CHAPTER XXI.

“A VERY SAD LITTLE BOY.”

Of course, Hubert’s black eye created an immense sensation, not only amongst his immediate circle, but throughout the whole establishment, from old Mr. Busson down to the smallest boy-labourer on the farm.

If the whole constitution of France had been represented in Gaston’s small person, and if the quarrel with Hubert had assumed properties of international warfare, racial feeling could not have run higher in the worthy rustic’s breast.

“A pretty joke indeed!” they declared, “to have that young Frenchy knocking one of _our_ little gentlemen about.”

And what a fuss Mrs. Busson made over the injured hero; whilst Ruth was careful to remark within Gaston’s hearing, that it was a great mercy that Master Hubert’s eye had been not hurt, for folks got sent to prison and kept there for less than that very often.

Hubert himself made no fuss at all. He was so delighted to possess anything so entirely un-nurserylike as a black eye, that he obstinately refused all Mrs. Busson’s offers of raw beef applications for the purpose of abating the swelling; and when he discovered that the “pomade divine” with which Fay had promptly anointed his temple, was supposed to reduce the discolouration of the bruises, he scrubbed it off with more energy than he had ever bestowed on his face before.

“But Hubert, didn’t it hurt you dreffully?” asked Marygold.

“Nothing to matter,” he said, “but of course you girls don’t under--”

“Oh! no,” began Andrew, teasingly, “it wasn’t the black eye that he minded, was it, Hubert. It was--”

“You’re not to say it,” shouted Hubert, crimson with rage. Andrew had jeered him so unmercifully all the morning, for having been slobbered like a nice little baby-girl, that he was in absolute terror lest Di should hear of it, for Diana’s teasing was quite as merciless as the boys’.

“If you say one word,” cried Hubert, swelling with rage, “I’ll ki--”

“Yes, shut up, Andrew,” interposed Jack. “It’s a shame to rag the poor chap, any more.”

And so, though at intervals during the day, Andrew dropped mysterious hints anent some still deeper disgrace that had befallen Hubert at Gaston’s hands, just for the sake of “getting a rise” out of Hubert, the girls never discovered the nature of poor Gaston’s further delinquency.

“Well, I don’t care,” said Di, standing in the doorway between her own room and Faith’s, “I always did think Gaston was a horrid little wretch, and now I’m sure of it. He must have done something horribly bad, for Jack said he’d never have forgiven him, if he’d been Hubert.”

“I’m afraid he did,” said Phoena, reluctantly, “but I’m quite sure, it could not have been all Gaston’s fault.”

“Well, it’s quite clear,” said Fay, with the uncompromising finality of early youth, “Gaston isn’t fit to play with our boys, we’ve tried to make the best of him, because he was an orphan and all that, but he has behaved like a little savage, and the less we have to do with him the better.”

But Marygold, who had been put to bed full an hour ago, and was supposed by her elders to be sound asleep, hid her face against the pillow and cried softly. “Oh! dear Father in Heaven,” she prayed, “be kind to poor Gaston, he is such a _werry_ sad little boy.”

The same thought came to soften Mrs. Busson’s heart,--very little was needed to do that,--as according to custom, she took a last look at Gaston, lying in his bed in the little room next her own.

“Poor little dear,” she said, looking down at the small thin face as it lay with closed eyes on the pillow, and carefully shading her light with her hand, that its reflection might not disturb him, “It’s a good little face, that it is, and it isn’t his fault that he was not born a nice English boy like the rest. It is a pity, to be sure, that he’s got to grow up into one of those Frenchmen. Well, I’m glad at any rate, that he’s sleeping so quiet.”

And Mrs. Busson crept away noiselessly to her own room.

Good soul! She little guessed that her softly spoken words had added the last drop of bitterness to Gaston’s already over-full cup. The lids that she had fancied were fast shut over Gaston’s eyes were quivering with wakefulness, and on the ears which she believed to be securely closed in sleep, every word of her mutterings fell clear and distinct.

From that day forward, there was a marked change in the relations between Gaston and the other boys. Whenever they invited him to join in their games and expeditions, he went with them, but more often than not they forgot all about him, and the girls never reminded them.

“I’m quite sure for all concerned that it’s much better for Gaston to be left to himself,” Fay ruled; “he adds neither to his own nor to others’ happiness by playing with them.”

“No, Hubert’s face testifies to that,” said Di.

And so even before the injured eye had gone through the various stages of discolouration, Gaston had drifted so far away from his fellow knights that, as Andrew said loftily, “there was no need to degrade him formally as he had had the good sense to retire practically.”

“Nonsense,” cried Phoena, who was in no such hurry to consign Gaston to the rank of a hopeless miscreant, “so long as none of you can show cause why he should be turned out, and I suppose none of you can?”

“Oh! rather not!” cried Jack, “poor beggar, why should he be turned out?”

“Very well, then, so long as we don’t turn him out, he remains a knight of course, and perhaps some day he will do something grand, that will surprise us all.”

“It’s very certain to be a _surprise_, whenever it does come,” said Di. Marygold however stole away to the orchard, making for the deep, dry ditch, whence Gaston had emerged on the first occasion of their meeting. It had become once more his favourite refuge, only Marygold always found him now, with his old lesson books open on his knee, trying hard to learn those tasks which, at the eleventh hour, he remembered that “Maman” had told him must be learnt, if he meant to grow up a wise man.

“Gaston,” said Marygold, creeping down to sit beside him in the ditch, “they’ve all been talking about you in the wood, and they say that you are a knight still, just the same as ever you were. And Phoena says, she believes that you will do something ever so grand and brave some day, that will astonish us all.”

But Gaston shook his head.

“Ah! no, that will never be,” he said, “because, because, there is, I know not what--but no one here can understand,” he added, helplessly.

“Oh! but they will understand, we shall all understand,” rejoined Marygold, eagerly, “and you mustn’t look so sad, poor dear Gaston, because it makes me feel so sad for you too.”

“Ah! you are good for me, Marygold,” he said, and a gleam set all his face alight, “you are very good.”

“But I pity you so, poor Gaston, because it’s not your fault that you are a little French boy,” said Marygold. “Oh! Gaston, where are you going so fast? Don’t run away.”

Gaston had started up as if he had been suddenly stung, and scrambled over the hedge. Nor did he return for all Marygold’s beseeching.

“No, it is done; I have finished with them,” he muttered. His eyes were dry, but his spirit had never been so sore, “even she says it now, even Marygold!”