"Well, well!" said the carpenter, whom nothing in the world could deter in his undertakings, whether it was a matter of overcoming a scruple or of felling a forest, "here she is all covered with mortification, and I shall be scolded for my indiscretion! but if Emile was here, he wouldn't disavow me. He would be very glad to have Monsieur de Boisguilbault see with his own eyes whether he has placed his affections wisely, and he will feel more than a little proud to-morrow when Monsieur de Boisguilbault says to him: 'I have seen her, I know her, and I am not surprised any longer!'—Isn't it true that you'll say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault?"
Monsieur de Boisguilbault did not reply. He was still gazing at Gilberte, struggling between a powerful attraction and a horrible suspicion. He walked several turns up and down the room to overcome a terrible feeling of oppression, and after many sighs and internal conflicts, he returned to Gilberte and took both her hands.
"Whoever you may be," he said, "you have in your hands the destiny of the noblest boy that I in my old age have ever dared to dream of for my staff and my consolation. I shall die before long, and I shall leave this earth without having known an instant's joy, if I do not leave Emile at peace with himself. Oh! I implore you—you who are destined to exercise so great an influence, for good or evil, over his whole future,—retain on the side of truth that heart which is so worthy to be its sanctuary. You are very young, you do not know yet what a woman's love is in the life of a man like him! You do not know perhaps that it depends upon you to make of him a hero or a dastard, a coward or an apostate. Alas! you probably do not understand the bearing of what I am saying to you now. No, you are too young; the more I look at you, the more like a child you seem to me! Poor young thing, without experience and without strength, you are to determine the future of a noble heart, to break it or ennoble it. Forgive me for saying this; I am deeply moved and I cannot find fitting words. I have no desire either to distress you or to cause you embarrassment; but I am depressed and alarmed, and the more fully I realize your innocence, the more I feel that Emile no longer belongs to me."
"Forgive me, monsieur le marquis," said Gilberte, wiping away her tears, "I understand you very well, and although I am in truth very young, I am conscious of my responsibility in God's sight; but I am not in question now, it is not myself whom I wish to defend and justify, but Emile, that noble heart whom you seem to doubt. Oh! have no fear! Emile will lie neither to you, nor his father, nor himself, nor other men. I don't know if I fully understand the importance of his ideas and the depth of yours; but I adore the truth. I am no philosopher, I am too ignorant. But I am pious, I was brought up in the precepts of the Gospel, and I cannot interpret them in a different sense from that Emile gives to them. I understand that his father, who also invokes the Gospel, by the way, when the fancy strikes him, wishes him to be false to the faith of the Gospel, and if I believed that Emile was capable of consenting, I should blush for having been so grossly misled as to love a man without intelligence and conscience; but I am not so unfortunate as that. Emile will be equal to renouncing me, if need be, rather than renounce his own manhood; and as for myself, I shall know how to be brave, if at times his courage seems to waver. But I am not afraid of it; I know that he suffers, and I suffer too; but I will be worthy of his affection, as he is worthy of yours, and God will help us to bear everything, for He does not abandon those who suffer for love of Him and for the glory of His name!"
"Well said!" exclaimed the carpenter; "I wish I could talk like that. But no matter, I think as she does, and the good Lord gives me as much credit."
"Yes, you are right," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, impressed by the depth of conviction revealed by the carpenter's earnest tone; "I did not know, Jean, that you would be as devoted a friend to Emile as myself and perhaps a more useful one."
"I don't say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; I know that Emile looks upon you as his real father, in place of the un-Christian father that fate gave him; but I am something of a friend to him, and last night I flatter myself that I cheered him up, as I cheered up some other people this morning. As for her," he said, pointing to Gilberte, "she didn't need any cheering up. I didn't expect she would! From the first moment her mind was made up, and in my opinion it's a fine thing for a girl of her age to be so strong as that, although you don't seem to think very much of it."
The marquis hesitated and continued to pace the floor without speaking; then he stopped at the window, opened it, returned to Gilberte, and said:
"The rain has stopped, and I am afraid your people will be anxious about you. I—I don't want to keep you any longer to-night, but—but we will see each other again, and I shall be better prepared to talk with you,—for I have many things to say to you."
"No, monsieur le marquis," replied Gilberte, rising, "we shall never meet again; for in that case I must continue to deceive you and that would be impossible to me. Chance has thrown us together, and I thought that I was only fulfilling a bounden duty in offering you some trivial attentions which my heart bade me offer. Thus far I was not blameworthy, I leave it to you to judge; for in order to induce you to accept them, it was necessary to tell a falsehood; and furthermore, my father had made me swear that I would never annoy you with his grief, with his repentance for an injury he did you long ago, of which I know nothing, with his affection for you, which has remained like a painful wound in the depths of his heart! In my dreams as a child I often formed a plan of coming and throwing myself at your feet and saying to you: 'My father suffers, he is unhappy on your account. If he has injured you, accept my tears, my humiliation, my enthusiasm, my life if you will, in expiation of his fault; give him your hand and trample me under your feet, and I will bless you, if you remove from my father's heart the grief that preys upon him and pursues him even in his sleep.'—Yes, that is the dream that I used to cherish long ago; but I abandoned it because my father ordered me to, thinking that I should simply add to your anger; and I abandon it more completely than ever to-night, seeing the coldness and aversion which my name inspires in you. So I take my leave without imploring you in his behalf, distressed by a very painful certainty that my father is the victim of very great injustice on your part; but I will put forth all my energies to distract his thoughts and comfort him. And as for you, monsieur le marquis, I leave you the means of punishing me for the innocent stratagem to which I gave my assent this evening in order to save the health and perhaps the life of the man whom my father once loved so dearly! I leave you my secret, which has been disclosed to you against my will, but which I no longer blush to know is in your hands; for it is the secret of a proud heart, and of a love that God has blessed by inspiring it. Have no fear of seeing me again, monsieur le marquis; and have no fear that Jean, our imprudent but generous friend, who has exposed himself to your anger by trying to reconcile us, will ever annoy you by reminding you of us. I shall find a way to make him abandon the task. I have been honored by your hospitality this evening, monsieur le marquis, and you will allow me never to forget it. You will have no reason to repent of it; for you will not have been the victim of a lie, and if it will be a consolation to your hatred, you still have an opportunity to drive Antoine de Châteaubrun's daughter from your presence with insulting touch."