The Wounded Name

by D. K. Broster

E. B. BROWNING, Aurora Leigh.

"Did he do right—did he do right to go?" Virginia de Courtomer asked herself, on this the ninth day after her son's departure. Yes, of course he had done right, but had he done wisely? They are not always the same, she thought. And then, "Oh, you foolish, faint-hearted mother! you ought to be proud of having a son who does not count the cost of devotion!"

And she was proud; she had made no attempt to hold him back. Had he not told her, at last, with all the rest, of an arm with five burns upon it? Moreover, there was always that flooded river. And of his friend's innocence she had no doubt . . . but supposing he could not establish it? It was not only on Laurent's account that she had shivered as she thought of what had been going forward these last few days at Aurannes—a sort of Bois des Fauvettes over again, as Laurent had put it. But Laurent himself would be there this time.

Yes, indeed she was glad that he was with L'Oiseleur in his ordeal, but still, she was a mother—a foolish mother, no doubt. And the General's words had been very weighty that day in the salon. Laurent could hardly have flouted them more openly and more immediately than he had done! No, Laurent cared nothing for himself and his reputation where his friend's was concerned—Laurent, who, as he had so absurdly remarked on the day which saw the beginning of all this enslavement, would never be a mother.

"Dear boy!" said the Comtesse de Courtomer, and went and worshipped the recent miniature of him on her table. No woman, she was sure, had ever had a son like hers. It was just possible that to-day would bring him back, and that to-morrow they could start for their stay at their country house in Picardy as they had arranged . . . without the Aunts. They would have a delightful autumn, with plenty to occupy them at Courtomer. But she paused on this thought. Yes, it would be delightful provided that Laurent did not return from Brittany broken-hearted. If M. de la Rocheterie were not cleared he would be broken-hearted. What in that case was she to do with him?

But, of course, L'Oiseleur would be acquitted. Yet . . . he had really sent the letter—and, of course, for the sake of a woman! Back came the memory of that evening in Devonshire when she had begun her clumsy remark and he had replied that there was no danger. "Dear me," reflected Mme de Courtomer, sighing, "we women . . . it is not only as mothers that we are to be condemned! And this one . . . 'did not understand.' Well, I think, from my recollection of him, that I could have 'understood' anything that M. de la Rocheterie had done. I have that amount of infatuation in common with Laurent, at all events."

And to her thus congratulating herself entered a domestic.

"Will Madame receive"—the card was presented to her—"Mme la Comtesse de Villecresne?"

"The Comtesse de Villecresne!" ejaculated Mme de Courtomer. She remained speechless for a moment. "Yes, of course. Where is she? In the large drawing-room? Ask her to be so kind as to come here to my boudoir."

She could not have been more astonished had she learnt that the Empress of China had called upon her. Mme de Villecresne herself . . . she, precisely, who had not "understood," who had been so cruel . . . but who was not to be blamed for it (Laurent's dictum).