Chapter III: Part 3

When they rose from the table, Pauline immediately left the room. Véronique was clearing the things away, and as she came back from the kitchen for a fresh trayful she said, with a triumphant expression: 'Ah, Madame! I know you think your Pauline quite perfect, but just go and look at her now in the yard.'

They all went out to see. Hiding away behind the coach-house, Pauline was holding Matthew against the wall, and, apparently mad with passion, was hitting his head with all the strength of her clenched fists. The poor dog seemed quite stupefied, and, instead of offering resistance to her blows, simply hung down his head. They rushed out at her, but even at their approach she did not desist from her cruel treatment, and they were obliged to carry her off. She was found to be in such a feverish, excited state that she was at once put to bed, and for the greater part of the night her aunt dared not leave her.

'Oh! yes, she's a dear little thing, a very dear little thing!' sneered Véronique, who was quite delighted at having discovered a flaw in the diamond.

'I remember, now,' said Madame Chanteau, 'that people spoke to me about her outbursts of temper when I was in Paris. She is quite jealous--what a nasty thing! I have noticed during the six months that she has been with us several trifling matters that haven't pleased me; but, really, to try to murder the poor dog beats everything!'

When Pauline saw Matthew the next day, she threw her trembling arms round him and, kissing him on the nose, burst into such a flood of tears that they feared she was going to have another hysterical attack. In spite of her repentance, she could not restrain these outbursts of mad passion. It was as though some sudden storm within her sent all her blood boiling and hissing into her head. She had doubtless inherited this jealous violence from some ancestor on her mother's side; yet she had a deal of common-sense for a child of ten years old, and used to say that she did all she could to struggle against those outbreaks, but without avail. They made her very miserable, as though they had been the symptoms of some shameful disease.

At times, when Madame Chanteau reproached her, she replied, hiding her head against her aunt's shoulder: 'I love you so much, why do you love others?'

Thus, in spite of all her efforts and struggles, Pauline suffered a great deal from Louise's presence in the house. Ever since the other had been expected, she had been looking forward to her coming with uneasy curiosity, and now she was impatiently counting the days of her stay, all eagerness for her departure. Yet she could not help remarking the charm of Louise's manner, the pretty seductiveness of her half-childish, half-womanish demeanour; but, perhaps, it was this very charm and seductiveness that troubled her and made her so angry when Lazare was present. For his part, the young man showed the greater preference for Pauline, and even made jokes about Louise, saying that she wearied him with her grand airs, and that Pauline and he had better leave her alone to play the fine lady by herself, while they went off somewhere to amuse themselves as they liked. All boisterous romping had ceased since Louise's arrival; indoors they remained looking at pictures, and when they went to the shore they walked about with irreproachable decorum. It was a fortnight utterly wasted.

One morning Lazare announced his intention of anticipating his departure by five days. He was anxious, he said, to get settled down in Paris, where he expected to find one of his old chums at the College of Caen. Pauline, whom the thought of the approaching separation had distressed for a month past, now strongly approved of her cousin's determination, and gleefully assisted her aunt to pack his trunk. But as soon as he had driven off in old Malivoire's ancient _berline_ she rushed away to her room, locked herself in it, and gave herself up to weeping. Then, in the evening, she bore herself very kindly and affectionately towards Louise, and the remaining week which the latter spent at Bonneville passed away delightfully. When the maid came to fetch her home again, explaining that the banker had not been able to leave his business, the two girls rushed into each other's arms and swore eternal friendship.

A year slowly passed away. Madame Chanteau had changed her mind, and, instead of sending Pauline to a boarding-school, had kept her at home with herself, being chiefly moved to this course by the complaints of Chanteau, who had grown so used to the girl that he declared he could not possibly get on without her. But the good lady did not confess that any such reason of self-interest had anything to do with the alteration of her plans; she talked about undertaking the child's education herself, feeling quite youthful again at the thought of reverting to her old profession of tuition. Besides, in boarding-schools, said she, little girls became acquainted with all kinds of things, and she wished her young ward to be reared in perfect innocence and purity. They hunted out from among Lazare's miscellaneous books a Grammar, an Arithmetic, a Treatise on History, and even an Abridgment of the Greek Mythology; and Madame Chanteau resumed her functions of preceptress. Lazare's big room was turned into a schoolroom; Pauline had to resume her music lessons there, and was put through a severe course of deportment to rid her of all the unladylike, boyish ways into which she had fallen. She showed herself very docile and intelligent, and manifested a great willingness to learn, even when the subject-matter of her lessons was distasteful to her. There was only one thing which seemed to weary her, and that was the catechism. She had not as yet supposed that her aunt would take the trouble to conduct her to mass on Sundays. Why should she, indeed? When she lived in Paris, no one had ever taken her to Saint-Eustache, which was quite near their house. It was only with difficulty that abstract ideas found their way into her understanding, and her aunt had to explain to her that a well brought-up young lady's duty in the country was to set a proper example by showing herself to be on good terms with the priest. Religion, with her, had never been anything more than a matter of appearance and respectability, and she looked upon it as part of a polite education, standing upon very much the same footing as the art of deportment.

