Brulette was trembling all over, and when I asked her what the matter was and what she was thinking of, she answered, rubbing her cheek with the back of her hand, "That man is pleasant, Tiennet, but he is very bold."
As I was rather more heated than usual, I found courage to say,—
"If the lips of a stranger offend your skin, perhaps those of a friend can remove the stain."
But she pushed me away, saying,—
"He has gone, and it is wisest to forget those who go."
"Even poor José?"
"He! oh, that's different," she answered.
"Why different? You don't answer me. Oh, Brulette, you care for—"
"For whom?" she said, quickly. "What is his name? Out with it, as you know it!"
"It is," I said, laughing, "the black man for whose sake José has given himself over to the devil,—that man who frightened you one night last spring when you were at my house."
"No, no; nonsense! you are joking. Tell me his name, his business, and where he comes from."
"No, I shall not, Brulette. You say we ought to forget the absent, and I would rather you didn't change your mind."
The whole parish was surprised when it was known that the piper had departed before they had thought of discovering who he was. To be sure, a few had questioned him, but he gave them contradictory answers. To one he said he was a Marchois and was named thus and so; to another he gave a different name, and no one could make out the truth. I gave them still another name to throw them off the scent,—not that Huriel the wheat-spoiler need fear any one after Huriel the piper had turned everybody's head, but simply to amuse myself and to tease Brulette. Then, when I was asked where I had known him, I answered, laughing, that I didn't know him at all,—that he had taken it into his head on arriving to accost me as a friend, and that I had answered him in kind by way of a joke.
Brulette, however, sifted me to the bottom, and I was forced to tell her what I knew; and though it was not much, she was sorry she had heard it, for like most country folks, she had a great prejudice against strangers, and muleteers in particular.
I thought this repugnance would soon make her forget Huriel; and if she ever thought of him she never showed it, but continued to lead the gay life she liked so well, declaring that she meant to be as faithful a wife as she was thoughtless a girl, and therefore she should take her time and study her suitors; and to me she kept repeating that she wanted my faithful, quiet friendship, without any thought of marriage.
As my nature never turned to gloominess, I made no complaint; in fact, like Brulette, I had a leaning to liberty, and I used mine like other young fellows, taking pleasure where I found it, without the yoke. But the excitement once over, I always came back to my beautiful cousin for gentle, virtuous, and lively companionship, which I couldn't afford to lose by sulking. She had more sense and wit than all the women and girls of the neighborhood put together. And her home was so pleasant,—always neat and well-managed, never pinched for means, and filled, during the winter evenings and on all the holidays of the year, with the nicest young folks of the parish. The girls liked to follow in my cousin's train, where there was always a rush of young fellows to choose from, and where they could pick up, now and then, a husband of their own. In fact, Brulette took advantage of the respect they all felt for her to make the lads think of the lasses who wanted their attentions; for she was generous with her lovers,—like people rich in other ways who know it is their duty to give away.
Grandfather Brulet loved his young companion, and amused her with his old-fashioned songs and the many fine tales he told her. Sometimes Mariton would drop in for a moment just to talk of her boy. She was a great woman for gossip, still fresh in appearance, and always ready to show the young girls how to make their clothes,—being well dressed herself to please her master Benoit, who thought her handsome face and finery a good advertisement of his house.
It was well-nigh a year that these amusements had been going on without other news of Joseph than by two letters, in which he told his mother he was well in health and was earning his living in the Bourbonnais. He did not give the name of the place, and the two letters were postmarked from different towns. Indeed, the second letter was none so easy to make out, though our curate was very clever at reading writing; but it appeared that Joseph was getting himself educated, and had tried, for the first time, to write himself. At last a third letter came, addressed to Brulette, which Monsieur le curé read off quite fluently, declaring that the sentences were very well turned. This letter stated that Joseph had been ill, and a friend was writing for him; it was nothing more than a spring fever, and his family were not to be uneasy about him. The letter went on to say that he was living with friends who were in the habit of travelling about; that he was then starting with them for the district of Chambérat, from which they would write again if he grew worse in spite of the great care they were taking of him.
