It was half clay, half mud; but out of it one could fashion the little poupées, the dolls for the children. They would not last very long, it was true; but then one fashioned them quickly, and there was delight in making them.
Jean dug a piece of the clay with his sheaf knife, leaned over from the bank of the little creek, and moistened it in the water. He dug another, moistened that, moulded the two together—and Marie-Louise smiled at him a little tremulously, as their eyes met.
The tears were very near to those brave dark eyes since three days ago. Jean mechanically added a third piece of clay to the other two. Much had happened in those three days—all Bernay-sur-Mer seemed changed since that afternoon when Gaston, so Marie-Louise had told him, seeing a boat adrift and fearing there might be some one in it, had tried during a lull in the storm to reach it with her assistance, and an oar had broken, and the tide on the ebb had driven them close to the Perigeau where they had swamped, and somehow Gaston had been flung upon the outer edges of the reef, and the boat, sodden, weighted, following, had crushed him against the rocks.
Jean looked at Marie-Louise again. She was all in black now—she and good Mother Fregeau had made the dress between them for the church that morning, when Father Anton had said the mass for Gaston. But Marie-Louise was not looking at him—her elbows were on the ground, her chin was cupped in her hands, and the long black lashes veiled her eyes. She had not told him any more of the story—Jean could picture that for himself. How many times must she have risked her life to have pulled Gaston to the rocks higher up upon the reef! A daughter of France, Gaston had called her. Bon Dieu, but she was that, with her courage and her strength! One would not think the strength was there, but then the black dress did not cling like the wet clothes that other night to show the litheness of the rounded limbs.
His fingers began to work into the clay, unnaturally diffident and hesitant at first, not with the deft certainty of their custom, but as though groping tentatively for something that was curiously intangible, that eluded them. Marie-Louise, as she had been that night, was living before him again—the lines of her form so full of grace and so beautiful, so full of the virility of her young womanhood, the shapely head, the hair streaming in abandon about her shoulders—and it was like and yet not like that great bronze statue so often in his dreams, imaginary and yet so real, that was set in the midst of that great city in a great square. And then suddenly, strangely, of their own volition, it seemed, his fingers, where they had been hesitant before, began now to work with a sure swiftness.
His eyes were drinking in the contour of Marie-Louise's face in a rapt, eager, subconscious way. There was something deeper there than the mere prettiness of feature, something that was impressing itself in an absorbing, insistent way upon him. Her face made him think of the face of that statue—there was a hint of masculinity that brought with it no coarseness, nor robbed it of its sweetness or its charm, but like that massive face of bronze that towered high, that people with uplifted heads stood and gazed upon, that none passed by without a pause, stamped it with calm fearlessness; and courage and resolve outshone all else and alone was dominant there.
Marie-Louise sat up suddenly from the ground and turned toward him, her brows gathered in a pretty, puzzled way.
"Why do you look at me like that, Jean?" she demanded abruptly. "And what are you doing there? It is not the doll you promised to make for little Ninon Lachance—it is much too big." She leaned forward. "What are you making?"
"Ma foi!" Jean muttered, with a little start—and stared at the lump of clay. "I—I do not know."
"Well, then," said Marie-Louise gravely, "don't do any more. I want to talk to you, Jean."
"How, not do any more!" protested Jean whimsically. "Was it not you who said, 'We will go to the creek this afternoon and make poupées'? And look"—he jerked his hand toward a large basket on the ground beside him—"to do that I shall perhaps not keep my promise to meet the Lucille when she comes in and bring a panier of fish to Jacques Fregeau at the Bas Rhône. And now you say, 'Don't do any more'!"
"Yes; I know," admitted Marie-Louise. "But I want to talk to you. Listen, Jean. To-morrow Mother Fregeau must go back to the Bas Rhône. She has been too long away in her kindness now. You know how she came to me the next morning after Uncle Gaston died, and put her arms around me and has stayed ever since."
Jean shifted the lump of clay a little away from Marie-Louise, but his fingers still worked on.
"She has a heart of gold," asserted Jean. "Who should know any better than I, who have lived with her all these years?"
Marie-Louise's eyes travelled slowly in a half tender, half pensive way over Jean. His coat was off; the loose shirt was open at the neck displaying the muscular shoulders, and the sleeves were rolled up over the brown, tanned arms; the powerful hands, powerful for all their long, slim, tapering fingers, worked on and on; the black hair clustered truantly, as it always did, over the broad, high forehead. She had known Jean all her life, as many years as she could remember, and her love for him was very deep. It had come to seem her life, that love; and each night in her prayers she had asked the bon Dieu to bless and take care of Jean, and to make her a good wife to him when that time should come. It was so great, that love, that sometimes it frightened her—somehow it was frightening her now, for there was a side to Jean that, well as she knew him, she felt intuitively she had never been able to understand.
She spoke abruptly again, a little absently.
"I do not know yet what I am to do. There is the house, and Father Anton says I must not live there alone."
"But, no!" agreed Jean. "Of course not! That is what I say, too. It is all the more reason why we should not wait any longer, you and I, Marie-Louise."
A tinge of colour crept shyly into Marie-Louise's face, as she shook her head.
"No; we must wait, Jean. It is too soon after—after poor Uncle Gaston."
