And we embraced again. Then I got away from him. It was gratifying but inexpedient to be an Englishman at that moment, and John Turner, whose clothes were made in Paris, silently denied me and edged away. Others seemed desirous of burying Waterloo also, but I managed the obsequies of that great victory with a shake of the hand.
"Vive l'Empereur!" they cried. "Long live Napoleon!"
And I shouted as loud as any. Whatever one may think, it is always wise to agree with the mob.
On the steps of the church I found John Turner awaiting me.
"Finished embracing your new-found friend?" he asked me, with a shortness which may have been a matter of breath. At all events, it was habitual with this well-fed philosopher.
"We were forgetting Waterloo," I answered.
At that moment a merry laugh behind us made me turn. It was not directed towards myself, and was doubtless raised by some incident which had escaped our notice. The mere fact that this voice was raised in merriment did not make me wheel round on my heel as if I had been shot. It was the voice itself—some note of sympathy which I seemed to have always known and yet never to have heard until this moment. A strange thing—the reader will think—to happen to a man in his thirties, who had knocked about the world, doing but little good therein, as some are ready and even anxious to relate.
Strange it may be, but it was true. I seemed to have known that voice all my life—and it was only the merry laugh of a heedless girl.
Has any listened to the prattle of the schoolroom without hearing at odd moments the tone of some note that is not girlish—the voice of the woman speaking gravely through the chatter of the child?
I seemed to hear that note now, and turning, found the owner of the voice within touch of me. She was tall and slim, with a certain fresh immaturity, which was like the scent of the first spring flowers in my own Norfolk woods at home. Flower-like, too, was her face—somewhat long and narrow, with a fair flush on it of youth, health and happiness. The merriest eyes in the world were looking laughingly into the face of an old gentleman at her side, smiling, happy eyes of innocent maidenhood. And yet here again I saw the woman in the girl. I saw a gracious lady, knowing life, and being yet pure, having learned of good and evil only to remember the good. For the knowledge of evil is like vaccine—it causes disturbance only when hidden impurity awaits it.