Chapter 31

Conclusion.

The hotel at Chaudfontaine was closed for the winter. Every window in the big white building was shuttered, every door barred; the courtyard was empty; not a footstep, nor a voice was resounded. Nevertheless, an open carriage from Liége stopped in front of the gate, and two people getting out, proceeded to look through the iron bars of the railing.

"Was I not right?" said Madelon. "I told you, Horace, it would be closed for the winter, and so it is."

"I don't care in the least," he replied. "If it affords me any gratification, Madelon, to look through the railings into that courtyard, I don't see why I should not have it."

"Oh! by all means," she answered; "but it is just a little tame, is it not?--for a sentimental visit, to be looking through these iron bars."

"That is the very place where I sat," said Graham, not heeding her, "and took you on my knee."

"I don't remember anything about it, Monsieur Horace----"

"Nothing, Madelon?"

"Well, perhaps--you gave me a fish, I remember--it was the fish that won my heart; and I have it still, you see."

"Oh! then, your heart was won?"

"A little," she answered, glancing up at him for a moment; and then, moving on, she said, "See here, Horace, this is the hawthorn bush under which I slept that morning after I had run away from the convent. How happy I was to have escaped! I remember standing at this gate afterwards eating my bread, and that dreadful woman came out of the hotel."

"Is there no way of getting in?" said Graham, shaking the gate.

"None, I am afraid," Madelon answered. "Stay, there used to be a path that led round at the back across a little bridge into the garden. Perhaps we might get in that way."

They were again disappointed; they found the path, and the wooden bridge that crossed the stream, but another closed gate prevented their entering the garden.

"This, however, becomes more and more interesting," said Graham, after looking at the spot attentively. "Yes, this is the very place, Madelon, where I first saw you with a doll in your arms."

"Really!" she said.

"Yes, really; and then some one--your father, I think--called you away."

They were silent for a minute, looking at the trees, the shrubs, the grass growing all rough and tangled in the deserted garden.

"We must go," Graham said at last; "it is getting late, Madelon, and we have to drive back to Liége, remember, after we have seen Jeanne-Marie."

They got into the carriage again, and drove on towards Le Trooz, along the valley under the hills, all red and brown with October woods, beside the river, gleaming between green pastures in the low afternoon sun. They had arrived at Liége the day before, and that morning was to have been devoted to visiting the convent; but the convent was gone. On inquiry, they learnt that the nuns had removed to another house ten miles distant from Liége, and on the hills where the old farm- house, the white, low-roofed convent had once stood so peacefully, a great iron-foundry was smoking and spouting fire day and night, covering field and garden with heaps of black smouldering ashes.

"How places and things change!" said Madelon, as they drove along; "we have had two disappointments to-day--shall we have a third, I wonder? Supposing Jeanne-Marie should have gone to live in another house? Ah! how glad I shall be to see her again!--and she will be pleased to see me, I know."

As she spoke, the scattered houses, the church, the white cottages of Le Trooz came in sight. Madelon checked the driver as they approached the little restaurant, the first house in the village, and she and Graham got out of the carriage. The bench still stood before the door, the pigeons were flying about, and the bee-hives were on their stand, but the blue board was gone from the white wall, and the place had a deserted look.

"It is strange," said Madelon. She pushed open the door that stood ajar, and went into the little public room; it was empty; the table shoved away into one corner, the chairs placed against the wall--no signs of the old life and occupation.

"Can Jeanne-Marie have gone away, do you think?" said Madelon, almost piteously. "I am sure she cannot be here."

"I will inquire," said Graham.

He went out into the road, and stopped a little girl of ten or twelve years, who was walking towards the village with a pitcher of water.

"Do you know whether the woman who lived in this house has left?" he asked. "Jeanne-Marie she was called, I think?"

The child stared up at the strange gentleman with the foreign accent:

"Jeanne-Marie that used to live here?" she said. "She is dead."

