voices began to come nearer. Mademoiselle Moineau snored on, it is true, but the enchanting time was coming to an end.

"Remember," Angelot said, "nothing sad or cruel can happen to you any more. You are in your own country; your own people will take care of you and love you--we are relations, remember--my father and mother and my uncle and Riette--and I, Helene!"

He ended in the lowest whisper, and suddenly his slight brown hands closed on hers, and his dark face bent over her.

"Never--never be sad again! I adore you--my sweet, my beautiful--"

Very softly their lips met. Helene, entirely carried out of herself, let him hold her for a moment in his arms, then started up with flaming cheeks in consternation, and began to hurry towards the gate.

At the same moment the three young girls came down the path towards the sun-dial, and Mademoiselle Moineau, waking with a violent start, got up and hobbled stiffly forward into the sunshine.

"Where are you, my children?" she cried. "Sophie, Lucie, it is quite time to go back to your lessons--see, your sister is gone already. Say good-by to your cousins, my dears--"

[Ill.u.s.tration: SUDDENLY HIS SLIGHT BROWN HANDS CLOSED ON HERS.]

"We may all go back to the chateau together, madame, may we not?"

said Angelot with dancing eyes, and he hurried the children on, all chattering of the wonderful corners and treasures that Henriette had shown them.

But Mademoiselle Helene flew before like the wind, and was not to be overtaken.

In the meanwhile, Madame de Sainfoy consulted Cousin Urbain about her new silk hangings for the large drawing-room, and also as to a list of names for a dinner, at which the chief guests were to be the Baron de Mauves, the Prefect of the Department, and Monsieur le General Ratoneau, commanding the troops in that western district.

"And I suppose it is necessary to invite all these excellent cousins?"

Madame de Sainfoy asked her husband that evening, when the cousins were gone.

"Entirely necessary, my dear Adelade!"

CHAPTER VIII

HOW MONSIEUR JOSEPH MET WITH MANY ANNOYANCES

Dark clouds were hanging over Les Chouettes. In the afternoon there had been a thunderstorm, with heavy rain which had refreshed the burnt slopes and filled the stream that wound through the meadows under the lines of poplars and willows, and set great orange slugs crawling among the wet gra.s.s. The storm had pa.s.sed, but the air was heavy, electric, and still. The sun had set gloriously, wildly, like a great fire behind the woods, and now all the eastern sky was flaming red, as if from a still more tremendous fire somewhere beyond the moors and hills.

Two men were sitting on a bench under Monsieur Joseph's south wall; himself and white-haired Joubard, the farmer; before them was a table with bottles and gla.s.ses. Joubard had been trying a wine that rivalled his own. Monsieur Joseph had entertained him very kindly, as his way was; but the shadow of the evening rested on Monsieur Joseph's face. He was melancholy and abstracted; he frowned; he even ground his teeth with restrained irritation. Joubard too looked grave. He had brought a warning which had been lightly taken, he thought; yet looking sideways at Monsieur Joseph, he could not help seeing that something, possibly his words, was weighing on the little gentleman. There were plenty of other things to talk about; the farm, the vintage, the war in Spain, the chances of Martin's return, the works at Lancilly. Monsieur Joseph and Joubard were both talkers; they were capable of chattering for hours about nothing; but this evening conversation flagged, at least on Monsieur Joseph's side. Perhaps it was the weather.

At last the old man was ready to go. He stood up, staring hard at Monsieur Joseph in the twilight.