by Ouida
CHAPTER XVIII.
So it came to pass that Bebee's day in the big forest came and went assimply almost as any day that she had played away with the Varnhartchildren under the beech shadows of Cambre woods.
And when he took her to her hut at sunset before the pilgrims hadreturned there was a great bewildered tumult of happiness in her heart,but there was no memory with her that prevented her from looking at theshrine in the wall as she passed it, and saying with a quick gesture ofthe cross on brow and bosom,--
"Ah, dear Holy Mother, how good you have been! and I am back again, yousee, and I will work harder than ever because of all this joy that youhave given me."
And she took another moss-rose and changed it for that of the morning,which was faded, and said to Flamen.--
"Look--she sends you this. Now do you know what I mean? One is morecontent when She is content."
He did not answer, but he held her hands against him a moment as theyfastened in the rose bud.
"Not a word to the pilgrims, Bebee--you remember?"
"Yes, I will remember. I do not tell them every time I pray--it will belike being silent about that--it will be no more wrong than that."
But there was a touch of anxiety in the words; she was not quite certain;she wanted to be reassured. Instinct moved her not to speak of him; buthabit made it seem wrong to her to have any secret from the people whohad been about her from her birth.
He did not reassure her; her anxiety was pretty to watch, and he left thetrouble in her heart like a bee in the chalice of a lily. Besides, thelittle wicket gate was between them; he was musing whether he would pushit open once more.
Her fate was in the balance, though she did not dream it: he had dealtwith her tenderly, honestly, sacredly all that day--almost as much so asstupid Jeannot could have done. He had been touched by her trust in him,and by the unconscious beauty of her fancies, into a mood that was unlikeall his life and habits. But after all, he said to himself--
After all!--
Where he stood in the golden evening he saw the rosy curled mouth, thesoft troubled eves, the little brown hands that still tried to fastenthe rosebud, the young peach-like skin where the wind stirred thebodice;--she was only a little Flemish peasant, this poor little Bebee, alittle thing of the fields and the streets, for all the dreams of Godthat abode with her. After all--soon or late--the end would be always thesame. What matter!
She would weep a little to-morrow, and she would not kneel any more atthe shrine in the garden wall; and then--and then--she would stay hereand marry the good boor Jeannot, just the same after a while; or driftaway after him to Paris, and leave her two little wooden shoes, and hervisions of Christ in the fields at evening, behind her forevermore, anddo as all the others did, and take not only silken stockings but theCinderella slipper that is called Gold, which brings all other goodthings in its train;--what matter!
He had meant this from the first, because she was so pretty, and thoselittle wooden sabots ran so lithely over the stones; though he was not inlove with her, but only idly stretched his hand for her as a child byinstinct stretches to a fruit that hangs in the sun a little rosier and alittle nearer than the rest.
What matter--he said to himself--she loved him, poor little soul, thoughshe did not know it; and there would always be Jeannot glad enough of ahandful of bright French gold.
He pushed the gate gently against her; her hands fastened the rosebud anddrew open the latch themselves.
"Will you come in a little?" she said, with the happy light in her face."You must not stay long, because the flowers must be watered, and thenthere are Annemie's patterns--they must be done or she will have no moneyand so no food--but if you would come in for a little? And see, if youwait a minute I will show you the roses that I shall cut to-morrow thefirst thing, and take down to St. Guido to Our Lady's altar inthank-offering for to-day. I should like you to choose them--youyourself--and if you would just touch them I should feel as if you gavethem to her too. Will you?"
She spoke with the pretty outspoken frankness of her habitual speech,just tempered and broken with the happy, timid hesitation, the curioussense at once of closer nearness and of greater distance, that had comeon her since he had kissed her among the bright beanflowers.
He turned from her quickly.
"No, dear, no. Gather your roses alone, Bebee; if I touch them theirleaves will fall."
Then, with a hurriedly backward glance down the dusky lane to see thatnone were looking, he bent his head and kissed her again quickly and witha sort of shame, and swung the gate behind him and went away throughthe boughs and the shadows.