.'*«' '/i •• . • • ■ 1 r .■ , r . . -• . . . •■ ^ r . ^ . .... ' .. .-..■.-.,-. . . - . - -•; 1 .'./•!■* r-: ;^fV V- ; ^/K \ n f f^I. ','. '.♦ ■fi. I, ■::.■. ■ r. ( /,'i ''V. '// r, !-ff?' :f !^ . ',' 'f.-i . ••;'. .ti'- / ,''/-r: ^^■'/^.'0'fi-'^''' '■f :>r • -^<^' '/--'' ■> r -.•.-•.■.'>. ff'. *'",^ .'J,t'.'i» '.A'r^f,-^i'l'//fty(, .,AStJ*'r'VV-'f/t' .)^;^:'^;^/.:^;v•/v^•'/^'•,Vr J, v:^r. r.'■':*f:■' L I B RA RY OF THE U N IVLR.5ITY or I LLI NOI5 K\7 CViMtiitbrra Cinx^riMumi no SEVEN YEARS. AND OTHER TALES. BY JULIA KAVANAGH, AUTHOR OF NATHALIE," " ADELe/' " THE TWO SICILIES, &c. &c. IN THREE VOLUlVi ES. A^OL. I. LONDON : HUEST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHEES, SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN, 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1860. Tlie right of Translation is reserved. JOHN CHILDS AND RON, PRINTERS. SEVEN YEARS. CO en Lo CHAPTER I. cC ►^ Or all the venerable places of Paris, the ^^ Marais may be entitled peer and prince. Other places may boast antiquity more remote ; — none ^ can vie with the recollections of past splendour •^^ which still linger around this. Here, under the reign of the most magnificent monarch of j^ Prance, once revelled the gayest and most ^ luxurious of the French nobility. Here they ^ raised noble and enduring mansions, which the hand of time long respected, and which the vi hammer of the leveller now shamelessly pulls V^down one after the other, reckless and regard- .. less of the historical tokens it is destroying; "^ sweeping away memorials of Louis Quatorze, C whom his contemporaries styled the Great, VOL. I. 1 2 SEVEN YEARS. dwellings still haunted by the frolics of his nobles and the gaieties of his court beauties, and consigning them all to dust and oblivion with philosophic indifference and impartiality. The Marais, however, is not all pulled down. It is still celebrated for its open stately streets, which trade is slowly invading, for its large hotels, Avhich commerce now possesses, and for the broad airy gardens w^hich every now and then extend at the back of those lordlv-lookinj^: abodes, filling the whole neighbom-hood with the sweet spring fragrance of young lilac trees, or the rich sunmier perfume of invisible roses in bloom. . In one of the finest streets of the ^Marais there stood some years ago a noble-looking mansion, which answered to number two. The lofty gateway and arches, the sculptured win- dows, and cast-iron balconies ; the high slate- covered roof and the tall stacks of chiumevs that topped all, like the battlements of a city, bespoke the impoi-tance of this dwelling. Yet througli that arched gateway, which stood ever open, appeared unmistakeable tokens that if stone and mortar were stout as ever, the mutabilitv of for- tune had affected this once splendid abode. Several boards, nailed on the wall bv the stair- SEVEN YEARS. 8 case, and covered witli painted characters, referred you to the various inhabitants of the mansion, and corresponded to other sign-boards dangUng from the iron balconies. Lamps were to be had on the second floor ; buhl furniture on the third ; a lace-mender tenanted the fourth; the lodgers of the fifth were too humble to claim public attention by any mural inscrip- tion. They were satisfied to exist, and left the dignity of boards and signs to their betters. Every Paris house is built round a yard, and the more ancient the house, the wider this yard is : the rule at least has few exceptions. The yard or court of this house, for it deserved the name, was square, paved, and surrounded with walls and windows, out of which various heads often peeped, — heads that did not exactly recall the aristocratic type or the splendid attire of the comiiers of Louis Quatorze. Rough un- shaved faces and blue blouses for the men, plain white caps and cotton dresses for the women, made the contrast as striking as any republican heart need have wished it. This was indeed the democratic part of the abode, it had nothing to do with the substantial and decorous tenants of the second, third, and fourth floors. Two mean, dark, and modern staircases SEVEN YEARS. led to the various lodgings of that cour, which ]\Iadame Grand, the portress of the whole house, held in supreme contempt, not to say abhorrence; whereas a real genuine old staircase, coeval w^ith the house itself, — a staircase that opened near the door of the lodge under shelter of the gate- way, — conducted with gentle and easy ascent to those apartments with windows on the street, which had Madame Grand's particular favour, as being tenanted by decent people, and espe- cially, for the world is the same all the world over, by people of substance. The English system of building is not favour- able to the development of staircase : narrow, wooden, and mean, it climbs up two floors and an attic, and, having done what it had to do, it stops. It may be covered with cai-pet or oil- cloth, or it mav not be covered at all, — a mean staircase it is, and will be on to the end. The continental staircase aims at grandeiu- ; it may not always attain its object, but a sort of dignity is the result of the attempt. The staircases of the Marais, and especially when thev claim the seventeenth centiu'v as the date of their existence, are famous for their stateli- ness. The broad and low stone steps ascend slowlv, e;uarded bv iron banisters rich in foli- SEVEN YEARS. ao'e and renaissance ornaments. Such a staircase was that of this particular house : too grand by far for the lamps on the second floor, for the bidil furniture on the third, and the lace- men dins; business on the fourth, but bv no means unsuited to the quiet, lady -like tenant of the premier ^tage, Madame la Roche. Madame la Roche was born in number two, like her mother and her mother's mother before her ; for this house, which was her property, always descended in the female line, and in number two ]\Iadame la Roche, who was seventy and more, devoutly hoped to live and die. The house had undergone many changes in passing through various hands, but the hand- some suite of rooms on the first floor had remained almost unaltered since they were first fitted up and furnished for the great grand- mother of Madame la Roche, who entered them a youthful bride of seventeen. The furniture was handsome, substantial, and good, and a constitutional indolence, hereditary in the lady proprietresses of the place, had resisted the insidious innovations of fashion. Accordingly the museum of Cluny itself scarcely boasted more treasures in carved cabinets, inlaid tables, precious china, and curiosities of G SEVEN YEARS. all sorts, than did the rooms of Madame la Roche, who was lazily glad to be possessed of so many valuables, but who in reality, and save for the sake of old family associations, did not care one rush about them all. In these large, roomy, and comfortable rooms, that looked out on the street and ignored the vulgar yard behind, Madame la Roche lived on all the more pleasantly that she possessed and enjoyed the privilege and luxmy of a garden, which, though small, rivalled the suspended gardens of Babylon, being like them artificially raised above the common level of this w^orld. Number two was a corner house. Madame la Roche's rooms ended in and gave out on a square terrace, which formed the angle of two streets, and interposed between both the green sward of a little pelouse, the silver spray of a diminutive fountain, and the foliage and flowers of luxuriant lilac andlabm*- num trees. A bosquet covered with roses, Avhere Madame la Roche liked to sit, and a handsome aviary, completed the delights of the place. To crown all, it was not o\crlookcd by more than a dozen windows ; some people, in- deed, might have thought this too much, but Madame la Roche, who had never done any- SEVEN YEARS. 7 thing in her Kfe, had nothing to hide, and would have Hved in a glass house with perfect satis- faction to herself. In this garden, for a garden it was, a young girl walked gathering flowers, on a lovely May morning, some years ago. It was early yet ; the grass sparkled with dew, which falls alike not merely on the good and the wicked, but on city guilt and pastoral innocence ; the fragrance of the lilac and of the laburnum was almost over- powering ; the little fountain splashed merrily in its stone basin edged w^ith bright flowers, and the birds in the aviary sang their most gleesome carols, whilst daring sparrows pecked the seed scattered by the wealthy little prodi- gals, and hopped about pert and free in the sanded walks. The young girl paused in the path she was following, put her hand in a tiny apron pocket, drew out some crumbs, which she scattered at her feet, and immediately an eager crowd gathered around her fearless and confident. The young girl looked at them with a pleased and triumphant smile, unconscious that, as she stood there with her flowers in her hand, she afforded a subject of contemplation to a tall and stout young upholsterer opposite, who b SEVEN YEARS. stood conveniently on a ladder, not indeed for the pnrpose of looking at her, for he was hang- ing up chairs in his newly-opened shop, but who yet made the most of the advantage he derived from this elevated position by taking a survev of the warden and its earlv tenant. She Avas very young, barely sixteen, and even fastidious eyes might have been pleased with her light supple figure and graceful motions ; but, though her dark hair neatly plaited shone in the sun, though her mobile face had all the expressive vivacity of the Parisian type, if the name of type can indeed be oriven to anvthino; beloui^ino; to that com- plex race, the young girl was not pretty. Her complexion was pale and even sallow, and she was decidedly thin. Her attire was neat but simple : a little cotton print dress and white collar and sleeves proved her to be a true Parisian in taste and toilette. The sparrows were fed, and, resuming her task of gathering flowers, the young girl was turning round, Avhen her quick eye perceived above the low stone wall that surrounded the garden, the full outlines of a masculine face. She did not pause in her task, but dart- ing a second glance, she endeavoured to dis- SEVEN YEARS. 9 cover to Avhom the face belonged. She per- ceived the ladder, and standing on it the charmed gazer, whose eyes seemed rivetted on her every motion. She also saw, though he did not, two or three working men in the shop, curiously watching their master on the ladder, and evidently unable to guess what he was looking at so intently. She could even in the morning stillness of the streets overhear their comments on the subject. "The master is studying the design of Madame la Roche's window draperies," said one man. " Real Louis Quinze style, I believe," replied another. The young girl, determined to undeceive them, though not caring to appear, here raised her voice, and began to sing in tones so young and gay as to prove very clearly that the indi- vidual on the ladder might have some more modem object to contemplate than the Louis Quinze draperies of Madame la Roche. " Oh ho ! " said the first of the two speakers in the shop. The other laughed mthout restraint. The young man on the ladder coloured to the very temples, and slowly descended; the 10 SEVEN YEARS. young girl in the garden, delighted at his ex- posure, continued singing as any lark, and did not enter until her apron was full of flowers. She then pushed open a glass door, and step- ping into a handsome dining-room, gaily lit Avith the morning sun, she began settling her flowers in a pair of old blue china vases, that looked made to set off* their brilliant colours. Presently one of the doors of the dining- room opened, and a short, stout, and round woman, long past middle age, put her head in, and said coaxingly : " Fanny, dear, can you come ? " " Not on any account," calmly replied Fanny ; " you see, Marie, how I am engaged." "Why yes, so you are," answered ^larie, " so you are. I always tell Charlotte so." And her head vanished. Presently another door opened, and another female face, older, calmer, and paler than Marie's, made its ap})earance. " Child," it said, " I think it is time to attend to that ironing." " I shall see to nothinc; till I have settled my flowers," rebelliously replied Fanny. There was a pause as of doubt, then the head vanished, the door closed, and Fanny was SEVEN YEARS. 11 left mistress of the field. She continued her task like one too much accustomed to such victories to care for them ; but the Ioav tinkling of a silver bell was heard in a room Avithin. At once Panny threw down her flowers, and darted away to answer the summons. 12 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER II. Madame la Roche was sitting in an arm- chair in her room. Heavy damask curtains half hid the lofty bed ; ancient engravings and tar- nished portraits in oval frames hmig on the walls ; lady-like knick-nacks were scattered about on spindle-legged tables. Pots-pourris, vases of every shape, screens and stands num- berless, made a pretty confusion about tlie place. The window was open, the morning air came in and breathed gently over Madame la Roche, who sat, as we said, in an arm-chair, with com- posure in her calm face, and the happiness of repose in her hands gently folded on her knees. A loose morning gown robed her person, a pretty morning cap framed her face, soft, aged, and fair ; a face on which care had left few lines, and these few time had gently smoothed away. At her hand stood a small table, on which was placed tlie little silver dinner-bell with which Madame la Roche had sununoned attend- ance, and which the young girl had so promptly SEVEN YEARS. 13 answered, that it had scarcely ceased to ring before the lady's door opened, and Fanny ap • peared on the threshold. " My dear, it was Marie I rang for," said Madame la Roche, smiling. " But I was there in the dining-room," replied Fanny, a little jealously, " there was no harm in coming." " Oh ! no," meditatively said the elder lady, " I do not think there can be harm in that. Well, child, I rang to say that I think I shall breakfast in the garden this morning." " I shall get it all ready," cried Fanny, with great eagerness. " In five minutes I shall come for you." " Very well, my dear," placidly replied Madame la Eoche ; " you need not hurry ; ten minutes will do." But Fanny was already gone. With a calm wonder at the strange hastiness of youth, Madame la Roche again leaned back in her chair, smoothed her lap, and once more folded upon it her dimpled white hands, hands made for idleness, or, as Madame la Roche Avould have said in the polite and courtly speech with which she clothed her thoughts, " hands which Nature had intended for repose." 14 SEVEN YEARS. Fortune had kindly seconded Nature in the case of Madame la Roche. She was born, nursed, and reared in affluence. She married young a rich lawyer, who soon left her a widow, with a handsome fortune and an only child, a daughter, who married early like her mother, and like her mother was w^edded to happiness and prosperity. Thus, with few cares and sorrows, with little to trouble her, and almost nothing to do, Madame la Roche had led the smoothest of smooth lives, and calmly reached her seventieth year. She had a kind heart, an amiable temper, a very easy disposition, and only a few passive faults, from .which no one had ever suffered. Her life had been spent in the house in which we now find her ; here she Avas born, and here, like her predecessors, she devoutly hoped to die, " as late as I can," she smilingly added. In the meantime Madame la Roche kept a man- servant, a cook, two maids nearly as old as herself, and, instead of the parrot or lap dog which every lady worn in years is expected to possess, a merry girl of sixteen, named Fanny, who happened to be the god- daughter of her maid Charlotte. With the chatter of Fannv Madame la Roche amused herself; when her SEVEN YEARS. 15 garden and rooms did not afford her sufficient exercise she took a drive in an ancient family carriage, and called on a few friends, whom every now and then she invited to dinner. Every Sunday she went to hear mass and vespers in the neighbouring church. How the rest of her time was spent Madame la Roche w^ould have found it hard to say, but though she might certainly have led a more useful life, even scandal herself could not say that her existence could be more harmless than it was. Her temper was all but perfect, and it was almost a matter of history that no one had ever seen Madame la Roche disturbed. Still as five minutes went by, then ten, and even fifteen, and as neither Fanny nor breakfast appeared, Madame la Roche wondered gently, moved in her chair, and finally stretched out her hand and rung again with just a touch of impatience. This first call not being answered, she renewed it, and presently the door opened, Marie appeared, and walked in with a resolute look . We have already said that Marie was short, round, and stout ; we may add that she now wore a conical Norman cap, that she had a red face, a quick eye, a quick tongue, and con- siderable vigour of mind and body. Fastidious 16 SEVEN YEARS. people thought Marie rather fiery, and spoke about her temper, but it was agreed that her heart was in the right place, — for it seems this useful organ is not always where it should be in the human frame, — and this advantage was held sufficient to counteract manv faults. " Marie " began Madame la Roche, " I have rung twice." " I was ironing," said Marie shortly, " doing Madame Charlotte's work. Besides, Madame knows this is my time for putting on my cap." Madame la Roche did not attempt to dispute the latter argument. The hat of Gessler him- self was not a sterner emblem of absolute power in ill-fated Uri, than the lofty cap of Marie in Madame la Roche's household. She added to its importance by referring to it in a stately fashion, that admitted of no joking or light talk on the subject. And every one accordingly stood in secret or acknowledged dread of it ; everv one from Madame la Roche do^^'n^^'ards, save Eanny, who was a spoiled, irreverent child, and afraid of nothing the sun shone upon. " Could not Fanny have helped you to iron ? " said Madame La Roche. " Fanny ! " cried Marie, firing up, " Fanny was in the garden gathering flowers. T SEVEN YEARS. 17 did not think Madame would turn upon Fanny ! " " Dear me ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche, " I did not think of that ; the dear child cannot be in two places at once, of course." " There is nothing Fanny does not do to please Madame, I am sure." " I never complain of her," placidly said Madame la Roche ; "I am sorry you do some- times, Marie." " I, Madame ? " Marie looked suffocated, to use the French idiom. '' Yes, I heard you grumbling this morning because the flaps of your cap were not ironed out to your liking. I do not wish to hear Fannv grumbled at.' " Oh ! if Madame begins at my poor cap," sarcastically said Marie. "Dear me," plaintively said her mistress, '* it is not your cap I care about just now, but my breakfast, which I cannot get." Before Marie could open her lips and say she was and had long been aware that Madame did not care about her or her cap either, the door opened, and Charlotte appeared like a dove of peace. Marie snuflFed and tossed her head. She and Charlotte were inseparable foes of VOL. I. 2 18 SEVEN YEARS. forty-five years' standing, united but on one point — love for Fanny, though each affected to consider the other the enemv, or at least the antagonist, of this common darling. Charlotte was short and stout like Marie, though she did not in the least resemble her. Hers was a mild breadth of countenance, a placid weight of figure, to Avhich the viva- cious Marie had no claim. Like Marie, she had a temper of her own, but it was sweet and honeyed even whilst it provoked, and, bee-like, stung to the quick. Charlotte was a widow, and had nursed Madame la Roche's daughter, in virtue of which office she assumed a calm dignity nothing could ruffle, and which did more than anything else to disturb Marie's equanimity. How Madame la Roche got on between these two domineering spirits no one exactly knew. Both treated her like their peculiar property, but after diff'erent methods. Marie thought it good to rouse her mistress, and Charlotte to smooth her down. Madame la Roche let them both have their way, happy if she could now and then have hers. But, as we said, Charlotte now came as a dove of peace, and, ignoring Marie's agorressive sniff, she said soothinorlv : SEVEN YEARS. 19 " Breakfast is ready, if Madame will come out to it." Madame la Roclie rose and took Charlotte's arm. Marie looked on wrathfully, and asked sharply : " May I know what Madame rang for?" "I do not feel very strong," evasively re- plied Madame la Roche, " give me yom' arm too, Marie." Thus supported on either side, the gentle and politic lady walked through stately rooms out into the terrace-like garden, where Panny stood beaming with smiles ready to receive and lead her to the bosquet. Here, though she had taken somewhat more than five minutes to prepare it, she had ce^iainly pro- vided a most dainty-looking little dejeuner. A snow-white cloth covered the rude garden table. Elegant sevres china waited for the rich coffee in the old silver coffee-pot ; croissants, a very pleasant French cake, a variety of small loaves, and pats of fresh butter, appeared on several plates. The tAvo old servants uttered exclama- tions of delight. " Beautiful !" said Charlotte. *"* No one does it like her ! " cried Marie. " My dear," said Madame la Roche smiling, "your reward shall be to breakfast with me." 20 SEVEN YEARS. " And we will wait on you both," zealously volunteered Marie. Fanny was too much accustomed to such favours to dispute them. She sat down opposite her kind protectress and breakfasted with her without using a bit of ceremony, either in ac- cepting the compliment or in allowing her god-mother or Marie to wait on her. It was no unusual event to see Madame la Roche breakfast in the garden ; yet numerous heads soon appeared at the various windows that overlooked it, for the laudable pui-pose of watching the proceedings below, and of over- hearing such snatches of the conversation as might rise upwards ; to which impertinent sur- vey Madame la Roche and Fanny both remain- ed indifferent. That Marie felt more on the subject than they did a remark uttered by Charlotte soon made apparent. " How red you are in the face, Marie," she kindly remarked, — "quite pimply." " Perhaps I am, and perhaps I am not," shortly said Marie. "A great deal depends on temper," pui-sued Charlotte, "as I often told my daughter Monica, who is now in America with her ffood-for- nothing husband, poor dear, — as I often told SEVEN YEARS. 21 her, ' look at me, cliild, you see what a clear, smooth complexion I have ; all temper, love, all temper. Be passionate, and you will be red ; be calm, and you will be clear and pale.' No one knows Avhat temper has to do with complexion." " Temper or complexion, I know this much," wrathfully said Marie, " that if I had the head of that fellow up there under my right arm, and that of the grinning little monkey by him under my left arm, I should squeeze them both soundly ! " " Dear me, Avhat an extraordinary wish ! " said Madame la Roche, putting down her cup and looking calmly surprised. '' I once heard of a Roman Emperor who wished all the world had but one head — but do you know, Marie, it would hurt you," added Madame la Roche, suddenly struck with that practical objection to Marie's plan. '' I should not care," recklesslv said Marie, '' I hate lookers-on." " Let them look," good-naturedly replied Madame la Roche ; " they like to see the birds, I dare say, and the flowers, and Fanny" " It is all Marie's cap," remarked Charlotte ; " she will not believe tliat Parisians never will 22 SEVEN YEARS. get accustomed to those high steeple-hke caps." " I have woni my Norman cap sixty years," — loftily began Marie. " And more," put in Charlotte, — " sixty- five years at least, Marie." " Take away the things," hastily said Ma- dame la Roche, rising ; " Fanny, my love, give me your arm and show me the new flowers." The new flowers were as far from the scene of contest as the limits of the garden allowed. They had been set at the foot of the low wall that overlooked the street. Madame la Roche bent over them as if to inhale their fraoirance, then looking down at the newly -opened shop opposite, she said slowly : " Fanny, my dear, who is that young man tliat never took his eyes off" of you whilst we were at break- fast?" Fanny's eyes were deceitfully raised to every third and foui-th floor of everv surrouiuling house, as with a look of great innocence she answered : '* I see no young man, Madame." " No, my dear, not up tliere, but down below in the upholsterer's shoj) there is a very tall young man, who looked at you so nuich whilst we were at breakfast, that 1 scarcelv think it SEVEN YEARS. 23 was the first time he did it. Do you know who he is?'* " The master of that new upholsterer's shop, I beheve," repKed Fanny. " Can you read his name for me, my dear?" '' Jean Baptiste Watt," said Fanny, casting a careless glance over the gilt letters of the new shop. " Very well," said Madame la Roche, draw- ing herself up slightly, " I shall give Monsieur Jean Baptiste Watt one or two further trials ; and if he continues to stare so at you I shall politely request him to discontinue his imperti- nence, and remind him that it is rude and un- neighbour-like to intrude even his looks on the privacy of two ladies enjoying themselves in their own garden." Fanny smiled demurely, and Madame la Roche, satisfied with the lofty resolve to which she had arrived, took a turn round her garden, and enjoyed her pelouse, her fountain, and her birds, like the owner of thirty acres. 24 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER III. Yanny was a dressmaker bv trade. She went out to work almost every day. She fed the birds or gatliered flowers before she left, whilst ]\Ia- dame la Roche was still in her room. How, there- fore, could her protectress watch over the good or bad behaviour of their young neighbour? And as it so happened that Fanny neither complained of him nor alluded to him in any fashion, the.matter slipped out of the good lady's mind, and Jean Baptiste Watt looked, or did not look, at his pleasure. Charlotte, who never })ut her foot in the garden when she coidd help doing so, exercised no surveillance over her god-daughter, and when Marie entered its precincts it was to scowl up at tlie window of the two offenders on whose heads she had longed to visit the condign punishment Madame la Roche deprecated. On the low regions of street and shop INlarie rarely cast a look. We need scarcely say that Jean Baptiste SEVEN YEARS. 25 Watt went on looking, — so long, at least, as Fanny would give him an opportunity, which was but seldom, the young girl being of a coy nature, willing enough to tantalize him with a glimpse of her young face, half seen amongst green shrubs and slender trees, but by no means inclined to afford him a full and convenient object for contemplation. Matters might have gone on thus, however, for ever so long but for the unexpected interference of Monsieur Noiret. Monsieur Noiret was one of Madame la Roche's oldest friends. He was sixty years odd ; a dry and withered, but stately old gentle- man, stronger, more active, and healthier than many a younger man. He was a gentleman of the old school too ; he wore a queue, small- clothes, black silk stockings, and shoes with gold buckles to them. His features were sharp, yet not without a quiet humour tinged Avith sarcasm ; his keen brown eyes twinkled beneath his strong grey eyebrows with mis- chievous light, and his white teeth gleamed, almost too white and sharp, behind his full good-humoured mouth. To these particulars we need only add, that Monsieur Noiret was a bachelor, that he enjoyed a comfortable in- 26 SEVEN YEARS. come, and that several times a vear he dined in state with Madame la Roche. He had been dining with her on this particular day, one of the brightest in June ; the meal was over, and was followed by the traditional cup of black coffee, which Madame la Roche and her guest took in the garden, with Fanny as waiter. The evening Avas clear and calm; not a breath of air stirred the roses of the bosquet, now in full bloom, and to whose hue Monsieur Noiret, more courteously than veraciously, com- pared Fanny's cheek. "Yes, the child is not amiss," said Madame la Roche, looking kindly at her favourite. " She grows, too, does she not, Monsieur Noiret ? " "Like a lily," said Monsieur Noiret, smiling his fullest smile ; " straight, fair, and modest, but with more than a lily's power to blush." Fannv, with whom Monsieur Noiret was no favourite, looked disdainful, as much as to im- ply that she did not blush on his account. " And Fanny has admirers, I perceive," con- tinued Monsieur Noiret, leaning back in his chair and glancing carelessly at the opposite shop. " That tall yellow-haired upholsterer has a decided admiration for Fannv." SEVEN YEARS. 27 " That young man's behaviour is getting indecorous/' loftily said Madame la Roche ; " I really must interfere." Monsieur Noiret whistled. " An old offender, I see," he shrewdly re- marked. " Oh, Fanny, Fanny ! " " Fanny has nothing to do with it, Monsieur Noiret ; do advise me." Monsieur Noiret waved his hand with a deprecatory gesture, that implied, " I cannot ; excuse me ;" and with a covert look at Fanny that said, " not in her presence, if you please." Madame la Roche took the hint, and gently said to the young girl : " You may take these things away, my dear." Fanny, nothing loth, took up the tray and entered the house. "My dear Monsieur Noiret, what shall I do ? " piteously exclaimed Madame la Roche ; " I had some thoughts of alighting from my carriage at this young man's door, and seri- ously requesting him not to look up in that strange way ; but on reflection it seems to me you cannot quarrel with people for looking, can you. Monsieur Noiret ? " " Certainly not, — especially for looking at youth and beauty, — else I should be in a sad 28 SEVEN YEARS. plight myself," added Monsieur Noiret, ''having always had a strong bent that way. But, my dear Madame, I thought Mademoiselle Fanny became very rosy when I spoke of this yellow- haired young man, who since her depart ure looks most blank and melancholy. Do you suppose she takes any interest in him ? " " Oh dear, no ! " exclaimed ^ladame la Roche, rather stiffly. " Those things have been," smiled ^lonsieiu* Noiret, as if he just then remembered some- thing of the kind within liis own experience ; " but whatever may be the feelings of Made- moiselle Fanny," he added, " I take it for granted that her admirer gets little encourage- ment, else he would not feed so hungrily on mere looks." "But what am I to do?" sighed Madame la Roche ; "I do not want to keep poor Fanny out of the garden, and it is not decorous that she should be looked at in that strange way." *' It is most indecorous," said Monsieur Noiret. " Well, mv dear ^ladame, I see but one thing to do. To send for tluit young man on some upholstery concern, and drop him a gentle hint." SEVEN YEARS. 29 Madame la Roclie eagerly grasped at the suggestion. " Of course, of course/' she said ; "I want some new garden chairs. What is it, Marie?" she added, addressing the owner of the Norman cap who then appeared on the threshold of the glass-door leading from the house to the garden. " Marie," she added, without waiting for an answer, ''will you just step down and tell Monsieiu- Watt that I should like to speak to liim on business ? If he can come at once he will very much oblige me." Marie was not a submissive servant. She had both a way and a will of her own, but the presence of Monsieur Noiret rendered her docile for once ; and though she went away muttering to herself about evening dews and damps, and people who never knew that they were getting old, she obliged her mistress, Avhich w^as the chief tliino;. Her stout fio-ure and formidable cap were soon seen at the upholsterer's door by Monsieur Noiret ; the former firmly planted on the pavement, the latter nodding impera- tively at Jean Baptiste Watt, who, yielding to its smnmons, put by the evening pipe he was en- joying and stepped across the street to comply 30 SEVEN YEARS. with Madame la Roche's bequest. Marie slowly brought up the rear, as if to prevent the possi- bility of escape. "Is he coming?" asked Madame la Roche, who was watching Monsieur Noiret's face. " He is coming," emphatically replied Mon- sieur Noiret. Even as he spoke Jean Baptiste Watt appear- ed at the entrance of the garden, and slowly approached the spot where Madame la Roche was sitting. The young upholsterer was tall, broad-shouldered, and strong. He might be twenty -three or more; he certainly looked older. He had a calm, open, manly face, serene blue eyes, with a shrewd twinkle in them, and firm silent lips that told of a tenacious puipose and strong will. His regidar features entitled him to the epithet of good-looking, though a certain want of vivacity and imagination in them denied him all claim to the meaning of the compre- hensive and wonderful word of " handsome." He was a Meming, as his name indicated, but he wore the dress of a Parisian working man ; the grey blouse and trousers, and a cloth casquette, which he quietly doffed as he ap- proached Madame la Roche. SEVEN YEARS. 31 This lady was favourably impressed by his appearance, and looked at him with a pleased and puzzled expression. " Madame wishes to speak to me," he said. " Yes/' hesitatingly rephed Madame la Roche. " Yes ; I think I should like some garden chairs." "I am an upholsterer," said the young man. " I can procure you garden chairs, but I do not make them." His voice and manner were both phlegmatic and cold. " I see, I understand," said Madame la Roche, and, not knowing how to get on, she gave Monsieur Noiret an appealing look. He smiled compassionately, gently threw himself back in his chair, and thus took the matter in hand. " Monsieur Watt, it is not merely garden chairs Madame la Roche requires, but an awning to protect her from the sun first of all, and also to screen her from indiscreet looks that are apt to find their way to this garden. I believe an awning of stout cloth, say striped red and white, scolloped at the edge, and held by strong poles, will answer her purpose very 32 SEVEN YEARS. well. But perhaps you do not make awnings, Monsieur Watt? " Monsieur Watt did not answer. He looked amazed and confounded at the prospect Mon- sieur Noiret so cruelly held out. No doubt a visionary awning, striped red and white, and artistically scolloped, the work of his own hands too, already stretched before his mind's eye along the ridge of wall above Avhich he had so often seen the graceful form of Fanny lightly moving ; but wakening as from a dream, he said with a strong effort : " I can make an awning for Madame." And taking out his metre measure, he began methodically calculating the height and breadth of the proposed awning. Monsieur Noiret watched and enjoyed his proceedings, but Madame la Roche, who had ever been more remarkable for kindness of heart than for logic or consistency, exclaimed compassionately: " Mon Dieu, Monsieur Watt ! I do not care about that awning ; if you will only not look up here so much as to get Fanny noticed in the neighbourhood, we will not put it up at all. But, you see, you are very tall, and so your eyes naturally look up, and people might misconstrue, Monsieur W^att." SEVEN YEARS. 33 Monsieur A¥att, fairly taken by surprise, reddened like a boy on hearing this speech ; but soon rallying he said coolly : " I will put up the awning, or not, at Madame's pleasure ; I am an upholsterer, and it is my business to comply with the orders of customers ; but as to not looking," he added with an emphatic smack of his lips, " Jean Baptist e Watt uses the eyes w^hich the Almighty gave him, and asks no one's leave as to how and when he is to look." This defiant speech, which was uttered with a full look at Monsieur Noiret, amused that gentleman exceedingly, but completely dis- concerted Madame la Roche. "What an obstinate young man," she mur- mured. " Well, well, put up the awning, Monsieur Watt. How much will it cost ? " " Two hundred and twenty-five francs." " So much ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche, opening her eyes ; " can you make it no cheaper? " " Not a sou." "Well, well, never mind," said the easy lady, "put it up all the same." An expression of conflicting emotions ap- peared on the young man's face. He VOL. I. 34 SEVEN YEARS. hesitated, stammered, coughed, and at length spoke to the following purport : " I am new in business, and naturally anxious to secure customers. Still, as I believe Madame is putting up that awning chiefly on my account, I think that Madame will spare some expense by putting up a wooden trellis, covered with creeping plants. It will cost less, look prettier, and answer the purpose better than any awning." "I shall like it a great deal better," cried Madame la Roche. " How much will it cost, Monsieur Watt ? " " A gardener will tell Madame best," answered the young man civilly, but coldly. " I have the honour to bid Madame a good evening." And, without casting a look at ^Monsieur Noiret, he resumed his casquette, left the garden, and was once more seen standing on his door-step leisiu*ely smoking, and all be- fore Madame la Roche had recovered from the suii)rise into which his bluntness, honesty, and coolness had thrown her. "What an extraordinarv vounii; man." she exclaimed at length ; " very stubborn though, and very tiresome, I suspect." SEVEN YEARS. 35 " I Avonder what Mademoiselle Fanny will say to all this?" put in Monsieur Noiret. " She shall know nothing," said Madame la Roche ; " she would fall in love directly, and she is too young. But that young man must not lose by his disinterestedness; I shall work vou a chair, Monsieur Noiret, and he shall make it up." " Then pray do not tell him so," said Mon- sieur Noiret rising, " or he will certainly stuff the seat with pins, and put an odd nail or two in the back?" " What an extraordinary fancy ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche ; " you do not think he could be so wicked ?" " Humph ! it was I suggested the awning. And he looks desperately in love." Madame la Roche granted the force of the argument, and gently thanked Heaven that she had never been in love. Which remark Mon- sieur Noiret heard with the compassion it merited. 36 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER IV. Madame la Roche was bv far too discreet to drop a word to Fanny of Avliat had passed. " No, Marie/' she said to her maid, as the latter helped her to undress that evening, " no, Fanny is a good girl, but if she were to know the state that poor young man is in, it might have some effect upon her. I never was in love, thank Heaven, and married Monsieur la Roche out of duty to my dear mother, who said he would make a good husband ; but the truth is, Marie, I was once very near being in love with a linen-draper, just because my nurse, like a foolish thing as she was, said that young man looked bewitched whenever I entered the shop. I confess I was beginning to take a liking to going into that shop, when I luckily married Monsieur la Roche, and an end was put to all that nonsense." We are sorry to say that Marie did not give this sensible speech the respectful hear- ing it certainly deserved. She was very much SEVEN YEARS. 37 provoked with every one : with her mistress for talking of getting a trellis put up ; with Jean Baptiste Watt for looking at Panny ; and with Fanny for being looked at. Marie liked the garden as it w^as ; she liked to see and be seen ; to lean with arms folded above the wall that overlooked the street, and ex- change shrill contests wdth any passing enemy below. The trellis threatened to be the destroyer of all her pleasures and habits, and Marie was resolved that it should not be put up. For this it was necessary to bring matters to a crisis, and she saw no better means of ac- complishing her object than to attack Fanny ; not by coarse reproaches or violent scolding, — Marie loved the young girl too much to use either, and, to say the truth, she was also too much in fear of this pert little tyrant, who managed to rule the whole house, — but by those delicate arts which are omnipotent all the Avorld over, and w^hich Fanny in particular was too young and inexperienced to compete w^ith. After seeing her mistress safe in bed, Marie, who never took long to mature her plans, pro- ceeded straightway to the room Avhere Fanny slept, and where she found the young girl workmg busily by the light of a solitary candle. 38 SEVEN YEARS. It was a small, neat room, which Madame la Roche had taken a peculiar pleasure in decor- ating, and which many a wcaltliier girl than Fanny might have envied her, so prettily and coquet tishly was it furnished. " My darling,'' said Marie, entering, " why will you spoil your eyes vdih that bad light ? " " Spoil mv eves ! " saucilv said Fannv, '' no- thing spoils them." " I dare say not — I dare say not," sighed Marie, sinking down on a chair ; " that poor Jean Baptiste Watt knows something about it. Well, well. I do not pity him ; that screen will only sen^e him right." " Screen, what screen ? " asked Fannv. "Dear me, child, do you not know? Did you not see him in the garden this evening ? Were you not present when he had that long talk with Madame ? " Fannv did not know what Marie meant. She had seen no one ; she had heard nothing. " Ah, to be sure, of coui-se not ! " exclaimed Marie, suddenlv remembering; ''well, you know, child, that big, fat, stupid-looking Flem- ing opposite, the upholsterer, who always does so stare at you." " T have never looked at him," sharply in- SEVEN YEARS. 