CHAPTER XIV.

BIDIANE RECEIVES A SHOCK.

"Whate'er thy lot, whoe'er thou be,-- Confess thy folly, kiss the rod, And in thy chastening sorrow, see The hand of God."

MONTGOMERY.

Bidiane flashed around upon her companions. Rose--pale, trembling, almost unearthly in a beauty from which everything earthly and material seemed to have been purged away--stood extending her hands to the wanderer, her only expression one of profound thanksgiving for his return.

Agapit, on the contrary, sat stock-still, his face convulsed with profound and bitter contempt, almost with hatred; and Bidiane, in speechless astonishment, stared from him to the others.

Charlitte was not dead,--he had returned; and Rose was not surprised,--she was even glad to see him! What did it mean, and where was Mr. Nimmo's share in this reunion? She clenched her hands, her eyes filled with despairing tears, and, in subdued anger, she surveyed the very ordinary-looking man, who had surrendered one of his brown hands to Rose, in pleased satisfaction.

"You are more stunning than ever, Rose," he said, coolly kissing her; "and who is this young lady?" and he pointed a sturdy forefinger at Bidiane, who stood in the background, trembling in every limb.

"It is Bidiane LeNoir, Charlitte, from up the Bay. Bidiane, come shake hands with my husband."

"I forbid," said Agapit, calmly. He had recovered himself, and, with a face as imperturbable as that of the sphinx, he now sat staring up into the air.

"Agapit," said Rose, pleadingly, "will you not greet my husband after all these years?"

"No," he said, "I will not," and coolly taking up his pipe he lighted it, turned away from them, and began to smoke.

Rose, with her blue eyes dimmed with tears, looked at her husband. "Do not be displeased. He will forgive in time; he has been a brother to me all the years that you have been away."

Charlitte understood Agapit better than she did, and, shrugging his shoulders as if to beg her not to distress herself, he busied himself with staring at Bidiane, whose curiosity and bewilderment had culminated in a kind of stupefaction, in which she stood surreptitiously pinching her arm in order to convince herself that this wonderful reappearance was real,--that the man sitting so quietly before her was actually the husband of her beloved Rose.

Charlitte's eyes twinkled mischievously, as he surveyed her. "Were you ever shipwrecked, young lady?" he asked.

Bidiane shuddered, and then, with difficulty, ejaculated, "No, never."

"I was," said Charlitte, unblushingly, "on a cannibal island. All the rest of the crew were eaten. I was the only one spared, and I was left shut up in a hut in a palm grove until six months ago, when a passing ship took me off and brought me to New York."

Bidiane, by means of a vigorous effort, was able to partly restore her mind to working order. Should she believe this man or not? She felt dimly that she did not like him, yet she could not resist Rose's touching, mute entreaty that she should bestow some recognition on the returned one. Therefore she said, confusedly, "Those cannibals, where did they live?"

"In the South Sea Islands, 'way yonder," and Charlitte's eyes seemed to twinkle into immense distance.

Rose was hanging her head. This recital pained her, and before Bidiane could again speak, she said, hurriedly, "Do not mention it. Our Lord and the blessed Virgin have brought you home. Ah! how glad Father Duvair will be, and the village."

"Good heavens!" said Charlitte. "Do you think I care for the village. I have come to see you."

For the first time Rose shrank from him, and Agapit brought down his eyes from the sky to glance keenly at him.

"Charlitte," faltered Rose, "there have been great changes since you went away. I--I--" and she hesitated, and looked at Bidiane.

Bidiane shrank behind a spruce-tree near which she was standing, and from its shelter looked out like a small red squirrel of an inquiring turn of mind. She felt that she was about to be banished, and in the present dazed state of her brain she dreaded to be alone.

Agapit's inexorable gaze sought her out, and, taking his pipe from his mouth, he sauntered over to her. "Wilt thou run away, little one? We may have something to talk of not fit for thy tender ears."

"Yes, I will," she murmured, shocked into unexpected submission by the suppressed misery of his voice. "I will be in the garden," and she darted away.

