"Saturday evening just at dusk the task was completed," Madame Bastien continued. "Frederick performed the work with an ardour and cheerfulness which showed that it was a real pleasure to him. I stayed with him all during the two days. There was a big juniper-tree only a little way off, and I sat in the shade of that and read or embroidered while my son worked; and how he worked! such vigorous blows of the spade as he struck, the very earth trembled under my feet."
"I can well believe it; though he is rather slim, he is remarkably strong for one of his years."
"I took him water now and then, and to save time when lunch-time came, our old Marguerite brought us out something to eat. How happy we were eating out there on the heath under the shade of the juniper. Frederick enjoyed it immensely. Of course there was nothing so very wonderful about what he did, but what touched and pleased me was the promptness with which he made the resolution, and the perseverance and tenacity of will with which he carried it out."
"You are, indeed, the happiest of mothers," said the doctor with genuine emotion, pressing Marie's hands warmly, "and you have reason to be doubly happy, as this happiness is your own work."
"What else could you expect, doctor?" replied Madame Bastien, artlessly. "One lives for one's son you know."
"You most assuredly do," said the doctor, warmly, "and it is well for you that you do, as but for him—" but M. Dufour checked himself suddenly as if he had been about to say something that would be better left unsaid.
"You are right, my dear doctor, but now I think of it, didn't you say something about a proposition you were going to make to Frederick and me?"
"True, it is this: you know, or rather you do not know—for you hear very little of the neighbourhood gossip—that the Château de Pont Brillant has recently undergone a thorough renovation."
"I am so little au courant with the gossip of the neighbourhood, as you say, that this is the first intimation I have had of the fact. I even thought that the château was closed."
"It will not be much longer, for the young marquis is coming down to occupy it with his grandmother."