第6章

In those days a sort of diligence with the mails for Olette passed through Prades early in the morning,and a conveyance was sent from Vernet to bring Adolphe to the baths.Never was prince or princess expected with more anxiety.Madame Bauche was up and dressed long before the hour,and was heard to say five several times that she was sure he would not come.The capitaine was out and on the high road,moving about with his wooden leg,as perpendicular as a lamp-post and almost as black.Marie also was up,but nobody had seen her.She was up and had been out about the place before any of them were stirring;but now that the world was on the move she lay hidden like a hare in its form.

And then the old char-a-banc clattered up to the door,and Adolphe jumped out of it into his mother's arms.He was fatter and fairer than she had last seen him,had a larger beard,was more fashionably clothed,and certainly looked more like a man.Marie also saw him out of her little window,and she thought that he looked like a god.

Was it probable,she said to herself,that one so godlike would still care for her?

The mother was delighted with her son,who rattled away quite at his ease.He shook hands very cordially with the capitaine--of whose intended alliance with his own sweetheart he had been informed,and then as he entered the house with his hand under his mother's arm,he asked one question about her."And where is Marie?"said he.

"Marie!oh upstairs;you shall see her after breakfast,"said La Mere Bauche.And so they entered the house,and went in to breakfast among the guests.Everybody had heard something of the story,and they were all on the alert to see the young man whose love or want of love was considered to be of so much importance.

"You will see that it will be all right,"said the capitaine,carrying his head very high.

"I think so,I think so,"said La Mere Bauche,who,now that the capitaine was right,no longer desired to contradict him.

"I know that it will be all right,"said the capitaine."I told you that Adolphe would return a man;and he is a man.Look at him;he does not care this for Marie Clavert;"and the capitaine,with much eloquence in his motion,pitched over a neighbouring wall a small stone which he held in his hand.

And then they all went to breakfast with many signs of outward joy.

And not without some inward joy;for Madame Bauche thought she saw that her son was cured of his love.In the mean time Marie sat up stairs still afraid to show herself.

"He has come,"said a young girl,a servant in the house,running up to the door of Marie's room.

"Yes,"said Marie;"I could see that he has come.""And,oh,how beautiful he is!"said the girl,putting her hands together and looking up to the ceiling.Marie in her heart of hearts wished that he was not half so beautiful,as then her chance of having him might be greater.

"And the company are all talking to him as though he were the prefet,"said the girl.

"Never mind who is talking to him,"said Marie;"go away,and leave me--you are wanted for your work."Why before this was he not talking to her?Why not,if he were really true to her?Alas,it began to fall upon her mind that he would be false!And what then?

What should she do then?She sat still gloomily,thinking of that other spouse that had been promised to her.

As speedily after breakfast as was possible Adolphe was invited to a conference in his mother's private room.She had much debated in her own mind whether the capitaine should be invited to this conference or no.For many reasons she would have wished to exclude him.She did not like to teach her son that she was unable to manage her own affairs,and she would have been well pleased to make the capitaine understand that his assistance was not absolutely necessary to her.

But then she had an inward fear that her green spectacles would not now be as efficacious on Adolphe,as they had once been,in old days,before he had seen the world and become a man.It might be necessary that her son,being a man,should be opposed by a man.So the capitaine was invited to the conference.

What took place there need not be described at length.The three were closeted for two hours,at the end of which time they came forth together.The countenance of Madame Bauche was serene and comfortable;her hopes of ultimate success ran higher than ever.The face of the capitaine was masked,as are always the faces of great diplomatists;he walked placid and upright,raising his wooden leg with an ease and skill that was absolutely marvellous.But poor Adolphe's brow was clouded.Yes,poor Adolphe!for he was poor in spirit,he had pledged himself to give up Marie,and to accept the liberal allowance which his mother tendered him;but it remained for him now to communicate these tidings to Marie herself.

"Could not you tell her?"he had said to his mother,with very little of that manliness in his face on which his mother now so prided herself.But La Mere Bauche explained to him that it was a part of the general agreement that Marie was to hear his decision from his own mouth.

"But you need not regard it,"said the capitaine,with the most indifferent air in the world."The girl expects it.Only she has some childish idea that she is bound till you yourself release her.

I don't think she will be troublesome."Adolphe at that moment did feel that he should have liked to kick the capitaine out of his mother's house.

And where should the meeting take place?In the hall of the bath-house,suggested Madame Bauche;because,as she observed,they could walk round and round,and nobody ever went there at that time of day.

But to this Adolphe objected;it would be so cold and dismal and melancholy.

The capitaine thought that Mere Bauche's little parlour was the place;but La Mere herself did not like this.They might be overheard,as she well knew;and she guessed that the meeting would not conclude without some sobs that would certainly be bitter and might perhaps be loud.