La Vendee Part 14

Annot!" and even the manly dignity of M. Chapeau succ.u.mbed to tears.

"It's no good talking," said she, greatly softened; "for you can't have loved me, and treated me as you did this day, letting me walk all alone from St. Laud, without so much as a word or a look; and that before all the people: and I that went merely to walk back with you. Oh! I could have died on the roadside to find myself treated in such a way."

"And what must I have felt to hear you talking as you did before them all? Do you think I felt nothing?"

"Talking, Jacques; what talk?"

"Why; saying that you loved Cathelineau better than any one. That he was the only man you admired; that you dreamed of him always, and I don't know how much more about his eyes and whiskers."

"Why now, Jacques; you don't mean to be jealous?"

"Jealous; no I'm not jealous."

"Jealous of a man you know I never saw," said Annot, smiling through her tears.

"Jealous. No, I tell you I'm not jealous; but still, one doesn't like to hear one's mistress talking of another man's eyes, and whiskers, and those sort of things; no man would like it, Annot; though I care about it as little myself as any man."

"But don't you know Cathelineau is a saint, Jacques?"

"Oh! but you said saints might marry, and have a lot of children, and so they may."

"But I never saw Cathelineau, Jacques," and she put her hand upon his arm.

"And you are not in love with him, Annot?"

"How can I be in love with a man I never put eyes on?"

"And you won't say again, that you'd like to have him for a lover?"

"That was only my little joke, Jacques. Surely, a girl may joke sometimes."

"And you do love me, don't you?" and Jacques now got very close to his mistress.

"Ah! but why did you let me walk home all the way by myself? You know I love you dearly; but you must beg my pardon for that, before I'll ever tell you so again."

And Jacques did beg her pardon in a manner of his own twenty times, sitting by the gurgling mill-stream, and to tell the truth Annot seemed well pleased with the way in which he did it; and then when the fountain of her love was opened, and the sluice gate of her displeasure removed, she told him how she would pray for him till he came back safe from the wars; how she would never speak a word to mortal man in the way of courting, till he came back to make her his wife; how she would grieve, should he be wounded; how she would die, should he be killed in battle: and then she gave him a little charm, which she had worked for him, and put it round his neck, and told him she had taken it with her to St.

Laud, to give it him there beneath the cross, only he had gone away from her, so that she couldn't do so: and then Jacques begged pardon again and again in his own queer way; and then, having sat there by the mill-stream till the last red streak of sunlight was gone, they returned home to the village, and Annot told her father that Dame Rouel had been so very pressing, she had made them stay there to eat bread and cheese.

And so Annot, at last, went to bed without her supper, and dreamed not of Cathelineau, but of her own lover, Jacques Chapeau.

CHAPTER VIII.

AGATHA LAROCHEJAQUELIN.

As Chapeau had said, great preparations were made at Durbelliere for the coming campaign. The old Marquis had joined with his son in furnishing everything which their limited means would admit of, for the wants of the royalists. Durbelliere had become quite a depot; the large granaries at the top of the house were no longer empty; they were stored with sacks of meal, with pikes and muskets, and with shoes for the soldiers.

Agatha's own room looked like an apartment in a hospital; it was filled with lint, salves, and ointments, to give ease to those whom the wars should send home wounded; all the contents of the cellars were sacrificed; wine, beer, and brandy, were alike given up to aid the spirits of the combatants; the cattle were drawn in from the farms, and kept round the house in out-houses and barns, ready to be slaughtered, as occasion might require, an abattoir was formed in the stable yard, and a butcher kept in regular employment; a huge oven was built in an outhouse attached to the stables, and here bakers, from neighbouring parishes, were continually kept at work: they neither expected, or received wages; they, and all the others employed got their meals in the large kitchen of the chateau, and were content to give their work to the cause without fee or reward. Provisions, cattle, and implements, were also sent from M. de Lescure's house to Durbelliere, as it was considered to be more central, and as it was supposed that there were still some republicans in the neighbourhood of Bressuire, whereas, it was well known that there were none in the rural districts; the more respectable of the farmers also, and other country gentlemen sent something; and oxen, sheep, and loads of meal; jars of oil, and casks of wine were coming in during the whole week before the siege of Saumur, and the same horses took them out again in the shape of bread, meat, and rations, to the different points where they would be required.

