The little fellow, believing that she had calmed down, ceased beating C?sar, in order to catch his mother's hand, and he listened, too, as if he understood.
When the narrative was finished, young Hautot continued:
"Now, we will settle matters together in accordance with his wishes. Listen: I am well off, he has left me plenty of means. I don't want you to have anything to complain about--"
But she quickly interrupted him:
"Oh! Monsieur C?sar, Monsieur C?sar, not today. I am cut to the heart--another time--another day. No, not to-day. If I accept, listen! 'Tis not for myself--no, no, no, I swear to you. 'Tis for the child. Besides this provision will be put to his account."
Thereupon C?sar scared, divined the truth, and stammering:
"So then--'tis his--the child?"
"Why, yes," she said.
And Hautot Junior gazed at his brother with a confused emotion, intense and painful.
After a lengthened silence, for she had begun to weep afresh, C?sar, quite embarrassed, went on:
"Well, then, Mam'zelle Donet, I am going. When would you wish to talk this over with me?"
She exclaimed:
"Oh! no, don't go! don't go! Don't leave me all alone with Emile. I would die of grief. I have no longer anyone, anyone but my child. Oh! what wretchedness, what wretchedness. Monsieur C?sar! Stop! Sit down again. You will say something more to me. You will tell me what he was doing over there all the week."
And C?sar resumed his seat, accustomed to obey.
She drew over another chair for herself in front of the stove, where the dishes had all this time been simmering, took Emile upon her knees, and asked C?sar a thousand questions about his father with reference to matters of an intimate nature, which made him feel, without reasoning on the subject, that she had loved Hautot with all the strength of her frail woman's heart.
And, by the natural concatenation of his ideas--which were rather limited in number--he recurred once more to the accident, and set about telling the story over again with all the same details.
When he said: "He had a hole in his stomach--you could put your two fists into it," she gave vent to a sort of shriek, and the tears gushed forth again from her eyes.
Then, seized by the contagion of her grief, C?sar began to weep, too, and as tears always soften the fibers of the heart, he bent over Emile whose forehead was close to his own mouth and kissed him.
The mother, recovering her breath, murmured:
"Poor lad, he is an orphan now!"
"And so am I," said C?sar.
And they ceased to talk.
But suddenly the practical instinct of the housewife, accustomed to be thoughtful about many things, revived in the young woman's breast.
"You have perhaps taken nothing all the morning, Monsieur C?sar."
"No, Mam'zelle."
"Oh! you must be hungry. You will eat a morsel."
"Thanks," he said, "I am not hungry; I have had too much trouble."
She replied:
"In spite of sorrow, we must live. You will not refuse to let me get something for you! And then you will remain a little longer. When you are gone I don't know what will become of me."
He yielded after some further resistance, and, sitting down with his back to the fire, facing her, he ate a plateful of tripe, which had been bubbling in the stove, and drank a glass of red wine. But he would not allow her to uncork the bottle of white wine. He several times wiped the mouth of the little boy, who had smeared all his chin with sauce.
As he was rising up to go, he asked:
"When would you like me to come back to speak about this business to you, Mam'zelle Donet?"
"If it is all the same to you, say next Thursday, Monsieur C?sar. In that way I would lose none of my time, as I always have my Thursdays free."
"That will suit me--next Thursday."
"You will come to lunch. Won't you?"
"Oh! On that point I can't give you a promise."
"The reason I suggested it is that people can chat better when they are eating. One has more time, too."
"Well, be it so. About twelve o'clock, then." And he took his departure, after he had again kissed little Emile, and pressed Mademoiselle Donet's hand.
III.
The week appeared long to C?sar Hautot. He had never before found himself alone, and the isolation seemed to him insupportable. Till now, he had lived at his father's side, just like his shadow, followed him into the fields, superintended the execution of his orders, and, when they had been a short time separated, again met him at dinner. They had spent the evenings smoking their pipes, face to face with one another, chatting about horses, cows, or sheep, and the grip of their hands when they rose up in the morning might have been regarded as a manifestation of deep family affection on both sides.
Now C?sar was alone, he went vacantly through the process of dressing the soil in autumn, every moment expecting to see the tall gesticulating silhouette of his father rising up at the end of a plain. To kill time, he entered the houses of his neighbors, told about the accident to all who had not heard of it, and sometimes repeated it to the others. Then, after he had finished his occupations and his reflections, he would sit down at the side of the road, asking himself whether this kind of life was going to last forever.
He frequently thought of Mademoiselle Donet. He liked her. He considered her thoroughly respectable, a gentle and honest young woman, as his father had said. Yes, undoubtedly she was an honest girl. He resolved to act handsomely toward her, and to give her two thousand francs a year, settling the capital on the child. He even experienced a certain pleasure in thinking that he was going to see her on the following Thursday and arrange this matter with her. And then the notion of this brother, this little chap of five, who was his father's son, plagued him, annoyed him a little, and at the same time, excited him. He had, as it were, a family in this brat, sprung from a clandestine alliance, who would never bear the name of Hautot, a family which he might take or leave, just as he pleased, but which would recall his father.
And so, when he saw himself on the road to Rouen on Thursday morning, carried along by Graindorge trotting with clattering foot-beats, he felt his heart lighter, more at peace than he had hitherto felt it since his bereavement.
On entering Mademoiselle Donet's apartment, he saw the table laid as on the previous Thursday, with the sole difference that the crust had not been removed from the bread. He pressed the young woman's hand, kissed Emile on the cheeks, and sat down, more or less as if he were in his own house, his heart swelling in the same way. Mademoiselle Donet seemed to him a little thinner and paler. She must have grieved
