LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 168, 19 December 1874, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A DREAM STORY. By the Author of ‘Patty.’ (Conlin ned,) ‘Would it make thee happier?’ she laughs mischievously. She is too full of youth and brightness to realise that she is jesting about her life’s destiny. ‘ But yes, Eugenie. ’ Jacques stands erect, holding his head rather higher than usual. ‘ The man at the top of the ladder and the man at the bottom are equally content; but the man who has got half way looks down and sees what lie has done, and looks up and secs what is yet to do; there is no happiness until he reaches the top; and I am half way up the ladder, my little girl.’ But still Jacques feels in a false position, and makes no attempt to caress his daughter.

Eugenie stands thinking. ‘ It’s all new and sudden, my father,’ she says. ‘ I cannot say at once that I will marry Monsieur Furet. I cannot even say,’ she goes on quickly fur an eager hope shoots into her father’s eyes, ‘ that I will ever marry him ; but I will try and think of it; and thou knowest, my father, 1 would do very much to please thee.’ The sweet blue eyes are so tender as she say these words that Jacques turns away suddenly, and draws the sleeve of his blouse across his eyes. Chavtek IV. It is Sunday. Madame llousset and Eugenie have been already once up and down the steep green hill when they went to mass this morning; and now they are going to vespers, and after that to pay a visit to Monsieur Furet’s garden. Eugenie has often looked with longing eyes over the low stone wall at the lovely flowers, and she consented readily to accept the invitation which her father brought back from Monsieur Furet.

Jacpuea Rousset stands and watches mother and daughter as they walk side by side down the slope.

“What a bundle the old woman grows! Will my trim sprightly little girl ever grow like that ? Well, the wheel goes round with us as with the machines. Ah ! the machines —dame ! but I did not think old Furet would have been so wide awake. He is not so much in love as our Jeannetonthinks he is.’

He ends with a growl. Yesterday, when he saw Monsieur Furet, he suggested as delicately as possible that his daughter was not anxious to marry, but that he, Jacques Rouset, was exceedingly rejoiced at the prospect of such a son-in-law. Monsieur bowed his thanks in reply, and then Monsieur Rousset changed the subject of conversation, and ended by introducing, as he thought, in an altogether casual way, the new machinery he had seen at Bolbec, and the immense advantages that would accrue to him as a miller if he could afford to purchase the like.

The old fox !’ Jacques stuffs his hands into his pockets and stamps. It was too exasperating to see him rub his smooth old hands together and say, ‘ I wish you all success, Monsieur. Then lam to understand that, although you cannot promise me your daughter, you permit mo to try to win her favor?’ He shrugs his shoulders impatiently, and paces down the slope as far as the shed. It is deserted to-day, and he seats himself on the rough wooden bench on which they chop fagots.

‘ Bah ! bah ! bah ! After all the old fellow has tact and sense, and I can manage anything but a fool. No one can do that. It shows he knows something about women, that he should ask to introduce Eugenie to his house and garden when he introduced himself to her. He will make an easy-going doating husband, no fear. The only thing I should like out of the arrangement is that square-faced, black-eyed menugere. I believe she has been listening at the door. ’

He comes out of the shed, and looks down the hill. The women are out of sight.

He would have been still more troubled if he had seen the dark eyes peering out of a little slit of a window of Monsieur Furet’s house when the congregation staggers out of church.

Monsieur Furet had been to vespers, and lie stands in the porch waiting for his visitors. He only makes Eugenie a profound bow, but he tucks Madame Rousset’s hand under his arm, and leads her in triumph to his house. The entrance is plain and dull. A narrow path leads from the little gate, between two closely-clipped hedges. As Murguerite does not appear, monsieur takes a key out of his pocket and opens the door. The long, dark, flagged passage entrance looks cold and cheerless. Eugenie steps down into it and she shivers; it feels damp; and as Monsieur Furet closes the door behind her the house seems like a prison. Monsieur is surprised at the absence of his housekeeper; but he keeps a smiling countenance and throws open the door of his study. Eugenie has heard about the avocat’s treasures, and she follows her mother into the quaint little room with a pretty flushed eagerness. It is quite a little museum; there is tapestry on the walls, and each of the chairs is an antique curiosity. Monsiur Furet speaks for the first time to Eugenie. M have not the happiness of being acquainted with the tastes of mademoiselle, so 1 hardly know what to show' her. If mademoiselle affects real antiquities—and these, I confess, for me have the greatest charm—l hare there’ —he points to a row of shelves opposite the fireplace—‘ Roman anaphoras and Phoenician tiles, discovered at Lillebonne; these are Celtic remains from Evreux; and that’—he pointed to a bit of stone — ‘ was brought from Ireland. But’—he gets so eager that his eyes brighten visibly- ‘it is possible that mademoiselle prefers these. Eugenie has looked with much disappointment lit the rows of grey and red pots and tiles and broken bits he has indicated, only enlivened here and there by a small dark porphyry figure, or one in lapis lazuli. She sees much more to admire on the table full of old blue and white faience he now shows hex’.