39 terrupted Panny, " and therefore he may be fat, stupid, and all you like, for all I know." " Of course, of course," soothingly said Marie ; " well, child, Madame and Monsieur Noiret sent for him." " I do not see what Monsieur Noiret had to do with it," again interrupted Eanny, who looked red and vexed. "Nothing, certainly,'' approvingly said Marie ; " but it seems they sent for him, and scolded him about his looking, and all that." " Marie, what do you mean by all that ? " asked Fanny, looking solemn. " Do you mean to say that I have ever taken the least notice of that young man, — that I should knoAV him in the street ? " "My darling, no one dreams of blaming you, — no one indeed ; the young man is nothing in this ; the screen is all to my seeming." " What screen ? " " Ah ! there it is, what screen, indeed ! It seems neither threats nor entreaties would make him promise not to look at you in the garden, so Monsiem^ Noiret said a screen — a wooden trellis with a creeping vine— was the onlv cure, and a screen there is to be all 40 SEVEN YEARS. round tlie garden, and Ave are to be locked up like the Grand Turk's wives." " Madame la Roche may put up the screen of course/' said Fanny, looking very- angry and very dignified, " but once it is up I shall not put my foot in the garden." "Then all the blame will be thrown upon me," ejaculated Marie, " for, to say the truth, child, I was not to have told vou. Nothinoj w^ould convince Madame but that if vou once knew about this young fellow, you woidd fall in love with him." " I ! " exclaimed Fanny. " Do not mind it, child, it is all Charlotte's doing, I have no doubt." " I do not care who has done it," cried Fanny, exasperated, " but this I know, that if the screen is put up I shall not put my foot in the garden again." " Stick to that, dear," said Marie shrewdly, " stick to that, and we shall have no screen, you may rely upon it." Every one knows the potent effect of contra- diction, especially in the discreet season of youth. As much through shyness as through prudence, Fanny had sluumcd the pertinacious looks of Jean Baptiste AVatt, but now the spirits SEVEN YEARS. 41 of curiosity and of disobedience were both roused, and Fanny got up at least half an hour earlier than usual the next morning, to see what this fat, stupid, big Fleming was really like. She went into the garden, she fed the birds in the aviary, and the sparrows on the grass ; she tied up drooping flowers, and spent an hour in these tasks, and did not once see the face of Jean Baptiste Watt. He sat in his shop stuff- ing a sofa ; but though he might have seen her, and though he certainly must have heard her, for she sang to herself, he never raised his head once. " He is a Fleming, and he is stupid," thought Fannv, all the more vexed that she was con- scions of having watched for an admiration she had disdained hitherto. She resolved not to give him another thought. Yet at twelve she was in the garden again, and again she saw Baptiste working hard, and never raising his look towards Madame la Roche's premises. " They have frightened him," thought Fanny, with something hke contempt. And she re- solved to see if he could abstain from looking one whole day. Madame la Roche was out in her carriage, making her round of calls > 42 SEVEN YEARS. Charlotte and Marie were busy within ; the June evening was balmy and mild. Fanny took out her work to the garden, and, seating herself near the wall, she sewed busily, now and then clipping off, with her scissors, a withered leaf from a neighbouring shrub, or casting a care- less look below. Women and girls were filling their pails at a fountain, children were playing in the middle of the street, and Jean Baptiste Watt stood on the threshold of his door lean- ing against the jamb, with sadly folded arms, smoking a huge pipe with slow relish, and looking at Fanny with all his might. The young girl had given him up, and in- deed had forgotten him, when, casting her eyes towards his shop, she made the discovery. An expression of great severity found its way to Fanny's face. She rose slowly, folded up her work, took in her chair, and disappeared for the evenino;. Indeed, Fannv was, or fancied her- self, very angry, and straightway went to ^larie, to whom she told what had happened, adding some trying conunents on the personal appear- ance as well as on the behaviour of her admirer, and concludiuG: with the declaration that the sooner the screen was put up the better. SEVEN YEARS. 43 " Well, perhaps it is," pensively ejaculated Marie, " for there is no knowing but you might be tempted to give the young fellow a look now and then/' ** I ! " interrupted Fanny. "Yes, my dear, just as you might look at the door, or at a horse and car in the street ; but men are so dreadfully conceited that this one would never fancy he is no more than a door or a horse in your sight, and of course you cannot tell him so. Yes, the trellis is certainly best, unless, indeed, he should fancy you are peeping at him through it." "Peeping, and at him!" indignantly ex- claimed Eanny. " Yes, dear, all conceit, of course ; but still not unlikely. Men are so. The best of them would not feel a bit surprised at being told, Monsieur, the queen's daughter is dying for you." Fanny was confounded : to be suspected of peeping at a Monsieur Watt through a trellis was more than pride could tolerate, and Marie followed up her advantage with so much skill, that the young girl once more declared she would not put her foot in the garden if once 44 SEVEN YEARS. the screen were put up. She said so not merely to Marie, but to Madame la Roche herself, when that lady remotely alluded to the subject, and spoke of the heat of the sun, and the staring of the neighbours. " I shall be very glad, of course, to be rid of the staring of that impertinent upholsterer," said Fanny, speaking very fast, " but for all that, once the screen is up, I shall not enter the garden." "My dear!" gravely exclaimed Madame la Roche. " I know he would think I am peeping at him from behind it," pursued Fanny, looking hot and vexed. Madame la Roche was very much pei'plexed. She hesitated : it was weak to yield to a child like Fanny ; it was committing her authority ; but then it was so easy. " I really do not like to hurt that young man's feelings," she apologetically said to Monsieur Noiret ; " on reflection, too, I think it would make him conceited. Then it would certainly spoil our garden, and ^larie thinks it would make i)eople take more no- tice than if we put up nothing at all ; and as SEVEN YEARS. 45 Fanny does not care about the young man's looking — we will leave matters as they are. Monsieur Noiret smiled politely, and thus Marie won the day, and Jean Baptiste Watt was allowed to use his eyes. 46 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER y. Prom that day forward Fanny took a de- cided, though discreet, Uking to the httle gar- den. No one could accuse her of going there for the mere purpose of idUng away an hour, for she never went without her Avork, and she sat in the bosquet of roses most decorously sewing. No one could say either that she wished Jean Baptiste AVatt to look at her, for the spot she chose to sit in was by no means within range of his eyesight ; in short it was difficult to say that Fanny Avent to the garden for any other reason than that she liked it, and that it was pleasant, in the freshness of summer mornings and the cool of summer evenings, to sit and sew there ; to hear the birds sing, to see the jet of sparkling water rise in mist and spray, and fall back in its stone basin ; to enjoy the verdure of grass and trees, and, instead of a room ceiling, to feel above her head the clear blue Paris sky. Madame la Roche was of too easy and con- SEVEN YEARS. 47 fidiiig a temper to dream of suspecting Fanny ; Charlotte was too busy within and too indolent to trouble herself about her god-daughter's doings, and only the busy, vigilant, mistrust- ful owner of the Nonnan cap Avas left to keep watch over the young girl. She did so osten- sibly at first, leaning over the wall and look- ing down defiantly at the upholsterer below ; then, reflecting that this was too frank and imprudent a laying of herself open to the enemy, she withdrew like an artful spider to the retreat of some young shrubs and trees, behind which she lurked in watch of the heedless fly opposite ; of this too she tired in time, and entered the house, where she stood behind curtains, or ascended the staircase and took her post at landing windows, like a warder in his turret ; all to no purpose : Marie became convinced of a truth, which it had not taken Fanny two days to ascertain : Jean Baptiste Watt looked up no more. Pride, sense, both perhaps, had w^on that victory over passion : the young Fleming had not w^aited for the threatened screen to be put up ; he had forestalled it by the effort of will, and thus won one of the greatest triunii)hs he could well win. 48 SEVEN YEARS. "The impertinent, conceited fellow I" ex- claimed Marie ; " does he mean anything by it?" "What should he mean?" impatiently re- plied Panny, " who wants him to look ?" " He is sly," said Marie, " he is sly, child ; I warrant, for all his demureness, that many a corner of his eye finds its way up here." Fanny did not reply, but hung her head over her work and sew^ed fast. There is no knoAving hoAV long matters might have gone on so. Fanny might have worked in the garden the whole summer long, and Baptiste might have stuffed sofas and chairs in his shop, and looked up from the corner of his eye, as Marie said, but for an event which no one could possibly have foreseen, and which brought matters to a crisis. Fanny rose one morning in her usual health. She went out to the garden, as her wont was when she spent the day at home, and she sat and sewed there. Towards noon her head ached ; by evening she felt feverish ; in the night she awoke seriously ill. A doctor was sent for by dawii ; he declared that Fanny had a fever of the worst kind, and pronounced her hfe in danger. How did the news reach SEVEN YEAS^^; 49 Baptiste AVatt? Perhaps he missed Fanny from the garden and made inquiries? Cer- tain it is, that on the evening of the tliird day of Fanny's ilhiess, Jean Baptiste Watt, pale and haggard-looking, rang the" bell at Madame la Roche's door, and asked to speak to the mistress of the house. It was Marie who opened. Speedy and sharp came her answer. " You cannot see Madame." And she was shutting the door in his face, when Baptiste quickly interposed his hand and prevented her purpose. " I must see her," he said coolly ; " and I will," he added, entering the ante-room. " You will ? " said Marie, amazed at his audacity. Baptiste shut the door, sat down on the first chair at hand, put his hat on the floor between his legs, and said with an increase of phlegm : " I shall not stir from this place till I have seen Madame la Roche." "And though you should stay here till morning, you shall not see her," indignantly cried Marie. There is something exquisitely provoking in VOL. I. \ 50 SEVEN YEARS. the stolidity of big people. Conscious of his size, strength, and immoveable pui'pose,Baptiste Watt did not deign to stir or speak. His ideas were naturally few, and he had now brought all his energies to bear on one par- ticular idea, — that it was requisite he should see Madame la Roche in order to know the truth about Panny ; more he was not equal to. But this he was so firmly resolved upon, that nothing and no one could have made him move from where he now was. Marie threaten- ed, scolded, and waxed red, and finally left him there and went to find Charlotte, who was ironing in the kitchen. " Charlotte ! " she exclaimed, *' do exert yourself for once, and go to that Fleming out there ; I cannot make him move from the ante- room, and I am determined he shall not see Madame." " It i% very strange that you should have let him in," mistrustfully replied Charlotte, who saw a trap in this speech. " I always said so to Monica. ' Never let a man in, my dear, unless you Avish him to stay. Ah, well, it is hard to have but one child, and to have her whipped off to America for you, by a good-for-nothing SEVEN YEARS. 51 fellow, who gave himself out as earning five francs ten a-day, and who never did make three, Monica,' I said." " I never heard anything like it," interrupted Marie, stamping her right foot. " I ask you to help me to turn out a man, and you talk of Monica's husband to me." " I know you have been wanting this curling iron all day," replied Charlotte ; " but if you think to make me leave it and my place here by yom- stories of men and all that, you are very much mistaken. I scorn such arts, thank Heaven." " The woman is mad," charitably exclaimed Marie. " As to that young giant, we shall see what the broomstick will do, and whether he will brazen that out." And there is no knomng to what extremi- ties Marie, w^ho had a violent temper, might have proceeded, if Madame la Roche had not happen- ed to cross the ante-room and to see Baptiste sitting there. She gave him an astonished look, which, rising at her approach, he answered with great calmness. "I know Madame has every right to be surprised at seeing me here," he said, " but I could live no longer in that state of suspense. LIBRARY IIMVFRQITY OF IIMNOIS o2 SEVEN YEARS. I know Madame is good, and that she will tell me the truth about Mademoiselle Fanny. Is she really so very ill as the people say?" The mild blue eyes of Madame la Roche fell with gentle compassion on the worn, un- happy face of the speaker. " Poor young fellow !" she said half to her- self; "why yes," she added aloud, "yes, our poor little darling is very ill. We are in great trouble about her. Monsieur Watt, — very great trouble ; I really do not know what I shall do if we should lose the dear child," added Madame la Roche, bursting into tears, "so good, so affectionate as she has always been. The doctor says she is very ill, and — dear me. Monsieur Watt, I hope you are not going to faint ! " added Madame la Roche, startled at the young man's appearance. He had turned white, then yellow ; his eyes stared vacantly at the wall before him ; his heavy hand grasped the back of the chair on which he had been sitting, and the whole of his strong frame shook like an undermined column. Madame la Roche stepped over to him, bewildered and frightened, and fimcied that she was propping him, because she pushed SEVEN YEARS. 53 lier little upraised hands against his strong shoulders. " Good heavens !" exclaimed Marie, dropping the broomstick as she entered, " that elephant is in Madame' s arms." " Get me some vinegar, Marie," agitatedly exclaimed Madame la Roche, " the poor child is fainting !" " The poor child !" cried Marie. " Get me some vinegar, I say," again ex- claimed her mistress. " Do you want him to drop?" " No, for it would not be easy to pick him up again," said Marie ; " let Madame help me to put him on the chair, and then we shall see about the vinegar." In a second it was done. Baptiste sat on the chair supported by Madame la Roche, whilst Marie zealously rul^bed his nose with vinegar. " Poor child, poor child," said Madame la Roche, with tears in her eyes. ''If Madame calls that man a child" — said Marie. " Yes, Marie, I do. He is but a big child, a poor foolish boy with a boyish heart. Let him alone. Do you want to take his skin off with 54 SEVEN YEARS. that vinegar ? Let him alone, I say, he is coming ronnd." Baptiste was coming round indeed, for with returning consciousness he uttered a deep groan, stared at Madame la Roche and Marie, and, rising, he opened the door and left them both without uttering a word. SEVEN YEARS. 55 CHAPTER YI. " Was there ever such an unmannered bear ? " exclaimed Marie, wroth and amazed at such extraordinary behaviour. " Let him alone, poor boy," compassionately exclaimed Madame la Roche, " let him alone ; he takes away a sore heart with him ; and I do not like your severity, Marie ; indeed I do not. Besides, what brought you here? you should be with Fanny. Is she in a condition to be left alone after what the doctor has said?'^ " The doctor is an impostor," replied Marie. " He pretends that Panny is ill, just because he wants to be made much of if she recovers. I know him. Why, he made the poor child ill w^ith his last medicine ; and I shall tell him so," added Marie, walking away with the cool self- possession of one long used to rule. "They are too much for me, that is the truth," sighed Madame la Roche; "I sometimes wish I had not such attached servants, and 5G SEVEN YEARS. could manage matters a little my own way ; but I su})])ose it is no use now\" AVitli this despondent conclusion Madame la Roche ^vould probably have remained satis- fied this time, as she had been satisfied many a time before, if she had not received a further and more irritating instance of that domestic rebellion, in the centre of which she lived. She had scarcely left the ante-room, when an impatient ring at the door announced the arrival of Docteur Leroy, the most impatient of men. Marie, mindful that she had just been sent to Panny's room, would not stir thence ; Charlotte, suspecting a trap in the ring, re- mained at her ironing ; the cook had some all- important mess on the fire, and did not stir ; in short, every one's business proved to be no one's l)usiness, and, as a third furious ring was heard, Madame la Roche herself went and admitted tlie doctor, who boimced in red as a turkey-cock, and scarcely calmed down on seeing the mis- tress of the house. "Madame," he beoran, "vour sen^ants — " '* I have none. Monsieur Leroy," interrupted Madame la Roche. " I have masters, but no servants." " Discharge them," said Docteur Leroy, SEVEN YEARS. 57 walking on to Fanny's room, — " discharge them, Madame." Fanny, who was sleeping, awoke as he en- tered. The doctor felt her pulse, and, with a satisfied look, declared the fever had abated considerably. *' Indeed," he added, turning to Madame la Roche, who had followed him in, " indeed, Madame, I think we may pronounce it all but gone : the effect, you see, of that last excellent potion, which has been faithfully administered, as I perceive from that empty phial. I believe I predicted the result." "Yes, I remember," faltered Madame la Roche ; "I am so glad, Docteur, I am so glad, and so much indebted to you." " Science, Madame," modestly replied Doc- teur Leroy, " science, no more." Marie, who had heard them both with her arms folded across her ample person, and her head and its lofty accompaniment gently nod- ding time to their words, now opened her lips, and slowly and deliberately uttered the omin- ous sentence : " I hate imposition." Docteur Leroy was a fiery and impatient man, but he was also a lofty man, and it was 58 SEVEN YEARS. with the strongest assumption of loftiness that, looking at Madame la Roche, he exclaimed : " Madame ! " But Madame la Roche only looked feeble and piteous. " I say I hate imposition," reiterated Marie ; *' and I say that Fanny has had no other illness than that which some abominable medicine has given her. I say too, sir, that the last excellent potion you ordered is here," she added, produc- ing a basin in which she had irreverently thrown it, " and Fanny is well, precisely be- cause she did not take it." The Docteur's temper here got the better of his dignity. " Woman ! " he exclaimed, " do you know that I can get you turned away for this ? Do you know it, I say ? " The daring nature of this" speech completely took away Marie's breath. " Get me turned awav ! " she screamed at length with a derisive laugh, " get me turned away ! — ha! ha! " Docteur Leroy became very red. " Madame," he said, turning to Madame la Roche, " I cannot attend this vouno^ orirl as^ain until you command yoiu* servants. AMiat the SEVEN YEARS. 59 consequences to my patient may be I know not. I wash mv hands of the Avhole affair." So saying he took his hat and loftily walked out. " Marie, what have you done ? " said Madame la Roche, sinking do\^Ti on a chair ; " how shall we manage with poor dear Tanny ? " "If Madame will only look at poor dear Fanny," replied Marie, " she will see how much the little chit is to be pitied ! " Madame la Roche was surprised, there is no denying it, Panny was laughing, not loud in- deed, for she was too weak, but with such good will that tears were running down her cheeks. " The child was never ill," triumphantly re- sumed Marie, " and so I would have told that young elephant if I had known what he was so mad about ; it would have been better than all the vinegar." Madame la Roche thought that Fanny either did not hear, or, hearing it, did not understand this speech, so little impression did it seem to produce upon her, so pale and calm did she look as it was uttered ; but in the course of the day Madame la Roche was undeceived. Marie had left the room, and the young girl 60 SEVEN YEARS. was alone with her protectress. She was cer- tainly, and spite Docteur Leroy's ominous adieu, getting much better, — so much better, that Madame la Roche began to rally round to Marie's opinion, and to think that Fanny had never been very ill. She was also coming round to the belief, which was never long shaken in her mind, that Marie was a wonder- ful woman, and wiser than Docteur Lerov or any one else besides, when a low voice roused her by the following remark : " Dear Madame, who was it Marie called a young elephant ? " Madame la Roche glanced down at Fanny's face. It looked utterly quiet and unconscious, and the good lady searched for an ambiguous answer, but found none better than the verv plain one : " My dear, it was Monsieur Watt." Fanny's brown eyes opened wide, — no doubt with surprise. " Monsieur Watt ! what ^Monsieur Watt ? " " Our neighbour the upholsterer, my dear." *' How odd! what did he come for, Madame?" " My dear, do you not know ? " rather gravely asked ]\Iadame la Roche, who feared that Fanny was indulging in a little duplicity. SEVEN YEARS. 61 Fanny coloured and pouted. Know ! why should she know? Monsieur Watt might be come for business. How could she tell? " Well, perhaps you cannot," replied good- natured Madame la Roche ; " but the truth is, he came to ask after you." " What ailed him, then ? What did Marie mean by vinegar? " asked Fanny. Here again the truth came to Madame la Roche's lips. " My dear, he was anxious about you, and I imprudently told him you were, as I thought, in some danger ; so the poor young fellow nearly fainted." " Very foolish of him," pettishly said Fanny, " I wish he would not." " My dear, there is no harm in it." " I wish he would not," persisted Fanny, "he is tiresome." " He will not come any more," said Madame la Roche. " I shall let him know you are well again, and he mil stay away." " I hope he will," said Fanny. Her hope was fulfilled. Baptiste, with whom kind Madame la Roche had a personal and private communication on the subject, 62 SEVEN YEARS. kept aloof, and Fanny recovered rapidly and undistui'bed. But Avho can answer for the caprices and the wayward turnings of a girl's heart, especially when that girl is sixteen, and has been spoiled and petted from her infancy up- wards ? Fanny's temper did not improve with her retmiiing health. She was peevish, fretfid, impatient. It Avas very plain something ailed her. " I cannot imagine what is the matter with the child," privately said Madame la Roche to her two confidential advisers, Charlotte and Marie, " nothing pleases her. She used not to be so." " Girls never know what thev wish for," replied Charlotte, "nor yet what is good for them. I had a cousin, who was as happy as the day was long, but who was never quiet till she ran awav \\\\\\ a married man." Charlotte's habit of thus getting out of pre- sent matters into some past history was a great source of annoyance to Marie's fiery temper, and a frequent cause of quarrel between her and Fanny's god-mother. SEVEN YEARS. 63 " Aiid Avhat has the runnmg away of your foolish cousin with a married man to do with Fanny being dull ? " she asked. " Where is the married man in this, if you please ? " "There may be one yet," was Charlotte's composed reply. Marie gave her a withering look, but scorn- ing to be drawn on dangerous ground, where Charlotte's irritating coolness and thorough skill ever gave her every advantage, she broke rather than entered on the real matter at issue, by saying hotly : *'And I say Fanny is in love with that young elephant opposite." " Oh, no ! " exclaimed candid Madame la Roche. " I am sure she does not like him at all." Marie gave her mistress a look of infinite pity, and asked dryly : " Shall I find out whether she does ? " " I object to that," quietly said Charlotte ; " to find out would be to make the child fall in love directly, which is by no means to be desired. Unless I know more of that young man, I shall allow nothing of the kind. I have had enough of Monica's unlucky mar- riage. My daughter has been whipped off" 64 SEVEN YEARS. to America. I will not have my god-daugliter whipped off to Flanders, Belgimn, or Holland, or such places." This broke up the conference, and poor Madame la Roche remained perplexed betw^een her two advisers, whose last thought seemed to be to give her anything like real advice ; but this opposition of Charlotte's produced upon Marie the effect opposition of any kind invariably brought about. Without in the least considering the right or wrong of the matter, she did not allow an hoiu to elapse before she entered the shop of Jean Baptiste Watt, and with a gently ironical air asked to speak to him in private. "Why not?" phlegmatically replied Baptiste, rising from his w^ork, and leading Marie into the back parlour, a gloomy room, Avhich he rendered more gloomy by closing the door. " Will you sit down ? " he asked, pointing to a chair. " No," shortly replied Marie. " I did not come here to sit, but to talk." Baptiste nodded, as much as to say, " I am listen- mg. " May I ask," rcsmued Marie, looking both shrewd and searching, "may I ask to know, SEVEN YEAKS. 65 sir, what you meant by coming in the other day, and fainting in our ante-room ? " " I explained my purpose to Madame la Koche," he replied coolly ; " that is enough." " Does that mean, sir, that you will say nothing to me ? " " I have nothing to say to you," said Baptiste. " Very well, sir," wrathfully replied Marie ; " I might have assisted you with Fanny, but mark my words, I shall not be your friend in that quarter." Baptiste Watt was never a quick speaker; he now seemed to think over his reply; at length it came forth : " I have nothing to do with Mademoiselle Fanny. I have never spoken to her. Why do you bring her name in ? " "Why do you stare at her?" indignantly asked Marie ; " why do you stare at her? " Baptiste shook his head a little gloomily. " You mistake," he said, " you mistake ; I have not looked at her for weeks. It was an annoyance and a trouble to her, I believe, and I have given it up." "Very well, sir, very well," angrily re- plied Marie, " make much of yourself, do. I thank Heaven that I never had anything to do VOL. I. 60 SEVEN YEARS. with your sex ; that I never would," added Marie with significant emphasis, " good morn- ing, sir." " Good morning," phlegmatically repUed Baptiste, and opening the parlour door, he saw her out ; but Marie had not crossed the thres- hold door before Baptiste was again at his work. Marie did not boast of her errand or its ill- success, but the whole day long she brooded over a scheme of revenge, which Avas destined to be destroyed in its very birth by events stronger than her will. It so chanced that Fanny was more fantas- tical than ever on that afternoon. Nothing pleased her, though she wished for many things ; Madame la Roche, who was alone with her, bore all these caprices with the easiest good humour, only saying once or twice, " My dear child, what can ail you ? " To which Fanny replied with an impatient, " Oh ! nothing ails me." " But I think something does ail you," at length rejoined Madame la Roche ; " yes, I really think something does ail you." Fanny looked provoked, but did not answer. *' I have just received a very unexpected SEVEN YEARS. 67 visit, and have had a long conversation with my visitor," pursued the elder lady. " I thought it would spare you some trouble if I repeated to you what passed, without bringing Monsieur Watt himself to say it. My dear, you need not colour up so ; it is very natural ; the young man likes you, and wants to marry you ; not now, of course, — you are too young, and he is only beginning business, and he is a very sen- sible young man ; but it seems that was the meaning of his looking up so much ; so if you like him, we need not put up the screen, which always hung so heavy on my mind ; for I felt as if it should have been put up, yet I could not gather courage to see to it. And now, my dear, all lies with you. Say yes or no." Fanny threw her arms around the neck of Madame la Roche. " Dear Madame," she said, " I do not want to say yes or no. I am too young, I do not know my own mind." " My dear, it nmstbe no, then," said Madame la Roche, very gravely. " But I do not want it to be no," impatiently replied Fanny ; "he is big and stupid, and a Fleming, but still I like him very well. I know he took my illness to heart, and I like him. 68 SEVEN YEARS. Surely, I need not say that I shall marry him for that." " My dear, it must be yes or no," persisted Madame la Roche. Upon which Fanny pouted and looked so dismal, that the kind-hearted lady rose, left the room, and held a solemn council with her two prime ministers. The debate was long and stormy. Charlotte, still mindful of the loss of Monica, was for not giving this designing Fleming a foot in the place ; Marie, resentfully remembering her recent repulse, vehemently denounced him as an imposter, second only to Docteur Leroy. Madame la Roche withdrew, deeply peri)lex- ed by the unusual agreement of two who never agreed ; but her perplexity did not last long, for scarcelv had she retired to her room to think over it five minutes, when Charlotte mysteriously entered. " Madame knows how much I like peace and a quiet life," she significantly began, " and Marie has such a dreadful temper, and flies out so, that one cannot be too careful, I have there- fore come to tell Madame my real opinion in this matter, and it is, that it is best to let the SEVEN YEARS. 69 child have her way ; but, of course, Madame will do as she pleases." With this kind permission Charlotte retired, leaving Madame la Roche very much inclined to avail herself of the leave and advice she had received ; but in considerable uneasiness of mind, considering w^hat Marie would say, should she venture to do so. Erom this second perplexity she was relieved by the appearance of Marie, who, luckily unconscious of Charlotte's covert desertion, walked in and roundly said to her mistress : " Madame may think what she likes, but it is no use going contrary to girls ; and since Fanny has set her mind on that young elephant, the best thing is not to go contrary to her, but just let her have her will, and she will get sick of him of her own accord." " There is a great deal of sense in what you say, Marie," replied her mistress; " but if I thought Fanny was trifling with that young man, I would have nothing to do with it, I have a feeling for him." Marie gave Madame la Roche a compassion- ate look, and Avent away with an " Ah, well ! " at the idea of having any feeling for anything in masculine shape, that spoke volumes touch- 70 SEVEN YEARS. ing her opinion of the male sex. But there were matters on which Madame la Roche could be obstinate, and after an inter^^ew and a con- versation of some length with Jean Baptiste Watt, she went back to the room where Fannv sat alone, read her a gentle homily on the wickedness of trifling wath an honest young man; and finally, exacting no promises, but leaving all to Fanny's good sense and good feel- ing, she informed her that Baptiste was coming to see her. " I have warned him that you do not pledge yourself," she continued, " that this is a mere friendly visit ; it now lies with you not to deceive him, which would be cruel and ^\icked." Fanny did not reply ; she was sitting in an arm-chair, her head resting on a pillow, her hands folded on her lap ; a faint blush rose to her pale and wasted cheeks, her lids fell, and her lips parted to murmur some inaudible assent. " My dear, we take it for granted," readily said Madame la Roche ; " and I believe here he is." The door opened, and Baptiste, red, confused, and affected, spite all his phlegm, entered the room. SEVEN YEARS. 71 " Our neighbour, Monsieur Watt, has called to see you, my dear," said Madame la Roche with great dignity ; " pray take a chair, Mon- sieur Watt." Monsieur Watt, who looked exceedingly un- comfortable, nevertheless did as he was bid, and looking at Fanny, seemed to ask for something besides the icy nod with which he had been welcomed. But, spite the kind efforts of Madame la Roche to compel the young girl to talk, it is doubtful whether she would have done more than open her lips, but for the un- expected entrance of Charlotte and Marie. Both the prime ministers of Madame la Roche, like other prime ministers in this, enter- tained a secret and scarcely disguised pity for the judgment of their sovereign. To both oc- curred the same doubt concerning the pro- priety of allowing Eanny to meet with Baptiste Watt under no other surveillance than that of their simple mistress, and both, accordingly, scarcely heard him enter, when they separately proceeded to the room where the interview was taking place. On meeting they exchanged covert glances, each believing the other taken by surprise, and expecting signs of war, wait- ing for which, one took up her position on the 72 SEVEN YEARS. left side of Fanny, and the other on the right. Madame la Roche looked annoyed, and Bap- tiste confounded ; Fanny, understanding the drift of this simultaneous visit, and resenting it greatly, resolved on rebellion, and, calling up her most gracious looks and smiles, began a lively conversation with Baptiste. "I am so much obliged to you for calling, Monsieur Watt," she said; "you cannot imagine how dull I feel, locked up as I am from morn- ing till night. Do give me some news of the world : I know nothing." And whilst, charmed and surprised at the change, Baptiste was meditating what answer to give her, Fanny, without waiting for his re- ply, started a new subject of conversation, and kept up the burden of the discourse with an ease that showed how hght she felt the task. When Baptiste rose to go, she smiled, held out her hand, and graciously said : " You A^dll come again. Monsieur Watt, will you not ? " Baptiste looked at Madame la Roche, who smiled and sighed as she said : "Of course, Monsieur Watt will come again." SEVEN YEARS. 73 CHAPTER YII. Baptiste came again ; and moreover Ma- dame la Roche managed matters so cleverly that Marie and Charlotte were kept out of the way, and he saw Eanny in her presence, which, she was so easy and good-natured, might almost be called seeing her alone. Fanny, indeed, was very coy, very high and fantastic, but still she was pleasant with it all, and Baptiste was too much smitten not to be charmed with her, however she might be. . They thus had two or three meetings, which, that there might be no impropriety in it, and that neighbours might make no odd conjectures and begin to talk about little Fanny, Madame la Roche rendered imperative and business-like, by consulting Baptiste on a set of chairs she and Fanny were going to work, — a vast undertaking, in which it might be confidently predicted that Madame la Roche would act the part of sleeping part- ner, and Fanny do the real business of the 74 SEVEN YEARS. firm. Baptiste had a good deal to say on this important matter. He had to help the two ladies to choose patterns ; he had next to submit to their approbation the designs of the chairs, to consult them on gimp, fringe, gilt nails, &c., and he might have come to and fro a dozen times with ease, if, Avith all her easy good-nature, Madame la Roche had not brought matters to a crisis. Fanny was now well, though still too weak to resume her work ; her kind friends at least thought so, and kept her at home. Madame la Roche was of opinion that early walks were the best thing for her, and that nowhere would or could Fanny get such pure bracino; air, as in Madame la Roche's ances- tral garden. Around these demesnes she accordingly took her every morning, declaring there was nothing like gentle exercise in the open air for bodily health. These walks Madame la Roche and Fanny took alone, and thus, after Baptiste had paid two or three of a series of visits that threatened to be endless, Madame la Roche liad the opportunity of talking seriously, as she called it, to her Httlc protegee. " Oh ! Madame, do look at that bird," ex- SEVEN YEARS. 75 claimed Panny, stopping before the aviary and laughing at a white cockatoo, gravely balancing itself on its perch. "Yes, my dear, but I must talk about Monsieur Watt to you.'' No one can answer for the strange fancies of girls. A sudden and ludicrous resemblance between the cockatoo and her admirer struck Fanny, and she laughed until the tears ran down her cheek. Madame la Roche was puzzled at this strange merriment ; still more puzzled Avhen Fanny explained its cause ; and gravely, though kindly, she assured the young girl she saw" no likeness between those two in- dividuals, — the cockatoo and Jean Baptiste Watt, — an assurance that nearly sent Fanny off again. For, of course, she knew" they were not alike ; a pretty thing if they were ! , " My dear," said Madame la Roche, '' you must not laugh about these things, especially this morning, for I want to talk to you quite seriously about Baptiste. You know, my dear, he cannot keep coming here. It is out of the question." Fanny looked very blank. " It is out of the question," resumed Madame la Roche ; " Monsieur Noiret is surprised at 76 SEVEN YEARS. my allowing so much intercourse between you. It seems I have been quite foolish." " I detest Monsieur Noiret !" cried Fanny, looking ready to shed tears. " My dear, Monsieur Noiret is your best friend," said Madame la Roche. " Oh, no, not he. He broke my doll when I was a child, and I have hated him ever since." " It was an accident, my love." " Madame, he trod on it on purpose. I saAv his heel on her poor face. I declare I still hear the crash, and I hate him ! My best friend ! oh, no, you are my best friend, dear Madame." And Panny gently and tenderly tAvined her arms around ]\Iadame la Roche's neck. "Yes, my dear," said that lady, "but Baptiste must not come any more, — or if he comes," she added, looking Fanny in the face, "it must be as your betrothed husband." Fanny did not reply. "\Vliy not agree to marry him, say two years hence," pursued the elder lady; "his prospects are good, his character is excellent, it is a good offer, and you seem to like him ? He certainlv likes vou dearlv ; what more is needed in marriage ? But trifle with him, my SEVEN YEARS. 77 dear, you must not ; so pray make up your mind. Will you have him?" Thus pressed, Fanny did make up her mind, and from that day Jean Baptiste Watt was an accepted suitor. The betrothal took place that same evening with some solemnity in the old drawing-room, which Madame la Roche never used unless on state occasions, and in the awful presence of Charlotte and Marie, who stood looking on like two grim statues of watchfulness. But there was nothing to watch. Madame la Roche sat in her chair and made a gentle little speech to Baptiste, who stood twirl- ing his cap in his hand with rather an awk- ward look, and to Fanny who stood by him, short and saucy, though endeavouring to look both meek and demure. " My dear children," said Madame la Roche, " with your choice I have nothing to do. You have both chosen for yourselves,— I hope and trust you have chosen wisely ; but with your behaviour, before that choice is made legal and binding, I have something to do in the way of good counsel. You must be very patient, Bap- tiste ; you, Fanny, must be very good, — but, dear me," interrupted Madame la Roche, who was getting tired, " I need say no more, you 78 SEVEN YEARS. know all about it, — give him your hand, Fanny, and let it be over." Fanny did as she was bid ; Baptiste grasped her hand with some emotion. "Fanny," he said, addressing her for the first time by her Christian name, " Fanny, do you really mean it, — do you like me ? " " I forbid Fanny to answer that question," said the calm voice of Charlotte ; " no girl en- tertaining an atom of self-respect ought to tell a man she likes him, until she has been married to him a sufficient length of time to know her own mind." A deep silence followed these ominous words. Marie was thinking how^ to contradict them without taking the part of Baptiste ; Madame la Roche did not dare to oppose what she could not help considering too harsh a sentence ; and Baptiste, confounded and somewhat dismayed, looked from Charlotte to his betrothed, and from her again to her god-mother. Fanny watched him a little while, then darting a rebellious look behind her, she raised herself up on tiptoe, and whispered as near Baptiste's ear as she coidd reach : " My good old Baptiste, do you mind no one but Fanny." SEVEN YEA.RS. 79 t He took both her hands, and grasping them, looked hard in her face. " Say you like me, say you really do ! " he exclaimed with some force. Fanny was half frightened at his earnest- ness. " I really do," she replied, " but let my hands go, pray do." Baptiste released her hands, but first he stooped and kissed her on either cheek. Two screams of hoiTor arose from the statues behind, but Fanny only laughed and blushed, and Madame la Roche, rising, did not wait for attack to defend the culprit. " It is all right," she said, nodding ; " when I was betrothed to Monsieur la Roche in this very room, fifty -three years ago, he did pre- cisely the same thing ; only," she added with a gentle touch of reproof, " he first requested my dear mother's permission." Baptiste reddened and stammered an apo- logy. " Only you see, Madame," he added, '' there are things that upset a man, and to have my little Fanny forbidden to say she liked me was more than I could bear. And with all due re- spect to those whom I must respect, of course," 80 SEVEN YEARS. • added Baptiste, looking firmly at Charlotte and Marie, and drawing Fanny's ann within his own, " this girl is mine or she is not. If she is mine," he continued strongly, "she must like me, or — " " Now do not be foolish," interrupted Fanny, shutting his mouth with her little fingers ; "I shall like you just as much as I please, neither more nor less." And, meek as a lamb, Baptiste submitted. SEVEN YEARS. 