The young couple got into the habit of playing cards; every day after lunch Jeanne played several games of bezique with her husband, while he smoked his pipe and drank six or eight glasses of brandy. When they had finished playing, Jeanne went upstairs to her bedroom, and, sitting by the window, worked at a petticoat flounce she was embroidering, while the wind and rain beat against the panes. When her eyes ached she looked out at the foamy, restless sea, gazed at it for a few minutes, and then took up her work again. She had nothing else to do, for Julien had taken the entire management of the house into his hands, that he might thoroughly satisfy his longing for authority and his mania for economy. He was exceedingly stingy; he never gave the servants anything beyond their exact wages, never allowed any food that was not strictly necessary. Every morning, ever since she had been at Les Peuples, the baker had made Jeanne a little Normandy cake, but Julien cut off this expense, and Jeanne had to content herself with toast. Wishing to avoid all arguments and quarrels, she never made any remark, but each fresh proof of her husband’s avarice hurt her like the prick of a needle. It seemed so petty, so odious to her, brought up as she had been in a family where money was never thought of any importance. How often she had heard her mother say: “Money is made to be spent”; but now Julien kept saying to her: “Will you never be cured of throwing money away?” Whenever he could manage to reduce a salary or a bill by a few pence he would slip the money into his pocket, saying, with a pleased smile: “Little streams make big rivers.” Jeanne would sometimes find herself dreaming as she used to do before she was married. She would gradually stop working, and with her hands lying idle in her lap and her eyes fixed on space, she built castles in the air as if she were a young girl again. But the voice of Julien, giving an order to old Simon, would call her back to the realities of life, and she would take up her work, thinking, “Ah, that is all over and done with now,” and a tear would fall on her fingers as they pushed the needle through the stuff. Rosalie, who used to be so gay and lively, always singing snatches of songs as she went about her work, gradually changed also. Her plump round cheeks had fallen in and lost their brightened color, and her skin was muddy and dark. Jeanne often asked her if she were ill, but the little maid always answered with a faint blush, “No, madame,” and got away as quickly as she could. Instead of tripping along as she had always done, she now dragged herself painfully from room to room, and seemed not even to care how she looked, for the peddlers in vain spread out their ribbons and corsets and bottles of scent before her; she never bought anything from them now. At the end of January, the heavy clouds came across the sea from the north, and there was a heavy fall of snow. In one night the whole plain was whitened, and, in the morning the trees looked as if a mantle of frozen foam had been cast over them. Julien put on his high boots, and passed his time in the ditch between the wood and the plain, watching for the migrating birds. Every now and then his shots would break the frozen silence of the fields, and hordes of black crows flew from the trees in terror. Jeanne, tired of staying indoors, would go out on the steps of the house, where, in the stillness of this snow-covered world, she could hear the bustle of the farms, or the far-away murmur of the waves and the soft continual rustle of the falling snow. On one of these cold, white mornings she was sitting by her bedroom fire, while Rosalie, who looked worse and worse every day, was slowly making the bed. All at once Jeanne heard a sigh of pain behind her. Without turning her head, she asked: “What is the matter with you, Rosalie?” The maid answered as she always did: “Nothing, madame,” but her voice seemed to die away as she spoke. Jeanne had left off thinking about her, when she suddenly noticed that she could not hear the girl moving. She called: “Rosalie.” There was no answer. Then she thought that the maid must have gone quietly out of the room without her hearing her, and she cried in a louder tone: “Rosalie!” Again she received no answer, and she was just stretching out her hand to ring the bell, when she heard a low moan close beside her. She started up in terror. Rosalie was sitting on the floor with her back against the bed, her legs stretched stiffly out, her face livid, and her eyes staring straight before her. Jeanne rushed to her side. “Oh, Rosalie! What is the matter? what is it?” she asked in affright. The maid did not answer a word, but fixed her wild eyes on her mistress and gasped for breath, as if tortured by some excruciating pain. Then, stiffening every muscle in her body, and stifling a cry of anguish between her clenched teeth, she slipped down on her back, and all at once, something stirred underneath her dress, which clung tightly round her legs. Jeanne heard a strange, gushing noise, something like the death-rattle of someone who is suffocating, and then came a long low wail of pain; it was the first cry of suffering of a child entering the world. The sound came as a revelation to her, and, suddenly losing her head, she rushed to the top of the stairs, crying: “Julien! Julien!” “What do you want?” he answered, from below. She gasped out, “It’s Rosalie who — who — ” but before she could say any more