The Bath Keepers Volume I Part 34

Bathilde occupied a room that looked on a yard behind the house. It was impossible for her to see from her window anything that took place in the street. But since her mother had been absent, the girl had enjoyed more liberty; so long as she avoided the baths, a place which it would have been imprudent for her to frequent, she was free to range over the whole first floor at her pleasure. Knowing that his daughter was in the house, Landry asked nothing more.

On the day following the Fire of Saint-Jean, Bathilde, although she did not know why, could not keep still. She went in and out, from one room to another, arranging the furniture, or rather disarranging it, in order to have an excuse for putting it to rights again.

In her peregrinations she visited most frequently a room at the front of the house, which Dame Ragonde used as a linen closet; it was the room with the balcony. Bathilde had put aside the curtain and glanced into the street from time to time, without opening the window. She had soon discovered the young seigneur of the preceding night walking back and forth in front of the baths, and stopping frequently to scrutinize the house from top to bottom.

Bathilde had felt the blood rush to her cheeks, although no one could have seen her put aside the curtain. She had left the window, but had returned to it a moment later.

"He is there!" she said to herself, trembling with excitement; "he is still there! Mon Dieu! why does he keep looking at our house?"

The little innocent guessed well enough why he did it; but there are things which we do not choose to admit at once, even to ourselves, especially when they give us pleasure; we are much less ceremonious with those that make us unhappy.

The next day, Bathilde did not fail to go early to the linen closet; she resumed her manuvres of the day before, and looked into the street after cautiously raising a corner of the curtain.

This lasted four days, during which she saw the handsome cavalier almost always in the street, gazing sadly at the windows, with his hand to his heart, and probably sighing; she did not hear the sigh, but she divined it.

On the fifth day, she no longer had the heart to keep the window closed, and yet she did not wish to appear on the balcony without a reason for going there.

Suddenly she remembered that she had a rosebush in her chamber, where, by the way, it rarely received a ray of sunlight.

She ran instantly to Master Landry and said:

"Father, you know I have a lovely rosebush, which Ambroisine gave me two years ago, on my birthday."

"Very likely; what then?"

"It is in my room, on the window sill, but I have just noticed that it's dying, the leaves are turning yellow. It's because it doesn't get enough air. The yard is so small, and then the steam from the baths is bad for it, perhaps. I should be awfully sorry if it should die. Will you let me put it on the balcony outside the window of the linen closet? There is nothing there, so it won't be in the way; it will have the sun, and I am sure that it will do better there."

"Put your rosebush where you please, my child; what hinders you?"

"Oh! thank you, father!"

And Bathilde went away, pleased beyond words. Dame Ragonde would never have allowed her to put a rosebush at a window on the front of the house. A woman would have felt, divined, an intrigue therein. But the old soldier saw nothing but a rosebush.

XXI

LOVE TRAVELS FAST

Bathilde made haste to take advantage of the permission her father had given her.

Before carrying the rosebush to the balcony, she cast a glance at her mirror. Was it coquetry? No. But the daughter of a master bath keeper did not wish to show herself to the eyes of chance pa.s.sers-by without being quite sure that nothing was lacking in her dress.

We know already that for three days the girl did not forget to visit the balcony several times during the day, and even after dark, to make sure that her beautiful rosebush needed nothing. Never was flower more sedulously tended, never were rosebuds examined with such care; and certainly no insect could have found a resting place on their stems, unless it had shown the most determined obstinacy in returning thither.

On the third day, or rather the third evening, Bathilde heard the stone fall on the balcony, where she did not happen to be at the time, although she was always close at hand. She instantly detected the paper wrapped about the stone. Her first impulse was to rush out and pick it up; but she reflected that he who had thrown it must still be in the street, and that, if she picked up his note at once, she would show him that she was there, watching behind the curtain.

See how slyly even the most innocent can act sometimes! La Fontaine tells us _how wit comes to young maids_; for my part, I believe that it is all there as soon as they feel love for a man.

Bathilde waited, therefore, until the evening was well advanced before she stole noiselessly out and picked up the stone and the paper. Then she hastened to her room and locked herself in, to read at her ease that first love letter, which was destined to put the finishing touch to this turmoil in her heart, and perhaps to cause her much suffering, and which it would have been wiser for her not to read.

But wisdom is often the fruit of experience, and Bathilde had had none.

She opened Leodgard's letter with a trembling hand, and eagerly read these words:

"CHARMING BATHILDE:

"Need I tell you that I love you, that from the moment I first saw you your cherished image has not gone from my memory and my heart?

You must know who I am: your friend Ambroisine called me by name before you, but she has slandered me if she has told you that I am incapable of keeping my faith.

"I shall love you always, Bathilde; because my love is sincere, because you are the first woman who ever caused me to know a genuine pa.s.sion.

"You will say, perhaps, that too great a distance separates us, that my name, my rank, keep us apart.--But only tell me that you love me a little, and I will find a way to remove all obstacles.

What does it matter to me in what station of life you were born? In my eyes, you are far above the _grandes dames_ of the court.

"My fortune, my name--I lay everything at your feet! Yes, before G.o.d, I swear to take you for my wife!

"But come to your balcony, do not fly at night when I come near; and, in pity's name, grant a few moments' interview to one who will die if you refuse to love him.

"LeODGARD DE MARVEJOLS."

Such a loving, ardent note was certain to make great ravages in an inexperienced heart, in a heart which was conscious of a craving to love. Love travels fast when it follows an unbeaten path.

Moreover, a secret sympathy drew the girl on; she too loved Leodgard.

Only an instant, a single glance, was necessary for that.

Bathilde read and reread and read again the young count's letter; she held it in her hand when she went to bed, she kept it against her heart all night. Ah! a first love letter is such a priceless treasure! A woman may receive many of them in the course of her life, but the others are never worth so much as that one.

The next morning Bathilde knew the letter by heart, and she said to herself every instant:

"He loves me! he will always love me! I am the first woman whom he has ever really loved! My birth is no obstacle, he says; in that case, he will ask my parents for my hand, and will marry me. What joy! how happy I shall be! Not because I shall be a countess; what do I care for that?

But I shall be his wife! and I shall be able, in my turn, to tell him that I love him!--But then, I must go out on the balcony to-night and speak to him. Suppose I consult my father first, and show him this letter? But perhaps he would scold me for receiving it and reading it without his permission!"

Bathilde was in dire perplexity, not knowing what she ought to do. But her heart was bursting with joy and happiness because she knew that Leodgard loved her.

She was still hesitating about going to her window, when Ambroisine suddenly appeared.

The _belle baigneuse_ had not had time to visit her friend since the Fire of Saint-Jean; and yet a secret presentiment told her that her friendship was more than ever necessary to Bathilde. At last, she stole a moment during the morning and hastened to Rue Dauphine; she ran up to her friend's room and did not find her there; a servant told her that her master's daughter pa.s.sed almost all her time now in the linen closet, and pointed it out to her.

This change of habit surprised Ambroisine. However, she went to the small room where Bathilde was. The latter, when she saw her friend, was confused for a moment, and hastily thrust into her bosom the letter which she was reading for the hundredth time.

Ambroisine ran to Bathilde and kissed her, saying:

"Well! here I am at last! I succeeded in making my escape to-day.--We have so many people at our baths, and so many young men come to be shaved by father! But I found a moment this morning, and I ran away. I was so anxious to see you! And you--have you no desire to talk over our evening on the Place de Greve? We have so many things to say to each other! haven't we?"

"Oh, yes! yes! I longed to see you, too."