Chapter XXIX

“Drink, I beg you, my old Barbet. Listen to your Elise. Drink a little--very slowly--but at least drink. You are all cold. It will warm you, old Barbet.”

She offered him some drops of brandy in the palm of her hand. He paid no attention to it. His lips were closed and shrivelled, a very bad sign. On her return from the watch Elise had found him lying stiff and without breath, as if his soul had passed in his last cry of distress.

“You are just as you were at first, but you will get better now, as you did then. If you will drink you will get well, my old Barbet.”

He lay motionless, and Elise watched him and wept.

Poidevin was snoring: all the men were asleep again. Florimond was seated on a box in the darkest corner of the room, half asleep, but the furrows in his forehead, his compressed lips, and the twitchings of his arms betrayed the feverish desire for vengeance which filled his whole being. Silvere alone watched by Elise’s side.

He seized Barbet’s jaws with his two hands and tried with all his might to unlock them. The lips opened a little and through them Elise succeeded in slipping some drops of cordial, but they did not produce a single tremor.

“It is not true. It is not true,” she cried, and from that moment she did not leave Barbet until they were in port.

* * * * *

It was to Dieppe that the _Jeune-Adolphine_ had come to leave her fish. While the men hurried to the nearest tavern, Elise made her way to the town with Barbet in her arms.

She had sent Silvere to the sanitary bureau to get the addresses of doctors, and the agent, thinking that it was some man who was ill, had given him those of the principal physicians.

On seeing the curious patient they brought, one laughed, another was angry, and all sent Elise mournfully away without advice. From street to street she carried the dog, mounting the steps in vain, for everywhere she received the same refusal.

Finally, the servant of one of these doctors, an old woman who had more feeling than the younger ones, told Elise of a man thoroughly skilled in the care of beasts, who lived between the town and the open fields, in a place sheltered from the sea winds, where there was fresh air and grass.

“It will be fine for you here, my Barbet,” said Elise as she reached the door, “but can I have the heart to leave you?”

Barbet did not answer. His head swung helplessly over Elise’s arm, his glassy eyes could not speak. The opinion was not favorable. The veterinary made his diagnosis, screwing up his mouth and nodding his head.

“He is dead. Leave him. I will bury him to-morrow.”

“Are you crazy, sir? Bury Barbet! As if one could find another friend like him! I would give my life for him, just as he would give his for me.”

“It would be of no use. If he is not dead he is the same as dead. He will be underground before two days.”

“Oh, no, sir! You will find out how to make him well, for you are a doctor. I will pay all expenses. The herring has furnished----”

She put Barbet quickly into Silvere’s arms, and, drawing from under her skirt a canvas bag, held it up for the veterinary to see.

“The sale of the fish will fill it. There will be enough to pay you for curing Barbet.”

Silvere interrupted, to promise still more.

“You are a couple of innocents,” said the veterinary rudely. “Leave the dog with me.”

“You will take me to board, too, sir. I am easy to please.”

It was hard work to convince Elise that a hospital for animals was not a tavern; the dog only was taken. Fortunately there was an inn not far away, and Elise engaged a bed. She was going to live there during the time it took to sell and deliver the herrings.

She came hourly to the hospital door, rang the bell boldly, troubling the concierge and the servants, and even the master, to get news of Barbet. They refused her entrance under the plea of interfering with his recovery, but she was so importunate that the surgeon ended by being interested in a dog which was the object of so firm a friendship. And so Barbet was saved. He was on the high way to recovery when the _Jeune-Adolphine_ sailed. After a more careful and patient examination than he usually gave his patients, the veterinary had discovered the state of the injury, applied the right remedy and a solid dressing; then he had turned the animal over to Elise, dismissing her with a crabbed good nature when she was persistent in trying to pay for his care. She was carried away with delight.

“I was sure I should rescue you from death, my old Barbet. When we fight for our friends, we are strong against evil.”

* * * * *

The _Jeune-Adolphine_ was sailing briskly toward her port. Barbet preferred the deck. He was in the bow, stretched on a pile of nets and mops, and it was thence that, six hours after leaving Dieppe, he saw again the well-known bay, with its gray outlines softened away into fog. Elise was near him. She lifted his head gently, and from afar he made out the white houses of the town behind the red sands of the dunes. As he saw these dear sights, his eye, so long bright with fever, recovered its limpid serenity.

The sun was just setting when the _Jeune-Adolphine_ appeared in the harbor. She had been signalled a half hour before, on entering the channel, and all those whose happiness was at risk with her, were waiting on the pier, impatient for her landing. Elise and Silvere saw Mother Pilote and good Mother Loirat. They threw toward them a long, joyful cry--a cry of home-coming, the lightest and most joyous of those which escape the human breast.

