Noémi looked out at the stars while she said her prayers. She was in a long chemise, and the tiled floor felt pleasantly cool under her bare feet. The soothing breath of the night caressed her white throat, and a tear ran down over her face into her mouth. The leaves of the scented lime-tree trembled against the Milky Way, and Noémi bade farewell to the dreams in which she had wandered along this lane of silver in the sky. The crickets chirping in the grass reminded her of her master. One hot airless night as she lay uncovered upon her sheets, she sobbed quietly and then wept aloud as she gazed with pitying eyes at her unsullied body, full of ardent life, but cool with the coolness of forest leaves. What would the cricket do with her? She knew that she could forbid him nothing; not even that mysterious and terrible act after which a baby would be born—a wretched little black Péloueyre. The cricket would be with her for the rest of her life, even in her bed. Madame d'Artiailh—scalloped nightdress and scanty braid of hair—found her daughter in a flood of tears, and was told that the idea of marriage filled her with horror; she now wanted to be a Carmelite nun. Madame d'Artiailh held the girl in her arms until the sobbing was less violent; then she assured her that matters like this ought to be discussed with her spiritual director. Had not the priest himself chosen the path of matrimony for her?
Noémi was silent; how could she reply, pre-eminently fitted as she was to be a wife and a mother, and full of piety and tenderness? She never read novels; she waited upon her parents, obeyed them. She was told that a man did not have to be handsome, that marriage produced love just as surely as a peach tree bore peaches. But Noémi needed only to be reminded of the obvious truth of the phrase: The son of the Péloueyres is not to be refused, or the farms, or the flocks of sheep, or the family plate, or the linen of ten generations neatly piled in lofty scented cupboards, or a social standing unequalled in Les Landes. No, he could not be refused!
[IV]
THERE was no earthquake, no omen in the sky, when that Tuesday dawned in September, and Jean had to be shaken out of a deep sleep. The flagstones in the hall were covered with box, laurel and magnolia, and the smell of the trampled leaves predominated. The bridesmaids stood about in whispering groups; they could not sit down for fear of rumpling their frocks. The reception room at the Cheval Rouge was festooned with paper chains, and the wedding breakfast was to come from B—— by the ten o'clock train. The streets were full of victorias bringing white-gloved guests to the feast; top hats gleamed in the sunlight, and swallow-tail coats filled the watching peasants with admiration.
M. Jêrome showed his true feelings by staying in bed; in this way he could face the weddings and funerals of his family, and when these momentous crises arrived, he swallowed a chloral cachet and drew his curtains. During his wife's last illness, he retired to a room at the top of the house, lay with his nose to the wall, and consented to open one eye only when he was certain that the last bit of earth had been shovelled on to the coffin, and the train had carried off the last guest. On the day of the wedding, when Jean, green and shrivelled in his dress coat, came to get his father's blessing, Cadette was not allowed to open the shutters.
It was a terrible day. All Jean's humiliation and shame came flooding back. In spite of the tumult of bells, his quick sportsman's ear missed none of the sympathetic undertones that were uttered in the crowded church, as the procession passed up the aisle. He heard a young man murmur: "What a pity!" Little girls, perched up on the backs of chairs, giggled when they saw him. When he faced the blazing altar, with the whispering crowd behind him, his legs weakened and he grasped the velvet praying-stool for support. He was conscious, without looking, of the trembling, mysterious body of a woman at his side,—the priest read on and on; if only he would never stop! But the sun that now sprinkled the old flagstones with golden confetti would set,—then, the night and its revelations.
The heat had spoiled the luncheon; one of the lobsters smelt horribly, and the bombe glacée had melted into a yellow cream. Instead of making their escape, flies allowed themselves to be crushed while feasting upon the cakes, and corpulent women suffered in their tight clothes, perspiring helplessly. Shouts of joy came from the children's table, but from no other. In his misery Jean watched the faces of Fernand Cazenave and one of Noémi's uncles; what were they whispering about? Like a deaf mute he guessed this phrase by the movement of their lips: "If they had only listened to us, this misfortune might have been avoided, but our position made it very difficult to interfere...."
[V]
THE bedroom in the Family Hotel at Arcachon was furnished in imitation bamboo; no curtain concealed the utensils under the wash-hand stand, and the wallpaper was soiled by crushed mosquitoes. Through the open window came a salt breeze from the harbour, smelling of fish and seaweed, and the purring of a motor-boat grew fainter and fainter as it neared the channel. Two guardian angels hid their ashamed faces in the folds of the cretonne curtains. When the numbed senses of the man at last awoke, he found beside him a woman still as lifeless as a corpse. At dawn a faint moan marked the end of the struggle. Jean lay motionless now, bathed in perspiration—the worm had finally abandoned the corpse.
She lay there like a sleeping martyr, her face thin and drawn like that of a beaten child, and her hair matted upon her brow as though she had been struggling with death. Her hands, crossed upon her breast, clutched a faded scapular and some blest medals. Someone should have kissed those white feet, lifted that young body without breaking the magic of sleep, borne it out to the open seas and surrendered it to the pure waves.