Her mother looked at her searchingly, and Marjolaine met her gaze steadfastly, with her clear, truthful eyes. It was patent she did not indeed know what caused this new pain at her heart. Madame looked long. Her daughter seemed, in a way, suddenly to have become a stranger to her. This child was a child no longer, and her mother no longer held the first place in her heart. Yes! and if Marjolaine had suddenly leapt out of childhood, then she, the mother, must begin to face old age: she was the mother of a marriageable girl. She would fight against this while she could; not for unworthy or small motives, but to keep her daughter's companionship. Who was this Jack Sayle that he should come like a thief in the night and steal Marjolaine's youth, her happiness and her peace of mind, and tear the girl out of her mother's arms? "No," she said, at last, "I will not tell you. If I told you it would grow stronger; and it must not. It shall not. You must win yourself back, as I did. Oh! but sooner, and more completely!"
Marjolaine was amazed. Had her mother gone through what she was going through now? "As you did—?" she cried, in a voice which betrayed her astonishment.
Madame smiled sadly. "My dearest dear, the young never realise they are not beginning the world. Your story is mine."
With a cry of "Oh, mother!" Marjolaine nestled closer.
"Yes; but mine was longer and therefore left more pain in its track. Chérie, chérie, I am not telling you this to make light of your sorrow, but to show you I know what your pain is: to show you how to fight now, now, with all your might, to win yourself back." She paused a moment, to gather her thoughts and to gather strength. Then she continued very softly, almost as if she were speaking to herself, "It was years and years ago, in my father's garden—in the old vicarage garden—that I felt the sun and the song enter my heart. He and I were very young and very happy." Madame paused. "And then he rode away; and I never saw him again."
"Maman!" whispered Marjolaine, stroking her mother's cheek.
"We had lived in our dream a whole year; so my love—"
Marjolaine started at the word. "Love!" Was this love?—
But her mother did not notice her, and went on; "So my love had time to grow. Its roots were twined round my heart; and when he left me, and tore the roots out of me, I thought he had torn my heart out with them."
"Like me," said Marjolaine, below her breath.