"But it was Gaston's wish, that," persisted Jean gently. "Have I not told you what he said, petite?"
Again Marie-Louise shook her head.
"But one is sad for all that," she answered. "And to go to the church, Jean, when one is sad, when one should go so happy! Oh, I want to be happy then, Jean. I do not want to think of anything that day but only you, Jean—and sing, and there must be sunshine and fête. But now, for a little while, it is Uncle Gaston. You do not think that wrong?"
"No," said Jean slowly, "it is not wrong, and I understand; but then, too, Gaston would understand, for it was his wish."
Marie-Louise bent forward with a strange little impulsive movement.
"That is twice you have said that, Jean," she said. "I—I almost wish Uncle Gaston had not said what he did to you that night. Jean, it—it is not what he said, nor what you said to him. That must not make any difference. Never, never, Jean! One does not marry for that—it is only if there is love."
"Mais, 'cré nom!" exclaimed Jean, suddenly setting aside his clay and catching Marie-Louise's face between his hands. "Why do you talk like that? What queer fancies are in that little head? Now, tell me"—he kissed her lips, while the blood rushed crimson to her cheeks—"tell me, is that not answer enough? And have we not loved each other long before that night, and does not all Bernay-sur-Mer know that it will dance at the noces?"
"Yes," whispered Marie-Louise, a little breathlessly.
"Ah, then," said Jean tenderly, "you must not talk like that. What, Marie-Louise, if I should say to myself, 'now perhaps Marie-Louise has not loved me all these years, and—'"
She drew hurriedly away.
"Don't, Jean!" she said quickly. "It hurts, that! I love you so much that sometimes I am afraid. And to-day I am afraid. I do not know why. And sometimes it is so different. That night on the reef when I thought that soon the rocks would be covered and that there was no help for Uncle Gaston and myself, and that no one could come to us even if we were seen, I saw your lantern and the bon Dieu told me it was you and I had no more fear. I was so sure then—so sure then. Oh, Jean, you must be very good to me to-day. It—it was so hard"—the dark eyes were swimming now with tears—"to say good-bye to Uncle Gaston. Perhaps it is that that is making me feel so strangely. But sometimes it seems as though it could never be, the great happiness for you and me, it is so great to think about that—that it frightens me. And I have wanted to talk to you about it, Jean, often and often. Does it make you very glad and happy, too, to think of just you and me together here, and our home, and the fishing, and—and years and years of it?"
"But, yes; of course!" smiled Jean; and, picking up the clay again, began to scrape at it with his knife.
"But are you sure, Jean?"—there was a little tremor in her voice. "I do not mean so much that you are sure you love me, but that you are sure you would always be happy to stay here in Bernay-sur-Mer. You are not like the other men."
"How not like them?" Jean demanded, surveying in an absorbed sort of way the little clay figure that was taking on rough outline now. "How not like them?"
"Well—that!"—Marie-Louise pointed at the clay in his hands. "That, for one thing—that you are always playing with, that it seems you cannot put aside for an instant, even though I asked you to a moment ago. You are always making the poupées, and if not the poupées with mud and dirt, then you must waste the inside of Mother Fregeau's loaves that she bakes herself, or steal the dough before it reaches the oven to keep your fingers busy making little faces and droll things out of it."
Jean looked up to stare at Marie-Louise a little perplexedly.
"Mais, zut!" he exclaimed. "And what of that! And if I amuse myself that way, what of that? It is nothing!"
"Nevertheless," Marie-Louise insisted, nodding her head earnestly, "it is true what I have said—that you are not like the other men in Bernay-sur-Mer. Do you think that I have not watched you, Jean? And have you not said little things to show that you grow tired of the fishing?"
"But that is true of everybody," Jean protested. "Does not Father Anton say that all the world is poor because there is none in it who is contented? And if I grumble sometimes, do not all the others do the same? Pierre Lachance will swear to you twice every hour that the fishing is a dog's life."
She shook her head.
"It is different," she said. "You are not Pierre Lachance, Jean, and I want you to be happy all your life—that is what I ask the bon Dieu for always in my prayers. And I do not know why these thoughts come, and I do not understand them, only I know that they are there."
"Then—voilà! We will drive them away, and they must never come back!" Jean burst out, half gaily, half gravely. "See, now, Marie-Louise"—he caught her hand in both of his, putting aside the lump of clay again—"it is true that sometimes I am like that, and I do not understand either; but one must take things as they are, is that not so?"
She nodded—a little doubtfully.
"Well, then," cried Jean, "why should I not be happy here? Have I not you, and is that not most of all? And as for the rest, do I not do well with the fishing? Is there any who does better? Do they not speak of the luck of Jean Laparde? 'Cré nom! Different from the others! Who is a fisherman if it is not I, who have been a fisherman all my life? And of what good is it to wish for anything else? What else, even if I wanted to, could I do? I do not know anything else but the boats and the nets. Is it not so, Marie-Louise?"
"Y-yes," she said, and her eyes lifted to meet his.
"And happy!" he went on. "Ah, Marie-Louise, with those bright eyes of yours that belong all to me, who could be anything but happy? Tiens! You are to be my little wife, and Bernay-sur-Mer and the blue water is to be our home, and we will fish together, and you shall sing all day in the boat, and—well, what more is there to ask for?"
