Mademoiselle Blanche

"Sorry?"

"Yes, because Madeleine will come back to me then, and I shall have to stay at home. I can't come any more as I do now."

A look of alarm appeared in her face. "But why can't you come just the same?" she asked, innocently.

He burst out laughing, and he felt a sudden desire to pat her on the cheek as he might have done to a child. What a child she was, anyway! Yet he would not have wished her to be different; she seemed to him just what a young girl should be.

"When your mother comes, I can't take breakfast with you any more, and I can't come early on Sunday mornings and stay all day. I shall have to go back to my lonely apartment."

"But you have Madeleine," she said, with a faint smile.

"Madeleine, yes, and she is good enough in her way." Then he suddenly threw his cigarette into the fireplace, and bent toward her. "Don't you know," he whispered, in a voice so low that Madeleine, who was moving about in the next room, could not hear him, "can't you see that it's you I shall miss? Can't you see that you've become everything in the world to me? Without you, dear Blanche, I shouldn't care to live. Before I met you I didn't know what life really was – I didn't know what love was. I loved you the first time I saw you, and the more I've seen you, the better I've known you, the dearer you've become to me. I don't think I ever really understood what it was to be pure and good till I knew you. You've made me ashamed of myself. Sometimes I feel as if I had no right to go near you. But I do love you, Blanche, and they say love helps a man to be good. I haven't dared to tell you this before; I've been afraid to ask you if you loved me. But this morning in church, it all came over me so – so that I must tell you. Blanche," he went on, taking her hand, "you aren't offended with me for saying this, are you? I love you so much – I can't help loving you. If you'll only love me a little, dear, I'll be satisfied. Won't you tell me if you do care for me a little – just a little?"

He knelt by her side, and tried to look into her face; but she turned her head away, and he saw that her neck was crimson. Her bosom kept rising and falling convulsively. Then he pressed toward her and clasped her in his arms and kissed her again and again, – on the face, the forehead, the hair, even on her ears when she buried her head on his shoulder. His lips were wet with her tears, and he felt radiantly, exultantly happy.

"I love you, I love you!" he kept repeating.

For the first time he felt sure that his love was returned; but he was not satisfied. He wanted to hear her speak out her love. His lips were on her cheek, and she was lying motionless in his arms, as he whispered:

"Won't you say that you love me, dear? Just three words. That isn't much, and it will make me the happiest man that ever lived."

Instead of speaking, she put her arms on his shoulders, as a child might have done, and he pressed her close to his breast again. Then he heard a noise behind him, and he saw Madeleine standing, big-eyed, in the doorway; she seemed too startled to move. He rose quickly to his feet, and still holding Blanche's hand, he said:

"Madeleine, come here!"

She came forward timidly, as if afraid she might be punished for her intrusion.

"Mademoiselle Blanche is going to be my wife, Madeleine."

Madeleine held out her arms to the girl, and for a moment they stood clasped in each other's embrace.

"Ah, Monsieur Jules," the old woman cried, "I pray God your mother can look down from heaven and see what a good daughter she's getting!"

IX

After confessing his love, Jules experienced, mingled with his exultation, a feeling of bewildered amazement at his own boldness. This was followed by a poignant regret that he hadn't spoken before. Now, however, that his weeks of doubt and of intermittent misery were over, he gave himself up to his happiness, which manifested itself in a wild exuberance of spirits.

In a short time he was speaking humorously of those weeks, ridiculing himself as if he had already become different, almost another person from what he had been then. He told Blanche about his tortures, and even succeeded in extorting a confession from her that she had been in love with him since the first Sunday when he had called at the apartment and acknowledged Durand's duplicity; she, too, had had her doubts and her fears. Then they became very confidential, and by the time the morning was over, and they found themselves in the restaurant, they felt as if they had known each other intimately for years.

In spite of Blanche's protests, Jules ordered a bottle of champagne and an elaborate luncheon.

"I suppose I ought to have asked Madeleine to come," he said, "but I wanted to be alone with you. Some day before your mother returns, we'll have another fête, and take Madeleine with us."

