THIRTIETH EVENING.
There was no use in protesting and getting angry; the company were more inclined to laugh than to listen, for it is always a great delight to misbehaving fellows to speak ill of a poor girl. They make haste to plunge her in the mire, reserving the right to deny it if they find she is innocent.
In the midst of their slanderous speeches, however, a loud voice, slightly weakened by illness but still capable of drowning every other in the room, made itself heard. It was that of the master of the tavern, long accustomed to quell the dissensions of wine and the hubbub of junketing.
"Hold your tongues," he said, "and listen to me, or I'll turn you out this moment, if I never open the house again. Be silent about an honest girl whom you decry because you have all found her too virtuous. As to the real parents of the child who has given rise to these tales, tell them to their face what fault you find with them, for here they are before you. Yes," he continued, drawing Mariton, who was holding Charlot in her arms and weeping, up to him, "here is the mother of my heir, and this is my son whom I recognize by my marriage to this good woman. If you ask me for exact dates, I shall tell you to mind your own business; nevertheless, to any who have the right to question me, I will show deeds which prove that I have always recognized the child as mine, and that his mother was my legitimate wife before his birth, though the matter was kept secret."
The silence of astonishment fell on everybody; and Joseph, who had risen at the first words, stood stock still like a stone image. The monk who noticed the doubt, shame, and anger in his eyes, thought best to add further explanations. He told us that Benoît had been unable to make his marriage public because of the opposition of a rich relative, who had lent him money for his business, and who might have ruined him by demanding it back. As Mariton feared for her reputation, specially on account of her son Joseph, they had concealed Charlot's birth and had put him to nurse at Saint-Sevère; but, at the end of a year Mariton had found him so ill-used that she begged Brulette to take charge of him, thinking that no one else would give him as much care. She had not foreseen the harm this would do to the young girl, and when she did find it out, she wished to remove the child, but Benoît's illness had prevented her doing so, and moreover Brulette had become so attached to Charlot that she would not part with him.
"Yes!" cried Mariton, "poor dear soul that she is, she proved her courage for me. 'You will have trouble enough,' she said to me, 'if you lose your husband; and, perhaps your marriage will be questioned by the family. He is too ill to trouble him now about declaring it. Have patience; don't kill him by talking of your affairs. Everything will come right if God grant that he recovers.'"
"And if I have recovered," added Benoît, "it is by the care of this good woman, my wife, and the kindheartedness of the young girl in question, who patiently endured both blame and insult rather than cause me injury at that time by exposing our secrets. And here is another faithful friend," he added, pointing to the monk,—"a man of sense, of action, and of honest speech, an old school friend of mine in the days when I was educating at Montluçon. He it was who went after my old devil of an uncle, and who at last, no later than this morning, persuaded him to consent to my marriage with my good housekeeper; and when my uncle had given his word to make me heir to his whole property, Brother Nicolas told him the priest had already joined Mariton and me, and showed him that fat Charlot, whom he thought a fine boy and very like the author of his existence."
Benoît's satisfaction revived the lost gayety of the party; every one was struck with the resemblance, which, however, no one had yet noticed,—I as little as any.
"So, Joseph," continued the innkeeper, "you can and ought to love and respect your mother, just as I love and respect her. I take my oath here and now that she is the bravest and most helpful Christian woman that ever a sick man had about him; and I have never had a moment's hesitation in my resolve to declare sooner or later what I have declared to-day. We are now very well off in our worldly affairs, thank God, and as I swore to her and to God that I would replace the father you lost, I will agree, if you will live here with us, to take you into partnership and to give you a good share of the profits.' So you needn't fling yourself into bagpiping, in which your mother sees all sorts of ills for you and anxieties for her. Your notion was to get her a home. That's my affair now, and I even offer to make hers yours. Come, you'll listen to us, won't you, and give up that damned music? Why can't you live in your own country and stay at home? You needn't blush at having an honest innkeeper for a step-father."
"You are my step-father, that's very certain," replied Joseph, not showing either pleasure or displeasure, but remaining coldly on the defensive; "you are an honest man, I know, and rich, I see, and if my mother is happy with you—"