Father hesitated for a second. “Very well,” he said simply and turned away.
In his tower where he had settled himself, grandfather took great comfort in wearing his famous green dressing gown and Greek cap of black velvet with its silk tassel. With his telescope fixed upon a pedestal, he would watch by day the boats that ploughed the waters of the lake, and at night he would bring the stars nearer—but only those which moved in the southern half of the sky, because from his former room he had only had a view of this part of the heavens, and knew it better. Much more frequently than in the old days he would come down stairs in this astrologer’s costume, like a deposed monarch who no longer sets store by majesty. It was with great difficulty that Aunt Deen prevented him from going into town, or walking in the country, in this accoutrement.
“It does no one any harm,” he would observe.
Nevertheless, after many entreaties, he would consent to replace the cap with a broad brimmed felt hat, and the dressing gown with a frock coat which had to be almost daily rubbed with benzine, in spite of him, to keep it decent. He would bring home from his walks aromatic plants of which he used to make decoctions which he would mix with brandy, and mushrooms which awakened Aunt Deen’s misgivings. I used to look at them, smell them, but for nothing in the world would I have tasted them. I could not think, in those days, that anything good to eat could be found outside a provision store, except, on a pinch, in our garden.
My father’s reign had lasted three good years, perhaps, indeed, nearer four than three, when an event occurred of large importance in my child life—I fell ill. The previous year I had made my first communion, with such deep fervour that my mother had confidentially wondered to Aunt Deen:
“Is he going to follow the example of Mélanie and Stephen? Will God require of us a third child? His will be done!”
My adventure was almost that of the fair child who escaped from the arms of his mother. In the course of a walk of our “division” I had tumbled into a brook which we had been forbidden to approach, and rather than be blamed had decided to say nothing about it, though I was soaked up to the chest. Fever set in the next day or the day after. I learned later that it was a severe attack of pneumonia, which in time degenerated into pleurisy. My life was believed to be in danger, and my malady became the occasion of a change in the family arrangements which had almost altered the whole direction of my youth. In a half-slumber I heard whisperings around me, the meaning of which I at once interpreted.
“Am I going to die?” I asked mother and Aunt Deen who were at my bedside.
“Be quiet, naughty boy!” murmured Aunt Deen blowing her nose with a sob and deep sighs, which she doubtless supposed herself to be suppressing.
Mother laid her hand upon my brow—its touch refreshed me as her gentle and persuasive voice said,