In the morning, when he spoke about a definite engagement, and she protested that her mother must be consulted, he had told her of his talk with Madame Perrault at the railway station. Now he went on to make plans for their marriage. There was no reason, he argued, why they should wait a long time; her mother had been engaged to Monsieur Berthier for three years, but she would not marry till Blanche had a protector. Jules liked to talk of himself in this character; it gave him a feeling of importance. So, altogether, he went on, the sooner the marriage took place the better. He would give up his place in the wool-house, and devote himself to his wife's career; for, of course, they couldn't be separated. They would be very happy travelling about, from one end of the world to the other.

It never occurred to either of them that Blanche might retire from the ring after marriage. She herself seemed to regard the circus as part of her life; she had been born in it, and she belonged to it as long as she was able to perform. As for Jules, he could not have dissociated her from the thought of the circus. Even now he felt as if he had himself become wedded to it, that he had acquired a kind of proprietary interest in it. He discussed Blanche's professional engagements as if they were his own. Why, he asked, couldn't the marriage take place during the weeks that intervened between her engagement at the Cirque Parisien and her appearance in Vienna? Jeanne and Louise could come up to Paris for Christmas and the New Year, and be present at the ceremony. By that time he would have his affairs arranged so that he could go with her to Vienna.

Of course, they must dismiss Pelletier after their marriage. Jules would take charge of his wife's affairs; his capacity for business would enable him to make good terms for her. He would plan wonderful tours; he would write to America, perhaps, and secure engagements for her there; artists were wonderfully well paid in America, better than in any other country, and they would enjoy seeing the new world together.

Blanche listened to his talk with a touching confidence; she seemed to think it natural that he should speak as if he had authority over her. She made no protest against any of his suggestions, though she repeated that nothing could be decided till her mother returned to Paris.

"But we'll write to your mother," said Jules. "We'll write to her this very day – this afternoon when we go back."

For a moment her face clouded.

"What's the matter? Don't you want me to write to your mother?"

She did not reply at once. When she did speak, she kept her eyes fixed on her plate.

"It will be so hard to be separated from her."

Jules laughed, and bent toward her.

"But you can't stay with her always," he said tenderly. "Then we'll take Madeleine with us. That will be a capital plan. She's strong and healthy, though she's over sixty, and she won't mind the travelling. Besides, we shall be in Vienna three months, and we'll rent a little apartment. It will be like being at home."

He spoke as if their future were settled, and his tone of confidence seemed to reassure her.

"I should like to have Madeleine," she said simply. "She is so good."

On their return to the apartment, they devoted themselves to writing long letters to Madame Perrault. Jules' letter was full of rhapsodies, of promises to be kind to the girl who had consented to be his wife, and of his plans for the future. They read their letters to each other, or rather Jules read all of his, and Blanche read part of hers, firmly refusing to allow him to hear the rest. They spent a very happy afternoon together, and in the evening Madeleine had a sumptuous dinner for them, with an enormous bunch of fresh roses on the table. In the evening they went to the Comédie Française, to finish what Jules declared to be the happiest day of his life.

Jules counted that day as the beginning of his real career. He looked back on himself during the years he had lived before it almost with pity. Since leaving the lycée, he had been merely a drudge, a piece of mechanism in the odious machinery of business. He had been content enough, but with the contentment of ignorance. How lonely and sordid his existence out of the office had been! He thought of his solitary dinners in cafés, surrounded by wretched beings like himself deprived of the happiness that comes from home and from an honest love. To the twins and his other comrades at the office he said nothing of the change that had taken place in his life; he was afraid they would chaff him; of course, when they heard he was going to marry an acrobat, they would make foolish jokes and treat him with a familiar levity. He determined not to tell them of his marriage until the eve of his departure from business; he would have to give the firm at least a fortnight's notice; but he would merely explain to Monsieur Mercier that he intended to devote a few months to travel, and thought of going to America.

Madame Perrault replied at once to Jules' letter. She made no pretence of being surprised by the news it contained; and she expressed her pleasure at the engagement, and gave her consent. But they must not make any definite plans until her return to Paris. That would be in about two weeks, for Aunt Sophie was very much better now and rapidly gaining strength, though she had as yet been unable to leave her bed. As soon as Sophie could go out, she was to be carried to the house of her cousin, Angélique Magnard, who would give her the best of care. Then Madame Perrault would be able to take Jeanne and Louise to Paris for the holidays; the girls were wild to see their dear Blanche again and to meet Jules. Monsieur Berthier talked of coming with them; he, too, was eager to make the acquaintance of Blanche's future husband.