"Good gracious!" cried Brulette, when the curate had read her all that was in the letter, "I'm afraid he is going to make himself a muleteer. I dare not tell his mother about either his illness or the trade he is taking up. Poor soul! she has troubles enough without that."
Then, glancing at the letter, she asked what the signature meant. Monsieur le curé, who had paid no attention to it, put on his glasses and soon began to laugh, declaring that he had never seen anything like it, and all he could make out, in place of a name, was the sketch of an ear and an earring with a sort of a heart stuck through it.
"Probably," said he, "it is the emblem of some fraternity. All guilds have their badges, and other people can't understand them."
But Brulette understood well enough; she seemed a little worried and carried off the letter, to examine it, I don't doubt, with a less indifferent eye than she pretended; for she took it into her head to learn to read, and very secretly she did so, by the help of a former lady's-maid in a noble family, who often came to gossip in a sociable house like my cousin's. It didn't take long for such a clever head as Brulette's to learn all she wanted, and one fine day I was amazed to find she could write songs and hymns as prettily turned as anybody's. I could not help asking her if she had learned these fine things above her station so as to correspond with Joseph, or the handsome muleteer.
"As if I cared for a common fellow with earrings!" she cried, laughing. "Do you think I am such an ill-behaved girl as to write to a perfect stranger? But if Joseph comes back educated he will have done a very good thing to get rid of his stupidity; and as for me, I shall not be sorry to be a little less of a goose than I was."
"Brulette, Brulette!" I retorted, "you are setting your thoughts outside your own country and your friends. Take care, harm will come of it! I'm not a bit less uneasy about you here than I am about Joseph down there."
"You can be easy about me, Tiennet; my head is cool, no matter what people say of me. As for our poor boy, I am troubled enough; it will soon be six months since we heard from him, and that fine muleteer who promised to send us news has never once thought of it. Mariton is miserable at Joseph's neglect of her; for she has never known of his illness, and perhaps he is dead without our suspecting it."
I assured her that in that case we should certainly have been informed of the fact, and that no news was always good news in such cases.
"You may say what you like," she replied; "I dreamed, two nights ago, that the muleteer arrived here, bringing his bagpipe and the news that José was dead. Ever since I dreamed that I have been sad at heart, and I am sorry I have let so much time go by without thinking of the poor lad or trying to write to him. But how could I have sent my letter?—for I don't even know where he is."
So saying, Brulette, who was sitting near a window and chanced to look out, gave a loud cry and turned white with fear. I looked out too, and saw Huriel, black with charcoal dust on his face and clothes, just as I saw him the first time. He came towards us, while the children ran out of his way, screaming, "The devil! the devil!" and the dogs yelped at him.
Struck with what Brulette had just said, and wishing to spare her the pain of hearing ill-news suddenly, I ran to meet the muleteer, and my first words were,—
"Is he dead?"
"Who? Joseph?" he replied. "No, thank God. But how did you know he was still ill?"
"Is he in danger?"
"Yes and no. But what I have to say is for Brulette. Is that her house? Take me to her."
"Yes, yes, come!" I cried; and rushing ahead I told my cousin to be comforted, for the news was not nearly so bad as she expected.
She called her grandfather, who was at work in the next room, intending to receive the muleteer in a proper manner; but when she saw him so different from the idea she had kept of him, so unrecognizable in face and clothes, she lost her self-possession and turned away sadly and in much confusion.
Huriel perceived it, for he smiled, and lifting his black hair as if by accident, showed Brulette her token which was still in his ear.
"It is really I," he said, "and no one else. I have come from my own parts expressly to tell you about a friend who, thanks to God, is neither dead nor dying, but of whom I must speak to you at some length. Have you leisure to hear me now?"
"That we have," said Père Brulet. "Sit down, my man, and take something to eat."
"I want nothing," said Huriel, seating himself. "I will wait till your own meal-time. But, first of all, I ought to make myself known to those I am now speaking to.”