81 CHAPTER VIII. Two years had slipped by. Madame la Roche had fallen fast asleep in her chair. The fire burned brightly, the lamp shed a subdued light, the room was warm within ; without the night was stormy, the rain beat against the window shutters, the wind moaned round the street comer, — in short, nothing was wanted to make an evening nap comfortable and pleasant. But human happiness is fleeting ; the heavy street door opened and closed again with a hollow^ sound; Madame la Roche started, sighed, and awoke. ''Alone!" she said gently, "they always leave me alone ; they are very tiresome." She said it in the softest voice, a voice that suited her pleasant face, framed in white hair and a dainty lace cap, a voice that did not jar with the quiet enclosed room, wann and shrouded, in which Madame la Roche was left to the solitude she lamented. VOL. I. 6 82 SEVEN YEARS. It was her bed-room ; one of tho>e chambres a couclier salons that have so long scandalized decorous English travellers. Here Madame la Roche received her visitors and friends. The drawing-room, the real salon, was kept for state occasions, like the betrothal of Fanny, that occurred seldom, and the bed-room, with its old, yet valuable furniture, profusely onia- mented with brass rods, knobs, and handles, did duty instead. Madame la Roche seemed made for that room, she suited it so well with her lace cap, wadded silk dress, and nice black mittens on her little Avhite dimpled hands ; and that she Avas really made for it she probably thought herself, for she seldom left it, now especially that winter and cold had both set in. But if she liked her room, she particularly objected to being left alone in it, and therefore on awakening from her evening nap, and find- ing herself in utter solitude, she said with her usual gentleness of tone and speech : " They are very tiresome.'' Scarcely were the Avords uttered, when Marie, the head offender, for it Avas her especial duty to be AAdth Madame la Roche Avhilst that lady slept, entered the room. ''Marie,'' began Madame la Roche, "I SEVEN YEARS. 83 tlioiiglit it was agreed you were to sit and sew here whilst I slept." " If I had not Madame Charlotte's work to do as well as my own," strongly replied i\Iarie, " I might attend to all my duties, but when I am left to open the door and all that, I cannot exactly be sitting with Madame." " And Fanny," said Madame la Roche. " Oh ! if Madame finds fault with Eanny"— ironically began Marie. " No such a thing," interrupted her mistress, " and I beg that you will not find fault with her, — I do not like it." " Nor do I," said Marie, darting a wrathful look at the door, or more probably at some one lurking within its shadow, '' and I think that if people cannot make themselves be loved, they had better be quiet. Come in. Monsieur Baptiste, and do not stand there like a post." This adjuration not having had a sufficiently speedy effect, Marie resolutely dragged in our old friend, Jean Baptiste AVatt, who came in towering to the ceiling of the room, which, to his seeming confusion, he pretty well half filled. " I declare," said Marie, breathless, " that boy is as big as a young elephant — and as 84 SEVEN YEARS. stupid too, I think," she added, muttering. " Well, now, what have you to say to Madame about Fanny ? for I know your errand before- hand, I w^am you." And, prepared to fight her little friend's battles, Marie folded her arms, and putting her head on one side, looked sarcastically at Baptiste. He was but little altered, and still looked the same calm, steady, phlegmatic Fleming he had looked two years before. " Good evening, Baptiste," said Madame la Roche, returning his greeting Avith a gentle nod ; " are not matters going on well between you and Fanny ? AVhat have you done ? " " Yes, Avhat have you done ? " suspiciously asked Marie, " I am sure you are in the wrong." " Perhaps I am," phlegmatically replied Baptiste, " at all events, ^larie, I do not come to accuse her. I onlv Avant what Madame can get for me, and what I cannot get for myself: a fair, straightforward an- swer." *' You must have patience, you really must," said Madame la Roche. " Fannv cannot be ft-' hurried." " I have waited these two years," replied Baj)tiste, sedately. " I have been put off from SEVEN YEARS. 85 one three months to another, — I cannot wait for ever." "You really must be patient," again said Madame la Roche. Baptiste looked at her earnestly. " Madame," he said, " from the morning when I saw Fanny gathering flowers in your garden I liked her. I said so to you, to her god-mother, and to her. We Avere betrothed. Everv one that knew me said I had done a foolish thing. I was new in busine-s, but I had good prospects, and two hundred francs a year of my own ; and though I might have looked out for a wife with money, and though every one says I am fond of money — and so I am, and w^ho is not ? — I never asked for a sou with Fanny. What you promised, Madame, you promised of your own accord." " Well, I am willing to keep to my word said Madame la Roche. " But Fanny will not keep to her word, resumed Baptiste, looking gloomy. " I like her dearly, — she knows it, and laughs at me for my pains. Well, men are fools if thev are all like me. When I thou<2:ht all settled a vear a":o, Mademoiselle Fannv told me she did not like my shop, with the back )> > J 86 SEVEN YEARS. parlour, the bed, the table, and two chairs. Then, when she saw me exasperated, she put out her hand, patted me on the arm, and said if I would only wait three months, we should see. Well, men are fools ! I w^aited three months, and was put off for another three months, because she was too young. After that came three months because she did not know her own mind; and for the same reason I have been put off until noAv, but I will wait no longer, — I told her so yester- day ; she only laughed, but I am resolved, I am ; and in your presence, Madame, and with yoiu" permission, Fanny shall give me a plain yes or no this evening." Madame la Roche had heard him out with the sleepy placidity of her nature, — Marie, with folded arms, that boded war, and an ominous smile. " And so," she said, wagging her head gently from side to side, " that is what you are come for, Monsieur Baptiste, to abuse the poor dear child ; to me, her friend, and to ^ladame, her protectress. You amaze me, sir, you amaze me ! " '' I have told the truth," sturdily said Baptiste, "and Fanny will not deny a word SEVEN YEARS. 87 of it; besides, all I ask for is a plain yes or no." " And why should you get it ? " resumed Marie. '' Why ? '' " Yes/' said Marie strongly, and looking at Madame la Roche, " why should Fanny give him, or any one else, a plain yes or no,^as he calls it, unless she so pleases ? " This strong assertion of female rights startled Madame la Roche. " Well, Marie," she said gently, " I really think Fanny ought to do that." " Oh ! if Madame turns against her," said Marie, wdth lofty indignation, " I need not wonder that Madame Charlotte should take the young man's part, in preference to her own god-daughter's." " By the way," meditatively said Madame la Roche, '' I think we ought to consult with Charlotte, she is the child's god-mother, she can advise her ; yes, call Charlotte." Marie tossed her head, and nodded her lofty cap, and it is doubtful whether, being gifted with an independent turn of mind, she w^ould have obeyed the order of Madame la Roche, — whom she considered as much intend- 88 SEVEN YEARS. ed by Providence for her, Marie's, comfort, as she, Marie, was meant for Madame la Roche's con- venience, — if Charlotte, drawn by an intuitive knowledge of what was going on, had not made her appearance with a freshly-ironed cap in her hand, by w^ay of apology for her in- trusion. " Charlotte, we want you ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche with a sigh, " Fanny is not getting on with Baptiste. Had you not better interfere ? " Prom the tone of Madame la Roche, Char- lotte concluded that Marie had sided ^\'ith the lover ; and, of course, she took part with Fannv. " I do not wish to contradict Madame,'' she said decorously, " nor to oppose Madame, but there are ways of dealing A\ith girls, and when lovers will not take those ways, girls will be offended and show it." " I do not see that,'' put in Marie. Charlotte ignored the remark, and pur- sued : " My god-daughter has been used to admir- ation, which she deser\'es. Monsieur Baptiste does not admire her enough." " I do not admire her enough I " cried SEVEN YEARS. 89 Baptiste, " why, what more can I do than wish to marry her? Is not that adnmation ? " " Besides, Fanny is not such a fool as all that," obsen^ed Marie, stoutly. " I have long been aware that my god- daughter w^as disliked in this house," resign- edly said Charlotte, " but I never before heard her called a fool. I hope that gross word has been applied to her for the first and last time, — in my presence, at least." " Marie, hold your tongue ! " hastily ex- claimed Madame la Roche, who, though Marie had not yet uttered a word, thought it best to forestall the offence by the prohibition, " Char- lotte, be silent ! Baptiste, I beg you will not add another syllable. I can scarcely wonder at your not getting on with Fanny, when I see how you upset my Avhole household. And al- together," added Madame la Roche, sinking- back in her chair exhausted with this long speech, and this unusual exertion of authority, " altogether, I think we had better leave this matter to Fanny. Let her say and do as she wishes." "Madame," coolly said Baptiste, "that is exactly what I wish for, let her give me a plain yes or no. I know there is a foohsh httle fellow 90 SEVEN YEARS. opposite, who looks after her ; but that," added Baptiste with a tragic frown, " is a matter to be settled between him and me." He did not proceed : a light tap was heard at the door, and almost immediately Fanny entered. SEVEN YEARS. 91 CHAPTER IX. Two years had altered Fanny. She was not much taller, it is true, but she had grow^n decidedly plump. The freshness of a rose had settled on her cheeks, which two dimples adorned. And with her bright black eyes, red lips, and white teeth, Fanny looked and was a very pretty girl indeed. Yet these charms, though real, could scarcely account for the fascination of which Baptiste was victim. He had loved, when Fanny was a slim, salloAV girl, whom most people thought plain. With his fondness her beauty had nothing to do. And who, that scanned her neatly-fitting merino, her tiny apron, in the pockets of which her hands rested with coquettish grace, who, above all, that saw the white fantastic cap perched on the top of her head, could suppose that Fanny might become the heroine of a love tragedy, or, at least, of a melo- drama. It seemed absurd ; comedy, light, careless comedy, was written in the whole aspect of the Parisian 92 SEVEN YEARS. girl. As well might two men draw swords about a butterfly, as quarrel for the preference of this flighty, pert-looking little creature. But there is no accounting for tastes. Bap- tiste was a grave, sober Fleming ; yet no sooner did Fanny make her appearance in the room of Madame la Roche, than he turned red, then pale, and in short, betrayed every sign of strong emotion. On seeing him, Fanny pouted like a naughty child who expects a scolding, and knows that the said scolding is deser\^ed. "Fannv," mildlv said Madame la Roche, " what is the meanins; of all this ? Whv do you trifle with an honest man like Baptiste ? I fear it is wronof, mv dear child, reallv wronoj." " Wrono; I " indiornantlv muttered Marie. Fanny stood leaning against a rosewood commode, her hands still in her pockets, her eyes downcast, her whole aspect expressing wilfulness and caprice. With some emotion Baptiste spoke. " Fanny, I did not come here to torment you. I merely want a plain answer from you. Tell me once for all, ' Baptiste, I dislike you,' and I shall trouble vou no more." Fanny smiled prettily without looking up, and did not seem in the least hiclined to pro- SEVEN YEARS. 93 nounce this harsh sentence. It was Charlotte who spoke for her. " DisHke hmi," she said with a sneer, " things had come to a pretty pass when a man expected to be disHked by a pretty girl." '' But I do not dislike you at all, Baptiste," mildly said Fanny. " Well, then, Fanny, have me," he urged ; " once for all, say yes. Madame approves our marriage, your god-mother Charlotte agrees to it ; I am well off." " Yes, yes, I know%" said Fanny, looking amiable ; " you have two hundred francs a year, a shop, a back parlour, a bed, a table, and tAvo chairs : I know it all by heart." Baptiste gave her so moody a look, that Marie audibly uttered the word ' wretch ! ' and that even Madame la Boche observed : , "Well, but you must have patience, you know." " Monsieur does not condescend to have patience," said Charlotte ; "a girl must throAV herself into his arms. I never heard anvthino: like it, — it is abominable." " I do not see why Fanny should marry just yet," said Madame la Boche, with a touch of querulousness ; " she is very young." 94 SEVEN YEARS. "I am not against marriage," observed Charlotte with irritating mildness, " no, cer- tainlv not ; but vet I know that if I had waited, say five years, to marry, I might have chosen and fared differently. My husband was a good sort of man, but he was a working- man, and five years later I might have had a captain ; over and over he told me so." " I thought he had a wife," said Marie. " Madame I " ejaculated Charlotte with wrathful majesty. " Hush ! " said Madame la Roche, without heeding them. Baptiste still looked at Fanny with steady gloom. She smiled at the fire, apparently unconscious of his look. " Fanny," he said, " a plain yes or no." Fanny bit her lip, coloured to her very hair, and lookins: at him steadilv, she said : " No." Baptiste turned extremely pale ; his eye grew dull and lustreless, his lip quivered, his voice was scarcely audible as he said : '' Thank you, Fanny," and, Avithout remembering the presence of Madame la Roche, he walked out of the room. " Dear me, how very strange," said Madame la Roche looking startled. SEVEN YEARS. 95 " Serve him right," sturdily said Marie. " Then you did not Hke him after all, Fanny ? " pursued the lady. " Like him ! '' almost screamed Marie, " who could like such a boor ? " Fanny said nothing ; she looked calm and unconcerned, but rather thoughtful. " Still I am afraid you have trifled with him, my dear," said Madame la Roche, "I really am." Marie was going to break out, but Fanny forestalled her. Madame la Roche was trying to look stern, but Fanny looked archly in her face, and Madame la Roche's anger melted away in a half smile. At once Fanny put in her easy justification. " I like him, Madame, I really do ; but not enough to marry him, and go and live with him in that little hole of a shop, with the back parlour, &c. I should die with ennui there, I know I should, or run awav, which would be worse. Is it not better, then, to have done with him now, than marry him and repent ? " " Of course it is," said Marie, stoutlv. " That child has a deal of sense," said Madame la Roche. 96 SEVEN^ YEARS. " Sense !" cried Marie, " she is made up of sense." " Yes, she is a clever Httle thing," said Madame la Roche, and they both looked ad- miringly at Fanny, who seemed strangely puz- zled at all this praise. Perhaps it did not strike her that sense was her particular quality ; she did not, however, attempt to dispute the fact, but implying by her looks that Madame la Roche and Marie were welcome to admire her as much as they pleased, she took her usual seat by the fireside. Charlotte, who had been lingering about the room, now thought proper to finish Baptiste's business by observing : " I am sorry for that young man, I really am ; though coarse and obtuse, he was good- natured, and, I believe, honest." "Baptiste is not coarse," said Fanny, looking vexed. "Big, my dear, big, decidedly big," said Charlotte. " Big ! " echoed Fanny ; but unable to deny the impeachment, she added no more, and, turning to Madame la Roche, she quietly asked what she was to read. On this hint, Charlotte SEVEN YEARS. 97 and Marie Avithdrew, whilst Madame la Roche meditatively replied : " Mariette is too flimsy, I think we will have the Three Masked Ladies." Accordingly in a clear voice Fanny began : "The midnight bell was tolling, when three ladies, masked and clothed in black, appeared in the place of Notre Dame." '' Fanny ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche, — whose placidity all the horrors of the French romantic school could not disturb, — "Fanny, it was a good offer! It is almost a pity you rejected that young man." "Perhaps it is," demurely said Fanny, and going on with the Three Masked Ladies, she thought : " and suppose I should regret it, cannot I get him back again ? I have only to open the window, look out, and let him see me, and all is right." In this easy frame of mind Fanny read on till ten struck. She then laid down her book, and Marie appeared, bearing a small tray with a glass and decanter. Madame la Roche took her frugal supper of toast and hot wine and water, allowed Marie and Fanny to un- dress her, and entering the downy bed that VOL. I. 98 SEVEN YEARS. closed around her, she softly said from behind the damask curtain : " Marie, do not tease Fanny about Baptiste ; I know he is a good fellow ; but since she does not care about him, we must not tease her." And, closing her eyes, Madame la Roche fell fast asleep, oblivious of Baptiste, love, Marie, and everything. " Tease Fanny about him ! " muttered Marie, " very likely, indeed ! " It did not seem probable, but the spirit of contradiction is strong, and it had sufficient power over Marie to make her scold Fanny not exactly in favour of Baptiste, but about him. Charlotte, who was present, mildly de- fended her god-daughter, and her mildness having, as usual, the effect of oil on Marie's fiery temper, a dire quarrel w^as the result. Fanny heard them both with evident im- patience, and put an end to the argument by saying saucily : " I did not have Baptiste because I did not like him, and I do not know whv I did not like him ; but if I did like him, I would have him to-morrow." SEVEN YEARS. 99 And, tired of hearing about Baptiste, she went to her room. It was close to Ma- dame la Roche's. Like that lady's apart- ment, it looked out on the street. The shop of Baptiste was exactly opposite. Erom that shop there came a streak of light, which Fanny watched on the window curtains. She lay awake, though in bed. Madame la Roche was sleeping calmly in the room on her right ; Marie and Charlotte w^ere quarrelling — but no longer about Baptiste — in another room on her left; but she could not sleep like one, nor forget like the others. Perhaps her con- science pricked her ; perhaps the pity of the young is stronger than the sympathy or than the anger of age. "What can he be doing?" she thought, and she got up to see. The street was silent ; eleven was striking ; she drew back the ciutains and looked. Baptiste was hard at work ; he was finish- ing a chair for Madame la Roche — a chair which Fanny had worked, — the last of the memorable set begim two years before, but the nature of his task did not mollify her displea- sure at the fact that, after parting from her. 100 SEVEN YEARS. Baptiste could work. She gave the dark and dingy little shop a scornful look ; live there, indeed ! her eye fell with disdain on the sturdy figure of the young Fleming, nailing and hammering by the light of a wretched tallow candle. "Much trouble there is on his mind!" thought Eanny, vexed at her needless pity ; " see how he works to earn a few francs ; that man loves nothing but money," — and dropping the curtain, she went back to bed, and soon slept soundly. For Fanny had grown pretty, and with her beauty she had acquired admirers, a circum- stance to which no pretty girl is indifferent, and which had thrown Baptiste's love consider- ably in the shade. " I like him ; I really do," she often thought ; "but then, why should I marry so soon?" which prudent reflection, the aversion she felt to exchange a pleasant home for the gloomy little back parlour and a business life, very much strengthened. And thus little by little her love had grown weak, and she could bear to part from Baptiste with little emotion, and after parting from him she could sleep. SEVEN YEARS. 101 CHAPTER X. Early the next morning there came a ring at Madame la Roche's door ; it was Eanny who opened. Baptiste stood before her with the chair on his head. " Good morning, Mademoiselle Eanny," he said civilly. " Good morning," she replied shortly, for she thought he must have worked all night, avaricious creatm'e ! " I have brought back Madame la Roche's chair." " Put it here," said Eanny, showing him into a back room. " I have done my best with it," said Baptiste, giving her a doubtful look , " 1 think she will like it." " I dare say she will." Baptiste sighed and turned away, then turned back. " Eanny," he said, '' I may have spoken 102 SEVEN YEARS. harshly last night ; I am sorry for it. I hope yon bear me no ill-will." " ni-will ! " said Fanny, laughing, " ill-\nll! what for ? " Baptiste hung his head, and said slowly : " For no particular reason, Fanny ; but since you bear me no ill-will, I suppose Ave are at peace." Fanny yawned a little behind her dimpled hand at what she considered the prosiness of her former lover, and shivered slightly, for the doors were all open, and the wind was whistling in sharply, but she tried to remain thoroughly good-humoured, and to say vdih a pleasant patronizing nod, " Yes, Monsieur Baptiste, we are at peace." Baptiste stroked his chin and smiled ; he was wondering perhaps at two years wasted, at the blindness and folly of his own heart, but he made no comment. " Good morning, ]\Iademoiselle Fanny," he said civilly, and he slowly walked down stairs. Fanny went to work as usual that day, and came back at eight. She found ]\Iarie very busy, and rather out of tcm{)er. The daughter of Madame la Roche, Madame Dupuis, and SEVEN YEARS. 103 her child, had come, " and settled themselves down," as Marie termed it, in the quiet dwell- ing of their relative. " They are come to stay ? " asked Fanny. "Of course they are; Monsieur Dupuis is going out of town, and must needs pack his wife and child upon us. I wonder at the man. Just hear how that child screams ; poor Ma- dame la Roche's head must be splitting by this ; and then it is ' Marie, run and fetch us some biscuits ; Marie, some milk ; Marie, call the coal-heaver to take away the naughty child ! ' I wish people who have children would let people who have none, and would have none, be quiet once for all. I think, too," she added, giving a fiery look to Charlotte, who was knitting placidly in a corner of the kitchen, " I think it very strange, I say, that those who nursed the mothers give themselves so little trouble about the children, but leave it all to others." Charlotte stuck one of her knitting- needles in her hair and looked meditative. " A sweet child was Mademoiselle Cecile," she said, " and her boy is just like her. Her very portrait : a sweet child." 104 SEVEN YEARS. " I wish yon had the sweet child to yourself then," hotlv said Marie, "for I have enough of him. A little wretch I call him." "Bless his heart," said Charlotte, re- suming her knitting. "And Baptiste," said Fanny, "has he been again ? " " Baptiste ! pray what should bring Bap- tiste here ? " shai-ply answered Marie. " He is not paid for his chair." " Child, let Madame settle that, and do not mind Baptiste nor his chair neither, Sui'ely there is enough trouble on our minds without him." " But, Marie, his shop is shut, and ]\Ia- dame Leroux says he is gone." " Gone ! ay, gone to the banner to drink." " Baptiste never drinks," said Fanny, look- ing vexed. " Dear me, child, do not fly at me ; the lad will turn up again and come for his money. I wish that were all we had to teaze or vex us just now." ]\Iarie could think but of her own troubles and wrono-s : and even when Famiv succeeded in convincing her that Baptiste was really gone. SEVEN YEARS. 105 all Marie answered was : " Well, let him be gone ! who regrets him?" "No one," shortly said Fanny; and there the matter ended. Madame Diipuis w^as as quiet a little lady as her mother, yet she and her child succeeded in upsetting Madame la Roche's peaceable house- hold. Before three days were over, the man-servant and the cook threatened to give notice, and Marie gave her mistress the news, with a sullen satisfaction that spoke of secret wrongs endured with ill-subdued resentment. Madame la Roche was sitting in her arm- chair in her pleasant bed-room ; her daughter occupied the chair Avhich was formerly Fanny's, and the child sat on the carpet, strewed with toys. '' Yes, Madame, go they will," said Marie. " How very strange !" exclaimed Madame la Roche, looking more bewildered than dismayed. '' What can ail them, Cecile?" Her daughter, thus addressed, looked help- less, as if too strong an effort had been required from her sluggish intelligence, but compelled herself to reply : " I really cannot tell, maman. They must be very unreasonable. Marie, will you tell lOG SEVEN YEARS. the cook that I shall want some more of that panade for Charles ? '' Marie smiled grimly. " And also tell her to stew me down the calf's foot, and will you tell the coachman that we shall take a drive this afternoon?" " The horses have taken cold, Madame ; and really the cook cannot attend to the dinner and to everything." Madame Dupuis seemed astonished. " Oh ! then, you will do it, Marie," she placidly suggested. " Madame forgets that I have all Monsieur Charles' things to iron, and that Madame Char- lotte will do nothing." " AVell, then, let it be Panny," put in Ma- dame la Roche ; " Fanny is very neat and handy." " Fanny is very ill in bed," said Marie. "Dear me, what ails her?" " Her head aches." " Ah ! I have such bad head aches !" sisrhed Madame Dupuis. " I hope she will be well this evening," said Madame la Roche, anxiouslv. " It is not likely," drily replied ^larie, "she has been unwell these two days, and is only getting worse." SEVEN YEARS. 107 " Two days ! and you never told me, Marie/' " Madame never asked about Fanny," replied Marie, looking deeply injured, " and of course it was not my place to intrude Fanny upon Madame." Madame la Roche looked guilty and peni- tent. " Dear me, I am very sorry," she said, "" but where is she?" " Fanny is in her room, Madame." "And I never heard her !" " Perhaps Monsieur Charles made too much noise," was the pointed reply. " I must go and see her," said Madame la Roche, with a sigh ; '' Cecile, cannot that child be induced to make less noise?" " No, maman," placidly replied her daughter, looking at Charles, who was flinging his toys about with great vigour, "no, I assure you Monsieur Dupuis and I have often tried, but we never could induce him to be more quiet." " I'd induce him !" muttered Marie. Peaceable Madame la Roche submitted, however, without demur, and prudently shun- ning the immediate vicinity of her grand-child, she left the apartment and entered Fanny's room. 108 SEVEN YEARS. Fanny was up and dressed, but looking so ill and so Avretched, that Madame la Roche was quite shocked at the change in her ap- pearance. She sat down by her, took her hand, which was burnino;, and kindlv asked Avhat ailed her- " Nothing, Madame," w^as the low reply, hst- lessly spoken. " You seem feverish," said Madame la Roche. " My head aches a little ; but indeed it is nothing." " How very odd that you should look so ill about nothing," simply suggested ^ladame la Roche. Fanny turned very red, then pale, then she said : " I assure you, Madame, that if you suppose I am thinking of Baptist e — " " My dear child, Avhy should I think that?" She seemed surprised at the suggestion. Fanny did not speak, but with some emotion she turned her head away from the mild astonished look of the elder lady. This simple little act, however, proved fatal to her com])osure, for, to avoid a glance more benevolent than penetrating, she looked through the window into the street, and there she saw exactlv fac- SEVEN YEARS. 109 ing her the closed shop of Baptiste, with the words To Let on the shutters. This was more than Fanny could bear. She hid her face in her hands and burst into tears. "Dear me!" said Madame la Roche, very much amazed. Panny cried and sobbed as if her heart would break ; at length she ceased, and, look- ing up, she said : " I dare say, Madame, you think I am cry- ing for Baptiste ; but that is not it ; yet it is about him I am crying, I do not deny it. Ma- dame, I could bear to think that I have lost him by my own folly, but I cannot bear to remember how that same folly has driven an honest man to ruin : that is what cuts me." " Dear me ! " again said Madame la Roche, not knowing what else to say on such, short warning ; but her mind gradually rallied and came round to its natural point ; she gave Fanny's hand a kind and compassionate squeeze, and said gently : " My dear child, do not exaggerate. Bap- tiste is gone, it is true, and I am sorry for the poor fellow ; but since you did not like him, what was to be done ? You must not suppose, moreover, that he will go to ruin for having 110 SEVEN YEARS. left his shop. I dare say it was not a thriving business." " But, Madame, do you not know that he has enhsted," said Fanny, " that he is a soldier ; that he may be sent to Algeria and killed ? " " Enlisted ! oh, dear no ; depend upon it you are mistaken." "Indeed, Madame, I am not; the person who told me saw him in his regimentals ; and his regiment is gone many leagues away by this." Madame la Roche looked gently sceptical, and Fanny had to talk a great deal before her protectress was finally convinced. When she was at length persuaded that Baptiste was a soldier, and was really gone, she said gently -. " Well, it is a pity ; but what is to be done ? you did not like him." " But I do like him," cried Fannv, fairlv provoked at so much blindness, " and I do not want him to be shot. Oh ! dear, what shall I do ? " " I suppose I have forgotten all about the ways of girls ! " ejaculated Madame la Boche. " Well, my dear, do not cry so, only tell me this : if Baptiste were to come back and ask you, would you marry him now ? " SEVEN YEARS. Ill " Marry him ! " said Fanny, drying lier eyes, and looking very much as if all her per- versity were coming back with the question, " but since he is far away, Madame ? " " My dear, you really must give me a yes or a no. 1 can do nothing without that." There was a great struggle between love and pride, but love prevailed ; and though not without many hesitating sighs and blushes, Panny at length confessed that if Baptiste would but forgive her and come back, he should have no reason to complain of her. " Well, my dear, do not fret. I shall do my best," said Madame la Roche rising, and leav- ing Fanny to such comfort as these words suggested, she went and called Marie to a secret council. Marie remained mute on learning that Fanny was fretting for Baptiste ; but though she looked very much amazed, she declared that she knew it all along. " I knew what the girl was fretting for, Ma- dame. I knew it quite well." " Dear me, I did not, Marie." " Oh ! no, Madame was too busy with Mon- sieur Charles to think of poor little Fanny ; poor dear ! " 112 SEVEN YEARS. " Really, Marie, you suq)rise me. If you knew the truth why did you not come and tell it to me ? If I had known the young man had enlisted — " " He did it to break the poor child's heart," wrathfully interrupted Marie. " Rely upon it, Madame, that was his motive." " The young man has been hasty," mildly said Madame la Roche, '' still his own feelings suffered." " Feelings ! " interrupted Marie again, " does Madame believe men have feelings ? " This was so general a question, and it in- volved so many delicate matters and recollec- tions, that Madame la Roche paused ere she answered with a sigh : " We will not talk about that now, jMarie ; the question is to get this young man back, since Fanny Avishes for him." " So I think," said Marie, with whom Bap- tiste was neither more nor less than a flesh and blood toy, which had hit Fanny's lancy ; and she no more thought of finding fault Avith the yomig girl's choice than the tender parent, whose darling choses a harlequin doll, quarrels with the pleasure which the hideous thing af- fords the beloved child. SEVEN YEARS. 113 " But it may not be easy to get him back/' said Madame la Roche. Marie groaned, and confessed that men were monsters now and then. . " But we will do our best," pursued the gentle lady, '' only you must help me, Marie." Then folloAved a long and close conversation, chiefly relating to the best means to be adopt- ed for securing the return of the fugitive, and in which so many plans were proposed and re- jected, that, by the time it was over, Madame la Roche was fairly exhausted. Marie generously took pity on her mistress, and remarked : " Let Madame take no trouble about the cook or coachman, — I will make them stay, whether they like it or not. I should like to hear them gnunble about Monsieur Charles again ! A fine spirited little fellow ! And as to Madame Charlotte, who hates her own god- daughter, I know, she shall hear a piece of my mind before the day is out." Upon which Marie, who was the soul and spirit of the household, rushed to the kitchen, settled the cook and the coachman in a twink- ling, and fought a dire battle with Charlotte, — if that can be called a battle of which the VOL. I. 8 114 SEVEN YEARS. fighting was all on one side : the enemy, like Wellington at Waterloo, conquering by dint of silent stubbornness, and, what was even more provoking, taking to herself the merit of future success, without incurring the risks of failure. " Ay, ay," she calmly said, going on with her knitting, and taking advantage of such ac- knowledgments as had escaped ]\Iarie during the heat of the contest, "I know what the child wants." " AVell, and what does she want ? " asked Marie. Charlotte's reply was an allusion to the history of her father's sister, whose lover re- tiu-ned after fifteen years. "And what has that to do with Fannv?" indignantly asked Marie. A supercilious smile was Charlotte's only answer. SEVEN YEARS. 115 CHAPTER XI. Promises are sweet; they lead on the wings of Hope to the happy land of Desire, that favoured abode of youth. The parting words of Madame la Roche had buoyed up Fanny ; all w^as right, or would be; Baptiste would come back, forgive, and be forgiven. She cared for no more, and gave no thought to the future beyond these fair hopes. But though Madame la Roche had promised, nothing appeared to come of her words. Bap- tiste neither returned nor wrote. No fond, happy, and forgiving lover came back to the light and imprudent girl, who did not know her own mind, and had trifled with her own heart. Perhaps it could not end so easily : strange and deep must have been the despair which had led the calm phlegmatic Fleming to take this impassioned step : a despair not easily soothed, a step not readily revoked. Baptiste loved deeply ; too deeply, no doubt, to submit to lose Fanny, and yet stay near her, breathe the same 116 SEVEN YEARS. air, and, may be, see his inconstant mistress favour a happy rival. It was easier to throw up business, future prospects, and all for which he had hitherto lived, than to remain and be- hold that dreary result. Better become a soldier, be sent off to Algeria, and shot by some Arab, and have an end of it all, than linger and suffer from a pain which, though it may pass away with time, is intolerable whilst it lasts. And perhaps because he had suffered so much, Baptiste did not come back. Fanny said nothing, but the roses forsook her cheek, the light fled from her eyes. She did not complain ; she even said she felt remarkably well, and she looked wretchedlv ill. Madame la Roche was concerned ; ]Marie was cross ; and Charlotte, Avhom a fit of rheumatism kept to her bed, was gently peevish, — love and lovers were all nonsense. There Avas but one real thing in life, and that was rheumatism ; Fanny heard her, and did not argue the point, she felt too sad and too weary. ' Everything else went on as usual in the httle household, that is to sav, evervthimr contiiuuHJ to be u])set by Madame Dupuis and her child : even the placid mother of the former seemed heartily wearied of this long, tiresome visit, and SEVEN YEARS. 117 was heard to observe once or twice : " How very long Monsieur Dupuis is staying." At the end of a week the cloud which had been hanging over the family became a settled gloom. Marie, with eyes and face on fire, took Fanny aside one evening to say to her vehe- nientlv : " Fanny, never think of that wretch again ; mind my words, never think of him." " Very well," said Fanny, with tolerable calmness. The same evening Madame la Roche like- wise spoke to the young girl ; her language was more gentle, but the meaning was the same. " My dear child," she said mildly, " I have done my best, and I have failed ; try and for- get Baptiste." "Yes, Madame," said Fanny, with apathetic calmness. Charlotte, too, thought proper to impart the information to her god-daughter, and to add to it a dose of comfort and advice, judiciously mingled. " Child," she said to Fanny, who was sitting with her, " you will live to know that love is a folly. Have I not been married, and do 1 not know all about it ? Forget that big Fleming, 118 SEVEN YEARS. my love; forget him, and depend upon it you ^ill sleep sound at night, eat well in the day, and come round. Bless you, you will marrv^ some other man some day. Yes, my love, and have a dozen of children, I dare say. I had a friend once, whose name was Jeanne, and who was desperately in love three times, and ended by marrying a man she did not care a pin about, and who made her as happy as the day was long." What could Fanny answer to this, especially when Charlotte concluded by declaring to her that life held but one real trouble, and that its name was rheumatism ! Fanny did not contradict ; she did not answer; but she thought of Baptiste from morning till night, and from night till morning. Fanny was melancholy ; Marie was kept in a state of permanent indignation by the exacting ways of Madame Dupuis and her boy; Charlotte Avas cross, and could not be spoken to; and all this sadness, wrath, and ill -temper acted on easy INIadame la Roche. She could not refrain from some secret murmurs. " It was love, tiresome love, that had done it all. Until love came SEVEN YEARS. 119 they were happy. Fanny was merry ; there was even something pleasant about the quarrels of Charlotte and Marie : but now all was wrong, all was upset." Madame la Roche could not indulge in such thoughts without looking disturbed and unhappy ; and Madame Dupuis, at length becoming aware of the fact, observed one evening, as she sat with her mother : "Maman, is anything the matter?" " Nothing, my dear. Fanny, go and fetch me the second volume of Racine from the library, if you please." Eannv, who sat with the two ladies em- broidering at a frame a little apart, rose and obeyed. The library was an old-fashioned piece of furniture, filled with many old-fashion- ed books. It stood in the dining-room, which it half filled, and was rarely opened. Fanny put down on a table the light she had brought with her ; and instead of looking for the second volume of Racine, she sat down in the nearest of the old- fashioned arm-chairs around her, and yielded for a while to the luxury of solitary de- spondency. Baptiste had been gone three 120 SKVEX YEARS. weeks ; it was a week since Marie and Madame la Roche had bid her cease to hope. Oh ! what a long dreary week she had spent ; sewing all day, — coming home at night to sit in that dull weary room, where the two ladies spoke in subdued mumiurs, bv the fireside, and where the boy stamped and shouted, whilst her needle for ever went in and out the canvass on which she was working the first of a new set of chairs for Madame la Roche. " And is it possible ! '' thought Fanny, groaning, "that I am to live for ever so? How dif- ferent a life I might have had wdth him ! T disliked the shop and the back room ; they were better any day than this dull stupid life I lead here, frettino^ mvself to death for what cannot be, and for what is." And by " what is " Fanny did not un- derstand merely her own troubles — she had distracting visions of a dusty and way-woni soldier, of a wounded man, of death-beds in tented camps, of war and all its hoiTors. Her heart swelled, her tears flowed, and, leaning her head on the table near which she sat, she cried long and bitterly. " Fanny ! " said a voice behind her. SEVEN YEARS. 121 Paiiny looked up with a cry. Baptiste, pale, haggard, and worn, but Baptiste in flesh and blood, stood behind her. Of what avail are resolves in life ? Fanny had thought that if she saw Baptiste again she would meet him with penitent sorrow ; Baptiste had firmly resolved that before he forgave his sinning mistress, he woiJd make her agree to a regular series of con- ditions ; and when they met, Panny could only laugh and cry for joy, and throw her arms around his neck, like a happy child; and Baptiste could only take her in his arms and hold her fast like a treasure lost, long sought for, and found at last. It was Fanny, moreover, who made all the conditions. ''You must never go away again," she cried. " Never ! " said Baptiste, who was too happy to do more than echo her words and look at her, and who, moreover, for- got that this submission was by no means what he had intended. " And you must never be so foolish as to think I do not like you." " Very well," said Baptiste, meek as a 122 SEVEN YEARS. lamb ; and who would have gone on promis- ing till morning, if Fanny had not sud- denly asked : "And how and why did you come back, sir .'