Julien was rushing up the stairs two at a time; he dashed into the bedroom, raised the girl’s clothes, and there lay a creased, shriveled, hideous, little atom of humanity, feebly whining and trying to move its limbs. He got up with an evil look on his face, and pushed his distracted wife out of the room, saying: “This is no place for you. Go away and send me Ludivine and old Simon.” Jeanne went down to the kitchen trembling all over, to deliver her husband’s message, and then afraid to go upstairs again, she went into the drawing-room, where a fire was never lighted, now her parents were away. Soon she saw Simon run out of the house, and come back five minutes after with Widow Dentu, the village midwife. Next she heard a noise on the stairs which sounded as if they were carrying a body, then Julien came to tell her that she could go back to her room. She went upstairs and sat down again before her bedroom fire, trembling as if she had just witnessed some terrible accident. “How is she?” she asked. Julien, apparently in a great rage, was walking about the room in a preoccupied, nervous way. He did not answer his wife for some moments, but at last he asked, stopping in his walk: “Well, what do you mean to do with this girl?” Jeanne looked at her husband as if she did not understand his question. “What do you mean?” she said. “I don’t know; how should I?” “Well, anyhow, we can’t keep that child in the house,” he cried, angrily. Jeanne looked very perplexed, and sat in silence for some time. At last she said: “But, my dear, we could put it out to nurse somewhere?” He hardly let her finish her sentence. “And who’ll pay for it? Will you?” “But surely the father will take care of it,” she said, after another long silence. “And if he marries Rosalie, everything will be all right.” “The father!” answered Julien, roughly; “the father! Do you know who is the father? Of course you don’t. Very well, then!” Jeanne began to get troubled: “But he certainly will not forsake the girl; it would be such a cowardly thing to do. We will ask her his name, and go and see him and force him to give some account of himself.” Julien had become calmer, and was again walking about the room. “My dear girl,” he replied, “I don’t believe she will tell you the man’s name, or me either. Besides, suppose he wouldn’t marry her? You must see that we can’t keep a girl and her illegitimate child in our house.” But Jeanne would only repeat, doggedly: “Then the man must be a villain; but we will find out who he is, and then he will have us to deal with instead of that poor girl.” Julien got very red. “But until we know who he is?” he asked. She did not know what to propose, so she asked Julien what he thought was the best thing to do. He gave his opinion very promptly. “Oh, I should give her some money, and let her and her brat go to the devil.” That made Jeanne very indignant. “That shall never be done,” she declared; “Rosalie is my foster-sister, and we have grown up together. She has erred, it is true, but I will never turn her out-of-doors for that, and, if there is no other way out of the difficulty, I will bring up the child myself.” “And we should have a nice reputation, shouldn’t we, with our name and connections?” burst out Julien. “People would say that we encouraged vice, and sheltered prostitutes, and respectable people would never come near us. Why, what can you be thinking of? You must be mad!” “I will never have Rosalie turned out,” she repeated, quietly. “If you will not keep her here, my mother will take her back again. But we are sure to find out the name of the father.” At that, he went out of the room, too angry to talk to her any longer, and as he banged the door after him he cried: “Women are fools with their absurd notions!” In the afternoon Jeanne went up to see the invalid. She was lying in bed, wide awake, and the Widow Dentu was rocking the child in her arms. As soon as she saw her mistress Rosalie began to sob violently, and when Jeanne wanted to kiss her, she turned away and hid her face under the bed-clothes. The nurse interfered and drew down the sheet, and then Rosalie made no further resistance, though the tears still ran down her cheeks. The room was very cold, for there was only a small fire in the grate, and the child was crying. Jeanne did not dare make any reference to the little one, for fear of causing another burst of tears, but she held Rosalie’s hand and kept repeating mechanically: “It won’t matter; it won’t matter.” The poor girl glanced shyly at the nurse from time to time; the child’s cries seemed to pierce her heart, and sobs still escaped from her occasionally, though she forced herself to swallow her tears. Jeanne kissed her again, and whispered in her ear: “We’ll take good care of it, you may be sure of that,” and then ran quickly out of the room, for Rosalie’s tears were beginning to flow again. After that, Jeanne went up every day to see the invalid, and every day Rosalie burst into tears when her mistress came into the room. The child was put out to nurse, and Julien would hardly speak to his wife, for he could not forgive her for refusing to dismiss the maid. One day he returned to the subject, but Jeanne drew out a letter from her mother in which the baroness said that if they would not keep Rosalie at Les Peuples she was to be sent on to Rouen directly. “Your mother’s as great a fool as you are,” cried Julien; but he did not say anything more about sending Rosalie away, and a fortnight