Cesaire had disappeared, taking advantage of the door being open. He did not want to listen, so much was he afraid, and he did not want his hopes to crumble with each obstinate refusal of his father. He preferred to learn the truth at once, good or bad, later on; and he went out into the night. It was a moonless night, a starless night, one of those foggy nights when the air seems thick with humidity. A vague odor of apples floated through the farm-yard, for it was the season when the earliest apples were gathered, the "soon ripe" ones, as they are called in the language of the peasantry. As Cesaire pa.s.sed along by the cattle-sheds, the warm smell of living beasts sleeping on manure was exhaled through the narrow windows; and he heard near the stables the stamping of horses who remained standing, and the sound of their jaws tearing and bruising the hay on the racks.
He went straight ahead, thinking about Celeste. In this simple nature, whose ideas were scarcely more than images generated directly by objects, thoughts of love only formulated themselves by calling up before the mind the picture of a big red-haired girl, standing in a hollow road, and laughing with her hands on her hips.
It was thus he saw her on the day when he first took a fancy for her. He had, however, known her from infancy but never had he been so struck by her as on that morning. They had stopped to talk for a few minutes, and then he went away; and as he walked along he kept repeating:
"Faith, she"s a fine girl, all the same. "Tis a pity she made a slip with Victor."
Till evening, he kept thinking of her, and also on the following morning.
When he saw her again, he felt something tickling the end of his throat, as if a c.o.c.k"s feather had been driven through his mouth into his chest, and since then, every time he found himself near her, he was astonished at this nervous tickling which always commenced again.
In three months, he made up his mind to marry her, so much did she please him. He could not have said whence came this power over him, but he explained it by these words:
"I am possessed by her," as if he felt the desire of this girl within him with as much dominating force as one of the powers of h.e.l.l. He scarcely bothered himself about her transgression. So much the worse, after all; it did her no harm, and he bore no grudge against Victor Lecoq.
But if the cure was not going to succeed, what was he to do? He did not dare to think of it, so much did this anxious question torment him.
He reached the presbytery and seated himself near the little gateway to await for the priest"s return.
He was there perhaps half-an-hour when he heard steps on the road, and he soon distinguished although the night was very dark, the still darker shadow of the sautane.
He rose up, his legs giving way under him, not even venturing to speak, not daring to ask a question.
The clergyman perceived him, and said gayly:
"Well, my lad, "tis all right."
Cesaire stammered:
"All right, "tisn"t possible."
"Yes, my lad, but not without trouble. What an old a.s.s your father is!"
The peasant repeated:
""Tisn"t possible!"
"Why, yes. Come and look me up to-morrow at midday in order to settle about the publication of the banns."
The young man seized the cure"s hand. He pressed it, shook it, bruised it, while he stammered:
"True--true--true, Monsieur le Cure, on the word of an honest man, you"ll see me to-morrow--at your sermon."
PART II
The wedding took place in the middle of December. It was simple, the bridal pair not being rich. Cesaire, attired in new clothes, was ready since eight o"clock in the morning to go and fetch his betrothed and bring her to the Mayor"s office; but, it was too early, he seated himself before the kitchen-table, and waited for the members of the family and the friends who were to accompany him.
For the last eight days, it had been snowing, and the brown earth, the earth already fertilized by the autumn savings had become livid, sleeping under a great sheet of ice.
It was cold in the thatched houses adorned with white caps; and the round apples in the trees of the enclosures seemed to be flowering, powdered as they had been in the pleasant month of their blossoming.
This day, the big northern clouds, the gray clouds laden with glittering rain had disappeared, and the blue sky showed itself above the white earth on which the rising sun cast silvery reflections.
Cesaire looked straight before him through the window, thinking of nothing happy.
The door opened, two women entered, peasant women in their Sunday clothes, the aunt and the cousin of the bridegroom, then three men, his cousins, then a woman who was a neighbor. They sat down on chairs, and they remained motionless and silent, the women on one side of the kitchen, the men on the other suddenly seized with timidity, with that embarra.s.sed sadness which takes possession of people a.s.sembled for a ceremony. One of the cousins soon asked:
"It is not the hour--is it?"
Cesaire replied:
"I am much afraid it is."
"Come on! Let us start," said another.
Those rose up. Then Cesaire, whom a feeling of uneasiness had taken possession of, climbed up the ladder of the loft to see whether his father was ready. The old man, always as a rule an early riser, had not yet made his appearance. His son found him on his bed of straw, wrapped up in his blanket, with his eyes open, and a malicious look in them.
He bawled out into his ear: "Come, daddy, get up. "Tis the time for the wedding."
The deaf man murmured in a doleful tone:
"I can"t, I have a sort of cold over me that freezes my back. I can"t stir."
The young man, dumbfounded, stared at him, guessing that this was a dodge.
"Come, daddy, we must force you to go."
"Look here! I"ll help you."
And he stooped towards the old man, pulled off his blanket, caught him by the arm and lifted him up. But the old Amable began to whine:
"Ooh! Ooh! Ooh! What suffering! Ooh! I can"t. My back is stiffened up.
"Tis the wind that must have rushed in through this cursed roof."
"Well, you"ll have no dinner, as I"m having a spread at Polyte"s inn.
This will teach you what comes of acting mulishly."
And he hurried down the ladder, then set out for his destination, accompanied by his relatives and guests.
The men had turned up their trousers so as not to soil the ends of them in the snow. The women held up their petticoats and showed their lean ankles, their gray woolen stockings, and their bony shanks resembling broomsticks. And they all moved forward balancing themselves on their legs, one behind the other without uttering a word in a very gingerly fashion through caution lest they might miss their way owing to flat, uniform uninterrupted sweep of snow that obliterated the track.
As they approached some of the farm houses, they saw one or two persons waiting to join them, and the procession went on without stopping, and wound its way forward, following the invisible outlines of the road, so that it resembled a living chaplet with black beads undulating through the white country side.
In front of the bride"s door, a large group was stamping up and down the open s.p.a.ce awaiting the bridegroom. When he appeared they gave him a loud greeting; and presently, Celeste came forth from her room, clad in a blue dress, her shoulders covered with a small red shawl, and her head adorned with orange-flowers.
But everyone asked Cesaire: