"Good news, my child."
"What do you mean, madame?" said La Goualeuse, rising.
"Your friends have not forgotten you, they have obtained your discharge; the governor has just received the information."
"Can it be possible, madame? Ah, what happiness!"
Fleur-de-Marie"s emotion was so violent that she turned pale, placed her hand on her heart, which throbbed violently, and fell back on the seat.
"Don"t agitate yourself, my poor girl," said Madame Armand, kindly.
"Fortunately these shocks are not dangerous."
"Ah, madame, what grat.i.tude!"
"No doubt it is Madame d"Harville who has obtained your liberty. There is an elderly female charged to conduct you to the persons who are interested in you. Wait for me, I will return for you; I have some directions to give in the work-room."
It would be difficult to paint the expression of extreme desolation which overcast the features of Mont Saint-Jean, when she learned that her good angel, as she called La Goualeuse, was about to quit St.
Lazare. This woman"s grief was less caused by the fear of becoming again the ill-used b.u.t.t of the prison, than by her anguish at seeing herself separated from the only being who had ever testified any interest in her.
Still seated at the foot of the bench, Mont Saint-Jean lifted both her hands to the sides of her matted and coa.r.s.e hair, which projected in disorder from the sides of her old black cap, as if to tear them out; then this deep affliction gave way to dejection, and she drooped her head and remained mute and motionless, with her face hidden in her hands, and her elbows resting on her knees.
In spite of her joy at leaving the prison, Fleur-de-Marie could not help shuddering when she thought for an instant of the Chouette and the Schoolmaster, recollecting that these two monsters had made her swear never to inform her benefactors of her wretched fate. But these dispiriting thoughts were soon effaced from Fleur-de-Marie"s mind before the hope of seeing Bouqueval once more, with Madame Georges and Rodolph, to whom she meant to intercede for La Louve and Martial. It even seemed to her that the warm feeling which she reproached herself for having of her benefactor, being no longer nourished by sadness and solitude, would be calmed down as soon as she resumed her rustic occupations, which she so much delighted in sharing with the good and simple inhabitants of the farm.
Astonished at the silence of her companion, a silence whose source she did not suspect, La Goualeuse touched her gently on the shoulder, saying to her:
"Mont Saint-Jean, as I am now free, can I be in any way useful to you?"
The prisoner trembled as she felt La Goualeuse"s hand upon her, let her hands drop on her knees, and turned towards the young girl, her face streaming with tears. So bitter a grief overspread the features of Mont Saint-Jean that their ugliness had disappeared.
"What is the matter?" said La Goualeuse. "You are weeping!"
"You are going away!" murmured the poor prisoner, with a voice broken by sobs. "And I had never thought that you would go away, and that I should never see you more,--never, no, never!"
"I a.s.sure you that I shall always think of your good feeling towards me, Mont Saint-Jean."
"Oh, and to think how I loved you, when I was sitting there at your feet on the ground! It seemed as if I was saved,--that I had nothing more to fear! It was not for the blows which the other women may, perhaps, begin again to give me that I said that I have led a hard life; but it seemed to me that you were my good fortune, and would bring good luck to my child, just because you had pity on me. But, then, when one is used to be ill-treated, one is then more sensible than others to kindness."
Then, interrupting herself, to burst again into a loud fit of sobs,--"Well, well, it"s done,--it"s finished,--all over! And so it must be some day or other. I was wrong to think any otherwise. It"s done--done--done!"
"Courage! Courage! I will think of you, as you will remember me."
"Oh, as to that, they may tear me to pieces before they shall ever make me forget you! I may grow old,--as old as the streets,--but I shall always have your angel face before me. The first word I will teach my child shall be your name, Goualeuse; for but for you it would have perished with cold."
"Listen to me, Mont Saint-Jean!" said Fleur-de-Marie, deeply affected by the attachment of this unhappy woman. "I cannot promise to do anything for you, although I know some very charitable persons; but, for your child, it is a different thing; it is wholly innocent; and the persons of whom I speak will, perhaps, take charge of it, and bring it up, when you can resolve on parting from it."
"Part from it! Never, oh, never!" exclaimed Mont Saint-Jean, with excitement. "What would become of me now, when I have so built upon it?"
"But how will you bring it up? Boy or girl, it ought to be made honest; and for that--"
"It must eat honest bread. I know that, Goualeuse,--I believe it. It is my ambition; and I say so to myself every day. So, in leaving here, I will never put my foot under a bridge again. I will turn rag-picker, street-sweeper,--something honest; for I owe that, if not to myself, at least to my child, when I have the honour of having one," she added, with a sort of pride.
"And who will take care of your child whilst you are at work?" inquired the Goualeuse. "Will it not be better, if possible, as I hope it will be, to put it in the country with some worthy people, who will make a good country girl or a stout farmer"s boy of it? You can come and see it from time to time; and one day you may, perhaps, find the means to live near it constantly. In the country, one lives on so little!"
