”‘When did you arrive?’
”‘Only last night,’ said Nanette. ‘But I am not tired now. Yesterday was very pleasant; father drove the light cart over to Machard to meet me. The two days before in the diligence—ah, that was tiring. My great-uncle Ludovic came the first day’s journey with me, by my lady’s wish; you see what care she takes of me—of every one about her.’
”‘As ever—our dear lady!’ said Madame Germain.
”‘Ah, if there were more like her!’ said Nanette. ‘Things and feelings would not be what they are coming to, if there had been more like her. The Marquise now—for all she looks so tiny and delicate—ah! she has a hard and cruel heart—or no heart at all. She is a fit wife for her husband. And how they are hated! Worse than ever, I believe.’
”‘By those about them in Paris, do you mean?’ said the father Germain. ‘At Sarinet he is now almost a stranger. All these years, I think, he has never been back again.’
”‘And do you not know why?’ said Nanette. ‘’Tis said he dare not—and yet at worst he is a brave man. Perhaps after all he has some conscience left, and shrinks from seeing the utter wretchedness he has caused. We passed through many villages on our way, but in none did I see more hideous misery than at Sarinet. My lord is always short of money now—he spends so much in every way—and they do say that he and the Marquise too lose great sums at play. And when the money runs dry it is always the same thing. “Get it out of those lazy hounds of mine at Sarinet,” writes my lord to his bailiff, and then the screw is put on again, ever tighter and tighter. Ah, it is horrible!’ and Nanette shuddered.
“Germain looked up at her in surprise. She had changed. It was not like the simple, light-hearted girl of three years ago to speak so forcibly, or to feel things so deeply.
”‘How have you heard so much, my girl?’ he said.
”‘In Paris one learns much,’ said Nanette. ‘Much ill I might have learnt had my lady not taken care of me almost as if I had been her own sister. But the servants all talk, and chatter, and complain, and threaten—and my lady, she too told me a great deal. She has almost no one to talk to there—no one who sees things as she does. And she told me to tell you—her good friends she always calls you—all I could. She wants you to understand how she is placed. There is nothing she longs for so much as to return to Valmont, and from month to month she is hoping to see her way to doing so. But the Marquis opposes it, and you know he is Mademoiselle’s guardian by law, and my lady does not like to anger him; his temper, too, grows worse and worse, though he is gentler to her than to any one else. But you can fancy it is not a home such as our dear ladies can be happy in. And at times I can see that the Countess is really afraid. There is talk of dark and wild things. There have been meetings of the people where dreadful threats have been uttered against the king and queen, the clergy and the nobles—against every one in high position, and sometimes the police and the soldiers even, could scarce disperse them. Many think the people once roused will not be quieted again. And of all the great rich nobles who have oppressed the poor and made themselves hated, none, or few at least, are more hated than the Marquis.’
”‘And our dear Countess is his sister!’ exclaimed Madame Germain, over whose cheerful face had crept a cloud of foreboding.