Twice every day the tide swept up to the cliffs of Bonneville, and Pauline's life passed on with the great expanse of surging water before her eyes. She had given over playing and romping, for she no longer had a companion. When she had run along the terrace with Matthew, or strolled to the end of the kitchen-garden with Minouche, her only pleasure was to go and gaze at the sea, which was full of changing life, dark and gloomy in the stormy days of winter, and gleaming with bright blues and greens beneath the summer sun. The beneficent influence which seemed to flow from the girl's presence in the house manifested itself in another form that year, for Chanteau received from Davoine a quite unlooked-for remittance of five thousand francs, which threats of a dissolution of partnership had extorted from him. Madame Chanteau never missed going to Caen each quarter to receive her niece's dividends, and when she had deducted her expenses and the sum which she was allowed for Pauline's board, she invested the balance in the purchase of further stock. On returning home she always took the girl into her room, and, opening the well-known drawer in the secrétaire, said to her: 'There, you see, I am putting this with the other. Isn't it getting a big heap? Don't be at all uneasy about it. You will find it all there when you want it. There won't be a centime missing.'

One fine morning in August Lazare suddenly made his appearance, bringing with him the news of his complete success in his preliminary examinations. He had not been expected for another week, but he had wanted to take his mother by surprise. His arrival greatly delighted them all. In the letters which he had written home every fortnight he had shown an increasing interest in medicine, and, now that he was amongst them again, he appeared to be completely changed. He never spoke a word about music, but was perpetually chattering about his professors and his scientific studies, dragging them in _à propos_ of everything, even of the dishes that were served at dinner and the direction in which the wind was blowing. He was, now, a prey to another wildly enthusiastic ambition, for he dreamed, day and night, of becoming a physician, whose wonderful skill would be trumpeted through the whole world. Pauline, when she had thrown her arms round his neck and kissed him with child-like frankness, was more surprised than the others at this change in him. It almost grieved her, indeed, that he should have dropped all his interest in music, even as a recreation. Could it be possible, she asked herself, that, when one had really loved anything, one could end by caring nothing at all about it? One day when she asked him about his symphony, he began to make fun of it, and told her that he had quite done with all such nonsense. She felt quite sad at those words. But he also seemed to be soon bored with her society, and laughed with an unpleasant laugh; while his eyes and his gestures spoke of a ten months' life which could not have been related in detail to little girls.

He had unpacked his trunk himself, so as to keep from view the books he had brought home with him, novels and medical works, some of them copiously illustrated. He no longer twirled his cousin like a top, as he had been wont to do, making her petticoats fly in a circle round her, and he even seemed quite confused at times when she persisted in coming into his room and staying there. However, she had scarcely grown at all during his absence, and she still looked him frankly in the face with her pure innocent eyes, in such wise that by the end of a week his appearance of uneasiness had vanished, and they reverted to their old intimacy and comradeship. The fresh sea-breezes had now swept the unhealthy influences of the students' quarter of Paris out of Lazare's brain, and he felt once more a child himself as he romped about with his little cousin, both of them full of vigorous health and gaiety. All the old life began anew; the racing round the table, the scampers with Matthew and Minouche through the garden, the rambles to the Golden Bay and the bathing in the open air. And that year, too, Louise, who had paid a visit to Bonneville in May, went to take her holidays with some other friends at Rouen; and so the others spent two very delightful months, without a single disagreement or misunderstanding to mar their enjoyment. When October came, Pauline watched Lazare pack his trunk for his return to Paris. He gathered together the books he had brought with him, which had remained stowed away in his cupboard without once being opened.

'Are you going to take them all back with you?' the girl asked in a melancholy voice.

'Yes, indeed,' he replied. 'I shall want them all for my studies. You have no notion how hard I am going to work. I shall want every one of them.'

