My Little Lady Part 26

"If you would like to have her removed to the hospital at Liege," continued the doctor, doubtfully, "it might still be done. It may injure your business to have her here. Still, as you say she is your niece----"

"As I say she is my niece," returned Jeanne-Marie, abruptly, "it is not likely I should turn her out of the house, and that is enough. My business will take care of itself. And now tell me what I am to do, doctor?"

He prescribed for Madelon, said he would call again, and left the house, pondering on the woman who kept so apart from her neighbours, and on her small visitor, who he knew well enough was not her niece, for had not Jacques Monnier told him how Jeanne-Marie had suddenly come in out of the rain, carrying the girl in her arms, and had taken her upstairs without a word of explanation?

"There is a mystery somewhere," thought the doctor; "but it is no concern of mine." And so he went his way to visit his next patient.

Jeanne-Marie had no fears concerning the doctor's discretion; he was a man too busy in his scattered district to have much time or inclination for gossip. But she had far less confidence in Jacques Monnier's wisdom, and thought it not inexpedient to go downstairs, after the doctor's departure, and give her customer a word of exhortation. He was seated at the table as before, twirling the gla.s.s in his fingers, and gazing vacantly out of window.

"Well, Jacques," said Jeanne-Marie, "and what did you tell the doctor?"

"I told him what you told me," said the man, in a surly voice.

"What was that?"

"That your niece was ill, and that he was to come and see her."

"Was that all?"

No answer.

"Was that all?" repeated Jeanne-Marie. "_Allons_, Jacques, don't keep me waiting. I will know what you said to the doctor."

Jacques, who under other circ.u.mstances might have met this imperative mode of questioning by dogged silence, or an evasive answer, was too uncertain as to what the doctor himself might have repeated to Jeanne-Marie, to attempt equivocation.

"I told him," he said, slowly and reluctantly, "that it was a queer thing you should have picked up your niece in the street, and that I didn't believe she was your niece at all; and no more I do, Jeanne-Marie," he added, gaining courage as he spoke.

"Ah! you told him that?" said the woman. "Well, look you, Jacques, if I find you saying any such thing again, this is the very last time you cross my door-step, and that account of yours will have to be paid in full next week. You understand?"

"Oh! yes, I understand well enough," he answered sulkily; "but if I hold my tongue the neighbours will talk; I am not the only person who saw you come through the street, I will answer for it."

"Who said I came through the village at all? And what does it matter to you what the neighbours say?" retorted Jeanne-Marie, "attend to what I say--that is enough for you, Jacques--and if you do hear anyone say anything about the child upstairs, tell them it is my niece come on a visit, and not a word more; otherwise you understand----"

"Oh! yes, I understand," he repeated grumbling, "but what do I care? Yours is not the only wine to be had in Le Trooz----"

"Bah!" was Jeanne-Marie's only answer, as she left the room.

She knew her customer too well to be in the least afraid of his carrying his implied threat into execution. Indeed, Jacques Monnier, who had no mind to be ousted from the convenient little restaurant, where he got good wine and long credit, acted upon the hints he had received, and stuck manfully to Jeanne-Marie's version of her adventure. And so it happened, that although for a day or two a few rumours were afloat in the village, they soon died away; and it was received as an established fact by those who cared to interest themselves in Jeanne-Marie's affairs, that it was her niece whom the doctor went to see so regularly. And so much apart did Jeanne-Marie keep from her neighbours, that the subject was soon half-forgotten, and Madelon's very existence seemed problematic, as she lay in the little upstairs room, and the woman who sheltered her, appeared to come and go about her business much the same as usual.

As for Jeanne-Marie, as soon as the house was quiet, on the evening of that day so eventful for our little Madelon, she sat down and wrote two letters: one she put into a large envelope, which she directed to a street in Paris; the other, inclosed in the first, was addressed to the Superior of the Convent at Liege, and the letters, with their Paris direction, were put into the post that very night.

CHAPTER XIV.

Madelon's Convalescence.

Madelon, if she had but known it, had small reason to apprehend any very vigorous pursuit on the part of the nuns.

