“Married! Alas! no,” replied the landlord mournfully. “Monsieur has not, then, heard?”
“Good heavens! she is not dead?” cried M. Gombard, dropping his feigned indifference in an instant.
“She is blind, monsieur—stone blind! It was a terrible accident; she was thrown from a carriage, and the shock and injuries she sustained destroyed her sight. They say she may recover it after a while; but I doubt it, monsieur, I doubt it.”
“And her fiancé—has he given up—”
The mayor was here cut short by the prefect, who called out from the post-chaise, where he had already seated himself.
“Come, M. Gombard, we had better be starting.”
M. Gombard left Cabicol with a sad heart. He looked wistfully up at the latticed window under the grand old escutcheon where he had last caught a glimpse of the beautiful young creature, now so heavily stricken. It made his heart ache to think of her in that lonely house, her bright eyes sightless, dwelling in perpetual night. Why had not his rival insisted on marrying her in spite, nay, because, of this catastrophe? He could fancy how her brave and generous nature would refuse to accept what she considered a sacrifice; but what sort of a love was his that could not overcome such reluctance? Poor child! How gladly he would have devoted himself to soothing and cheering her darkened life! But perhaps he was wronging his rival; it might be that she had merely postponed their marriage, that they both believed in her ultimate recovery, and that she preferred waiting, until it had taken place, until her brown eyes had been restored, until the spirit which once animated them should awake and vivify them as of old.
M. Gombard did not return to Cabicol for many a long year after this. He left Loisel, and went to live in Normandy, where an uncle had died and left him some property—a rambling old house, surrounded by some wooded fields and a fruit-garden; the house was called the Château, and the fields were called “the Park.” M. Gombard had not been long in possession of
this ancestral estate before he was elected mayor of the village. He was the kind of man to be elected mayor wherever he resided. Some men, we hear said, are born actors, doctors, ambassadors, etc.; M. Gombard was born a mayor.
Life went smoothly with him amongst his fields and fruit-trees for nearly ten years. Then friends took it into their heads, and put it into his, that he ought to become a deputy; the elections were at hand, and they put up his name as opposition candidate for the department of X——, whose chef-lieu was Loisel. The proposal took M. Gombard’s fancy mightily. To go back to the place where he had left such a good name and exercised such undisputed influence; to go back as representative of the department—this was a triumph that even in perspective made him purr like a stroked cat. He started off one morning in high spirits for Loisel. His most direct road lay through Cabicol. The railroad landed him within a mile of the quaint old town at eight o’clock in the morning. He was in the mood for a walk, so he set out on foot. It was within a few days of Christmas; the weather was intensely cold, but the sky was as blue as a field of sapphire, and the sun shone out as brightly as in spring. He remembered the first time he had been to Cabicol; it was about this season of the year, but what miserable weather it was! Snow deep on the ground, and then the heavy rains coming before it melted, and turning the roads and streets into canals of mud and slush. This bracing cold, with the sun cheering up the landscape, was delightful. M. Gombard walked on with a brisk step, whistling snatches of one tune or another, till he came within sight of the church. The first