The little house at Bonneville once more subsided into lifeless, monotonous quietude. Each day passed in precisely the same way as its predecessors, bringing the same round of incidents beside the ceaseless rhythm of the ocean. That year, however, was marked distinctly for Pauline. In the month of June she took her first communion, being then twelve and a half years old. By slow degrees a religious feeling had taken possession of her, but it was a religious feeling loftier than the one indicated in her catechism, whose answers she constantly repeated without understanding them. With her reflective young mind she had ended by picturing the Deity to herself as a very powerful and very wise ruler, who directed everything upon earth in accordance with principles of strict justice; and this simplified conception of hers sufficed to put her on a footing of understanding with Abbé Horteur. The Abbé was a peasant's son, and into his hard head nothing but the letter of the law had ever made its way. He had grown to be contented with the observance of outward ceremonies and the maintenance of religious practices. True, he bestowed the greatest care and thought upon his own salvation; and if his parishioners should finally be damned, well, it would be their own fault. For fifteen years he had been trying to terrify them without success, and now all that he asked of them was to come to church on the great feast days. And, in spite of the sinful state in which it rotted, Bonneville did come to church pretty regularly, drawn thither by the influence of old habit. But the priest's tolerance had degenerated into indifference as to the real spiritual condition of his flock. Every Saturday it was his custom to go and play draughts with Chanteau, although the mayor, making his gout an excuse, never set foot inside the church. But then Madame Chanteau did all that was necessary by attending the services regularly and taking Pauline with her. It was the priest's great simplicity and frankness which by degrees won Pauline over. While living in Paris, she had heard priests scoffed and sneered at as hypocrites, whose black robes concealed all manner of sins and wickedness. But the priest of that little sea-side hamlet seemed to her a thoroughly genuine, honest fellow, with his heavy boots and sun-browned neck and farmer-like speech and manner. One little fact especially impressed her. Abbé Horteur was strongly addicted to puffing away at a big meerschaum pipe, but he seemed to be disturbed by some slight scruples as to the propriety of such a habit, for whenever he wanted to smoke he always retired into his garden, and hid himself away in the solitude of his lettuce-beds. And it was the anxious air with which he hastily tried to put his pipe out of sight when he was taken unawares in his garden that touched the girl, though she could scarcely have told why. She took her first communion in a very serious and reverent frame of mind, in company with two other girls from the village and one boy. When the priest came to dine with the Chanteaus in the evening, he declared that never since he had been at Bonneville had he seen a communicant who had conducted herself with such reverence at the Holy Table.

Financially, the year was not so prosperous for the Chanteaus. The rise in the price of deal, for which Davoine had been hoping for a long time past, did not take place, and so only bad news came from Caen, for, being driven into selling at a loss, the business was in a bad way indeed. Thus the family lived in the most meagre fashion, and were only able to make their income of three thousand francs cover the necessary expenses by practising the most rigid economy. Lazare, whose letters to herself she kept strictly private, was Madame Chanteau's chief source of anxiety. He was apparently leading a life of extravagance and dissipation, for he constantly applied to her for money. When she went to Caen in July to receive Pauline's dividend, she made a fierce attack upon Davoine. Two thousand francs which he had previously given to her had been sent to Lazare, and now she succeeded in wringing another thousand francs out of him, and these she at once despatched to Paris. For Lazare had written to tell her that he would not be able to come home unless he was provided with the means of paying his debts. Every day during a whole week they expected his arrival amongst them, but each morning a letter came announcing that his departure had been put off till the morrow. When at last he did actually start for home, his mother and Pauline went as far as Verchemont to meet him. They met there, kissed each other on the high-road, and walked home together, followed by the unoccupied coach, which carried Lazare's luggage.

Lazare's return home that year was by no means so gay as his previous triumphal surprise. He had failed to pass an examination in July, and was embittered against all his professors, of whom he fell foul throughout the evening. The next morning, in Pauline's presence, he threw his books upon one of the shelves in the wardrobe, exclaiming that they might lie there and rot. This sudden disgust for his studies alarmed her. She heard him scoff bitterly at medicine, and deny its power to cure even a cold. One day when she was attempting to defend it from his attacks, in an impulse of youthful belief, he sneered so bitterly at her ignorance of what she was talking about that his remarks brought a hot blush to her cheeks. But, all the same, he said, he had resigned himself to being a doctor; as well that kind of humbug as any other: everything was equally stupid at bottom. Pauline grew quite indignant and angry at the new ideas which he had brought home with him. Where had he got them from? From those wicked books he read, she was quite sure; but she dared not discuss the matter fully, held back as she was by her own ignorance, and feeling ill at ease amidst her cousin's sneers and innuendoes and pretences that he could not tell her everything. The holidays glided away in perpetual misunderstandings and bickerings. In their walks together the young man seemed to be bored, and declared that the sea was wearisome and monotonous. As a means of killing time, however, he had taken to writing verses, and composed sonnets on the sea with great elaboration and fastidiousness of rhymes. He declined to bathe, saying that he had found that cold baths disagreed with his constitution, for, in spite of his denial of all value to medical science, he now indulged in the most sweeping and authoritative opinions, condemning or curing people with a word. About the middle of September, when they were expecting Louise's arrival, he suddenly expressed his intention of returning to Paris, saying that he wished to prepare for his examination again. He really thought that his life would be unbearable between two little girls, and wished to get back to the Latin Quarter. Pauline's manner to him, however, became gentler and more submissive the more he did to vex her. When he was rude and sought to distress her, she merely looked at him with those tender, smiling eyes of hers, whose soft influence was able to soothe even Chanteau when he groaned and moaned amidst one of his attacks of gout. She thought that her cousin was in some way out of health, for he looked upon life like a weary old man.

The day before his departure Lazare manifested such delight at the prospect of leaving Bonneville that Pauline burst into tears.

'You don't love me any more now!'

'Don't be a goose! Haven't I got to make my way in life? A big girl like you to be crying! The idea of it!'

Then she summoned up her courage again and smiled as she said to him: 'Work hard this year, so that when you come back again we may all be quite happy and satisfied.'

'Oh! there's no good in working hard! Their examinations are nothing but foolery. I didn't pass because I didn't care to. I am going to hurry through with it all now, since my lack of fortune prevents me from living a life of ease and leisure, which is the only satisfactory life a man can lead.'