There was, it is true, no small commotion in the convent, when Soeur Lucie, entering Madelon's cell the morning after her flight, found the empty room, the unslept-on bed. She did not indeed realize at first that the child had run away; but when, after inquiry and search through the whole convent, she found that nothing had been seen or heard of her, since she herself had quitted the cell the previous evening, then the whole truth became apparent, and a general sense of consternation pervaded the sisterhood. It was the enormity of the offence that struck them aghast, the boldness of the attempt, and its complete success. It was altogether a new idea to them that any one should wish to escape from those walls; an appalling one that any one should make such an attempt, and succeed.

Soeur Lucie, held responsible for Madelon, was summoned before the Superior, questioned, cross-questioned, and, amid tears and sobs, could only repeat that she had left her charge as usual, the evening before; and that, in the morning, going to her cell, had discovered that she had vanished; how, or when, or whither, she could not imagine. How she had escaped was indeed at first a mystery, which could not fail to rouse an eager curiosity in the sisters, and a not unpleasing excitement succeeded the first indignation, as, with one accord, they ran to examine Madelon's room. The window stood wide open, the branches of the climbing rose-trees were broken here and there, small footsteps could be traced on the flower- bed below. It was all that was needed to make their supposition a certainty--Madelon had run away.

This point settled, a calmer feeling began to prevail, and, as their first consternation subsided, the nuns began to reflect that after all worse things might have happened. If it had been one of themselves indeed, that would have been a very different matter; such a sin, such a scandal could not even be thought of without horror. But this little stray girl, who belonged to n.o.body, whom n.o.body had cared for, who had been a trouble ever since she had come, and who had been left a burthen and a responsibility on their hands--why should they concern themselves so much about her flight? No doubt she had made her escape to some friends she had known before she was brought to the convent, from no one knew where, two or three years ago. The nuns were not more averse than other people to the drawing of convenient conclusions from insufficient premises, and this theory of Madelon's having run away to her friends once started, every one was ready to add their mite of evidence in aid of its confirmation. Some thought she had possibly started for England--it was an Englishman who had brought her to the convent; others that she had friends in Paris--it certainly was from Paris she had come; one suggested one thing, and one another, and in the meantime, though inquiries were made, the search was neither very energetic nor very determined. When the evening came, it was generally felt to be rather a relief than otherwise that nothing had been heard of the small runaway. What could they do with her if she came back? No one felt disposed to put in a claim for her-- least of all Soeur Lucie, whom she had brought into terrible disgrace, and who had yet been really fond of the child, and who for months after had a pang in her kind little heart whenever she thought of her wayward charge. And so, when, two days later, a letter, with neither date nor signature, but bearing a Paris post-mark, arrived for the Superior, announcing that Mademoiselle Madeleine Linders was with friends, and that it was useless for any one to attempt to find her or reclaim her, for they had her in safe keeping, and would never consent to part with her, every one felt that the matter was arranged in the most satisfactory manner possible, and troubled themselves no more.

As for the Countess G----, there had been a flatness about the termination of her share in Madelon's adventures that effectually put a stop to any desire on her part to pursue the matter further; and finding, on her arrival at Liege, that her husband was obliged to start for Brussels that very afternoon, she found it convenient altogether to dismiss the subject from her mind. With her departure from Liege, we also gladly dismiss her from these pages for ever.

So Madelon, tossing and moaning on her bed of sickness, is once more all alone in the world, except for Jeanne-Marie, to whom, before two days were over, she had somehow become the one absorbing interest in life. The lonely woman, whose sympathies and affections had, as one might guess, been all bruised, and warped, and crushed in some desperate struggle, or in some long agony, found a new channel for them in an indescribable, yearning love for the little pale girl whom she had rescued, and by whose side she sat hour after hour, wondering, as she listened to her wild broken talk about her father and Monsieur Horace, Aunt Therese, and Soeur Lucie, what the child's past life could have been, and by what strange chances she had come to be in such evil straits. A new world of hopes and fears, of interests and anxieties, seemed to have suddenly opened for Jeanne-Marie, as she sat in the little upper chamber; whilst in the public room downstairs the rough men, in obedience to her word, sat silently drinking and smoking, or talking in subdued voices, so that no disturbing sound might reach the sick child above.

Madelon's second attack of fever was far worse than the first.