^ The countenance and manner of Baptiste underwent a complete change. " Madame la Roche wrote to me," he replied ; " she wanted to buy me out, but though people say I am fond of money, it is not the money of others I am fond of, so I thanked her and declined. Still I could not help thinking of you ; so at last I made up my mind, I bought myself out, and came back." Fanny reddened and bit her lip. " I suppose Madame la Roche Avrote to say I was breaking my heart about you, — I wonder you believed her." Baptiste put Fanny away ; he was pale but cool, his brow was calm but resolute, and his look was settled and almost cold. " Fanny," he said, " we will say little, but it shall be to the purpose. When will you marry me ? " The dawnino: rebellion of Fannv fled as by magic. SEVEN YEARS. 123 "When you please," she said, trying to smile ; " you have travelled from a suf- ficient distance to have your way." If Baptiste had followed his own will he would have said, " Let it be in a week," but generosity prevailed over passion, and he merely said : " Then, Panny, let it be this day month." " Very well," said Panny ; " if my god- mother, Marie, and Madame la Roche agree to it, this day month let it be." " I have your word," impressively said Baptiste. " My word of honour," said Fanny, lay- ing her left hand on her heart, and giving him her right hand with a grand air. " Mind, Fanny, this day month," repeated Baptiste, secretly uneasy at the delay, though of his own fixing. Fanny laughed gaily. " Do not be tiresome," she said, " you will often wish it undone before the year is out." " The year will be out in six weeks, Fanny." " Oh ! if you begin finding out all the stupid things I say," began Fanny hotly, " we shall never have done," she would have added, but had not time. 124 SEVEN YEARS. Madame la Roche, surprised at the non-ap- pearance of Fanny with the second volume of Racine, and thinking that the young girl must have fainted away alone, and be lying in a swoon in one of the ann -chairs, had kindly come out herself to see what the matter was. A sound of voices which she heard before open- ing the door changed the current of her thoughts from a fainting fit to an invasion of thieves ; and Baptiste was so altered, and his presence was so unexpected, that if she had not seen the smile on Eanny's lips, Madame la Roche might have persisted in the latter belief. " It is I, Baptiste Watt, Madame," said the young man, perceiving he was not recognised ; " I am come back, and Eanny has promised to marry me this day month." " To-day is Friday," said Madame la Roche, nervously , " not this day month, Baptiste, to- morrow month." " As Madame pleases," replied Baptiste, looking red and annoyed. " But how very odd that you are come back ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche with re- trospective wonder ; "you wrote that you would not." " I beg ^ladame's pardon, I only wrote that SEVEN YEARS. 125 T did not wish to be bought out by Madame ; but I bought myself out, and here I am." " You are very independent/' said Madame la Roche, a little testily. " Well, well, Eanny shall have the fifteen hundred francs I promised on her wedding day." "Pifteen hundred francs is a nice sum/' said Baptiste, looking pleased, " and I do not deny that I w^ould rather have it with Fanny than not, though it will not make me a bit fonder of her." He looked so fondly at the young girl as he spoke, that Madame la Roche felt convinced Fanny would be a happy woman. She felt moved, and very much inclined to shed a few tears, when the propriety of making him ap- pear before Charlotte suddenly occurred to her. "You must speak to Charlotte," she said gravely ; " Charlotte is the child's god-mother, and we can settle nothing without her." Fanny smiled archly at her lover in a w^ay that said plainly : " You know better than that, do you not ? " but slipping her ann within his, she led him at once to the presence of her god-mother. Marie was sitting with Charlotte, whom rheumatism still kept captive, for somehow or 126 SEVEN YEARS. other the two enemies were not happy apart, and Marie held it her duty to rouse Charlotte, to stir her up by gentle discourse. The sooth- ing down of invalids she held an egregious mistake. " Sick people are already low," thought and said Marie, " it is rousing they want. Therefore rouse them up." Acting on this judicious and benevolent principle, she gave her spare time to Charlotte, with whom she sat several hours daily, anxiously exerting herself to rouse her. It happened indeed that Char- lotte roused Marie as often as Marie roused her ; but this reversing of their natural positions Marie kindly disregarded, and persevered in her endeavours. The two friends were engaged as usual, when Madame la Roche opened the door of Char- lotte's room, and ushered in Baptiste and Fanny. Charlotte showed no great signs of wonder ; she was not in the habit of betraying her emotions, but Marie, who was more un- sophisticated, stared at Baptiste in mingled surprise and wrath. " Well, sir," she began. "Marie, you must not scold," interrupted her mistress ; " the young man is a very good young man, though a little flighty" — Fanny SEVEN YEARS. 127 looked demurely at her betrothed, who seemed sm^prised at this definition of himself — " and rather too disinterested for this present state of society." " Hmnph ! " gnimbled Marie, who had always held Baptiste close and rather avaricious. " I know w^hat I am saying," testily re- sumed Madame la Roche ; " but, as I said, he is a good young man, and Fanny likes him, and they are to be married to-morrow month, and they are come to get the consent of their friend and god-mother, Charlotte." Charlotte, who sat in an arm-chair, whence indeed she could not move, nodded and smiled blandly. " I knew," she said, " that my efibrts for the happiness of these young people coidd not long remain unavailing ; but I expected Bap- tiste sooner." " Sooner ! " sneered Marie, " sooner ! why how then could Monsieur make our poor child fret herself pale and ill for his sake if he came back ? No, no, he must stay away of course, and Panny must wait his leisure." " There, sir," said Fanny, " you hear how badly you have behaved, I hope you will show yourself penitent." 128 SEVEN YEARS. " He show himself penitent ! " screamed Marie. " No, no, you really must not scold," said Madame la Roche. " I am an infallible judge of character, and I know that Baptiste will make an excellent husband." Marie gave her mistress a look of infinite compassion, for she was accustomed to keep Madame la Roche in a state of mental sub- jection, and could not see without pity so futile an attempt at liberty, but not deigning to discuss the point, and pleased at the happy face of Fanny, she said with some loftiness : " Since the young man has shown a proper sense of his errors, he is welcome to my for- giveness." Baptiste reddened, and was going to object to being forgiven, but the fingei-s of Fanny were laid on his lips, and his mouth was effectually stopped. *' I give my consent to his marriage with Fanny," resumed Marie with great majesty, *' and I allow him to embrace me." This permission Baptiste received with a suspicious look, as if he thought it part, of the forgiveness, and Fanny had to frown and shake her head, and even to give him a sly SEVEN YEARS. 129 push behind, before the obstinate young giant would move a step towards the stately Marie. She beheld his hesitation Avith a benevolent smile, and as sovereigns see the awe and em- barrassment their presence creates. Still smil- ing, she held up one cheek, then the other, and when the salute was over she said blandly : " As to the wedding ; do you not think, Baptiste, it will do very well this day three months ?" " I suppose you mean six months," said Charlotte, quietly. " I hope my god- daughter is not going to be so indecorous as to marry off* in a hurry." Baptiste did not answer ; but he looked so sullen and so black, that Fanny, half frightened, slipped her arm within his, and gave him an appealing look, which cleared his face at once, and made him half smile. " Thank you, Marie, thank you, Charlotte," he said phlegmatically, " but Fanny and I think a month long enough to wait." " Of course it is," said Madame la Roche. " No, Marie, no, Charlotte, you really must not oppose the poor children. Any one can see they will have no peace of mind until they arc married." VOL. I. 9 130 SEVEN YEARS. A remark vvliich, thoiifrli innocentlv utterexl, yet verged so much on indecorum, called for due reproof. Marie thought fit to take this task on herself, and set her simple mistress to rights. Ignoring, therefore, the imprudent words ^ladame la Roche had uttered, ^larie said loftily : " In the mean while. Monsieur Watt, I shall suggest your seeing Fanny as httle as possible. Deconmi you know, Baptiste, deconun." " Ay to be sure, decorum," put in Madame la Roche, who felt slie had gone too far ; " Fanny has not been reared like a common girl, ^lon- sieur Watt. She is an orphan, and has been under my special care ever since she was three years old; and you see, Baptiste, it is pre- ciselv because vou are to marrv her that vou ought to see her as little as possible." Baptiste looked confounded, and Fanny mis- chievouslv demure. " And I even suggest," put in Charlotte, " that Baptiste should go to some little dis- tance and keep out of the way." " That," said Ba])tiste, coolly, '' is impossible. I nuist prepare a home for Fanny ; but since vou object to my seeing her, why I will not do so without vour consent." SEVEN YEARS. 131 He bowed to Madame la Roche and to Charlotte and Marie, and, taking Fanny's hand, he simply said : '' Good bye, Fanny ; we shall soon meet." He dropped her hand and turned away, leaving them all rather surprised at the quiet dignity of his manner. Fanny stood a while irre- solute, then darted after him, and reached the door as he was opening it. " You tiresome man," she said petulantly ; " why do you mind them ? do you not know that it shall be as I like, and not as they like ; and do you suppose I am not going to see you for a month ? " But Baptiste shook his head, and sturdily resisted the temptation. " One w^ord, one man," he said bravely, " I shall see you when they like, Fanny." And, not trusting himself with a look, he slowly and heavily walked down-stairs. ''He is very stupid!" thought Fanny. " When they like, and is not that when I like, Monsieur Baptiste ? " "A very remarkable young man," said Madame la Roclie to Marie, " and a very strong will." 13.2 SEVEN YEARS. " Trust Fanny for twisting him round her little finger," knowingly said Marie. Fanny, who had returned, stood behind them : she overheard Marie's words, and smiled wist- fully at the future. She did not seem to see Madame la Roche, or to think of going back to her w^ork in that lady's room. She stood like one in a dream, and Madame la Roche witli her usual good-nature kindly smiled, and say- ing, " I shall not want you any more this even- ing, child," she returned to the cheerful apart- ment where she had left her daughter. "AVas the book lost?" asked jNIadame Dupuis. " Ah ! Cecile, this is a strange w^orld, and 1 cannot think Avlmt possesses men and women, to make it stranf]rer. But thev will love and be wretched, and marry, too, — it is surj)ris- >> mo* '' Amazing ! " said ]\Iadame Dupuis, " espe- cially when people are ])oor." " Fanny is not exactly poor," began Madame la Roche. " Dear me," interrupted Madame Dnpuis, opening her languid eyes, "is little Fanny in love ; is she going to mariT ? " " Yes, mv dear, she actuallv is, and she is SEVEN YEARS. 133 goinor to leave me, too." And in the fulness of her heart Madame la Roche related to her daughter Fanny's history. Madame Dupuis heard it with little interest. She was not unkind, but she was very cold ; her heart was heavy and dull, and she never thoroughly apprehended the troubles or con- cerns of others. She thought it strange that Fanny should be in love, and should want to marry. " But, my dear, you manied," objected her mother. Madame Dupuis looked as if she thought that quite another sort of thing. " And I married," pursued her mother, " so that I suppose it is the general lot. ' But still Madame Dupuis thought it singu- lar that Fanny should leave an agreeable and comfortable house like her mother's for such a home as a working-man could offer. " Perhaps there is no home like one's own home after all," sighed Madame la Roche. " But I shall miss my little Fanny, ay, and sorely too." Madame Dupuis said nothing, but she stared at her mother, whose eyes were dim, and she seemed to think this the strangest of all. 134 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XII. Partly through pique, partly through pride, Panny took no steps, that is to say, expressed no wish, to see Baptiste until the month was nearly out. He kept strictly to his word, and chose the middle of the dav, when she was not within, to call on Charlotte and Marie, and set- tle with them matters relative to the approacli- ing event. Thus he reopened his shop, set u]) once more his little stock, resumed his business, and prepared that dingy home for the presence of his bright and gay betrothed. Panny, whom he had deferentiallv consulted through the medium of her god-mother, replied by the same means, that he was to act as he pleased, and that she, P'annv, would be satisfied with what- ever he did. '' I shall do my best," replied Baptiste ; " a man can do no more." Thev thus reached, without meetino:, the Thursday that preceded the Saturday on which thev were to be married. To the great s\u'- SEVEN YEARS. 135 prise of Marie, Fanny said to her in the morn- ing: '' Marie, god-mother is too ill to accompany me, so you and I must go and spend this even- ing with Baptiste. Will you tell him so, if you please ? " " My dear child," said Marie, solemnly, " you mean, I suppose, that we must ask Baptiste to come here. It would be better not to meet him till Saturday morning, but since you wish it, let it be." " No, Marie, not here. I wish to see him and the place too ; so please to tell him so." Marie demurred, spoke of propriety and the world, and delivered an excellent homily on decorum ; but Eanny was obstinate. " There is no impropriety in my going with you," she said ; " and as we have only the street to cross, it is very hard if we cannot do so without the world being apprized of it; besides, we shall only stay an hour or so ; and, I tell you, I must see Baptiste, speak to him, and look at the house I am to live in." Marie offered no further resistance, she knew of old that when Fanny was determined on anything it must come to pass, and that to submit with a good grace to the will of this 13C SEVEN YEARS. little despot was her best poliey. Baptiste, accordino:lv, was warned of the honour he was to receive ; he showed no extraordinary degree of elation, but enough of honest, substantial, hearty pleasure beamed in his honest blue eyes, to make Marie say kindly : " Make no e^ctraordinary preparations to re- ceive us, Baptiste ; we are only paying you a flying visit." '' I shall do Avhat is right," said Baptiste, sturdily. The day was wet and dreary ; night came early, and set dark and starless over the Marais. At a quarter past eight the street door of Madame la Roche's house opened to let out Marie and Fanny. Muf- fled in heaps of cloaks and shawls, Marie had some trouble in moving ; Fanny, bare- headed, and with a light silk handkerchief on her shoulders, skipped across in a moment, and stood waitincj on the threshold of the shop for her slow companion. " Good evening, Fanny," said Baptiste, in a low moved voice ; " this is kind of vou." " And it would have been verv kind of you. Monsieur Baptiste, to have come across and helped me over that abominable nuul," SEVEN YEARS. 137 testily said Marie, entering the shop and closing the door. " You told me I was not to show my- self," said Baptiste, astonished. " And pray who could see you on this black night ? some people are very tire- some ; they always take one at one's word." " I am afraid you will always find me so," said Baptiste slowly ; "when a person says a thing, I think that person means it." He spoke to Marie, and looked at Panny, wlio stood smiling, casting furtive looks about the shop, and seeming pleased with its aspect, Baptiste's honest face beamed with plea- sure and pride, and throwing open the door of the back room, he said with some stateliness : " Please to walk in, ladies." " Really this is nice," said Marie. Fanny said nothing, and Baptiste, who liad expected some slight degree of praise, seemed disappointed. He closed the door, drew chairs round the fire, and sat down with a slightly clouded broAV. Yet to one who had seen this room formerly, and who saw it now, Baptiste 138 SEVEN YEARS. had done wonders. A bright paper, scat- tered with roses and jonquils, enUvened the dark walls. A marble slal) had re-placed the wood of the mantel-piece. A handsome mirror above it, with a small gilt time- piece, and china vases for flowers, — though no uncommon luxury in Paris, where every one has a clock and a looking-glass, — gave the place a gay look. The room, indeed, had not got any larger than it was for- merlv, but the new chairs, covered with bright red damask, were lighter and less cumbersome than the old ones ; thin muslin curtains enclosed the bed in its recess, where it looked lofty like a throne ; on the small round table, pushed on one side that the three might And room around the blazing wood fire, there Avas a trav covered with a w^hite cloth, under which imagination might revel and conceive a world of dainties. Baptiste saw Fanny give it a stolen look, and he smiled, for he knew that his be- trothed had a swxet tooth. " Well, Fanny," he said, unable to kee]) in, "what do you think of this nice little room to sit and work in, eh ? " " Where is the window ? " asked Fannv, SEVEN YEARS. 139 who knew that this room was ht from the shop, and ahnost as dark at noon-day as at night ; but Baptiste smiled, rose, and point- ing to a narrow curtained opening in the w^all, which the bed had concealed from Fanny's view, he triumphantly said : "There!" " Yes," he resumed, enjoying Fanny's sur- prise, '' I persuaded the landlord to let me have it made. The look-out is not very gay, but when the sun shines on the wall opposite, it becomes quite cheerful." " And the kitchen," said Fanny, gravely ; " I hope you have not forgotten that, Baptiste. This room is too pretty and nice to cook in." Baptiste laughed, walked to the wall, open- ed a cupboard, and displayed to Fanny, who did not know whether to laugh or cry at the sight, a complete kitchen within. A kitchen in a cupboard is one of those continental contrivances which bewilder an English ima- gination ; but a kitchen in a cupboard is re- ally a practicable thing, and better than no kitchen at all. Breast high, and in the centre, a space was devoted to the round receptacles for charcoal fires, which do all the fine French cookery ; how or where the 140 SEVEN YEAllS. sinoke went Fanny could not see ; but around the range she saw hanging on nails the requisite number of pots and pans, and she could not but confess that nothing was wanted. It was a complete kitchen. " Baptiste, how did you think of that ?" she asked, when he closed the cupboard and re- sumed his seat by her side. " I did not think of it," replied Baptiste, with evident regret, "it was my working-man, Joseph." " Never mind, you did it, and I am very nmch obliged to you all the same, Baptiste." Here she looked again at the tray, and Baptiste, calling her a little " friande," rose once more, and handed round some hot punch and cakes. " Very appropriate on this cold night," said Marie, whose good humoiu' w\as remarkable ; "you have a great deal of judgment, Monsieur Baptiste." Baptiste smiled, and filled her glass twice for the once that he filled his and that of Fanny, who said it was strong, and made her head ache, and that she preferred the cakes and sweets. " Stron-j; !" said Marie, amused, " child, this SEVEN YEARS. 141 is ladies' punch, quite harmless." And she held out her glass and winked at Baptiste, Avho seemed slightly surprised, but dutifully replenished her tumbler. But, like many harmless people, this innocent punch had tricks of its own ; Marie always averred that it was weak as water, yet scarcely had she taken this last glass, than her head dropped on her shoulder in a state of pleasant drowsiness, and her body sank back in the deep and Avarm arm-chair which Baptiste had borrowed from his shop for her use. " Mane is sleepy," said Fanny, Avith the self-possession women display in those cases. " Yes," said Baptiste hesitatingly, " the heat of the lire, you see." A long silence followed, during wdiich the crackling of the wood on the hearth and the calm snoring of Marie in her chair alone w^ere heard. Fannv sat straio;ht on her chair, wdth her hands folded on her lap, and her eyes fixed on the fire, and Baptiste sat looking at her, and feeling a great deal too happy to be quite com- fortable. When he saw the girl whom he had liked so long, and remembered that on 142 SEVEN YEARS. the next day but one she wouhl come and share this pleasant httle home with him, his heart filled, and he could only sigh with pleasure. " Fanny," he said at length, "I hope you w^ill be happy." Fanny looked up at him very eaniestl}', but did not answer one word. " If I thought you would not," resumed Baptiste, looking at the fire, " it Avould make me Avretched. I Avould rather give you up this moment than think, she will regret having married me." " I shall not regret it," said Fanny, smihng quietly, " why should I ? I feel very good this evening, Baptiste, and I am sure you Avill help me to be good ; you will have patience with me ; you will not take a hasty word for more than it means." " No," said Baptiste. "Why should we not be happy?" she added after a while. "We are both young — I am scarcely eighteen, you are not twenty-five. W^e have the world, work, some money, and kind friends before us. ^^ hy should Ave not be happy?" She spoke gravely, and looked at him with SEVEN YEARS. 143 unwonted seriousness. Baptiste hesitated, then gave a look at Marie, and said : " Fanny, you have never fairly told me that you really liked me. Tell me so now." " I shall have to say it after to-morrow," said Fanny ; " once is enough." Baptiste looked disappointed. "What ails you?" asked Fanny, frowning ; " am I a girl to do what I do not like doing? T have agreed to marry you; is not that enough? ought you not to be satisfied?" — "Perhaps I ought; but you speak so lightly, so coldly, always in jest." Fannv lauohed and looked mischievous. " If you go on so I shall get naughty," she said ; "I must tell you how to manage me once for all, Baptiste," she added confiden- tially. " You must love me like the apple of your eye, spoil me a good deal, and rule me like a little child, — I am not fit to have my own Avill, that is the truth." Baptiste looked bewildered, then rueful. " I shall never be able to manage that," he said ; " rule you like a little child, but how ? " "As if I were to tell you ! " cried Fanny, looking vexed, " I never heard anything like it. 144 SEVEN YEARS. "And you will never get that from me," said Baptiste, with a sad shake of the head. *' I can love a woman lionestly and faithfully, and love none but her." Fanny stamped her foot. " Indeed," she said, " well, you had better love some one else. I warn vou, I am dread- fully jealous." *'Are you?" phlegmatically replied Bap- tiste. *' But I cannot rule a woman, " he added, calmly continuing his former speech. " No, Panny, T must respect my wife, and if she is a child, how can I respect her? " " Oh ! that will never do." exclaimed Fannv, " I tell you I have been spoiled and petted, and if you treat me so grandly, I shall feel dull." Baptiste looked thoroughly disconcerted. Fanny spoke his secret fears : she would be dull with him. And, what was worse, he knew not, even remotely, how to keep this gay young girl in joy and good luunour. The mixture of fondness, teasing, and authority which Fanny herself held requisite for their mutual liappiness, Baptiste could not i)ractise. He could only love and honour like any kniglit of old. SEVEN YEARS. 145 Fanny saw his troubled looks, and was sorry. She rose from her chair, she went up to his, and standing by him with friendly grace, she said cheerfully : "Do not be afraid, Baptiste, we shall not be able to help being happy. I feel sure of that. As I said a while ago, we have some money, kind friends, work to do, and the world before us. What more is wanted ? " Baptiste could have said that he wanted Fanny to love him as he loved her, — with a love deep set and beyond the reach of change ; but where was the use ? This cheerful, light little girl liked him as well as she could like. She would not become a different woman just because they were going to be married the next day but one. He folded his arms with a sigh and looked up at her ; there she stood by him, pretty, gay, beaming, an image of grace- ful cheerfulness, but looking as light as a feather. " I must marry her after to-morrow," thought Baptiste, with a sort of calm despair, " not merely because I am bound to her, but because I cannot do without her, and yet I shall be wretched and she will not be happy. I shall spend money and waste time to please VOL. I. 10 14G SEVEN YEARS. her fancy, and get a jest and a laugli, or a yawn of ennui, for my pains ; and yet I must do it with my eyes open, just as I came back and bought myself out at her bidding." " What ails you ? what are you thinking of ? " asked Fanny, displeased at his gloomy looks and at his silence. " Of you," he replied calmly. "Then you might look more amiable," she said shortly, and she walked back to her chair looking vexed. " What o'clock is it ? " asked Marie, waken- ing up with a start. " Eleven ! Fanny, are you dreaming ? we were to be in at ten. Mon- sieur Baptiste, there is magic in that chair ; it made me fall asleep, it positively did. Fanny, put on my shawl." She had risen : Fanny rose too, and wrap- ped Marie in the shawls and cloaks which she held indispensable to the preservation of her health. Baptiste silently assisted in the task, and, scarcely speaking, saw them out ; but he was of a taciturn temper, and not accustomed to many words. Marie saw nothing in his silence, especially as his adieu had all the re- quisite cordiality. " You may embrace me," kindly said Marie, SEVEN YEARS. 147 as tliey parted, " and Fanny, too, I allow it." Baptiste had already complied with the first part of this precept, he now turned to Fanny with some hesitation. He took her in his arms, and stooping, for though not unusually short, she looked a mite near him, he kissed her with a sigh. " Good night, my dear little Fanny," he said fondly ; " like me at least as much as you can." " If you wish for it do not ask for it," saucily said Fanny ; " you know I am possess- ed with the spirit of contradiction. Good night, Baptiste." And with a nod half friendly, half careless, she left him standing on the door-step look- ing after her in the dark night, and thinking bitterly : " That girl will drive me mad, I know she will." The street was quickly crossed ; a knock at the street door without and a pull at the porter's cordon within, soon brought Marie and Fanny within Madame la Roche's house. The lodge was dark, for the concierge had retired to her bed, but her wrinkled face, peering through the frill of a night-cap, appeared be- hind the panes of the glass door. 148 SEVEN YEARS. " Who is there ? " asked her shrill voice. " Dear me, Madame, you might put on your spectacles and look," loftily replied Marie, be- tween whom and this dignitary there existed a constant feud, and whose natural irascibilitv the punch might have heightened. " There is no need for that, Madame," re- plied the lady of the lodge, with much dignity ; " no one who hears you need look at you in order to identify you." " Madame," began Marie, turning pale with wrath. " Madame," interrupted Madame Grand, " we will have no discussion, if you please. I am sleepy, it woidd moreover disturb the house, Avhich is, I thank Heaven, a quiet one ; but I shall feel very much obliged to you if you will take up this letter to your mistress. It came as I was going to bed, and I could not of coiu'se take it up-stairs." She held forth a letter, which Panny took, for Marie would have seen her hand bunied before she would have stooped to an act of so much meanness, and put an end to the con- versation bv closimr her 2:lass door and retirinix to the privacy of her slee})ing apartment, viz. an alcove or recess in the lodge. SEVEN YEARS. 149 " Mark my words, Panny," said Marie, dart- ing a wrathful look at the dark glass door, be- hind which her enemy had retreated, " mark my words, that woman will not end well." There is no denying that, on hearing a pre- diction which might apply to a scapegrace of fifteen, but was scarcely suited to three-score, the lady of the lodge longed to come forth and resume the battle, but dignity and prudence alike kept her where she Avas — in bed, and satisfied Avitli this easy victory, Marie went up-stairs once more elate. The staircase, like all French staircases, was lit with a lamp, hung midway in the spiral hollow, that went from the top to the bottom of the house. A sort of half gloom was the result. But in addition to the imperfect light thus diffused, another lamp, fixed to the wall close by the door of Madame la Roche, shed its glow on her landing. It was there, and just as the door had closed upon him, that Marie and Fanny met Monsieur Noiret. They thus enjoyed a good view of his active figure, and Monsieur Noiret likewise had the advan- tage of recognizing Marie's portly person and Fanny's pretty face. " Good evening, Marie," he said blandly. 150 SEVEN YEARS. " we are old friends, eh ? Good evening, little Fanny, you are going to get married, I hear." " Yes, sir, I am," shortly rephed Fanny, with whom Monsieur Noiret was no favourite. " Yes, sir, we are old friends," said Marie ; *' old friends in vears of our own, sir, and in the time we have known each other, sir." " Precisely," replied Monsieur Noiret, show- ing his teeth again. "Good evening, Marie; good night, little Fanny." He pinched her cheek, nodded to them both, and went down humming a tune. " A pleasant gentleman thirty-three years ago," said Marie, with a sigh ; " ah, child, if I had liked ! " She shook her head and sidied a2:ain as they entered. " If I had liked," she pursued, "I might have been Madame Noiret. I might, indeed, and then no low creatures in lodsres would have had their say at me." Fanny did not reply, she entered her room, sat down on a chair, and burst into tears. " Bless me," cried Marie, " you do not mind that loAv creature ? " " Oh ! Marie," said Fannv, sobbinir, " I am wretched." SEVEN YEARS. 151 " Never mind her, child." " Oh ! I do not ; it is Baptiste. I feel and I see it, we shall not be happy together : I am sure of it." And her tears flowed afresh. Marie stared and asked Avhat she meant. " He likes me too much," said Fanny. " I like him verv much, to be sure ; but not so much as he likes me ; he sees it, it exasperates him, and it already bores me. What will it be when we are married ? " " My dear," said Marie, much relieved, " do not trouble vourself about that. I never heard wives complaining that their husbands teased them by too much love." " Baptiste will always be fond of me," said Fanny, reddening. " Yes, dear, but not more than you Avill like," pacifically replied Marie ; " give me Madame la Roche's letter, and do not trouble yourself about Baptiste' s excessive love. It will calm down, my dear, it will calm down." Fanny looked very vexed, but did not an- swer one word. Marie took the letter and left the room. 152 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTEE XIII. A DOOR had formerly led from the bed-room of Madame la Roche to that of Fannv ; as both rooms Avere accessible by either doors, that one had been suppressed, that is to say, a chest of drawers had been placed against it on Fanny's side ; on Madame la Roche's it remained visible, though unused : but that door, it is scarcely necessary to say, could not exclude sound, and Fanny, as she sat alone, fretting at Baptiste's over-fondness, and vexed at the mere thought that this troublesome affection might grow less, could not help hear- ing the discourse between Madame la Roche and Marie in the next room. " Marie, where have you been ? " asked the lady's voice ; to which Marie's sturdy tones re- plied : *' Only at Baptiste's, Madame.'* There was a pause before the voice of Ma- dame la Roche was heard a2;ain. " Was Fanny with you? " SEVEN YEARS. 153 " Of course, Madame. Is this the night- cap Madame means to wear ? " "Marie, I am very much sm-prised. I thought it was agreed the young man was to be kept at a distance ? " " Fanny wished it, Madame." " I do not say there was any harm in it ; but I think, Maiie, it would have been respectful to tell me about it." " And not to stay out till eleven, without leave," put in the voice of Mame Dupuis. " No one is anything in this house," ob- served the voice of Charlotte. " My own god- daughter is not mine ; but I have always been used so, and I will never believe that if Monica had not been advised to it she would have orone off to America." " May I ask what Monica has to do with my taking Fanny over to Baptiste's this even- ing ? " calmly inquired Marie, with whom this referring of Charlotte's to something or other that had nothing to do with the matter in hand, was a constant and irritating griev- ance. Charlotte was opening her lips to an- swer, and war was imminent, when Madame Dupuis again said : 154 SEVEN YEARS. " I wonder you went out without leave, Marie." This second interference of her mistress's daughter probably irritated Marie, for in anything but a pleasant voice she observed, '' that she did not know she had two mis- tresses." " Marie, you are very rude," said Madame la Roche, " I beg you will not ansAver my daughter so." " I always spoke my mind to Mademoiselle Cecile when she was a child," put in Marie, with great spirit, " and I cannot leave off now." " I know you are an attached friend, more than a servant," said Madame la Roche, " but still, Marie, you are too rude. The world has seen and commented on it. It is my duty to put a stop to it." " Maman has been a great deal too indul- gent," put in Madame Du])uis. *' Cecile, do not interfere. I am quite able to direct my own servants. Yes, Marie, I must put a stop to it. You talk too loud ; moreover, you are always quarrelling with the portress, Madame Grand, a thing I have the SEVEN YEARS. 155 greatest objection to. What were you and she saymg this evening ? Cecile and I actually heard the noise up here.'' " I know Madame always takes the portress's part," indignantly said Marie ; " but I did not expect to be turned upon this evening, because, as Panny knows and can say, I resented that Madame the portress should give me a letter to carry, which it is her bounden dutv to deliver to the mistress of the house." " A letter ! dear me, Marie, how very odd you shoidd keep it all this time, and stand talkinoj there. A^Hio knoAvs but it is of im- portance ! Give it to me. Just look at it, Cecile, and tell me what it is. You mav read it aloud. 1 have no secrets for Marie and Charlotte." " It is from a Monsieur Dam-ay," said the voice of Madame Dupuis. " I know no one of the name ; go on, my dear." Madame Dupuis read : " Madame, " I have not the honour of being acquaint- ed with you, and yet I must wound your heart with the most painful news. I keep the 15G SEVEN YEARS. inn of the Lion d' Argent, in the town of Laval. A gentleman, a stranger, came here yes- terday, and took the room number one. This morning we fomid him dying in his room; he had conmiitted suicide ; at least we think so, from the only words we heard him utter : ' I am a ruined and dishonoured man, — I will not live dishonoured.' That gentleman, Madame, I write it with sorrow, is Monsieur Dupuis, your son-in-law." Here Fanny, who had been hstening, \^4th sudden anxiety heard a fearful scream, and a heavy fall on the floor. Scarcely knowing how, Fanny rushed out of her room into that of Madame la Roche, and there beheld a picture she never forgot. Madame la Roche stood in her white night- dress, looking more amazed than horrified ; Madame Dupuis lay on the floor at her mother's feet, and a dark stream of blood was pouring from her lips down on the letter which she still held; Marie stood in the act and attitude in which the news had found her, — holding with one uplifted hand a decan- ter of water, and a glass in the other ; Char- lotte sat and stared, and the lamp binned calmly, and the fire blazed cheerfully, on this SEVEN YEARS. 157 scene of woe. The white frightened face of Fanny at the door broke the spell that petri- fied them ; Madame la Roche groaned and fainted ; Marie dropped decanter and glass with a crash, and rushed fonvard in time to catch her mistress ; Fanny knelt on the car- pet, and tried to raise the head of Madame Dupuis, and to stop the blood that still flowed from her white lips, though more slowly. " What shall we do ? What shall we do ? " cried Marie distracted ; " Madame is as cold as a stone, I cannot rouse her a bit. Help me, Charlotte." But Charlotte did not stir. She seemed paralysed, and groaned on her chair. " Marie," said Fanny, in a low strange voice, " can you carry Madame into my room ? if you can, do so, and do not be in a hurry to waken her." Marie turned round from her senseless mistress, and stared at Fanny, who merely said, " Look." The pale head of Madame Dupuis still rested against the young girl's lap ; her eyes were open, but her featiu^es were white and rigid as marble. " Dead ! " said Marie, bewildered. 158 SEVEN YEARS. " Dead ! " screamed Charlotte, suddenly springing to her foster-daughter's side. " Ay, dead — dead ! " echoed Fanny, clasp- ing her hands, " dead in a moment." Ay, Fanny, dead in a moment ; called from all the little folhes of life to grief, and from grief to death. Take the lesson to heart, and keep it there ! SEVEN YEARS. 159 CHAPTER XIY. Baptiste was not superstitious ; but happy di'eams influence the waking moods of the wisest, and his dreams that night were of so rosy a hue, that he must needs be cheerful the next morning. He got up early, opened his shop, took down the shut- ters, and looked up with a smile at Fanny's windoAV. Her curtains moved slightly ; he did not see her, indeed, but he felt sure that she was slyly watching him. Baptiste shook his head. " That girl will give me a Avorld of trouble," he thought, "but a world of joy too — that is the truth." And he began stuffing a sofa with horse- hair, and singing as he worked : an unusual token of cheerfulness. " The master is merry to-day," said Joseph, his working-man, who walked in as he spoke. "A man can well be merry when he is 160 SEVEN YEARS. going to many a pretty girl the morrow," replied Baptiste with a knowing nod, " you will find that out yet, Joseph." Joseph shrugged his shoulders, and said he was too poor to marry. His master slapped him on the back, and said kindly : " Work, Joseph ; do not drink ; work, and I will help you, and you will put money by ; and if in two years' time you cannot marry, my name is not Baptiste Watt." "Will the master get me a Tvdfe like Mademoiselle Fanny ? " asked Joseph, de- murely. Baptiste laughed till his blue eyes shone. " Get you a girl like Fanny, ah ! my lad, girls like that are not got every day. Every day ! /never saw another like her." " Nor I," sighed Joseph, with mock envy. He thought Fanny a pretty girl, but he thought, too, that there were plenty twice as handsome everywhere around him. " The fact is," pursued Baptiste, sitting down, and looking meditative, " that Fanny desen^es a better match than Baptiste Watt ; but human nature is selfish, and I cannot help being selfish and taking her. It is human nature, Joseph, human nature." SEVEN YEARS. 161 Joseph philosophically replied that it was, and set to work. But though Baptiste felt thoroughly happy, he could not work : he was haunted with a vision of Fanny in the white silk dress which Madame la Roche had kindly provided, and to which Madame Dupuis had added the tulle veil and orange wreath. Marie had let him into a secret : at seven, before going to her work, Fanny w^as to try on this bridal attire ; and she, Marie, had added, " that she w'ould do what she could for him," — wdiich meant, Baptiste supposed, that she would kindly procure him a sight of his beloved, if he would only be in the way ; now it was just upon seven, and Baptiste was longing to go, and hesitating to do so. " The little thing will only laugh at me," he thought, with a deep sigh ; "let her, — I cannot help it." And giving Joseph a few orders, he rose, left the shop, crossed the street, entered the house of Madame la Roche, for the wdde gate stood ever open, and, without being seen by the portress, he went up to the first-floor by a back staircase. He rang, expecting jNIarie to open ; it was Fanny Avho came. On seeing him she burst into VOL. I. 11 162 SEVEN YEARS. tears, and flung her arms around his neck. Baptiste turned pale, he knew that some- thing dreadful had happened, and swift and sudden came the thought : "I shall not marry Fanny to-morrow." He closed the door, which had remained open ; he drew Fanny to his breast, and kissed her again and again ; and Fanny, her shyness and her coquetry all gone with grief, kept her arms around him, and laid her head on his shoulder, where she sobbed freely. At length she became more calm and looked up. Baptiste had taken her into that quiet din- ing-room where he had found her that day month. He had sat down, and still holding her fast, he looked with an aching heart at a white dress covered wdth muslin, lightly thrown on a chair, and an orange wreath near it ; Marie had placed them there for five minutes on the preceding evening, and forgotten them in the sudden calamities of the night. " Oh ! Fanny, my darling little Fanny," said Baptiste with a groan, "what is it? what has happened? " " Then you do not know?" asked Fanny. *' I know nothing," said Baptiste, with SEVEN YEARS. 