In the early part of October, after Louise had returned to Caen, Pauline again resumed her lessons with her aunt. The curriculum of her third year's studies embraced bowdlerised French History, and Greek Mythology as 'adapted to the use of young persons.' But the girl, who had shown such diligence in the previous year, now seemed to have become quite sluggish and dull. Sometimes she even went to sleep over her tasks, and her face flushed with a hot surging of blood. A mad outburst of anger against Véronique, who didn't like her, she declared, made her so ill that she had to stop in bed for a couple of days. Then came changes in herself which disquieted and distressed her. About Christmas-time Pauline's health was such as to alarm Madame Chanteau. But that worthy woman, from ridiculous notions of her own, was largely to blame, as she refused to take Doctor Cazenove's advice and talk to the girl as she should have done. And in the result Pauline, at an important period in her youth, narrowly escaped being stricken with an attack of brain-fever.

When she was well again and resumed her studies, she began to affect an enthusiastic interest in the Greek Mythology. She shut herself up in Lazare's big room--which was still used as a schoolroom--and had to be sent for at meal-times. When she came down, she seemed buried in thought and quite indifferent to all that went on. Upstairs, however, the Mythology lay quite neglected on the table, for it was in poring over all the medical books which Lazare had left in the old wardrobe that she now spent her time. There were a good many of those works, and, though at first she failed to understand all the technical terms she met with, she plodded on through anatomy and physiology, and even pathology and clinical medicine. Thus she not only learnt--in all simplicity and purity of mind, saved from all vicious thought by a healthy craving for knowledge--many things of which girls of her age are usually ignorant; but her researches extended to the symptoms and treatment of all sorts of disease and ailment. Superfluous subjects she passed by unheeded. She seemed to know intuitively what knowledge was necessary to enable her to be of assistance to those who suffered. Her heart melted with pity as she read on, and she gave herself up again to her old dream of learning everything so that she might be able to cure all that went amiss.

Knowledge rendered Pauline grave and thoughtful. She felt surprised and annoyed at her aunt's silence towards her, which had resulted in such terror and serious illness. And when one day Madame Chanteau did see fit to refer to the matter, the girl quietly intimated that she needed no information. At this the other was alarmed, and Pauline then told her all about Lazare's books. There was a scene, but the girl, with her outspoken frankness, quite routed her aunt. 'How can there be harm in knowledge of the normal conditions of life?' she asked. Her enthusiasm was perfectly mental, and never did a single wrong thought disturb the pure depths of her clear, child-like eyes. On the same shelf with the medical books she had found novels which had repelled her and bored her, so that she had thrown them aside after glancing at the first few pages. Her aunt, growing more and more disconcerted, though she had recovered a little from her first shock, contented herself with locking the wardrobe and taking away the key. But a week later it was there again, and Pauline indulged herself in reading at intervals, by way of recreation, either a chapter on neurosis, with her mind fixed the while upon her cousin, or one relating to the treatment of gout, with the idea of undertaking her uncle's cure.

Each day increasing love of life and its various manifestations displayed itself in Pauline and made of her, to use her aunt's phrase, a general mother. Everything that lived, everything that suffered, aroused in her a feeling of active tenderness and won from her abundant kindliness and thoughtful care. She had now forgotten all about Paris, and began to feel as though she had been born in that wild spot under the pure breezes from the sea. She had developed, too, into a well-formed young woman, and with her healthy mind and love of knowledge it was with delight that she found herself reaching full growth and sunny ripeness. On her part there was a full acceptance of life, life beloved in all its functions, welcomed with the triumphant greeting of vigorous health and soundness of nature.

That year Lazare remained for six months without writing home, with the exception, that is, of a very brief note now and then to tell them he was all right. Then all at once he began to deluge his mother with letters. He had again been plucked at the November examination, and had become more disgusted than ever with the study of medicine, which dealt with too gloomy matters for his taste, so that he had now enthusiastically turned to chemistry. He had chanced to make the acquaintance of the illustrious Herbelin, whose discoveries were then revolutionising the science, and had entered his laboratory as an assistant, without owning, however, that he was relinquishing medicine. But his letters were soon full of a new scheme, which he at first mentioned somewhat timidly, but gradually grew wildly enthusiastic about. It was a plan for turning sea-weed to wonderful profit, by the adoption of some new methods and reagents discovered by the illustrious Herbelin. Lazare dwelt upon the great probability of the scheme's success; the great chemist's assistance; the ease with which raw material could be obtained, and the very small expense that would be incurred for plant. In the end he frankly expressed his disinclination to be a doctor, and jokingly declared that he should prefer to sell remedies to the sick rather than to kill them off himself. He finished all his letters by recapitulating the prospects of speedily acquiring a large fortune, and mentioned as an additional lure to his parents that, if they would consent to his new plans, he should remain with them, as he proposed setting up his works quite close to Bonneville.

