Toilers of the Sea Part 74

They were silent for a moment. Caudray continued:

"There is but one duty left to me. It is to depart."

"And mine to die. Oh! how I wish there was no sea, but only sky. It seems to me as if that would settle all, and that our departure would be the same. It was wrong to speak to me; why did you speak to me? Do not go. What will become of me? I tell you I shall die. You will be far off when I shall be in my grave. Oh! my heart will break. I am very wretched; yet my uncle is not unkind."

It was the first time in her life that Deruchette had ever said "my uncle." Until then she had always said "my father."

Caudray stepped back, and made a sign to the boatman. Deruchette heard the sound of the boat-hook among the shingle, and the step of the man on the gunwale of the boat.

"No! no!" cried Deruchette.

"It must be, Deruchette," replied Caudray.

"No! never! For the sake of an engine--impossible. Did you see that horrible man last night? You cannot abandon me thus. You are wise; you can find a means. It is impossible that you bade me come here this morning with the idea of leaving me. I have never done anything to deserve this; you can have no reproach to make me. Is it by that vessel that you intended to sail? I will not let you go. You shall not leave me. Heaven does not open thus to close so soon. I know you will remain.

Besides, it is not yet time. Oh! how I love you."

And pressing closely to him, she interlaced the fingers of each hand behind his neck, as if partly to make a bond of her two arms for detaining him, and partly with her joined hands to pray. He moved away this gentle restraint, while Deruchette resisted as long as she could.

Deruchette sank upon a projection of the rock covered with ivy, lifting by an unconscious movement the sleeve of her dress up to the elbow, and exhibiting her graceful arm. A pale suffused light was in her eyes. The boat was approaching.

Caudray held her head between his hands. He touched her hair with a sort of religious care, fixed his eyes upon her for some moments, then kissed her on the forehead fervently, and in an accent trembling with anguish, and in which might have been traced the uprooting of his soul, he uttered the word which has so often resounded in the depths of the human heart, "Farewell!"

Deruchette burst into loud sobs.

At this moment they heard a voice near them, which said solemnly and deliberately:

"Why should you not be man and wife?"

Caudray raised his head. Deruchette looked up.

Gilliatt stood before them.

He had approached by a bye-path.

He was no longer the same man that he had appeared on the previous night. He had arranged his hair, shaved his beard, put on shoes, and a white shirt, with a large collar turned over, sailor fashion. He wore a sailor's costume, but all was new. A gold ring was on his little finger.

He seemed profoundly calm. His sunburnt skin had become pale: a hue of sickly bronze overspread it.

They looked at him astonished. Though so changed, Deruchette recognised him. But the words which he had spoken were so far from what was pa.s.sing in their minds at that moment, that they had left no distinct impression.

Gilliatt spoke again:

"Why should you say farewell? Be man and wife, and go together."

Deruchette started. A trembling seized her from head to foot.

Gilliatt continued:

"Miss Lethierry is a woman. She is of age. It depends only on herself.

Her uncle is but her uncle. You love each other----"

Deruchette interrupted in a gentle voice, and asked, "How came you here?"

"Make yourselves one," repeated Gilliatt.

Deruchette began to have a sense of the meaning of his words. She stammered out:

"My poor uncle!"

"If the marriage was yet to be," said Gilliatt, "he would refuse. When it is over he will consent. Besides, you are going to leave here. When you return he will forgive."

Gilliatt added, with a slight touch of bitterness, "And then he is thinking of nothing just now but the rebuilding of his boat. This will occupy his mind during your absence. The Durande will console him."

"I cannot," said Deruchette, in a state of stupor which was not without its gleam of joy. "I must not leave him unhappy."

"It will be but for a short time," answered Gilliatt.

Caudray and Deruchette had been, as it were, bewildered. They recovered themselves now. The meaning of Gilliatt's words became plainer as their surprise diminished. There was a slight cloud still before them; but their part was not to resist. We yield easily to those who come to save. Objections to a return into Paradise are weak. There was something in the att.i.tude of Deruchette, as she leaned imperceptibly upon her lover, which seemed to make common cause with Gilliatt's words. The enigma of the presence of this man, and of his utterances, which, in the mind of Deruchette in particular, produced various kinds of astonishment, was a thing apart. He said to them, "Be man and wife!"

This was clear; if there was responsibility, it was his. Deruchette had a confused feeling that, for many reasons, he had the right to decide upon her fate. Caudray murmured, as if plunged in thought, "An uncle is not a father."

His resolution was corrupted by the sudden and happy turn in his ideas.

The probable scruples of the clergyman melted, and dissolved in his heart's love for Deruchette.

Gilliatt's tone became abrupt and harsh, and like the pulsations of fever.

"There must be no delay," he said. "You have time, but that is all.

Come."

Caudray observed him attentively; and suddenly exclaimed:

"I recognise you. It was you who saved my life."

Gilliatt replied:

"I think not."

"Yonder," said Caudray, "at the extremity of the Banques."

"I do not know the place," said Gilliatt.

"It was on the very day that I arrived here."

"Let us lose no time," interrupted Gilliatt.

"And if I am not deceived, you are the man whom we met last night."

"Perhaps."

"What is your name?"