Occasionally Jean would rise and go near the altar and look down at François, mute and meek, for even François le Bourgeois was meek in death.
Jean’s memory, travelling back slowly but accurately to the beginning of things, recalled that François had loved Diane from the first, but had been clever enough to keep the preposterous thing to himself. Well, François was ever a mystery and a contradiction, and so his death contradicted his whole life, and atoned for it.
Two weeks later, on a beautiful June morning, the Bishop had what was left of François le Bourgeois interred close to the walls of the little old cathedral of Bienville.
“Because,” said the Bishop, to Diane and Jean Leroux, who were present, “when I die, they will put me in the church on the other side of the wall, and I think I should like to be near François, for, to tell you the truth, I loved him better than I ever acknowledged. He was such an amusing fellow, you know, and I had known him when he was the child of greatness and I was the boy who tended the cows. François and I, having been together in our boyhood, will be close together at the end, and I am sure when the last trump sounds, François will rise with a joke upon his lips; otherwise, it would not be François at all.”
After François had finally been laid to rest, Diane and Jean went into a side chapel of the cathedral, and were married by the Bishop. When the ceremony was over, the new-made wife of Jean Leroux went out and laid her bridal bouquet upon the grave of François; who called himself Le Bourgeois.
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