Part 26 (1/2)

”Oh, madame, I do not say so. I have no positive reason for saying so.

She has told me nothing--”

”I should think not,” said Madame de Sainfoy, shortly.

Mademoiselle Moineau was dismissed back to her pupils, whom she found, under Henriette's surveillance, deep in the romance of French history.

Madame de Sainfoy crossed the pa.s.sage and tried Helene's door. It was not fastened, as she had half expected. Opening it quickly and gently, she found her daughter sitting in the window, as the governess had described her, with both arms stretched out upon its broad sill, and eyes fixed in a long wistful gaze on the small spire of the church at La Mariniere, and the screen of trees which partly hid the old manor buildings from view.

”What are you doing, Helene?” said Madame de Sainfoy.

Her voice, though low, was peremptory. The girl started up, turning her white face and tired eyes from the window. Her mother walked across the room and sat down in a high-backed chair close by.

”What a waste of time,” she said, ”to sit staring into vacancy! Why are you not reading history with your sisters, as I wished?”

”Mamma--my head aches,” said Helene.

”Then bathe it with cold water. What is the matter with you, child? You irritate me with your pale looks. Do you dislike Lancilly? Do you wish yourself back in Paris?”

”No, mamma.”

”I could excuse you if you did,” said Madame de Sainfoy, with a smile.

”I find the country insupportable myself, but you see, as the fates have preserved to us this rat-infested ruin, we must make the best of it. I set you an example, Helene. I interest myself in restoring and decorating. If you were to help me, time would not seem so long.”

She did not speak at all unkindly.

”I like the country. I like Lancilly much better than Paris,” said Helene.

There was a moment's gleam of pity in Madame de Sainfoy's bright blue eyes. Languid, sad, yet not rebellious or sulky, her beautiful girl stood drooping like a white lily in the stern old frame of the window.

The mother believed in discipline, and Helene's childhood and youth had been spent in an atmosphere of cold severity. Punishments would have been very frequent, if her father's rather spasmodic and inconsequent kindness had not stepped in to save her. She owed a good deal to her father, but these debts only hardened her mother against both of them.

Yet Madame de Sainfoy was not without a certain pride in the perfect form and features, the delicate, exquisite grace and distinction, which was one of these days to dazzle the Tuileries. On that, her resolution was firm and unchanging. _Tout va bien!_ One of these days the Emperor's command might be expected. With that confident certainty in the background, she felt she need not trouble herself much about her husband's objections or her daughter's fancies.

”You are a very difficult young woman, Helene,” she said, still not unkindly, and her eyes travelled with slow consideration over every detail as the girl stood there. ”I do not like that gown of yours,” she said. ”Don't wear it again. Give it to Jeanne--do you hear?”

”Must I? But it is not worn out, mamma. I would rather keep it,” the girl said quickly, stroking her soft blue folds, which were in truth a little faded.

Then she flushed suddenly, for what reason could she give for loving the old gown! Not, certainly, that she had worn it one day in the garden--one day when Mademoiselle Moineau went to sleep!

”You will do as I tell you,” said Madame de Sainfoy. Then she added with a slight laugh--”You are so fond of your own way, that I wonder you should object to being married. Do you think, perhaps, you would find a husband still more tyrannical?”

The girl shook her head. ”No,” she murmured.

”Then what is your reason? for you evidently intend not to be married at all.”

”I do not say that,” said Helene; and Madame de Sainfoy was conscious, with sudden anger, that once more the dreamy grey eyes travelled out of the open window, far away to those lines of poplars and clipped elms opposite.

”How different things were when I was young!” she said. ”My marriage with your father was arranged by our relations, without our meeting at all. I never saw him till everything was concluded. If I had disliked him, I could neither have said nor done anything.”

”That was before the Revolution,” said Helene, with a faint smile.

”Indeed you are very much mistaken,” her mother said quickly, ”if you think the Revolution has altered the manners of society. It may have done good in some ways--I believe it did--but in teaching young people that they could disobey their parents, it did nothing but harm. And it deceived them, too. As long as our nation lasts, marriages will be arranged by those who know best. In your case, but for your father's absurd indulgence, you would have been married months ago. However, these delays cannot last for ever. I think you will not refuse the next marriage that is offered you.”