later the maid was able to get up and perform her duties again. One morning Jeanne made her sit down, and holding both her hands in hers; “Now, then, Rosalie, tell me all about it,” she said, looking her straight in the face. Rosalie began to tremble. “All about what, madame?” she said, timidly. “Who is the father of your child?” asked Jeanne. A look of despair came over the maid’s face, and she struggled to disengage her hands from her mistress’s grasp, but Jeanne kissed her, in spite of her struggles, and tried to console her. “It is true you have been weak,” she said, “but you are not the first to whom such a misfortune has happened, and, if only the father of the child marries you, no one will think anything more about it; we would employ him, and he could live here with you.” Rosalie moaned as if she were being tortured, and tried to get her hands free that she might run away. “I can quite understand how ashamed you feel,” went on Jeanne, “but you see that I am not angry, and that I speak kindly to you. I wish to know this man’s name for your own good, for I fear, from your grief, that he means to abandon you, and I want to prevent that. Julien will see him, and we will make him marry you, and we shall employ you both; we will see that he makes you happy.” This time Rosalie made so vigorous an effort that she succeeded in wrenching her hands away from her mistress, and she rushed from the room as if she were mad. “I have tried to make Rosalie tell me her seducer’s name,” said Jeanne to her husband at dinner that evening, “but I did not succeed in doing so. Try and see if she will tell you, that we may force the wretch to marry her.” “There, don’t let me hear any more about all that,” he said, angrily. “You wanted to keep this girl, and you have done so, but don’t bother me about her.” He seemed still more irritable since Rosalie’s confinement than he had been before. He had got into the habit of shouting at his wife, whenever he spoke to her, as if he were always angry, while she, on the contrary, spoke softly, and did everything to avoid a quarrel; but she often cried when she was alone in her room at night. In spite of his bad temper, Julien had resumed the marital duties he had so neglected since his wedding tour, and it was seldom now that he let three nights pass without accompanying his wife to her room. Rosalie soon got quite well again, and with better health came better spirits, but she always seemed frightened and haunted by some strange dread. Jeanne tried twice more to make her name her seducer, but each time she ran away, without saying anything. Julien suddenly became better tempered, and his young wife began to cherish vague hopes, and to regain a little of her former gayety; but she often felt very unwell, though she never said anything about it. For five weeks the crisp, shining snow had lain on the frozen ground; in the daytime there was not a cloud to be seen, and at night the sky was strewn with stars. Standing alone in their square courtyards, behind the great frosted trees, the farms seemed dead beneath their snowy shrouds. Neither men nor cattle could go out, and the only sign of life about the homesteads and cottages was the smoke that went straight up from the chimneys into the frosty air. The grass, the hedges and the wall of elms seemed killed by the cold. From time to time the trees cracked, as if the fibers of their branches were separating beneath the bark, and sometimes a big branch would break off and fall to the ground, its sap frozen and dried up by the intense cold. Jeanne thought the severe weather was the cause of her ill-health, and she longed for the warm spring breezes. Sometimes the very idea of food disgusted her, and she could eat nothing; at other times she vomited after every meal, unable to digest the little she did eat. She had violent palpitations of the heart, and she lived in a constant and intolerable state of nervous excitement. One evening, when the thermometer was sinking still lower, Julien shivered as he left the dinner table (for the dining-room was never sufficiently heated, so careful was he over the wood), and rubbing his hands together: “It’s too cold to sleep alone to-night, isn’t it, darling?” he whispered to his wife, with one of his old good-tempered laughs. Jeanne threw her arms round his neck, but she felt so ill, so nervous, and she had such aching pains that evening, that, with her lips close to his, she begged him to let her sleep alone. “I feel so ill to-night,” she said, “but I am sure to be better tomorrow.” “Just as you please, my dear,” he answered. “If you are ill, you must take care of yourself.” And he began to talk of something else. Jeanne went to bed early. Julien, for a wonder, ordered a fire to be lighted in his own room; and when the servant came to tell him that “the fire had burnt up,” he kissed his wife on the forehead and said good-night. The very walls seemed to feel the cold, and made little cracking noises as if they were shivering. Jeanne lay shaking with cold; twice she got up to put more logs on the fire, and to pile her petticoats and dresses on the bed, but nothing seemed to make her any warmer. There were nervous twitchings in her legs, which made her toss and turn restlessly from side to side. Her feet were numbed, her teeth chattered, her hands trembled, her heart beat so slowly that sometimes it seemed to stop altogether; and she gasped for breath as if she could not draw the air into her