Wanderfoot (The Dream Ship)
and Bran she stood for the true romance! She always brought in tons of
fish, not only the everlasting _raie_, but deep-sea fish, and as soon as
her arrival was heralded all the village sabots came clipper-clopping
down the terrace, shawls clutched round bosoms, the wind flicking bright
red spots in old cheeks, every one anxious to pick and choose from the
mass of coal-fish, red gurnet, plaice, congers, and mullets that was
hooked out of the hold and flung quivering ashore. The big
weather-beaten fishermen in their sea-boots bandied jests with the
carking old village wives and the girls showered laughter. In the end,
the villagers departed with full baskets, and the seamen well content
adjourned to the _petit cafe_ close by for a "cup of coffee with a burn
in it" and a good meal.
CHAPTER XV
WAYS SACRED AND SECULAR
"A gentleman makes no noise: a lady is serene."--EMERSON.
In May, the gentle month of May, the weather cleared up again, and green
things commenced to sprout and bloom on the cliff above Villa Duval. The
country-side began to bloom and blossom as the rose. From the high
coast that lies facing the sea, Jersey could be discerned on clear days
etched as if in India ink upon the horizon thirteen miles away. Clots
of sea-samphire burst into flower, cleverly justifying its name of
_creste marine_ by just keeping out of reach of the high tides. The
gorse showed dots of yellow amongst its prickles, and little brilliant
blue squills stuck up their perky faces and gave out a sweet scent. All
along the path to the lighthouse wild thyme came out in springy masses,
and the mad Americans often went up that way for the special purpose of
lying on it as on a soft, pink silk rug. It seemed to cause them a
peculiar kind of joy to put their faces down in it, crying, "Oh! oh!
oh!"
The garbage-hole across the road in front of Villa Duval which the
dustman had been trying for many summers to transform into a building
plot by filling it with empty tins and rubbish from the hotel, and which
had been an eyesore all the winter, now suddenly became a place of
beauty, for a lot of prickly, thistly-looking plants growing among the
jam tins burst into a blaze of red and yellow. It turned out that they
were poppies that had been keeping themselves secret all through the
winter, and the yellow bright gold of "Our Lady's bedstraw." One day
Haidee brought home some long, fragile trails of cinquefoil, one of the
first spring things, and Val, worn and haggard under her blue veil,
pinned it over her heart because she had read in old Elizabethan days
that cinquefoil was supposed to be a cure for inflammations and fevers.
She quoted to Haidee what an old herbalist had once written of such
cures:
"Let no man despise them because they are plain and easy: the ways of
God are all such."
Haidee flushed faintly and retired into awkward silence, shy like most
girls of her age at the mention of God. She was going to make her
communion the next day with the First Communion candidates, but it was
not her first, for that had been made once when she was ill in New York.
She was to be confirmed in June when the archbishop of a neighbouring
parish intended to visit Mascaret and hold a confirmation service.
It being Saturday afternoon Hortense as well as Haidee was due at the
confessional for the recital of her weekly sins, therefore she bustled
over the washing-up, announcing her intention of making a _bon_
confession, as though the one she usually made was of an inferior brand.
"What are you going to tell?" asked Haidee, drying plates. She knew
very well it was forbidden to talk about your confession, but the
subject was a curiously fascinating one. Hortense had a "cupful of
sins" for the cure's ear. She had been reading love stories in the
_Petit Journal_ (a forbidden paper because it is "against the Church"),
telling the cards, and consulting her dream book; also she had missed
Vespers twice and several meetings of the "Children of Mary," of which
body she was a member. She computed that her _penitence_ would be as
long as her arm.
"He will scold me well, I know," she said cheerfully, "for he saw me
talking with Leon Bourget yesterday."
"What! that awful fisherman with the hump?"
"Yes; but he is not a bad fellow, mademoiselle, only all the fishermen
here are wicked towards the cure because, as you know, he would not bury
the mother of Jean le Petit, and they had to go and get the mayor to do
it."
"Yes; but you must remember that she lived with old man le Petit without
being married to him, and that is forbidden by the Church. She would
not even repent on her death-bed and receive the Blessed Sacrament. How
could the cure bury her after that?"
Haidee knew all about the little scandal, for the storm it occasioned
had raged all the winter about the cure's head. The same day he had
refused to bury _mere_ le Petit he was obliged to go to Paris on Church
business. On his return in the dusk of a December evening he was met at
the station by all the fishermen in the village partially disguised in
home-made masks, each carrying some instrument or implement with which
to make hideous sounds; pots, pans, old trays, sheep-bells, and
cow-horns had all been pressed into service, and the din was truly
fearsome. The cure preserving his serenity was conducted to his
presbytery by this scratch band, and on every dark night thereafter it
had serenaded him from the shadows near his house. The blare sometimes
continued until the small hours of the morning, keeping not only the
unfortunate cure, but the whole village awake. The gendarmes from
Barleville, the nearest police-station, had made several midnight raids
with the stated intention of capturing the offenders, but their efforts
were attended by a lack of success so striking as to suggest a certain
amount of sympathy, not to say complicity, on the part of the law. At
any rate, the cure's music, or "_Mujik de Churie_," as it was popularly
pronounced, went on gaily, and there had been some kind of unofficial
announcement that it would continue until the cure cleared out. Old
_pere_ Duval opined, however, that the entertainment was likely to cease
with the arrival of the first summer visitors, for however vindictive
the fishermen were they knew which side their bread was buttered on, and
were politic enough not to want to drive away trade by their thrilling
"mujik."
