It did not seem to him that it could really be true; and as he must needs be convinced of the fact every time he spoke to her, his love constantly appealed to him with all the force of novelty.
He was a little embarrassed, too, in her presence, could not find his words, contented himself with smiling at her, with yielding submission to her like a child, with running to fetch this or that for her, divining her desires from her glance; mistaking now and then, but rarely; feeling the same pleasure in being the maiden’s footman that is felt by the misshapen court dwarf in love with the king’s fair daughter.
His sobriquet of The King seemed to him a mockery beside her. She embarrassed him; in her presence he was meek and lowly.
He was surprised, indignant even, in his heart, at the familiar tone assumed by others with Livette. It seemed strange to him that her companions should treat her as an equal; that her father and her grandmother should not have the same respect and consideration for his fiancée that he himself had.
Frequently, when the grandmother cried to Livette: “Do this or that; run! be quick!” he would be angry, and would long to say to her: “Why do you order her about? She was not made to obey! You’re a bad grandmother! Don’t you see that she is too delicate and pretty for such tasks?”
But this was a feeling kept hidden in his heart; he would not have dared to avow it, for women are made, according to our ancestors, to be the slaves of man. So he said no word of what he felt. He even deemed himself a little ridiculous to feel it. He contented himself by doing in a twinkling, in Livette’s stead, the thing she was bidden to do, if it was something within his power.
Ah! but if any man had ventured to indulge in any ill-sounding pleasantry with Livette, to take any liberty with her—oh! then, be sure that he would without reflection have felled him on the spot with his stout fist!
Why, if any one, man or woman, in the crowd on a fête-day, happened to make a coarse remark in her hearing,—one of the sort that he himself knew how to make with great effect upon occasion,—he would be overcome with rage against that person; it seemed to him that every one should take notice of Livette’s presence, should feel that she was near, and understand that, before her, they should show some self-respect.
All this he would have been incapable of explaining, but he felt it all, confusedly and vaguely, in his heart.
Livette, for her part, was keenly conscious of the drover’s adoration. She revelled in it, without unduly seeming to do so. She saw very plainly that she had, without effort, tamed a wild beast. She laughed sometimes, as she looked at him—a frank, ringing laugh, in which there was, however, a touch of the triumph of the mysterious feminine witchery, the marvellous invention of nature, which decrees that the strong man shall be vanquished, rolled in the dust, at the pleasure of fascinating weakness. This miracle, performed by life, by nature, by love, she believed to be her own work,—hers, Livette’s,—and the little woman was a bit swollen with pride! More than frequently she would say to herself: “What have I done? I don’t deserve this good fortune; no, indeed, I don’t deserve it!” She saw very clearly that, in his eyes, she was a being apart: that he did not treat her by any means as everybody else did: and, greatly astonished as she was, she was proud of it.