"Oh, Jean!"—she was smiling now.
"There, you see!" said Jean, and burst out laughing. "Marie-Louise is herself again, and—pouf!—the blue devils are blown away. And now wait until I have finished this, and I will show you something"—he picked up the clay once more. "Only you must not look until it is done."
"Mustn't I? Oh!"—with a little moue of resignation. "Well, then, hurry, Jean," she commanded, and cupped her chin in her hands again, her elbows propped upon the ground.
It was playfully that Jean turned his back upon her, hiding his work, but as his fingers began again to draw and model the clay and his knife to chisel it, the smile went slowly from his face and his lips grew firmly closed. It was strange that Marie-Louise should have known! It was true, the fishing grew irksome too often now; for those moods, like the mood in the storm, came very often, much more often than they had been wont to do. He had laughed at her, but that was only to pretend, to chase the sadness away and make her eyes shine again. It was true, too, as he had told her, that one must take things as they were. Whether he wanted to fish or not, he must fish—voilà! How else could one make the sous with which to live?
Oh, yes, he had laughed to make her laugh; but now, pardieu! it was bringing that mood upon himself. Where was that great city and that great square, and what was that great statue before which the people stood rapt and spellbound, and why should it come so often to his thoughts and be so real as though it were a very truth and not some queer imagination of his brain? There were wonderful things in the face of that bronze figure. He leaned a little forward toward the clay before him, his lips half parted now, his fingers seeming to tingle with a life, throbbing, palpitant, that was all their own, that was apart from him entirely, for they possessed a power of movement and a purpose that he had nothing to do with. He became absorbed in his work, lost in it. Time passed.
"Jean," Marie-Louise called out, "let me see it now."
"Wait!" he said almost harshly. "Wait! Wait! Wait!"
"Jean!"—it was a hurt little cry.
He did not hear her. There was something at the base of that statue of his dreams that always troubled him, that the people always pointed at as they gazed; but he had never been able to make out what it was there at the base of the statue. It was very strange that he was never able to see that, when he could see the figure of the woman with the wonderful face so plainly!
He worked on and on. There were neither hours nor minutes—the afternoon deepened. There was no creek, no Marie-Louise, no Bernay-sur-Mer, nothing—only those dreams and the little clay figure in his hands.
And then Marie-Louise, her face a little white, timidly touched his arm.
"Jean!" she said hesitantly.
Her voice roused him. It seemed as though he was awakened from a sleep. He brushed the hair back from his eyes, and looked around.
"Mon Dieu," he said, "but that was, strange!" And then he smiled, still a little dazed, and lifted around the clay figure for her to see. "I do not know if it is finished," he said, staring at it; "but perhaps I could do no better with it even if I worked longer."
Marie-Louise's eyes, puzzled, anxious, on Jean's face, shifted to the little clay figure—and their expression changed instantly.
"But, Jean!" she cried, clasping her hands. "But, Jean, that is not a poupée you have made there. It—it will never do at all! Ninon Lachance would break the arms off at the first minute, and it is too charmante for that. Oh, but, Jean, it—it is adorable!"
Jean was inspecting the figure in a curiously abstracted way, as though he had never seen it before, turning his head now to this side, now to that, and turning the clay around and around in his hands to examine it from all angles, while a heightened colour crept into his face and dyed his cheeks. It was a small figure, hardly a foot and a half in height—the figure of a fisherwoman, barefooted, in short skirts, the clothes as though windswept clinging close around her limbs, her arms stretched out as to the sea. He laughed a little unnaturally.
"Well, then, since it will not do for Ninon Lachance, and you like it, Marie-Louise," he said a little self-consciously; "it is for you."
"For me—Jean? Really for me?" she asked happily.
"And why not?" said Jean. "Since it is you."
"Me!"—she looked at him in a prettily bewildered way.
"But, yes," said Jean, holding the figure off at arm's length. "See, it is a beacon—the welcome of the fisherman home from the sea. And are you not that, Marie-Louise, and will you not stand on the shore at evening and hold out your arms for me as I pull home in the boat? Are you not the beacon, Marie-Louise—for me?"
Her hand stole over one of his and pressed it, but it was a moment before she spoke.
"I will pray to the bon Dieu to make me that, Jean—always," she said softly.
He drew her close to him.
"It is the luck of Jean Laparde!" he whispered tenderly.
They sat for a little time in silence—then Jean sprang sharply to his feet.
"Ma foi, Marie-Louise!" he called out in sudden consternation, glancing at the sun. "I did not know we had been here so long." He picked up the little clay figure hastily, placed it in the basket, threw his coat, that was on the ground, over it, and, swinging the basket to the crook of his arm, held out his hand to Marie-Louise. "Come, petite, we will hurry back."
It was not far across the fields and down the little rise to the road that paralleled the beach; and in some five minutes, walking quickly, they came out upon the road itself by the turn near the rough wooden bridge that crossed the creek halfway between the eastern headland and the white, clustering cottages of Bernay-sur-Mer. But here, for all their hurry, they paused suddenly of one accord, looking at each other questioningly, as voices reached them from the direction of the bridge which, still hidden from their view, was just around the bend of the road ahead.
*****
"But, my dear"—it was a man speaking, his tone a sort of tolerant protest—"I am sure it is just the place we have been looking for. It is quiet here."
