Jean shifted the lump of clay a little away from Marie-Louise, but his fingers still worked on.
"She has a heart of gold," asserted Jean. "Who should know any better than I, who have lived with her all these years?"
Marie-Louise's eyes travelled slowly in a half tender, half pensive way over Jean. His coat was off; the loose shirt was open at the neck displaying the muscular shoulders, and the sleeves were rolled up over the brown, tanned arms; the powerful hands, powerful for all their long, slim, tapering fingers, worked on and on; the black hair clustered truantly, as it always did, over the broad, high forehead. She had known Jean all her life, as many years as she could remember, and her love for him was very deep. It had come to seem her life, that love; and each night in her prayers she had asked the bon Dieu to bless and take care of Jean, and to make her a good wife to him when that time should come. It was so great, that love, that sometimes it frightened her—somehow it was frightening her now, for there was a side to Jean that, well as she knew him, she felt intuitively she had never been able to understand.
She spoke abruptly again, a little absently.
"I do not know yet what I am to do. There is the house, and Father Anton says I must not live there alone."
"But, no!" agreed Jean. "Of course not! That is what I say, too. It is all the more reason why we should not wait any longer, you and I, Marie-Louise."
A tinge of colour crept shyly into Marie-Louise's face, as she shook her head.
"No; we must wait, Jean. It is too soon after—after poor Uncle Gaston."
"But it was Gaston's wish, that," persisted Jean gently. "Have I not told you what he said, petite?"
Again Marie-Louise shook her head.