“Ah! my friend,” he said to Dupré, “how pleasant it is to be able to do good!”
The carriage entered the courtyard; the peasants uttered cries of joy.
“Hush! hush! my friends,” said the old man as he alighted from his carriage; “do not give such loud expression to your joy; it pleases me, but it distresses an unhappy woman to whom the slightest noise is a danger.”
As he spoke, Gerval helped Adeline out of the carriage, while Dupré lifted little Ermance in his arms.
Adeline glanced uneasily about; much noise always caused her to shrink in alarm; the sight of a number of people increased her excitement; she shuddered and tried to fly. Gerval was obliged to motion to the villagers to stand a little aside, before he could induce the unfortunate young woman to enter the house.
They gazed at Adeline with interest, and joy gave way to sadness when they realized her condition.
“Poor woman!” was heard on all sides; “what can have deprived her of her reason? And that little girl! how beautiful she will be some day! They are two more unfortunates, whom Monsieur Gerval has taken under his protection.”
“My children,” said Catherine, “as soon as I learn this young stranger’s story, I will tell it to you, I promise you; and I shall know it soon, for my master keeps nothing from me.”
Unfortunately for Catherine, her master knew no more than she upon that subject. To satisfy his old servant’s curiosity, Monsieur Gerval told her how he had made Adeline’s acquaintance, and the deplorable state in which he had found her afterward. The servant uttered exclamations of surprise during her master’s narrative, but she declared that she would be able to learn all the young woman’s misfortunes little by little. Meanwhile, as she already felt drawn to love and cherish her child, she hastened to prepare one of the pleasantest rooms in the house for them.
Adeline was given a room on the ground floor, looking on the woods; the window was supplied with stout iron bars, and there was no danger that she would run away from the house in one of her fits of delirium. They left the child with her, for she seemed always to know her daughter, and often pressed her affectionately to her heart.