"He had the women!"
"And we have not him!"
"He would not have left us!" she cried hysterically.
"I believe it."
"Had they taken me, do you think he would have lain behind walls? Or
skulked in safety here, while--while--" Her voice failed her.
He shook his head despondently.
"And that is all you can do?" she cried, and turned from him, and to him
again, extending her arms, in bitter scorn. "All you will do? Do you
forget that twice he spared your life? That in Paris once, and once in
Angers, he held his hand? That always, whether he stood or whether he
fled, he held himself between us and harm? Ay, always? And who will now
raise a hand for him? Who?"
"Madame!"
"Who? Who? Had he died in the field," she continued, her voice shaking
with grief, her hands beating the parapet--for she had turned from
him--"had he fallen where he rode last night, in the front, with his face
to the foe, I had viewed him tearless, I had deemed him happy! I had
prayed dry-eyed for him who--who spared me all these days and weeks! Whom
I robbed and he forgave me! Whom I tempted, and he forbore me! Ay, and
who spared not once or twice him for whom he must now--he must now--" And
unable to finish the sentence she beat her hands again and passionately
on the stones.
"Heaven knows, Madame," the minister cried vehemently, "Heaven knows, I
would advise you if I could."
"Why did he wear his corselet?" she wailed, as if she had not heard him.
"Was there no spear could reach his breast, that he must come to this? No
foe so gentle he would spare him this? Or why did he not die with me
in Paris when we waited? In another minute death might have come and
saved us this."
With the tears running down his face he tried to comfort her.
"Man that is a shadow," he said, "passeth away--what matter how? A
little while, a very little while, and we shall pass!"
"With his curse upon us!" she cried. And, shuddering, she pressed her
hands to her eyes to shut out the sight her fancy pictured.
He left her for a while, hoping that in solitude she might regain control
of herself. When he returned he found her seated, and outwardly more
composed; her arms resting on the parapet-wall, her eyes bent steadily on
the long stretch of hard sand which ran northward from the village. By
that route her lover had many a time come to her; there she had ridden
with him in the early days; and that way they had started for Paris on
such a morning and at such an hour as this, with sunshine about them, and
larks singing hope above the sand-dunes, and with wavelets creaming to
the horses' hoofs!