She made no reply. He looked at her, and then getting up said:
“Let us go back. It is growing dark. We must not leave Mother alone any longer.”
Madame Guibert was seated at the door, waiting for them. With her old hands she was knitting some woollen stockings for a farmer’s little girl. She had put on her spectacles to see her needles. She often lifted her eyes towards the avenue. This side of the house was covered with the five-leaved ivy whose scarlet color was deepened by the rays of the dying sun.
As soon as she saw Marcel and Paule she smiled at them. But as they were coming up the staircase she quickly took off her spectacles to wipe her eyes.
“At last!” she cried.
Her son kissed her.
“We stayed too long in the Montcharvin woods. But here we are, Mother. Are you not afraid of the cold? It is getting late to be out of doors.”
And as they went into the house, the young man turned to look at the neighboring meadows, the chestnut avenue, and the open gate. Knowing how things stood with his family, he was aware that they would have to think of selling Le Maupas, unless his brother Étienne made a fortune in Tonkin. Here he had spent his childhood, and formed his soul. From this country—now all pink and violet—his memories came back to him at his call. They came to him from all sides, like a flight of birds clearly defined in the setting sun. Marcel shut the door. In the drawing-room he went and sat beside his mother on a low seat, leaned on her shoulder, and took her hand.
“I am so comfortable here,” he said in a caressing voice which was a contrast to his determined face.
For the first time he noticed the hand that he was holding in his own, a poor, worn, rough hand with fingers swollen and ringless, which betrayed a life of toil and old age. Madame Guibert followed her son’s eyes—and understood.