lungs. As the cold crept higher and higher up her limbs, she was seized with a terrible fear. She had never felt like this before; life seemed to be gradually slipping away from her, and she thought each breath she drew would be her last. “I am going to die! I am going to die!” she thought; and, in her terror, she jumped out of bed, and rang for Rosalie. No one came; she rang again, and again waited for an answer, shuddering and half-frozen; but she waited in vain. Perhaps the maid was sleeping too heavily for the bell to arouse her, and, almost beside herself with fear, Jeanne rushed out onto the landing without putting anything around her, and with bare feet. She went noiselessly up the dark stairs, felt for Rosalie’s door, opened it, and called “Rosalie!” then went into the room, stumbled against the bed, passed her hands over it, and found it empty and quite cold, as if no one had slept in it that night. “Surely she cannot have gone out in such weather as this,” she thought. Her heart began to beat so violently that it almost suffocated her, and she went downstairs to rouse Julien, her legs giving way under her as she walked. She burst open her husband’s door, and hurried across the room, spurred on by the idea that she was going to die and the fear that she would become unconscious before she could see him again. Suddenly she stopped with a shriek, for by the light of the dying fire she saw Rosalie’s head on the pillow beside her husband’s. At her cry they both started up, but she had already recovered from the first shock of her discovery, and fled to her room, while Julien called after her, “Jeanne! Jeanne!” She felt she could not see him or listen to his excuses and his lies, and again rushing out of her room she ran downstairs. The staircase was in total darkness, but filled with the desire of flight, of getting away without seeing or hearing any more, she never stayed to think that she might fall and break her limbs on the stone stairs. On the last step she sat down, unable to think, unable to reason, her head in a whirl. Julien had jumped out of bed, and was hastily dressing himself. She heard him moving about, and she started up to escape from him. He came downstairs, crying: “Jeanne, do listen to me!” No, she would not listen; he should not degrade her by his touch. She dashed into the dining-room as if a murderer were pursuing her, looked round for a hiding-place or some dark corner where she might conceal herself, and then crouched down under the table. The door opened, and Julien came in with a light in his hand, still calling, “Jeanne! Jeanne!” She started off again like a hunted hare, tore into the kitchen, round which she ran twice like some wild animal at bay, then, as he was getting nearer and nearer to her, she suddenly flung open the garden door, and rushed out into the night. Her bare legs sank into the snow up to her knees, and this icy contact gave her new strength. Although she had nothing on but her chemise she did not feel the bitter cold; her mental anguish was too great for the consciousness of any mere bodily pain to reach her brain, and she ran on and on, looking as white as the snow-covered earth. She did not stop once to take breath, but rushed on across wood and plain without knowing or thinking of what she was doing. Suddenly she found herself at the edge of the cliff. She instinctively stopped short, and then crouched down in the snow and lay there with her mind as powerless to think as her body to move. All at once she began to tremble, as does a sail when caught by the wind. Her arms, her hands, her feet, shook and twitched convulsively, and consciousness returned to her. Things that had happened a long time before came back to her memory; the sail in Lastique’s boat with him, their conversation, the dawn of their love; the christening of the boat; then her thoughts went still farther back till they reached the night of her arrival from the convent — the night she had spent in happy dreams. And now, now! Her life was ruined; she had had all her pleasure; there were no joys, no happiness, in store for her; and she could see the terrible future with all its tortures, its deceptions, and despair. Surely it would be better to die now, at once. She heard a voice in the distance crying: “This way! this way! Here are her footmarks!” It was Julien looking for her. Oh! she could not, she would not, see him again! Never again! From the abyss before her came the faint sound of the waves as they broke on the rocks. She stood up to throw herself over the cliff, and in a despairing farewell to life, she moaned out that last cry of the dying — the word that the soldier gasps out as he lies wounded to death on the battlefield — “Mother!” Then the thought of how her mother would sob when she heard of her daughter’s death, and how her father would kneel in agony beside her mangled corpse, flashed across her mind, and in that one second she realized all the bitterness of their grief. She fell feebly back on the snow, and Julien and old Simon came up, with Marius behind them holding a lantern. They drew her back before they dared attempt to raise her, so near the edge of the cliff was she; and they did with her what they liked, for she could not move a muscle. She knew that they carried her indoors, that she was put to bed, and rubbed with hot flannels, and then she was conscious of nothing more. A nightmare — but was it a nightmare? — haunted her. She thought she was in bed in her