163 another groan ; "I left my work, I crossed the street to see you with those pretty white things on." " Poor fellow," said Fanny, softly stroking his cheek and crying again ; " poor fellow ; it is not a wedding we will have to-mor- row, Baptiste, but a funeral, — Madame Dupuis is dead." " Dead ! Fanny, dead ! " " Ay, dead, killed by grief." She told him the whole story in a few words. A third groan expressed Baptiste's feelings. " Fanny," he said at length, " I am a wretch ; God knows I am sorry for the poor lady, for the child, for the mother ; but still, Fanny, I cannot help thinking too that I shall not have you to-morrow. Ah ! why were we not married a week ago? Well, well, it is little use to think of that now. What can I do for them, Fanny?" " Nothing, Baptiste. W^e have sent for Monsieur Noiret, that old friend of Madame la Roche's, you know ; he will see to the funeral." Baptiste groaned again, and asked to see Marie. 164 SEVEN YEARS. " You cannot see her," replied lanny, shaking her head, " she is with Madame la Roche, who, poor lady, has spent the night in tears and sorrow; but if you will come in to my god-mother, I dare say she will like to see you." She rose and led the way to her god- mother's room. Charlotte was up, sitting in an arm-chair, and looking with a bewildered glance on the little orphan, who was playing memly at her feet. " Papa is gone," he was singing ; " he is gone. He will not come back; he will not come back." " Well, Monsieur Baptiste," said Charlotte, looking at huu and groaning, "you see what life is, — death without Avaming, chil- dren sinsrino; above their fathers' cjraves. I hope and trust that you will have the wisdom to give up all the vanities of life." " If by the vanities of life you mean Fanny," said Baptiste, drawing the young girl's arm within his, " I declare that nothing; shall make me give her up." "I wonder at you!" querulously said SEVEN YEARS. 165 Charlotte. " Death is in the house, and you must needs talk nonsense ; I wonder at you. Charles, be quiet." "Can I be of any use to you?" asked Baptiste. Charlotte sighed. " I am broken with pains," she answered, *' if you have an easier chair than this I should like it ; if not, do not mind. Any- thing will do for me." Baptiste was surprised at a request, which to him savoured of the vanities of life, but he said it should be complied with ; and perceiving that his presence was not required, and was more likely to lead to disturbance than to be of use, he bade Charlotte good morning and retired. Fanny saw him out. As they parted, Baptiste said with a heavy sigh : " Fanny, I know I am wretch to speak of it, but you must promise to marry me at least this day three months." " No, Baptiste, I cannot do that ; but I will promise to marry you when you like, for I know that you will like nothing which is not right." Still Baptiste looked unhappy, and ill at 166 SEVEN YEARS. ease. Fanny took both his large heavy hands in her own, and looking up at him, said simply : "Baptiste, perhaps I ought not to speak of that now either ; but like you I feel that I must. I know I grieved you last night ; I know you thought me light and too careless ; perhaps I was ; perhaps I even gnimbled at your over-fondness for me. Ah 1 Baptiste, when death and sorrow^ fell so heavilv around me, when I knelt on the floor, with the head of the poor dying lady on my lap, my thought flew to you, and I felt it was a good thing to be so much, so fondly loved by a good man." Never before had Fanny spoken so kindly. Baptiste looked down at her much moved, and from his disappointments drew comfort. " She has a good little heart," he thought, " and I was a fool not to see it." " Go now," said Pannv, rather sadlv ; " if you stay people Avill say that we make love whilst the house is in mourning." *' Are you siu'e you do not want me, Fanny ? " " Quite sure." Thus dismissed, Baptiste left, sighing, as SEVEN YEARS. 167 he went down the staircase, the old proverb, " Man proposes, God disposes," which ap- phed wonderfully to his present case. As he passed by the lodge, Madame Grand put out her dry withered face and beckoned him in. "Well, Monsieur Watt," she said mysteri- ously, " you know the news. Sad, eh ? sad, — very. And when do you get married?" " This is no time to talk of weddings," coldly answered Baptiste. Madame Grand peered in his face and nodded. "A shrewd man!" she said, "a shrewd man. Yes, Monsieur Watt, you do well to mind what you are about. I smell changes, Monsieur W^att; I smell changes, and so do you. A word to the wise," and she nodded and winked at poor Baptiste, who stared and walked away without having apprehended her meaning. " Ay, ay," soliloquized Madame Grand, when he was gone, " he Avill never marry that saucy little Fanny, who took the letter from me last night, and never so much as looked at me : the little monkey ! We shall see what sort of a figure big Marie will cut 168 SEVEN YEARS. now. I am sorry for the old lady, but she is a simpleton, and if i)eople will be simple, why they must bear the consequences, that is all." SEVEN YEARS. 169 CHAPTER XY. The funeral was over, and Madame la Roche was sitting in her room, listening vaguely to Monsieur Noiret. That gentleman had made some sad discoveries : he had found that Ma- dame la Roche's fortune was placed under the control of her son-in-law, but what the unfortu- nate man had done with it, whether he had gam- bled or squandered it away, as well as his own, Monsieur Noiret could not discover. One thing he saw plainly, — the money had vanished, and Madame la Roche was Hterally left destitute. Monsieur Noiret had just been imparting the painful news with as much caution as he thought required to prevent hysterics or a fainting fit, and he was expecting a burst of tears at the very least, when, to his great sur- prise, Madame la Roche, whose grief, like her temper, was composed and meek, calmly con- tradicted him. " No, no. Monsieur Noiret," she said with a sigh, " it is all a mistake, depend upon it. I 170 SEVEN YEARS. have indeed suffered a severe calamity ; I have lost my dear child and her husband, but the money is all right enough. Would to Heaven the unhappy man had trusted to me, and asked me for some of thai worthless monev, which cannot give me back my poor daughter." Monsieur Noiret coughed behind his hand, and looked considerably puzzled. He was not at all so sure as Madame la Roche that she had so much of that worthless money to spare as she fancied, but how to convince her of this melancholy truth did not seem easy. Monsieur Noiret stroked his chin, thought a while, and, without attempting to argue the case with Madame la Roche, he said simply : " May I ask, my dear Madame, how your for- tune is invested ? " '' Oh ! dear yes, Monsieur Noiret, I have no secrets from you. The best part of my money is in the three per cents ; the rest in railway shares. Altogether five hundred thousand francs." " Capital ! " said Monsieur Noiret. " Oh ! capital, of course. Ah ! the money is safe enough, and if I only had my poor dear child — " a burst of tears concluded the sen- tence. SEVEN YEARS. 171 " Shares and papers of the Idnd are valuable thinors," said M. Noiret. " I have no doubt vou CD ' 'J kept yours very safely. May I ask to see them ? " " Monsieur Dupuis, my poor son-in-laAv, had them," said Madame la Roche, with a sigh. " I gave them to him to keep and manage for me. " They must be lost then," said M. Noiret, " for they have not been found amongst his papers." " Lost ! " said Madame la Roche, " but they are mine." " Were," suggested M. Noiret. " Now, un- fortunately, they are the property of some other person." She stared at him in amazement, but with a dim revelation of the calamity she had refused to believe in. Gently but firmly he pursued his advantage, and, by going over and over again the same ground, he convinced Ma- dame la Roche that she was a poor and desti- tute woman. She burst into tears and clasped her hands. " The poor child," she cried, " the poor child. It does not matter for me, 1 am an old woman, but the poor child ! " 172 SEVEN YEARS. Monsieur Noiret administered the comfort usual in such cases. He spoke of Providence, and held out delusive visions of helping friends, and some unknown good that was to turn up, until Madame la Roche was pretty well paci- fied, after which he said thoughtfully : "I am sorry though this house is not yours." " What ! " exclaimed Madame la Roche, astounded. " Yes," he resumed, " it is disagreeable, it is unpleasant ; but you know you became security for Monsieur Dupuis six months ago ; a mere matter of form, as we then thought, but a very serious matter it turns out now. He has left debts, and of course his creditors will come down upon you. I am very sorry, I really am; but patience is the best remedy." This was the merest fiction ; patience was no remedy at all in the present case : but Ma- dame la Roche did not think of that. She stared at Monsieur Noiret in mingled amaze and incredulity. She had signed some paper or other, to be sure, but that she had thus alienated her ancestral property, that she had only left herself the bed she slept on and the clothes she wore, seemed too much for belief. SEVEN YEARS. 173 Monsieur Noiret's task was neither gracious nor pleasing, but he conscientiously persevered in it, and Madame la Roche was convinced. She cast a dreary look around her luxurious and comfortable home, then she hung her head and said in a low voice : " I thought to die here ; but the will of God be done." Again Monsieur Noiret spoke words of comfort, but this time Madame la Roche could not heed him. " My poor servants ! " she ejaculated. " You must tell them, Monsieur Noiret, I have not the heart. They were all to be pensioned off at my death. God help them, poor souls." " Very unpleasant, certainly," said Monsieur Noiret, as he rang the bell. It was Fanny who answered it. "My dear," said Monsieur Noiret, "will you be kind enough to call the servants together and bring them here? Madame la Roche has a communication to make to them." Fanny bent her head in token of ac- quiescence and vanished. In a few minutes the door opened again, and the little house- hold of Madame la Roche appeared. Char- 174 SEVEN YEARS. lotte and Marie stood foremost ; behind them stood the cook and coachman, who had only been ten years in the family, and were still held new-comers. Fanny remained a little apart, holding Charles by the hand. Monsieur Noiret took a pinch of snufF, smiled a good-humoured smile, and said cheer- fully : " Well, my friends, life is made up of ups and downs, as we all know. You are aware that a sad calamity has befallen your excellent mistress, — she has lost money, and much more than money. I dare say I need scarcely tell you that her household must be broken up. Indeed, Madame la Roche leaves this house for a home too narrow to receive her and you." The cook burst into tears, and sank in the arms of the coachman, who seemed consider- ably affected, and nuittered something about not minding some wages owing. But ^lon- sieur Noiret at once waved his hand, and deprecated any such offer. " Thanks, thanks," he said, " but there is no need for that. Madame la Roche merely 'wished me to inform you that she could keep you no longer." SEVEN YEARS. 175 " And does Madame mean to say that I am going to leave her ? '' said Marie, wrathfully, nodding her cap at Monsieur Noiret, and for once forgetting that they were old friends. " Why, what Avould she do without me ? she is no more fit to take care of herself than a baby." Before Monsieur Noiret could reply, Char- lotte had calmly obseived : " Of com'se nothing that has been said con- cerns me. I have been forty-five years with Ma- dame, and it is absm^d to suppose I could leave her." The cook, Avho had partly recovered her first emotion, was likewise going to enter a protest against leaving Madame, and would no doubt have found excellent arguments to prove that Madame la Roche could not possibly do without her, when Fanny quietly stepped across the floor, and going up to Madame la Roche, who sat mute and pale in her chair, she said gently : " Dear Madame, you cannot remain alone, it is out of the question. You want us to take care of you and little Charles ; indeed you do, and we will stay with you." " My dear," began Madame la Roche, " my money — " 176 SEVEN YEARS. *' I will earn money for you, and Marie, and Charlotte, and the boy there," said Fanny cheerfully ; "and I do not care what happens — I will never leave you." She spoke with an earnestness that flushed her cheek and lit her eyes. It was the beau- tiful story, for ever young and true, of faithful human love, stronger than calamity or grief. It w\as Ruth saying again to Naomi, — " Thy people shall be my people, and thy God shall be my God." Madame la Roche looked at the faithful girl, at the orphan child, at the two old serv- ants, whose savings, she remembered it now% had been swallowed up with her handsome fortune, and she wrung her hands in sore dis- tress. With a keenness of vision to which long prosperity had not used her, she saw the melancholv future before her, and in that future — brief though her years nuist neces- sarily make it — Fanny, worn with ceaseless toil, and consuming youth, beauty, and love, in a self-appointed task ! INIadame la Roche did not speak, but groaned and clasped her hands. " My good friends," said Monsieur Noiret, waving his hand, " your mistress, as you see, is SEVEN YEARS. 177 considerably affected ; be so kind as to with- draw and leave me with her, she and I have much to discuss together." This was a fiction ; Monsieur Noiret had little or nothing more to say to Madame la Roche, but the assertion produced the desired effect ; the cook and coachman withdrew first ; Marie and Charlotte followed, and Fanny closed the door, and left Monsieur Noiret and Madame la Roche once more alone. Their discourse was brief. A few words of curt and common-place consolation passed Monsieur Noiret's lips, then he rose, bade Madame la Roche a good afternoon, and left her so crushed by the unexpected misfortune it had been his unpleasant task to reveal, that she allowed him to depart without seeing him to the door, or summoning a servant to open it for him. The omission was supplied by Fanny, who sat in the dining-room, with her arm passed around the neck of Charles, for whose amuse- ment she had taken a book of engravings from the library, and which he noAv looked at as it lay open on her lap. On hearing Monsieur Noiret's step Fanny looked up, and perceiving that he was alone, VOL. I. 12 178 SEVEN YEARS. she wanted to rise and open the door for him, but Monsieur Noiret would not allow it. " Go on and amuse the child, my dear," he said, " it makes a charming picture," and he looked rather hard at Fanny, on whose cheek the flush of recent emotion still lingered. *' My dear," said he, resting his hand on the back of her chair, " I have known you lono:. Allow me to ask if vou are aware of the pledge you have given to Madame la Roche, who, poor thing, wishes for no such sacrifice from you. I understand you were going to marry, too : pray how will you manage that now? No one can serve two masters. You cannot belong to Madame la Roche and this little fellow," he added, touching the child's fair head, " and belong also to your be- trothed." *' Baptiste would not wish me to be un- grateful," said Fanny. " My dear, a man wants the Avoman he likes for himself," was Monsieur Noiret's answer. The young girl seemed much moved ; per- haps she had not yet thought of that ; her lids fell ; her lips quivered. " God will provide," she said at length. SEVEN YEARS. 179 "Very pious and proper/' said Monsieur Noiret, smiling ; " well, my dear, I do not dis- approve ; I only wished to know if you had reflected on the consequences of your offer. I see you have. I wish you joy. Good afternoon." Fanny rose mechanically, and saw Monsieur Noiret to the door. When she came back, Charles was as eager as ever about the picture- book, but Fanny heard him with an abstract- ed glance and thoughts far away. For the first time she felt the burden heavy and un- foreseen that was falling on a youth hitherto so smiling and so fair. 180 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XYI. Within a few days blue bills were pla- carded all over the front of number two, advertising it for sale by auction. It was soon disposed of, and to such advantage, that the proceeds of the sale more than covered the sum for which Madame la Roche had rendered herself liable. Her furniture remained her own, an unexpected piece of good fortune, on which Monsieur Noiret con- gratulated her. " It is extremely valuable," he said, " and will bring in a good deal." " Then I must sell it ! " sighed Madame la Roche. " My dear Madame, you would not dream of keeping so much capital lying idle." " I suppose not," again sighed Madame la Roche, " but I am sorry to part from the old things. I was used to them." Monsieur Noiret 2:ranted the force of the argument, but began nevertheless to speculate SEVEN YEARS. 181 Oil the probable value of an ebony cabinet, and the very same day brought a dealer to inspect it. The cabinet produced a sum that partly reconciled Madame la Roche to its loss ; but when day after day she saw the old familiar rooms despoiled of the handsome and substantial furniture that had adorned them so long ; when Dresden, Sevres, and Indian china vanished from buhl and marqueterie stands and tables, — when these, too, took their leave, with pictures and family plate no lon- ger to be hoarded up w^ith gentle family pride, the pang became so severe, that with some- thing like energy she said : " I must go. Monsieur Noiret ; I must, be- fore all is gone. I cannot stay till the rooms are bare. I must go." But w^here to go to w^as the question. The cook and coachman had both left, shedding tears ; but the child, Fanny, Marie, and Char- lotte had remained to share the fortunes and the home, such as it might be, of Madame la Roche. To find a home for those three per- sons, besides herself and the child, was no easy task; and yet separation was not to be thought of. Marie boldly scouted the mere suggestion that her mistress could do without 182 SEVEN YEARS. her. " Madame is helpless," she said, " help- less as a baby." Marie did not add, " and I, Marie, am strong yet and able to work for my old mistress." She kept these thoughts in her own heart, and so naturally did thev spring, that maybe Marie scarcely knew they were there. Charlotte was in reality as devoted to her mistress as her old fellow-sen^ant, bnt she viewed matters differently. To every one, save Madame la Roche, Charlotte, the sav- ings of whose lifetime had perished in the catastrophe, called Monsieur Dupuis a SArad- ler, and wound up the accoimt of her wrongs, which were but too real, by declaring that Madame la Roche w^as bound in duty and honour to take care of her. She rather per- versely omitted saying how one, Avho could not take care of herself, was to take care of others. This view of the subject Charlotte discarded. Yet, in the main, she came to the same resolve with Marie. She would live and die with her dear mistress. Fanny said least and felt most ; grave, thoughtful, and sad, she kept her thoughts and projects locked in her own heart. When she spoke of the future, she ever used the signiticant pronoun " we," that bound her SEVEI^ YEARS. 183 destiny with that of her kind protectress. Both she and Marie saw the case more clearly than Charlotte ; like Charlotte, indeed, they were fully resolved to live and die with Madame la Roche, but with a full conscious- ness of the burden that was falling on the youth of one and on the age of the other. Madame la Roche was the last of her family ; her son-in-law was the native of a remote province, whence he had come to Paris, obscure and poor. Save his aged grand- mother, Charles Dupuis had no one, and, save a young girl and two old servants, she was friendless. Monsieur Noiret was Avilling enough to oblige Madame la Roche by help- ing her to dispose of her furniture to the best advantage, but when she spoke of seeking a new home he politely acquiesced, without offering to assist her in a search that might have committed him in some des^ree to future help. It was Fanny who, of her own accord, took the lead, — found a little apartment at some distance from their present dwelling, — had a few articles of Madame la Roche's furniture transferred to it, and who, in short, did what was to be done, and saw to everything. 184 SEVEN YEARS. Thanks to her exertions, and something Hke a fortnight after the house had passed into the hands of its new owner, Madame la Roche could rise one morning and say, " Well, let us go. It was a cold dreary morning : a leaden sky hung over Paris : a thin white snow was fall- ing ; it whitened the roofs of houses, and be- came converted into grey mud on the street pavement ; but the quiet paths of Madame la Roche's little garden were unsullied. The snow had gathered over them all night, and no foot-print had stained its whiteness. Snow lay on the roof of the little aviary, empty of its once gay tenants ; snow had replaced the roses of the bosquet, beneath Avhich ^ladame la Roche liked to sit ; snow touched with white streaks the bare branches and slender trunks of the laburnums and lilacs Fannv loved. Every favourite spot, every pleasant memorial of the past, wore the same death- hke hue, the same funereal shroud. Yet with a restlessness not habitual to her, Madame la Roche, spite the snow that fell above and that lay cold below, would enter that little c^arden ai^ain, walk over every inch of it, and bid all fai'cwell. SEVEN YEARS. 185 "I liked it so much!" she said to Fanny, who accompanied and supported her, " it was my Versailles, my St Cloud. I envied no one their parks and gardens, — this little place was as much to me as theirs to them. Not that it was so very little, Fanny, was it ? For there are the four paths that wind and meet and divide, so that you might spend an hour in following them out ; then there is the bosquet, and the basin, and the aviary. Ah ! well, Fanny, they may say what they Hke, and laugh at it — I say it is a pleasant place, and that to sit in that bosquet, with the roses above your head, and the birds singing, and the water splashing, is as plea- sant a thing as one can wish for on a sum- mer's day. Ah ! well, it is all over ; we need not set honey-suckle next year, nor put up a trellis that Baptiste may not look at you. It is all over, and I am but an old simpleton to stand dreaming here of old pleasures and old times, without thinking that this same snow is falling on my poor child's grave; would it fell on mine, Fanny, would it fell on mine !" Tears flowed down her withered cheeks, and her hands trembled as she clasped them. 186 SEVEN YEARS. " And what would the poor child do without you?" asked Fanny, gently. But Madame la Roche shook her head despond- ently. '' Of what use am I to him, or to any one?" she asked; and without w^aiting for the reply, she added, "let us go. I am keeping you here in the cold, and what for? old dreams, old thoughts, and w^hat for?" They reentered the house, they crossed the rooms more than half stripped of their contents ; a few minutes more, they stood on the threshold of the apartment. Charlotte led the child by the hand ; Marie, laden with imibrellas and boxes, Avas going down-stairs, grumbling. " Shut the door, child, and give the key to Madame Grand," said INIadame la Roche, and she too went down to the fiacre waiting for them below. Madame Grand Avas considerably affected at the departure of her old mistress. She was even more profuse in her expressions of regret than Madame la Roche — little used to compassion implied or spoken — could well bear. She shrank from it with a fastidious sensitiveness, for which she internally checked SEVEN YEARS. 187 herself, and which she so far conquered outwardly as to say : "I am very much obliged to you, Madame Grand." But with a little touch of conse- quence she added : " You have always been a faithful domestic. Good bye. I have recommended you to the new landlord." That she should be recommended by any one, and especially by so fallen a person as Madame la Roche, seemed to strike Madame Grand dumb. She stared amazed, whilst Madame la Roche passed on, entered the fiacre, took Charles on her knees, and was followed by Fanny and Charlotte, leaving Marie behind to fight a dire battle with the coachman, who declared that all the packages he saw could not and should not enter his vehicle. After a short and fierce contest, the coachman was conquered ; Marie entered the fiacre exulting and dragging her property after her, and the carriage drove slowly away. 188 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XYII. The fiacre stopped before a poor, mean- looking house, in a narrow and not over clean street. " It looks worse because tliis is such a bad day," said Fanny, looking wistfully at Madame la Roche. " My dear, it Avill do ; let us be thankfid for the shelter of a roof." "Thankful for the shelter of a roof," querulously put in Charlotte, whose temper followed the variations of her rheumatism ; " I suppose Madame woidd be thankfid if we were put under a shed like horses. Ah ! well, I have told Monica she woidd repent the day she went to America ; but maybe it is I shall repent the day I stayed in Paris." This last remark, however, was more mut- tered than spoken, and was not heard or heeded by Madame la Roche, whom Fanny SEVEN YEARS. 189 assisted to alight, and who, giving tlie dull dirty-looking house and the gloomy porter's lodge a half frightened look, clung to the young girl's arm, as a male head, with a cotton handkerchief tied around it, and a grisly beard by way of adornment, looked out of the dark cave-like opening, and growl- ed more than asked : " What do you want ?" " We are the new lodgers," replied Fanny. " And you must needs come in a fiacre, eh ? why not walk, too grand, eh ? well, then, let me tell you this is no place for grandeur," with which the head vanished, and a ham- mering was heard within. "Is that the porter?" asked Madame la Roche, in a whisper. " Yes, Madame, but do not mind him ; I am sure he is a good-natured man, though he grumbles so ; he helped me to carry up half the things, and left his work — he is a shoemaker — to do it, and he grumbled the whole way. It is his way." "Yes, I suppose it is his way," sighed Madame la Roche, and catching a glimpse of a yard like a well, she went up the steep 190 SEVEN YEARS. staircase, learning the pain and bitterness of new ways at every step of the four floors that led her to her new home. She was pale and exhausted by the time they stopped before a narrow wooden door, very unlike the handsome massive entrance of her old abode. Fanny took a rusty key from her pocket, opened the door, and led Madame la Roche into a square room, where a deal table and a few chairs made a poor show. " This is our sitting room, kitchen, and dining-room," said Fanny, passing hastily through it, — '' and this is Charlotte and Marie's room," she said — entering a double-bedded room scarcely better fm^nished, — " and this is your room," she added, pushing open a door, and leading the way into a room, which, though small, was a dainty little boudoir when com- pared to the other two. A pretty paper covered the walls ; clean white curtains half hid Madame la Roche's bed, the very same in which she had slept for fifty years and more ; the little crib of Charles was placed near it ; there was a carpet on the floor ; opposite the fire-place, in which a bright SEVEN YEARS. 191 fire burned cheerfully, ]\Iadame la Roclie re- cognised a little rose-wood commode, that had always been a great favourite of hers. A glass and time-piece adorned the mantel-piece, and by the fire her own favourite chair and stool seemed to await her. " My dear, Avhat have you been doing ? " said Madame la Roche, much moved. " This is not right." " Not right ! " put in Marie, who came up sturdy as ever, though somewhat short of breath, " not right ! I say it is all as it should be. Eh! Charlotte?" " Madame has been used to conveniences, and Madame must have them, come what will," said Charlotte, gravely. " But your rooms," said Madame la Roche, sighing, " why should they be so bare and so cold ? " " We like them so," curtly replied Marie ; " and there is one comfort," she added, nodding her lofty cap, which reverses of fortune had not induced her to relinquish, " there is one comfort too, I told that coachman a bit of my mind before we parted." "And where do you sleep, Panny ? " asked Madame la Roche, suddenly remembering 192 SEVEN YEARS. that she had seen no provision for the young girl. " In a closet, — oh, it is all right," hastily re- phed Fanny ; and she at once engaged tlie attention of Charles by giving him his toys, which he was rather clamorouslv clairainG^, and diverted the mind of Madame la Roche from all present topics by calling her to look at a cage suspended in the window, and which held a superannuated canary, the only one Madame la Roche had consented to keep. " Poor fellow," she sighed, " he is old and useless, like me," and she sank in the arm- chair, whilst Fanny amused the child, and Charlotte and Marie made preparations for luncheon. Madame la Roche looked on sad and troubled, but did not dream of offering help, which would indeed have been indignantly rejected. Wealth and ease have their moral disadvan- tages even for the best and the wisest. Ma- dame la Roche was accustomed to be waited on, and she could not relinquish the habit at once. She was accustomed that others should be busv, Avhilst she sat idle and looked on, a habit of indolence which her years had rendered a second nature, and of which she was herself SEVEN YEARS. 193 scarcely conscious. Looking round her Avarm and comfortable room, she soon forgot that the other rooms were rather chill and bare, and sitting in her easv chair, she did not remember that the two old servants and the young girl, who had united their destiny to her own, were not — though of more active habits — much more used to hard and coarse work than Ma- dame la Roche herself. Luncheon was soon ready. , Marie cooked it, and perfonued prodigies ; Fanny brought it in, for Madame la Roche was served in her own room, a stateliness against which she protested in vain. The meal, a plain one after all, for it consisted merely of a cotelette au gra tin, with two potatoes for the plat au legumes, and a solitary apple for the dessert, was scarcely begun, when a ring announced a visitor, and Fanny, who answered it, admitted Monsieur Noiret. Monsieur Noiret was, as usual, in good spirits, — he joked with Marie, he pinched Fanny's cheek, he patted the head of Charles, who eyed him askance, and looking benevolently at Ma- dame la Roche, at the bright fire by which she sat, at the pleasant little room, at the comfort- VOL. I. 13 194 SEVEN YEARS. able meal on the table, Monsieur Noiret ex- claimed cheerfully : " Why, this is all as it should be ! T congra- tulate you, my dear friend, on the pleasant home you have found." Madame la Roche laid down the bit she was carrying to her mouth : the word home brought with it remembrances still too fresh and too trying; but though tears stood in her eyes, she compelled herself to reply : " God is very good to me, I am very thankful." " Of course, of course," said Monsieur Noiret, still cheerful. " By the way, I am going to the comitry, and before going, I called to settle some little matters with you. Do you know, I think that the sum-total brought in by your furniture will bring you in no less than four hundred francs a year. Very hand- some, is it not ? Of course it would bring in more if you would have an annuity, but then that would die with you, and there would be nothing left for that fine little fellow. Well, what do you say to that ? Shall I send my honnne d'affaires to manaiiie that for vou ? I am going to the country, otherwise I should be most happy to take the whole charge of this little business." SEVEN YEARS. 195 " As you like, if you please," said Madame la Roche. " I am very much obliged to you." "Do not mention it," replied Monsieur Noiret rising, " you are highly welcome, and do not stir, I beg. I am rather in a hurry on ac- count of going into the country, else I should not leave you so early." And gracious and buoyant as ever, Monsieur Noiret departed. " Going into the country," grumbled Marie, as the door closed upon him ; "ay, ay, we know what that means. Mind my words, Charlotte, Monsieur Noiret will come no more." " Madame is in want of no one, friend or foe," said Charlotte, with much dignity. " I never before heard that people were in want of enemies," sharply said Marie. " Nor I," composedly replied Charlotte, " so, if you please, we will say no more about it." The invitation not to speak was one which Marie always particularly resented, and which would probably have led to some bitter alter- cation, if Fanny, issuing from Madame la Roche's room, had not appeared, holding up her fore-finger in a warning attitude. " Ma- dame is sleeping," she said softly. 196 SEVEN YEARS. " Poor dear," sighed Charlotte, " she has not slept this many a night. I hope no one will have the hard-heartedness to waken her." Marie felt the implied insult, but had virtue enough to resist the provocation and keep her peace. Monsieur Noiret, being in the country, could not call any more ; but his solicitor came, an honest man, and one of few words, who speedily put Madame la Roche in possession of her new income, amounting to four hundred francs, as Monsieur Noiret had announced. Wlien this matter was satisfactorily settled the solicitor withdrew, and, like Monsieur Noiret, was seen no more. " Four hundred francs a year," said Madame la Roche to her little assembled familv ; "it does not seem much, and yet it is pleasant to have something left, though but a mite." " Let not Madame mind," stoutly said Marie, " we can work, and we will, too. I can earn twenty francs a month, which makes two hundred and fortv francs a vear." " And I can earn two francs a dav," said Fanny, "which makes seven hundred and twenty francs a year. If ^Madame adds that SEVEN YEARS. 197 to four hundred and two hundred and forty, she will find it makes quite a pretty income." "Why, so it does!" exclaimed Madame la Roche, dazzled at this unexpected vision of prosperity ; " thirteen hundred and sixty francs a year. Quite a large sum." " Quite," said Fanny, gaily, " and therefore Madame is to take no thought, no care, and no trouble, but leave us to manage all." " I should like to know how you are going to manage all those fine things," rather tartly asked Charlotte, as soon as they were withdrawn from Madame la Roche's presence. " God knows ! " replied Panny, suddenly despondent ; " but yet it must be done." " Ay, ay, it must be done," said Marie. " If that bad man had not taken away all my poor savings," sighed Charlotte, " I could now live like a lady." " I wonder you think of yourself when a real lady like Madame is reduced to four hundred francs a year," hotly said Marie. " I wonder." " And I wonder you cannot leave off quar- relling," interrupted Fanny ; " doors and walls are thin, and suppose Madame should hear you? This suggestion effectually secured silence. 198 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XYIII. Monsieur Noiret kept up the polite and convenient fiction of being in the country. He probably conceived that he was not called upon to do any more for Madame la Roche than he had done ; it may be, too, that he thought he had done plenty, for he ceased his visits, and allowed his old friend to shift for herself, as a matter of course. Baptiste, who had kept in the back-ground, now came forward and quietly did his best. " If Madame will allow me," he said, re- spectfully addressing Madame la Roche, " I think I can improve matters a little. Uphol- sterers have experience in these things." Madame la Roche thanked him, and gave him full authority to act as he pleased. So because he was an upholsterer, and had ex- perience in those things, Baptiste began making some wonderful changes. He first of all discovered that his shop was full of useless furniture. A little chintz sofa, which had SEVEN YEARS. 199 found no purchaser, an easy chair, stools, carpets, curtains, all equally useless to him, were quickly transfen-ed from his shop to the apartment of Madame la Roche. The change was too great not to strike her; still, not being of a suspicious turn or temper, she only marvelled a little, then demurred gently : " Baptiste, you are doing too much," she said. " I cannot allow it. Some of that furniture must be useful to you." " I shall put nothing more, Madame," re- plied Baptiste, who had done by this, and had only a few more pictures to hang up. His conduct was variously commented upon in the little circle. Madame la Roche was moved bv the kindness, but she had been too long used to money to feel the full value of Baptiste's conduct. Charlotte, whom he had vmfortunately offended by an allusion to selfishness, which she unluckily took as a personal reflection, querulously declared the young man was good, but conceited, and especially overrated. Marie grumbled loud, and darted fiery suspicious looks at him. Fanny said nothing, but Baptiste uneasily noticed that her brown eyes rested on him with a sad lingering expression. He never 200 SEVEN YEARS. questioned her ; he never asked why she looked so, or what ailed her : he went on with his self-imposed task, sturdily resolved on an end, which he kept to himself. In the mean while Marie went out as a dav- servant in a quiet family close by ; Fanny had resumed her occupation as a dressmaker; Charlotte took care of Charles, the only thing she was fit for, and Madame la Roche did nothing : to do nothing had unfortunately been the occupation of her whole lifetime. Madame la Roche was not what might be called a selfish woman. Her own comfort and happiness were not and had not been her only aim in life, but it had so happened, that she had had no other great object to engross her attention, and that she had taken a habit of being comfortable, easy, indolent, and helpless, like many a moneyed lady. Sacrifices she did not take for granted, but she was not always conscious of them. She soon forgot that Baptiste's fmiiiture filled her rooms, it seemed so natural to have things comfortable. She did not dwell long on the hardship of ^larie and Fanny having to support her and her grand- child. She had always seen them busy ; they SEVEN YEARS. 201 did not mind working, and it seemed so like as things should be, that want should not come near her. That she might ever be cold or hungry was more than Madame la Roche could possibly conceive. Thus a few weeks had passed. The day had been cold, though fine ; it was freezing now, and Madame la Roche, her two old servants, Panny, and the child, were gathered in the front room, and around one light and one fire. Poverty had levelled distinctions, and broken down barriers that had never been very potent. Madame la Roche sat in the easy chair worked by Fanny. Baptiste had bought it back at the sale, for the use of the young girl's protectress. Placid and settled grief was in her features. She sat, as of old, with her hands on her knees. She was watching her little grand-child, who, nestled on Fanny's lap, was learning his letters from a large spelling-book. Marie was sewing vigorously .by the light of a tallow candle, and Charlotte, groaning with rheumatic pains, that prevented her from stirring out of her arm-chair, — another gift of the provident Baptiste, — was holding a mild argument with her usual antagonist. 202 SEVEN YEARS. To Fanny's annoyance they were talking of Baptiste. " I never liked him," said Marie, strongly, "and when I do not like, why I do not ; but I do say that he has behaved well.'* '' Bay)tiste has been very kind," sighed Ma- dame la Roche. " Very," resumed Marie, " but I do say it is time he should leave it off." " He really has done enough," interrupted Madame la Roche. " Leave off coming here," pursued INIarie, " what does he want ? It is loss of time to him, and no gain to us." " The young man is not imderstood," said Charlotte, in a mild tone of voice that implied she would set both right ; " he is conceited, neither more nor less." " Poor Baptiste !" ejaculated Fanny, but she spoke low, and no one heard her. " The young man is conceited," repeated Charlotte ; "he has an exaggerated opinion of his own importance, but he is not amiss." " He has behaved verv well," said Marie, « significantly glancing at Charlotte's easy chair, and at the comfortable stool under her feet, " and when one knows how to manage him, one SEVEN YEARS. 203 can get anything out of Baptiste. But, thank Heaven, my spirit always was above that." Charlotte acknowledged the taunt with a smile, and merely replied : " Baptiste has good points, and can be taught his place. A knowledge much older persons do not always arrive at." A severe answer rose to Marie's lips, but charity checked it. She remembered that Charlotte was a useless member of their little household, and compassionate delicacy silenced the reproving words, to which the flesh would fain give vent. She took a lofty air, that im- plied : "I could crush you, but I will not," and sewed on with renewed vigour. A ring at the door was heard. " I suppose it is Baptiste," snappishly said Marie, '' at this hour, too ! I marvel at him ; stay where you are, Fanny, I shall go and open." Fanny, who had half risen, sat down again, and Marie opened the door of the room where they were sitting, and which was also the first that a visitor must needs enter. Baptiste appeared on the threshold, care- fully holding a picture, an old family portrait which he had undertaken to frame anew with 204 SEVEN YEARS. a frame in his shop, " quite useless to him," and which he now brought back to Madame la Roche. She received him with her usual kind- ness, thanked him for the trouble he had taken, and made him sit down by her. Bap- tiste replied rather at random ; he was watch- ing Fanny, who scarcely minded him, and was still engrossed with the child. The calm repelling looks of Charlotte, or the stern forbidding glances of Marie, both of which said : " what brings you here ? " Baptiste did not mind, although he un- consciously answered the question they con- veyed. " Madame," said he, addressing Madame la Roche, " I hope you will not think me troublesome, if I mention a matter relative to myself, and solicit your kind attention." " Certainly not," replied iMadame la Roche, '' cei-tainly not, Baptiste ; you have a right to talk about yourself; for it seems to be a thing you never do. Indeed, I fancy you think a great deal too much about others. Do you know, it is quite a nice frame you have put around the portrait of my dear grandmother." SEVEN YEARS. 