Noon.
"Listen," she said, stretching out her hand. "Listen. The Angelus is ringing somewhere ... at the village church...."
They uncovered their heads, and while they listened to the ringing of the bell, which came to them in irregular bursts, one would have said that they were waiting for the clock to start going and connect with the minute that was passing the thread of the minutes of long ago.
Dorothy fell on her knees. Her emotion was so deep that she was weeping.
[CHAPTER XI]
THE WILL OF THE MARQUIS DE BEAUGREVAL
Tears of joy, tears which relieved her strained nerves and bathed her in an immense peacefulness. The five men were greatly disturbed, knowing neither what to do nor what to say.
"Mademoiselle?... What's the matter, mademoiselle?"
They seemed so staggered by her sobs and by their own presence round her, that Dorothy passed suddenly from tears to laughter, and yielding to her natural impulse, she began forthwith to dance, without troubling to know whether she would appear to them to be a princess or a rope-dancer. And the more this unexpected display increased the embarrassment of her companions the gayer she grew. Fandango, jig, reel, she gave a snatch of each, with a simulated accompaniment of castanets, and a genuine accompaniment of English songs and Auvergnat ritornelles, and above all of bursts of laughter which awakened the echoes of Roche-Périac.
"But laugh too, all five of you!" she cried. "You look like five mummies. It's I who order you to laugh, I, Dorothy, rope-dancer and Princess of Argonne. Come, Mr. Lawyer," she added, addressing the gentleman in the frock-coat. "Look more cheerful. I assure you that there's plenty to be cheerful about."