own room; it was broad daylight, but she could not get up, though she did not know why she could not. She heard a noise on the boards — a scratching, rustling noise — and all at once a little gray mouse ran over the sheet. Then another one appeared, and another which came running towards her chest. Jeanne was not frightened; she wanted to take hold of the little animal, and put out her hand towards it, but she could not catch it. Then came more mice — ten, twenty, hundreds, thousands, sprang up on all sides. They ran up the bed-posts, and along the tapestry, and covered the whole bed. They got under the clothes, and Jeanne could feel them gliding over her skin, tickling her legs, running up and down her body. She could see them coming from the foot of the bed to get inside and creep close to her breast, but when she struggled and stretched out her hands to catch one, she always clutched the air. Then she got angry, and cried out, and wanted to run away; she fancied someone held her down, and that strong arms were thrown around her to prevent her moving, but she could not see anyone. She had no idea of the time that all this lasted; she only knew that it seemed a very long while. At last she became conscious again — conscious that she was tired and aching, and yet better than she had been. She felt very, very weak. She looked round, and did not feel at all surprised to see her mother sitting by her bedside with a stout man whom she did not know. She had forgotten how old she was, and thought she was a little child again, for her memory was entirely gone. “See, she is conscious,” said the stout man. The baroness began to cry, and the big man said: “Come, come, madame le baronne; I assure you there is no longer any danger, but you must not talk to her; just let her sleep.” It seemed to Jeanne that she lay for a long time in a doze, which became a heavy sleep if she tried to think of anything. She had a vague idea that the past contained something dreadful, and she was content to lie still without trying to recall anything to her memory. But one day, when she opened her eyes, she saw Julien standing beside the bed, and the curtain which hid everything from her was suddenly drawn aside, and she remembered what had happened. She threw back the clothes and sprang out of bed to escape from her husband; but as soon as her feet touched the floor she fell to the ground, for she was too weak to stand. Julien hastened to her assistance, but when he attempted to raise her, she shrieked and rolled from side to side to avoid the contact of his hands. The door opened, and Aunt Lison and the Widow Dentu hurried in, closely followed by the baron and his wife, the latter gasping for breath. They put Jeanne to bed again, and she closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep that she might think undisturbed. Her mother and aunt busied themselves around her, saying from time to time: “Do you know us now, Jeanne, dear?” She pretended not to hear them, and made no answer; and in the evening they went away, leaving her to the care of the nurse. She could not sleep all that night, for she was painfully trying to connect the incidents she could remember, one with the other; but there seemed to be gaps in her memory which she could not bridge over. Little by little, however, all the facts came back to her, and then she tried to decide what she had better do. She must have been very ill, or her mother and Aunt Lison and the baron would not have been sent for; but what had Julien said? Did her parents know everything? And where was Rosalie? The only thing she could do was to go back to Rouen with her father and mother; they could all live there together as they used to do, and it would be just the same as if she had not been married. The next day she noticed and listened to all that went on around her, but she did not let anyone see that she understood everything and had recovered her full senses. Towards evening, when no one but the baroness was in her room, Jeanne whispered softly: “Mother, dear!” She was surprised to hear how changed her own voice was, but the baroness took her hands, exclaiming: “My child! my dear little Jeanne! Do you know me, my pet?” “Yes, mother. But you mustn’t cry; I want to talk to you seriously. Did Julien tell you why I ran out into the snow?” “Yes, my darling. You have had a very dangerous fever.” “That was not the reason, mamma; I had the fever afterwards. Hasn’t he told you why I tried to run away, and what was the cause of the fever?” “No, dear.” “It was because I found Rosalie in his bed.” The baroness thought she was still delirious, and tried to soothe her. “There, there, my darling; lie down and try to go to sleep.” But Jeanne would not be quieted. “I am not talking nonsense now, mamma dear, though I dare say I have been lately,” she said. “I felt very ill one night, and I got up and went to Julien’s room; there I saw Rosalie lying beside him. My grief nearly drove me mad, and I ran out into the snow, meaning to throw myself over the cliff.” “Yes, darling, you have been ill; very ill indeed,” answered the baroness. “It wasn’t that, mamma. I found Rosalie in Julien’s bed, and I will not stay with him any longer. You shall take me back to Rouen with you.” The doctor had told the baroness to let Jeanne have her own way in everything, so she answered: “Very well, my pet.” Jeanne began to lose patience. “I see you don’t believe me,” she said pettishly. “Go and find papa; perhaps he’ll