Sylvie avoided answering, and said:--"Do you dare to tell me, mademoiselle, that a man did not come under your window and talk to you of marriage?"
Persecution had taught Pierrette the wariness of slaves; so she answered bravely:--"I don't know what you mean,--"
"Who means?--your dog?" said Sylvie, sharply.
"I should have said 'cousin,'" replied the girl, humbly.
"And didn't you get up and go in your bare feet to the window?--which will give you an illness; and serve you right, too. And perhaps you didn't talk to your lover, either?"
"No, cousin."
"I know you have many faults, but I did not think you told lies. You had better think this over, mademoiselle; you will have to explain this affair to your cousin and to me, or your cousin will be obliged to take severe measures."
The old maid, exasperated by jealousy and curiosity, meant to frighten the girl. Pierrette, like all those who suffer more than they have strength to bear, kept silence. Silence is the only weapon by which such victims can conquer; it baffles the Cossack charges of envy, the savage skirmishings of suspicion; it does at times give victory, crushing and complete,--for what is more complete than silence? it is absolute; it is one of the attributes of infinity. Sylvie watched Pierrette narrowly. The girl colored; but the color, instead of rising evenly, came out in patches on her cheekbones, in burning and significant spots. A mother, seeing that symptom of illness, would have changed her tone at once; she would have taken the child on her lap and questioned her; in fact, she would long ago have tenderly understood the signs of Pierrette's pure and perfect innocence; she would have seen her weakness and known that the disturbance of the digestive organs and the other functions of the body was about to affect the lungs. Those eloquent patches would have warned her of an imminent danger. But an old maid, one in whom the family instincts have never been awakened, to whom the needs of childhood and the precautions required for adolescence were unknown, had neither the indulgence nor the compassionate intelligence of a mother; such sufferings as those of Pierrette, instead of softening her heart only made it more callous.
"She blushes, she is guilty!" thought Sylvie.
Pierrette's silence was thus interpreted to her injury.
"Pierrette," continued Sylvie, "before your cousin comes down we must have some talk together. Come," she said, in a rather softer tone, "shut the street door; if any one comes they will rung and we shall hear them."
In spite of the damp mist which was rising from the river, Sylvie took Pierrette along the winding gravel path which led across the lawn to the edge of the rock terrace,--a picturesque little quay, covered with iris and aquatic plants. She now changed her tactics, thinking she might catch Pierrette tripping by softness; the hyena became a cat.
"Pierrette," she said, "you are no longer a child; you are nearly fifteen, and it is not at all surprising that you should have a lover."
"But, cousin," said Pierrette, raising her eyes with angelic sweetness to the cold, sour face of her cousin, "What is a lover?"
It would have been impossible for Sylvie to define a lover with truth and decency to the girl's mind. Instead of seeing in that question the proof of adorable innocence, she considered it a piece of insincerity.
"A lover, Pierrette, is a man who loves us and wishes to marry us."
"Ah," said Pierrette, "when that happens in Brittany we call the young man a suitor."
"Well, remember that in owning your feelings for a man you do no wrong, my dear. The wrong is in hiding them. Have you pleased some of the men who visit here?"
"I don't think so, cousin."
"Do you love any of them?"
"No."
"Certain?"
"Quite certain."
"Look at me, Pierrette."
Pierrette looked at Sylvie.
"A man called to you this morning in the square."
Pierrette lowered her eyes.
"You went to your window, you opened it, and you spoke to him."
"No cousin, I went to look out and I saw a peasant."
"Pierrette, you have much improved since you made your first communion; you have become pious and obedient, you love God and your relations; I am satisfied with you. I don't say this to puff you up with pride."
The horrible creature had mistaken despondency, submission, the silence of wretchedness, for virtues!
The sweetest of all consolations to suffering souls, to martyrs, to artists, in the worst of that divine agony which hatred and envy force upon them, is to meet with praise where they have hitherto found censure and injustice. Pierrette raised her grateful eyes to her cousin, feeling that she could almost forgive her for the sufferings she had caused.
"But if it is all hypocrisy, if I find you a serpent that I have warmed in my bosom, you will be a wicked girl, an infamous creature!"
"I think I have nothing to reproach myself with," said Pierrette, with a painful revulsion of her heart at the sudden change from unexpected praise to the tones of the hyena.
"You know that to lie is a mortal sin?"
"Yes, cousin."
"Well, you are now under the eye of God," said the old maid, with a solemn gesture towards the sky; "swear to me that you did not know that peasant."
"I will not swear," said Pierrette.
"Ha! he was no peasant, you little viper."
Pierrette rushed away like a frightened fawn terrified at her tone.
Sylvie called her in a dreadful voice.
"The bell is ringing," she answered.