The months slipped away, and Lazare did not come home for the vacation. All through the winter he continued to unfold the details of his new scheme in long closely-written letters, which Madame Chanteau used to read aloud in the evening after dinner. One night in May they resolved themselves into a solemn family council to discuss the matter seriously, for Lazare had written to ask for a categorical reply. Véronique was bustling about the room, taking off the dinner-cloth and putting the red one on the table in its place.

'He is his grandfather over again, always running after some fresh scheme and doing no good at anything,' declared Madame Chanteau, glancing up at the former journeyman-carpenter's masterpiece, whose presence on the mantelshelf was a perpetual source of annoyance to her.

'Well, he certainly doesn't get his flighty disposition from me, for I detest all change,' sighed Chanteau between a couple of groans, as he lay back in his arm-chair, where he was just recovering from another attack of gout. 'But you yourself, my dear, you know you are a little given to restlessness.'

His wife shrugged her shoulders as though to imply that all her actions were dictated and carried out by reason and common-sense. Then she added slowly: 'Well, what are we to say? I suppose we shall have to write to him and tell him that he may have his own way. I wanted to see him in the magistracy, and I wasn't over well pleased at his being a doctor; but now he has got down to being an apothecary! Still, if he comes back home again and makes a lot of money, that will be better than nothing.'

It was really this hope of money-making which decided her. She began to indulge in new dreams for the son she was so fond of. She foresaw him very wealthy, the owner of a fine house at Caen, a councillor-general, perhaps even a deputy. Chanteau, who had no opinion either one way or the other, and was absorbed in his own sufferings, left his wife to see after all the interests of the family. Pauline, in spite of her surprise and silent disapprobation of her cousin's continual changes, thought that he had better be allowed to try his luck at the grand new scheme which he had got into his head.

'At any rate, we shall be all together,' she said.

'And it's precious little good that Monsieur Lazare seems to be doing in Paris,' Véronique ventured to add. 'It will be better for him to come and live quietly here with us.'

Madame Chanteau nodded assent. She again took up the letter which she had received that morning.

'He here goes into the financial side of his scheme,' she said. Then she read the letter, commenting on it as she proceeded. Sixty thousand francs would be required for erecting the works. In Paris Lazare had met one of his old Caen friends, Boutigny, who was now selling wine on commission there. Boutigny was very enthusiastic about the new scheme, and had offered to invest thirty thousand francs in the business. He would make an admirable partner, one whose practical business habits would ensure the success of the undertaking. There would, however, still remain thirty thousand francs to be borrowed somewhere, as Lazare was anxious to have half the business in his own hands.

'As you hear,' continued Madame Chanteau, 'he wants me to apply in his name to Thibaudier. It is a good idea, and I am sure Thibaudier will let him have the money. Louise is not very well just now, and I have thought of going to Caen to ask her to stay with us for a week. As I shall see her father, I will mention the matter to him.'

A cloud passed before Pauline's eyes, and her lips quivered as she drew them tightly together. Véronique was standing at the other side of the table, wiping a tea-cup and watching her closely.

'I had, indeed, thought of another way,' said Madame Chanteau in a low voice; 'but as there is always some risk in a business enterprise, I have come to the conclusion to say nothing about it.'

Then, turning to the young girl, she added: 'Yes, my dear, you might have lent the thirty thousand francs to your cousin yourself. You couldn't find a better investment, and you would very likely get twenty-five per cent. interest, for your cousin would share his profits with you, and it quite grieves me to think of a lot of money going into an outsider's pocket. But I shouldn't like you to run any risk with your fortune. It is a sacred deposit. It is quite safe upstairs, and I will restore it to you unimpaired.'

Pauline grew pale as she listened to her aunt's words; and a struggle went on within her. She had inherited a somewhat avaricious disposition: Quenu's and Lisa's love of money. In the pork-butcher's shop she had been taught to reverence its power, and to guard against the want of it. Then, too, her aunt had so frequently called her attention to the drawer in the secrétaire where her little fortune was locked up, that the thought of seeing it gradually squandered by her erratic cousin irritated her. So she kept silent, though she was also troubled by a vision of Louise handing a great bag of money to Lazare.

'Even if you, my dear, should wish it, I shouldn't,' Madame Chanteau continued; and, addressing her husband, she added: 'It is quite a matter of conscience, isn't it?'

'Her money belongs to her,' said Chanteau with a deep groan as he tried to move his leg. 'If things were to turn out badly, we should be called upon to make good the loss. No! no! we mustn't do that. Thibaudier will be glad to lend it, I have no doubt.'

Then Pauline, in an impulse of affection, cried:

'No! no! please don't grieve me like this. I certainly ought to lend the money to Lazare myself. Isn't he my brother? It would be very unkind of me if I refused to let him have it. How could you suppose that I could have any objection? Give him the money at once, aunt; give him all of it!'

Her eyes filled with tears at the effort she had just made; then her face broke out into a smile, while she remained in a state of confusion between her regret at having hesitated for a moment and a miserable fear that the money would be lost. She had to struggle a little while against the protest of her relations, who were certainly honest enough to show her the risks she would run.