manage to understand that I am speaking the truth.” The baroness rose slowly to her feet, dragged herself out of the room with the aid of two sticks, and came back in a few minutes with the baron. They sat down by the bedside, and Jeanne began to speak in her weak voice. She spoke quite coherently, and she told them all about Julien’s odd ways, his harshness, his avarice, and, lastly, his infidelity. The baron could see that her mind was not wandering, but he hardly knew what to say or think. He affectionately took her hand, like he used to do when she was a child and he told her fairy tales to send her to sleep. “Listen, my dear,” he said. “We must not do anything rashly. Don’t let us say anything till we have thought it well over. Will you promise me to try and bear with your husband until we have decided what is best to be done?” “Very well,” she answered; “but I will not stay here after I get well.” Then she added, in a whisper: “Where is Rosalie now?” “You shall not see her any more,” replied the baron. But she persisted: “Where is she? I want to know.” He owned that she was still in the house, but he declared she should go at once. Directly he left Jeanne’s room, his heart full of pity for his child and indignation against her husband, the baron went to find Julien, and said to him sternly: “Monsieur, I have come to ask for an explanation of your behavior to my daughter. You have not only been false to her, but you have deceived her with your servant, which makes your conduct doubly infamous.” Julien swore he was innocent of such a thing, and called heaven to witness his denial. What proof was there? Jeanne was just recovering from brain fever, and of course her thoughts were still confused. She had rushed out in the snow one night at the beginning of her illness, in a fit of delirium, and how could her statement be believed when, on the very night that she said she had surprised her maid in her husband’s bed, she was dashing over the house nearly naked, and quite unconscious of what she was doing! Julien got very angry, and threatened the baron with an action if he did not withdraw his accusation; and the baron, confused by this indignant denial, began to make excuses and to beg his son-inlaw’s pardon; but Julien refused to take his outstretched hand. Jeanne did not seem vexed when she heard what her husband had said. “He is telling a lie, papa,” she said, quietly; “but we will force him to own the truth.” For two days she lay silent, turning over all sorts of things in her mind; on the third morning she asked for Rosalie. The baron refused to let the maid go up and told Jeanne that she had left. But Jeanne insisted on seeing her, and said: “Send someone to fetch her, then.” When the doctor came she was very excited because they would not let her see the maid, and they told him what was the matter. Jeanne burst into tears and almost shrieked: “I will see her! I will see her!” The doctor took her hand and said in a low voice: “Calm yourself, madame. Any violent emotion might have very serious results just now, for you are enceinte .” Jeanne’s tears ceased directly; even as the doctor spoke she fancied she could feel a movement within her, and she lay still, paying no attention to what was being said or done around her. She could not sleep that night; it seemed so strange to think that within her was another life, and she felt sorry because it was Julien’s child, and full of fears in case it should resemble its father. The next morning she sent for the baron. “Papa, dear,” she said, “I have made up my mind to know the whole truth; especially now. You hear, I will know it, and you know, you must let me do as I like, because of my condition. Now listen; go and fetch M. le curé; he must be here to make Rosalie tell the truth. Then, as soon as he is here, you must send her up to me, and you and mamma must come too; but, whatever you do, don’t let Julien know what is going on.” The priest came about an hour afterwards. He was fatter than ever, and panted quite as much as the baroness. He sat down in an armchair and began joking, while he wiped his forehead with his checked handkerchief from sheer habit. “Well, Madame la baronne, I don’t think we are either of us getting thinner; in my opinion we make a very handsome pair.” Then turning to the invalid, he said: “Ah, ah! my young lady, I hear we’re soon to have a christening, and that it won’t be the christening of a boat either, this time, ha, ha, ha!” Then he went on in a grave voice, “It will be one more defender for the country, or,” after a short silence, “another good wife and mother like you, madame,” with a bow to the baroness. The door flew open and there stood Rosalie, crying, struggling, and refusing to move, while the baron tried to push her in. At last he gave her a sudden shake, and threw her into the room with a jerk, and she stood in the middle of the floor, with her face in her hands, sobbing violently. Jeanne started up as white as a sheet, and her heart could be seen beating under her thin nightdress. It was some time before she could speak, but at last she gasped out: “There — there — is no — need for me to — question you. Your confusion in my presence — is — is quite sufficient — proof — of your guilt.” She stopped for a few moments for want of breath, and then went on again: “But I wish to know all. You see that M. le curé is here, so you understand you will have to answer as if you were at confession.” Rosalie had not moved from