Sons of the Soil

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"The mayors of Conches, Cerneux, and Soulanges have sent us all their
paupers," said Groison, who had now looked at the certificates; "they
had no right to do so."

"No, but our people will go to their districts," said the general.
"For the time being we have done enough by preventing the gleaning
before the sheaves were taken away; we had better go step by step," he
added, turning to leave the field.

"Did you hear him?" said Mother Tonsard to the old Bonnebault woman,
for the general's last words were said in a rather louder tone than
the rest, and reached the ears of the two old women who were posted in
the road which led beside the field.

"Yes, yes! we haven't got to the end yet,--a tooth to-day and to-morrow
an ear; if they could find a sauce for our livers they'd eat 'em as
they do a calf's!" said old Bonnebault, whose threatening face was
turned in profile to the general as he passed her, though in the
twinkling of an eye she changed its expression to one of hypocritical
softness and submission as she hastened to make him a profound
curtsey.

"So you are gleaning, are you, though my wife helps you to earn so
much money?"

"Hey! my dear gentleman, may God preserve you in good health! but,
don't you see, my grandson squanders all I earn, and I'm forced to
scratch up a little wheat to get bread in the winter,--yes, yes, I
glean just a bit; it all helps."

The gleaning proved of little profit to the gleaners. The farmers and
tenant-farmers, finding themselves backed up, took care that their
wheat was well reaped, and superintended the making of the sheaves and
their safe removal, so that little or none of the pillage of former
years could take place.

Accustomed to get a good proportion of wheat in their gleaning, the
false as well as the true poor, forgetting the count's pardon at
Conches, now felt a deep but silent anger against him, which was
aggravated by the Tonsards, Courtecuisse, Bonnebault, Laroche,
Vaudoyer, Godain, and their adherents. Matters went worse still after
the vintage; for the gathering of the refuse grape was not allowed
until Sibilet had examined the vines with extreme care. This last
restriction exasperated these sons of the soil to the highest pitch;
but when so great a social distance separates the angered class from
the threatened class, words and threats are lost; nothing comes to the
surface or is perceived but facts; meantime the malcontents work
underground like moles.

The fair of Soulanges took place as usual quite peacefully, except for
certain jarrings between the leading society and the second-class
society of Soulanges, brought about by the despotism of the queen, who
could not tolerate the empire founded and established over the heart
of the brilliant Lupin by the beautiful Euphemie Plissoud, for she
herself laid permanent claim to his fickle fervors.

The count and countess did not appear at the fair nor at the Tivoli
fete; and that, again, was counted a wrong by the Soudrys, the
Gaubertins, and their adherents; it was pride, it was disdain, said
the Soudry salon. During this time the countess was filling the void
caused by Emile's return to Paris with the immense interest and
pleasure all fine souls take in the good they are doing, or think they
do; and the count, for his part, applied himself no less zealously to
changes and ameliorations in the management of his estate, which he
expected and believed would modify and benefit the condition of the
people and hence their characters. Madame de Montcornet, assisted by
the advice and experience of the Abbe Brossette, came, little by
little, to have a thorough and statistical knowledge of all the poor
families of the district, their respective condition, their wants,
their means of subsistence, and the sort of help she must give to each
to obtain work so as not to make them lazy or idle.

The countess had placed Genevieve Niseron, La Pechina, in a convent at
Auxerre, under pretext of having her taught to sew that she might
employ her in her own house, but really to save her from the shameful
attempts of Nicolas Tonsard, whom Rigou had managed to save from the
conscription. The countess also believed that a religious education,
the cloister, and monastic supervision, would subdue the ardent
passions of the precocious little girl, whose Montenegrin blood seemed
to her like a threatening flame which might one day set fire to the
domestic happiness of her faithful Olympe.

So all was at peace at the chateau des Aigues. The count, misled by
Sibilet, reassured by Michaud, congratulated himself on his firmness,
and thanked his wife for having contributed by her benevolence to the
immense comfort of their tranquillity. The question of the sale of his
timber was laid aside till he should go to Paris and arrange with the
dealers. He had not the slightest notion of how to do business, and he
was in total ignorance of the power wielded by Gaubertin over the
current of the Yonne,--the main line of conveyance which supplied the
timber of the Paris market.



