Nobody's Girl Part 48

"A very beautiful dress to wear in the evening," said Mme. Bretoneux.

"But I am in mourning," answered Perrine.

"But being in black does not prevent you from wearing a lovely dress.

You are not dressed well enough to dine at my brother's table. You are very badly dressed--dressed up like a clever little dog."

Perrine replied that she knew she was not well dressed but she was somewhat humiliated to be compared with a clever little dog, and the way the comparison was made was an evident intention to lower her.

"I took what I could find at Mme. Lachaise's shop," she said in self-defense.

"It was all right for Mme. Lachaise to dress you when you were a little factory girl, but now, that it pleases my brother to have you sit at the table with him, we do not wish to blush for you. You must not mind us making fun of you, but you have no idea how you amused us in that dreadful waist you have been wearing...."

Mme. Bretoneux smiled as though she could still see Perrine in the hideous waist.

"But there," she said brightly, "all that can be remedied; you are a beautiful girl, there is no denying that, and I shall see that you have a dinner dress to set off your beauty and a smart little tailored costume to wear in the carriage, and when you see yourself in it you will remember who gave it you. I expect your underwear is no better than your waist. Let me see it...."

Thereupon, with an air of authority, she opened first one drawer, then another, then shut them again disdainfully with a shrug of her shoulders.

"I thought so," she said, "it is dreadful; not good enough for you."

Perrine felt suffocated; she could not speak.

"It's lucky," continued Mme. Bretoneux, "that I came here, for I intend to look after you."

Perrine wanted to refuse everything and tell this woman that she did not wish her to take care of her, but remembered the part she had to play. After all, Mme. Bretoneux's intentions were most generous; it was her words, her manner, that seemed so hard.

"I'll tell my brother," she continued, "that he must order from a dressmaker at Amiens, whose address I will give him, the dinner dress and the tailor suit which is absolutely necessary, and in addition some good underwear. In fact, a whole outfit. Trust in me and you shall have some pretty things, and I hope that they'll remind you of me all the time. Now don't forget what I have told you."

CHAPTER XXVI

PAINFUL ARGUMENTS

After the talk his mother had had with Perrine, Casimir, by his looks and manner, gave her every opportunity to confide in him. But she had no intention of telling him about the researches that his uncle was having made both in India and in England. True, they had no positive news of the exile; it was all vague and contradictory, but the blind man still hoped on. He left no stone unturned to find his beloved son.

Mme. Bretoneux's advice had some good effect. Until then Perrine had not taken the liberty of having the hood of the phaeton pulled up, if she thought the day was chilly, nor had she dared advise M. Vulfran to put on an overcoat nor suggest that he have a scarf around his neck; neither did she dare close the window in the study if the evening was too cool, but from the moment that Mme. Bretoneux had warned her that the damp mists and rain would be bad for him she put aside all timidity.

Now, no matter what the weather was like, she never got into the carriage without looking to see that his overcoat was in its place and a silk scarf in the pocket; if a slight breeze came up she put the scarf around his neck or helped him into his coat. If a drop of rain began to fall she stopped at once and put up the hood. When she first walked out with him, she had gone her usual pace and he had followed without a word of complaint. But now that she realized that a brisk walk hurt him and usually made him cough or breathe with difficulty, she walked slowly; in every way she devised means of going about their usual day's routine so that he should feel the least fatigue possible.

Day by day the blind man's affection for little Perrine grew. He was never effusive, but one day while she was carefully attending to his wants he told her that she was like a little daughter to him. She was touched. She took his hand and kissed it.

"Yes," he said, "you are a good girl." Putting his hand on her head, he added: "Even when my son returns you shall not leave us; he will be grateful to you for what you are to me."

"I am so little, and I want to be so much," she said.

"I will tell him what you have been," said the blind man, "and besides he will see for himself; for my son has a good kind heart."

[Ill.u.s.tration: HE TOLD HER THAT SHE WAS LIKE A LITTLE DAUGHTER TO HIM.]

Often he would speak in these terms, and Perrine always wanted to ask him how, if these were his sentiments, he could have been so unforgiving and severe with him, but every time she tried to speak the words would not come, for her throat was closed with emotion. It was a serious matter for her to broach such a subject, but on that particular evening she felt encouraged by what had happened. There could not have been a more opportune moment; she was alone with him in his study where no one came unless summoned. She was seated near him under the lamplight. Ought she to hesitate longer?

She thought not.

"Do you mind," she said, in a little trembling voice, "if I ask you something that I do not understand? I think of it all the time, and yet I have been afraid to speak."

"Speak out," he said.

"What I cannot understand," she said timidly, "is that loving your son as you do, you could be parted from him."

"It is because you are so young you do not understand," he said, "that there is duty as well as love. As a father, it was my duty to send him away; that was to teach him a lesson. I had to show him that my will was stronger than his. That is why I sent him to India where I intended to keep him but a short while. I gave him a position befitting my son and heir. He was the representative of my house. Did I know that he would marry that miserable creature? He was mad!"

"But Father Fields said that she was not a miserable creature," insisted Perrine.

"She was or she would not have contracted a marriage that was not valid in France," retorted the blind man, "and I will not recognize her as my daughter."

He said this in a tone that made Perrine feel suddenly cold. Then he continued abruptly: "You wonder why I am trying to get my son back now, if I did not want him back after he had married. Things have changed.

Conditions are not the same now as then. After fourteen years of this so-called marriage my son ought to be tired of this woman and of the miserable life that he has been forced to live on account of her.

Besides conditions for me have also changed. My health is not what it was, and I am blind. I cannot recover my sight unless I am operated upon and I must be in a calm state favorable to the success of this operation. When my son learns this do you think he will hesitate to leave this woman? I am willing to support her and her daughter also. I am sure many times he has thought of Maraucourt and wanted to return. If I love him I know that he also loves me. When he learns the truth he will come back at once, you will see."

"Then he would have to leave his wife and daughter?"

"He has no wife nor has he a daughter," said the old man sternly.

"Father Fields says that he was married at the Mission House by Father Leclerc," said Perrine.

"This marriage was contracted contrary to the French law," said M.

Vulfran.

"But was it not lawful in India?" asked Perrine.

"I will have it annulled in Rome," said the blind man.

"But the daughter?"

"The law would not recognize that child."

"Is the law everything?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that it is not the law that makes one love or not love one's parents or children. It was not the law that made me love my poor father. I loved him because he was good and kind and he loved me. I was happy when he kissed me, and smiled at me. I loved him and there was nothing that I liked better than to be with him. He loved me because I was his little girl and needed his affection; he loved me because he knew that I loved him with all my heart. The law had nothing to do with that. I did not ask if it was the law that made him my father. It was our love that made us so much to each other."

"What are you driving at?" asked M. Vulfran.

"I beg your pardon if I have said anything I should not say, but I speak as I think and as I feel."