The coast was now clear for any action the new arrival might choose to take. His first proceeding was to stare hard at Agapit, as if he wished that he, too, would take himself away; but this Agapit had no intention of doing, and he smoked on imperturbably, pretending not to see Charlitte's irritated glances, and keeping his own fixed on the azure depths of the sky.

"You mention changes," said Charlitte, at last, turning to his wife. "What changes?"

"You have just arrived, you have heard nothing,--and yet there would be little to hear about me, and Sleeping Water does not change much,--yet--"

Charlitte's cool glance wandered contemptuously over that part of the village nearest them. "It is dull here,--as dull as the cannibal islands. I think moss would grow on me if I stayed."

"But it would break my heart to leave it," said Rose, desperately.

"I would take good care of you," he said, jocularly. "We would go to New Orleans. You would amuse yourself well. There are young men there,--plenty of them,--far smarter than the boys on the Bay."

Rose was in an agony. With frantic eyes she devoured the cool, cynical face of her husband, then, with a low cry, she fell on her knees before him. "Charlitte, Charlitte, I must confess."

Charlitte at once became intensely interested, and forgot to watch Agapit, who, however, got up, and, savagely biting his pipe, strolled to a little distance.

"I have done wrong, my husband," sobbed Rose.

Charlitte's eyes twinkled. Was he going to hear a confession of guilt that would make his own seem lighter?

"Forgive me, forgive me," she moaned. "My heart is glad that you have come back, yet, oh, my husband, I must tell you that it also cries out for another."

"For Agapit?" he said, kindly, stroking her clenched hands.

"No,--no, no, for a stranger. You know I never loved you as a woman should love her husband. I was so young when I married. I thought only of attending to my house. Then you went away; I was sorry, so sorry, when news came of your death, but my heart was not broken. Five years ago this stranger came, and I felt--oh, I cannot tell you--but I found what this love was. Then I had to send him away, but, although he was gone, he seemed to be still with me. I thought of him all the time,--the wind seemed to whisper his words in my ear as I walked. I saw his handsome face, his smiling eyes. I went daily over the paths his feet used to take. After a long, long time, I was able to tear him from my mind. Now I know that I shall never see him again, that I shall only meet him after I die, yet I feel that I belong to him, that he belongs to me. Oh, my husband, this is love, and is it right that, feeling so, I should go with you?"

"Who is this man?" asked Charlitte. "What is he called?"

Rose winced. "Vesper is his name; Vesper Nimmo,--but do not let us talk of him. I have put him from my mind."

"Did he make love to you?"

"Oh, yes; but let us pass that over,--it is wicked to talk of it now."

Charlitte, who was not troubled with any delicacy of feeling, was about to put some searching and crucial questions to her, but forbore, moved, despite himself, by the anguish and innocence of the gaze bent upon him. "Where is he now?"

"In Paris. I have done wrong, wrong," and she again buried her face in her hands, and her whole frame shook with emotion. "Having had one husband, it would have been better to have thought only of him. I do not think one should marry again, unless--"

"Nonsense," said Charlitte, abruptly. "The fellow should have married you. He got tired, I guess. By this time he's had half a dozen other fancies."

Rose shrank from him in speechless horror, and, seeing it, Charlitte made haste to change the subject of conversation. "Where is the boy?"

"He is with him," she said, hurriedly.

"That was pretty cute in you," said Charlitte, with a good-natured vulgar laugh. "You were afraid I'd come home and take him from you,--you always were a little fool, Rose. Get up off the grass, and sit down, and don't distress yourself so. This isn't a hanging matter, and I'm not going to bully you; I never did."

"No, never," she said, with a fresh outburst of tears. "You were always kind, my husband."

"I think our marriage was all a mistake," he said, good-humoredly, "but we can't undo it. I knew you never liked me,--if you had, I might never--that is, things might have been different. Tell me now when that fool, Agapit, first began to set you against me?"

"He has not set me against you, my husband; he rarely speaks of you."

"When did you first find out that I wasn't dead?" said Charlitte, persistently; and Rose, who was as wax in his hands, was soon saying, hesitatingly, "I first knew that he did not care for you when Mr. Nimmo went away."