205 " It was lying all but useless in my shop," muttered Baptiste. "I am sorrv to hear that," musindv re- plied Madame la Roche ; '' I fear your business is not quite thriving just now." " Oh yes, it is," he rather quickly answered ; " I am doing very well, Madame." " So much the better," she placidly rejoined, " but I thought the reverse, from the number of useless things you had lying on your hands. And what was it you Avanted to say, Baptiste?" The voice of Baptiste stuck in his throat, he looked at Fanny, who turned red and pale, and he was going to speak, Avhen Marie, lay- ing down her work, observed calmly : " Of course. Monsieur Baptiste, all that nonsense is over — for a time at least," she added, hesitatingly. " But I was to have married Fanny in another day," urged Baptiste, rather earnestly. Madame la Roche sank back in her chair and wept slowly. Marie audibly uttered the word *' wretch." Baptiste heard her with more amazement than wrath, and as he had one of those slow pertinacious tempers, which are not easily disconcerted, he waited until Madame la 20G SEVEN YEARS. Roclie gently wiped her eyes, to resume calmly : " I am sorry to have grieved Madame, I was far from supposing that I should do so." " It is no fault of yours, Baptiste," gently said Madame la Roche ; "I am nervous, and cannot think calmly of that sad day. But really, Baptiste, with the people leaving all those things on your hands, — frames, tables, and even sofas and chairs, — I cannot think your business to be a flourishing one, or such as will allow you to marry." Baptiste looked disconcerted at the argu- ment, but he soon rallied, and assured Madame la Roche his circmnstances were good. " Well, but you know I cannot give Fanny those fifteen hundred francs which I had promised," she resumed, " and that makes a great difference." " I am aware of that, Madame, but though the fifteen hundred francs would have been welcome, I can do without them. My plan is this," he resumed: "to marry Fanny, and to ask Madame, her godmother," he added, look- ing at Charlotte, *' to live with us." By ridding jNladame la Roche and Marie of SEVEN YEARS. 207 a useless member of their family, Baptiste thought to atone for the loss he must make them sustain in depriving them of Tanny's services and earnings. But the plan, though excellent, was destined to meet with unquali- fied opposition from tw^o influential persons. Marie opposed it because she had not suggest- ed it, or had not been consulted about it ; Charlotte, because she held it as neither more nor less than a premeditated afli'ont to her dignity. *' Young man," she said with a lofty wave of the hand, " know your place, know your place. My place," she added, looking hard and nodding at Marie, " my place is here, and nowhere else." " Monsieur Baptiste," sharply said Marie, " I have plenty wherewith to try my temper ; plenty, I assure you; you will oblige me by not bringing a hornet's nest about my ears. As for your proposal to marry Fanny, it is absurd, quite absurd." " No, no," gently sighed Madame la Boche, " not absurd ; but still, Baptiste, do you not think it might be put off"? Surely there is plenty of time for marriage." Baptiste looked at the three women. Per- 208 SEVEN YEARS. haps he thought this but a poor return for some kindness, but, without hngering on this thought, he turned to Fanny. She sat by the fire, her head leaning against the mantel-shelf, silent tears slowly coursing down her pale cheeks. The child still sat on her knees, and looked at her wondering. Baptiste felt hurt, he rose. " Fanny," he said, " it rests with you." Fanny looked up at him earnestly. " No, Baptiste," she said, " that cannot be." " Is that your promise ? " asked Baptiste, stung to the very heart. She did not reply. He looked round him, and said huskily : " Good night, ladies." Then he turned away and left the room un- detained. Baptiste had got down to the second floor, when a light hand laid on his arm made him turn round. On the step above him he saw Fanny with tears on her cheek. " Oh ! Baptiste," she said in a subdued voice, "how can you leave me so? Do you not see it is because I like you that I will not marry you ? You do not know what it would be to take me ! What a sad burden I should bring with me ! Baptiste, it woidd be four to SEVEN YEARS. 209 provide for, and worse, far worse, believe me — to please." " I will bear with anything to have you," said Baptist e, taking her in his arms. " And I like you too well to have you," said Fanny, hanging down her head. " Fanny, that cannot be," resumed Baptiste, " that cannot be. Think of it well, — it is parting for ever. If you send me away thus, I will not seek you again, Fanny." Her heart failed her ; her head swam, her hand trembled in his. Baptiste would keep to his word, sturdily and stoutly he would. She knew it, and a pang like that of death seized her whole being. " Baptiste, is that our parting ? " she asked in a low voice ; " can we not part, since part we must, like two friends whom Providence divides, but who love each other for all that? " " No," said Baptiste, clasping her more closely ; " you are my wife, Fanny, or you are not. And now, Fanny, if you love me, now is the time to show it. Will you marry me ? " " It would be your ruin ; I cannot," said Fanny, in a low faint voice. ' " Are those your last words ? " asked Bap- tiste, releasing her. VOL. I. 14 210 SEVEN YEARS. " They are," she repHed, leaning against the banisters for support. " Then good niglit, and good bye. You never liked me." He went down, and did not look back. SEVEN YEARS. 211 CHAPTER XIX. Fanny went up like one stunned. She entered the room where Madame la Roche and the two old servants were sitting, and she resumed her chair, without uttering a word. The three looked at her, feeling rather fright- ened at her white face ; but Fanny did not speak. Madame la Roche at length said : " My dear child, have you not tried your- self too far ? " To which Fanny replied in a low voice : " Madame, what I have done I would do again." " Of course," said Marie, with a strength of look ajid accent meant to veil some secret uneasiness. " Fanny has too much sense not to know this is no time for marriage, and all such follies." "I am surprised at the young man's extra- ordinary presumption," observed Charlotte ; "of course he was encouraged in, as well as advised to, his recent conduct ; but still I am surprised." 212 SEVEN YEARS. " May I request to know what you mean to insinuate by encouraged and advised ? " asked Marie, laying down her ^vork. " I really cannot allow any more of this," said Madame la Roche, nervously ; " it is late ; besides, I really cannot." " T always knew Madame took Charlotte's part," reproachfully remarked Marie, " al- ways. It is nothing new to me, whatever some people may think." To this taunt Charlotte did not reply, but rising, she piously thanked Heaven that she knew her place, that she had always known it, and that no one had ever needed to remind her of the necessity of keeping her place. Marie seemed exasperated, and jNIadame la Roche, folding her hands, looked piteous and imploring. " Poor Baptiste ! " thought Fanny, " it would have driven him mad." Magnanimity made Marie keep silent, but when Charlotte had left the room she turned to Fanny and said sharply : " I trust that the unfortunate vouns: man, Avho has proved an apple of discord, will not come here in a InuTv." " It is not likely," replied Fanny, with slight SEVEN YEARS. 213 bitterness ; ''he is no longer of any use, why should he come here? " " Fanny, my dear ! " mildly said Madame la Roche. " Madame," said Fanny, firmly, " I regret nothing ; I am content that things should be as they are." " I am not surprised at this," put in Marie, looking injured ; " that big booby was always more in her eyes than anything or any one else." Fanny did not reply ; Madame la Roche wrung her hands and looked distressed. " Oh ! why did I lose my money ? " she ejaculated. " I did not think Madame would turn on me," said Marie, with a meek resignation that seemed borrowed from Charlotte ; " but, thank Heaven, I can bear with many things. Come along. Monsieur Charles, it is time for you to go to bed." And, taking the child by the hand, she left the room. Madame la Roche looked at Fanny, whose head was resting once more on the corner of the mantel-shelf. In the young girl's heart, too, had rung that bitter cry : " Oh, why did I lose my money ? " 214 SEVEN YEARS. Ay, it was money-loss did it all. A little money, and these three would, as of old, have quarrelled but to make her happy. No other strife, but how best to please her, their darling, need have arisen amongst them. And now her happiness, her pleasure, seemed their last thought ; she might fret and break her heart, about Baptiste, — the coldness of age, the sad- ness of experience and of poverty, would make them think liditlv of her trouble. A gentle voice roused her from these sad thoughts. " My dear," said ]\Iadamela Roche," I fear you have tried yourself too much." Fanny smiled bravely. " Madame," she said, " I Avould do it over aorain — Avere it to be done," she added sadly. Madame la Roche felt that the young girl would acknowledge no more, and though her mind was tender and delicate, and could pity love troubles, even in the midst of her own sorrows, it was not subtle or ingenious enough to extract the acknowledgment of grief from a sad yovmg heart. She gave Fanny a pitiful look, and feeling unable to comfort her, she rose, and bidding her a good night, hoped '* she would try and sleep." SEVEN YEARS. 21 5 Madame la Roche went to her room, and Fanny to her little bed in the closet ; but the somid sleep of youth came not near her. She sighed and wept, and sighed again, and was glad to see the dull light of morning creep- ing in, and to get up to the dull cares of the day. She prepared the breakfast as usual, and as usual she did it neatly and handily without noise or seeming trouble ; but her sorrow slept in her own heart, unallayed and undisturbed by the screaming and scolding that went on around her. " Monsieur Charles, will you be quiet ! " said Marie, in a voice of subdued indignation, that for a moment at least checked the boy. He was galloping across the room astride on an old cotton umbrella, but he stopped when Marie told him to let his grandmother sleep. " She always was a late sleeper," added Marie, turning to Charlotte, " and it is not be- cause the dear lady is poor that she is not to sleep. That costs nothing at least." "Time enough to waken to care and sor- row," groaned Charlotte. '' Very true," approvingly remarked Marie. There was this particular beauty in the quar- rels of Marie and Charlotte, that they ended 216 SEVEN YEARS. every evening. Every^ morning these two ene- mies woke friends, and began on a fresh score. Thus their pastime was never over, and they could agree and disagree to their life's end and to their heart's content. A ceaseless quarrel would not have answered the purpose by any means ; whereas these intervals of truce gave something like zest to the battle. On the principle of peace they now agreed that Madame la Roche could not do better than sleep in the morning, and on the principle of war they soon emitted different opinions on sleep in general, and on dreams in particular. " The best sleep is the last," said Charlotte. " I like the first best," replied Marie. " Perhaps your early dreams are the plea- santest," said Charlotte, smiling. " Perhaps they are," retorted Marie. " They may refer to your early years and triumphs," continued Charlotte, sweetly. " Ah ! well," sighed Marie, " if early sleep makes early dreams, vou may well like the last sleep best. You need not dream of your husband — poor man." Charlotte inquired into her exact meaning, and why she used the adjective poor. " I know, I know," sagaciously said Marie, SEVEN YEARS. 217 " and so do many besides me," she added, sotto voce. " Never was any good got by keeping low company," sighed Charlotte. " Please to explain," rejoined Marie. " I know, I know," was the quiet retort. On these first random shots followed a sharp fusillade, and when Fanny awoke from her sad dreams she found herself in the very din of war. She looked at them listlessly, whilst the beseeching voice of Madame la Roche was heard exclaiming from within : " Charlotte, what is the matter ? " At once Charlotte went in to her mistress. " Ay, Fanny, let her go and tell her story to Madame," said Marie, " let her, Fanny, — we scorn her." " Breakfast is ready," said Fanny, cold and passive. She laid the cloth, and filled out two large coffee cups with the bever- age in which the French excel. In a smaller cup of Sc^vres china she poured rich chocolate. The cup had been Madame la Roche's breakfast-cup since she was a bride. Chocolate of the choicest quality was the breakfast she preferred ; with pardonable ex- travagance, and spite altered circumstances, 218 SEVEN YEARS. her two old servants would not hear of her giving it up. Charlotte soon came out of her mistress's room, took the chocolate, and carried it in w^ith a grand air. Charles, Avho always shared his grandmother's dainty, slipped in after her. Marie sat down and took her breakfast, without waiting for her fellow-serv^ant. " Do like me, Fanny," she added, ad- dressing the young girl, "do not mind her; treat her with contempt, and take your breakfast." " I am not hungry," replied Fanny. " Not hungry, child ; you do not mean to say that you mind her? take your break- fast, Fanny, and let her go on as she likes, and despise it all." Spite this touching exhortation, Fanny did not eat, and Marie had finished her solitary meal by the time Charlotte conde- scended to come forth and sit down to her coffee, which Fanny had kept warm. " Thank Heaven," said Marie, rising from the table, " thank Heaven, I never eat the bread of idleness. I work, and I am proud to work," she added, pinning on her shawl. SEVEN YEARS. 219 " Some people are in independent circum- stances, and need not work/' placidly said Charlotte. This was almost more than Marie, going out as a day-servant for the general good, could bear with patience. But she controlled herself as she thought, and said mildly : " I thank Heaven that if I have to earn my bread by going out, a hard fate at my age, I am at least appreciated where I go. Madame le Brun is already as fond of me as if I had been years with her. It is Marie here, and Marie there, and Marie everything. If I only would go and live with her I might do so. It was only last night that she said to me : ' Marie, I wonder at a girl of your spirit re- maining as you are, I wonder at you. Come with me and make me comfortable, and I will make you happy, and after I die, Marie, you shall be provided for.' ' No, no, Madame,' I replied, ' I cannot do that, I have my dear mistress, who, though not dependent upon me, requires me ; then I must dress Monsieur Charles, the little darling, in the morning : and there is my little Fanny, a good work-woman, but a little giddy, flighty thing, who requires an older and a wiser head than her own to 220 SEVEN YEARS. rule her ; and then, Madame/ I added, ' there is a poor old thing, a helpless fellow-servant of mine, Madame, who has nothing but my poor earnings, Madame, and I would die, Madame, and I would have mv rio;ht hand cut off, Ma- dame, before I would forsake her, Madame.' * Very proper,' said Madame le Brun, ' I admire you, Marie ; stick to her, poor old thing, do not forsake her, Marie. If you do, who will mind her ? ' " Here Marie stopped, perhaps because she was out of breath, perhaps because she wished to see what effect she had produced. Char- lotte Avas still drinking her coffee, the contents of which she longed to throw in the face of her devoted fellow^-seiTant. A few words, slowly uttered, comprised her revenge. " You see, Fanny," she said, addressing the young girl, "you see Avhat age can do. It impairs body, mind, memory, all, and makes us what you behold," she added, casting on Marie a look of deep compassion. " AVhat is the matter?" asked the soft j)laintive voice of Madame la Roche, who ap- peared on the threshold of the room. " AVhat have you been saying?" Swiftly did ^larie reply with a short laugh : SEVEN YEARS. 221 " Oh ! nothing, jNIadame. Charlotte, though she knows I am younger than Madame, throws my age in my face. We are both in second childhood, Madame. However, I can work, thank Heaven. And there is this comfort at least, that Madame Charlotte cannot say I am a dependant upon her." So saying, Marie majestically went out, slammed the door, and in going doAvn, slipped and fell. The sound of her fall brought out the whole family and a neighbour on the landing. They found Marie senseless with the pain. Not Avithout trouble, for she was a great weight, they carried her in, and laid her on a bed. A little vinegar soon restored her to conscious- ness ; without saying a word, Marie sat up, felt her foot, groaned with pain, then sank back and burst into tears. " Oh ! my work, my work," she moaned. " My Avork and my wages ! I have sprained my ancle." Charlotte bent over her and kissed her. " Never mind, dear," she said, '' I'll do your work for you." Marie did not reply, but turned her face to the wall and cried bitterly. 222 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XX. Marie had indeed sprained her ancle, and the doctor, who was immediately called in, coolly declared she should not stir for six wxeks. " But I must," said Marie ; " I have work to do." " You cannot," he replied. " She shall not," declared Charlotte. " We have been fellow-servants forty years and more, and it will go hard indeed if I cannot work whilst Marie stays quiet." Marie was considerably affected by these generous sentiments, and as she really could not move, she submitted with tolerable grace to Charlotte's patronage. Charlotte's rheumatism was indeed so fiu* better that she could supply Marie's place with Madame le Brun ; but if she went out and worked, lanny had to spend many days at home to attend on the patient. Madame la Roche was too inexperienced SEVEN YEARS. 223 and too delicate for the task, so that Charlotte's devotedness was a very doubtful piece of eco- nomy. This Fanny vainly tried to make her understand. Charlotte was too happy in her magnanimity to give it up so easily. Yet, strange to say, Marie, as she got better, grew tired of kindness ; she became more than usually irritable and fantastic, and Fanny paid the penalty of her caprices. Nothing would do her one evening, but that the young girl should go to Madame Grand's, and claim a book of dreams, formerly lent in times of amity to that lady. " But I am so busy," objected Fanny, " and Charlotte passes the door every day." " And do you suppose I am going to ask Charlotte ? " was the indignant reply. " Char- lotte, who gives herself such airs just because she goes to Madame le Brun in my stead ! No, child, thank Heaven, I am not quite so mean, and you shall either get me that book, or I shall do without it till I am well again." " Very well, I shall go," replied Fanny ; and she thought, '' it is evening, I shall not see Bap- tiste, nor will he see me." Yet it was not without emotion that Fanny reentered once more the well-known street, 224 SEVEN YEARS. caught a glimpse of Baptiste's shop, and crossed the threshold of the old number two. " Oh, Fanny ! " said Madame Grand, who had put her head out to see who it was, " well, my dear, how are you, and whom do you want ? " " Marie sends me," replied Fanny, who felt the patronizing tone ; " she lent you a dream- book formerly, and must trouble you for it now\" Madame Grand laughed and seemed amused. " A dream-book ! tell her, my dear, that she dreamt it. Bless you, child, I have not and never had such a thing. Poor Marie, she is getting old, I see. But just come here, my dear, I have a word or two to sav to vou." Fanny reluctantly coni})lied, and drew near Madame Grand, avIio confidentially whis- pered : " I am very sorry about Baptiste. I assure you we all think you very ill used. I cannot bear to look at the man." " I do not complain of Baptiste, I have no right," said Fanny, coldly. " No right ! " echoed Madame Grand. " The man who Avas to have married you marrying SEVEN YEARS. 225 another girl, and a little pink-eyed thing, too. No right ! \\ hy, child, what do you mean ? " " That Monsieur Watt was free to marry, and does me no wrong." She still spoke calmly, for, to say the truth, she did not believe a word Madame Grand had uttered. " Well, well, people will be proud," muttered Madame Grand, not looking well pleased; " as you like, my dear ; but, let me tell you, other people know best." *' Good evening," coldly said Fanny, and she turned away apparently unmoved. She left the house and the street without having seen Baptiste, or cast a look towards his shop. Coming, she had a vague unacknowledged hope that they might meet by chance, and that this meeting, though fruitless, might yield to both a sort of bitter joy. But now Fanny had no such hope or wish. She hastened away like one pursued, and did not slacken her pace till all danger of a meeting was over. So far the words of Madame Grand had borne their fruit. When the young girl reentered the house she found Charlotte, who had just come in, anything but pleased at her absence, and at VOL. I. 15 r 22G SEVEN YEARS. the cause of it, wliicli Mane had not chosen to conceal. Magnanimity, though sweet, wearies in the end, and Chariotte was getting tired of being magnanimous ; accordingly, when Fanny briefly delivered Madame Grand's message, to the purport that that lady had not and had never had a dream-book, Charlotte exclaimed, without waiting for Marie's reply : " A dream-book ! Absurd. I had an aunt who believed in dreams, and who missed marrv- ing a captain, because the night before he made his proposal she had dreamed of carrots." " I am very fond of young carrots," softly said Madame la Roche, hoping to allay the storm, but only adding to its force, by giving Marie time to subdue the first bursts of her anger, and meditate before she aimed her blow. Charlotte had sat down on a chair like one tired. " How very fatigued you look," said Marie. '* Not I," curtly replied Charlotte, " not I. How is your ancle ? " '* Almost well, thank vou. I know vou feel this over-exertion, but it will soon be over, 1 shall soon be well again." *' My dear ^^larie," kindly observed Char- SEVEN YEARS. 227 lotte, " I did not like to say so, because I would not hurt your feelings, but it is time you should know the truth : you need not return to Ma- dame le Brun's." " What ! " said Marie. " You need not return to Madame le Brun's. I am sorry to say she has not shown a proper sense of gratitude to you. Her language and her tone are not respectful." " Ah ! bah I " said Marie, with sceptical irony. " She has quite hurt my feelings," pursued Charlotte ; " ' that old Marie was a bore,' she says, ' and the charcoal she used to burn, my dear ! such waste, such extravagance I As for her cooking, it was poor in the extreme. She tried three times to fricass^ a chicken, and she could not. She would not, my dear. I am sorry for her ancle, but I am not sorry to be rid of her ; I really am not. You suit me much better.' You do not call that gratitude, do you ? " added Charlotte, turning to Marie. " I call it a scandalous invention," replied Marie, trembling with passion. "Time will show," said Charlotte, calmlv, " time will show. I might tell you a great deal more that Madame le Brun says, but where 228 SEVEN YEARS. is the use ? it would only exasperate you, and I do not want to do that," kindly added Charlotte. " Oh, dear ! " sighed Madame la Roche, " why did I lose my money ? I had always heard the poor were so good and so kind to each other, but I am afraid, I really am, that their poverty makes them bitter, and that they only know how to snap, snarl, and bite." " I suppose Madame means that for me," said Marie. " I was never told before that I was given to biting." *' I think it is a judgment on us about that poor Baptiste," resumed Madame la Roche ; " we did not behave well to him ; we really did not." Fanny smiled with some bitterness, but went on with her sewing. This allusion to Baptiste restored sudden peace between the contending parties. " Oh ! if Madame takes Baptiste's part," be- gan Marie. " If she thinks wc have not behaved well to that presumptuous young fellow!" said Charlotte. " Dear me, I think nothing," said Madame la Roche, rather frightened, and ho})ing by SEVEN YEARS. 229 this declaration to be on the safe side. But though respectful in form, the reproaches of her two old servants might have been bitter in spirit, if, looking up at them both, Fanny had not said : " I do not care to hear Baptiste praised, for no one knows half the good of him that I do ; but I will not hear him blamed by those who have no right to blame him." This rather peremptory speech diverted the storm from Baptiste to Fanny ; she re- ceived reproaches, remonstrances, and argu- ments with freezing coldness, and heard them without a word. "I am sm^e she still thinks of him," said Marie. " I always shall," said Fanny, speaking for the first time. " Well, then, my dear," said Charlotte, after a pause, " do not. For some days I have known what I must tell you now." " I do not believe it," interrupted Fanny, turning very red ; "I know what you mean, but I do not believe it ; you have been mis- infonned." '' I tell you, child, 1 read it with my 230 SEVEN YEARS. own eyes at the door of the Mairie : Baptiste Watt is going to get mamed." Fanny clasped her hands tightly, and seemed to gasp for breath, but she soon recovered, and said quietly : " Oh I very well," and she resumed her work with assumed calmness. This incident broke the tide of war, but did not prevent Marie from brooding un- easily over the words of Charlotte. Such indeed was the result of her medita- tions, that she resolved to put the gratitude of Madame le Brun to speedy proof. She knew it Avas that lady's intention to send Charlotte out at two the next day, and at two, accordinoflv, Marie dressed herself and went out. Her ancle was now almost well, and it was little trouble to her to walk, and with a cool and deliberate air she called on her former mistress. Madame le Bnm lived on a second floor in a quiet house. She was a widow of forty odd, a thin, ners^ous, eccentric lady, who received Marie like an utter stranger. " Madame does not seem to recognise me," said Marie, rather huffed. " I am ^laric )> SEVEN YEARS, 231 '' Oh ! dear me, Marie ! yes, I remember she was very stout, and something happened to her foot." ' " I am Marie," said ]\Iarie again. '' Yes, yes, I see. I Kked her very much." This seemed favourable, though it was rather puzzHng, when one was present, to be treated hke a past and absent individual. However, Marie was determined to take the best view of the case, and she observed strongly : " Madame says she likes me, but if I were to believe Charlotte — " " Do not mention her," interrupted Madame le Brun, shivering, " T detest her." Marie beamed again. " Dear me, what can the poor thing have done?" she asked, seeming shocked. " All sorts of things," replied Madame le Brim ; " she has broken china and denied it." Marie shook her head, and confessed that to break and then deny was very like Char- lotte. ''Besides, I am sick of her," resumed Madame le Brun. " And that is the best reason of all," said 232 SEVEN YEARS. Marie, with a triumphant chuckle ; " I suj)- pose Madame does not mean to keep her." " No, indeed/' "And when sliall I return to Madame?" asked Marie, with her most insinuating smile. " I shall let you know," graciously rephed Madame le Brun ; *' good morning." "And not a word about the charcoal or the fricass^," triumphantly thought Marie, going home ; " I knew it was all invention — I knew it." Marie could scarcely keep in for the rest of the day, and when evening came and Char- lotte returned from Madame le Brun's, and imprudently indulged in the following bit of boasting : " I wonder, Marie, you could not succeed in attaching Madame le Brun to you ! She might have been a most useful friend. I do nothing to please her, nothing beyond my duty, and she is always so gracious and civil. She liked mv fricasse chicken verv nnich to-day. ' Charlotte, you excel in that,' she said, 'and as to how vou make live bushels of charcoal last three weeks — why, it amazes me.' " SEVEN YEARS. 233 When we say Charlotte spoke thus, and Marie heard her, Marie could not help saying : " I think, Charlotte, I shall be rendering you a service by telling you the truth. I called on Madame le Brun to-day ; I had a little private and confidential conversation with her, and I was sorry to learn she was not quite pleased with you. The china you have broken, and your denial of it, have amazed her, to say the least. Charcoal and fricass^ are not everything, my dear Charlotte — there must be trust, there must be trust ; and, to make a long story short, as I am to resume my services with Madame le Brun, the best thing you can do is to drop off of your own accord, and not be told to stay at home." " Oh ! that is it, is it ?" said Charlotte, with a freezing smile; "you think me easily man- aged, I perceive, but all I say is this : you do not know Madame le Brun, and I do ; at least, I think so. She told me you had been there to-day. She made no mystery of it, I promise you." " Yes, yes, I know," said Marie, with a prim smile. 234 SEVEN YEARS. " Dear me, who can be ringing at this hour?" exclaimed Madame la Roche. "It sounds like Baptiste's ring, — but it cannot be Baptiste." " Oh, no ! " said Fanny, rising to open the door, ''it is not Baptiste." It was not Baptiste, but a round-faced buxom Avoman, in a white cap, who asked " if Charlotte lived there." " You might say Madame," put in Char- lotte, from her chair. " Madame, if you like," replied the buxom woman, with a good-humoured smile, " we will not quarrel about it." " What is your errand ? " asked Madame la Roche, wdth a quiet dignity, which the woman acknowledged by directing to her all her fiu'ther discourse. " I am sent bv ]\Iadame le Brun," she said, "to tell Madame Charlotte that here is her money," — and she laid down a few five- franc pieces on the table, — " and that she need not come anv more." " I knew it," Marie could not help exclaim- ing, " I knew it ; but Madame Charlotte would not believe me — not she ! Well, well, pride SEVEN YEARS. 235 will have a fall ! And when am I to call on Madame le Brun ? " she added, brightening up. "When you like/' replied the woman, smiling. " Then tell Madame le Brun I shall be with her to-morrow at eleven," said Marie, with dignity. " Tell her that. But perhaps you wdll not see her before that time ? " " Not see her 1 " said the woman, smiling, " why, I am her servant." " What ! " cried Marie, whilst Charlotte burst into a loud laugh. " I say I am her servant," replied the woman, " but you may come all the same, and if you are the stout old woman called Marie, as I suppose, please to bring back the key of the dining-room cupboard you took away. Good evening, ladies." And with a cool nod around, the buxom good-humoured woman took her leave and closed the door. Madame la Koche, confounded that such strange things should take place in her pre- sence, uttered not a word. Marie stared at the w^all opposite her, muttering broken words, in which " stout old woman " and " the key 236 SEVEN YEARS. of the dining-rooiri cupboard " recurred three times. Charlotte looked vacantly at the three pieces on the table, but she saw them not ; and yet, of all that had passed, these three coins impressed Fanny most. " Fifteen francs !" she thought, " and I have not more than twenty, and our rent is coming on. SEVEN YEARS. 237 CHAPTER XXI. So sore a blow did not, unfortunately, conduce to the peace of the little family. Charlotte and Marie thrcAv on each other the blame of Madame le Brun's defection, which might have been more safely attributed to that lady's capricious temper ; and they left the result to the anxious thoughts of Fanny, who from the first had been purse keeper. Matters had been drawing to a crisis for some time, and the young girl was at length obliged to speak plainly to Madame la Roche, and tell her without disguise in what position they stood. Madame la Roche clasped her hands, and looked piteous. "No money," she said, "and dissension and strife from morning till night. Formerly Marie and Charlotte quarrelled ; but it was in the kitchen or in the dining-room, and one did not hear it always ; and then one had the comfort of knowing that they liked it ; but now they have nothing else to do, and they 238 SEVEN YEARS. are ever at it, and we are all together, and I declare my head aches with the din." " Yes, it is tiresome," apathetically said Fanny. Her heart was full of her own troubles, and the annoyances of Madame la Roche sounded idle and weak. Besides, Ma- dame la Roche had suggested no cure to the great trouble of all — want of money, and of this Fanny reminded her gently : " What is to be done, Madame ? " she asked. " That my god-mother and Marie should quar- rel is tiresome ; but that there should be no money in the house seems worse." " I suppose it is," said Madame la Roche, with evident distress ; " well, Fanny, all this quarrelling has set me thinking for some time, for really the noise alone is too much, and I think now we must act. I shall Avrite a letter, and you must take it, to Monsieur Noiret." " Monsieur Noiret ! " echoed Fanny with a slight start, ''he has never come near us, Madame." "He is like the world, my dear," sighed Madame la Roche ; " vet if he can assist us without detriment to himself, he will do so. I shall write the letter, and you will take it." Fannv raised no further opposition; the SEVEN YEARS. 239 letter was written, and, without even inquiring into the nature of its contents, the young girl took it to Monsieur Noiret. Monsieur Noiret was an old bourgeois of the old school ; he lived in comfortable style in a comfortable apartment of a house in the Marais, not far from the former residence of Madame la Roche. Fanny shunned the street in which Baptiste still resided, and took a turn to reach Monsieur Noiret's dw^elling. It was a venerable old mansion, built round a court-yard, the centre of which was a little garden, Avith a few young lilac trees budding into verdure, for March was nearly over, and spring had begun, and with spring, flowers, green leaves, and the song of birds had come. In sunny rooms on the second floor resided Monsieur Noiret. A demure-looking servant, in a close white cap, and with a curious twinkle in her grey eyes, answered Fanny's hesitating ring, and slowly eyed her from head to foot. *' Monsieur Noiret," said Fanny. "lie is at luncheon," replied the demure servant. Can I wait until he has done ? " Yes, you may sit here." (( (( 240 SEVEN YEARS. And Fariny was ushered in, and told to sit down in a green ante-room with plain oak chairs. " You are very young, if you are come for the place," said the demure servant ; " Mon- sieur does not like young girls." *' I am not come for the place," said Fanny, " I bring a letter." " Oh, a letter ! I thought you were come for the place : I am leaving ; I am going to get married." Her grey eyes twinkled again as she said it ; she seemed in a communicative mood. Fanny, however, heard her without apparent emotion or interest ; a profound apa- thetic indifference spread for her over every high or low detail of life. " Who is there ? " asked Monsieur Noiret's voice from within. " Fanny, from Madame la Roche," said the young girl, addressing the seiTant, who went in with the message, and presently came out again and ushered Fanny into a comfortable dining-room, painted oak colour, and furnished with plain mahogany and red morocco. Be- fore a table covered with a substantial meal sat Monsieur Noiret. He smiled graciouslv to Fanny, and pointed to a chair. SEVEN YEARS. 241 " And what news from Madame la Roche ? " he asked, his white teeth shining. '* I bring a letter, sir." " A letter ! " said Monsieur Noiret, carving the leg of a cold capon ; " and have you any reason to suppose, my dear, that it requires to be read innnediately — that it cannot wait half an hour, for instance ? " " I think it can wait, sir." " Well, then, my dear, we will let it wait," rejoined ^Monsieur Noiret, making two mouth- fuls of the capon's limb ; " but if reading be injurious to digestion, talking, on the contrary, is excellent, and therefore let us talk. Are you married yet ? " Fanny gave a start like one that receives an unseen blow, but she soon mastered this in- vohmtary emotion, and said quietly enough : " No, sir." Monsieur Noiret laid down his knife and fork, and said emphatically : " Are you not going to marry, Fanny ? " " No, sir." " Tell me all about it," he resumed. '' There is nothing to tell, sir," rather shortly replied the young girl. VOL. I. 16 242 SEVEN YEARS. '' I see, I see, — a lover's quarrel, soon to be made up." " No, sir," dc^liberatelv said Fannv ; " for excellent reasons I broke off my engagement witli Baptiste, and he, availing himself of his liberty, is going to marry another girl three days hence. Making up is out of the ques- tion." Monsieur Noiret whistled, and finished his meal in profound silence. When he had drunk his last glass of claret, and vainly pressed Tanny to drink with him and take a biscuit, he deliberately opened and read Ma- dame la Roche's letter. He smiled as he finished it, and folded it up, then rising he said to the young girl : " Fanny, you have never seen this place of mine ; come and have a look at it. Marianne, who has the keys, shall show us the way." Fanny would rather have said nay, but, fearing to displease the friend to whom Ma- dame la Roche had appealed for assistance, she rose in token of ac(]uiescence with Mon- sieur Noiret's wish. ^larianne took a long time to hear her master's summons, which was the more surprising, that having been standing behind the dinin2:-room door the whole time of SEVEN YEARS. 243 his conversation with Panny, she must have been aware of his intentions. When she came at length, she had to spend another quarter of an hour in hunting for the keys, and when the keys were found, she plainly asked Monsieur Noiret what he wanted them for. He smiled, showed his two rows of sound white teeth, and patting her cheek, said kindly : " Get married, my dear, get married." Thus lectured, Marianne showed the way, and her master and Fannv followed. There was w^ealth and comfort in Monsieur Noiret's home. The salon Avas large, hand- some, and substantial; the bed-rooms were comfortable and plain ; the kitchen, the laundry, and all their appurtenances, were models of cleanliness and ingenious contrivance. To crowm all, Monsieur Noiret took care to dis- play to Panny's vievr a goodly store of house- hold provisions, and a handsome stock of shining old plate, not to speak of a large ma- hogany press piled up high with choice damask linen. " This is my town house," he said, when the survey was over; "my country house you nuist see later. It is more of a farm than of a villa, with cows, calves, hens, chickens, and 244 SEVEN YEARS, rather a pleasant orchard full of fmit ; but, as I said, you will see that later, and now, Marianne, you may take the keys and leave us. Marianne would rather have stayed, hut her master's eye enjoined obedience, and this time he secured privacy by sending her on an errand. When Monsieur Noiret found himself once more alone with Tanny in the dining-room, he began pacing it up and down, and taking a grave look, he said, addressing the young girl, who remained standing : " And now, Fanny, we will come to business. Do you know what there was in the letter of Madame la Eoclie?" " No, sir, I do not." " Then I will tell you. It seems my two old friends, Marie and Charlotte, would be better apart, and Madame la Roche, hearing that Marianne is going to get married and lea,ve me to solitude, expects me to take either — she allows me my choice — of the two old ladies. Now, Fanny, you have seen my house- hold. I leave it to you to say if either stout old ]\Iarie or rheumatic old Charlotte is equal to the task of keeping everything in the order I SEVEN YEARS. 245 like, ^vithoiit having another servant under her." Fanny was obliged to acquiesce in the correctness of this remark. Monsieur Noiret, still walking up and down the room, con- tinued : " I always said that, rather than have a servant and a housekeeper, I would marry ; but I am, and have always been, particular. I like youth, beauty, health, a good heart, and a good temper. You have them all," added Monsieur Noiret, stopping short before Fanny, "and I have. always had a liking for you. If you will be my Avife, say so. I shall provide for the family you leave ; take either Charlotte or Marie to keep you company; make vou mistress of all I have whilst I live, and of half my property after my death." Monsieur Noiret spoke seriously, with his rich brown eyes fastened full on Fanny's face. The young girl heard him first with a mute surprise that suspended every other feeling then a painful blush overspread her coun- tenance, and coldly turning her head away, she said quietly : '' I am very much obliged to you, sir, but I cannot be your wife." 246 SEVEN YEARS. " My dear child," said Monsieur Noiret, with his unpleasant smile, " I did not mean you to decide so hastily. This proposal ex- presses no new thought of mine, though it be new to you. It requires reflection and con- sideration, my dear. You feel sore, no doubt, about vour former lover, and no wonder ; but remember that I am not askino; you for love. I labour under no illusions. I am strong, and I enjoy good health, but I am old ; I kiio\v it, and if I wish for a vouno; wife, it is because I like youth, but I do not expect youth to be fond of me. I believe, however, that I could make you happy ; I have the means and the inclination.. You are a good little thing, and in time you would like me as nuich as I shoidd wish or expect you to like me. You see I am reasonable; besides, I give you time to think over it. Say a week. With regard to Madame la Roche's letter, tell her simply what you have seen, and how impossible it is for me to comply with her request. And now, my dear," added Monsieur Noiret, " as I have kei)t you some time, and as you seem anxious to pro, I will delav vou no Ioniser. A week hence I shall call on Madame la Roche and heai' your answer." SEVEN YEARS. 