CHAPTER VII

THE GREYHOUND

Towards the middle of September Emile Blondet, who had gone to Paris
to publish a book, returned to refresh himself at Les Aigues and to
think over the work he was planning for the winter. At Les Aigues, the
loving and sincere qualities which succeed adolescence in a young
man's soul reappeared in the used-up journalist.

"What a fine soul!" was the comment of the count and the countess when
they spoke of him.

Men who are accustomed to move among the abysses of social nature, to
understand all and to repress nothing, make themselves an oasis in the
heart, where they forget their perversities and those of others; they
become within that narrow and sacred circle,--saints; there, they
possess the delicacy of women, they give themselves up to a momentary
realization of their ideal, they become angelic for some one being who
adores them, and they are not playing comedy; they join their soul to
innocence, so to speak; they feel the need to brush off the mud, to
heal their sores, to bathe their wounds. At Les Aigues Emile Blondet
was without bitterness, without sarcasm, almost without wit; he made
no epigrams, he was gentle as a lamb, and platonically tender.

"He is such a good young fellow that I miss him terribly when he is
not here," said the general. "I do wish he could make a fortune and
not lead that Paris life of his."

Never did the glorious landscape and park of Les Aigues seem as
luxuriantly beautiful as it did just then. The first autumn days were
beginning, when the earth, languid from her procreations and delivered
of her products, exhales the delightful odors of vegetation. At this
time the woods, especially, are delicious; they begin to take the
russet warmth of Sienna earth, and the green-bronze tones which form
the lovely tapestry beneath which they hide from the cold of winter.

Nature, having shown herself in springtime jaunty and joyous as a
brunette glowing with hope, becomes in autumn sad and gentle as a
blonde full of pensive memories; the turf yellows, the last flowers
unfold their pale corollas, the white-eyed daisies are fewer in the
grass, only their crimson calices are seen. Yellows abound; the shady
places are lighter for lack of leafage, but darker in tone; the sun,
already oblique, slides its furtive orange rays athwart them, leaving
long luminous traces which rapidly disappear, like the train of a
woman's gown as she bids adieu.

On the morning of the second day after his arrival, Emile was at a
window of his bedroom, which opened upon a terrace with a balustrade
from which a noble view could be seen. This balcony ran the whole
length of the apartments of the countess, on the side of the chateau
towards the forests and the Blangy landscape. The pond, which would
have been called a lake were Les Aigues nearer Paris, was partly in
view, so was the long canal; the Silver-spring, coming from across the
pavilion of the Rendezvous, crossed the lawn with its sheeny ribbon,
reflecting the yellow sand.

Beyond the park, between the village and the walls, lay the cultivated
parts of Blangy,--meadows where the cows were grazing, small
properties surrounded by hedges, filled with fruit of all kinds, nut
and apple trees. By way of frame, the heights on which the noble
forest-trees were ranged, tier above tier, closed in the scene. The
countess had come out in her slippers to look at the flowers in her
balcony, which were sending up their morning fragrance; she wore a
cambric dressing-gown, beneath which the rosy tints of her white
shoulders could be seen; a coquettish little cap was placed in a
bewitching manner on her hair, which escaped it recklessly; her little
feet showed their warm flesh color through the transparent stockings;
the cambric gown, unconfined at the waist, floated open as the breeze
took it, and showed an embroidered petticoat.

"Oh! are you there?" she said.

"Yes."

"What are you looking at?"

"A pretty question! You have torn me from the contemplation of Nature.
Tell me, countess, will you go for a walk in the woods this morning
before breakfast?"

"What an idea! You know I have a horror of walking."

"We will only walk a little way; I'll drive you in the tilbury and
take Joseph to hold the horses. You have never once set foot in your
forest; and I have just noticed something very curious, a phenomenon;
there are spots where the tree-tops are the color of Florentine
bronze, the leaves are dried--"

"Well, I'll dress."

"Oh, if you do, we can't get off for two hours. Take a shawl, put on a
bonnet, and boots; that's all you want. I shall tell them to harness."

"You always make me do what you want; I'll be ready in a minute."

"General," said Blondet, waking the count, who grumbled and turned
over, like a man who wants his morning sleep. "We are going for a
drive; won't you come?"

A quarter of an hour later the tilbury was slowly rolling along the
park avenue, followed by a liveried groom on horseback.