where the baron had pushed her; she made no answer, but her sobs became almost shrieks. The baron, losing all patience with her, seized her hands, drew them roughly from her face and threw her on her knees beside the bed, saying: “Why don’t you say something? Answer your mistress.” She crouched down on the ground in the position in which Mary Magdalene is generally depicted; her cap was on one side, her apron on the floor, and as soon as her hands were free she again buried her face in them. “Come, come, my girl,” said the curé, “we don’t want to do you any harm, but we must know exactly what has happened. Now listen to what is asked you and answer truthfully.” Jeanne was leaning over the side of the bed, looking at the girl. “Is it not true that I found you in Julien’s bed?” she asked. “Yes, madame,” moaned out Rosalie through her fingers. At that the baroness burst into tears also, and the sound of her sobs mingled with the maid’s. “How long had that gone on?” asked Jeanne, her eyes fixed on the maid. “Ever since he came here,” stammered Rosalie. “Since he came here,” repeated Jeanne, hardly understanding what the words meant. “Do you mean since — since the spring?” “Yes, madame.” “Since he first came to the house?” “Yes, madame.” “But how did it happen? How did he come to say anything to you about it?” burst out Jeanne, as if she could keep back the questions no longer. “Did he force you, or did you give yourself to him? How could you do such a thing?” “I don’t know,” answered Rosalie, taking her hands from her face and speaking as if the words were forced from her by an irresistible desire to talk and to tell all. “The day he dined ’ere for the first time, ‘e came up to my room. He ‘ad ‘idden in the garret and I dursn’t cry out for fear of what everyone would say. He got into my bed, and I dunno’ how it was or what I did, but he did just as ‘e liked with me. I never said nothin’ about it because I thought he was nice.” “But your — your child? Is it his?” cried Jeanne. “Yes, madame,” answered Rosalie, between her sobs. Then neither said anything more, and the silence was only broken by the baroness’s and Rosalie’s sobs. The tears rose to Jeanne’s eyes, and flowed noiselessly down her cheeks. So her maid’s child had the same father as her own! All her anger had evaporated and in its place was a dull, gloomy, deep despair. After a short silence she said in a softer, tearful voice. “After we returned from — from our wedding tour — when did he begin again?” “The — the night you came back,” answered the maid, who was now almost lying on the floor. Each word rung Jeanne’s heart. He had actually left her for this girl the very night of their return to Les Peuples! That, then, was why he had let her sleep alone. She had heard enough now; she did not want to know anything more, and she cried to the girl: “Go away! go away!” As Rosalie, overcome by her emotion, did not move, she called to her father: “Take her away! Carry her out of the room!” But the curé, who had said nothing up to now, thought the time had come for a little discourse. “You have behaved very wickedly,” he said to Rosalie, “very wickedly indeed, and the good God will not easily forgive you. Think of the punishment which awaits you if you do not live a better life henceforth. Now you are young is the time to train yourself in good ways. No doubt Madame la baronne will do something for you, and we shall be able to find you a husband — ” He would have gone on like this for a long time had not the baron seized Rosalie by the shoulders, dragged her to the door and thrown her into the passage like a bundle of clothes. When he came back, looking whiter even than his daughter, the curé began again: “Well, you know, all the girls round here are the same. It is a very bad state of things, but it can’t be helped, and we must make a little allowance for the weakness of human nature. They never marry until they are enceintes; never, madame. One might almost call it a local custom,” he added, with a smile. Then he went on indignantly: “Even the children are the same. Only last year I found a little boy and girl from my class in the cemetery together. I told their parents, and what do you think they replied: ‘Well, M’sieu l’curé, we didn’t teach it them; we can’t help it.’ So you see, monsieur, your maid has only done like the others — ” “The maid!” interrupted the baron, trembling with excitement. “The maid! What do I care about her? It’s Julien’s conduct which I think so abominable, and I shall certainly take my daughter away with me.” He walked up and down the room, getting more and more angry with every step he took. “It is infamous the way he has deceived my daughter, infamous! He’s a wretch, a villain, and I will tell him so to his face. I’ll horsewhip him within an inch of his life.” The curé was slowly enjoying a pinch of snuff as he sat beside the baroness, and thinking how he could make peace. “Come now, M. le baron, between ourselves he has only done like everyone else. I am quite sure you don’t know many husbands who are faithful to their wives, do you now?” And he added in a sly, good-natured way: “I bet you, yourself, have played your little games; you can’t say conscientiously that you haven’t, I know. Why, of course you have! And who knows but what you have made the acquaintance of some little maid just like Rosalie. I tell you every man is the same. And your escapades didn’t make your wife unhappy, or lessen your affection for her; did