Part 26 (1/2)
”If you would like to have her removed to the hospital at Liege,” continued the doctor, doubtfully, ”it might still be done. It may injure your business to have her here. Still, as you say she is your niece----”
”As I say she is my niece,” returned Jeanne-Marie, abruptly, ”it is not likely I should turn her out of the house, and that is enough. My business will take care of itself. And now tell me what I am to do, doctor?”
He prescribed for Madelon, said he would call again, and left the house, pondering on the woman who kept so apart from her neighbours, and on her small visitor, who he knew well enough was not her niece, for had not Jacques Monnier told him how Jeanne-Marie had suddenly come in out of the rain, carrying the girl in her arms, and had taken her upstairs without a word of explanation?
”There is a mystery somewhere,” thought the doctor; ”but it is no concern of mine.” And so he went his way to visit his next patient.
Jeanne-Marie had no fears concerning the doctor's discretion; he was a man too busy in his scattered district to have much time or inclination for gossip. But she had far less confidence in Jacques Monnier's wisdom, and thought it not inexpedient to go downstairs, after the doctor's departure, and give her customer a word of exhortation. He was seated at the table as before, twirling the gla.s.s in his fingers, and gazing vacantly out of window.
”Well, Jacques,” said Jeanne-Marie, ”and what did you tell the doctor?”
”I told him what you told me,” said the man, in a surly voice.
”What was that?”
”That your niece was ill, and that he was to come and see her.”
”Was that all?”
No answer.
”Was that all?” repeated Jeanne-Marie. ”_Allons_, Jacques, don't keep me waiting. I will know what you said to the doctor.”
Jacques, who under other circ.u.mstances might have met this imperative mode of questioning by dogged silence, or an evasive answer, was too uncertain as to what the doctor himself might have repeated to Jeanne-Marie, to attempt equivocation.
”I told him,” he said, slowly and reluctantly, ”that it was a queer thing you should have picked up your niece in the street, and that I didn't believe she was your niece at all; and no more I do, Jeanne-Marie,” he added, gaining courage as he spoke.
”Ah! you told him that?” said the woman. ”Well, look you, Jacques, if I find you saying any such thing again, this is the very last time you cross my door-step, and that account of yours will have to be paid in full next week. You understand?”
”Oh! yes, I understand well enough,” he answered sulkily; ”but if I hold my tongue the neighbours will talk; I am not the only person who saw you come through the street, I will answer for it.”
”Who said I came through the village at all? And what does it matter to you what the neighbours say?” retorted Jeanne-Marie, ”attend to what I say--that is enough for you, Jacques--and if you do hear anyone say anything about the child upstairs, tell them it is my niece come on a visit, and not a word more; otherwise you understand----”
”Oh! yes, I understand,” he repeated grumbling, ”but what do I care? Yours is not the only wine to be had in Le Trooz----”
”Bah!” was Jeanne-Marie's only answer, as she left the room.
She knew her customer too well to be in the least afraid of his carrying his implied threat into execution. Indeed, Jacques Monnier, who had no mind to be ousted from the convenient little restaurant, where he got good wine and long credit, acted upon the hints he had received, and stuck manfully to Jeanne-Marie's version of her adventure. And so it happened, that although for a day or two a few rumours were afloat in the village, they soon died away; and it was received as an established fact by those who cared to interest themselves in Jeanne-Marie's affairs, that it was her niece whom the doctor went to see so regularly. And so much apart did Jeanne-Marie keep from her neighbours, that the subject was soon half-forgotten, and Madelon's very existence seemed problematic, as she lay in the little upstairs room, and the woman who sheltered her, appeared to come and go about her business much the same as usual.
As for Jeanne-Marie, as soon as the house was quiet, on the evening of that day so eventful for our little Madelon, she sat down and wrote two letters: one she put into a large envelope, which she directed to a street in Paris; the other, inclosed in the first, was addressed to the Superior of the Convent at Liege, and the letters, with their Paris direction, were put into the post that very night.
CHAPTER XIV.
Madelon's Convalescence.
Madelon, if she had but known it, had small reason to apprehend any very vigorous pursuit on the part of the nuns.
There was, it is true, no small commotion in the convent, when Soeur Lucie, entering Madelon's cell the morning after her flight, found the empty room, the unslept-on bed. She did not indeed realize at first that the child had run away; but when, after inquiry and search through the whole convent, she found that nothing had been seen or heard of her, since she herself had quitted the cell the previous evening, then the whole truth became apparent, and a general sense of consternation pervaded the sisterhood. It was the enormity of the offence that struck them aghast, the boldness of the attempt, and its complete success. It was altogether a new idea to them that any one should wish to escape from those walls; an appalling one that any one should make such an attempt, and succeed.
Soeur Lucie, held responsible for Madelon, was summoned before the Superior, questioned, cross-questioned, and, amid tears and sobs, could only repeat that she had left her charge as usual, the evening before; and that, in the morning, going to her cell, had discovered that she had vanished; how, or when, or whither, she could not imagine. How she had escaped was indeed at first a mystery, which could not fail to rouse an eager curiosity in the sisters, and a not unpleasing excitement succeeded the first indignation, as, with one accord, they ran to examine Madelon's room. The window stood wide open, the branches of the climbing rose-trees were broken here and there, small footsteps could be traced on the flower- bed below. It was all that was needed to make their supposition a certainty--Madelon had run away.
This point settled, a calmer feeling began to prevail, and, as their first consternation subsided, the nuns began to reflect that after all worse things might have happened. If it had been one of themselves indeed, that would have been a very different matter; such a sin, such a scandal could not even be thought of without horror. But this little stray girl, who belonged to n.o.body, whom n.o.body had cared for, who had been a trouble ever since she had come, and who had been left a burthen and a responsibility on their hands--why should they concern themselves so much about her flight? No doubt she had made her escape to some friends she had known before she was brought to the convent, from no one knew where, two or three years ago. The nuns were not more averse than other people to the drawing of convenient conclusions from insufficient premises, and this theory of Madelon's having run away to her friends once started, every one was ready to add their mite of evidence in aid of its confirmation. Some thought she had possibly started for England--it was an Englishman who had brought her to the convent; others that she had friends in Paris--it certainly was from Paris she had come; one suggested one thing, and one another, and in the meantime, though inquiries were made, the search was neither very energetic nor very determined. When the evening came, it was generally felt to be rather a relief than otherwise that nothing had been heard of the small runaway. What could they do with her if she came back? No one felt disposed to put in a claim for her-- least of all Soeur Lucie, whom she had brought into terrible disgrace, and who had yet been really fond of the child, and who for months after had a pang in her kind little heart whenever she thought of her wayward charge. And so, when, two days later, a letter, with neither date nor signature, but bearing a Paris post-mark, arrived for the Superior, announcing that Mademoiselle Madeleine Linders was with friends, and that it was useless for any one to attempt to find her or reclaim her, for they had her in safe keeping, and would never consent to part with her, every one felt that the matter was arranged in the most satisfactory manner possible, and troubled themselves no more.