Part 33 (1/2)
Rose gave a little s.h.i.+ver. She could recall one time, the last, when Pierre had laid his hand on both her shoulders and drawn her to him, and she had wrenched herself away, every drop of blood within her rising up in protest.
”Don't you dare to touch me again, or I will kill you,” she had flung out with blazing eyes.
Then for weeks he had never so much as looked at her.
”Yes,” retrospectively. ”Why do people take likes the wrong way? Now if M. Boulle had----”
”It is said he was wild for love of you,” interposed Therese.
”That made the trouble. Miladi liked him so much. Therese, there is some kind of love we must have before you can put yourself in a man's hand, and let him take you to his home, where you must remain while life lasts. A whole long life, think of it! And if you wanted to get free the priest would forbid it. There would be nothing but to throw yourself into the river.”
Therese looked with frightened eyes at the impetuous girl.
”There is G.o.d to obey and serve. And if He sends you a good husband--M.
Boulle was brother to our dear Sieur's wife. It would have been an excellent marriage.”
”If it hadst only been thou!” Rose's short-lived pa.s.sion was over, and she was smiling.
”But you see, Mam'selle, they are strong Catholics. I follow my mother's faith, and we do not believe telling beads and saying prayers is all of the true service to the Lord. So it would never have done.”
Rose was minded to laugh at the grave, satisfied tone, and the placid face.
”I am not a good Catholic, either. I do not go to confession. I do not tell lies nor steal, and though I get in tempers, it is because people try me and insist that I should do what I know it would be wrong for me to do. I did not want any husband, and I said so.”
”But all girls hope to marry some time. I should like to have as good a husband as my mother has, and be as happy with him.”
”He is delightful,” admitted Rose. ”But your mother loved him.”
”He was chosen for her, and there was no good reason why she should not accept him. Yes, they have been very happy. But in France girls do not have a voice, and when the husband is chosen, they set themselves about making every act and thought of theirs agreeable.”
”But if he was--unworthy?”
”Few parents would choose an unworthy lover, I think. They have the good of their children at heart.”
Eustache Boulle had not been unworthy. He would have married her, nameless. Her heart turned suddenly tender toward him. She was learning that in the greater world there was a certain pride of birth, an honor in being well-born. She was better satisfied that she had not accepted Eustache. What if the Sieur had been opposed to it and Madame de Champlain frowned upon her?
And then the Sieur returned, but he came alone. The house in the Rue St.
Germain l'Auxerrois, with Madame Boulle, was more attractive than the roughness of a half-civilized country. Even then Helene plead for permission to become a lay sister in a convent, which would have meant a separation, but he would not agree to this. Ten years after his death she entered the Ursuline Convent, and some years later founded one in the town of Meaux, endowing it with most of her fortune. And though the next summer Eustache renewed his suit, he met with a firm refusal, and found the influence of his brother-in-law was against him.
Rose had been brave enough to lay the matter before him.
”Little one,” he said, in the most fatherly tone--”if thou dost not love a man enough to give him thy whole soul, except what belongs to G.o.d, to desire to spend thy life with him, to honor and serve him with the best thou hast, then do not marry him. It is a bitter thing for a man to go hungry for love, when a woman has promised to hold the cup of joy to his lips.”
Eustache then returned to France, and after a period of study and preparation, took holy orders, as a Friar.
CHAPTER XIV
A WAY OVER THORNS