One morning, however, she replied to him:
'No, uncle, I am going to stay with you.'
The Doctor, who was present, went off, raising his arms to heaven.
'Ah! there is no doing anything with that child! And what a hornets' nest she has got into! She will never get free of it—never!'
[IX]
Once more did the days glide by in the house at Bonneville. After a very cold winter there had come a rainy spring, and the sea, beaten by the downpour, looked like a huge lake of mud. Then the tardy summer had lasted into the middle of autumn, with heavy, oppressive suns, beneath whose overwhelming heat the blue immensity slumbered. And then the winter came round again, and another spring, and yet another summer, slipping away minute by minute, ever at the same speed, as the hours pursued their rhythmical march.
Pauline, as if her heart were regulated by that clock-like motion, had recovered all her old calmness. The placid sameness of her days, which were passed in the same unvarying occupations, lulled the keenness of her sorrow. She came downstairs in the morning and kissed her uncle, said much the same things to the servant as she had said the day before, sat down twice at table, spent the afternoon in sewing, and then, early in the evening, went to bed. The next day the same programme was gone through, without ever any unexpected incident breaking the monotony of her life. Chanteau, who was becoming more and more disfigured by gout, which had puffed out his legs and warped and deformed his hands, sat silent, when he was not bellowing, quite absorbed in the delight of being free from pain. Véronique, who seemed almost to have lost her tongue, had fallen into a state of gloomy surliness. Only the Saturday dinners brought any relief. Cazenove and Abbé Horteur dined there with great regularity, and chatter was heard till ten o'clock or so, when the priest's wooden shoes clattered away over the stones of the yard, and the Doctor's gig started off at the slow trot of the old horse. Pauline's gaiety—that gaiety which she had so bravely maintained during all her troubles—had assumed a subdued character. Her ringing laughter no longer echoed through the rooms and the staircase, though she still remained all kindliness and activity, and every morning displayed fresh courage and zest for life. By the end of a year her heart had fallen asleep, and she had come to believe that the days would now flow on in that peaceful monotony, without anything ever happening to awake her slumbering sorrow.
For some time after Lazare's departure every letter from him had troubled the girl, though it was only for his letters that she lived, looking out for them with impatience, reading them over and over again, and even adding to them something from her own imagination beyond what they actually contained. For three months Lazare had written very regularly, sending, every fortnight, a very long letter, full of detail and breathing the liveliest hopes. Once more he was wildly enthusiastic. He had launched out into business and was dreaming of a colossal fortune in the immediate future. According to his account, the Insurance Company could not fail to return enormous profits. He was not, however, confining himself to that venture, but was engaging in all kinds of speculations. He appeared to have become quite charmed with the financial and mercantile world, which he now reproached himself for having judged so absurdly. All his literary schemes seemed quite abandoned. Then, too, he was never tired of writing about his domestic joys, and related all sorts of things about his wife—the kisses he had given her, and the life they led together—setting forth at length all his happiness by way of expressing his gratitude to her, whom he called his 'dear sister.' It was those details, those familiar passages, which made Pauline's fingers tremble feverishly.—The odour of love which the paper diffused, the perfume of heliotrope, Louise's favourite scent, which clung to it, seemed to stupefy her. But the letters gradually became fewer and shorter. Lazare ceased to write about business, and in other respects confined himself to sending his wife's love to Pauline. He offered no explanations, but simply ceased to tell her everything. Was he discontented with his position and already sick of finance? Was his domestic happiness compromised by misunderstandings? Pauline was afraid it must be so, and she was saddened by the evidence of her cousin's weariness, which she thought she could detect in certain passages that seemed to have been reluctantly written. About the end of April, after a six weeks' silence, she received a short note of four lines, in which her cousin told her that Louise was enceinte. Then silence fell again, and she had no further news.
May and June passed away. A heavy tide swept away one of the stockades, an incident which for a long time afforded subject for talk. All the Bonneville folk jeered and grinned, and the fishermen stole the broken timbers. Then came another scandalous affair. The Gonin girl, young as she was, had a baby. And afterwards all the old monotony returned, and the village vegetated at the foot of the cliffs as lifelessly as a tract of seaweed. In July it became necessary to repair the terrace-wall and one of the gable ends of the house. As soon as the workmen began to remove the first stones, the rest threatened to fall, and they were kept at work for an entire month, an expense of nearly ten thousand francs being incurred.