"How did you know?"

"He broke your picture, my husband,--oh, do not make me tell what I do not wish to."

"How did he break it?" asked Charlitte, and his face darkened.

"He struck it with his hand,--but I had it mended."

"He was mad because I was keeping you from the other fellow. Then he told you that you had better give him the mitten?"

"Yes," said Rose, sighing heavily, and sitting mute, like a prisoner awaiting sentence.

"You have not done quite right, Rose," said her husband, mildly, "not quite right. It would have been better for you to have given that stranger the go by. He was only amusing himself. Still, I can't blame you. You're young, and mighty fine looking, and you've kept on the straight through your widowhood. I heard once from some sailors how you kept the young fellows off, and you always said you'd had a good husband. I shall never forget that you called me good, Rose, for there are some folks that think I am pretty bad."

"Then they are evil folks," she said, tremulously; "are we not all sinners? Does not our Lord command us to forgive those who repent?"

A curious light came into Charlitte's eyes, and he put his tongue in his cheek. Then he went on, calmly. "I'm on my way from Turk's Island to Saint John, New Brunswick,--I've got a cargo of salt to unload there, and, 'pon my word, I hadn't a thought of calling here until I got up in the Bay, working towards Petit Passage. I guess it was old habit that made me run for this place, and I thought I'd give you a call, and see if you were moping to death, and wanted to go away with me. If you do, I'll be glad to have you. If not, I'll not bother you."

A deadly faintness came over Rose. "Charlitte, are you not sorry for your sin? Ah! tell me that you repent. And will you not talk to Father Duvair? So many quiet nights I think of you and pray that you may understand that you are being led into this wickedness. That other woman,--she is still living?"

"What other woman? Oh, Lord, yes,--I thought that fool Agapit had had spies on me."

Rose was so near fainting that she only half comprehended what he said.

"I wish you'd come with me," he went on, jocosely. "If you happened to worry I'd send you back to this dull little hole. You're not going to swoon, are you? Here, put your head on this," and he drew up to her a small table on which Bidiane had been playing solitaire. "You used not to be delicate."

"I am not now," she whispered, dropping her head on her folded arms, "but I cannot hold myself up. When I saw you come, I thought it was to say you were sorry. Now--"

"Come, brace up, Rose," he said, uneasily. "I'll sit down beside you for awhile. There's lots of time for me to repent yet," and he chuckled shortly and struck his broad chest with his fist. "I'm as strong as a horse; there's nothing wrong with me, except a little rheumatism, and I'll outgrow that. I'm only fifty-two, and my father died at ninety. Come on, girl,--don't cry. I wish I hadn't started this talk of taking you away. You'd be glad of it, though, if you'd go. Listen till I tell you what a fine place New Orleans is--"

Rose did not listen to him. She still sat with her flaxen head bowed on her arms, that rested on the little table. She was a perfect picture of silent, yet agitated distress.

"You are not praying, are you?" asked her husband, in a disturbed manner. "I believe you are. Come, I'll go away."

For some time there was no movement in the half prostrated figure, then the head moved slightly, and Charlitte caught a faint sentence, "Repent, my husband."

"Yes, I repent," he said, hastily. "Good Lord, I'll do anything. Only cheer up and let me out of this."

The grief-stricken Rose pushed back the hair from her tear-stained face and slowly raised her head from her arms.

It was only necessary for her to show that face to her husband. So impressed was it with the stamp of intense anguish of mind, of grief for his past delinquencies of conduct, of a sorrow nobly, quietly borne through long years, that even he--callous, careless, and thoughtless--was profoundly moved.

For a long time he was silent. Then his lip trembled and he turned his head aside. "'Pon my word, Rose,--I didn't think you'd fret like this. I'll do better; let me go now."

One of her hands stole with velvety clasp to his brown wrists, and while the gentle touch lasted he sat still, listening with an averted face to the words whispered in his ear.

Agapit, in the meantime, was walking in the garden with Bidiane. He had told her all that she wished to know with regard to the recreant husband, and in a passionate, resentful state of mind she was storming to and fro, scarcely knowing what she said.

