“There they are still,” he said to himself, discontentedly. “Madame Danville in the same place on the seat; my master, the bridegroom, dutifully next to her; Mademoiselle Rose, the bride, bashfully next to him; Monsieur Trudaine, the amateur apothecary brother, affectionately next to her; and Monsieur Lomaque, our queer land-steward, officially in waiting on the whole party. There they all are indeed, incomprehensibly wasting their time still in looking at nothing! Yes,” continued Monsieur Justin, lifting his eyes wearily, and staring hard, first up the river at Rouen, then down the river at the setting sun; “yes, plague take them! looking at nothing, absolutely and positively at nothing, all this while.”
Here Monsieur Justin yawned again, and, returning to the garden, sat himself down in an arbor and resignedly went to sleep.
If the valet had ventured near the five persons whom he had been apostrophizing from a distance, and if he had been possessed of some little refinement of observation, he could hardly have failed to remark that the bride and bridegroom of the morrow, and their companions on either side, were all, in a greater or less degree, under the influence of some secret restraint, which affected their conversation, their gestures, and even the expression of their faces. Madame Danville–a handsome, richly-dressed old lady, with very bright eyes, and a quick, suspicious manner–looked composedly and happily enough, as long as her attention was fixed on her son. But when she turned from him toward the bride, a hardly perceptible uneasiness passed over her face–an uneasiness which only deepened to positive distrust and dissatisfaction whenever she looked toward Mademoiselle Trudaine’s brother. In the same way, her son, who was all smiles and happiness while he was speaking with his future wife, altered visibly in manner and look exactly as his mother altered, whenever the presence of Monsieur Trudaine specially impressed itself on his attention. Then, again, Lomaque, the land-steward–quiet, sharp, skinny Lomaque, with the submissive manner, and the red-rimmed eyes–never looked up at his master’s future brother-in-law without looking away again rather uneasily, and thoughtfully drilling holes in the grass with his long sharp-pointed cane. Even the bride herself–the pretty, innocent girl, with her childish shyness of manner–seemed to be affected like the others. Doubt, if not distress, overshadowed her face from time to time, and the hand which her lover held trembled a little, and grew restless, when she accidentally caught her brother’s eye.
Strangely enough there was nothing to repel, but, on the contrary, everything to attract in the look and manner of the person whose mere presence seemed to exercise such a curiously constraining influence over the wedding- party. Louis Trudaine was a remarkably handsome man. His expression was singularly kind and gentle; his manner irresistibly winning in its frank, manly firmness and composure. His words, when he occasionally spoke, seemed as unlikely to give offense as his looks; for he only opened his lips in courteous reply to questions directly addressed to him. Judging by a latent mournfulness in the tones of his voice, and by the sorrowful tenderness which clouded his kind, earnest eyes whenever they rested on his sister, his thoughts were certainly not of the happy or the hopeful kind. But he gave them no direct expression; he intruded his secret sadness, whatever it might be, on no one of his companions. Nevertheless, modest and self-restrained as he was, there was evidently some reproving or saddening influence in his presence which affected the spirits of every one near him, and darkened the eve of the wedding to bride and bridegroom alike.
As the sun slowly sank in the heavens, the conversation flagged more and more. After a long silence, the bridegroom was the first to start a new subject.
“Rose, love,” he said, “that magnificent sunset is a good omen for our marriage; it promises another lovely day to-morrow.”
The bride laughed and blushed.
“Do you really believe in omens, Charles?” she said.
“My dear,” interposed the old lady, before her son could answer, “if Charles does believe in omens, it is nothing to laugh at. You will soon know better, when you are his wife, than to confound him, even in the slightest things, with the common herd of people. All his convictions are well founded–so well, that if I thought he really did believe in omens, I should most assuredly make up my mind to believe in them too.”
“I beg your pardon, madame,” Rose began, tremulously, “I only meant–”
“My dear child, have you so little knowledge of the world as to suppose that I could be offended–”
“Let Rose speak,” said the young man.