'Come and kiss me then, my dear,' her aunt finished by saying, yielding to the girl's tears. 'You are a very good girl, and you shall lend Lazare your money, since it would vex you so much if he did not take it.'

'Come and kiss me, too, dear, won't you?' added her uncle. They cried and kissed all round the table. Then, as Pauline went out of the room to call Matthew, and Véronique brought in the tea, Madame Chanteau exclaimed, wiping the tears from her eyes: 'It's a great consolation to find her generous-minded.'

'Of course!' growled the servant; 'why, she would strip her chemise off her back rather than let that other one have a chance of giving anything!'

It was a week later, on a Saturday, that Lazare returned to Bonneville. Doctor Cazenove, who had been invited to dine with the Chanteaus, brought the young man along with him in his gig. They found Abbé Horteur, who was also dining there that evening, playing draughts with Chanteau, who was lying back in his invalid's chair. He had been suffering for three months past from the attack from which he was now recovering. It had been more painful and violent than any previous one, and now, in spite of the terrible twinges he constantly felt in his feet, he considered himself in a state of Paradise. His skin was scaling, and the swellings had almost disappeared. Véronique was busy roasting some pigeons in the kitchen, and every time the door opened he sniffed the appetizing odour, overcome, again, by his irrepressible greediness, on which subject the priest began to remonstrate with him.

'You are not attending to the game, Monsieur Chanteau. Now, be advised by me, and be very careful about what you eat this evening. Rich food is bad for you in your present condition.'

Louise had arrived the previous day. When she and Pauline heard the Doctor's gig approaching, they both rushed wildly into the yard. But it was only his cousin whom Lazare appeared to notice, and he looked at her with an expression of amazement.

'What! can this really be Pauline?'

'Yes, indeed, it is I.'

'But, good gracious, what a lot you must have eaten to have grown like that! Why, you are quite big enough to get married now!'

She blushed, and laughed gaily, her eyes glistening with pleasure at seeing him take such notice of her. He had left her a mere chit, a raw schoolgirl in a pinafore, and now he saw her again as a well-grown young woman, whose figure showed to advantage in her white rose-sprayed summer gown. However, she became quite serious as she examined him in turn. She thought he was looking much older, he stooped, his laugh no longer sounded young, and his face twitched nervously at times.

'By the way,' said Lazare, 'I must really treat you a little more ceremoniously now. How do you do, partner?'

Pauline's blush assumed a deeper tint; the word 'partner' made her feel intensely happy. When her cousin had kissed her, he might well kiss Louise afterwards. She experienced no feeling of jealousy now.

It was a delightful dinner. Chanteau, alarmed by the Doctor's threats, ate with moderation. Madame Chanteau and the priest discussed magnificent schemes for the aggrandizement of Bonneville when the sea-weed business should have enriched the neighbourhood. It was eleven o'clock before they separated. As Lazare and Pauline were about to quit each other, at the doors of their rooms, the young man said to her laughingly:

'So young ladies, when they have grown up, no longer wish one good-night?'

'Why, yes, they do,' she cried; and, throwing her arms round his neck, she kissed him full on the lips with all her old girlish impulsiveness.

III

Two days later a very low tide laid the rocks quite bare. Lazare, brimming over with the wild enthusiasm which always filled him at the outset of any of his new schemes, was impatient to be off to the sea-weed. So away he hurried, with bare legs and just a canvas jacket over his bathing-costume. Pauline went with him to share in his investigations. She, too, wore a bathing-costume and the heavy shoes which she used when bound on shrimping expeditions. When they had got about half a mile from the cliffs, and had reached the centre of the spreading tract of sea-weed, still streaming with the water of the ebbing tide, the young man's enthusiasm burst forth as if he were only now discovering that immense crop of marine plants over which he and Pauline had rambled a hundred times before.

'Look! look!' he cried; 'what money we shall make out of it all; and nobody has ever thought of making any use of it before!'

Then he began to point out to her the different species with gleeful pedantry; the zosterias, of a delicate green and similar to long hair, stretching far away in spreading lawns; the ulvæ, with large lettuce-like leaves of glaucous transparency; the serrated fuci and the bladder-bearing fuci, which grew in such thick profusion that they enveloped the rocks like thick moss. As they followed the tide, too, they came upon species of greater size and stranger forms, such as various kinds of laminaria, especially that known as Neptune's Belt, a girdle-like strip of greenish leather, with wrinkled edges, that looked as though it were made to circle some giant's waist.

'What wealth there is going to waste here!' exclaimed Lazare. 'How stupid people are! In Scotland folks are sensible enough to make some use of the ulvæ at any rate, for they turn it into food and eat it. We here just use the fuci to pack fish with, and the zosteria to stuff mattresses; and as for the rest, it is simply turned into manure; and all that science does is to burn a few cartloads to extract soda from the residue.'

Pauline, in the water to her knees, felt perfectly happy amidst all the sharp saltness; and her cousin's explanations interested her extremely.

'So do you intend to distil all this?' she asked.

Lazare was very much amused with the word 'distil.'

