“Yes, my dear father,” observed Catherine; “but I doubt whether the quartermaster of the gendarmerie is of your opinion.”
“And why do you think so?”
“Because it appears to me that this letter may not only bring the doctor into trouble, but you also, my dear father.”
“Pshaw!” said Billot; “you are always afraid. But that matters not. Here is the pamphlet; and here is employment ready found for you, Pitou. In the evenings you shall read it.”
“And in the daytime?”
“In the daytime you will take care of the sheep and cows. In the mean time, there is your pamphlet.”
And the farmer took from one of his holsters one of those small pamphlets with a red cover of which so great a number were published in those days, either with or without permission of the authorities.
Only, in the latter case, the author ran the risk of being sent to the galleys.
“Read me the title of that book, Pitou, that I may always speak of the title until I shall be able to speak of the work itself. You shall read the remainder to me another time.”
Pitou read on the first page these words, which habit has since rendered very vague and very insignificant, but which at that period struck to the very fibres of all hearts:
“Of the Independence of Man, and the Liberty of Nations.”
“What do you say to that, Pitou?” inquired the farmer.
“I say that it appears to me, Monsieur Billot, that independence and liberty are the same thing. My protector would be turned out of Monsieur Fortier’s class for being guilty of a pleonasm.”
“Pleonasm or not,” cried the farmer, “that book is the book of a man.”
“That matters not, Father,” said Catherine, with woman’s admirable instinct. “Hide it, I entreat you! It will bring you into trouble. As to myself, I know that I am trembling even at the sight of it.”
“And why would you have it injure me, since it has not injured its author?”
“And how can you tell that, Father? It is eight days since that letter was written; and it could not have taken eight days for the parcel to have come from Havre. I also have received a letter this morning.”
“And from whom?”
“From Sebastian Gilbert, who has written to make inquiries. He desires me, even, to remember him to his foster-brother, Pitou. I had forgotten to deliver his message.”
“Well!”
“Well! he says that for three days he had been expecting his father’s arrival in Paris, and that he had not arrived.”
“Mademoiselle is right,” said Pitou. “It seems to me that this non-arrival is disquieting.”
“Hold your tongue, you timid fellow, and read the doctor’s treatise,” said the farmer; “then you will become not only learned, but a man.”
It was thus people spoke in those days; for they were at the preface of that great Grecian and Roman history which the French nation imitated, during ten years, in all its phases, devotedness, proscriptions, victories, and slavery.
Pitou put the book under his arm with so solemn a gesture that he completely gained the farmer’s heart.
“And now,” said Billot, “have you dined?”
“No, sir,” replied Pitou, maintaining the semi-religious, semi-heroic attitude he had assumed since the book had been intrusted to his care.
“He was just going to get his dinner, when he was driven out of doors,” said the young girl.
“Well, then,” said Billot, “go in and ask my wife for the usual farm fare, and to-morrow you shall enter on your functions.”
Pitou, with an eloquent look, thanked Monsieur Billot, and, led by Catherine, entered the kitchen,—a domain placed under the absolute direction of Madame Billot.
Chapter VI
Pastoral Scenes
MADAME BILLOT was a stout, buxom mamma, between thirty-five and thirty-six years old, round as a ball, fresh-colored, smooth-skinned, and cordial in her manners. She trotted continually from the fowl-house to the dovecote, from the sheep-pens to the cow-stable. She inspected the simmering of her soup, the stoves on which her fricassees and ragouts were cooking, and the spit on which the joint was roasting, as does a general when surveying his cantonments, judging by a mere glance whether everything was in its right place, and by their very odor, whether the thyme and laurel-leaves were distributed in due proportions in the stewpans. She scolded from habit, but without the slightest intention that her scolding should be disagreeable; and her husband, whom she honored as she would the greatest potentate of the earth, did not escape. Her daughter also got her share, though she loved her more than Madame de Sevigné loved Madame de Grignan; and neither were her workpeople overlooked, though she fed them better than any farmer in a circuit of ten leagues fed his. Therefore was it, that when a vacancy occurred in her household, there was great competition to obtain the place. But, as in heaven, unfortunately there were many applicants and comparatively but few chosen.