"Quiet!"—it was a woman's voice this time, in a wealth of irony. "It is stagnation! There isn't a single thing alive here—even the sea is dead! It is enough to give one the blues for the rest of one's life! And the accommodations at that unspeakable tavern are absolutely appalling. I can't imagine what you are dreaming of to want to stay another minute! I'm quite sure there are lots of other places that will furnish all the rest and quiet required, and where, at the same time, we can at least be comfortable. Anyway, I'm not going to stay here!"
"But, Myrna, you—"
"There is some one coming," said the girl.
*****
Jean and Marie-Louise were walking forward again.
"What are they saying, Jean?" asked Marie-Louise.
Jean shook his head.
"I do not know," he answered. "It is English. See! There they are!"
An elderly, well-dressed man, grey-haired, clean-shaven, a little stout, with a wholesomely good-natured, ruddy face, was leaning against the railing of the bridge; and beside him, digging at the planks with the tip of her parasol, stood a girl in dainty white, her head bent forward, her face hidden under the wide brim of a picture hat.
Jean's eyes, attracted as by a magnet, passed over the man and fixed upon the girl. At Nice, at Monte Carlo, so they said, one saw many such as she; but Bernay-sur-Mer was neither Nice nor Monte Carlo, and he had never seen a woman gowned like that before. 'Cré nom, what exquisite harmony of line and poise! If she would but look up! Bon Dieu, but it would be a desecration of the picture if she were not gloriously pretty!
The gentleman, nodding pleasantly, greeted them as they approached.
"Good afternoon!" he said smilingly, in French.
The girl had raised her head, grey eyes sweeping Marie-Louise with well bred indifference—and Jean was staring at her.
"Bon jour, m'sieu!"—he spoke mechanically, lifted his cap mechanically.
His eyes had not left the girl's face. He could not take his eyes from her face. It was a wonderful face, a beautiful face, and something in it thrilled him and bade him feast his eyes upon it to drink in its beauty. And, his head thrown back exposing the bare rugged neck, the broad, sturdy shoulders unconsciously squared a little, the fine, dark eyes wide with admiration and a strange, keen appraisement, the splendid physique, the strength, the power and vigour of young manhood outstanding in face and form, he gazed at her. And her eyes, from Marie-Louise, met his, and from them faded their expression of indifference, and into them came something Jean could not define, only that as the blood rushed suddenly unbidden to his face and he felt it hot upon his cheeks, he saw the colour ebb from hers to a queer whiteness—and then her hat hid her face again—and he had passed by.
It was as though his veins were running fire. He glanced at Marie-Louise. Shyly diffident in the presence of strangers, her head was lowered. She had seen nothing. Seen nothing! Seen what? He did not know. His blood was tingling, his brain was confusion.
He walked on, hurrying unconsciously.
It was Marie-Louise who spoke.
"They are of the grand monde," she said in a sort of wondering excitement, when they were out of ear-shot.
"Yes," said Jean absently.
"And English or American."
"Yes," said Jean.
"But the rich people do not come to Bernay-sur-Mer where there is no amusement for them," she submitted with a puzzled air. "I wonder what they are going to do here?"
Jean's eyes were on the road. He did not raise them.
"Who knows!" said Jean Laparde.
The mattress was of straw—and the straw had probably been garnered in a previous generation, if not in a prehistoric age! It was so old that it was a shifting, lumpy mass of brittle chaff, whose individual units at unexpected moments punctured the ticking and, nettle-wise, stuck through the coarse sheet. It was not comfortable. It had not been comfortable all night. Truly, the best that could be said for the Bas Rhône was that, as Father Anton in his gentle way had taken pains to make it clear, its proprietors were well-intentioned—and that was a source of comfort only as far as it went!
Myrna Bliss wriggled drowsily into another position—and a moment later wriggled back into the old one. Then she opened her eyes, and stared about her. The morning sun was streaming in through the window. She observed this with sleepy amazement. After all then, she must have slept more than she had imagined, in spite of the awful bed.
The lap-lap-lap of the sea came to her. In through the open window floated the voices of children at play in the street; from down on the beach the sound of men's voices, shouting and calling cheerily to each other, reached her; from below stairs some sort of a family reunion appeared to be in progress. She could hear that absurd Papa Fregeau talking as though he were a soda-water bottle with the cork suddenly exploded!
"Ah, mignonne—chérie! You are back! You will go away no more—not for a day! I have been in despair! It is the Americans! I have been miserable! Tiens, embrasse-moi, my little Lucille!"
There was the commotion of a playful struggle, then the resounding smack of a kiss—and then a woman's voice.
"Such a simpleton as you are, mon Jacques!"—it was as though one were talking to a child. "So they have put you in despair, these Americans! Well, then, I am back. And listen!"—importantly. "What do you think?"
"Think?" cried Papa Fregeau excitedly. "But I do not think!"
"That is true," was the response; "so I will tell you. They are going away this morning."
"Merci!" exclaimed Papa Fregeau fervently. "I am very glad!"
"They are going to Marie-Louise's."
"To Marie-Louise's!"—incredulously. "You tell me that they are going to Marie-Louise's?"