"It is abominable, treacherous!--and we stand idly here. Go and drive him away, Agapit. He should not be allowed to speak to our spotless Rose. I should think that the skies would fall--and I spoke to him, the traitor! Go, Agapit,--I wish you would knock him down."

Agapit, with an indulgent glance, stood at a little distance from her, softly murmuring, from time to time, "You are very young, Bidiane."

"Young! I am glad that I am young, so that I can feel angry. You are stolid, unfeeling. You care nothing for Rose. I shall go myself and tell that wretch to his face what I think of him."

She was actually starting, but Agapit caught her gently by the arm. "Bidiane, restrain yourself," and drawing her under the friendly shade of a solitary pine-tree that had been left when the garden was made, he smoothed her angry cheeks and kissed her hot forehead.

"You condone his offence,--you, also, some day, will leave me for some woman," she gasped.

"This from you to me," he said, quietly and proudly, "when you know that we Acadiens are proud of our virtue,--of the virtue of our women particularly; and if the women are pure, it is because the men are so."

"Rose cannot love that demon," exclaimed Bidiane.

"No, she does not love him, but she understands what you will understand when you are older,--the awful sacredness of the marriage tie. Think of one of the sentences that she read to us last Sunday from Thomas à Kempis: 'A pure heart penetrates heaven and hell.' She has been in a hell of suffering herself. I think when in it she wished her husband were dead. Her charity is therefore infinite towards him. Her sins of thought are equal in her chastened mind to his sins of body."

"But you will not let her go away with him?"

"She will not wish to go, my treasure. She talks to him, and repent, repent, is, I am sure, the burden of her cry. You do not understand that under her gentleness is a stern resolve. She will be soft and kind, yet she would die rather than live with Charlitte or surrender her child to him."

"But he may wish to stay here," faltered Bidiane.

"He will not stay with her, _chérie_. She is no longer a girl, but a woman. She is not resentful, yet Charlitte has sinned deeply against her, and she remembers,--and now I must return to her. Charlitte has little delicacy of feeling, and may stay too long."

"Wait a minute, Agapit,--is it her money that he is after?"

"No, little one, he is not mercenary. He would not take money from a woman. He also would not give her any unless she begged him to do so. I think that his visit is a mere caprice that, however, if humored, would degenerate into a carrying away of Rose,--and now _au revoir_."

Bidiane, in her excited, overstrained condition of mind, bestowed one of her infrequent caresses on him, and Agapit, in mingled surprise and gratification, found a pair of loving arms flung around his neck, and heard a frantic whisper: "If you ever do anything bad, I shall kill you; but you will not, for you are good."

"Thank you. If I am faithless you may kill me," and, reluctantly leaving her, he strode along the summit of the slight hill on which the house stood, until he caught sight of the tableau on the lawn.

Charlitte was just leaving his wife. His head was hanging on his breast; he looked ashamed of himself, and in haste to be gone, yet he paused and cast an occasional stealthy and regretful glance at Rose, who, with a face aglow with angelic forgiveness, seemed to be bestowing a parting benediction on him.

The next time that he lifted his head, his small, sharp eyes caught sight of Agapit, whereupon he immediately snatched his hand from Rose, and hastily began to descend the hill towards the river.

Rose remained standing, and silently watched him. She did not look at Agapit,--her eyes were riveted on her husband. Something within her seemed to cry out as his feet carried him down the hill to the brink of the inexorable stream, where the bones of so many of his countrymen lay.

"_Adieu_, my husband," she called, suddenly and pleadingly, "thou wilt not forget."

Charlitte paused just before he reached the bridge, and, little dreaming that his feet were never to cross its planks, he swept a glance over the peaceful Bay, the waiting boat, and the beautiful ship. Then he turned and waved his hand to his wife, and for one instant, they remembered afterwards, he put a finger on his breast, where lay a crucifix that she had just given him.

"_Adjheu_, Rose," he called, loudly, "I will remember." At the same minute, however, that the smile of farewell lighted up his face, an oath slipped to his lips, and he stepped back from the bridge.