Zoséphine was not merely willing, but eager, to see the arrangements made. She beckoned the boy aside and spoke to him alone.
“You must go, Bonaventure. You will go, will you not—when I ask you? Think how fine that will be—to be educated! For me, I cannot endure an uneducated person. But—ah! ca sré vaillant, pour savoir lire. [It will be bully to know how to read.] Aie ya yaie!”—she stretched her eyes and bit her lip with delight—“C’est t’y gai, pour savoir écrire! [That’s fine to know how to write.] I will tell you a secret, dear Bonaventure. Any girl of sense is bound to think it much greater and finer for a man to read books than to ride horses. She may not want to, but she has to do it; she can’t help herself!”
Still Bonaventure looked at her mournfully. She tried again.
“When I say any girl of sense I include myself—of course! I think more of a boy—or man, either—who can write letters than of one who can play the fiddle. There, now, I have told you! And when you have learned those things, I will be proud of you! And besides, you know, if you don’t go, you make me lose my chance of learning the same things; but if you go, we will learn them together.”
He consented. She could not understand the expression of his face. She had expected gleams of delight. There were none. He went with silent docility, and without a tear; but also without a smile. When in his new home the curé from time to time stole glances at his face fixed in unconscious revery, it was full of a grim, unhappy satisfaction.
“Self is winning, or dying hard. I wish no ill to ’Thanase; but if there is to be any bad news of him, I hope, for the sake of this boy’s soul, it will come quickly.” So spoke the curé alone, to his cards.