of the mule, angrily told him that his son might kill him, but never, never would he consent, and continued to keep the girl about the house, not worrying about the matter, expecting it would soon blow over.  For two years longer the young folks kept on adoring and desiring each other, and never the least breath of scandal sullied their names.  Then one day there was a frightful quarrel between the two men, after which the young man, feeling he could no longer endure his father’s tyranny, enlisted and was packed off to Africa, while the butcher still retained the servant-maid, because she was useful to him.  Soon after that a terrible thing happened:  Silvine, who had sworn that she would be true to her lover and await his return, was detected one day, two short weeks after his departure, in the company of a laborer who had been working on the farm for some months past, that Goliah Steinberg, the Prussian, as he was called; a tall, simple young fellow with short, light hair, wearing a perpetual smile on his broad, pink face, who had made himself Honore’s chum.  Had Father Fouchard traitorously incited the man to take advantage of the girl? or had Silvine, sick at heart and prostrated by the sorrow of parting with her lover, yielded in a moment of unconsciousness?  She could not tell herself; was dazed, and saw herself driven by the necessity of her situation to a marriage with Goliah.  He, for his part, always with the everlasting smile on his face, made no objection, only insisted on deferring the ceremony until the child should be born.  When that event occurred he suddenly disappeared; it was rumored, subsequently that he had found work on another farm, over Beaumont way.  These things had happened three years before the breaking out of the war, and now everyone was convinced that that artless, simple Goliah, who had such a way of ingratiating himself with the girls, was none else than one of those Prussian spies who filled our eastern provinces.  When Honore learned the tidings over in Africa he was three months in hospital, as if the fierce sun of that country had smitten him on the neck with one of his fiery javelins, and never thereafter did he apply for leave of absence to return to his country for fear lest he might again set eyes on Silvine and her child.

The artilleryman’s hands shook with agitation as Maurice perused the letter.  It was from Silvine, the first, the only one that she had ever written him.  What had been her guiding impulse, that silent, submissive woman, whose handsome black eyes at times manifested a startling fixedness of purpose in the midst of her never-ending slavery?  She simply said that she knew he was with the army, and though she might never see him again, she could not endure the thought that he might die and believe that she had ceased to love him.  She loved him still, had never loved another; and this she repeated again and again through four closely written pages, in words of unvarying import, without the slightest word of excuse for herself, without even attempting to explain what had happened.  There was no mention of the child, nothing but an infinitely mournful and tender farewell.