The Sin That Was His

by Frank L. Packard

“No!” she cried out sharply. “No—I——” And then her voice faltered, and she burst suddenly into tears. “I—I don't know.”

His arm was still about her shoulders, and now his hand tightened a little upon her. She was crying softly. He was silent now—staring before him at that tiny flame burning in the moon rays on the altar. Well, suppose she did! Suppose even Mother Blondin believed, though she would fight on until she was beaten to her knees before she would unconditionally admit it, did that mean anything to him? Mother Blondin had not stood before that altar there with a crucifix upon her breast, and——

She was speaking again—brushing the tears away with the back of her hand.

“Once I did—once I believed,” she said. “That was when I was a girl, and—and for a little while afterward. I used to come to the church then, and I used to believe. And then after Pierre died I married Blondin, and after that very soon I came no more. It is forty years—forty years—it was the old church then. The ban came before this one was built—I was never in here before—it is only the old cross there, the cross that was on the old church, that I know. Forty years is a long time—a long time—I am seventy-two now—seventy-two.”

She was crying again softly.

“Yes,” said Raymond, and his own voice choked, “and to-night—after forty years?”

“I wanted to come”—she seemed almost to be whispering to herself—“I wanted to come. Blondin said there was no God, but I remembered that when I was a girl—forty years ago—there was a God here. I—I wanted to come and see—and—and I—I don't know—I—I couldn't remember the prayers very well, and so maybe if God is still here He did not understand. Pierre always said there was a God, and he used to come here with me to mass; but Blondin said the priests were all liars, and I began to drink with Blondin, and he said they were all liars when he died, and no one except the ones that came to buy the whiskey-blanc would have anything to do with us, and—and I believed him.”

“And Pierre?” Raymond asked softly. “Who was Pierre?”

“Pierre?” She turned her head and looked at him—and somehow, perhaps it was the tint of the moon rays, somehow the old, hard face was transfigured, and seemed to glow with untold sweetness, and a smile of tenderness mingled with the tears. “Pierre? Ah, he was a good boy, Pierre. Yes, I have been happy! Who shall say I have not been happy? There were three years of it—three years of it—and then Pierre died. I was eighteen, eighteen on the day that Pierre and I were married. And it was a great day in the village—all the village was en fête. You would not believe that! But it is true. It is a long time between eighteen and seventy-two, and I was not like I am now, and Pierre was loved by every one. It is hard to believe, eh? And there are not many now who remember. But there is old Grandmother Frenier. She will tell you that I am telling you the truth about Pierre Letellier.”

“Letellier!”—it came in a low, involuntary cry from Raymond. Letellier! Where had he heard that name before? What strange stirring of the memory was this that the name had brought? Letellier! Was it—could it be——?