Bijou Part 36

"It's quite true," said Bijou, laughing, "that you were not very amiable yesterday during our journey to Pont-sur-Loire."

"It was your fault!"

"My fault--mine?"

"Yours."

"And pray why?"

"I will tell you if you like."

"Yes, I should like; but not now, because I am keeping some one waiting in the dairy."

"Who is waiting for you?" he asked anxiously.

"The dairy-maid," answered Bijou, without noticing his anxiety.

"Oh! go at once, then, if that is the case," said M. de Rueille sarcastically. "I should not like the dairy-maid to be kept waiting on my account."

"You should come and see the cheeses," proposed Denyse.

"That must certainly be very festive; no, really, are you not afraid that I should find that too exciting, Bijou, my dear?"

"You would find it as exciting, anyhow, as going to bed, and reading over again some old book that you must know by heart. Oh, you know it by heart, I am sure! There is nothing in the library but the cla.s.sics, or a lot of old-fashioned things; ever since I have come no new books are put in the library, either in the Paris house or here at Bracieux.

Grandmamma is so afraid that I should get hold of them; but she is quite mistaken, for I should never open a book that I had been told not to open--never!"

"Grandmamma is afraid of your doing what any other girl would do; you are such an astonishing exception, Bijou!"

"Yes, I am an exception--an angel, anything you like; but either come with me, or let me go, if you please! I don't like to keep people waiting."

"Oh, well, I'll come with you if you like," said M. de Rueille, putting his book down on a side-table.

He followed Bijou without speaking, as she trotted along in front of him. She looked so sweet, going backwards and forwards amongst the great pails of milk; her straw hat, covered with lace, tossed carelessly on her fair hair; her morning dress, of pink batiste, fastened up rather high with a safety-pin.

She inspected everything, gave her orders, and settled all kinds of details, without troubling about her cousin any more than if he did not exist; and then, when she had quite finished, she turned towards him, smiling.

"Now, then," she said, "if you would like a stroll, I am at your service." She turned into one of the garden paths that led to the avenues, and then added, as she looked up at Paul, "I'm listening!"

"You are listening? What do you want me to say?"

"I thought you were going to tell me why you were so bad-tempered yesterday; you said it was my fault."

"Well, it was; you were--" he began, in an embarra.s.sed way; and then he continued, in desperation, "the way you went on, it was not at all like you generally are, nor like you ought to be!"

"Ah! what did I do then?"

"Well, in the first place, you insisted, in the most extraordinary way, that Bernes should come on to the coach when we met him. Why did you insist like that?"

"Well, it is natural enough when you meet anyone walking a mile away from where you are driving yourself, that you should offer to pick him up; it seems to me that it would be odd, on the contrary, not to offer to pick him up!"

"Yes, agreed; but then it was M. de Clagny who should have offered a seat in his own carriage."

"He never thought of it--"

"Or else he did not care to? And you obliged him to do it whether he would or not?"

"Rubbish! he adores M. de Bernes. The other day he spent half an hour singing his praises to me in every key."

"Ah! that is probably what made you so pleasant to him?"

"Was I so pleasant?"

"Certainly! As a rule you don't pay the slightest attention to him, but yesterday you had no eyes for anyone but him."

"I did not notice that myself."

"Really? Well, you were the only one who did not, then! You went on to such a degree that I wondered if it were not simply for the sake of tormenting me that you were acting in that way!"

Bijou gazed straight at M. de Rueille with her beautiful, luminous eyes.

"To torment you? and how could it torment you if I chose to be agreeable to M. de Bernes?"

"How?" stuttered M. de Rueille, very much confused; "why, I have just told you I am not--we are not accustomed to seeing you make a fuss like that, especially of a young man! No, I a.s.sure you, I was amazed.

I am still, in fact."

"And I am ever so sorry to have vexed you," she said sweetly. "Yes, I am really; you see, I had never noticed M. de Bernes particularly, and I wanted to see whether all the nice things M. de Clagny had told me about him were quite true, and so I was studying him. Will you forgive me?"

M. de Rueille did not reply to this, as he had another grievance on his mind.

"With Clagny, too, you have a way of carrying on, which is not at all the thing. He is an old man; that's all well and good; but, you know, he is not so ancient yet for you to be able to take such liberties with him!"

"What do you call liberties?"

"Well, sometimes you appear to admire him, to be in ecstasies about him; and then sometimes you coax and wheedle him in the most absurd way, as you did yesterday."

"Yesterday! I coaxed and wheedled M. de Clagny? I?"

"You!"

"But about what?"

"When you would insist, in spite of everything, in driving through Rue Rabelais; and I'll be hanged if I can see why you wanted to; it's about as dirty a street as there is, without taking into account that you might have caused us all to break our necks. Yes, certainly, it was the most dangerous experiment--your fad! Young Bernes, who is one of the most out-and-out daring fellows himself, tried to persuade you out of wanting to go along that street!"

The strange little gleam, which sometimes lighted up Bijou's eyes, came into them now.

"Yes, that's true!" she said, smiling. "He was wild to prevent our going down the Rue Rabelais--M. de Bernes! It was as though he was afraid of something!"

"He was afraid of coming to smash, by Jove, just as I was, and the abbe, and even Pierrot. I cannot understand how old Clagny could have let you have your fad out, for he was responsible for the little Dubuisson girl, and for Pierrot, and you, without reckoning all of us!"