Rose à Charlitte

by Marshall Saunders

Bidiane burst into a flood of conversation. "I think it is so romantic,—his devotion to you. He does not talk of it, but I can't help knowing, because Mrs. Nimmo talks to me about it when she gets too worked up to keep still. She really loves you, Madame de Forêt. She wishes that you would allow her son to marry you. If you only knew how much she admires you, I am sure you would put aside your objection to her son."

Rose for a few minutes seemed lost in thought, then she said, "Does Mrs. Nimmo think that I do not care for her son?"

"No, she says she thinks you care for him, but there is some objection in your mind that you cannot get over, and she cannot imagine what it is."

"Dear little mademoiselle, I will also speak freely to you, for it is well for you to understand, and I feel that you are a good friend, because I have received so many letters from you. It is impossible that I should marry Mr. Nimmo, therefore we will not speak of it, if you please. There is an obstacle,—he knows and agrees to it. Years ago, I thought some day this obstacle might be taken away. Now, I think it is the will of our Lord that it remain, and I am content."

"Oh, oh!" said Bidiane, wrinkling her face as if she were about to cry, "I cannot bear to hear you say this."

Rose smiled gently. "When you are older, as old as I am, you will understand that marriage is not the chief thing in life. It is good, yet one can be happy without. One can be pushed quietly further and further apart from another soul. At first, one cries out, one thinks that the parting will kill, but it is often the best thing for the two souls. I tell you this because I love you, and because I know Mr. Nimmo has taken much care in your training, and wishes me to be an elder sister. Do not seek sorrow, little one, but do not try to run from it. This dear, dear man that you speak of, was a divine being, a saint to me. I did wrong to worship him. To separate from me was a good thing for him. He is now more what I then thought him, than he was at the time. Do you understand?"

"Yes, yes," said Bidiane, breaking into tears, and impulsively throwing herself on her knees beside her, "but you dash my pet scheme to pieces. I wish to see you two united. I thought perhaps if I told you that, although no one knows it but his mother, he just wor—wor—ships you—"

Rose stroked her head. "Warm-hearted child,—and also loyal. Our Lord rewards such devotion. Nothing is lost. Your precious tears remind me of those I once shed."

Bidiane did not recover herself. She was tired, excited, profoundly touched by Rose's beauty and "sweet gravity of soul," and her perfect resignation to her lot. "But you are not happy," she exclaimed at last, dashing away her tears; "you cannot be. It is not right. I love to read in novels, when Mr. Nimmo allows me, of the divine right of passion. I asked him one day what it meant, and he explained. I did not know that it gave him pain,—that his heart must be aching. He is so quiet,—no one would dream that he is unhappy; yet his mother knows that he is, and when she gets too worried, she talks to me, although she is not one-half as fond of me as she is of Narcisse."