III
As soon as dinner was over, Chantal took me by the arm. It was the hour for his cigar, a sacred hour. When he was alone, he went out to smoke it in the street; when he had any one to dinner, they went up to the billiard-room, and he smoked as he played. This evening they had even lighted a fire in the billiard-room in honour of Twelfth-night, and my old friend took his cue, a very thin cue, which he chalked with great care, then he said:
“You lead off, my boy!”
For he always called me “my boy,” in spite of my five-and-twenty years; but then he had seen me when I was a baby.
So I commenced the game; I made some cannons, and missed others; but, as Mademoiselle Perle was always running through my mind, I suddenly asked:
“I say, Monsieur Chantal, is Mademoiselle Perle any relation of yours?”
He stopped playing in great surprise, and looked at me.
“What, don’t you know? Have you never heard Mademoiselle Perle’s story?”
“No.”
“Did your father never tell you?”
“No.”
“Well, well, that is strange! That is indeed strange! Why, it is quite a romance!”
He was silent, then began again:
“If you only knew how singular it is that you should ask me that question to-day, on Twelfth-night!”
“Why?”
“Ah! Why? Listen. It was forty-one years ago, forty-one years this very day, Epiphany. We were then living at Roüy-le-Tors, on the ramparts. But I must first describe the house, in order that you may understand properly. Roüy is built on a slope, or rather on a knoll which commands a wide extent of that country. We had a house there with a fine hanging garden, supported in the air by the old city walls. So the house was in the town, in the street, while the garden overlooked the plain. There was also a postern-gate from this garden to the country, at the foot of a secret staircase which went down in the thickness of the walls, like those read of in romances. A road passed by this gate, which was furnished with a big bell, for the peasants used to bring their provisions that way to escape the long round about.
“You can see the places, can’t you? Well, that year, on Twelfth-day, it had been snowing for a week. It looked like the end of the world. It chilled our very soul when we went to the ramparts to look at the plain, the great white landscape, all white, icy, shining like varnish. It looked as if the good Lord had wrapped up the Earth to send it to the lumber-room of old worlds. I can assure you that it was very dreary.
“The whole family was together at that moment, and we were numerous, very numerous, my father, my mother, my uncle and aunt, my two brothers, and my four cousins; pretty girls they were. I am married to the youngest. Of all that company there are only three alive now, my wife, myself, and my sister-in-law at Marseilles. Bless me, how a family slips away! It makes me tremble when I think of it. I was fifteen then; now I am fifty-six.
“Well, we were going to keep Twelfth-night, and we were very merry, very merry! All were in the drawing-room waiting dinner, when my elder brother, Jacques, suddenly said, ‛There’s a dog been howling in the plain for the last ten minutes. It must be some poor beast that is lost.’
“We had not finished speaking when the garden-bell rang. It had a deep church-bell tone, which made one think of the dead. We all shivered at the sound. My father called the servant and told him to go and look. There was perfect silence as we waited; we were thinking of the snow that covered all the earth. When the man returned, he declared that he had seen nothing. The dog was still howling incessantly, and the sound came from exactly the same place.
“We sat down to table, but we were still a little upset, especially we young people. All went nicely until the joint, when, hark, the bell began ringing again, three times in succession, three great, long peals, which thrilled us to our finger-tips and made us catch our breath. We sat looking at each other, our forks in the air, still listening, seized with a sort of supernatural fear.
“At last my mother spoke. ‛It is extraordinary that they should have waited so long before coming back. Do not go alone, Baptiste; one of these gentlemen will go with you.’
“My uncle François rose. He was a Hercules, very proud of his strength, and afraid of nothing on earth. My father said to him, ‛Take a gun. You never know what it may be.’
“But my uncle only took a stick, and went out at once with the servant.
“We others remained behind, trembling with terror and anxiety, without eating, without speaking. My father tried to reassure us. ‛You will see,’ he said, ‛that it will be some beggar or some traveller lost in the snow. After he rang the first time, seeing that the door was not opened at once, he has tried to find his way, then, failing to do so, he has come back to our door.’
“We felt as if our uncle’s absence lasted an hour. Then he returned furious and swearing. ‛There’s nothing, as I’m alive! Some one’s playing a trick! There’s nothing but that confounded dog howling a hundred yards away from the walls. If I had had my gun, I’d have shot him to make him quiet!’
“We sat down again, but we all continued anxious. We felt that this was not the end of it, that something was going to happen, and that presently the bell would ring again.
“And it did sound, at the very moment when we were cutting the Twelfth cake. All the men got up together. My uncle François, who had drunk some champagne, declared that he was going to massacre IT, so furiously that my mother and my aunt caught hold of him to stop him. My father, in spite of being quite calm and not very fit (he dragged one leg ever after it had been broken by a fall from a horse), declared in his turn that he wanted to know what it was, and that he was going. My brothers, aged nineteen and twenty, ran to get their guns; and, as no one paid much attention to me, I possessed myself of a rook-rifle and so prepared to accompany the expedition.
“It set out at once. My father and my uncle led, with Baptiste carrying a lantern. My brothers Jacques and Paul followed, and I brought up the rear in spite of my mother’s entreaties, who remained with her sister and my cousins on the door-step.
“The snow had begun again the last hour, and the trees were laden. The pines were bending under the heavy dusky mantle, like white pyramids, or enormous sugar loaves; and through the grey curtain of fine hurrying flakes it was almost impossible to make out the smaller shrubs, all pale in the gloom. The snow was falling so quickly that nothing else could be seen ten paces off. But the lantern threw a great light before us. When we began to descend the corkscrew staircase hollowed in the thickness of the wall, I was afraid in good earnest. I felt as if some one was walking behind me; as if some one was about to catch me by the shoulders and carry me off; and I wanted to go home. But, as I should have had to go all the way back through the garden, I did not dare.
