XLIV.
THE GARRET WINDOW.
"Do I direct my love? It directs me.
And I could abide it if I would!…
And I would, after all, that I could not."
V. SARDOU (Nos Intimes).
Other days passed, and then others.
From a garret-window in the loft of the parsonage, the eye commanded a view of the whole village. Over the roofs could be seen the house of Captain Durand, quite at the bottom of the hill. Marcel went up there several times, and with his gaze fixed on that white wall which concealed the sweet object which had torn from him his tranquillity and his peaceful toil, he forgot himself and was lost in his thoughts.
Then his eyes wandered over the verdant plain, and the length of the stream edged with willows which wound along as far as the wood, side by side with the little path, where often he had met with Suzanne.
Sometimes the keen April wind blew violently through the ill-closed timber and the cracks of the roofing. It shook the joists and filled the loft with that shrill sinister sound, which is like an echo of the lamentable complaint of the dead, and it appeared to him that these groanings of the tempest mingled with the groanings of his soul.
But he soon discovered that the garret-window was also a post of observation for Veronica, for to their mutual embarrassment, they caught one another climbing cautiously up the wooden stair-case, or slipping under the dusty joists. Again he was caught in fault. What business had he in that loft?
He resumed his walks and prolonged them as much as possible; he resumed his pastoral visits with a zeal which charmed the feminine portion of his flock; but nowhere did he see or hear anything of Suzanne. That name filled his heart, and he dreaded the least suspicion, the slightest comment.
He was seen always abroad. He fled from his house, his books, his flowers, that little home which he loved so well when it was quiet, and where now he heard the muttering storms; he suspected some infernal plot.
And the remembrance of that hand which was surrendered to him, and on which he had placed his lips, that remembrance consumed his heart. He saw again Suzanne's emotion, her large dark eyes full of amazement, yet without anger, and he would have wished to see them again, were it only for a second, in order to read in them the impression which his presence left there.