'Yes; distil it, if you like to call it so. But the process is a very complicated one, as you'll see. However, mark my words. We have subjugated terrestrial vegetation to our use; we eat vegetables and fruit, and avail ourselves in other ways of trees and plants, don't we? Well, perhaps we shall find that we can turn marine vegetation to still greater profit when we seriously try to do so.'

Meantime they both enthusiastically gathered specimens, loading themselves and going so far out that they became drenched on their way back. Lazare went on pouring forth explanations, repeating all that his master, Herbelin, had told him. The ocean was a vast reservoir of chemical compounds, and the sea-weed was ever condensing in its tissues the salts contained in the water. The problem they had to solve was how to extract from the sea-weed all its useful components at small cost. He talked of taking the ashes which resulted from combustion--the impure soda of commerce--of sifting them, and finally extracting in a state of perfect purity the various iodides and bromides of sodium and potassium, the sulphate of soda, and the various salts of iron and manganese, so as to turn every particle of the material to profitable use. He waxed particularly enthusiastic over the fact that by the system which the illustrious Herbelin had devised nothing that could be of the slightest use would be lost. So there was an immense fortune before them.

'Good gracious! what a mess you're in!' cried Madame Chanteau, when they got home again.

'Never mind about that,' said Lazare gaily, as he flung his load of sea-weed on to the middle of the terrace. 'We are bringing you back five-franc pieces.'

The next day one of the Verchemont peasants was sent with a cart to bring back a whole load of weed, and the experiments were commenced in the big room on the second floor. Pauline was appointed assistant. For a month they went quite mad over the subject. The room was soon crammed with dried weeds, with jars containing floating sprays, and instruments of all sorts of odd shapes. There was a microscope on the table, and the piano was hidden beneath retorts and flasks; whilst the wardrobe groaned with the weight of technical works and collections that were perpetually being referred to. The experiments, made with small quantities of material with the most scrupulous care, gave encouraging results. Herbelin's cold system was based upon the discovery that certain bodies crystallise at very low temperatures, and the only thing required was to obtain the necessary lowness of temperature, whereupon each particular substance deposited itself in crystals successively, and thus separate from others. Lazare burned the weeds in a pit, mixed the ashes with water, and subjected them to the necessary temperature, which he obtained by a refrigerative method based upon the rapid evaporation of ammonia. He would afterwards have to carry out these operations on a large scale and transfer them from the laboratory to proper works, observing careful economy in the method of manufacture and the installation of the requisite plant.

On the day when he succeeded in extracting five distinct substances from his crude liquor, the room rang with cries of triumph. They had obtained quite a surprising proportion of bromide of potassium, and would be able to supply that popular remedy as plentifully as bread. Pauline danced wildly round the table; and then flew downstairs and burst into the dining-room, where her uncle was reading his newspaper and her aunt was marking table-napkins.

'There!' she cried, 'you can be as ill as you like now, and we can give you as much bromide of potassium as ever you'll want!'

Madame Chanteau, who had been suffering lately from nervous attacks, had been put upon a bromide _régime_ by Doctor Cazenove. She smiled as she answered:

'Have you got enough to cure everyone?--for everyone seems to be out of sorts just now.'

The vigorous young girl, whose face beamed with robust health, spread out her arms as though she were casting the remedy to the four corners of the earth.

'Yes, yes!' said she, 'we shall make enough for the whole world. Neurosis is done for!'

After inspecting the coast Lazare decided that he would build his works near the Golden Bay. It answered all the necessary requirements. It had a wide spreading beach, flagged as it were with flat rocks, which facilitated the gathering of the weed; there was good communication from it by the Verchemont Road; land was cheap; the necessary materials were at hand; and it was sufficiently isolated without being remote. Pauline joked about the name which they had given to the bay on account of its gleaming sand. They did not think then, said she, that they would ever find real gold there, as they were going to do now. They made a capital beginning, bought about five acres of barren land at a low price, and obtained the Prefect's authorisation after only two months' delay. Then the building was commenced. Boutigny had already arrived on the scene. He was a little, ruddy-faced man of thirty, extremely common in appearance, and the Chanteaus did not take to him at all. He declined to live at Bonneville, saying that he had found a very convenient house at Verchemont; and the family's coldness towards him increased when they heard that he had brought there a woman whom he had probably picked up in some low haunt in Paris. Lazare shrugged his shoulders at what he called their provincial narrow-mindedness. She was a very pleasant sort of person, he thought, and had shown a good deal of devotion in consenting to bury herself in such a wilderness; but he made no further protest, on Pauline's account. What was expected from Boutigny was active surveillance and intelligent organisation of the work, and in this respect he showed himself to be all that could be desired. He was never idle, and had a perfect genius for management; under his direction the building soon sprang up.

