Angelot: A Story of the First Empire

by Eleanor C. Price

It might naturally be imagined that Angelot would have found a refuge in some of the wild old precincts of La Marinière; but Simon soon convinced himself that this was not the case. No mother whose son was hidden about her home would have spent her time as Anne did, wandering restlessly about, expecting nothing but her husband's return, or spending long hours before the altar in the church, praying for her son's safety. Simon began to suspect that his prisoner had got away to the west, into Brittany, among the Chouans who were there so numerous that it was better to leave them alone.

"Bien! his absence in any way will suit Monsieur le Général," Simon reflected. "As to that, it does not much matter. But I and my fellows will not get our promised pay, and that signifies a great deal. I, who have given up my furlough to serve that animal!"

So he gnawed his nails in distraction, and still watched with a sort of fascination the little square of country where he felt more and more afraid that Master Angelot was no longer to be found.

The sympathy that Anne de la Marinière, in her lonely sorrow, might have expected from the cousins at Lancilly who owed Urbain so much, she neither asked nor found. Once or twice, Hervé de Sainfoy came himself to the manor to ask if she had any news; but his manner was a little stiff and awkward; and Adélaïde never came; and the messages he brought from her were too evidently made by his politeness on the spur of the moment. Was it not possible, Anne thought, to be too worldly, too unforgiving? Had not her beautiful boy been punished enough for his presumption in falling in love with their daughter, and behaving like a lover of the olden time? They were even partly responsible for the arrest, she thought, for it was to escape them that Ange had walked away with Martin up the hill that evening.

Looking over at the great castle on the opposite hill, she accused it bitterly of having robbed her not only of Urbain, but of Angelot.

The October days brought wilder autumn weather; the winds began to blow in the woods, to howl at night in the wide old chimneys of La Marinière; sometimes the cry of a wolf, in distant depths of forest, made sportsmen and farmers talk of the hunts of which Lancilly used long ago to be the centre. Those days would return again, they hoped, though Count Hervé had not the energy or the country training of his ancestors. But his son, when the war was over, seemed likely to vie with any seigneur of them all. In the meanwhile, this young man's leave was shortened by an express from the army—a fact which seemed at first unlikely to have any influence on the fate of his cousin Angelot—but life has turns and twists that baffle the wisest calculations. Neither Georges nor his mother had been displeased at the arrest of Angelot; though they had the decency to keep their congratulations for each other. As for Hélène, the news had been allowed to reach her through the servants and Mademoiselle Moineau. She dared not cry any more; her mother had scolded her enough for spoiling her eyes and complexion. Pale and silent, she took this new trouble as one more proof that she was never meant to be happy. Her fairy prince was a dream; yet, whatever the poets may say, she found a little joy and comfort, warmth and peace, in dreaming her dream again, and even in this worst time, by some strange instinct of love, Angelot seemed never far away from her.

One evening, when it was blowing and raining outside, a wood fire was flaming in the salon at La Marinière. For herself, Anne would not have cared for it; but the old Curé sat and warmed his hands after dining with her and playing a game of tric-trac. Not indeed to please and distract her, but himself; for he had long been accustomed to depend on her for comfort in all his troubles. After the game was over he had told her a piece of news; nothing that mattered very much, or that was very surprising, characters and circumstances considered; but Anne took it hardly.

"I cannot believe it," she said at first. "Who told you, do you say?"

"My brother at Lancilly told me," said the Curé. "You do not think him worthy of much confidence, madame—and it may not be true—he had heard the report in the village."

She shrugged her shoulders, with a little contempt for the Curé of Lancilly. Her old friend watched her face, pathetically changed since all this new sorrow came upon her; thinner, paler, its delicate beauty hardened, purple shadows under the still lovely eyes, and a look of bitter resentment that hurt him to see. He gazed at her imploringly.