Part 7 (1/2)
”You will be able to bring some here; it would be amusing!”
Jean did not answer. Madame Oberle blushed, as she often did when a word too much had been said before her. Lucienne was laughing again, when the grandfather stopped eating, and painfully, by jerks, each of which must have been painful, turned his sad, white head towards his grand-daughter. The eyes of the old Alsatian must have spoken a language very easy to translate, for the young girl ceased laughing, made a gesture of impatience as if she said, ”Oh! I did not remember that you were here,” and bent towards her father to offer him some Wolxheim wine, but really to escape the reproach she felt weighing on her.
The three others, M. Joseph Oberle, Jean, and his mother, as if they were agreed not to prolong the incident, began to talk of the service, men at the St. Nicolas barracks, but hurriedly, multiplying their words and their signs of interest with useless gestures.
No one dared raise his head in the direction of the grandfather. M.
Philippe Oberle continued to stare with his look as implacable as remorse, at his grand-daughter, guilty of a giddy and regrettable speech. The meal was shortened owing to the general awkwardness, which had become almost unbearable, when M. Philippe Oberle, begged by his daughter-in-law to forget what Lucienne had said, had answered ”No,” and refused to eat further.
Ten minutes later, Lucienne went into the alleys of the park, to rejoin her brother, who had gone out before and was lighting a cigar. Hearing her approach behind him, he turned round. She was no longer laughing. She had put on no hat, in spite of the wind, which disarranged her hair; but having thrown a shawl of white wool round her shoulders, no longer trying to charm but become all at once pa.s.sionate and domineering, she ran up to him.
”You saw it? It is intolerable!”
Jean lit his cigar, clasping his hands to protect the lighted match, then throwing away the glowing vesta.
”Without doubt, but one must learn to put up with it, little one.”
”There is no little one,” she interrupted quickly, ”there is a grown-up one, on the contrary, who wants to have a clear explanation with you. We have been separated for a long time, my dear, we must learn to know each other, for I hardly know you and you do not know me. I am going to help you--don't be afraid--I came for that.”
He had a look of admiration for this fine creature violently moved, who had deliberately come to him; then, without losing his calmness, feeling that his part and his man's honour commanded him to be judge and not to get excited in his turn, he began to walk along by the side of Lucienne, in the alley which ran between a clump of trees on one side and the lawn on the other.
”You can speak to me, Lucienne--you may be sure....”
”Of your discretion? I thank you. I do not want any this morning. I came simply to explain to you my way of thinking on a certain point, and I am not going to make any mystery about it. I repeat that it is intolerable. You may say nothing here about Germany or the Germans, if it is not something bad. As soon as one has a word of praise or only of justice for them mamma bites her lips, and grandfather makes a disgraceful scene and shames me in front of the servants, as happened just now. Is it a crime to say to a volunteer: 'You will bring us some officers to Alsheim'? Can we prevent you serving your turn in a German regiment, in a German town, commanded by officers who, in spite of being Germans, are not the less men of the world?”
She walked nervously, and with her right hand twisted a gold chain which she wore on her mauve bodice.
”If you knew, Jean, what I have suffered by this want of liberty in the house, to find our parents so different from what they have had us trained to be. For I ask, why did they give it to me?”
The young man took the cigar he was smoking from his lips:
”Our education, Lucienne? It was only our father who wished it.”
”He alone is intelligent.”
”Oh, how can you speak like that of your mother?”
”Understand clearly,” she answered, embarra.s.sed. ”I am not of those who hide one half of their thoughts and who make the others unrecognisable because of the flowery language they are wrapped up in. I love mamma very much more than you think, but I judge her also. She is possessed of intelligence as regards household affairs; she is refined; she has some little taste for literature, but she cannot deal intelligently with general questions. She does not see farther than Alsheim. My father has understood far better the position which is given us in Alsace; he has been enlightened by his intercourse, which is very wide and of all kinds, by his commercial interest and by his ambition....”
And as Jean made a questioning movement: ”What ambition do you mean?”
Lucienne continued: ”I surprise you; yes, for a young girl, as you said, I seem audacious and even irreverent. Is it not true?”
”A little.”
”My dear Jean, I am only antic.i.p.ating your own judgment--only hindering you from losing time in comparative psychological studies.
You have just come home, I left school two years and a half ago. I am letting you benefit by my experience. Well, there is no doubt about it: our father is ambitious. He has all that is necessary for success. A will of iron for his inferiors, much flexibility _vis-a-vis_ others, wealth, a quickness of mind which makes him the superior of all the manufacturers or German officials we meet here.
I prophesy you that now that he is in favour with the Stadthalter you will not be long in seeing him a candidate for the Reichstag.”
”That is impossible, Lucienne.”