they?” The baron stood still in confusion. It was true that he had done the same himself, and not only once or twice, but as often as he had got the chance; his wife’s presence in the house had never made any difference, when the servants were pretty. And was he a villain because of that? Then why should he judge Julien’s conduct so severely when he had never thought that any fault could be found with his own? Though her tears were hardly dried, the idea of her husband’s pranks brought a slight smile to the baroness’s lip, for she was one of those good-natured, tender-hearted, sentimental women to whom love adventures are an essential part of existence. Jeanne lay back exhausted, thinking, with open unseeing eyes, of all this painful episode. The expression that had wounded her most in Rosalie’s confession was: “I never said anything about it because I thought he was nice.” She, his wife, had also thought him “nice,” and that was the sole reason why she had united herself to him for life, had given up every other hope, every other project to join her destiny to his. She had plunged into marriage, into this pit from which there was no escape, into all this misery, this grief, this despair, simply because, like Rosalie, she had thought him “nice.” The door was flung violently open and Julien came in, looking perfectly wild with rage. He had seen Rosalie moaning on the landing, and guessing that she had been forced to speak, he had come to see what was going on; but at the sight of the priest he was taken thoroughly aback. “What is it? What is the matter?” he asked, in a voice which trembled in spite of his efforts to make it sound calm. The baron, who had been so violent just before, dared say nothing after the curé‘s argument, in case his son-inlaw should quote his own example; the baroness only wept more bitterly than before, and Jeanne raised herself on her hands and looked steadily at this man who was causing her so much sorrow. Her breath came and went quickly, but she managed to answer: “The matter is that we know all about your shameful conduct ever since — ever since the day you first came here; we know that — that — Rosalie’s child is yours — like — like mine, and that they will be — brothers.” Her grief became so poignant at this thought that she hid herself under the bedclothes and sobbed bitterly. Julien stood open-mouthed, not knowing what to say or do. The curé again interposed. “Come, come, my dear young lady,” he said, “you mustn’t give way like that. See now, be reasonable.” He rose, went to the bedside, and laid his cool hand on this despairing woman’s forehead. His simple touch seemed to soothe her wonderfully; she felt calmer at once, as if the large hand of this country priest, accustomed to gestures of absolution and sympathy, had borne with it some strange, peace-giving power. “Madame, we must always forgive,” said the good-natured priest. “You are borne down by a great grief, but God, in His mercy, has also sent you a great joy, since He has permitted you to have hopes of becoming a mother. This child will console you for all your trouble and it is in its name that I implore, that I adjure, you to forgive M. Julien. It will be a fresh tie between you, a pledge of your husband’s future fidelity. Can you steel your heart against the father of your unborn child?” Too weak to feel either anger or resentment, and only conscious of a crushed, aching, exhausted sensation, she made no answer. Her nerves were thoroughly unstrung, and she clung to life but by a very slender thread. The baroness, to whom resentment seemed utterly impossible and whose mind was simply incapable of bearing any prolonged strain, said in a low tone: “Come, Jeanne!” The curé drew Julien close to the bed and placed his hand in his wife’s, giving it a little tap as if to make the union more complete. Then, dropping his professional pulpit tone, he said, with a satisfied air: “There! that’s done. Believe me, it is better so.” The two hands, united thus for an instant, loosed their clasp directly. Julien, not daring to embrace Jeanne, kissed his mother-inlaw, then turned on his heel, took the baron (who, in his heart, was not sorry that everything had finished so quietly) by the arm, and drew him from the room to go and smoke a cigar. Then the tired invalid went to sleep and the baroness and the priest began to chat in low tones. The abbé talked of what had just occurred and proceeded to explain his ideas on the subject, while the baroness assented to everything he said with a nod. “Very well, then, it’s understood,” he said, in conclusion. “You give the girl the farm at Barville and I will undertake to find her a good, honest husband. Oh, you may be sure that with twenty thousand francs we shall not want candidates for her hand. We shall have an embarras de choix.” The baroness was smiling happily now, though two tears still lingered on her cheeks. “Barville is worth twenty thousand francs, at the very least,” she said; “and you understand that it is to be settled on the child though the parents will have it as long as they live.” Then the curé shook hands with the baroness, and rose to go. “Don’t get up, Madame la baronne, don’t get up,” he exclaimed. “I know the value of a step too well myself.” As he went out he met Aunt Lison coming to see her patient. She did not notice that anything extraordinary had happened. No one had told her anything, and, as usual, she had not the slightest idea of what was going on.