The Galley Slave's Ring Part 17

While her daughter was engaged with her needle, Madam Lebrenn saw to the books of the establishment. She was a tall woman of forty. Her face, at once serious and kind, preserved the traces of extraordinary beauty. In the cadence of her voice, her carriage, and her countenance there was a certain calmness and firmness that conveyed a high opinion of her nature. A glance at her was enough to remind one that our mothers, the Gallic women, took part in the councils of the nation on critical occasions, and that such was the valor of those matrons that Diodorus Siculus expresses himself in these terms:

"The women of Gaul vie with the men not in tallness only, they also match them by their moral strength."

And Strabo adds these significant words:

"The Gallic women are fertile and good teachers."

Mademoiselle Velleda Lebrenn sat by the side of her mother. So marked was the girl's exceptional beauty that none could behold her without being struck by its radiance. Her mien was at once proud, ingenuous and thoughtful. Nothing more limpid than the blue of her eyes; nothing more dazzling than her complexion; nothing loftier than the carriage of her charming head, crowned with long tresses of brown hair that here and there gleamed in gold. Tall, lithesome and strong without masculinity, the sight and nature of the beauty explained the paternal whim that caused the merchant to give his child the name Velleda, the name of an ill.u.s.trious heroine in the patriotic annals of the Gauls. Mademoiselle Lebrenn could be readily imagined with her brow wreathed in oak leaves, clad in a long white robe belted with bra.s.s, and vibrating the gold harp of the female druids, those wonderful teachers of our forefathers who, exalting them with the thought of the immortality of the soul, taught them to die with so much grandeur and serenity! In Mademoiselle Lebrenn the type was reproduced of those Gallic women, clad in black, with arms "so wonderfully white and nervy," as Ammienus Marcellinus expresses it, who followed their husbands to battle, with their children in their chariots of war, encouraged the combatants with word and gesture, and mingled among them in the hour of victory or of defeat, ever preferring death to slavery and shame.

Those whose minds were not stored with these tragic and glorious remembrances of the past saw in Mademoiselle Lebrenn a beautiful girl of eighteen, coiffed in her magnificent head of brown hair, and whose elegant shape outlined itself under a pretty high-necked robe of light blue poplin, which set off a little orange cravat tied around her neat, white collar.

While Madam Lebrenn was casting up her accounts and her daughter sewed, occasionally exchanging a few words with her mother, Gildas Pakou, the shop-boy, stood at the door. The youngster was uneasy and greatly disturbed in mind, so very much disturbed that it never occurred to him, as was otherwise his wont, to recite promiscuously favorite pa.s.sages from his beloved Breton songs.

The worthy fellow was preoccupied with just one thought--the strange contrast that he found between the reality and his mother's promises, she having informed him that St. Denis Street in general, and the house of Monsieur Lebrenn in particular, were particularly quiet and peaceful spots.

Gildas suddenly turned about and said to Madam Lebrenn in a high state of alarm:

"Madam! Madam! Listen!"

"What is it, Gildas?" asked Madam Lebrenn, proceeding unperturbed to make her entries in the large ledger.

"But, madam, it is the drum! Listen! Besides--Oh, good G.o.d!--I see some men running!"

"What of it, Gildas," returned Madam Lebrenn; "let them run."

"Mother," put in Velleda after listening a few seconds, "it is the call to arms. There must be some fear that the agitation that has reigned in Paris since yesterday may spread."

"Jeanike," Madam Lebrenn called out to the maid servant, "Monsieur Lebrenn's National Guard uniform must be got ready. He may want it on his return home."

"Yes, madam, I shall see to it," answered Jeanike, going to the rear room.

"Gildas," Madam Lebrenn proceeded, "can you see the St. Denis Gate from where you are?"

"Yes, madam," answered Gildas, all in a tremble; "would you want me to go there?"

"No; be at ease; only let me know whether there is much of a crowd gathering at that end of the street."

"Oh! yes, madam," answered Gildas, craning his neck. "It looks like an ant-hill. Oh, good G.o.d! Madam! Madam! Oh, my G.o.d!"

