Part 5

That was the summer of the building of the grand stone tower of the church. The men of Abbéville did it themselves, with their own hands, for the glory of God. They were keen about that, and the _curé_ was the keenest of them all. No sharing of that glory with workmen from Quebec, if you please! Abbéville was only forty years old, but they already understood the glory of God quite as well there as at Quebec, without doubt. They could build their own tower, perfectly, and they would. Besides, it would cost less.

Vaillantcœur was the chief carpenter. He attended to the affair of beams and timbers. Leclère was the chief mason. He directed the affair of dressing the stones and laying them. That required a very careful head, you understand, for the tower must be straight. In the floor a little crookedness did not matter; but in the wall—that might be serious. People have been killed by a falling tower. Of course, if they were going into church, they would be sure of heaven. But then think—what a disgrace for Abbéville!

Everyone was glad that Leclère bossed the raising of the tower. They admitted that he might be _lâche_, but he was assuredly careful. Vaillantcœur alone grumbled, and said the work went too slowly, and even swore that the sockets for the beams were too shallow, or else too deep, it made no difference which. That _bête_ Prosper made trouble always by his poor work. But the friction never came to a blaze; for the _curé_ was pottering about the tower every day and all day long, and a few words from him would make a quarrel go off in smoke.

"_Doucement, mes garçons_," he would say; "work smooth and you work fast. The logs in the river run well when they run all the same way. But when two logs cross each other, on the same rock—psst! a jam! The whole drive is hung up! Do not run crossways, my children."

The walls rose steadily, straight as a steamboat pipe—ten, twenty, thirty, forty feet; it was time to put in the two cross-girders, lay the floor of the belfry, finish off the stonework, and begin the pointed wooden spire. The _curé_ had gone to Quebec that very day to buy the shining plates of tin for the roof, and a beautiful cross of gilt for the pinnacle.

Leclère was in front of the tower putting on his overalls. Vaillantcœur came up, swearing mad. Three or four other workmen were standing about.

"Look here, you Leclère," said he, "I tried one of the cross-girders yesterday afternoon and it wouldn't go. The templet on the north is crooked—crooked as your teeth. We had to let the girder down again. I suppose we must trim it off some way, to get a level bearing, and make the tower weak, just to match your _sacré_ bad work, eh?"

"Well," said Prosper, pleasant and quiet enough, "I'm sorry for that, Raoul. Perhaps I could put that templet straight, or perhaps the girder might be a little warped and twisted, eh? What? Suppose we measure it."

Sure enough, they found the long timber was not half seasoned and had cork-screwed itself out of shape at least three inches. Vaillantcœur sat on the sill of the doorway and did not even look at them while they were measuring. When they called out to him what they had found, he strode over to them.

"It's a dam' lie," he said, sullenly. "Prosper Leclère, you slipped the string. None of your _sacré chicane_! I have enough of it already. Will you fight, you cursed sneak?"

Prosper's face went gray, like the mortar in the trough. His fists clenched and the cords on his neck stood out as if they were ropes. He breathed hard. But he only said three words:

"No! Not here."

"Not here? Why not? There is room. The _curé_ is away. Why not here?"

"It is the house of _le bon Dieu_. Can we build it in hate?"

"_Polisson!_ You make an excuse. Then come to Girard's, and fight there."

Again Prosper held in for a moment, and spoke three words:

"No! Not now."

"Not now? But when, you heart of a hare? Will you sneak out of it until you turn gray and die? When will you fight, little musk-rat?"

"When I have forgotten. When I am no more your friend."

Prosper picked up his trowel and went into the tower. Raoul bad-worded him and every stone of his building from foundation to cornice, and then went down the road to get a bottle of cognac.

An hour later he came back breathing out threatenings and slaughter, strongly flavored with raw spirits. Prosper was working quietly on the top of the tower, at the side away from the road. He saw nothing until Raoul, climbing up by the ladders on the inside, leaped on the platform and rushed at him like a crazy lynx.

"Now!" he cried, "no hole to hide in here, rat! I'll squeeze the lies out of you."

He gripped Prosper by the head, thrusting one thumb into his eye, and pushing him backward on the scaffolding.