As soon as M. de Lescure had left home, on his recruiting service in the south of La Vendee, the ladies of his house went over to Durbelliere, to remain there till Henri Larochejaquelin should start for Saumur, and give their aid to Agatha in all her work. Adolphe Denot was also there: he, too, had been diligently employed in collecting the different sinews of wars; and as far as his own means went had certainly not begrudged them. There was still an unhappy air of dissatisfaction about him, which was not to be observed with any one else: his position did not content his vanity; the people did not talk of him as they did of Cathelineau, and Henri Larochejaquelin; he heard nothing of La Vendee relying on his efforts; the nanes of various men were mentioned as trustworthy leaders, but his own was never among them. De Lescure, Charette, d'Elbee, Stofflet, were all talked of; and what had they done more than he had; or what, indeed, so much: the two latter were men of low origin, who had merely shown courage in the time of need: indeed, what more had Cathelineau done; whereas, he had never failed in courage, and had given, moreover, his money, and his property; yet he felt that he was looked on as a n.o.body. Jacques Chapeau was almost of more importance.

And then, again, his love for Agatha tormented him. He had thought to pique her by a show of indifference himself, but he found that this plan did not answer: it was evident, even to him, that Agatha was not vexed by his silence, his altered demeanour, and sudden departure. He had miscalculated her character, and now found that he must use other means to rouse the affection in her heart, without which he felt, at present, that he could not live happily. He thought that she could not have seen with indifference the efforts he was making in the cause which she loved so well; and he determined to throw himself at her feet before he started for Saumur, and implore her to give him a place in her affections, while her heart was softened by the emotions, which the departure of so many of her friends, on the eve of battle, would occasion.

Agatha had had but little conversation with him since his last arrival at Durbelliere, but still she felt that he was about to propose to her.

She shunned him as much as she could; she scrupulously avoided the opportunity which he anxiously sought; she never allowed herself to be alone with him; but she was nevertheless sure the evil hour would come; she saw it in his eye as they sat together at their meals--she heard it in the tones of his voice every time he spoke. She knew from his manner that he was preparing himself for the interview, and she also knew that he would not submit tamely to the only answer she could bring herself to give him.

"Marie," said she to her cousin, on the Sat.u.r.day evening, "I am in the greatest distress, pray help me, dearest. I am sure you know what ails me."

"In distress, Agatha, and wanting help from me!--you that are wont to help all the world yourself! But I know, from your face, you are only half in earnest."

"Indeed, and indeed, I never was much more so. I never was more truly in want of council. Can you not guess what my sorrow is?"

"Not unless it is, that you have a lover too much?--or perhaps you find the baker's yeast runs short?"

"Ah, Marie, will you always joke when I am serious!"

"Well then, Agatha, now I am serious--is it that you have a lover too much?"

"Can any trouble be more grievous?"

"Oh, dear, yes! ten times worse. My case is ten times worse: and alas, alas! there is no cure for that."

"Your case, Marie?"

"Yes, my case, Agatha--a lover too few!"

"Ah, Marie, do not joke with me tonight. I want your common sense, and not your wit, just now. Be a good, dear girl, and tell me what I shall say to him. I know he will not go to Saumur before--before he has proposed to me."

"Then, in the name of common sense, dear Agatha, tell him the truth, whatever it may be."

"You know I do not--cannot love him."

"Nay, I know nothing. You have not said yet who 'him' is--but I own I can give a guess. I suppose poor Adolphe Denot is the man you cannot love? Poor Adolphe! he must be told so, that is all."

"But how shall I tell him, Marie? He is so unlike other men. Henri is his friend, and yet he has never spoken to him about me, nor to my father. If he would ask my hand from Henri, as another would, Henri would talk to him, and explain to him that it could not be-that my heart is too much occupied with other cares, to care for loving or being loved."

"That means, Agatha, till the right lover comes."

"No, Marie; but till these wars are over. Not that I could ever love Adolphe Denot; but now, at present, methinks love should be banished from the country, and not allowed to return till the King is on his throne again."

"Well, Agatha, I don't know. That would be somewhat hard upon us poor girls, whose lovers are more to our taste, than M. Denot is to yours.

I know not that our knights will fight the worse for a few stray smiles, though the times be so frightful."

"Do you smile on yours then, Marie; and I will smile to see you happy.

But tell me, dearest, what shall I say to Adolphe? You would not have me give him hope, when I feel I can never love him?"

"G.o.d forbid!--why should you? But has he never spoken to Henri on the subject, or to the Marquis?"

"Never a word. I'm sure he never spoke of it to my father, and Henri told me that he had never said a word to him."