“I heard the door to the plain being opened; then my uncle began to swear afresh. ‛Hang it! he’s off again. If I could see his shadow, I’d not miss him, the—.’
“It was eerie to see the plain, or rather to feel it was there before one; for it could not be seen, all that was visible was an endless veil of snow, above, below, in front, to right, to left, everywhere.
“My uncle spoke again, ‛Wait, there is the dog howling. I’ll go and show it how I can shoot. That will always be something.’
“But my father, who was a kindly man, replied, ‛Better go and look for the poor animal that’s crying with hunger. It’s barking for help, poor wretch. It’s calling like a human being in distress. Let’s go to it.’
“And we set out through that curtain, through that dense unceasing fall, through that powder that filled the night and the air, that moved, floated, fell, and froze the flesh as it melted, froze as if it would burn, with a short sharp sting on the skin at each touch of the tiny white flakes.
“We sank to the knees in the soft chill dust, and had to step very high to walk at all. As we advanced the dog’s bark became clearer and louder. My uncle cried, ‛There it is!’ We halted to observe it, as one ought to do on encountering an unknown enemy in the dark.
“For my part I could see nothing; then I made up with the others, and I made it out. The dog was a fearful and fantastic sight; a great black dog, a sheepdog, with shaggy hair and a head like a wolf, standing on all fours at the very end of the long beam of light cast by the lantern on the snow. He did not move; he was quiet now, and was looking at us.
“My uncle said, ‛It is strange, he does not come at us, and he does not run away. I have a good mind to take a shot at him.’
“But my father said decidedly, ‛No, we must catch him.’
“Thereupon my brother Jacques said, ‛But he is not alone. There’s something beside him.’
“And there was something beside him, something grey, indistinct. We began to advance again carefully.
“When the dog saw us approaching, he squatted down on his hindquarters. He did not look savage, rather he seemed pleased that he had succeeded in attracting somebody.
“My father went straight up to him and caressed him. The dog licked his hands, and we saw that he was tied to the wheel of a little carriage, a sort of toy carriage completely enveloped in three or four woollen wraps. We took these cloths off carefully, and when Baptiste held his lantern to the door of the go-cart, which was like a kennel on wheels, we saw a little baby inside asleep.
“We were so dumbfounded that we could not utter a word. My father was the first to recover himself, and, as he was a large-hearted man, and somewhat of a visionary, he laid his hand on the top of the carriage and said, ‛Poor forsaken child, you shall be one of us!’ And he ordered my brother Jacques to wheel our find in front of us.
“And my father continued, thinking aloud:
“‘Some love-child whose poor mother has come and rung at my door this Epiphany night, thinking of the Christ-child.’
“He stopped again, and four times shouted through the night at the pitch of his voice to the four corners of the heavens, ‛We have taken it up!’ Then, putting his hand on his brother’s shoulder, he murmured, ‛If you had shot at the dog, François?...’
“My uncle gave no answer, but he made a great sign of the cross in the darkness, for he was very devout, in spite of his swaggering airs.
“The dog had been untied, and followed us.
“I can assure you our return to the house was a pretty sight indeed. First we had a lot of trouble to get the carriage up the rampart stair: but we managed at last, and wheeled it into the hall.
“How amused, and pleased, and frightened mamma was! As for my four little cousins (the youngest was six), they were like four hens around a nest. At last the baby, which was still sleeping, was taken out of its carriage. It was a girl, about six weeks old. And in its clothes we found ten thousand francs in gold, yes, ten thousand francs, which papa invested for her dowry. So she was not the child of poor parents ... but perhaps the child of a nobleman and some small citizen’s daughter ... or else ... we formed a thousand conjectures but we never learned anything ... no, not a thing ... not a thing.... Even the dog was not recognized by any one. He was strange to these parts. In any case, he or she who came three times and rang at our door must have known my parents well, to have chosen them in this way.
“So that is how Mademoiselle Perle made her entrance at six weeks’ age to the Chantal family.
“We did not call her Mademoiselle Perle until later, however. She was baptized Marie Simonne Claire; Claire was to serve as her surname.
“I can tell you it was a funny return to the dining-room with the small mite, now awake, who gazed about her at the people and the lights with her big wondering blue eyes.
“We sat down once more and the cake was cut up. I was king, and I chose Mademoiselle Perle as my queen, just as you did a little ago. She was all unconscious then of the honour that was done her.
“Well, the child was adopted and brought up as one of the family. She grew up, years passed on. She was a nice, gentle, obedient child. Every one loved her, and she would have been dreadfully spoiled, if my mother had not prevented that.
“My mother was a woman of order and hierarchy. She consented to treat little Claire as she did her own sons, but at the same time she took care that the distance between us was clearly marked, and the situation distinctly laid down.
“Therefore, as soon as the child was old enough to understand, she explained her story to her, and gently, indeed tenderly, impressed upon the little one’s mind that her relation to the Chantals was that of an adopted daughter, welcome, no doubt, but still a stranger.
“Claire grasped the situation with singular intelligence, and with surprising intuition. She learned to accept and keep the place assigned to her with such tact, grace, and delicacy that it moved my father to tears.
“My mother, too, was so touched by the passionate gratitude and the somewhat timid devotion of the darling, tender creature that she took to calling her ‛my daughter.’ Sometimes, when the little one had done something good or delicate, my mother would push her spectacles up on her brow, always a sign of emotion with her, and repeat, ‛Why, she’s a pearl, a regular pearl, the child!’ The name stuck to little Claire, who became and remained for us Mademoiselle Perle.”