Blinded, half-maddened by the pain, Prosper thought of nothing but to get free. He swung his long arm upward and landed a fearful blow on Raoul's face that dislocated the jaw; then twisting himself downward and sideways, he fell in toward the wall. Raoul plunged forward, stumbled, let go his hold, and pitched out from the tower, arms spread, clutching the air.

Forty feet straight down! A moment—or was it an eternity?—of horrible silence. Then the body struck the rough stones at the foot of the tower with a thick, soft dunt, and lay crumpled up among them, without a groan, without a movement.

When the other men, who had hurried up the ladders in terror, found Leclère, he was peering over the edge of the scaffold, wiping the blood from his eyes, trying to see down.

"I have killed him," he muttered, "my friend! He is smashed to death. I am a murderer. Let me go. I must throw myself down!"

They had hard work to hold him back. As they forced him down the ladders he trembled like a poplar.

But Vaillantcœur was not dead. No; it was incredible—to fall forty feet and not be killed—they talk of it yet all through the valley of the Lake St. John—it was a miracle! But Vaillantcœur had broken only a nose, a collar-bone, and three ribs—for one like him that was but a _bagatelle_. A good doctor from Chicoutimi, a few months of nursing, and he would be on his feet again, almost as good a man as he had ever been.

It was Leclère who put himself in charge of this.

"It is my affair," he said—"my fault! It was not a fair place to fight. Why did I strike? I must attend to this bad work."

"_Mais, sacré bleu!_" they answered, "how could you help it? He forced you. You did not want to be killed. That would be a little too much."

"No," he persisted, "this is my affair. Girard, you know my money is with the _notaire_. There is plenty. Raoul has not enough, perhaps not any. But he shall want nothing—you understand—nothing! It is my affair, all that he needs—but you shall not tell him—no! That is all. _C'est fini!_"

Prosper had his way. But he did not see Vaillantcœur after he was carried home and put to bed in his cabin. Even if he had tried to do it, it would have been impossible. He could not see anybody. One of his eyes was entirely destroyed. The inflammation spread to the other, and all through the autumn he lay in his house, drifting along the edge of blindness, while Raoul lay in his house slowly getting well.

The _curé_ went from one house to the other, but he did not carry any messages between them. If any were sent one way they were not received. And the other way, none were sent. Raoul did not speak of Prosper; and if one mentioned his name, Raoul shut his mouth and made no answer.

To the _curé_, of course, it was a distress and a misery. To have a hatred like this unhealed, was a blot on the parish; it was a shame, as well as a sin. At last—it was already winter, the day before Christmas—the _curé_ made up his mind that he would put forth one more great effort.

"Look you, my son," he said to Prosper, "I am going this afternoon to Raoul Vaillantcœur to make the reconciliation. You shall give me a word to carry to him. He shall hear it this time, I promise you. Shall I tell him what you have done for him, how you have cared for him?"

"No, never," said Prosper, "you shall not take that word from me. It is nothing. It will make worse trouble. I will never send it."

"What then?" said the priest. "Shall I tell him that you forgive him?"

"No, not that," answered Prosper, "that would be a foolish word. What would that mean? It is not I who can forgive. I was the one who struck hardest. It was he that fell from the tower."

"Well, then, choose the word for yourself. What shall it be? Come, I promise you that he shall hear it. I will take with me _M. le Notaire_, and the good man Girard, and the little Marie Antoinette. You shall hear an answer. What message?"

"_Mon père_," said Prosper, slowly, "you shall tell him just this. I, Prosper Leclère, ask Raoul Vaillantcœur that he will forgive me for not fighting with him on the ground when he demanded it."

Yes, the message was given in precisely those words. Marie Antoinette stood within the door, Bergeron and Girard at the foot of the bed, and the _curé_ spoke very clearly and firmly. Vaillantcœur rolled on his pillow and turned his face away. Then he sat up in bed, grunting a little with the pain in his shoulder, which was badly set. His black eyes snapped like the eyes of a wolverine in a corner.

"Forgive?" he said, "no, never. He is a coward. I will never forgive!"

