“Not with that cock-and-bull story. There, there, you’d better go. What’s the good of talking? I cannot pardon.” He was implacable. Self-love refused to waste pity on others when he suffered so much himself. Her steadfastness merely incensed him. He was granite. But at his words she rose up quickly.
“Do not do him the wrong of supposing I am asking you to pardon him. May God forgive you!”
“You’ve said that twice. Now, go.”
She went out of the room, looking back. A sign of compunction would have taken her again to his side, but none came. Fanchon marched out of the kitchen, wiping the flour from her hands with a cloth.
“But, Mademoiselle Nathalie, you are not going to leave monsieur so soon! As soon as ever I saw you, I said to myself, ‘There, now, here comes the best medicine for monsieur,’ and I made up my mind you’d stop a good bit, and that would cheer him up. Why, you’ve been here next to no time! And monsieur not even coming out to see you off! Well, that’s droll! I never knew him not come out.”
“I do not think he is quite himself to-day,” said his daughter, catching at straws. “Has any one been here—any one to vex him?”
“Holy Virgin! no, who should come? And as for vexing, there’s no one would dare. Something he’s eaten or drunk, but not of my getting, has just set the world upside-down with him. Oh, he’ll be better to-morrow, you’ll see! And Monsieur Raoul, the treasure, how is it with him?”
Nathalie drove home, unshaken but thoughtful. The slander, then, was more serious in its effects than she had imagined, since her father, with all his pride in Poissy and the De Beaudrillarts, was affected by it. To her it had seemed only ludicrous; but she began to perceive that other people would expect absolute proof that the thing was not. By her own feelings she was sure this would be agony to Léon. She blamed herself for having treated his fits of depression too lightly, and promised herself to be more sympathetic. She would ask him, too, to explain the incident of the envelope.
As for Mme. de Beaudrillart, that she could really have any doubt, was impossible, and she smiled again at the bare idea. She could imagine how it had been struck into her father’s mind by her mother-in-law’s impassive manner. Secure, as she would have been, she probably did not attempt to express her security, and, especially with M. Bourget in the room, would have been so coldly indifferent that he had misjudged her. Nathalie understood that her father would have expected indignation and protestations, and not meeting them, thrust their absence upon conviction of guilt. She tried to think calmly, justly of him. “Some chance word has stung him,” she thought, wondering that the clang of rumour had so soon reached the quiet town, and not understanding that it was M. Bourget’s own fear which had given chance words their imaginary force. She was only thankful that Léon had not accompanied her. If he had read distrust in M. Bourget’s manner, she could scarcely have borne it. They must be kept apart until the time when the force of the law obliged her father to admit the shamefulness of his distrust.
Reaching Poissy, she heard that all, even Mme. de Beaudrillart, had gone down to one of the nearest vineyards. She knew that her husband would not have expected her to return so soon, and impulse made her long to be by his side. She lost no time in hurrying after them, crossing the river by the bridge, and finding them without difficulty, guided, as she was, by the vibration of voices in the clear air. From out of her anxious thoughts she came into the gayest of scenes. The grapes were being picked into great baskets; from a sky of clearest blue, the sun, now a little low, shone ripeningly upon the mellow clusters, the women’s white head-gear and bright dresses flitting here and there between the green vines; light, warmth, colour, and gaiety were everywhere. Raoul was the masterful head of the troop of children whom he had constituted his regiment, Léon in his grey suit was chatting familiarly with one of the oldest of his tenants, Mme. de Beaudrillart and Claire stood graciously regarding the busy scene, and eating from the beautiful bunch of grapes which had just been presented to them, while Félicie, with her small steps, moved about from group to group. Almost every one from the château, down to Jean Charpentier, was there, and in all fair France it would have been difficult to have lit upon a spot more peaceful, more sunny, and more secure.