White Lies [78]
keep up his heart. She used to meet him out walking in a mysterious way, and in short, be always falling in with him and trying to cheer him up: with tolerable success.
Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got well at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own quarters. The news of the house had been told him by letter, but, of course, in so vague and general a way that, thinking he knew all, in reality he knew nothing.
Josephine had married Raynal. The marriage was sudden, but no doubt there was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden attachments. Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back to France wounded, and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this incident appeared neither strange nor any way important. What affected him most deeply was the death of Raynal, his personal friend and patron. But when his tyrants, as he called the surgeon and his uncle, gave him leave to go home, all feelings were overpowered by his great joy at the prospect of seeing Rose. He walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a sling, his heart beating. He was coming to receive the reward of all he had done, and all he had attempted. "I will surprise them," thought he. "I will see her face when I come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this pays for all." He entered the house without announcing himself; he went softly up to the saloon; to his great disappointment he found no one but the baroness: she received him kindly, but not with the warmth he expected. She was absorbed in her new grief. He asked timidly after her daughters. "Madame Raynal bears up, for the sake of others. You will not, however, see her: she keeps her room. My daughter Rose is taking a walk, I believe." After some polite inquiries, and sympathy with his accident, the baroness retired to indulge her grief, and Edouard thus liberated ran in search of his beloved.
He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone. She was walking with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant officer. She was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling of death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
The next moment Rose caught sight of him. She flushed all over and uttered a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a little antelope, and put out both her hands at once. He could only give her one.
"Ah!" she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand with both hers.
This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place. He was all happiness.
When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said quickly, "I will come down to welcome him--dear Edouard!"
The sisters looked at one another. Josephine blushed. Rose smiled and kissed her. She colored higher still, and said, "No, she was ashamed to go down."
"Why?"
"Look at my face."
"I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other people's, and I have long forgiven you that."
"Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago it was pale as ashes."
"Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?"
"Rose, I am a very bad woman."
"Are you, dear? then hook this for me."
"Yes, love. But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew how hard I pray to be better. Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as I ought; but I can't, I can't. My cold heart seems as dead to unhappiness as once it was to happiness. Am I a heartless woman after all?"
"Not altogether," said Rose dryly. "Fasten my collar, dear, and don't torment yourself. You have suffered much and nobly. It was Heaven's will: you bowed to it. It was not Heaven's will that you should be blighted altogether. Bow in this, too, to Heaven's will: take things as they come, and do cease to try and reconcile feelings that are too opposite to live together."
"Ah! these
Such was the state of affairs when the party was swelled and matters complicated by the arrival of one we have lost sight of.
Edouard Riviere retarded his cure by an impatient spirit: but he got well at last, and his uncle drove him in the cabriolet to his own quarters. The news of the house had been told him by letter, but, of course, in so vague and general a way that, thinking he knew all, in reality he knew nothing.
Josephine had married Raynal. The marriage was sudden, but no doubt there was an attachment: he had some reason to believe in sudden attachments. Colonel Dujardin, an old acquaintance, had come back to France wounded, and the good doctor had undertaken his cure: this incident appeared neither strange nor any way important. What affected him most deeply was the death of Raynal, his personal friend and patron. But when his tyrants, as he called the surgeon and his uncle, gave him leave to go home, all feelings were overpowered by his great joy at the prospect of seeing Rose. He walked over to Beaurepaire, his arm in a sling, his heart beating. He was coming to receive the reward of all he had done, and all he had attempted. "I will surprise them," thought he. "I will see her face when I come in at the door: oh, happy hour! this pays for all." He entered the house without announcing himself; he went softly up to the saloon; to his great disappointment he found no one but the baroness: she received him kindly, but not with the warmth he expected. She was absorbed in her new grief. He asked timidly after her daughters. "Madame Raynal bears up, for the sake of others. You will not, however, see her: she keeps her room. My daughter Rose is taking a walk, I believe." After some polite inquiries, and sympathy with his accident, the baroness retired to indulge her grief, and Edouard thus liberated ran in search of his beloved.
He met her at the gate of the Pleasaunce, but not alone. She was walking with an officer, a handsome, commanding, haughty, brilliant officer. She was walking by his side, talking earnestly to him.
An arrow of ice shot through young Riviere; and then came a feeling of death at his heart, a new symptom in his young life.
The next moment Rose caught sight of him. She flushed all over and uttered a little exclamation, and she bounded towards him like a little antelope, and put out both her hands at once. He could only give her one.
"Ah!" she cried with an accent of heavenly pity, and took his hand with both hers.
This was like the meridian sun coming suddenly on a cold place. He was all happiness.
When Josephine heard he was come her eye flashed, and she said quickly, "I will come down to welcome him--dear Edouard!"
The sisters looked at one another. Josephine blushed. Rose smiled and kissed her. She colored higher still, and said, "No, she was ashamed to go down."
"Why?"
"Look at my face."
"I see nothing wrong with it, except that it eclipses other people's, and I have long forgiven you that."
"Oh, yes, dear Rose: look what a color it has, and a fortnight ago it was pale as ashes."
"Never mind; do you expect me to regret that?"
"Rose, I am a very bad woman."
"Are you, dear? then hook this for me."
"Yes, love. But I sometimes think you would forgive me if you knew how hard I pray to be better. Rose, I do try so to be as unhappy as I ought; but I can't, I can't. My cold heart seems as dead to unhappiness as once it was to happiness. Am I a heartless woman after all?"
"Not altogether," said Rose dryly. "Fasten my collar, dear, and don't torment yourself. You have suffered much and nobly. It was Heaven's will: you bowed to it. It was not Heaven's will that you should be blighted altogether. Bow in this, too, to Heaven's will: take things as they come, and do cease to try and reconcile feelings that are too opposite to live together."
"Ah! these