The Duke's Daughter; and, The Fugitives; vol. 3/3

by Mrs. Oliphant

“Ah! je voudrais bien! I should then have the pleasure of talking to these demoiselles,” the man said, taking off his hat.

“I don’t like him,” said little Janey. “He has a big cut on his head; he has eyes like the ogre in ‘Jack the Giant-killer.’ What does he want with you, papa? He will take you into a cave, and he will eat you up. I like the other one best.”

The other was Baptiste, who was the son of the landlady at the Lion d’Or. It was he who advised the Côte du Midi. He knew all the coverts as well as the partridges did, or the old wolf that lurked in the darkest shades of the forest. And his woodland likings had brought him woe; but he was bent upon defending l’Anglais, who was his private property for the moment, his mother’s lodger, from the clutches of Antoine.

When they came as far as the château, Janey consented to give up her father’s finger, and to withdraw from the procession of the wood merchants. The château was not one of those deserted grey houses they had passed on their way from Montdard, but a fine medieval building, surrounded by a moat, and modernised under Louis Quatorze. It occupied three sides of a square, and at the end nearest the village was distinguished by a noble tower, covered with a pointed roof, from the windows of which the lights always shone at night, like a sort of lighthouse to the village. Helen stopped to look at it with a little quickening of natural interest. There was nothing about it of the luxury of the English home. It stood close to the road, no privacy of exquisite lawns or wealthy foliage withdrawing it from the humblest of its neighbours, a poor little plot of shrubs occupying the centre of the square within the gravelled drive. The long row of large white windows, very close to each other, which ran round two sides of the square, were undraped and unornamented, not a curtain, not a piece of furniture, showing from the outside. The great door underneath them stood open, and showed only a narrow corridor, and a bare stone staircase, mounting between two white walls. Helen stood and looked at it wistfully. She scarcely seemed to remember her own past life—it was a life which had no sort of connection with the cottages of Latour, the women in their white caps, the strange existence of the Lion d’Or; but here there was a kind of link of connection. If there were girls in the château, theirs might be a French version of her old life. They would be in the neighbourhood, in the village, something like what she had been. If they but knew! “But I hope,” she said to herself with a sigh, realising vividly the imagination that had presented itself to her, as if the fancied daughters of this house were certainly existing, “I hope that nothing will ever happen to them!” As the thought passed through her mind, the very creatures of her fancy appeared at the open door, two girls, she thought about her own age, though they were both older than Helen, dressed in the gloomy mourning of France, without an edge of white anywhere. They came out with a little clamour of talk, their voices louder than Helen was used to, though finely modulated and sweetly toned. Their French gave her that sense of giddiness, as if her head was turning round, which a new language imperfectly understood is apt to give. She went on, thinking it rude to stand and stare after they appeared; but the attraction was strong, and she turned when they had gone a few steps farther, to go back again, almost meeting the two girls as they came out of the gate. Their pleasant voices seemed to make a difference in the air. When they perceived her their lively talk broke off suddenly. Helen felt sure they were asking each other in undertones, “Who is that? Where has she come from? Do you think she looks nice?” though all in their French. She scarcely liked to look at them, but her heart beat; for they seemed to make a pause and consult each other. She wondered would they speak to her? It went to her heart when, after that consultation, they went on, though with a momentary hesitation. “They do not like the looks of us, Janey,” she said.

“Where are they doing to?” said Janey. “What are they thinking about? I wonder if there are any little children in that big funny castle. Little children are everywhere,” said the little girl mournfully, “but you tan’t play with them. Helen, don’t you want to do home?”

“I don’t know; perhaps it would not be home now—not like what it used to be. But you are too little,” said Helen, with a sigh; “if I were to tell you, you wouldn’t understand.”

“I understand more better than you,” said Janey, promptly, “for papa tells me everything. I know,” she said, clapping her hands, “I am not to be called the old name any more. I am little Janey Harford. Papa told me so. It is because of naughty, wicked men. Is it not funny, Helen? And you are Helen Harford too. I sing it to myself, over and over, not to forget. Nursey wouldn’t know who we were, if she were to hear. We are all different people now. Dolly, that I put in my little bed is me, and I’m little Janey Harford.” The child made a little chant of it as she frisked along the road. “I’m little Janey Harford, I am little Janey Haar-ford!” It was a piece of delightful fun to Janey. What child can resist the pleasure of being not me, but somebody else? The spirit of an adventurer was in the little girl. She did not cling to the superstitions of propriety and an honest life as Helen did. The mystification charmed her. “It will not be you and me, but it will be two other girls,” Janey said. Perhaps the profound gravity of this new step was lessened to Helen also by its effect upon her little sister. “It is I who am silly,” poor Helen said to herself. She reminded herself how common it was for people to travel incognito. “That means out of their right name. The Queen does it!” Helen said suddenly to herself, with a sense of relief and consolation unspeakable. She knew that august lady could do no wrong.

They went back slowly through the village, following at a long interval the young ladies from the château, in whom Helen felt so great an interest, and who stopped to speak to M. le Curé, and turned round, plainly indicating to him the two figures in the distance. M. le Curé looked very closely at Helen and Janey when he passed them a little afterwards. He was an active, spare, tall man, in his long black soutane and his three-cornered hat of fluffy beaver on his head. He let his eyes rest with a lingering look of pleasure and interest upon the child. Most likely he took Helen, who looked older than her eighteen years, for a young mother with her child, and the Curé knew how to win the hearts of parents. Now that all the intending purchasers had passed, there were very few people about. The cottages did not stand open, as at Fareham; here and there a woman washing her vegetables outside the door, or chopping her wood into small pieces, would break the monotony, but there was no lively coming and going of gossips and neighbours. At one of the two larger houses an old man had come out, and was standing at the door. He had a handkerchief tied round his head, and a long coat, half a dressing-gown, folded across his long legs, and was looking out with the keenest malignant eyes, as if in search of some one. The Curé passed this personage with a stiff nod, but the other only grinned in reply. He grinned also at the young strangers as they came along, and at a lady who suddenly appeared from the door of the other house, dressed in the simple morning dress, fitting the figure behind, but falling straight and loose in front, which is common in France. There was a little conversation between these two, in the high-pitched voices which made every word audible.

“Madame goes out early,” said the old man. “M. le Précepteur perhaps has gone to the forest to lay in wood for the winter?”

“No; Monsieur le Précepteur has his public duties to think of. Persons in the public service have not time to consider their own advantage,” said the lady.