Josephine cast a deprecating glance at her mother."Yes, my angel!"said the latter, "I was harsh.But we are no longer of one mind, and I suppose never shall be again.""Oh, yes, we shall.Be patient! Mother--you shall not leave Beaurepaire."The baroness colored faintly at these four last words of her daughter, and hung her head.
Josephine saw that, and darted to her and covered her with kisses.
That day the doctor scolded them both."You have put your mother into a high fever," said he; "here's a pulse; I do wish you would be more considerate."The commandant did not come to dinner as usual.The evening passed heavily; their hearts were full of uncertainty.
"We miss our merry, spirited companion," said the baroness with a grim look at Rose.Both young ladies assented with ludicrous eagerness.
That night Rose came and slept with Josephine, and more than once she awoke with a start and seized Josephine convulsively and held her tight.
Accused of egoism! at first her whole nature rose in arms against the charge: but, after a while, coming as it did from so revered a person, it forced her to serious self-examination.The poor girl said to herself, "Mamma is a shrewd woman.Am I after all deceiving myself? Would she be happy, and am I standing in the way?" In the morning she begged her sister to walk with her in the park, so that they might be safe from interruption.
There, she said sadly, she could not understand her own sister.
"Why are you so calm and cold, while am I in tortures of anxiety?
Have you made some resolve and not confided it to your Rose?""No, love," was the reply; "I am scarce capable of a resolution; Iam a mere thing that drifts."
"Let me put it in other words, then.How will this end?""I hardly know."
"Do you mean to marry Monsieur Raynal, then? answer me that.""No; but I should not wonder if he were to marry ME.""But you said 'no.'"
"Yes, I said 'no' once."
"And don't you mean to say it again, and again, and again, till kingdom come?""What is the use? you heard him say he would not desist any the more, and I care too little about the matter to go on persisting, and persisting, and persisting.""Why not, if he goes on pestering, and pestering, and pestering?""Ah, he is like you, all energy, at all hours; but I have so little where my heart is unconcerned: he seems, too, to have a wish! Ihave none either way, and my conscience says 'marry him!'""Your conscience say marry one man when you love another?""Heaven forbid! Rose, I love no one: I HAVE loved; but now my heart is dead and silent; only my conscience says, 'You are the cause of all your mother's trouble; you are the cause that Beaurepaire was sold.Now you can repair that mischief, and at the same time make a brave man happy, our benefactor happy.' It is a great temptation: Ihardly know why I said 'no' at all; surprise, perhaps--or to please you, pretty one."Rose groaned: "Are you then worth so little that you would throw yourself away on a man who does not love you, nor want you, and is quite as happy single?""No; not happy; he is only stout-hearted and good, and therefore content; and he is a character that it would be easy--in short, Ifeel my power here: I could make that man happy; he has nobody to write to even, when he is away--poor fellow!""I shall lose all patience," cried Rose; "you are at your old trick, thinking of everybody but yourself: I let you do it in trifles, but I love you too well to permit it when the happiness of your whole life is at stake.I must be satisfied on one point, or else this marriage shall never take place: just answer me this; if Camille Dujardin stood on one side, and Monsieur Raynal on the other, and both asked your hand, which would you take?""That will never be.Whose? Not his whom I despise.Esteem might ripen into love, but what must contempt end in?"This reply gave Rose great satisfaction.To exhaust all awkward contingencies, she said, "One question more, and I have done.
Suppose Camille should turn out--be not quite--what shall I say--inexcusable?"
At this unlucky gush, Josephine turned pale, then red, then pale again, and cried eagerly, "Then all the world should not part us.
Why torture me with such a question? Ah! you have heard something."And in a moment the lava of passion burst wildly through its thin sheet of ice."I was blind.This is why you would save me from this unnatural marriage.You are breaking the good news to me by degrees.There is no need.Quick--quick--let me have it.I have waited three years; I am sick of waiting.Why don't you speak? Why don't you tell me? Then I will tell YOU.He is alive--he is well--he is coming.It was not he those soldiers saw; they were so far off.How could they tell? They saw a uniform but not a face.
Perhaps he has been a prisoner, and so could not write; could not come: but he is coming now.Why do you groan? why do you turn pale?
ah! I see; I have once more deceived myself.I was mad.He I love is still a traitor to France and me, and I am wretched forever.Oh!
that I were dead! oh! that I were dead! No; don't speak to me:
never mind me; this madness will pass as it has before, and leave me a dead thing among the living.Ah! sister, why did you wake me from my dream? I was drifting so calmly, so peacefully, so dead, and painless, drifting over the dead sea of the heart towards the living waters of gratitude and duty.I was going to make more than one worthy soul happy; and seeing them happy, I should have been content and useful--what am I now?--and comforted other hearts, and died joyful--and young.For God is good; he releases the meek and patient from their burdens."With this came a flood of tears; and she leaned against a bough with her forehead on her arm, bowed like a wounded lily.