After these preliminaries, Madame Perrault devoted herself to practical matters. She felt it her duty to inform Monsieur Jules that Blanche had no dot; she had earned a great deal of money, but most of it had been spent in maintaining the family; since the death of her father she had been their sole support. Of course, after marriage, her daughter's earnings would belong to Jules; but he must distinctly understand that he was taking a penniless bride. After her own marriage, Madame Perrault would have no fear for the future; Monsieur Berthier had promised of his own accord to provide for the girls; indeed, it was chiefly for their sake that, at the age of fifty-three, she was willing to marry again. So Blanche would no longer have her family dependent on her.

Jules replied with an impassioned letter. He didn't care whether Blanche had a dot or not. He wanted to marry her because he loved her, because without her his life would be unendurable: he would marry her if she were the poorest girl in France. It took him several pages to say this, and he read the letter with satisfaction, and then aloud to Blanche, who laughed over it, and gave him a timid little kiss in acknowledgment of his devotion. He thought he had done a commendable act, and he felt convinced that every word he had written was true.

At the office Jules grew reserved, and he resented haughtily the familiarities of the twins. Indeed, to all of his companions in the wool-house he could not help displaying the superiority he felt. He would be there only a few weeks longer, and he acted as if he were conferring a favor on his employer by staying. The twins spent many hours in discussing the change in him; but they could not discover the cause.

"You ought to have heard him talk to old Mercier the other day," said Leroux. "You'd think he was the President receiving a deputation."

Early in November, Blanche received a letter from her mother, saying Aunt Sophie was so much better that they had decided to move her the next day, and two days later she would herself leave Boulogne with the girls and Monsieur Berthier. Jules was both glad and sorry to hear the news, – sorry because his long tête-à-têtes with Blanche would end for a time, and glad because he would be able to arrange definitely with her mother for the marriage. Madeleine grieved at parting with the girl, but was consoled when Jules explained that she would probably be needed every night at the circus after Madame Perrault's return, for, of course, Monsieur Berthier would want to take his fiancée to the theatres. In speaking of Monsieur Berthier, Jules had adopted a facetious tone, which half-amused and half-pained Blanche.

"How droll it will be," he said one day, "to have two pairs of lovers billing and cooing together."

"Mamma doesn't bill and coo," the girl replied, with just a suggestion of resentment in her tone. "She's too sensible." Then Jules patted her affectionately on the cheek, and told her she mustn't take what he said so seriously.

"Monsieur Berthier must be a very good man, or he wouldn't get such a good wife," he said lightly. Then, with a comic look in his eyes, he added as an afterthought: "What a very good person I must be!"

The next night, when Jules appeared in the rue St. Honoré for dinner, he found the little apartment crowded. Madame Perrault embraced him, and by addressing him as "my son," seemed to receive him formally into the family. Then she introduced the two girls, who were much larger than he had imagined them to be. Jeanne, rosy-cheeked and black-eyed, approached him fearlessly, and offered her hand with a smile; Louise, fair and slight, with her light brown hair braided down her back, looked frightened, and blushed furiously when she received her salutation. The little fat man standing in front of the mantel, Jules recognized at once from his pointed white beard and laughing eyes.

"I should have known you in a crowd on the Boulevard," Jules said, as he extended his hand. "You're exactly like your photograph."

"And you are even better-looking than Mathilde said you were," Monsieur Berthier replied. "Ah, little one," he went on, turning to Blanche, and giving her a pinch on the arm, "you're getting a fine, handsome husband."

Jules tried to make friends with the girls. With Jeanne he had no difficulty; she was quite ready to banter with him, and he found her pert and quick-witted. Louise, however, was so shy that he could extract only monosyllables from her. She seemed to him very like Blanche, only less pretty. Jeanne had Blanche's beauty, more highly-colored and exuberant; her snapping black eyes showed, too, that she had a will and a temper of her own. Jules began to chaff her, to make her show her spirit, but she parried his jests good-humoredly, and she retaliated very smartly.