"Yes; to Marie-Louise's, stupid! Father Anton came an hour ago to make the arrangements. They are to rent the house, and Marie-Louise is to remain there en domestique. Now what have you to say to that?"
"Mon Dieu!" ejaculated Papa Fregeau, with intense earnestness. "That I am sorry for Marie-Louise!"
Myrna Bliss laughed softly, delightedly to herself—and then, with a sudden little gasp, sat bolt upright in bed. The whole thing, everything since yesterday afternoon had been inconceivably preposterous—and she herself preposterous most of all! If her father ever heard the truth of it, what a scene there would be!
She got out of bed impulsively, walked to the window, and leaned her elbows on the sill, her brows gathered in a perplexed little frown. Just what had happened anyway? She had decided ten minutes after they had arrived in Bernay-sur-Mer that she would die of ennui if she stayed there. They had started for a walk, she and her father, and, without saying anything to him, she had turned back and taken it upon herself to inform this fat, effervescent little hotel proprietor that they would go on that afternoon. She had intended, during the walk, to tell her father what she had done, and, in fact, had told him; and then on her return after that—yes, that meeting on the bridge—she had countermanded her orders, and not only countermanded them but had even rented a cottage! Her father had seen nothing extraordinary in it, which was natural enough—since he left all travelling arrangements to her. Indeed, on the contrary, as Bernay-sur-Mer had seemed to appeal to him, he had been rather taken with the idea—if perhaps a trifle sceptical as to the success of the housekeeping plan. In a word, if the discovery of what she believed to be suitable accommodations had induced her to change her mind and stay in Bernay-sur-Mer, it was perfectly satisfactory to him. The brows smoothed out. As far as her father was concerned, that was all there was to it. She had been the practical manager ever since her mother had died five years before.
The brows puckered up again. Her father would never give it a second thought, he would never for an instant imagine there was any ulterior motive for what she had done. How could he—when the real reason was so utterly absurd, ridiculous and unheard of! Fancy! What would that select and ultra-exclusive set in Paris say? What if it ever came to the ears of New York! Myrna Bliss to bury herself alive in a little Mediterranean village that was probably not even on the map, and all at a glance from the eyes of a—fisherman! They wouldn't believe it. Who would believe it! It was unimaginable!
Dainty little fingers reached up and drummed with their pink tips on the window pane; the pucker became more pronounced. Well, she had done it, nevertheless. And why was it so absurd, so ridiculous, so impossible after all? She would do exactly the same thing over again without an instant's hesitation. It was quite true the man was a fisherman—but he did not look like a fisherman. He was magnificent! It was not ridiculous at all—it was piquantly delightful. Neither was it so absurdly impossible—if she did not stay in Bernay-sur-Mer, it would only be to choose some other place equally as tiresome—and without even a "fisherman" to compensate for it. What a face the man had! It was not merely handsome, it was—well, it was the prototype of what the artist coterie that buzzed around her father day and night was forever attempting to give expression to, but which, until now, she had never believed could exist in real life. He would be a refreshing change this astounding man-creature, this Jean Laparde, after the vapid attentions of the vapid men who made up her life in the social whirl of Paris—Count von Heirlich and Lord Barnvegh, for examples, out of a host of satellites who were constantly at her heels, because, of course, she was an heiress; and whose attentions she endured because, of course, some day she must marry, and because, of course again, to marry anything less than a title, a name, fame, was quite out of the question. As for that, no one expected anything but a brilliant match for her—and certainly she expected nothing less for herself. What a pity that they were not like Jean Laparde, those men of her world!
The fingers, from the window pane, tossed back a truant coil of hair; the white shoulders lifted in a little shrug. Paris—New York! That was all the world she knew. New York once a year—Paris the rest of the time. Expatriates—for art! That's what they were! Art—her father was obsessed with it. It was a mania with him; it was the last thing in the world that interested her. As a matter of fact, she couldn't seem to think of anything that particularly interested her. One tired quickly enough of the social merry-go-round—after a season it became inane. One surely had the right to amuse one's self with a new sensation—if one could find it! The man had the physique of a young god. A fisherman—well, what of it? He was splendid. He was more than splendid. Even the crude dress seemed to enhance him. It was a face that had made her catch her breath in that long second when their eyes had met. Yes, of course—why not admit it?—he interested her. He was rugged, he was strong, and above all he was supremely a man. Of course, it was only a matter of a week, a month, the time they chose to stay there; but it would be a decided novelty while it lasted.
She laughed suddenly aloud—a low, rippling little laugh. Actually the man was already her slave! Imagine a man like that her slave! Certainly it would be a new sensation. What a strange thrill it had given her when she had first caught sight of him on the bridge the afternoon before. Well, why shouldn't it have done so—a fisherman with a face like that? It was amazing! Think of finding such a man in such a situation! Was it any wonder that she had thrilled—even if he were only a fisherman? In Paris, of course, she could not have done what she had done, it would have been quite out of the question, there were the conventions—but then in Paris one didn't see men like that!
"And since," confided Myrna Bliss to a little urchin running in the street below, who neither saw nor heard her, "we are not in Paris, but in Bernay-sur-Mer, which is quite another story, you see it is not absurd or ridiculous at all, and I and my fisherman—"
She turned abruptly from the window at the sound of a knock and the opening of her door. It was Nanette, her maid, with a tray.