"Dead?" cried Madelon. The tears came rushing into her eyes. "Ah! why did I not know? I would have come if I had known. When did she die?"

"More than a month ago," the girl answered; "she died here in this house."

"And who lives here now?" inquired Graham.

"Jacques Monnier--he that works at the factory now. He is out all day; but his wife should be here."

And in fact, at the sound of the voices, the door leading into the kitchen opened, and a young woman appeared.

"Pardon," said Madelon, going forward; "we came here to inquire for Jeanne-Marie; but she--she is dead, we hear."

"Yes, she is dead," the woman replied; then, in answer to further questions, told how Jeanne-Marie, when she was taken ill, had refused to let any one be written to, or sent for; and had died alone at last with no one near her but a hired nurse. "She left enough money for her burial, and to have a wooden cross put on her grave," said the woman, "and asked M. le Curé to see that all her things were sold, and the money given to the poor."

"Is she buried here?" said Madelon. "Horace, I should like to see her grave."

"Louise, there, can show it to you," says Madame Monnier, pointing to the child; "run home with your water, _ma petite_, and then come back and show Monsieur and Madame the road to the churchyard."

"And I have a favour to beg," said Madelon, turning to the woman again. "I knew Jeanne-Marie well; she was very kind to me at one time. Might I see the room in which she died? It is upstairs, is it not, with the window opening on to the steps leading into the garden?"

The woman consented civilly enough, concealing any astonishment she might feel at this tall, beautiful lady, who had come to inquire after Jeanne-Marie; and Madelon left Graham below, and went up alone to the little bed-room, where she had spent so many hours. It was hardly altered. The bed stood in the old place; the vines clustered round the window. Madelon's heart was full of sorrow; she had loved Jeanne-Marie so much, and more and more perhaps, as years went on, and she had learnt to understand better all that the woman had done for her--and she had died alone--she who had saved her life.

When she came down again Louise had reappeared, and was waiting to conduct them to the churchyard. The child went on in front, and they followed her in silence down the village street. It was already evening, the sun had sunk behind the hills; the men were returning from their work; the children were playing and shouting, and the women stood gossiping before their doors. All was life and animation in the little village, where a strange, silent woman had once passed to and fro, with deeds and words of kindness for the suffering and sorrowful, but who would be seen there no more.

"There is the grave," says Louise, pointing it out to them. It was in a corner of the little graveyard; the earth was still fresh over it, and the black cross at its head was one of the newest amongst the hundred similar ones round about. Graham dismissed the child with a gratuity, and he and Madelon went up to the grave. There was no name, only the initials J. M. R. painted on the cross beneath the three white tears, and the customary "_Priez pour elle!_" Some one had hung up a wreath of immortelles, and a rose-tree, twined round a neighbouring cross, had shed its petals above Jeanne-Marie's head.

Madelon knelt down and began to pull out some weeds that had sprung up, whilst Graham stood looking on. Long afterwards, one might fancy, would that hour still live in his memory--the peaceful stillness brooding over the little graveyard, the sunset sky, the sheltering hills, the scent of the falling roses, and Madelon, in her dark dress, kneeling by the grave. Her task was soon accomplished, but she knelt on motionless. Who shall say of what she was thinking? Something perhaps of the real meaning of life, of its great underlying sadness, ennobled by patient suffering, by unselfish devotion, for presently she turned round to Graham.

"Oh, Horace," she said, "help me to be good; I am not, you know, but I would like to be----and you will help me."

"My little Madelon!" he raised her up, he took her in his arms. "We will both try to be good, with God's help. The world is all before us, to work in, and do our best--we will do what we can; with God's help, I say, we will do what we can."

They drove swiftly back towards Liége; the air blew freshly in their faces, the sunset colours faded, the stars came out one by one. As they vanish from our sight, they seem to fade into the mysterious twilight land. For them, as for us, other suns will rise, other days will dawn, but we shall have no part in them; between them and us falls the darkness of eternal separation.

THE END.

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Typographical errors silently corrected by the transcriber :