Part 14 (2/2)
Agatha had had but little conversation with him since his last arrival at Durbelliere, but still she felt that he was about to propose to her.
She shunned him as much as she could; she scrupulously avoided the opportunity which he anxiously sought; she never allowed herself to be alone with him; but she was nevertheless sure the evil hour would come; she saw it in his eye as they sat together at their meals--she heard it in the tones of his voice every time he spoke. She knew from his manner that he was preparing himself for the interview, and she also knew that he would not submit tamely to the only answer she could bring herself to give him.
”Marie,” said she to her cousin, on the Sat.u.r.day evening, ”I am in the greatest distress, pray help me, dearest. I am sure you know what ails me.”
”In distress, Agatha, and wanting help from me!--you that are wont to help all the world yourself! But I know, from your face, you are only half in earnest.”
”Indeed, and indeed, I never was much more so. I never was more truly in want of council. Can you not guess what my sorrow is?”
”Not unless it is, that you have a lover too much?--or perhaps you find the baker's yeast runs short?”
”Ah, Marie, will you always joke when I am serious!”
”Well then, Agatha, now I am serious--is it that you have a lover too much?”
”Can any trouble be more grievous?”
”Oh, dear, yes! ten times worse. My case is ten times worse: and alas, alas! there is no cure for that.”
”Your case, Marie?”
”Yes, my case, Agatha--a lover too few!”
”Ah, Marie, do not joke with me tonight. I want your common sense, and not your wit, just now. Be a good, dear girl, and tell me what I shall say to him. I know he will not go to Saumur before--before he has proposed to me.”
”Then, in the name of common sense, dear Agatha, tell him the truth, whatever it may be.”
”You know I do not--cannot love him.”
”Nay, I know nothing. You have not said yet who 'him' is--but I own I can give a guess. I suppose poor Adolphe Denot is the man you cannot love? Poor Adolphe! he must be told so, that is all.”
”But how shall I tell him, Marie? He is so unlike other men. Henri is his friend, and yet he has never spoken to him about me, nor to my father. If he would ask my hand from Henri, as another would, Henri would talk to him, and explain to him that it could not be-that my heart is too much occupied with other cares, to care for loving or being loved.”
”That means, Agatha, till the right lover comes.”
”No, Marie; but till these wars are over. Not that I could ever love Adolphe Denot; but now, at present, methinks love should be banished from the country, and not allowed to return till the King is on his throne again.”
”Well, Agatha, I don't know. That would be somewhat hard upon us poor girls, whose lovers are more to our taste, than M. Denot is to yours.
I know not that our knights will fight the worse for a few stray smiles, though the times be so frightful.”
”Do you smile on yours then, Marie; and I will smile to see you happy.
But tell me, dearest, what shall I say to Adolphe? You would not have me give him hope, when I feel I can never love him?”
”G.o.d forbid!--why should you? But has he never spoken to Henri on the subject, or to the Marquis?”
”Never a word. I'm sure he never spoke of it to my father, and Henri told me that he had never said a word to him.”
<script>