"I have mademoiselle's déjeuner," announced Nanette. "Monsieur Bliss has already finished his, and asks if mademoiselle will soon be ready. He is waiting with Monsieur le Curé for you."
"Waiting—with Monsieur le Curé?"—Myrna's eyebrows went up in well-simulated surprise.
"To visit the cottage mademoiselle has taken," amplified Nanette, and her retroussé nose was delicately elevated a trifle higher. Nanette, very evidently, was one at all events who was not in favour of the plan.
"Oh, the cottage—of course!" exclaimed Myrna, as though suddenly inspired. "I had forgotten all about it. Dress me quickly then, Nanette."
Nanette tossed a shapely dark head.
"Is mademoiselle going to stay here long?"—Nanette at times felt privileged to take liberties.
"Gracious, Nanette!" complained Myrna sweetly. "What a question! How can you possibly expect me to know?"
Nanette arranged the tray perfunctorily.
"There was a man who left a message with that imbecile proprietor for mademoiselle early this morning," she observed. "Mademoiselle has engaged a boatman?"
"A boatman? Certainly not!" declared Myrna Bliss. "Not without seeing the boat—and I have seen no boat!"
"But mademoiselle engages a cottage without seeing the cottage," murmured Nanette slyly.
"That will do, Nanette!" said Myrna severely. "There was but one cottage; there are dozens of boats. It is quite a different matter. What did the man say?"
"That he was obliged to go out for the four o'clock fishing this morning," said Nanette, pouting a little at the rebuke; "but that he would go to mademoiselle at the cottage early in the forenoon."
A row of little white teeth crunched into a piece of crisp toast.
"Very well, Nanette." Myrna's brows pursed up thoughtfully. "You may get out that new marquisette from Fallard's; and, I think"—she glanced out of the window—"my sunbonnet. And, Nanette"—suddenly impatient—"hurry, please—since father is waiting."
Myrna's impatience bore fruit. In ten minutes she was ready, and, running down the stairs, went out to the street, where her father and the curé, deep in conversation—on art undoubtedly, since her father was doing most of the talking!—were pacing slowly up and down, as they waited for her.
Her sunbonnet was swinging in her hand, the big grey eyes were shining, the glow of superb health was in her cheeks.
"Good morning, Father Anton!" she called out gaily. "What a shame to have kept you waiting!"
The old priest turned toward her with unaffected pleasure, as he held out his hand.
"Good morning to you, mademoiselle"—he was smiling with eyes as well as lips. "What a radiant little girl! It makes one full of life and young again; you are, let me see, you are—a tonic!"
She laughed as she turned to her father.
"'Morning, Dad! Sleep well?"
Henry Bliss removed his cigar to survey his daughter with whimsical reproach; then he patted her cheek affectionately.
"Fierce, wasn't it?" he chuckled. "Those beds are the worst ever! I was telling the curé here about them."
"It is too bad," said Father Anton solicitously. "It is regrettable. I am so very sorry. But"—earnestly—"you must not think too hardly of the Fregeaus. Since no guests sleep here, I am sure they can have no idea that—"
"No; of course not!" agreed Henry Bliss heartily, and laughed. "The hard feelings are all in the beds—and we'll let them stay there. Now, then, Myrna, are you ready to inspect this new domain of yours? And shall we walk, or take the car? Father Anton says it is not far."
"We will walk then," decided Myrna.
It was the walk she had taken yesterday, at least it was the same as far as the little bridge; and for that distance she walked beside her father and the curé, chatting merrily, but there she loitered a little behind them. Half impishly, half with a genuine impulse that she rather welcomed than avoided, she told herself that it was quite unfair to pass the little spot so indifferently. Was it not here that this most bizarre of adventures had begun? She had stood here by the railing, and he had stood there across on the other side, and—the red leaped suddenly flaming into her cheeks. She had never looked at a man like that before—no man had ever looked at her like that before! And it had been spontaneous, instant, like a flash of fire that had lighted up a dark and unknown pathway, which, in the momentary blaze of light, was full of strange wonder; and which, because it was an unknown way, and because the glimpse had shown so much in so brief an instant that the brain fused all into confusion and nothing was concrete, resulted, not in illuminating the way, but, the flash of light gone again, in transforming the pathway only into a bewildering maze.
She laughed a little after a while, shaking her head. Such an absurd fancy! But what an entrancing, alluring little fancy! Decidedly, it would be a new sensation to be lost in a maze like that—for a time. She would tire of it soon enough—the thrill probably would not even last as long as she would want it to. No thrill ever did! She bit her lip suddenly in pretty vexation. It was stupid of the man to go off fishing! Had he done it to pique her? The idea! He certainly could not have the temerity to imagine that it lay within his power to pique her. The sunbonnet swung to and fro abstractedly from its ribbon strings. Wasn't it strange that he had—piqued her!
She went on after her father and the curé. They were quite a way ahead now, and she hastened to catch up with them. As she drew near, she caught her father's words.
"... Peyre on the Histoire Générale des Beaux-Arts, Monsieur le Curé, I recommend it to you heartily. It is a most comprehensive little volume, embracing in a condensed form the story of the arts from the time of the Egyptians down to the present day, and—"
Myrna, in spite of herself, laughed outright, at which both men turned their heads. Her father, incorrigible, was at it again; and, once started, there was no stopping him. Poor Father Anton! For the rest of the way he would listen to art!