Weakened as she was by her former illness, it was an almost hopeless fight with death that was carried on for days; and when the crisis came at last, the doctor himself declared that it was scarcely possible that she should rally, and be restored to life and reason. But the crisis pa.s.sed, and Madelon was once more safe. She awoke about midnight to the confused consciousness of a strange room, perplexing her with unfamiliar surroundings. A dim light burned before the coloured picture of a saint that hung on the rough white- washed wall, and by its uncertain gleams she could distinguish the rude furniture, the patchwork quilt, the heavy rafters that crossed above her head. The window stood wide open, letting in the night scents of the flowers in the garden below; she could see a s.p.a.ce of dark, star-lit sky; and hear the rustling of the trees, the whispering of the breeze among the vine-leaves that cl.u.s.tered about the window. Her eyes wandered round with vague bewilderment, the flickering light and long shadows only seeming to confuse her more, as she tried to reconcile her broken, shadowy memories with the present realities, which seemed more dreamlike still.

The door opened, and Jeanne-Marie came in, holding another candle, which she shaded with her hand, as she stood by the bed for a moment, looking down upon Madelon.

"You are better," she said at last, setting down the candle on the table behind her, and smoothing the pillow and coverlet.

Her voice was like her face, harsh and melancholy, but with a tender, pathetic ring in it at times.

"Am I?" said Madelon. "Have I been ill again? Where is Soeur Lucie? This is not the convent--where am I?"

"You are not at the convent now," answered Jeanne-Marie. "I am taking care of you, and you must lie very still, and go to sleep again when you have taken this."

Madelon drank off her medicine, but she was not satisfied, and in a moment her brain was at work again.

"I can't make out where I am," she said, looking up at Jeanne- Marie with the old wistful look in her eyes--"is it in an hotel? --is papa coming? I thought I was at the convent with Aunt Therese. Ah! do help me!"

"I will tell you nothing unless you lie still," said Jeanne- Marie, as Madelon made a most futile attempt to raise herself in bed. She considered a moment, and then said--"Don't you remember, _ma pet.i.te?_ Your papa is dead, and you are not at the convent any more, and need not go back there unless you like.

You are with me, Jeanne-Marie, at Le Trooz, and I will take care of you till you are well. Now you are not to talk any more."

Madelon lay silent for a minute. "Yes, I remember," she said at last, slowly. "Papa is dead, and Monsieur Horace--he is not here?" she cried, with startling eagerness.

"No, no," said Jeanne-Marie, "no one is here but me."

"Because you know," Madelon went on, "I cannot see him yet--I cannot--it would not do to see him, you know, till--till--ah! you do not know about that----" She stopped suddenly, and Jeanne- Marie smoothed the pillow again with her rough, kindly hands.

"I know that you must go to sleep now, and that I shall not say a word more to you to-night," she said; and then, without heeding Madelon's further questions, she put out the light, and sat silently by the bedside till the child was once more asleep.

Madelon did not recover readily from this second attack. Even when she was p.r.o.nounced wholly out of danger, there were the weariest days to be pa.s.sed, relapses, weakness, languor.

Flowers bloomed and faded in the garden below, the scent of the roses perfumed the air, the red-tipped vine-shoots growing upwards narrowed the s.p.a.ce of blue sky seen through the little window, till the sun shone in softened by a screen of glowing green leaves; and all through these lengthening summer days our pale little Madelon lay on her sick bed, very still, and patient, and uncomplaining, and so gentle and grateful to Jeanne-Marie, who nursed and watched her unceasingly with her harsh tenderness, that a pa.s.sionate affection seized the hard, lonely woman, for the forlorn little stranger who was so dependent upon her, and who owed everything to her compa.s.sion and care.

It was not long before a recollection of the past came back to Madelon, sufficiently clear, until the moment of her jumping out of the train at Le Trooz; after that she could remember nothing distinctly, only a general sense of misery, and pain, and terror. She asked Jeanne-Marie numberless questions, as to how and where she had found her, and what she had said.

"How did you know that I had run away from the convent?" she asked.

"You said so," answered Jeanne-Marie. "You were afraid that your aunt would come and take you back."

"Aunt Therese is dead," said Madelon. "I remember it all very well now. Did I tell you that? And did I tell you about papa, too? How strange that I should not remember having said so many things," she added, as the woman replied in the affirmative.

"Not at all strange," replied Jeanne-Marie. "People often talk like that when ill, and recollect nothing of it afterwards."

"Still, it is very odd," said Madelon, musing; and then she added, suddenly, "Did I talk of any one else?"