The morning was a September morning. The dark blue of the sky burst
forth here and there from the gray of the clouds, which seemed the sky
itself, the ether seeming to be the accessory; long lines of
ultramarine lay upon the horizon, but in strata, which alternated with
other lines like sand-bars; these tones changed and grew green at the
level of the forests. The earth beneath this overhanging mantle was
moistly warm, like a woman when she rises; it exhaled sweet, luscious
odors, which yet were wild, not civilized,--the scent of cultivation
was added to the scents of the woods. Just then the Angelus was
ringing at Blangy, and the sounds of the bell, mingling with the wild
concert of the forest, gave harmony to the silence. Here and there
were rising vapors, white, diaphanous.

Seeing these lovely preparations of Nature, the fancy had seized
Olympe Michaud to accompany her husband, who had to give an order to a
keeper whose house was not far off. The Soulanges doctor advised her
to walk as long as she could do so without fatigue; she was afraid of
the midday heat and went out only in the early morning or evening.
Michaud now took her with him, and they were followed by the dog he
loved best,--a handsome greyhound, mouse-colored with white spots,
greedy, like all greyhounds, and as full of vices as most animals who
know they are loved and petted.

So, then the tilbury reached the pavilion of the Rendezvous, the
countess, who stopped to ask how Madame Michaud felt, was told she had
gone into the forest with her husband.

"Such weather inspires everybody," said Blondet, turning his horse at
hazard into one of the six avenues of the forest; "Joseph, you know
the woods, don't you?"

"Yes, monsieur."

And away they went. The avenue they took happened to be one of the
most delightful in the forest; it soon turned and grew narrower, and
presently became a winding way, on which the sunshine flickered
through rifts in the leafy roof, and where the breeze brought odors of
lavender, and thyme, and the wild mint, and that of falling leaves,
which sighed as they fell. Dew-drops on the trees and on the grass
were scattered like seeds by the passing of the light carriage; the
occupants as they rolled along caught glimpses of the mysterious
visions of the woods,--those cool depths, where the verdure is moist
and dark, where the light softens as it fades; those white-birch
glades o'ertopped by some centennial tree, the Hercules of the forest;
those glorious assemblages of knotted, mossy trunks, whitened and
furrowed, and the banks of delicate wild plants and fragile flowers
which grow between a woodland road and the forest. The brooks sang.
Truly there is a nameless pleasure in driving a woman along the ups
and downs of a slippery way carpeted with moss, where she pretends to
be afraid or really is so, and you are conscious that she is drawing
closer to you, letting you feel, voluntarily or involuntarily, the
cool moisture of her arm, the weight of her round, white shoulder,
though she merely smiles when told that she hinders you in driving.
The horse seems to know the secret of these interruptions, and he
looks about him from right to left.

It was a new sight to the countess; this nature so vigorous in its
effects, so little seen and yet so grand, threw her into a languid
revery; she leaned back in the tilbury and yielded herself up to the
pleasure of being there with Emile; her eyes were charmed, her heart
spoke, she answered to the inward voice that harmonized with hers. He,
too, glanced at her furtively; he enjoyed that dreamy meditation,
while the ribbons of the bonnet floated on the morning breeze with the
silky curls of the golden hair. In consequence of going they knew not
where, they presently came to a locked gate, of which they had not the
key. Joseph was called up, but neither had he a key.

"Never mind, let us walk; Joseph can take care of the tilbury; we
shall easily find it again."

Emile and the countess plunged into the forest, and soon reached a
small interior cleared space, such as is often met with in the woods.
Twenty years earlier the charcoal-burners had made it their kiln, and
the place still remained open, quite a large circumference having been
burned over. But during those twenty years Nature had made herself a
garden of flowers, a blooming "parterre" for her own enjoyment, just
as an artist gives himself the delight of painting a picture for his
own happiness. The enchanting spot was surrounded by fine trees, whose
tops hung over like vast fringes and made a dais above this flowery
couch where slept the goddess. The charcoal-burners had followed a
path to a pond, always full of water. The path is there still; it
invites you to step into it by a turn full of mystery; then suddenly
it stops short and you come upon a bank where a thousand roots run
down to the water and make a sort of canvas in the air. This hidden
pond has a narrow grassy edge, where a few willows and poplars lend
their fickle shade to a bank of turf which some lazy or pensive
charcoal-burner must have made for his enjoyment. The frogs hop about,
the teal bathe in the pond, the water-fowl come and go, a hare starts;
you are the master of this delicious bath, decorated with iris and
bulrushes. Above your head the trees take many attitudes; here the
trunks twine down like boa-constrictors, there the beeches stand erect
as a Greek column. The snails and the slugs move peacefully about. A
tench shows its gills, a squirrel looks at you; and at last, after
Emile and the countess, tired with her walk, were seated, a bird, but
I know not what bird it was, sang its autumn song, its farewell song,
to which the other songsters listened,--a song welcome to love, and
heard by every organ of the being.