* * * * *

They were to have a week on shore, and Elise passed it in her cabin, caring for Barbet. She had signed for the whole campaign, and could not think of breaking her engagement. Barbet was too weak yet to take up life on shipboard again, and their separation was close at hand, for the _Jeune-Adolphine_ was to sail in two days.

Elise was all the while in tears. She did not dare to leave the dog to Mother Pilote, who could not be depended on to watch a sick person. She wished to leave him with Chrétien.

Chrétien had not gone to sea again. He had yielded to the wishes of Mother Loirat, who had been so greatly aged by her recent shock that she preferred poverty to being left alone. He fished from the beach, according to the season. It was a wretched occupation, but a safe one at least.

Since Elise had returned home he often made his way to her cabin. He would reach the house and watch her through the windows a long time before he knocked. As soon as he was within he would seat himself and remain an hour or two without saying anything, simply following her with his childlike look.

He had been there since noon, sitting in a corner of the cabin, and more restless and more silent than ever before. His eyes, naturally so quiet, were lighted at intervals by strange gleams. He fixed them longingly on the bridal bouquet, which, on the sideboard under a glass globe, shone brilliantly with its leaves of gold paper. Then he turned them to Elise as if in some secret trouble.

“What is it, Chrétien? tell me. Perhaps I may be able to comfort you.”

She had no reply. She saw him look more earnestly than before at the bouquet, and then glance at her with a sort of sweet supplication. He seemed so sad, and to desire it so much, that she was not able to resist the pleasure of granting his silent prayer.

She ran to the sideboard, lifted the globe, took the bouquet, and, blowing the dust off the leaves, broke off the brightest and gave it to the young man.

“They say that it brings luck to lovers. Have you then a promise, Chrétien?”

“I shall never marry.”

“What are you saying? You are especially made for home life.”

“No. I cannot hope to be happy, for you are to marry another. I shall at least have the pleasure of dying for you.”

Elise was sitting by Barbet, and as she talked she was running her fingers through his long hair, all tangled like that of a sick person. At Chrétien’s word, she rose in surprise, and withdrew her hand so suddenly that she pulled out a tuft. Barbet did not cry out, but he was not able to repress a little whimper of pain.

“Is it possible that I hurt you, my old Barbet? You made me do it, Chrétien, with your gloomy talk.”

And leaning toward the dog, she petted him consolingly.

Their confidential talk once broken, Chrétien had not another word to say. He stayed a long time, abstracted and quiet, then, toward night, he went out, throwing at Elise a long look of farewell.

“Chrétien, where are you going? Tell me.”

He was already some distance away. She followed him with her eyes for some seconds. He went toward the dunes by the road that led to the graveyard. Elise returned to Barbet and kissed his forehead.

“Do not be restless, Barbet. Chrétien had a strange look about him. I want to find out what he is going over there for.”

She went out hastily and ran, for he was out of sight. She did not catch sight of him again until after she had climbed the top of the dune. He was not alone. As nearly as she could distinguish in the twilight, Florimond and big Poidevin were with him.

Nothing is so depressing as the coming of night. Oppressed with forebodings, Elise quickened her pace. What could bring them there, those three, so late, on this gloomy road? Could what she feared be true?

It was altogether improbable, she said; but the further she went the stronger grew her fears.

She recalled the strange actions of Cousin Florimond during the last few days. He was not a man to acknowledge defeat, and since his return he had renewed his attentions to her and his threats. He took advantage of the absence of Silvere, who had gone some distance into the country to announce his approaching wedding to some old relatives, and was delayed by business. But contrary to Florimond’s expectations he had met a new champion of Elise’s rights, for Chrétien had been only too happy to take up the duty of protecting her, if only for a week.

Had the two men quarrelled? At the very thought Elise trembled with fear. She knew how all these sailors’ duels ended--duels with knives and without mercy.

She thought she should faint when she saw the three figures disappear suddenly in the Crow’s Hole. They usually fought there in the ditch, the better to keep them face to face and prevent either from escaping. Elise tried to run, but her legs tottered under her. She tried to cry out, to frighten them by this approach of a stranger, but her voice died away in her throat.

She heard the voice of Poidevin directing the fight.

“To your work, lads. You know the custom. In a case of gallantry you strike to kill.”

There were some frightful instants of silence; overhead the sea-gulls wheeled--sea-gulls drawn by the hope of blood; then came Poidevin’s voice judging the blows. Then there was a hoarse clamor and two voices cried together:

“His account is settled. Yes. You have ripped him up like a sack.”

“Who! Chrétien surely! Poor Mother Loirat!” And seized by a tremor of unconquerable anguish Elise fell prostrate on the sand. She had fainted.

* * * * *

“Mam’selle Elise. It is I. Do you not know me! The bouquet has brought me luck.”

Elise came to herself in the arms of Chrétien, who carried her to her cabin.

“Fear no longer, Mam’selle Elise. Florimond will never trouble you again. He had sworn to kill Silvere.”