A little later in the afternoon, when the rose of sunset lay on the snowy hills, some one knocked at the door of Leclère's house.

"_Entrez!_" he cried. "Who is there? I see not very well by this light. Who is it?"

"It is me," said 'Toinette, her cheeks rosier than the snow outside, "nobody but me. I have come to ask you about that new carriage—do you remember?"

IV

The voice in the canoe behind me ceased. The rain let up. The _slish_, _slish_ of the paddle stopped. The canoe swung sideways to the breeze. I heard the rap, rap, rap of a pipe on the gunwale, and the scratch of a match on the under side of the thwart.

"What are you doing, Ferdinand?"

"I go to light the pipe, M'sieu'."

"Is the story finished?"

"But yes—but no—I know not, M'sieu'. As you will."

"But what did old Girard say when his daughter broke her engagement and married a man whose eyes were spoiled?"

"He said that Leclère could see well enough to work with him in the store."

"And what did Vaillantcœur say when he lost his girl?"

"He said it was a cursed shame that one could not fight a blind man."

"And what did 'Toinette say?"

"She said she had chosen the bravest man in Abbéville."

"And Prosper—what did he say?"

"M'sieu', I know not. He spoke only to 'Toinette."

"THE PLAY'S THE THING"

By Albert White Vorse

ILLUSTRATED BY W. GLACKENS

Beatrice was making an angel. She had lifted down the Princess Angelica from the hook whence her royal highness had been suspended since her death a few weeks before, had removed the royal crown and the royal legs, and was turning the royal robe into celestial drapery. Beatrice's conception of a heavenly garment was a white morning wrapper gathered at the bottom, so that when the angel soared head downward—as angels do—its clothes could not fall over its face. Beside Beatrice, who was seated on the floor, lay a pair of wings constructed of muslin tacked upon thin sticks; and about her feet writhed long wires designed to support the angel that evening in its visitation to her father's Italian marionette theatre.

It was behind the scenes that I was waiting for her father to come in; and meanwhile I lounged upon the helpers' bench and enjoyed the quaintness of the place.

Lighted by an irresolute gas-jet, the space between the back-drop and the rear wall of the theatre was a chaos of strange objects. Beside me, upon the bench, lay the book of the play—a collection of those legends of Charlemagne's court, descended from the _Chansons de gestes_, which have been so dear to Italian poets and are still so dear to the Italian people. Each afternoon the manager read over the adventure to be presented in the evening. When the curtain rose he took his stand in the wings and declaimed lines extemporized to fit the situations. The helpers, from their places upon the high bench, leaned over the back-drop, swung the marionettes upon the stage by means of long rods running down through the heads of the figures, and by means of other rods and of strings caused the mock men and women to make gestures and to fight. That was a task which told upon heads as well as hands; for the helpers were bound, not only to make the figures walk—no light labor, for each puppet weighed seventy pounds—but also to make them express the sentiment of every speech as it fell from Pietro's lips. Many times had I tried to handle a marionette and as often had failed; and I looked with respect upon the row of little creatures hung about the walls from a rack. They were dight in the panoply of knighthood. At my left shone the brass armor of the Christianos. The right was brilliant with the party-colored robes and turbans and the glowering faces of dusky infidels. The corners were piled high with heterogeneous properties; bright silks, bits of armor, shields, swords. From the right-hand heap protruded a ghastly leg, lopped from a Christian. The summit of the opposite heap was the grinning head of a dragon which had met death a few nights before in terrible battle with Orlando.

The dragon's body was a comfortable support for Beatrice's back. Of her face, bent over her work, I could see only an obstinate little olive-colored chin, two faintly red cheeks, and two straight black brows. Her hair hung over ears and shoulders and fell in dusky tangles upon a green silk waist. Ordinarily, Italian girls begin early in life to use hairpins.

"How old are you, Beatrice?" I asked.

The girl looked up and opened wide a pair of great tawny eyes.

"How old, Signore?" she repeated, in her low, husky voice. "Fifteen-a. Nex' moont' I s'all be sixteen-a."

"So old!" I commented. "Almost a woman. You'll be having a sweetheart soon; and what will your father do when he wants an angel?"

