Volume II Part 46 (1/2)
La Louve shrugged her shoulders.
”Do you think he would take me for his wife?”
”Except his poaching, has he ever committed any other culpable action?”
”No; he is a poacher on the river, as he was in the woods; and he is right. Are not fish, like game, the property of those who can take them? Where is the mark of their owner?”
”Well, suppose, having renounced this, he wishes to become an honest man; suppose that he inspired, by the frankness of his good resolutions, enough confidence in an unknown benefactor to be given a place--as gamekeeper, for instance. To a poacher, it would be to his liking. It is the same trade, only lawful.”
”Lord! yes; it is life in the woods.”
”Only this place would be given to him on the sole condition that he would marry you and take you with him.”
”I go with Martial?”
”Yes; you would be happy, you say, to live together in a forest. Would you not like better, instead of a miserable poacher's hut where you would hide yourselves like criminals, to have a nice little cottage, of which you should be the active, industrious housekeeper?”
”You make fun of me. Can this be possible?”
[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SCAFFOLD]
”Who knows? though it is only a castle.”
”Ah, true; very well.”
”I say, La Louve, it seems to me I already see you established in your cottage in the forest, with your husband, and two or three children.
What happiness!”
”Children! Martial!” cried La Louve; ”oh, yes, they would be _proudly_ loved.”
”How much company they would be for you in your solitude. Then, when they began to grow up, they could render you some a.s.sistance. The smallest could pick up the dead branches for your fire; the largest could drive to pasture the cow which has been given to your husband for his activity; for, having been a poacher himself, he would make all the better gamekeeper.”
”Just so; that's true. Ah, these castles in the air are amusing. Tell me some more, La Goualeuse.”
”They will be very much pleased with your husband. You will receive from his master some presents; a nice garden. But marry! you will have to work, La Louve, from morning to night.” ”Oh, if that was all, once along with Martial, work wouldn't make me afraid. I have strong arms.”
”And you would have enough to occupy them, I answer for it. There is so much to do. There are the meals to prepare, clothes to mend; one day the was.h.i.+ng, another day the baking, or the house to clean from top to bottom; so that the other gamekeepers would say, 'Oh, there is not a housekeeper like Martial's wife; from cellar to garret her house is as nice as a new pin; and the children always so neat and clean. It is because she is so industrious.'”
”Tell me, La Goualeuse, is it true I would be called Madame Martial?”
”It is a great deal better than to be called La Louve, is it not?”
”Certainly; I prefer the name of any man to the name of a beast. But, bah! bah! wolf I am born, and wolf I shall die.”
”Who knows? Do not recoil from a hard but honest life that brings happiness. So, work would not alarm you?”
”Oh, no.”
”And then, besides, it is not all labor: there are moments of repose.
In the winter evenings, while your children are asleep, and your husband smoking his pipe, cleaning his gun, or caressing his dogs, you could have a nice quiet time.”