247 " You may hear it now, sir," said Fanny : " I cannot be your wife." "My dear," replied Monsieur Noiret, with a smile, " you know nothing about it yet. This day week I shall call on ]\ladame la Roche." And, with his politest smile and bow, he saw her to the door. A reply, that would have disturbed the ex- cellent opinion Monsieur Noiret had conceived of Fanny's temper, rose to the young girl's lips, but she remembered that she did not pos- sess the right to alienate from Madame la Roche a friend, such as he Avas, and she held her peace. Yet she went home in a strange fever ; Baptiste was going to marry, she had read his name and that of his betrothed on the bill at the Mairie ; after to-morrow he was to marry in the little parish church in which they were to have been united; but still this did not seem such utter separation from him as to be asked to become Monsieur Noiret's wife. To belong to that old man, to live with him in his com- fortable and stately, but rather gloomy, home, to move in another circle, and become a mem- ber of another world, to be, in short, Madame Noiret, seemed a change so strange and so 248 SEVEN YEARS. entire, tliat no extremity, Fanny thoiiglit, could bring her to it. In this mood she reached home, and found ^Madame la Roche looking on hopelessly, whilst Marie and Charlotte, to whom she had unfortunately confided the contents of her note to Monsieur Noiret, were both ve- hemently declarino:, that no consideration should induce them to enter that gentleman's house, no matter in what capacity. Fanny, who had got to be a little bit of a misanthrope of late, smiled with some bitter- ness at the useless strife. " You need not trouble, either of you,'* she said, coldly ; " Monsieur Noiret will have neither ^laHe nor Chai'lotte, unless on a con- dition with Avhich I shall certainly not comply." ** A condition! what condition, mv dear?" asked ]\Iadame la Roche. Fanny involuntarily grew red, then pale, then she said with forced cahnness : " He wants me to be his wife." " His wife ! " exclaimed ^ladame la Roche, "that proud old Monsieur Noiret wants to marrv you ? " " The condescension of the offer had not SEVEN YEARS. 249 struck me," said Fanny, liurt at this view of the subject. "Nor need it," put in Charlotte; ''my god- daughter could have better offers any day." " If I had not been a fool," said Marie, " I might have been ]\Iadame Noiret years ago. Well, child, you will scarcely refuse that, will VOU !f " It is a good offer," approvingly said Ma- dame la Roche. Fannv heard them with amazement ; she had fancied that they would be indignant and angry, and their complacency in what revolted her, was a bloAV she had not anticipated. " So you all wish me to go away and leave 5> VOU. " I do not, I do not," cried Charles, starting up from his toys on the floor, and springing on her lap ; " do not go, Fanny, do not." Fanny kissed him, and cried as if her heart would break ; for it seemed to her in the bit- terness of that hour as if tliat child's affection were the onlv disinterested likinsr left to her. Love liad forsaken her, and old affection seemed sordid and low. She kissed Charles, dried her eyes, and said coldly : " I will not marry Monsieur Noiret." 250 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTEH XXII. Youth is severe ; no sad knowledge of life, no bitter experience of liuman Aveakness have taught it the virtue and the value of leniency. Fanny was hurt, and hurt to the very heart, to find that Madame la Roche and the two women, who had so long been her devoted and faithful friends, could wish her to become Monsieur Noiret's wife. She forgot the ad- vantao:es thev saw in this union for her ; she forgot that Marie and Charlotte had never looked on Baptiste with particidar favova*, and that, more or less advanced in life as thev all three were, they could not think so much about Monsieur Noiret's wrinkles and years as she did. Iiuleed, to do them justice, they saw chiefly that Monsiem* Noiret was rich, that he co\dd give Fanny every comfort and manv luwu'ies, and thoudi thev were also conscious that by this fortunate marriage peace and comfort would be restored to their own narrowed circle, this thought came second, SEVEN YEARS. 251 even as Fanny's happiness came first. But the advantages they prized so higlily Fanny thouglit nothing of, and she could see but one cogent motive for the open or indirect methods they took to press her "into sell- ing herself to an old man/' as she bitterly called it. If Madame la Roche sighed and said : " My dear, he would make you so comfort- able." " And he would pay the rent," was Fanny's internal reply. If Charlotte looked grand and suggested : "Would you feel nothing to hear yourself called ' Madame Noiret ? ' " Fannv moodilv thought : " You want me to become Madame Noiret, that you, as Madame Noiret's god-mother, may rule Monsieur Noiret's house." If Marie hinted : " Child, show your spirit to that low Bap- tiste." Fanny felt angrily : " She wants to drive me into it, that she may remain here alone and in comfort with Madame la Hoche." In short, in every word that was uttered, in every look that was given, 252 SEVEN YEARS. Fannv read self-interest. This was but the natural reaction of a heart too lonj? indulfjed, of a temper that had never been controlled, of a happy youth that had never known trouble or sorrow. But this misanthropic mood could not last long ; Tanny soon returned to the natural tenderness of her heart and gentleness of her disposition, and then, indeed, no longer looking with prejudiced eyes on the advice she got, she began to endure the strange torment of knowing that there was a remedy to the many cares and troubles she saw, that this remedy lay in her own hands, but that she would not use it. The little family were in great trouble ; i\Iadame la Roche's four hundred francs a year and Eanny's earnings could not support five persons ; rent was coming due, and money was growing short ; distre-^s had the effect of subduing for a while the ceaseless quarrels of Charlotte and Marie ; they grumbled indeed, but in low dismal voices that had scarcely a touch of the old liveliness. IMadame la Roche said nothing, but she looked at Charles, the only merry one amongst them all, and Aviped away silent tears from her pale face. To look on and to know, " with a word I could make SEVEN YEARS. 253 them all happy, I could turn that grief to joy," was a trial indeed : a trial on which Monsieur Noiret had shrewdly calculated as a chance of success. His liking for Fanny, which had come with her beauty, was the liking old men feel for young girls. He had too much sense to expect her to be fond of him, but he had too little faith in the love of vouth not to think that, if she married him, he would easily make her forget Baptiste and all such early dreams ; a handsome dress now and then, a cashmere shawl, with even a sprinkling of diamonds if necessarv, — Monsieur Noiret had his mother's jewel box in store, — were in his opinion pallia- tives to every feminine affliction, especially when the sufferer was a poor working girl, raised from the obscurity of a dressmaker to the dignity of a young bourgeoise. About Monsieur Noiret's thoughts Fanny did not trouble herself much ; the sad faces at home were arguments more powerful than the temptation of his gifts, but against both rose a reproachful image : the sorroAvful look of Baptiste, that seemed to follow her saying: "Did you leave me for this ? " " I will have done with that at least," de- sperately thought Fanny, as she rose on the 254 SEVEN YEARS. Saturday morning that was to see Baptiste wedded ; " I will see him married to that girl, whoever she may be, and forget him as if he had never been." Without breathing a word of her purpose, and merely going out as if to work as usual, Fanny took her way to the church in which the ceremony was to be performed. It was an old church, which has since been pulled down to make way for modern improvements : the gloomy, gothic building had few claims to beauty of any kind ; the ceiling was low, the floor was damp and dark with age ; the pictures on the walls had a dingy look ; the altar looked poor and bare ; only a few old men and women were listening to the mass which a priest was saying. Fanny went on to the vestry, and calmly asked the sacristan at what hour Monsieur AVatt was to be married. " At eleven," he replied, " and at the high altar." She thanked him, and went and chose her place in the light aisle, — a chair behind one of the pillars, — thence she could see, unseen, whatever passed in the nave. It was ten ; Fannv had onlv an hour to wait. Only ! is that the word, indeed, wherewith SEVEN YEARS. 255 to describe the heart-sick expectation with which she sat and prayed and Avept, and felt ten times over that it was best for her to fly and leave the place, and not see again the faithless lover whom she had no right to blame, yet coidd not absolve. For ever came the secret cry : " he might have loved me more ; he need not have forsaken me so soon." In the mean while preparations for the forthcoming ceremony were being made : the altar was decorated: velvet cushions fringed with gold were placed for the bridal pair ; velvet chairs were set in rows for the bridal party ; eleven struck, — the priest in white vestments issued from the vestry, and up the nave a rustling of silk and a sound of steps announced the approach of the " noce." Fanny felt very sick, she closed her eyes, and lean- ing her head against the cold pillar, she would not see. At length she gathered cour- age. " What did I come here for, and lose a day's work, but to know?" she asked of her- self, and opening her eyes she looked at the altar. The bride and bridegroom were kneeling before it : the bride was a pretty girl in white, who looked all the prettier for her veil and orange wreath, but Fanny did not heed her ; 256 SEVEN YEARS. with fixed amazed eyes and parted lips she looked at the bridegroom — a short, slim, and sallow young man, not in the least like Baptiste. " There is some mistake," thon2:ht Fannv, relieved at not seeing what she had dreaded, but pained at a delay that spoke of a new pang to be undergone. But as she cast a hasty and impatient look on the bridal party, as on persons concerned in doings that no longer interested her, Eanny could scarcely repress a scream on perceiving Baptiste a beholder, like herself, of the marriage ceremony. He stood grave and sad, looking on with folded arms and bent look. He was attired in holiday black, and was evidently a member of the bridal party. The truth flashed across Fanny's mind. The bridegroom was his cousin and namesake, of whom she had often heard him speak, and who had probably come down to Paris to get married. The bride might now be who and what she liked ; Fanny's heart beat, her head swam, and leaning her forehead on the chair before her, she lost consciousness. The sound of voices behind her wakened the younsj ffirl. " She is praying !" whispered one voice. SEVEN YEARS. 257 " She is sleeping," said another voice, in a louder key, " and it is a shame to come to a church to sleep in it." With a start Eanny looked up ; the lights on the altar were extinguished : bride, bride- groom, and bridal party had vanished. It was as if she had dreamed it all, so quiet and silent was now the old church. But too vivid for a dream rose before her the scene she had witnessed. Panny did not even go to the vestry to inquire : there was no need ; Baptiste was not married, she knew it, she felt it ; she thought herself foolish and mad to have even for a moment believed that, within a month of their parting, he could have thought of another Avoman, and, without heeding the owners of the two voices who had passed such strictures on her supposed slumbers, she sent a fervent thanksgiving to the Almighty, then rose from her chair, and swiftly left the church. VOL. 1. 17 258 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XXIII. Light and giddy with feverish joy, Fanny skipped down the church steps, hke one tread- ing on air. She felt thoroughly happy ; she had not a thought, not a care ; everything was brio-ht and cheerful, from the orrev skv that lowered above the house roofs, to the muddy pavement along which she tripped light and gay as a little fairy. On her way home Fanny passed a toy- shop ; she had passed it going, but for obvious reasons she had not seen it ; now she saw it, and thought of poor little Charles at home, ^dio had said the evening before : " Grandmamma, why do I not have any toys now ? " and of ]\ladame la Roche's sad answer : " Because we are poor, child." F'anny thought of this, and her heart was full. She put her hand in her pocket and felt a five-franc piece in it. It was more than enougli ; Fanny walked into the sho}), and deliberately purchased a horse and car, for SEVEN YEARS. 259 twenty-five sous. She walked out tliinking how pleased Charles would be, and how kind Madame la Roche would enjoy his pleasure ; then she wondered if she could not please her too, in a more direct fashion. She looked in at a pastry-cook's ; that was Madame la Roche's favourite tart in the window. Fanny could not resist it. She walked in, and came out with the tart, ^vhich proved a more expensive purchase than even the horse and car. '' But neither Marie nor Charlotte will touch a mite of it," thought Fanny, " they will leave it all to Madame la Roche and the child ; what shall I bring to them ? " She hit on no better expedient than to Avalk in to the chare utier's shop. The charcutier bears but a faint likeness to his English brother, the dealer in pork, bacon, and ham. The charcutier sells neither butter nor poul- try, and he scorns eggs and rabbits. His shop is adorned, without, by fresco paintings of what may be called the Dutch school. Plump sausages and hams, with the most tempting mixture of fat and lean, show the triumph of the painter's art. Within, mirrors, marbles, and delicious viands fulfil the promises held forth without. The buxom charcutiorc, with 260 SEVEN YEARS. her white cap, rosy cheeks, red hps, round figure, and white apron and tucker, is herself a fair proof of the excellence and solidity of the goods in which she deals. These are most seducingly dis})layed on the white marble counter behind which she stands smiling. Potted meats, quivering jellies, compounds of pork and veal, mysterious meat cheeses, fair pink sausages ready for the hissing fiying-pan, tender poii cutlets, dinde farcie, cold veal, all lie there before you adorned — as if such chanus needed heightening — with pink paper roses and Avhite paper frills, daintily cut. Of the strings of black pudding hanging about, of the trophies in the shape of goodly hams which the walls display, of petit lard, even thouo;h it come from Strasbouror, we sav nothing : they are there to fill up. The count- er and its dainties will ever absorb the love and attention of the gently gonnandizing sons and daughters of Paris. Into such a palace did Fanny enter. Dinde farcie was her extravagant choice, and when she left the shop she had ten sous in her poc- ket. But Fanny was not in a mood to trouble herself about money : she was in a temper to defy care, to laugh at the future, to rejoice in SEVEN YEAUS. 261 the present, and make those around her rejoice. Tired and laden, but glad with all that, Fanny went home. It was the child who admitted her. On seeing the horse and car he uttered a scream of delight, at once took possession of them, and ran off with his prize to the room of Madame la Roche. She came out amazed to see Avho had been so generous, and found Eanny in the act of laying the tart on a plate. She caaght a glimpse too of the dinde farcie, and unable to understand the meaning of all this, she asked with mild surprise : "My dear child, what has brought you back from your work? " " I did not go to work," said Fanny, blushing. " And liow did you get those things ? Who gave them to you ? " " I bought them," answered Fanny, hanging down her head. Madame la Roche felt and looked bewilder- ed, and Charlotte and Marie, who now came out, felt and looked like their mistress. Charles alone, who was whipping his horse and car about the room, shouted and laughed without surprise. 262 SEVEN YEARS. " I know you like this, ]\Iadame," continued Fanny, pointing to the tart, *' so I brought it to yon. This," she added, designating the meat, "is for Marie and my god-mother. It is long since we had a treat. I hope I have not done wrong ? I do not think I have." " There is no harm in it," despondently re- plied Madame la Roche, whose pale cheek bore the traces of recent tears, " bnt this is scarce- ly a day for rejoicing." " I do not suppose Fanny thinks we are going to eat meat on Saturday, a fa^t-day," gravely obser\xd Charlotte. *' I never thought about that," replied Fanny, disconcerted at having forgotten it. " And I think," said Marie, " I think it is verv luckv the landlord, who has iust called in to insult iMadame because she cannot pay her rent the verv dav it is due, I think it is luckv he did not meet Fanny coming up the stair- case laden with tovs, and cakes, and tarts, and capons, and turkeys, instead of being at her work like a sensible girl." '' Do not be severe," sighed i\Iadame la Roche, " the y)oor child meant kiiully, and that is mv favourite tart, and vou know how fond you are of dindc farcie ; and look at SEVEN YEARS. 263 Charles, the dear Httle fellow is beside himself with joy. She meant it kindly, and if we liad only money for the rent, I dare say we should enjoy it very much." But she sighed again as she came to the close of this long speech, and her eyes filled with tears. The joy of Fanny was considerably damped by the way in which her treat was received. She put her dainties away without a word, w^hilst Marie said with marked emphasis : " Have you got any money, child ? " " I have not," said Fanny. " No more have Ave," austerelv said Char- lotte. " A strange time, my dear child, for such extravagant fancies, and meat on a Saturday." " I have got a few francs left," mildly put in Madame la Roche. Fanny sighed deeply. The weight of care she had a while forgotten sank on her anew. Baptiste was not married, true ; Baptiste was still fond of her, she felt sure of it : but grim poverty faced her, and the helpless women and the unconscious child, none the less. She rose, and said resignedly : " I shall go and work ; better half a day's work than none." 264 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTER XXIV. Fanny was ready to go out the next morning, when a sharp ring was heard at the door : she w^ent and opened : it was the rough and grisly porter, wdth his cotton handkerchief tied round his heavy brows. " He is come about the rent," thought Fanny, trembhng from head to foot ; but she none the less civilly requested the por- ter to come in. " Why should I come in ? " he asked suspiciously. '' I have only come up to tell you a bit of my mind ; people who are so grand — " " Do not, pray do not," inteiTupted Fanny, casting a timid look towards the inner rooms, and evidently afraid lest Madame la Roche should hear ; " I hope yet that we shall find the means of paying tliat money, though God knows how," she added in a low despairing voice. " You liad better find the means quickly then," said the porter, roughly, " for I may SEVEN YEARS. 2G5 as well tell you tliat Mademoiselle is in the house, and means to pay you a visit." " Mademoiselle ! who is Mademoiselle ? " asked Fanny. " The landlord's sister, and let me tell vou that, though she makes less noise than her brother, who storms and raves, she is a great deal more troublesome than he is. That is all I had to say. Good morning." He nodded and left her distracted at the prospect of the coming visit. She went to Charlotte and Marie, and told them what the porter had said ; but they could give her no counsel. Their calm lives had been spent in the peacefid bosom of prosperity ; they knew nothing of poverty ; they had no practical experience of debts, or of the poor ways and means by which troublesome applications may be warded oflP. To pay what was owing seemed the only plan offered to them. " But I have got no money," said Fanny. " No, child, and you never will have whilst you go and buy toys and cakes, and capons and turkevs," said Marie. " I cannot imagine what possessed her yes- terday," remarked Cliarlotte. " She is as stingy as can be on other days, but yesterday 266 SEVEN YEARS. being a fast day, she must needs buy dinde farcie." " Do not, pray do not," entreated Fanny, " I hear a step on the staircase, it must be that ladv ! What shall we do ? what shall we do ? " A mild modest ring was heard even as she spoke ; her face red and burning with shame, Fanny went and opened. It was Mademoiselle, the landlord's sister, and the joint proprietress of the house. A meeker and more demure-looking ladv Fannv had never seen. Her fair hair was smoothed awav from her hidi and white forehead ; her drooping lids modestly veiled her blue eyes ; decorum was written in her grave and mild features, in her slightly bending figure, in her subdued manners. " Madame la Roche," she said, mildly. " She will come presently," faltered Fanny ; " will you sit down and Avait ? " " With pleasure," sedately replied ^lade- moiselle. She took a chair, and looked bene- volentlv at Charlotte and Marie. " A fine morning," she said. " Oh, very," replied Marie, brightening at this amicable opening ; and she kindly added : " Madame la Roche will be pleased to see SEVEN YEARS. 267 Mademoiselle : the gentleman who came yes- terday was not civil." " Indeed ! " said Mademoiselle. " Ah, well, my brother is a httle noisy at times ; I like to do things quietly." " Of course," said Marie, " so much better; especially," she added, with her most gracious smile, " when people, though not able, are willing." " To be sure, quite wilhng," said Made- moiselle. " Most willing !" emphatically echoed Marie. " We shall settle this little matter without trouble," said Mademoiselle, casting a quiet look around her. " I understand Madame la Roche has been well off. I have no doubt she has kept some lady -like trinkets, or scraps of lace, that may help us to come to a pro- per understanding." Marie stared, but did not answer. Made- moiselle continued : "It is a settled plan with my brother and me never to allow rent to run on ; but whereas he insists on monev, I am satisfied with valuables. A jewel, a watch, a chain, nay, even a piece of furniture, will pay a quarter's 268 SEVEN YEARS. rent : if the value exceeds the amount due, it is deducted from the next quarter." " If Madame la Roche had such valuables," replied Marie, firing up, " she would not wait to be asked for her rent in order to pay it. She would sell and pledge them, and no one would know her poverty." *' Then if Madame la Roche cannot pay the rent we must part," suavely said ^la- demoiselle ; " we never allow rent to run on." Trembling with indignation, Marie was going to answer, when Madame la Roche appeared. With quiet dignity she bowed to Made- moiselle, and requested to know her errand. Mademoiselle mildlv answered that she had come for the rent. '' I have no money now," said Mad;\me la Roche, in a low voice. " And no valuables ? " ask^d Mademoiselle. " None." *' Then I am sorry for it : we must part." *' And vou will detain the furnitiu'e ? " said Madame la Roche. " I see no other means." "Very well, Madame," replied Madame la SEVEN YEARS. 269 Roche, in a tone that said : " Your errand is over. " Mademoiselle felt it, for she rose and cast around a look that was scarcely pleasant spite its meekness. Fanny, who had looked on w4th helpless calmness, opened the door to let her out, and thereby spared Monsieur Noiret the trouble of ringing. That gentleman and Mademoiselle exchanged exclamations on meeting : they were acquainted, it appeared. " How very fortunate 1 " said Monsieur Noiret, " I have been looking for you these three weeks. Pray allow me to exchange a few words with you — I am sure my good friend Madame la Roche will raise no objection." Madame la Roche said he might command her place, and was going to leave the room, but he would not allow it. " It is no secret," he said, with his ready smile, " only a bit of news for Mademoiselle. I have seen your nephew," he added, turning towards her. Mademoiselle's blue eyes lit with a fiery spark. '' Where — how — when ! " she exclaimed. " In the Palais Royal, with three young fellows, a month ago." 270 SEVEN YEARS. The intelligence brought no great amount of j)leasure or sweetness to Mademoiselle's . face. Her nephew, a spend-thrift, a gambler, and a runjiwav, was a thorn in her side, a sore spot in her life. " I shall stop him yet," she said, clenching tightly an ample reticule which she carried about on rent days, and which her lodgers knew well. " I shall stop him yet. And you, Madame," she added, looking sourly at Madame la Roche, "please to bear my last words in mind, and to have those eighty francs by to-morrow morning. No rents run on here." " Dear me ! " said Monsieur Noiret, seeming surprised, " would you prefer the eighty francs to-day?" Mademoiselle looked at him. "Of course I shoidd," she at length answered. Monsieur Noiret put four Napoleons in her hand. Mademoiselle counted and \vei2;hed them, gave him a receipt in exchange, and walked out without a word. " I am so fj:lad I was able to relieve vou of that troublesome woman," said Monsieur Noiret to Madame la Roche, " she is a leech. Did she not j)ropose purchasing or exchanging something? " SEVEN YEARS. 271 " She did ! " cried Marie, who was bursting with wrath, " she did. As if Madame kept valuables when she wanted money ! " " Monsieur Noiret, I am obliged to you," said Madame la Roche, whose tears were flow- ing, " but God only knows when I shall be able to pay you." " A trifle, a trifle !" said Monsieur Noiret, glancing at Fanny ; "I came at this early hour on account of that young creature." Fanny, who was sitting apart with Charles, on her lap, looked up on being thus indirectly addressed. " The fact is," said Monsieur Noiret, " that Madame des Granges, a friend of mine, has asked me for a clever seamstress, and as I believe her terms are better than those Fanny gets, I came early to give our little friend the intimation." Fanny's face cleared at once. If Monsieur Noiret came to procure her work, must it not be that he had given up that odious plan of marriage ? She thanked him with a warmth that made him smile, and receiving from him a line for Madame des Granges, she exclaimed eagerly that she would go at once ; and at 272 SEVEN YEARS. once, glad perhaps to escape from his presence, she Avent. The tide had turned to prosperity. Madame des Granges received Fanny very favourably ; agreed to pay her one-third more than she received from the dressmaker who gave her occasional work, and finally secured her ser- vices for the next day. A weight of care seemed removed from Fanny as she came home that evening. The rent was paid ; three months' peace was secur- ed ; she had found profitable work ; and, crown- ing blessing of all, Baptiste was not married. No wonder she climbed up the four steep flights of stairs with a light and happy heart. She found jVIadame la Roche in smiles, and Charlotte and Marie gracious. " Anything new ?" she asked, gaily. " No," replied Charlotte, " nothing, unless that Monsieur Noiret is to come this evening." Fanny felt the blow, but tried to smile. *' A most extraordinary piece of good for- tune that he should have dropped in just in time to pay Madame's rent," said Marie. " I suppose you mean to lend Madame the money," corrected Charlotte. SEVEN YEARS. 273 "You may call that lending," said Marie strongly, " I do not." " I do," said Charlotte, " Madame Avould scorn it otherwise." " I am past scorning," said Madame la Roche, with a resignation not free from bitter- ness ; " the hand of God is on me, and I yield to what I cannot prevent; I submit to hu- miliations I have no right and no power to reject." Fanny was moved to the very heart. ' " Dear Madame," said she, going up to her former protectress, and taking her hands as she sat down at her feet ; '' dear Madame, all is not over : if Monsieur Noiret has been so kind as to lend you that money, cannot I work and pay it back?" " Fudge," said Marie, '' you cannot." This was but too true. Fanny felt the sting and started, and vainly tried to look brave. " I know what Fanny can do," mildly said Charlotte ; " she can give Monsieur Noiret his answer, and not have him coming here any more and insulting Madame." Fanny turned very pale : it seemed as if a net were drawing round her, and tightening her on every side. VOL. U. 18 274 SEVEN YEARS. Madame la Roche looked up, and said with some dio:nitv : " Charlotte and Marie, we will have no more of this. Monsieur Noiret lent me that money of his own accord : I beg that he may come here or not, at his pleasure, and that you will not tease or torment Fannv. She has said she would not marry him : that is enough." "Did you tell him so, Madame?" asked Fanny, brightening with sudden hope. " No, my dear," hesitatingly replied Madame la Roche, " I have not told him so, but he has given me to understand that he would like to come and see me now and then ; I have no doubt you will have more than one opportunity of letting him see and feel your meaning." The head of Fanny sank despondently on her bosom, she clasped her hands with a troubled look, that did not escape Marie or Charlotte : the poor girl was beginning to hesitate, but she struggled against her own weakness, and saying with assumed calmness : " 1 shall never be Monsieur Noiret's wife," she rose and prepared the evening meal. Monsieur Noiret's plans were carefully laid : he had calculated his chances well. He would SEVE?^ YEARS. 275 not tease or torment Fanny, but he would not let her forget him either. To be an invisible benefactor, dropping a quarter's rent, and then vanishing conveniently, until he could again be useful, by no means formed part of Mon- sieur Noiret's schemes. He came that evening, and spent a quiet hour with Madame la Roche. He scarcely looked at Fanny, who took care to keep apart. When he spoke to her, his manner was not that of an accepted or of a rejected lover. It was both cool and calm, and gave her no right to complain or show mistrust. At nine he rose and took his leave. " Good evening, my dear Madame," saidhe^ kissing the hand of Madame la Roche, " I shall soon call again. Good evening, Charlotte. Good evening, Marie, we are old friends, eh ! Good night, little Fanny. I shall soon call again." The door had scarcely closed upon him, and Fanny had scarcely breathed, relieved at his departure, when Charlotte said thought- fully : " A fine old gentleman !" "Old!" echoed Marie, "Monsieur Noiret is quite a young man." 276 SEVEN YEARS. " Ay, ay," smiled Charlotte, " he is an old friend of yours." " I cannot allow this," said Madame la Roche, distractedly, " I really cannot. If you must needs quarrel about something, pray look out for another bone besides Monsieur Noiret, to whom we are so much indebted." " Madame has already spoken of my biting and snarling," said Marie, looking injured, "but now she calls me a dog in plain speech. I will bear much, but not this, and I will starve." " Supper is ready," drily said Fanny. And Marie forgot her resolve to starve, and sat down to her evening meal just as usual. Fannv alone did not eat. She said she was not hungry, and she spoke the truth. It had been her task to let Monsieur Noiret out that evening, and as he turned round and bade her a last jxood nii^rht, he had cjiven her a smile and a look Fanny coidd not mistake. " God help me," she thought ; " we are fall- ing into that man's power, and I am the price he wants. God help me." SEVEN YEARS. 277 CHAPTER XXY. Monsieur Noiret came often ; he soon came every evening. No more was said about his visits in the little family. Madame la Roche did not mention the subject to Fanny, nor did Fanny broach it with her. Even Charlotte and Marie proved studiously discreet, and did not tread on forbidden ground. The visits of Monsieur Noiret did not add, however, to the common prosperity. Charlotte and Marie could find nothing to do, and what were Madame la Roche's four hundred francs a year, and Fanny's daily earnings, to support a family with ? Not half enough ! The young girl's health and spirits sank under the pressure of so many cares and so much trouble. Madame la Roche reverted uneasily to her altered looks, but Monsieur Noiret gallantly declared that Fanny looked as pretty as ever. Beyond this polite speech he did nothing to lighten her anxiety. His con- tinued presence only irritated the young girl, 278 SEVEN YEARS. and at length, unable to bear any longer the suspense in which it kept her, she one day asked Madame la Roche if she had given Monsieur Noiret her answer. "My dear/' hesitatingly said Madame la Roche, "Monsieur Noiret told me he was not in a hurry, so what could I do?" "Then perhaps he comes here on my account," said Fannv, moodilv. " Mv dear, we cannot tell him not to come," uneasily replied Madame la Roche. " I hope you will do nothing indiscreet, he is oiu* only friend now." "I shall say and do nothing, Madame," resignedly replied Panny. "This is your house, not mine." " And how much money have you got now, child?" hesitatingly asked Madame la Roche. " I have none," answered Fanny ; " Madame des Granges said to-day she would pay it all in a lump." "Dear me!" said Madame la Roche, look- ing startled, " that is not convenient for us, is it?" " No, Madame, it is not." " I have not a franc left ; how shall we manage?" SEVEN YEARS. 279 " We must try and get credit," said Fanny, making a strong effort. " I ^TOnder if Monsieur Noiret would lend me any more money?" doubtfully observed Madame la Roche. Fanny did not reply. What right had she to say, " you must not borroAV from him ? " None. She submitted, but with a heart heavy with forebodings. Monsieur Noiret came in the evening. What passed between him and Madame la Roche Fanny only knew the next morning, when that lady put a gold piece in her hand, and said sadly : " My dear, make this go as far as you can ; it is all I shall ever get, for it is all I shall ever ask for from that quarter." '' Twenty francs," thought Fanny, " and we are four without the child ! " Careful as she was, she could not make the money last more than a few days ; her own money, though it had reached the lump stage, did not make an amount sufficient to satisfy the lady who employed her, — for being one of those kind persons who like to manage the affairs of the poor, she patted Fanny's cheek, and told her benevolently that she 280 SEVEN YEARS. was saving it up for her, lest she should spend it in frivolities. " Well, but you are not going to stand that, are vou?" asked Marie of Fanny, one evening. " It is hard," replied the young girl, " but 1 am afraid of losing the custom." " Custom, indeed, a pretty custom I You will never do in the world, child." Fanny did not answer, and Marie took a resolve, on which she forthwith acted, without thinking it necessary to apprize Fanny of her intention. Under pretence of calhng on an old friend she went out, and proceeded at once to the house of Madame des Granges, who so kindly kept Fanny's money in a lump for her. Madame des Granges rented a very hand- some apartment in a stylish house ; she kept a footman, who was cook as well, and maid- of-all-work ; and a ladv's-maid, who dressed graiully, and was suspected to be a govern- ess on the sly to the five young Des Granges. It was this ])otentate who re- ceived Marie, and recognising her for having seen her once or twice with Fannv, she graciously asked what she wanted. SEVEN YEARS. 281 " Only to say a few words to Madame," replied Marie, Avitli a prim smile. The lady's-maid feared her mistress was not visible, but would inquire. She vanished behind a damask hanging, and presently re- turned, requesting Marie to follow her in to Madame's bed-room. Madame was dressing, and her maid re- mained in the room to assist in her toilet. In a gracious voice Madame des Granges, nodding at Marie, said amiably: " My good woman, what do you want with me at this hour ? " Some people like being called good ; others have an objection to it. To the latter class Marie belonged. '' She might be a good woman, or she might not, but what was that to Madame des Granges, or any other Madame ? Nothing, that she knew of." Bristling up, therefore, w^ith a sense of injured dignity, yet smiling a grim smile that vainly tried to be sweet, Marie replied : " I beg pardon for disturbing Madame at this liour ; but I believe Madame has been so kind to my Fanny as to keep her money in a lump for her." " Yes," replied Madame des Granges, 282 SEVEN YEARS. with an approving look, " I always do. Young people in that class of life are so improvident : they spend their money in such trifling, foolish things, that on princii)le I keep it up for them. You may, therefore, set your mind at ease, my good woman ; Avhat Panny has said to you is quite correct. I keep her money in a lump for her." . " Very kind of Madame," said Marie, " but if Madame would not mind giving me Fanny's money, I could put it out at inter- est," — this was a gratuitous fib, but Marie was not scrupulous, — " at a good interest, I mean. It is Fanny's own wish, — only the silly thing did not like mentioning it to Madame,-^as if it could make anv difference to Madame whether the money was in her drawer or in a bank." This was most provoking, and Madame des Granges was fairly exasperated ; for this kind lady had the habit of making lumps of all the money she could decently keep from trades-people and servants. The maid who was fasten! ns; her flounced silk dress knew the meaning of the word ' lump ; ' the man-seiTant, who was then listening behind the door, knew it; every SEVEN YEARS. 283 one knew it who had anything to do with Madame des Granges, and that she should be compelled to refund a ' lump/ howso- ever insignificant, was so dangerous a pre- cedent, that she could not contemplate it without alarm and displeasure. " I am very much sui'prised," she said, drawing herself up with great majesty; "I am surprised, indeed, at so strange a pro- ceeding; but ingratitude is the common reward of benevolence like mine. You will give Fanny this amount," she added, putting- do^vn on the table four five-franc pieces, " and you will inform her that I dispense^ with her services henceforth." Marie took the money, curtsied, and feeling, as she afterwards said, that it was all done for, she thought she might as well have her revenge. Politely, therefore, but with a stinging politeness, she said : " I am sorry it inconvenienced Madame to let me have that money ; if Fanny and I had known it, we would willingly have given Madame more time." " Show the woman out," loftily said Ma- dame des Granges. " Ah ! she will not call me a good woman 284 SEVEN YEARS. now," thought Marie, exulting in her success. And being one of those happy persons with whom the gratification of temper is para- mount, Marie left the house neither disheart- ened nor disconcerted by the remembrance that through her kind exertions Fanny had lost a customer. " Nothing like sticking up for one's owti, child," soliloquized Marie, addressing an ima- ginary Fanny as she went home. " Let your- self be trod on, and you will be trod on ; stick up for your rights, and you will be respected." In this triumphant and congratulatory frame of mind Marie went home. SEVEN YEARS. 285 CHAPTER XXVI. Madame la Roche was talking with Mon- sieur Noiret ; Fanny was preparing the sober supper, of which the family partook every evening ; and Charles, tired with play, was sleeping in Charlotte's arms, when Marie made her appearance. With that want of all cere- mony which had ever characterized her, Marie, spite the presence of Monsieur Noiret, at once informed every one present of what had oc- curred ; but she did so in her own fashion. " There, child," said she, throwing down the money on the table, " there is your money. My opinion is, that without me you might have done long enough without it." The plate Fanny held nearly dropped from her hand. " You have been to Madame des Granges ? " she said, looking frightened. " Yes, child ; and trouble enough I had in getting these few silver pieces from her. I 286 SEVEN YEARS. would be aslianied to be a lady and not be able to pay for the work I got done." " I hope there is no mischief done," un- easily said Fanny. " Mischief, my dear ! " put in Charlotte, " I can tell you what mischief there is, — you had better never go near Madame des Granges again." " That is not it, surely ! " said Fanny, giving Marie an uneasy look. Marie put a brave face on the matter. " Of course it is," stoutly replied Marie ; " you would not go to a woman that does not want to pay you, would you ? No. Besides, 6ven if you did, my dear, it would be of no use. Madame des Granges is deep : seeing me deteniiined, she thought it best to draw in her horns, and she accordingly muttered some- thing about having no more work for you, with which we parted." Fanny forgot the presence of Monsieur Noi- ret : she only felt the calamity. She sank down on a chair, and clasped her hands, ex- claiming : " God forgive you, and help us, ^larie. She was my last customer." SEVEN YEARS. 