The Grip of Desire Part 16

--And the day before yesterday?

--Why this questioning, dearest papa?

--Ah! dearest papa, dearest papa. There is no dearest papa here, I want to know the truth.

--But what truth? I have nothing wrong to hide from you. I went to Ma.s.s. Is that forbidden?

--To Ma.s.s! Good Heavens! To Ma.s.s! That is most decidedly making up your mind to disobey me!

--But papa, you have not forbidden it to me.

--Not in so many words, it is true; because I counted on your reason and good sense. Have I not spoken loudly enough my way of thinking on this subject?

--But, papa, your way of thinking is completely contrary to that which I have been taught. You ought to have said when you sent me to Saint-Denis: "You are not to teach my daughter any religion." They have taught me religion, what is more natural than for me to follow it.

--And what has your religion in common with your Ma.s.s? If you want to pray to G.o.d, can you not pray to him at home?

--Am I not a Catholic before all?

It was the first time that Suzanne had spoken to her father in this firm and decided tone. Nothing more was wanted to irritate the irascible soldier:

--Ah! I know the hidden and villainous insinuation! he cried, Catholic before all! It is that indeed. Before being daughter! before being wife!

before being mother! the Church, the priest first; the rest only comes after. The Ma.s.s, the Church! the Church, the Ma.s.s! With that they cover every vileness. Well, do you want me to tell you what I think of women who frequent churches? They are either lazy, or hypocrites, or idiots, or finally hussies in love with the Cure. There are no others. In which category do you want to be placed, my daughter?

--And all that because I discharge my religious duties!

--You have spoken to that Cure? I see it. Where have you spoken to him?

--I have nothing to hide from you, father; but Monsieur Marcel had not given me any bad advice, I ask you to believe.

--So it is true then; you have spoken to this man: unknown to me, in secret.

--I had no secret to make of it. I went to confession, that is all, as I was accustomed to do at school.

--Confession! what, good Heavens! You went and knelt before that rascal, after what I have told you concerning all his like!

--All priests are not alike.

--Ah! you are under his influence already. Doubtless, he is the pearl, the model, the saint. Thunder of Heaven! my daughter too, but you do not know that your mother died of remorse of soul because she found a saint, a model of virtue in that black crew of scoundrels. Stay, be silent, you make me say too much.

--I don't understand you.

--I will be obeyed and not questioned. Have I the right to expect that from my daughter?

--You have every right, father.

--Well, I forbid you for the future to put your foot inside the church.

--In truth, father, would not one say that you were talking of some ill-reputed place?

--Worse than that. Those who enter a place of ill-repute, know beforehand where they go and to what they expose themselves, which the little fools who frequent churches never know.

Suzanne made no reply and went down into the garden.

The old governess who bad brought her up and who loved her tenderly, came to meet her.

--Your father is after the Cures again. What can these poor people of G.o.d have done to the man?

They walked a long time round the kitchen-garden, then they sat down under an arbour of honeysuckle.

--What time is it, Marianne? the young girl said all at once, fixing her eyes on the window of her father's room.

--It is late, my child, it is ten o'clock at least; everybody in the village has gone to bed. Come, your father has finished his newspaper, there is no longer any light in his room; he has just blown out his lamp.

Let us go in.

They were near the little back-gate which led out to the meadows. Suzanne opened it cautiously: "No, let us go out," she said.

x.x.xV.

THE SHELTER.

"Is it a chance? No. And besides; chance, what is it after all but the effect of a cause which escapes us?"

ERCHMAN-CHATRIAN (_Contes fantastiques_).

As soon as Marcel had recognized Suzanne, he did not take time to reflect, and say to himself:

"What is it you are going to do, idiot?" He ran downstairs, stumbling like a drunken man, and gently opened the door. What did he intend? He did not know. Was he going to call these women? He did not know. He opened his door, that was all, and his thought went no further.

The same morning at church, he had seen Suzanne, and said to himself, "I will not look at her." He did not look at her. He kept his eyes lowered when he turned towards the nave, but he could have said how many times Suzanne lifted hers, if she were joyous or sad, and if she had a red ribbon or a blue ribbon at her neck.

Oh! the eternal contradiction of mankind. He had not wanted to look at her by day, and here he is throwing himself in her path in the middle of the night.

The steps approached and his heart beat with violence; he was so agitated that, at the moment when the two women pa.s.sed before his door to reach the lane which led to the bottom of the hill, he could hardly articulate in a hesitating voice:

"Mademoiselle Durand."

They uttered a cry.

--It is I, he said coming forward. Is it possible? You here at such an hour and in the rain?

--I had gone out with my maid, said Suzanne, and the rain has surprised us.

--Do not go farther. Shelter yourselves under my door. It is an April shower; it will soon have pa.s.sed.