‘But, monsieur,’she says, timidly, ‘why do you prize this more than the lovely porcelain in the shops at Rouen ?’ ‘Ma foi , mademoiselle ! but that is of our day! it has no speciality. It is the age and the rarity which make this valuable. ’ ‘ I could never like old things so well as new ones,’ says Eugenie, saucily, as she turns away, perfectly unconscious of Monsieur Furet’s confusion:

‘Do not mind her,’ whispers Madame Roussct ; ‘ she is young and giddy. Take us to your garden ; my child has a passion for flowers.’

Monsieur bows and leads the way into the garden. Hero it is so bright and full of sunshine, and the flowers are so full of lovely life and color, that Eugenie feels at her ease again, and she smiles and looks happy. Monsieur Furet gathers her a bunch of China roses, and she thanks him gratefully. He feels younger already in the light of those sweet soft glances, and his first embarrassment passes away. He talks to Eugenic about the flowers, and banters her so playfully about her mistakes—-for she is very ignorant respecting them—that the girl forgets the dismal tomb-like house and the lonely study, full of ‘old things,’ and thinks how charming it would be to have this garden for her own. Eugenie has a reverence for learning. Her father’s only fault, in her eyes, is that he never looks at a book or a newspaper; and as she listens to Monsieur Furet’s gentle talk—now of the special properties of a plant, now of the singular circumstance which led to its discovery, now narrating some old Norman legend—time goes by, and still Eugenic paces up and down the garden beside her host, and listens with interest to his talk. She has not only to listen. He sets himself to draw her out, and'grows fascinated by her fresh simplicity. She has quite lost her shyness. Her mother got tired some time ago, and sat down on a huge green Chinese seat, just outside the kitchen window. Monsieur has forgotten everything but Eugenic, or he would surely summon Margot to entertain Madame Rousset; he would wonder, too, what has become of the me nag ere, generally all too forward in the presence of visitors. But he is in love, with all the foolishness of love at fifty-five; he cannot lose a glance of those sweet blue eyes, a curve of those red smiling lips, and his homage is so earnest, yet so gentle and respectful, that it fascinates Eugenie. It is wonderful, she thinks, that a gentleman and a scholar like Monsieur Furet should take so much kind trouble to amuse her.

Monsieur Furet pauses in front of the rocker and the grove of sycamores.

‘ I have a potager behind,’he says, ‘ and beyond that are two fields, so that I have room for a cow and a pony: Will you like to see my cow ?’ ‘lf you please, monsieur. ’ And then Eugenie feels a pang of conscience- ‘ But my mother will be tired, ’ she says ; ‘ we have left her so long alone. ’ Monsier Furet is in fresh delight. Here is a new proof of Eugenie’s goodness, and tlie ‘we ’ pleases him. ‘ Wait a moment, ’ he says ; ‘ I will, with mademoiselle’s permission, call my housekeeper, Margot, so that Madame Rousset may be no longer alone, and I will return and conduct mademoiselle to my cow.’ He bows and leaves her.

‘ I shall not wait, ’ says Eugenie. ‘I think exploring a strange place alone is great fun. I am only afraid of a dog, and monsieur would have told me if there had been a dog.’ She goes quickly through the trees; they are planted so closely that the path is damp and moss-grown. The kitchen garden is on the right, but this does not interest her. She passes on through a swing-gate which ends the path, and finds herself suddenly in the field beside the stagnant pool. The trees throw long branches across the water, and choke it with fallen leaves; here and there a gnarled, twisted, writhing limb has fallen in, and over all the scum and the water weeds cling close in foul embrace. Something in the dull choked water makes Eugenie pause ; then she shudders and turns back to the swing gate. A woman is opening it, and as she advances quickly towards her Eugenie recognises the housekeeper. She has never spoken to Marguerite, but she knows her by sight; she has often seen the broad red face in the doorway of Monsieur Furet. The housekeeper is as pale now as Nature will permit her to be. She nods familiarly to Eugenie, and looks at her till the girl’s eyes drop beneath the fixed gaze. ‘ Bon. jour, mademoiselle.’ Marguerite’s face relaxes into a sudden smile. She has changed her tactics. Something in the girl’s face tells her that insolence is not a safe weapon. ’ ‘ Tunis, but why then has mademoiselle left the pretty flowers, to look at this dark pond ?’ Marguerite gives a little shiver of fear, and turns away. To be continued.