"Did I not tell you to beware, Father Anton?" she cried out in comical despair—and waved them to go on again.
She had no desire to listen to art, its relation to nature, its relation to science, its relation to civilisation, nor, above all, to a dissertation on the modern school. She had heard it all before; and, if it had not passed as quickly through one ear as it had come into the other, her head, she was quite sure, would have driven her to distraction. Besides, it was much more important to think about something else—no, not what she had been thinking about a moment ago; but, for instance, to be practical, about this menage whose wheels, without knowing whether they were oiled or not, she had impulsively set in motion. Would the cottage be at all habitable? Would this Marie-Louise be at all suitable? Would Marie-Louise and Nanette get along together? Nanette was insanely jealous of Jules—nothing but the fact that Jules was with them would have induced Nanette, to whom Paris was the beginning and the end of all things, to have come on such a trip. Yes, there was a very great deal to think about—now that it occurred to her! Myrna fell into a brown study, quite oblivious to her surroundings.
When she joined her father and the curé again, they had stopped at the edge of the little wood on the headland, and a cottage, almost as prettily vine-covered as Father Anton's, lay before them.
"Well, Myrna," her father called, with a smile, "I must say your plunge in the dark looks propitious so far."
"No, no! Not a plunge in the dark!" protested Father Anton quickly, his eyes full of expectant pleasure on Myrna. "That is not fair, Monsieur Bliss! It was on my recommendation, was it not, mademoiselle? And now—eh?—what does mademoiselle think of it?"
It was like the imaginative conception of some painter. The cottage, green with climbing vines, spotlessly white where the vines were sparse, nestled in the trees—in front, as far as the eye could reach, the glorious, deep, unfathomable blue of the Mediterranean; nearer, the splash of surf, like myriad fountains, on the headland's rugged point; while a tiny fringe of beach, just peeping from under the edge of the cliff at the far side of the cottage, glistened as though full of diamonds in the sunlight.
"Father Anton—you are a dear!" Myrna cried impetuously.
Her eyes roved delightedly here and there. There was a little trellis with flowers over the back door—that little outhouse would do splendidly as a garage. And then the front door opened, and her eyes fixed on a girl's figure on the threshold—and somehow the figure was familiar.
"Who is that, Father Anton?" she demanded.
"But it is Marie-Louise—who else?" smiled the priest. "I will call her."
"No," said Myrna; "we will go in."
Of course! How absurd! She recognised the girl now. It was the girl who had passed them on the bridge—Myrna's sunbonnet swung a little abstractedly again—with Jean Laparde.
Father Anton bustled forward.
"Marie-Louise," he said, as they reached the door, "this is the lady and gentleman who are to take the house, and—"
"Oh, but I think we have seen each other before," interposed Myrna graciously. "Was it not you, Marie-Louise, who passed us on the bridge yesterday afternoon?"
Marie-Louise's dark eyes, deep, fearless, met the grey ones—and dropped modestly.
"Yes, mademoiselle," she said.
"Certainly!" said Henry Bliss pleasantly. "I remember you too, and—ah!" With a sudden step, quite forgetting the amenities due his daughter, he brushed by her into the room, and stooped over the clay figure of the beacon. He picked it up, looked at it in a sort of startled incredulity, as though he could not believe his eyes; then, setting it down, went to the window, threw up the shade for better light, and returned to the clay figure. And then, after a moment, he began to mutter excitedly. "Yes—undoubtedly—of the flower of the French school—Demaurais, Lestrange, Pitot—eh?—which? And—yes—here—within a day or so—it is quite fresh!" He rushed back to the doorway to Father Anton. "Who has been in the village recently?"—his words were coming with a rush, he had the priest by the shoulders and was unconsciously shaking him. "Was it a man with long black hair over his coat collar and a beak nose? Was it a little short man who always jerks his head as he talks? Or was it a big fellow, very fat, and, yes, if it were Pitot he would probably be drunk? Quick! Which one was it?"
Father Anton, jaw dropped, dumb with amazement, could only shake his head. This American! Had he gone suddenly mad?
"Good heavens, dad, what is the matter?" Myrna cried out.
He paid no attention to her.
"You, then!"—he whirled on Marie-Louise, grasping her arm fiercely. "Who has been here?"
"But—but, m'sieu," stammered Marie-Louise, shrinking back in affright, "no one has been here."
Myrna pressed forward into the room.
"Dad, what is the—" She got no further.
"It is true—I am a fool. I was wrong. Look, Myrna!"—his face flushed, his eyes lighted with the fire of an enthusiast, he was at the table, lifting up the little clay figure of the fisherwoman with the outstretched arms, the beacon, in his hands again. "Look, Myrna! No, I am not mad—I am only a fool. I, who pride myself as a critic, was fool enough for a moment to think this the work of perhaps Demaurais, or Lestrange, or Pitot—when no one of the three even in his greatest moment of inspiration could approach it! There is life in it. You feel the very soul. It is sublime! But it is more than that—it is a stupendous thing, for, since it has been freshly done, and no stranger to these people has been here, the man who did it must be one of themselves. Don't you understand, Myrna, don't you understand? The world will ring with it. It is the discovery of a genius. I make the statement without reservation. This is the work of the greatest sculptor France will have ever known!"