For the next four months, while the work for the installation of the machinery was going on, the Golden Bay Factory, as they called it, became the goal of the young people's daily walk. Madame Chanteau sometimes went with them, but Matthew was more often their only companion. He soon grew tired, dragged his big feet along wearily till they reached the works, when he would lie down, with his tongue hanging out, panting like a blacksmith's bellows. The dog was the only one of the party who bathed now, and would rush into the sea whenever a stick was thrown for him to fetch, showing sufficient intelligence to turn his back to the waves when he seized the stick, so as to avoid swallowing the salt water. At each visit to the works Lazare used to hurry on the contractors, while Pauline made practical remarks which occasionally showed a good deal of common-sense.

The apparatus, constructed after designs made by Lazare himself, had been ordered at Caen, and workmen came thence to set it up. Boutigny was beginning to show a good deal of uneasiness at the rapid rate at which the estimates increased. Why couldn't they have commenced with as small a building as possible, and with merely the absolutely indispensable appliances, he asked. Why launch out into all those intricate workshops and rooms and all that elaborate machinery for a business which it would have been more prudent to have started on a small scale? They might gradually have extended it as they gained some experience of the conditions under which it ought to be carried on and the demand there might be for the output. But Lazare was carried away by his enthusiastic dreams, and, if he had been allowed to have his own way entirely, he would have added to the works a magnificent façade looking towards the sea and proclaiming the grandeur of his plans to the limitless horizon. Each visit only seemed to increase his feverish hopes. So, what was the use of being stingy, especially as they were going to make such a fortune out of the place? Thus the walk back was delightfully gay. Poor Matthew used to lag far behind them; and at times Pauline and Lazare would hide behind a wall, as delighted as little children when the dog, suddenly finding himself alone and fearing that he was lost, began hunting about for them in a state of comical alarm.

Every evening on their return they were greeted with the same question: 'Well, how's it all getting on? Are you well pleased?'

The answer, too, was always the same.

'Oh, yes; but it is not finished yet.'

This was a period of close intimacy between the two young people. Lazare showed a warm affection for Pauline, which a feeling of gratitude for the money she had advanced served to strengthen. Again, too, he gradually lost sight of her sex and regarded her as a boyish companion, a younger brother, whose good points became more manifest every day. She was so sensible and courageous, so cheerful and pleasant, that he could not refrain from looking on her with an unconfessed feeling of respect and esteem, which he tried to conceal even from himself by chaffing and teasing her. In the most unconcerned and casual way she had told him of her private studies and her aunt's horror, and he had experienced a moment's wonder and embarrassment as the girl, who knew so much already, turned her big candid eyes upon him. After that, however, a perfect understanding seemed to exist between them, and he talked freely and openly, as they worked together at their common studies. She was continually asking him questions, in which she appeared to have no other object than the simple acquisition of information, so that she might make herself useful to him. And she often amused him by the many gaps which she showed in her knowledge, by the extraordinary mixture of information with which she was crammed. When she showed herself to be labouring under some ludicrous misconception, Lazare broke out into such peals of laughter that she grew quite angry with him and told him that it would be much better if, instead of laughing at her, he would show her where she was wrong; and the matter generally terminated in a lesson.

Pauline, however, was changing; she often felt a vague uneasiness. At times, when Lazare pulled her about in his brotherly fashion, her heart would beat excitedly. The woman whom they had forgotten all about was awaking within her amid the pulsing of her blood. She often believed that she was on the point of falling into some serious illness, for she grew very feverish, and could not sleep. In the daytime, too, she felt weary and listless, but she made no complaints to her aunt.

One evening, after dinner, however, she began to talk about the absurdity and annoyance of dreams. How tiresome it was that one was compelled to lie on one's back, quite defenceless and helpless, a prey to all sorts of idiotic ideas and fancies! But what vexed her most, she said, was the absolute loss and annihilation both of the will and body power. Then her cousin, with his pessimistic views, also fell foul of dreams, as disturbing the happiness and serenity of utter unconsciousness. Her uncle, however, proceeded to distinguish between different sorts of dreams, saying that he liked to have pleasant ones, while he detested nightmares. Pauline spoke so strongly on the subject that Madame Chanteau, in surprise, began to question her. Then she stammered and hesitated, saying that her dreams were about all sorts of ridiculous things, trifles too vague to remember. And she was speaking the truth in this respect, for the incidents of her dreams remained obscure. She saw no one in them; and all she felt was like the kiss of the sea-breezes as they flew at her window in the summer-time.

Every day Pauline's affection for Lazare seemed to increase. And this was not merely the instinctive awakening of womanhood after seven years' brotherly companionship; she also felt a need of devoting herself to somebody, and illusion showed him to her as the worthiest in intelligence and strength of all she knew. By slow degrees her old sisterly feeling was being transformed into love, with sweet touches of budding passion, secret thrills, furtive longings, all the fond delights that attend the heart's start upon its journey of affection, beneath the promptings of Nature. Lazare, protected by his former free-and-easy life in the students' quarter of Paris, had no curiosity to satisfy, and still looked upon her as a sister, never as an object of desire; while she, on the other hand, all virginal purity in this lonely spot where she knew no other young man, grew to worship him more and more, and to bestow herself upon him entirely. From morning till evening, when they were together, she seemed to derive life from his presence, and her eyes ever sought his, as she eagerly busied herself to serve him.