“‘Jean,’ she said, ’I am going
to make a confession to you. I owe it to you,
Jean. I have never been false to you, never! never,
before or after you married me. M’sieu
le Cure is there, and can tell you so; he knows my
soul. Well, listen, Jean. If I am dying,
it is because I was not able to console myself for
leaving the chateau, because I was too fond of the
young Baron Monsieur Rene, too fond of him, mind you,
Jean, there was no harm in it! This is the thing
that’s killing me. When I could see him
no more I felt that I should die. If I could
only have seen him, I might have lived, only seen
him, nothing more. I wish you’d tell him
some day, by and by, when I am no longer here.
You will tell him, swear you, will, Jean—swear
it—in the presence of M’sieu le Cure!
It will console me to know that he will know it one
day, that this was the cause of my death! Swear
it!’
“’Well, I gave her my promise, M’sieu
It Baron, and on the faith of an honest man I have
kept my word.’
“And then he ceased speaking, his eyes filling
with tears.
“Good God! my dear boy, you can’t form
any idea of the emotion that filled me when I heard
this poor devil, whose wife I had killed without suspecting
it, telling me this story on that wet night in this
very kitchen.
“I exclaimed: ‘Ah! my poor Jean!
my poor Jean!’
“He murmured: ’Well, that’s
all, M’sieu le Baron. I could not help it,
one way or the other—and now it’s
all over!’
“I caught his hand across the table, and I began
to weep.
“He asked, ‘Will you come and see her
grave?’ I nodded assent, for I couldn’t
speak. He rose, lighted a lantern, and we walked
through the blinding rain by the light of the lantern.
“He opened a gate, and I saw some crosses of
black wood.
“Suddenly he stopped before a marble slab and
said: ‘There it is,’ and he flashed
the lantern close to it so that I could read the inscription:
“’ToLouise Hortense MARINET,
“’Wife
of Jean-Francois Lebrument, Farmer,
“‘She
was A faithful wife. God rest
her soul.’
“We fell on our knees in the damp grass, he
and I, with the lantern between us, and I saw the
rain beating on the white marble slab. And I
thought of the heart of her sleeping there in her grave.
Ah! poor heart! poor heart! Since then I come
here every year. And I don’t know why, but
I feel as if I were guilty of some crime in the presence
of this man who always looks as if he forgave me.”
The peasant and the doctor stood on opposite sides
of the bed, beside the old, dying woman. She
was calm and resigned and her mind quite clear as
she looked at them and listened to their conversation.
She was going to die, and she did not rebel at it,
for her time was come, as she was ninety-two.