Father Anton had come forward a little timorously, lacing and unlacing his fingers. Upon Myrna's face was a sort of bewildered stupefaction. Marie-Louise, her breath coming in little gasps, was gazing wide-eyed at the man who held in his hands her beacon, the clay figure she had seen Jean make.
"Is—is it true—what you say?" she whispered.
Henry Bliss looked at her for a moment, startled—as though he was for the first time aware of her presence.
"You—yes, of course, you must know about this, as it is in the house here," he burst out abruptly. "You know who made it?"
"But, yes," said Marie-Louise, and now there was a sudden new note, a trembling note of pride that struggled for expression in her voice. "But, yes—it was Jean Laparde."
"Laparde—Jean Laparde?"—his voice was hoarse in its eagerness. "Quick!" he cried. "Laparde—Jean Laparde? Who is Jean Laparde?"
A flush crept pink into Marie-Louise's face.
"He is my fiancé," she said.
It was the room Myrna Bliss had occupied. Mother Fregeau had insisted; Jacques Fregeau had implored. It was fitting that the best at the Bas Rhône should be Jean's. The little back room that had been his for ten years was quite impossible. It was different now. It would be but to make him ridiculous—what with all these grand strangers that were around him! And besides, merveille du bon Dieu, was he not now himself the greatest of the great ones!
In through the window the late afternoon sun played over the faded wallpaper of the chambre de luxe; from without there was the hum of voices, exclamations of amazement, cries of delight and admiration, the curious composite sound of a gathered, eager crowd. And Jean, well back from the sill that he might not be seen, glanced outside, it was his—his! The work that he had done during the past week in the atelier they had made for him in the barn behind the Bas Rhône! It was finished! Monsieur Bidelot was exhibiting it now to Bernay-sur-Mer. The great Academician was standing in the tonneau of the automobile and holding it up for every one to look at—the fisherman with his boat and net in clay. Ah, they understood that, the people of Bernay-sur-Mer! But they understood only that it was magnificent because Bidelot and Monsieur Bliss and the great men who had come amongst them told them that it was magnificent.
For years he had made the poupées, and they had seen nothing—and he had seen nothing. But now they knew because they were told; and now he knew because his soul, his brain was ablaze with the knowledge of creative power, because what had gone before was nothing, because what was to come would sweep the past, that little thing that Bidelot in his emotion cried over, into insignificance.
He drew back, his head high; his outflung arms, hands clenched, stretched heavenward. These strangers, these great critics had said it, and it was so! The name of Jean Laparde would never die!
He stripped off the long sculptor's apron that covered him from neck to knees, and held it out at arm's length, gazing first at it and then at the rough fisherman's clothes that hung, where Mother Fregeau had placed them, on the end peg on the wall—a little apart, significantly it seemed, whether by accident or design, from the new clothes that had come from Marseilles. And then he laughed out suddenly in a quick, exalted way, and tossed the apron on the bed. It was all changed, that! He was through with the fisherman's dress, he was through with Bernay-sur-Mer! To-night he was to dine with Bidelot and a score of others in Marseilles, and after that in a few days it would be—Paris.
He undressed hurriedly, and began to dress again in a clean suit—but a little slowly now, none too deftly. They were still strange to him these clothes; but then everything was strange. The people around him were strange. At times he felt awkward, constrained in their presence—and at times he could laugh down at them as from a superior height. Ay, he could laugh—they were at his feet! Only—he frowned heavily—he could not laugh at Myrna Bliss. He was not master there! And yet she, somehow, did not erect the barrier. It was himself that did that—because he could not forget that behind the roguish smile in the grey eyes might lurk the thought that, after all, he was only a fisherman.
A fisherman! They were cheering now outside. His hands shut tightly. A fisherman! He was no longer a fisherman! He was Jean Laparde, a sculptor of France, a man before whom lay a path of glory, a man whom the nation would acclaim, a man of whose future all stood in envy! They had told him that, these men whom France had already honoured, these men who had accepted him as more than their equal. But there was no need for them to tell him—he knew it in his soul. None, no man, the world itself, could hold back now the genius of Jean Laparde!
Paris! He was pacing the room now, his eyes afire. To-morrow or the next day, when the Blisses had made their plans, Paris and fame was his. What a life it was that now opened out before him! A place amongst the highest, the world to resound with the name of Jean Laparde—and those grey eyes, that bronze hair, that glorious beauty of the American—God! he would immortalise her in clay, in bronze, in marble.
Ay, they might well cheer while the chance was theirs, these people of Bernay-sur-Mer! To-morrow or the next day he would be saying good-bye to them, and—he stood suddenly still—and good-bye, too, to Marie-Louise. The thought put a damper upon his spirits; his brows gathered in deep furrows of impatient perplexity.
He had not seen much of Marie-Louise in the last week—he had seen her scarcely at all. Only twice—when she with many others had stood in the doorway to watch his work. She had smiled at him then, as though it were her work, too, as though it were a joint proprietorship—but she had gone before he could speak to her. And at the cottage, when he had been there at the invitation of Myrna or her father, Marie-Louise, strangely enough, now that he thought of it, was never to be seen.
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