Again I saw of Beatrice only a veil of hair and a hand rapidly plying to and fro.

"No, Signore," she murmured from behind her screen. "I am not enough old-a. I s'all nevair marry. Who would tak-a me?"

"Anselmo?" I suggested.

I caught a gleam of the tawny eyes through the hair.

"I do not tink of 'im!" she expostulated.

"The other helper, then. What's his name? Giuseppe?"

Beatrice ceased to sew, tossed her hair away from her face, and shook her head slowly. The pink in her cheeks had deepened, but her luminous eyes gazed straight into mine.

"Signore," she said, impressively, "I ask-a to credit me. I do not tink of eit'er of desa men."

I found myself abashed, as if I had been making light of sacred things.

"I beg your pardon, Beatrice," I stammered. "It's not my business, of course. I'm sorry I spoke of it."

Without making reply she bent over her work again. For some moments she sewed, while I chid myself for suggesting romance to a sensible child.

Rapid steps beat upon the stairs outside, and Beatrice's father hurried into the little den.

"Beatrice," he called, sharply, in his own language, "go thou to the ticket-office. It is the hour of admittance for the people. I will finish the angel."

The girl dropped her needle and sped out through the door. The manager slammed it behind her, turned toward me, drew up his shoulders, and raised his eyes toward heaven.

"May the saints aid me to make righteous that child!" he exclaimed. "Both of my helpers came to me to-day to ask her in marriage. She promised herself to both last night."

II

It so happened that a year elapsed before I visited the theatre again. During that time I had fallen in love with the most charming girl in the world. In my college days I had patronized her young-maiden adoration; but when she came home, after three years of travel, the most self-possessed, as well as the most beautiful of women, the adoration and the indifference exchanged places. All I seemed to win from her was good-comradeship and confidence; and they were due to the friend of her childhood.

She had travelled with her mother, whose delight was picture-galleries, court-balls, and dinners at embassies. Of unconventional life, Deborah had seen nothing, and she listened eagerly to my descriptions of nooks and corners in New York.

One day her mother yielded. Deborah might go through the foreign quarter with me, if I would promise not to bring her into danger from men or germs.

For our first expedition I chose the Italian theatre. It was safe, picturesque, unique. We drove to the door in a hansom, and I instructed the driver to call for us at eleven o'clock.

As we entered the tiny foyer my companion murmured a little "Ah!" of delight. The walls had been decorated by the manager himself with wonderful pictures of kings, queens, knights, and ladies. The colors were green, red, and white, because those were the paints Pietro had on hand. Upon one side Orlando and Olliviero were fighting their famous duel in the presence of Charlemagne and his gorgeous court. Pietro's admiration was for legs. Those of Orlando had muscles unknown to anatomists, and those of his cousin were big enough for two Ollivieros.

While Deborah was trembling with pleasure in this work of art, I heard the latch of the ticket-office door click, and, turning, saw Beatrice. She stood upon the threshold, gazing not at me but at Deborah. In a year she had grown tall. Her hair was coiled upon her neck, and her eyes seemed to be deeper and tawnier than ever.

"What a pretty child!" exclaimed my companion.

"It's Beatrice," I answered. "How do you do, little girl? How is Pietro?"

"My father is well," replied the girl; but her scrutiny still rested upon my companion's face and yellow hair. Under this inspection Deborah was flushing, and I hastened to end it.

"This is Miss Speedwell, Beatrice." I said. "She has come with me to see the play. You must give us good seats."

Beatrice touched Deborah's glove with a soiled paw, and, without a word of reply, led the way through the door of the theatre and along the aisle.

We had arrived early, and the theatre was empty. The place was fascinating enough, but I noticed that my companion, who was commonly both curious and self-reliant, followed me closely.

"What a beautiful, strange child," she whispered.

"H—m! child!" I said to myself, and fell to musing upon my last visit to the theatre.

"Beatrice," I asked, "are you married yet?"

"No, Signore," answered the girl, without turning her head.

"What has become of Anselmo?" I went on.

"He is 'ere. 'E is our helper."

"And Giuseppe?"

"'E is 'ere. My father cood not-a get better helpers. Why dey go away?"