"Yes, but to separate myself from it,--to separate myself from it! It would be my only joy,--I, who have nothing else in the world to love,--nothing that loves me!"
"You must think more of it than of yourself, my poor Mont Saint-Jean. In two or three days I will write to Madame Armand, and if the application I mean to make in favour of your child should succeed, you will have no occasion to say to it, as you said so painfully just now, "Alas! What will become of it?""
Madame Armand interrupted this conversation, and came to seek Fleur-de-Marie. After having again burst into sobs, and bathed with her despairing tears the young girl"s hands, Mont Saint-Jean fell on the seat perfectly overcome, not even thinking of the promise which Fleur-de-Marie had just made with respect to her child.
"Poor creature!" said Madame Armand, as she quitted the yard, accompanied by Fleur-de-Marie, "her grat.i.tude towards you gives me a better opinion of her."
Learning that La Goualeuse was discharged, the other prisoners, far from envying her this favour, displayed their delight. Some of them surrounded Fleur-de-Marie, and took leave of her with adieux full of cordiality, frankly congratulating her on her speedy release from prison.
"Well, I must say," said one, "this little fair girl has made us pa.s.s an agreeable moment, when we agreed to make up the basket of clothes for Mont Saint-Jean. That will be remembered at St. Lazare."
When Fleur-de-Marie had quitted the prison buildings, the inspectress said to her:
"Now, my dear child, go to the clothing-room, and leave your prison clothes. Put on your peasant girl"s clothes, whose rustic simplicity suits you so well. Adieu! You will be happy, for you are going to be under the protection of good people, and leave these walls, never again to return to them. But I am really hardly reasonable," said Madame Armand, whose eyes were moistened with tears. "I really cannot conceal from you how much I am attached to you, my poor girl!" Then, seeing the tears in Fleur-de-Marie"s eyes, the inspectress added, "But we must not sadden your departure thus."
"Ah, madame, is it not through your recommendation that this young lady to whom I owe my liberty has become interested in me?"
"Yes, and I am happy that I did so; my presentiments had not deceived me."
At this moment a clock struck.
"That is the hour of work; I must return to the rooms. Adieu! Once more adieu, my dear child!"
Madame Armand, as much affected as Fleur-de-Marie, embraced her tenderly, and then said to one of the women employed in the establishment:
"Take mademoiselle to the vestiary."
A quarter of an hour afterwards, Fleur-de-Marie, dressed like a peasant girl, as we have seen her at the farm at Bouqueval, entered the waiting-room, where Madame Seraphin was expecting her. The housekeeper of the notary, Jacques Ferrand, had come to seek the unhappy girl, and conduct her to the Isle du Ravageur.
CHAPTER XIV.
RECOLLECTIONS.
Jacques Ferrand had quickly and readily obtained the liberty of Fleur-de-Marie, which, indeed, only required a simple official order.
Instructed by the Chouette of La Goualeuse being at St. Lazare, he had immediately applied to one of his clients, an honourable and influential man, saying that a young female who had once erred, but afterwards sincerely repented, being now confined in St. Lazare, was in danger of forgetting her good resolutions, in consequence of her a.s.sociation with the other prisoners. This young girl having been (added the notary) strongly recommended to him by persons of high respectability, who wanted to take care of her when she quitted the prison, he besought his client, in the name of religion, virtue, and the future return to goodness of the poor girl, to interest himself in obtaining her liberation. And, further to screen himself from all chance of future consequences, the notary most earnestly charged his client not to allow his name to transpire in the business on any account, as he was desirous of avoiding any mention of having been employed in the furtherance of so good and charitable a work.
This request, which was attributed to the una.s.suming modesty and benevolence of Jacques Ferrand, a man equally esteemed for his piety as for honour and probity, was strictly complied with, the liberation of Fleur-de-Marie being asked and obtained in the client"s name alone; and by way of evincing a still greater regard for the shrinking delicacy of the notary"s nature, the order for quitting the prison was sent under cover to Jacques Ferrand, that he might send it on to the parties interesting themselves for the young girl. And when Madame Seraphin presented the order to the directors of the prison, she stated herself to have been sent by the parties feeling a desire to save the young person it referred to.
From the favourable manner in which the matron of the prison had spoken to Madame d"Harville of Fleur-de-Marie, not a doubt existed as to its being to that lady La Goualeuse was indebted for her return to freedom.
There was, therefore, no chance of the appearance of Madame Seraphin exciting any mistrust in the mind of her victim. Madame Seraphin could so well a.s.sume the look and manner of what is commonly styled "a nice motherly kind of person," that it required a more than ordinary share of penetration to discover a strong proportion of falsehood, deceit, and cunning behind the smooth glance or the hypocritical smile; but, spite of the hardened villainy with which she had shared so long and deeply in the nefarious practices of her employer, Madame Seraphin, old and hackneyed as she was, could not view without emotion the exquisite loveliness of the being her own hand had surrendered, even as a child, to the cruel care of the Chouette, and whom she was now leading to an inevitable death.