"What silence!" said the countess, with emotion and in a whisper, as
if not to trouble this deep peace.

They looked at the green patches on the water,--worlds where life was
organizing; they pointed to the lizard playing in the sun and escaping
at their approach,--behavior which has won him the title of "the
friend of man." "Proving, too, how well he knows him," said Emile.
They watched the frogs, who, less distrustful, returned to the surface
of the pond, winking their carbuncle eyes as they sat upon the
water-cresses. The sweet and simple poetry of Nature permeated these
two souls surfeited with the conventional things of life, and filled
them with contemplative emotion. Suddenly Blondet shuddered. Turning
to the countess he said,--

"Did you hear that?"

"What?" she asked.

"A curious noise."

"Ah, you literary men who live in your studies and know nothing of the
country! that is only a woodpecker tapping a tree. I dare say you
don't even know the most curious fact in the history of that bird. As
soon as he has given his tap, and he gives millions to pierce an oak,
he flies behind the tree to see if he is yet through it; and he does
this every instant."

"The noise I heard, dear instructress of natural history, was not a
noise made by an animal; there was evidence of mind in it, and that
proclaims a man."

The countess was seized with panic, and she darted back through the
wild flower-garden, seeking the path by which to leave the forest.

"What is the matter?" cried Blondet, rushing after her.

"I thought I saw eyes," she said, when they regained the path through
which they had reached the charcoal-burner's open.

Just then they heard the low death-rattle of a creature whose throat
was suddenly cut, and the countess, with her fears redoubled, fled so
quickly that Blondet could scarcely follow her. She ran like a
will-o'-the-wisp, and did not listen to Blondet who called to her,
"You are mistaken." On she ran, and Emile with her, till they suddenly
came upon Michaud and his wife, who were walking along arm-in-arm.
Emile was panting and the countess out of breath, and it was some time
before they could speak; then they explained. Michaud joined Blondet
in laughing at the countess's terror; then the bailiff showed the two
wanderers the way to find the tilbury. When they reached the gate
Madame Michaud called, "Prince!"

"Prince! Prince!" called the bailiff; then he whistled,--but no
greyhound.

Emile mentioned the curious noise that began their adventure.

"My wife heard that noise," said Michaud, "and I laughed at her."

"They have killed Prince!" exclaimed the countess. "I am sure of it;
they killed him by cutting his throat at one blow. What I heard was
the groan of a dying animal."

"The devil!" cried Michaud; "the matter must be cleared up."

Emile and the bailiff left the two ladies with Joseph and the horses,
and returned to the wild garden of the open. They went down the bank
to the pond; looked everywhere along the slope, but found no clue.
Blondet jumped back first, and as he did so he saw, in a thicket which
stood on higher ground, one of those trees he had noticed in the
morning with withered heads. He showed it to Michaud, and proposed to
go to it. The two sprang forward in a straight line across the forest,
avoiding the trunks and going round the matted tangles of brier and
holly until they found the tree.

"It is a fine elm," said Michaud, "but there's a worm in it,--a worm
which gnaws round the bark close to the roots."

He stopped and took up a bit of the bark, saying: "See how they work."

"You have a great many worms in this forest," said Blondet.

Just then Michaud noticed a red spot; a moment more and he saw the
head of his greyhound. He sighed.

"The scoundrels!" he said. "Madame was right."

Michaud and Blondet examined the body and found, just as the countess
had said, that some one had cut the greyhound's throat. To prevent his
barking he had been decoyed with a bit of meat, which was still
between his tongue and his palate.

"Poor brute; he died of self-indulgence."

"Like all princes," said Blondet.

"Some one, whoever it is, has just gone, fearing that we might catch
him or her," said Michaud. "A serious offence has been committed. But
for all that, I see no branches about and no lopped trees."

