She crept to the door and whispered:
"My heaven, be patient. Very soon you shall have food and be with me."
With an air of a somnambulist did Amélie comb out her long blond hair and arrange it in its accustomed style. Then she performed her entire toilet, laughing stridently from time to time. Sometimes tears would trickle fast down her beautiful face, so pale and worn with its great anxiety. When at noon the silent attendant brought the meal, she said to him:
"Tell the Duchess de Rousillon that I shall comply with her wishes, provided she has the door opened immediately which separates me from the child."
[Chapter VI]
THE MARRIAGE
An hour later, Baby sat in Amélie's lap. She had given him milk and soup and he was covering her face with kisses,—this child whom she loved more than ever since renouncing for him what was dearer to her than life. Suddenly the doors were thrown wide open and the Duchess entered accompanied by the two liveried attendants, bearing handsome clothes, jewels and laces. Amélie did not raise her eyes. Two girls, the maid-servants who had been so curious to see her, approached eagerly and began to deck the bride. They fastened a velvet petticoat beneath an embroidered silk jacket and pinned the veil and flowers in her beautiful hair. Soon she was transformed into a lovely Breton bride. Then the Duchess summoned Jean Vilon, who, in gala costume, a spray of wild flowers on his breast tied with many colored ribbons, made a brilliant handsome picture. He was pale, ecstatic, scarcely sensible of what was in preparation. Things had happened in so bewildering a manner that he could not co-ordinate his thoughts; he remembered that the Duchess had unexpectedly arrived and imposed her authority as René's mother to force entrance into the castle; then she had ordered him in her son's name to prepare to marry the girl above, who was under the family's special protection, adding that her misfortunes were the consequence of being abandoned by a man who had betrayed her. Jean, tho wild with joy, hesitated and the Duchess added that Amélie came from his class and was unconnected with the de Brezé family.
"Be a good husband to her, Jean, and you will lack nothing. Be a good father to the child, and I will give you the Plouret farm."
O what did the farm matter to him! He trembled in a rapture of love. The husband of Amélie! He enveloped her now in a glance that was a wave of flame and then, intimidated by the prize he longed to grasp, he turned interrogating eyes upon the Duchess.