"What is it now, Gildas?"

"Oh, madam! Down there--the drums--they were about to turn the corner--"

"Well?"

"A lot of men in blouses stopped them--they have broken the drums.

Listen! Madam! Look! The whole crowd is running this way. Do you hear them screaming, madam? Should we not close the shop?"

"It is very evident, Gildas, you are none too brave," said Mademoiselle Lebrenn without raising her eyes from her needlework.

At that moment a man clad in a blouse and dragging with difficulty a small handbarrow that seemed to be heavily loaded, stopped before the door, pulled the barrow up alongside the sidewalk, stepped into the shop, and accosted the merchant's wife:

"Monsieur Lebrenn, madam?"

"This is his place."

"I have here four bales for him."

"Linen, I suppose?" asked Madam Lebrenn.

"Well, madam, I think so," answered the messenger with a smile.

"Gildas," she resumed, addressing the good fellow, who was casting ever more uneasy glances into the street, "help monsieur carry the bales to the rear of the shop."

The messenger and Gildas raised the bales out of the barrow. They were long and thick rolls, and were wrapped in coa.r.s.e grey cloth.

"This must be fiercely close-packed linen," remarked Gildas as, with great effort, he was helping the barrowman to carry in the last of the four rolls. "This thing is as heavy as lead."

"Do you really think so, my friend?" said the man in the blouse, fixedly looking at Gildas, who modestly lowered his eyes and blushed.

The barrowman thereupon addressed himself to Madam Lebrenn, saying:

"There, my errand is done, madam. I must, above all things, recommend to you that the bales be kept in a dry place, and no fire near, until Monsieur Lebrenn arrives. That linen is very--very delicate."

And the barrowman mopped the sweat from his forehead.

"You must have had work to wheel those bales here all alone," remarked Madam Lebrenn kindly; and opening the drawer in which she kept the small change, she took out a ten-sou piece, which she pushed over the desk to the barrowman. "Take this for your pains."

"Thank you very much, madam," answered the man, smiling. "I have been paid."

"A messenger _thanks very much_, and refuses a tip!" said Gildas to himself. "A puzzling--a very puzzling house this is!"

Herself considerably surprised at the manner in which the barrowman formulated his declination, Madam Lebrenn raised her eyes and saw a man of about thirty years, of an agreeable face, and who, an exceptional thing with package carriers, had remarkably white hands, carefully trimmed nails, and a neat gold ring on his little finger.

"Could you tell me, monsieur," asked the merchant's wife, "whether the excitement in Paris is on the increase?"

"Very much so, madam. One can hardly move on the boulevard. Troops are pouring in from all sides. Artillerymen are posted in front of the Gymnasium with their fuses lighted. I came across two squadrons of dragoons on patrol duty, with loaded carbines. Everywhere the roll of the drum is calling to arms--although, I must say, the National Guard does not seem to be in any great hurry. But you must excuse me, madam,"

added the barrowman, bowing politely to Madam Lebrenn and her daughter.

"It will be soon four o'clock. I am in a hurry."

He went out, took his handbarrow and wheeled it rapidly away.

On hearing of artillerymen stationed in the neighborhood with lighted fuses in hand, Gildas was overwhelmed with a fresh flood of misgivings.

Nevertheless, rocked between fear and curiosity, he risked another peep into the fearful St. Denis Street, which lay so near to the artillery station.

At the moment that Gildas stretched his neck outside of the shop again, the young girl who had taken breakfast with the Count of Plouernel that very morning, and who improvised such giddy-headed ditties, emerged from the alley of the house where George d.u.c.h.ene lodged, and which, as was stated before, stood opposite the linendraper's shop.

Pradeline looked sad and uneasy. After taking a few steps on the sidewalk, she approached the shop of Lebrenn as near as she dared, in order to cast an inquisitive look within. Unfortunately, the shade over the window intercepted the sight. True enough, the door was ajar. But Gildas, who stood before it, entirely obstructed the pa.s.sage.