This I could not answer. Beatrice had a way of making me shamefaced.

"Dese are your seats," she said, pausing at the third row of settees. "Now I begga to pardon, I must go to my father."

"But you'll come back, won't you, Beatrice?" I asked. "We have forgotten some of our Italian, and we need you to interpret for us—just as you used to interpret for me."

This attempt to establish old-time relations fell flat. Beatrice replied, "Yes, Signore," in calm tones, and left us. When she had closed the door, Deborah drew a long breath.

"I'm glad she's gone," said Deborah. "She made me feel uncanny."

"Nonsense," I laughed. "She's only a queer little girl. Look at Pietro's paintings; they are more wholesome."

The dingy little theatre had once been a stable. Pietro had turned the loft into a gallery, with tiers of benches receding high into the gloom. He had cut off the stall-room with a wooden proscenium. Upon it twined a mastodon of a vine, the like of which no botanist ever beheld. The toy curtain bore, upon its forty-eight square feet of canvas, a representation of a Roman triumph that would have insured Pietro's admission into any Academy with a sense of humor.

It cheered Deborah amazingly, and the audience, which burst in at eight o'clock, caused her to clasp her hands. It was chiefly composed of men—laborers, chestnut venders, and bootblacks, with swarthy skins, gleaming eyes, and gleaming teeth. They rushed, shouting, down the single aisle, sprang over settees, scrambled and pushed to win the seats nearest the stage. In three minutes the theatre was a bewilderment of bobbing heads and active hands, and a tumult of voices and laughter. Not a seat was vacant except those upon our settee. The Italians had respected the presence of strangers. The men in front of us and on either hand turned about to greet the American lady and to smile a welcome.

Deborah returned every smile and every bow. Her eyes were bright with excitement.

"How nice they are! How polite!" she exclaimed. Presently she laid a clinging hand upon my arm.

"How can I ever thank you," she whispered, "for bringing me here!"

I tried to tell her by a look, but her attention was not for me.

"See," she went on, "see the faun!"

A slender boy appeared in the proscenium doorway. His hair clustered about deep red cheeks, and his great dark eyes looked mournfully over the house. I fancied he was seeking someone. The audience hailed him with applause and he descended two or three steps to the street-piano, which served as orchestra, and began to turn the crank. Deborah started, raised eyebrows of dismay, and pressed her hands over her ears. Never before had she heard the Intermezzo from Cavalleria rendered by a street-piano in a twenty by forty foot room.

Beatrice, appearing at my side, evidently perceived the gesture. Her face turned crimson and she drew herself up proudly.

"Gaiterno!" she called, "stop that noise."

The boy paused, and, still bent over at the lower curve of his stroke, turned an astonished face toward us. The chatter from the seats hushed.

"Stop the music," repeated Beatrice, imperiously.

A grumble sounded in the rear and increased from seat to seat until it was a growl. The corners of Beatrice's mouth curled up like those of an angry cat. She wheeled about and stamped her foot.

"Silence, pigs!" she screamed.

The tumult fell away. For a moment the girl stood poised as if ready to spring, and then turned, and, in the hush passed beyond us to a seat at Deborah's farther side. My companion shrank slightly toward me and once more laid a hand upon my arm. Her face was turned toward Beatrice, whose color had died down and whose eyes were perfectly indifferent.

The raising of the curtain put an end to the strain. The audience, forgetting their disappointment, bent excited faces toward the stage, and so, after a few moments, did Deborah.

I fear I was an inattentive spectator. I dared not move lest I should disturb that precious touch upon my arm, and the eager face before me I found a sight more fascinating than the absurd gestures of puppets. But presently, beyond Deborah's face appeared Beatrice's, and a certain self-consciousness in its expression took my notice. The girl's lips were pressed together and her eyes were directed sternly toward the stage, but it was evidently with an effort that she held them thus. A glance about the theatre gave me the clew. The faun by the street-piano was looking full at her, with such a face of adoration as I had read of but never beheld. It was pathetic, but it was funny as well, and I laughed. Glances of scorn from Deborah and Beatrice punished me, and Deborah transferred the hand to her lap.