Having finished drying plates Haidee retired up-stairs to prepare her
confession, telling Hortense to be sure and wait for her. She proceeded
to write her sins down on a piece of paper. In spite of her good French
she stammered so much from nervousness when confessing that the cure had
arranged this method with her. She always gave him the piece of paper,
which he took away to the sacristy while she waited in the confessional.
When he had read her paper he came back, conferred penance and a little
scolding, then gave her absolution.
With the aid of a French Catechism, which had a formula for confession
in it, she proceeded to write out her sins, her method being to dive
into the book first for a question and then into her soul for a sin that
corresponded. Eventually the piece of paper contained the following
statement:
"Je ne me suis pas confesse depuis trois semaines; j'ai recu
l'absolution. Je m'accuse:
"De n'avoir pas fait ma priere du matin beaucoup de fois.
"De n'avoir pas fait ma priere du soir plusieurs fois.
"D'avoir manque aux Vepres 4 fois.
"D'avoir ete distraite dans l'Eglise 2 fois.
"D'avoir ete dissipee dans l'Eglise 2 fois.
"D'avoir desobei a ma mere 2 fois.
"D'avoir manque de respect envers elle 1 fois.
"De m'ete disputee avec mon frere 2 fois.
"D'avoir fait des petits mensonges 4 fois.
"Je m'accuse de tous ces peches et de ceux dont je ne me souviens pas.
"Je demande pardon de Dieu et a vous, mon pere, la penitence et
l'absolution selon que vous m'en jugerez digne."
Whether this list of offences truly represented the burden of her
transgressions for the past three weeks it would be hard to say. It is
possible that Val could have made out a longer and more comprehensive
one for her, as she often threatened to do when Haidee vexed her.
Anyway, the latter folded up her piece of paper with a complacency that
either betokened a clear conscience or a heart hardened in crime. She
computed that her penance would be to recite a decade of the rosary, and
she knew that the cure would then speak of the next Church feast, and of
the wishes preferred by the Sacred Heart and the Blessed Virgin, tell
her to invoke the aid of the Saints when she felt herself tempted to
sin, to try always to give a good example to her little brother, and to
be very pious so that her mother would be converted and become a
Catholic. Both Val and Haidee had long since given up explaining that
they were not mother and daughter. They found that it saved time and a
lot of questions just to let people think what they liked.
Putting on her hat Haidee now popped her head out of the window and gave
a hoot to Hortense, who was below in the yard cleaning her boots on the
garden seat. Just as they were about to start Val came down-stairs and
begged Haidee to go to the butcher's shop on her way back, and bring
home something for Sunday's dinner.
"What kind of something?" asked Haidee belligerently, for the butcher's
shop had no allure for her. There ensued a discussion as to which was
the most economical meat to get. Hortense, waiting at the bottom of the
steps, piped in with the announcement that every one ought to eat lamb
on First Communion Sunday. Val and Haidee looked at each other.
Vaguely they knew that the price of lamb was high. But suddenly it came
into Val's mind how sick the children must be of _raie_, and stewed
veal, and that though funds were low the play was nearly finished. They
would have a nice English dinner for once. Roast lamb and mint sauce!
She gave Haidee her last _louis_ to change.
"Pick some mint from the cliff-side as you come back," she enjoined.
French peasants have no use for mint in their cooking. Some English
visitors had once planted a root of it in _pere_ Duval's garden, but
after they were gone he flung it out again on to the cliff-side, where
it had increased and multiplied until it was now a large bed.
In the butcher's shop Haidee found a number of villagers squabbling over
beef-bones, and not a sign of lamb anywhere. The truth was that every
portion of the one lamb killed early in the week had been sold, and
though there were still one or two customers in need of First Communion
lamb, Mother Durand knew better than to offer any of the freshly-killed
beast that hung in the back shed. Peasants are well aware that
freshly-killed meat should not be cut too early or it will be full of
air, soft, flabby, and never tender. Mother Durand, under her calm
exterior, was furiously angry with her man for having delayed the
killing until now--after to-day there would be no demand for anything
but beef-bones and veal until the summer visitors began to arrive. The
young American mademoiselle asking guilelessly for lamb was a godsend.
Waiting until the last villager had gone from the shop so that there
would be no adverse comment on what she meant to do, she turned
ingratiatingly to Haidee.
"But certainly, mademoiselle ... there is none in the shop ... but
outside I have a lamb that is _superbe_ ... just the thing for a
_premiere communion_ ... it is not for every one I would cut that lamb,
but for such customers as you and your _belle maman_ there is nothing I
would not do." She returned presently from the back shed. "There,
mademoiselle--a beautiful shoulder. Six francs."