He turned round petulantly, almost with the air of a spoiled child, to his mother, as he said those words. She had been looking fondly and proudly on him the moment before. Now her eyes wandered disconcertedly from his face; she hesitated an instant with a sudden confusion which seemed quite foreign to her character, then whispered in his ear,
“Am I to blame, Charles, for trying to make her worthy of you?”
Her son took no notice of the question. He only reiterated sharply, “Let Rose speak.”
“I really had nothing to say,” faltered the young girl, growing more and more confused.
“Oh, but you had!”
There was such an ungracious sharpness in his voice, such an outburst of petulance in his manner as he spoke, that his mother gave him a warning touch on the arm, and whispered “Hush!”
Monsieur Lomaque, the land-steward, and Monsieur Trudaine, the brother, both glanced searchingly at the bride, as the words passed the bridegroom’s lips. She seemed to be frightened and astonished, rather than irritated or hurt. A curious smile puckered up Lomaque’s lean face, as he looked demurely down on the ground, and began drilling a fresh hole in the turf with the sharp point of his cane. Trudaine turned aside quickly, and, sighing, walked away a few paces; then came back, and seemed about to speak, but Danville interrupted him.
“Pardon me, Rose,” he said; “I am so jealous of even the appearance of any want of attention toward you, that I was nearly allowing myself to be irritated about nothing.”
He kissed her hand very gracefully and tenderly as he made his excuse; but there was a latent expression in his eye which was at variance with the apparent spirit of his action. It was noticed by nobody but observant and submissive Monsieur Lomaque, who smiled to himself again, and drilled harder than ever at his hole in the grass.
“I think Monsieur Trudaine was about to speak,” said Madame Danville. “Perhaps he will have no objection to let us hear what he was going to say.”
“None, madame,” replied Trudaine, politely. “I was about to take upon myself the blame of Rose’s want of respect for believers in omens, by confessing that I have always encouraged her to laugh at superstitions of every kind.”
“You a ridiculer of superstitions?” said Danville, turning quickly on him. “You, who have built a laboratory; you, who are an amateur professor of the occult arts of chemistry–a seeker after the Elixir of Life. On my word of honor, you astonish me!”
There was an ironical politeness in his voice, look, and manner as he said this, which his mother and his land-steward, Monsieur Lomaque, evidently knew how to interpret. The first touched his arm again and whispered, “Be careful!” the second suddenly grew serious, and left off drilling his hole in the grass. Rose neither heard the warning of Madame Danville, nor noticed the alteration in Lomaque. She was looking round at her brother, and was waiting with a bright, affectionate smile to hear his answer. He nodded, as if to reassure her, before he spoke again to Danville.
“You have rather romantic ideas about experiments in chemistry,” he said, quietly. “Mine have so little connection with what you call the occult arts that all the world might see them, if all the world thought it worth while. The only Elixirs of Life that I know of are a quiet heart and a contented mind. Both those I found, years and years ago, when Rose and I first came to live together in the house yonder.”
He spoke with a quiet sadness in his voice, which meant far more to his sister than the simple words he uttered. Her eyes filled with tears; she turned for a moment from her lover, and took her brother’s hand. “Don’t talk, Louis, as if you thought you were going to lose your sister, because–” Her lips began to tremble, and she stopped suddenly.
“More jealous than ever of your taking her away from him!” whispered Madame Danville in her son’s ear. “Hush! don’t, for God’s sake, take any notice of it,” she added, hurriedly, as he rose from the seat and faced Trudaine with undisguised irritation and impatience in his manner. Before he could speak, the old servant Guillaume made his appearance, and announced that coffee was ready. Madame Danville again said “Hush!” and quickly took one of his arms, while he offered the other to Rose. “Charles,” said the young girl, amazedly, “how flushed your face is, and how your arm trembles!”