Blondet and the bailiff began a cautious search, looking at each spot
where they set their feet before setting them. Presently Blondet
pointed to a tree beneath which the grass was flattened down and two
hollows made.

"Some one knelt there, and it must have been a woman, for a man would
not have left such a quantity of flattened grass around the impression
of his two knees; yes, see! that is the outline of a petticoat."

The bailiff, after examining the base of the tree, found the beginning
of a hole beneath the bark; but he did not find the worm with the
tough skin, shiny and squamous, covered with brown specks, ending in a
tail not unlike that of a cockchafer, and having also the latter's
head, antennae, and the two vigorous hooks or shears with which the
creature cuts into the wood.

"My dear fellow," said Blondet, "now I understand the enormous number
of _dead_ trees that I noticed this morning from the terrace of the
chateau, and which brought me here to find out the cause of the
phenomenon. Worms are at work; but they are no other than your
peasants."

The bailiff gave vent to an oath and rushed off, followed by Blondet,
to rejoin the countess, whom he requested to take his wife home with
her. Then he jumped on Joseph's horse, leaving the man to return on
foot, and disappeared with great rapidity to cut off the retreat of
the woman who had killed his dog, hoping to catch her with the bloody
bill-hook in her hand and the tool used to make the incisions in the
bark of the tree.

"Let us go and tell the general at once, before he breakfasts," cried
the countess; "he might die of anger."

"I'll prepare him," said Blondet.

"They have killed the dog," said Olympe, in tears.

"You loved the poor greyhound, dear, enough to weep for him?" said the
countess.

"I think of Prince as a warning; I fear some danger to my husband."

"How they have ruined this beautiful morning for us," said the
countess, with an adorable little pout.

"How they have ruined the country," said Olympe, gravely.

They met the general near the chateau.

"Where have you been?" he asked.

"You shall know in a minute," said Blondet, mysteriously, as he helped
the countess and Madame Michaud to alight. A moment more and the two
gentlemen were alone on the terrace of the apartments.

"You have plenty of moral strength, general; you won't put yourself in
a passion, will you?"

"No," said the general; "but come to the point or I shall think you
are making fun of me."

"Do you see those trees with dead leaves?"

"Yes."

"Do you see those others that are wilting?"

"Yes."

"Well, every one of them has been killed by the peasants you think you
have won over by your benefits."

And Blondet related the events of the morning.

The general was so pale that Blondet was frightened.

"Come, curse, swear, be furious! your self-control may hurt you more
than anger!"

"I'll go and smoke," said the general, turning toward the kiosk.

During breakfast Michaud came in; he had found no one. Sibilet, whom
the count had sent for, came also.

"Monsieur Sibilet, and you, Monsieur Michaud, are to make it known,
cautiously, that I will pay a thousand francs to whoever will arrest
_in the act_ the person or persons who are killing my trees; they must
also discover the instrument with which the work is done, and where it
was bought. I have settled upon a plan."

"Those people never betray one another," said Sibilet, "if the crime
done is for their benefit and premeditated. There is no denying that
this diabolical business has been planned, carefully planned and
contrived."

"Yes, but a thousand francs means a couple of acres of land."

"We can try," said Sibilet; "fifteen hundred francs might buy you a
traitor, especially if you promise secrecy."

"Very good; but let us act as if we suspected nothing, I especially;
if not, we shall be the victims of some collusion; one has to be as
wary with these brigands as with the enemy in war."

"But the enemy is here," said Blondet.

Sibilet threw him the furtive glance of a man who understood the
meaning of the words, and then he withdrew.

"I don't like your Sibilet," said Blondet, when he had seen the
steward leave the house. "That man is playing false."

"Up to this time he has done nothing I could complain of," said the
general.

Blondet went off to write letters. He had lost the careless gayety of
his first arrival, and was now uneasy and preoccupied; but he had no
vague presentiments like those of Madame Michaud; he was, rather, in
full expectation of certain foreseen misfortunes. He said to himself,
"This affair will come to some bad end; and if the general does not
take decisive action and will not abandon a battle-field where he is
overwhelmed by numbers there must be a catastrophe; and who knows who
will come out safe and sound,--perhaps neither he nor his wife. Good
God! that adorable little creature! so devoted, so perfect! how can he
expose her thus! He thinks he loves her! Well, I'll share their
danger, and if I can't save them I'll suffer with them."