287 " Some people mar where they meddle," be- gmi Charlotte. Madame la Roche extended her pale thin hand. " Hush," she said gently ; but in a voice of command, and with the self-possession which good breeding imparts, she resumed her con- versation with Monsieur Noiret, who had looked on keenly though silently, whilst Fanny returned to her preparations, and Marie and Charlotte were sulkily silent. Monsieur Noi- ret soon rose, and looking hard at Fanny, he said quietly : "I am sorry for what has occurred. I am acquainted with few ladies, and I cannot give another customer instead of the lost one ; but Fanny knows there is an easy remedy for all this uneasiness." The lips of Fanny opened to give Monsieur Noiret his answer once for all, but she met the startled look of Madame la Roche, and check- ing herself, she merely bent her head as much as to say, " I know it." " Oh 1 you will think it over," said Mon- sieur Noiret in his cheerful voice ; " that is all I wish for, mv dear, — all I wish for. Good 288 SEVEN YEARS. evening, ladies, good evening." And with a graceful wave of his hand he left them. The supper was silent. Fanny was pale as death ; Madame la Roche, guessing what passed in the young girl's mind, looked at her pitifully ; Charlotte and Marie seemed agreed on a silent truce. Perhaps they, too, were meditating on Monsieur Noiret's last words, on Fanny's looks, and speculating on the pro- bable issue of both. We have said that Fanny slept in a sort of closet, which was barely large enough to hold her bed. She always w^as the last up, and on this evening she stayed later up than usual. At length, however, she lay down and prepared for a sleepless night. She had not been long in bed, when, wrapped in a shawl and holding a candle, Madame la Roche appeared by her bed-side. Fanny sat up startled, and was going to ask what ailed her, or what had happened, when the lady signed her to be silent and lie down. " My dear," she softly said, bending over her, " do not fret, do not trouble ; do not think of what Monsieur Noiret said, and do not mind either Charlotte or Marie, if thev SEVEN YEARS. 289 urge YOU. They mean well, but they think all the happmess of life is in money : they know nothing about it, and do not mind them. All will be well yet : I have a plan I will talk of with you to-morrow, and now good night, and sleep." She kissed her, and withdrew softly, without having allowed the young girl to utter a word. Fanny Avondered at first what Madame la Roche's projects could be, then soothed, spite of herself, by a vague hope, she sighed with relief, and closing her eyes soon slept soundly. At breakfast the next morning Madame la Roche unfolded her plans ; smiling, with a content to which her mild but sad face had long been a stranger, she said cheerfully : " I wonder I never thought of it before ; but I have often heard that good ideas are slow to come. It is singular, I do not see why it should be so. Well, this is what I have thought of," she added, displaying a little painted fan on the table. "You know how much my fan has been admired. The people of the shop who mounted it declared it was a beautiful work of art, and that they would willingly give twenty francs for one like it. Now you know, Fanny, my dear, that I VOL. I. 19 290 SEVEN YEARS. painted it in three mornings. Twenty francs in three mornings ! why, that makes forty francs a week, and one hundred and sixty francs a month ! Besides that, Fannv can learn, and paint fans too, in a very short time. Now, my dear child, do not look so startled. It is not difficult. This is how it is done. I have a set of pieces of card-board, you know, with the flowers, birds, and buttei-flies all perforated. Where I find a vacant place I put a colour, then I finish off", and I have produced a rose, a pink, or a bird, as the case may be. A circle does for the rose, a triangle for the pink, an oval for the bird. I add the head and tail aftenvards ; the head at one end and the tail at the other, of course. Our master at school used to call this geometrical drawing, and really the effect is very pretty ; then the grouping is all mv own, to be sure." And with innocent vanity Madame la Roche opened the fim, which, thanks to its bright colours, plenty of gilding, and the grouping, really looked very pretty. " If I had all the fans I have painted and given away," sighed Madame la Roche, " I should have quite a fortune by this. Well, well, I gave them freely, and it is wrong to grudge a gift." SEVEN YEARS. 291 Marie and Charlotte had too long looked on their mistress as on a superior fairy, gifted with every accomplishment, to doubt the beauty of the fans and consequently their success. Fanny was not quite so confident or so sanguine ; but she too, from her child- hood upwards, had learned to respect the artistic talents of her protectress, and though she timidly objected that perhaps so many fans as Madame la Roche could paint might not be saleable, the fans themselves found in her a ready and devout believer. Madame la Roche felt no sort of doubt on the subject. Inexperience of life and its trials supplied in her the hopefulness of youth, and produced results apparently similar. Confident of suc- cess, she talked and laughed with unusual liveliness, and as soon as the meal was over, she went out with the fan in her pocket, and Charles by the hand. "It is a fine thing Madame has thought of," observed Marie, as she was making the beds : "it will be the making of Monsieur Charles, pretty dear." "I did not think Madame was going to paint fans in her old age, nor that the child 292 SEVEN YEARS. of my dear foster- daughter was to rely on fans for a fortune/' replied Charlotte. " It is Avell people have not the evil eye, as well as an evil tongue," angrily exclaimed Marie, throwing a counterpane on the bed wdth a revengeful air, '' else Heaven have mercy on us. We should be in a pretty state." " The belief in the evil eye is an ancient superstition," placidly answered Charlotte. " I have heard of remote provinces and of aged people who still cherish it." This was one of the speeches that usually exasperated Marie, and which, by urging her to make some bitter and vehement reply, in- variably led to a dire quarrel. And a severe encounter no doubt took place, but Eanny heard no more, for she went out on a domestic errand, and remained some time awav. When she came back Madame la Roche had returned, and was sitting in her arm-chair by the fire-side. A look at her face told Tannv what the fate of Madame la Roche's errand had been. Pale and sad she sat, her hands folded on her knees, her look listlessly fastened on the child play- ing on the nig as gaily as if his futiu'c were SEVEN YEARS. 293 couleur de rose. Marie and Charlotte sat a little apart, one sewing, the other doing no- thing, and both gloomy. " Well, my dear," said Madame la Roche, speaking with an effort, '' I have received another strange proof of the insincerity of the world. AVhen I was a rich lady, and got fans mounted, I painted beautifully ; now that I am a poor woman and want to earn my bread, my painting is all trash. Yes, my dear, that same fan which they praised so much formerly is trash now." "Dear Madame, do not mind them," said Fanny, much moved. " My dear child, I should not care if it were not that we are as we are, so miserably poor." She sighed, and closing her eyes sank back in her chair with an air of weariness. " Some one else may like the fans," timidly suggested Fanny. But if inexperience sometimes gives the sanguine hopes of youth to age, it never bestows the wonderful elasticity of that happy time of life to declining years. Madame la Roche's dreams had been rudely dispelled j they could not know a second birth. 294 SEVEN YEARS. " No, child," she said, sighing, " I perceive I have been deceived. It does not matter much, so far as I am concerned : I thought my fan pretty and valuable, and it is worthless ; no, it does not matter about mv little amour- propre ; but why cheat myself willingly ? I will not ; indeed, I could not." "Bonne maman," said Charles, "you pro- mised me a gim, where is it ? " Madame la Roche took up the child on her knees, and kissed him silentlv. " Child," she said, " I w^as glad when you were born, and when your poor mother died it seemed a comfort to have vou left : but now I think that if you were in your little grave I should not fret or crv much. I should think, God has taken him away to spare him a world of trouble and care." The round face of Charles lengthened, and his bright eyes grew fixed as he heard this. Charlotte threw her handkerchief on her face and sobbed from behind it, and Marie, looking at Fanny, said moodily : " Well, Fanny, if I had in my power what vou have in vours, matters should not be as Ihey are." Before Fannv could reply, ^ladame la Roche SEVEN YEARS. 295 looked up and said gravely, " I beg, Marie, and once for all, that Fanny may never be urged on that subject again." " Ay," thought Fanny, pressing her hand to her aching forehead, '' it all lies with me ! I can make them happy with a word, and it seems so easy." But no more was said on the subject. Ma- dame la Roche tried to rally, and succeeded indifferently ; Charles resumed his gambols ; Marie and Charlotte picked up a quarrel about nothing, and Fanny was left to her own thoughts. The day seemed dull and heavy ; evening brought Monsieur Noiret with his brisk cheerfulness ; if he noticed the gloom cast on the little family he took care to seem unconscious of it, and was as polite and gal- lant as if addressing a circle of smiling faces. Similar to this were the next day and the next evening. On the third morning Fanny rose pale as death. " Something ails her," said Marie to Char- lotte. "She looks like Monica on the day she went to America," sententiously replied Char- lotte. " Now, Monica, I said, mhid what you are about. It is all very well to go to 296 SEVEN YEARS. America, but to come back is another thing." "What has America to do with Fanny *s white face?" impatiently asked Marie. "She is not a map, is she ? " " Perhaps you think she is," rephed Char- lotte, coolly. " I like the girl too much to find any likeness." " A saint coidd not stand that," wrathfully began Marie. " Peace, peace," said Madame la Roche, ap- pearing ; *' I will have quietness ; Fanny, my dear, what ails you ? " " Nothing, Madame," replied Fanny, with a cold abstracted manner. "Are you going out?" asked jNIadame la Roche, seeing that she put on her shawl. Fanny said she was. " And where are you going ? " " I want air," evasively said Fanny. Ma- dame la Roche gave her a compassionate look^ and went back to her room. Marie and Char- lotte exchanged furtive glances, but did not utter a word till the door had closed on Fanny. " She has made up her mind, then," said jMarie, whom a natm'al infirmitv rarclv allowed SEVEN YEARS. 297 to keep her inind to herself; "she is as white as paper." " Paper is not always white," replied Char- lotte ; " there is brown paper and blue paper." " I never heard anything like it," exclaim- ed Marie, exasperated ; "I tell you what, Charlotte, the same house cannot hold us long. It cannot." *' It need not," placidly said Charlotte ; " when Fanny is Madame Noiret, I shall of course go and live with my god-daughter. Summer is coming on, and I shall enjoy country air." To this taunt, for a taunt it was, Marie having often declared that she would live with Fanny in the event of her marriage, the owner of the Norman cap now only replied with an attempt to w^histle, and an emphatic bah ! 298 SEVf:N YEARS. CHAPTER XXVII. At twelve Charlotte discovered that she wanted to go out ; and at one Marie made a similar discovery. Madame la Roche saw them depart with apathetic listlessness, and only asked if they would not take out Charles. " I am going to the Faubourg St Germain," said Charlotte, " it is too far." Marie was going to the Rue St Honor^, and though that happened to be the opposite direction, it was also too far for the child to accompany her. " Oh ! very well," listlessly said Madame la Roche, and she resumed her sad contemplation of the decaying embers on the hearth, for spring time though it w^as, the morning was chill. Marie was going to the Rue St Honor^, but unaccountably her steps took another direction, and before half an hour was over she crossed the threshold of ^lonsieur Noiret's house, and was admitted by Monsieur Noiret's servant into that gentleman's sitting-room. SEVEN YEARS. 299 " Ell ! my old friend Marie," he said jocularly ; " well, what news, Marie ? " " Good news, sir," knowingly said Marie. " Good news." Monsieur Noiret had passed the age when the heart beats and the cheek flushes ; but a sparkle of triumph, nevertheless, lit his brown eye ; and a slow smile, a genuine smile, dis- played his shining teeth. "Good news!" he repeated; "sit down, Marie, and tell me those good news." " Fanny has made up her mind." "About what?" placidly asked Monsieur Noiret. " Monsieur knows." " I shall know when you tell me, Marie." " Monsieur knows," repeated Marie, who was of a stubborn turn. " I came to tell Monsieur, and also to warn Monsieur about Charlotte. It does not become me to speak ill of an old fellow-servant to whom I am at- tached, and for whom I would work my poor bones bare ; but all I say is this, if Monsieur Noiret takes Charlotte in his house he will repent it as long as he lives." " Not exactly," said Monsieur Noiret, smil- ing, " not exactly. I never repent anything 300 SEVEN YEARS. more than a day ; for when what I have done does not suit me," continued Monsieur Noiret, " I undo it." Marie was rather disconcerted, and coughed from behind her hand ; but she soon ralhed and observed : *' I can assure Monsieur that Charlotte does not think of that, and that she contem- plates spending her life with Monsieur." " Very curious," said .Monsieur Noiret, smiling ; " Charlotte has not been gone five minutes, and she averred the same thing of you." The eyes of Marie shot fire. " Oh ! if Charlotte has been here," she said, *' I can imagine what she has been saying of me. " Very kind things," rephed Monsieur Noiret ; "in short, much al)out what vou have been savins; of her." This did not seem to soothe Marie nmch ; for she observed, with considerable asperity : " Then I suppose it is all settled, and that she is to come here. All I can say is. Monsieur will repent it." "Dear me, this is very singular," said Monsieur Noiret ; " something has happened SEVEI^ YEARS. 301 that requires me to be favoured with your presence, or with that of Charlotte, but I can- not possibly learn what it is from either one or the other." " Did not Charlotte tell Monsieur ? " asked Marie, blight ening. "Not more than you have done," replied Monsieur Noiret ; "I am supposed to be a sphinx, and to guess riddles." " Dear me, to think of it. Well, then, since Monsieur wishes to know the truth, I must tell it in plain words. Fanny has made up her mind." " To what ? " said Monsieur Noiret. "To become Monsieur's wife, I suppose," said Marie, curtseying. " Hem ! " said Monsieur Noiret, giving her a keen look, " did Fanny say so ? " " Young girls never say so," sharply replied Marie. " Oh, yes they do — sometimes," replied Monsieur Noiret, "and I have no doubt that if Fanny has made up her mind she will say so. In the mean while, my dear creature, and until the little thing has fairly spoken, we will consider that nothing, actually nothing, has happened." 302 SEVEN YEARS. "But Fanny has made up her mind," ob- stinately said Marie. " Very well," placidly replied Monsieur Noiret. " I shall sav a few words to her to- night ; and to-morrow or after to-morrow," he graciously added, " we can discuss those other matters that brought you and Charlotte here to-day." This w^as a polite dismissal : Marie curtsied again, and left in a suspicious mood, convinced that Charlotte had forestalled her, and any- thing but pleased with the success of her errand. And yet in one respect Marie was right enough. Fanny's mind was made up, and when she left the house that morning she seemed to be treading upon air. Light and swift as a vision she passed through streets, and went up and down lanes and alleys, seeing nothing, feeling nothing, — absorbed in one thought that effaced every other. At length she stopped before the shop of Baptiste, and pushing the door open she entered. Baptiste was alone, making up an account. He looked up Avith the slowness habitual to him, and saw Fanny standing before him look- ing at him with sad eyes, and pale as death. SEVEN YEARS. 303 Strong man as he was, Baptiste shook and grew white. For a while he could not move, but sat and looked amazed at this pale vision. It may be that Fanny misunderstood his silence, for, raising her hand with a deprecating gesture, she said meekly : " Baptiste, am I welcome ? " " You ask it ! " broke from Baptiste' s full heart, " you ask if you are welcome, Fanny ! " and rising he went towards her. Fanny sat doAvn on a chair, and hid her burning face in her hands. Baptiste thought she was crying, and that something dreadful happened. " What is it? " he cried ; " nothing to you, surely," he added, eyeing her uneasily, as if, even though he saw her before him, he scarcely thought her safe ; " what is it, Fanny ? " " Nothing," she answered, looking up, and uncovering her red face, " nothing, only Avhat do you think of my coming to you, Baptiste ? " " That you are in trouble," he simply re- plied, " and that you want me." " Yes, that is it," said Fanny, with a touch of bitterness ; " if I did not want you I should not be here, and you know it. Well, Baptiste, I do not care what you think ; you are the 304 SEVEN YEARS. only friend I have left, and T come to you. Help me to bear up, or I shall sink. Tell me you are fond of me, spite of all that has passed, or I shall get reckless and do something de- sperate that shall end it all." Baptiste took both her hands in his, and clasped them with tender firmness. " Fanny, my little Fanny," he said, '' what is it ? Tell me all, tell me everything." "They want me to marry old ^Monsieur Noiret," said Fanny, hanging down her head, " and I will not — I cannot." Baptiste set his teeth. " Marry that old man ! " he said, " many any man — not whilst I am alive, Fanny. You are my wife, or as good as my Avife, and all the mischief is that you will not be my wife out- right." '' I cannot — I cannot," cried Fanny, desper- ately. " Oh ! if I but could, Baptiste, what a world of care it would spare me. But 1 cannot. They want me too much, and I like vou too well to cast that burden on vou. But I wish that old man would not come, and 1 wish they would not sigh and look as they do. I know the poverty and the Avant of our wretched home, and mv heart feels readv to SEVEN YEARS. 305 break. That is why I came to you. I have no one else to fly to for strength and succour, and if I stay alone I am undone — I am un- done." " I am a wretch to have forsaken you, my poor little darling," said Baptiste, with tears in his eyes, " but do not fret, my heart, my trea- sure ; say nothing Avhen you go home. Let them sigh, let them look as long as they like. I shall drop in this evening as if nothing had happened ; and when that old gentleman sees me," added Baptiste, grimly, " I am very much mistaken if he does not drop off", eh ! " Fanny laughed through her tears : trust and comfort came to her with Baptiste' s hon- est voice and look. " With that good friend," she thought, " surely all will be well yet." And full of faith and hope she gave Bap- tiste her hand, and smiled brightly as she said : " What possessed me, Baptiste, ever to let you leave me ? I ought to have known that I could not do without you. Ought I not ? " Baptiste's eyes sparkled. " I do think vou are fond of me," he said. " I have often thought you were not ; but VOL. I. 20 306 SEVEN YEARS. since we parted I thought over many things, and I felt it in my heart : Fanny hkes me." *' Conceit, mere conceit," said Fanny. '' I want you just now to send off Monsieur Xoiret, that is all. And so good bye." She nodded, and was gone. " She may say w^hat she likes," thought Baptiste, " that girl is fond of me." Fanny let him rejoice in the triumphant conviction, and went home. Of what had happened she said nothing : she had always been able to keep her own counsel, and she thought it w^ould be time enough to speak when Baptiste showed himself. Fanny, indeed, might have been more open had she suspected the mistake under which her friends laboured, but she did not, and she helped to deceive them in perfect good faith. " My dear, you look feverish," said Madame la Roche, anxiously. " I do not know when 1 have seen you with such a colour." Fanny blushed, and said something about a headache, which was not, we fear, quite cor- rect. Marie spoke next. " Girls are so," she said, " thev cannot be like other people : they uuist colour and look SEVEN YEARS. 307 foolLsli, one never knows why. What is there in marriage that upset them so ? They are all mad to be married, and yet when it comes to the point, they are as fantastical as prin- cesses." Fanny looked and felt puzzled ; there seem- ed something in this speech that applied to her, but more that did not. She thought it most prudent not to reply. " Girls are not always so anxious to get married," said Charlotte, who could not lose the opportunity of contradiction ; "it depends on the advice they get, and if Monica had not been ill advised I will not believe that she would even have gone off to America." " Fanny," said Madame la Roche, wishing to know more, and to put an end to the con- test, "you were a long time out: where have you been ? " Fanny reddened more than ever, and remained mute. " Never mind, dear, never mind," quickly said Madame la Roche, unwilling to distress her, " all in good time, I have no doubt." Fanny thought so too, and did not speak. Charlotte and Marie exchanged significant looks : evidently Fanny had had a private con- versation with Monsieur Noiret. It was 308 SEVEN YEARS. strange that she had not seen him at home in their presence, but Fanny was a fanciful girl, and liked to do things her own way. Madame la Roche came to the same con- clusions ; with mingled surj)rise and relief she saw that Fanny seemed very happy ; there was a ready smile on her lips and a light in her eyes to which both had long been a stranger : "I suppose it is having made her mind up," thought Madame la Roche ; "I always feel much lighter when I have made my mind up. Poor Baptiste ! T wonder how he will bear it." In this discreet silence on both sides the day passed : Fanny thinking herself suspected, Madame la Roche, Charlotte, and ]\larie con- cluding all was right : none on either side holding it necessary to speak. Unsuspicious of the approaching stonn, Madame la Roche dropped asleep after dinner. It was early yet, when a ring was heard at the door. Fanny started up joyous but a little flurried. She knew Bnptiste's ring, and open- ed with a trembling hand, yet with a happy smile, that faded awav on beholdinc: Monsieur Noiret. He did not apjiear to heed or see her blank SEVEN YEARS. 309 looks. He entered gay, smiling, cheerfnl ; he directed his most amiable bow and greeting to Madame la Roche, and as he sat down by her side, he nodded to Charlotte and Marie, and looked hard at Fanny. Her countenance re- vealed none of the signs Monsieur Noiret had been led to expect. Uneasy and disturbed at his visit, she sheltered her face behind Charles's curly head, and looked with the child at a book on her lap. " Charles is learning how to read," said Monsieur Noiret. " I know all my letters ! " cried Charles, proudly. " No wonder, with such a teacher ! " re- sumed Monsieur Noiret, still looking hard at Fanny. She felt the child w^as but a means of drawing attention to her, so she quietly put him away, and rose apparently to take some work in hand. Marie, who was burning to bring matters to a crisis, hastened to observe in an under voice : " The most industrious girl." " A treasure to a husband ! " put in Char- lotte. Monsieur Noiret smiled, and Fanny, red as 312 SEVEN YEARS. Noiret, Baptiste looked around him. Not one face, not even Eanny's, bade him welcome. The yomig girl was shocked and frightened at Monsieur Noiret's words. Madame la Roche looked as if she had gazed on Medusa's face ; and Charlotte and Marie were fairlv boilinjj over with wrath at an intrusion which, in their opinion, ruined everything. It was lucky for Baptiste that he was of a phlegmatic temper, else he might have been disconcerted at so strange a reception ; as it was, he looked calmly around him, and seeing that Fanny was only startled, he troubled him- self but little Avith the rest. Madame la Roche was the first to speak. She clasped her hands and wrung them. " T owe Monsieur Noiret a hundred francs," she moaned, " and he looked as I never saw him look before." She spoke half wildly, and for a moment she was certainly unconscious of Baptiste's presence. " A hundred francs," he said, quietly. " I beg Madame's pardon for meddling in what concerns me not, but T can let Madame have two hundred francs, before to-morrow morn- mo' SEVEN YEARS. 313 " You, Baptiste," said Madame la Roclie, opening her eyes and shaking lier head sadly, " and what should I take your money for? " " Ay," put in Marie with much energy, '' what should Madame take your money for ? " Baptiste neither looked at nor answered the last speaker. He fastened his clear blue eyes on Madame la Roche, and said with respectful firmness : " Madame has reared Fanny, who is all but my wife ; all I have is hers, and all she has is Madame's. I have a little money just now, and it is heartily at Madame's disposal." " Strange presumption ! " meditatively said Charlotte, commenting upon it. But Madame la Roche's eyes grew dim. " It is God's will ! " she sighed, '' ay, verily it is God's will that I should be humbled, that my old age should be a bm-den on their youth. Come here, Baptiste, here by me. I see Fanny and you are reconciled : well, I am glad, Baptiste, I am, and I will not stand any more between you — you must marry." Fanny looked frightened, and Charlotte and Marie uttered exclamations, but Madame la 316 SEVEN YEARS, " Has Madame reflected ? " she began. " I have," interrupted iVIadame la Roche, rather testily, " and I will not hear one word against it." Marie turned up her eyes and shook her head, but submitted for all that. Monsieur Noiret's money was paid the very next morning, and before he had even time to ask for it. Whether he still thought that an attempt to deceive him had been made, and had been defeated by chance alone, or whether he acquitted Madame la Roche and Fannv of the un worth v desio;n, was more than either knew. He came no more, and gave his resentment at what had occurred no active or outAvard shape. A heavy burden now fell on Baptiste. True, ]\Iarie found a little work to do, and Fanny w^as fortunate enough to secure per- manent employment ; but still the wants of the house were many, and Baptiste never waited to see them twice before tliev were supplied, and time, weary time, passed away, and he seemed no nearer an end he never forgot, though he never mentioned it. Sometimes, not often, for the indulgence SEVEN YEARS. 317 was perilous, Faimy looked at him wistfully, as much as to say : " When will it all end, Baptiste ? " And Baptiste by a shrewd nod seemed to answer : " All in good time, Fanny, all in good time." And thus four years passed away. 318 SEVEN YEARS. CHAPTEH XXYIII. The March sun shone brightly. The day was fine. Charles said and thought so. " Bonne maman says it will not rain," he said, stopping short before Fanny, who sat sewing, and he looked at her wistfully. Fanny sighed, but did not reply. " And this is a holiday," pursued Charles, who had grown up into a fine strong boy, and who was handsome too, and tolerably good. Fanny sighed again. " Poor child," she said, half aloud, " he wants a walk, and exercise would do him good." Charles had heard her ; he flung his arms around her neck. " Oh ! yes, Fanny, do, do ! " he exclaimed, " do take me out." But Fanny, who, though still very pretty, had grown very sober and very grave, shook her head with mild denial. " It is a holiday for you, but not for me," she said ; "you see yourself that I must sew." SEVEN YEARS. 319 " You could do it to-night," whispered Charles ; " I know you often sit up by the sly, burning candle ends — I see you." Fanny blushed. " I do not do it by the sly," she said, "but I make no noise, because I do not wish to waken them." "Yes, and you do not want Baptiste to know," suggested Charles, nodding. " Bap- tiste says it injures your eyes, and he does not like it. Baptiste is very fond of you." " Of course he is," said Fanny, quietly ; " have you only just found that out. Monsieur Charles ? " Monsieur Charles looked piqued, and said he had known it a long time. " Oh ! " said Fanny, slowly. " Yes," pursued Charles, " I have." " Baptiste told you, I suppose ? " " Oh ! no, he did not tell me." Fanny questioned no more, but Charles's wish of imparting information was too strong to be resisted, so he went on. " I know it, because the evening you were out late, Baptiste walked about the rooms, and struck his forehead, and said to bonne ma- man, ' I shall go mad if anything has happened 320 SEVEN YEARS. to that girl.' Charlotte and Marie said no- thing had happened to you, but he would not mind them, and he was not quiet till you came in." " And what did Baptiste say then ? " asked Fanny, to whom the circumstances, recalled by Charles, came back like a dream. " Say ! oh, he said nothing. And now, Panny, do take me out." " Go into the next room, and see if Char- lotte or Marie want anything," said Fanny. Charles obeyed all the more readily that, he concluded, this duty over, he and Fanny would take the walk he so longed for. Fannv was workino; in the front room, minding the dinner as well as her sewinor. In the second room were, as of old, the two beds of Charlotte and Marie, but alas ! these two beds were now never vacant. Charlotte was a paralytic ; she could not even sit up. A low fever had long been wasting Marie. Weary days and weary nights were now the lot of the two sufferers. Conversation, laments for youth and strength long gone, for old times and old happiness, mixed with an occasional tiff, by way of interlude, were now their chief solace. SEVEN YEARS. 321 " Ah ! Marie, times are changed since I entered the house of Madame la Roche," sighed Chariotte, whilst Fanny and Charies were talking in the next room. " I remember you well, when Mademoiselle Cecile, Heaven give her poor soul peace, was a baby in arms, and you were as fine a Norman girl as ever was seen." " I used to be called la belle Normande'' replied Marie, lifting her pale head, in which two sunken eyes shone with unnatural fire. " People knew me from my cap." '' It became you," munnured Charlotte ; " you looked well in that cap, Marie, remark- ably well." '' A rosy face and a pair of black eyes would have looked well under anything," sighed Marie ; " but I liked my cap, I confess I did. It reminded me of my native place, a pretty village, with the Seine flowing through, and a clean white church. Yes, Charlotte, I liked it, and when I took it ofi" the last time, and took to my bed, Charlotte, I felt it was all over with me, ay, all over." " Not all over," said Charlotte, " vou can stir, I cannot." VOL. I. ai 322 SEVEN YEARS. " Stir," moaned Marie, " stir ! would I could not — would I were in my grave, and not a burden on them all." " I do think it singular that you will per- sist in wishing to die," said Charlotte, with a touch of asperity ; " you know I have a positive presentiment that I shall not survive you, and to speak of your grave is just to wish me to be bm'ied." " I suppose I may wish my own death," said Marie, sharply ; "as to the death of other people, and as to their presentiments, pray what have I to do with them ? " "You have nothing to do with them," re- plied Charlotte, with some of her old provoking calmness: " You are a passive agent, a sign- post like, you do not know what you indicate, but others see and feel it." " A sign-post," said Marie, rallying a httle ; " a sign-post," she added, turning round, " ah ! well, times are changed indeed." It was at this critical moment that Charles opened the door, and putting in his fair cm-ly head, said glibly : " Fanny sends me to know if you want any- thing." SEVEN YEARS. 323 "Faiiny might come herself," said Marie, crossly ; " she might come and sit here with me, instead of leaving me to be insulted by her god-mother." Charles colom-ed up. He loved no one, not even his grandmother, as he loved Fanny, and to touch her was to rouse all his child- ish ire. " Fanny cannot be in two places at once," he said hotly, " and she cannot be here and mind the dinner in the next room." " I always thought that to have a god-child was better than having a child of one's own," sighed Charlotte, from her bed, " but it is not. My daughter left me to go off to America, and my god- daughter wdll not even sit in the room with me. Ah ! well, it is a weary world, a weary world." '* Then you want nothing ? " said Charles, looking sulky. " Nothing ! " almost screamed Charlotte, "nothing! did the child say nothing? Why am I not to eat and drink? — and have I had luncheon?" Marie only moaned and said, " She never got her drink nor anything." 320 SEVEN YEARS. to that girl.' Charlotte and Marie said no- thing had hai)pened to you, but he would not mind them, and he was not quiet till you came in." " And what did Baptiste say then ? " asked Eanny, to whom the circumstances, recalled by Charles, came back like a dream. " Say ! oh, he said nothing. And now, Fannv, do take me out." " Go into the next room, and see if Char- lotte or Marie want anything," said Fanny. Charles obeyed all the more readily that, he concluded, this dutv over, he and Fannv would take the walk he so longed for. Fannv was workino; in the front room, minding the dinner as well as her sewing. In the gecond room were, as of old, the two beds of Charlotte and ^larie, but alas ! these two beds were now never vacant. Charlotte was a paralytic ; she could not even sit up. A low fever had lone; been wasting; ]\Iaric. Weary days and weary nights were now the lot of the two sufferers. Conversation, laments for vouth and strcnojth loncj Cfone, for old times and old happiness, mixed with an occasional tiif, bv wav of interlude, were now their chief solace. SEVEN YEARS. 321 " All ! Marie, times are changed since I entered the house of Madame la Roche," sighed Charlotte, whilst Fanny and Charles were talking in the next room. " I remember you well, when Mademoiselle Cecile, Heaven give her poor soul peace, was a baby in arms, and you were as fine a Norman girl as ever was seen." " I used to be called la helle Normande,'' replied Marie, lifting her pale head, in which two sunken eyes shone with unnatural fire. " People kncAv me from my cap." " It became you," munuured Charlotte ; " you looked well in that cap, Marie, remark- ably well." " A rosy face and a pair of black eyes would have looked well under anything," sighed Marie ; " but I liked my cap, I confess I did. It reminded me of my native place, a pretty village, with the Seine flowing through, and a clean white church. Yes, Charlotte, I liked it, and when I took it off the last time, and took to my bed, Charlotte, I felt it was all over with me, ay, all over." " Not all over," said Charlotte, " you can stir, I cannot." VOL. I. 21 322 SEVEN YEARS. " Stir," moaned Marie, " stir ! would I could not — would I were in my grave, and not a burden on them all." *' I do think it singular that you ^vill per- sist in wishing to die," said Charlotte, with a touch of asperity ; " you know I have a positive presentiment that I shall not survive you, and to speak of your grave is just to wish me to be buried." " I suppose I may wish my own death," said Marie, sharply; "as to the death of other people, and as to their presentiments, pray what have I to do with them ? " " You have nothing to do with them," re- plied Charlotte, with some of her old provoking calmness. " You are a passive agent, a sign- post like, you do not know Avhat you indicate, but others see and feel it." " A sign-post," said Marie, rallying a little ; *' a sign-post," she added, turning round, " ah ! well, times are changed indeed." It was at this critical moment that Charles opened the door, and putting in his fair ciu'ly head, said glibly : " Panny sends me to know if you want any- thing." SEVEN YEARS. 323 "Fanny might come herself," said Marie, crossly ; " she might come and sit here with me, instead of leaving me to be insulted by her god-mother." Charles colom-ed up. He loved no one, not even his grandmother, as he loved Fanny, and to touch her was to rouse all his child- ish ire. " Fanny cannot be in two places at once," he said hotly, " and she cannot be here and mind the dinner in the next room." " I always thought that to have a god-child was better than having a child of one's own," sighed Charlotte, from her bed, " but it is not. My daughter left me to go off to America, and my god- daughter will not even sit in the room with me. Ah ! well, it is a weary world, a weary world." "Then you want nothing?" said Charles, looking sulky. " Nothing ! " almost screamed Charlotte, "nothing! did the child say nothing? Why am I not to eat and drink? — and have I had luncheon?" Marie only moaned and said, " She never got her drink nor anything." 324 SEVEN YEARS. Charles came back to Fanny with the in- formation that Charlotte was very cross and wanted her luncheon, and that Marie was verv cross and wanted her drink. " Well, Charles, do you think we can go out and take a walk, and leave these two poor helpless sufferers, who are cross only because they suffer, — do you think we can go out and take pleasure, and leave them alone?" Charles hung his head and did not reply. "And now go in to your grandmamma," said Fanny, "this is the time when she likes you to read to her." Charles looked very blank. "I do not like to read to bonne maman," he said, with more frankness than dutv, " it is tiresome." "Poor child, I dare say it is," ejaculated Fanny, " but, Charles, if you do not learn early to do what you do not like, you will find it a hard, very hard lesson when you are a man. And now go and be good. Your grand- mamma expects you." Charles obeyed, for under new, though tender, discipline, he had grown obedient, but SEVEN YEARS. 325 before going, he threw his arms arouiul Fanny's neck and said coaxingly : " You will ask Baptiste to buy me a dnmi, will you not?" "Why not ask him yourself?" said Fanny. " Because he does not mind me, but does whatever you ask him to do." Fanny could not help smiling, but she would promise nothing, and Charles, compelled to feed on hope, went to Madame la Roche's room. It was still a pretty, pleasant room, a little retired spot, which the cares and anxieties of the outer regions were not allowed to pene- trate. There was a kind and gentle conspiracy from Marie down to Charles, to keep Madame la Roche in ignorance of troubles, which she would have felt too keenly, considering her utter want of power to suggest even a remedy for them. The caution was not superfluous : Madame la Roche had grown so weak during the last three years, that she seldom left the house. To sit by her window, in her arm- chair, to enjoy sunshine in fair weather, a bright fire in cold and frost, and to do nothing 326 SEVEN YEARS. f but linger on through Hfe, was now her lot. She bore this feebleness and decay with the gentleness and patience of her nature. She might even have been called cheerful, so calm was the look of her mild blue eyes, so sweet the smile that lingered on her pale lips. Her greatest, perhaps her only, pleasure was to watch Charles growing up a fine healthy child, with some generous qualities, and not more than childhood's usual amount of faults. She now saw him come in with a brighten- ing look and a ready smile. " Right, child," she said, " you did well to come, I felt dull, and I do, not to have you every day. I sup- pose he must go to school," added Madame la Roche, soliloquizing, " but yet one woidd like to have him, for the little one has to live." " Baptiste says I must know a great many things," said Charles, alarmed at a speech in which he saw intimations of being kept from school for the gratification of his grand- mamma. " Baptiste is an angel," sighed Madame la Roche. Charles looked incredulous. SEVEN TEARS. 327 " Angels have got wings/' he said, evidently holding the argument unanswerable. " You will know better when you are older," said Madame la Roche ; " and noAV read me something, child." " Shall I read you the story of Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp?" asked Charles, who was tired of the classical authors whom, to form his taste and improve his morals, Madame la Roche put into his hands. She seemed slightly surprised at the suggestion, but good- humouredly replied he might read what he pleased. So Charles perched himself upon a chair, and read how the tailor's son married the Sultan's daughter. Madame la Roche closed her eyes because it was unnecessary and painful to keep them open, and she kept them closed because she was soon fast asleep. But zealously, with unflagging zeal, Charles read on. He knew the tale by heart in all its windings ; no matter, it was a wonderful tale, and thrilled him • through and through for all that. And whilst the grandmother slept, and the happy child read, Fanny, after ministering to the wants of the two poor patients, after soothhig them down 328 SEVEN YEARS. with kind words and a kiss, was working hard and fast. " If I could only lighten the load off Baptiste," she thought. And Baptiste in his shop was working with equal ardour. "I know that girl sits up at night," he thought ; " if I could only make more money, and save her poor eyes, — my little darling, would I were a rich man for your sake !" Noble hearts, with whom love was not self- ish, with whom the performance of duty was not the cold absence of love. END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. JOHN CHILDS AND SON, PRINTERS. ■rffj, I. ,',«i.V/^. ..•{}th- t-j'/ lErrJwJaWmMmtiltSmt^^ 3 0112 047695066 •/i^v:*. h'h\'ifi}f.'fh • •• if.l. *■,;■■ ■■' - • ♦ < s ' ' 7--",-' V r. 'r. .• -' f. .'r '■ L^' ."/ f iS'' ^^^^ ^'^: •-:^'...''i/;k^ov:'i;'':. >r'(^ij.