Mlle. Fouchette Part 81

With the noiseless tread of a scared animal she turned back again into the kitchen, and, closing the door softly, leaned against it with ghostly face. She quickly stuffed the corner of her ap.r.o.n into her mouth to keep back the scream of agony that involuntarily rose to her lips. Her thin hands were tightly clinched and her body half drawn into a knot.

"Ah! mon Dieu! mon Dieu!"

Even the Saviour stumbled and fell beneath the heavy cross He had a.s.sumed to insure the happiness of others.

And Mlle. Fouchette was only a poor little, weak, nervous, ignorant woman, groping blindly along the same rugged route of her Calvary.

Unconsciously the same despairing cry had broken from her lips.

"Fouchette!"

It was Jean's voice.

Half fainting, half terror-stricken at her unfortunate position, she drew a needle from the bosom of her dress and thrust it into her thigh--twice.

"Fouchette!"

"Yes, monsieur!"

"That poor girl is certainly ill, Je--Cousin Jean," said Mlle. Remy, sympathetically.

"Nonsense!" he lightly replied.

He wished to spare the unhappy Fouchette this attention. "She has worked too hard. Drop it till to-morrow, little one," he said, gently.

"You must let things alone for to-night."

"Indeed, it is nothing, monsieur. I must clear away these dessert dishes----"

"Have a gla.s.s of wine," insisted Andree, putting her arm affectionately about the slender waist and pouring out a gla.s.s of champagne.

Lerouge regarded them with a frown of disapproval. Turning to M.

Marot, he said,--

"You were congratulating France just now upon a new ministry, monsieur. At least the new ministry ought to give us a new set of spies. Don't you think----"

But the wine-gla.s.s broke the last sentence, as it fell to the floor with a crash.

Only the protecting arm of Mlle. Remy sustained the drooping figure for a moment, then Jean and his affianced bride bore it gently to the model's home.

CHAPTER XXII

"C'est fini!"

The girl raised herself wearily from her knees by the side of her bed, where she had fallen when she had bravely gotten rid of Jean and Andree.

"C'est fini!"

She repeated the words as she looked around the room, the poor, cheap little chamber where she had been so happy. Just so has many a bereaved returned from the freshly made grave of some beloved to see the terrible emptiness of life in every corner of the silent home.

Mlle. Fouchette had grievously overrated her capacity to bear--to suffer. Instead of lightening the load she had a.s.sumed, the discovery of her sister in the beloved had doubled it.

She had schooled herself to believe that to be near the object of her love would be enough. She had thought that all else, being impossible, might be subordinated to the great pleasure of presence. That to serve him daily, to share after a fas.h.i.+on his smiles and sorrows, to be at his elbow with her sympathy and counsel, would be her happiness,--all that she could ask for in this world. It would be almost as good as marriage, n'est-ce pas?

Fouchette was in error. Not wholly as to the last a.s.sumption; it was a false theory, marriage or no marriage. Countless thousands of better and more intellectual people have in other ways found, are finding, will continue to find, it to be so.

Mlle. Fouchette's tactical training in the great normal school of life had not embraced Love. Therefore no line of retreat had been considered. She was not only defeated, she was overwhelmed.

All of her theories had vanished in a breath.

Instead of finding happiness in the happiness of those whom she loved, it was torture,--the thumbscrew and the rack. It was terrible!

How could she have imagined that she might live contentedly under this day after day?

The malice of Lerouge had been but the knock-out blow. It seemed to her now that his part was not half so cruel as that one kiss,--the kiss of Andree's, that had stolen hers, Fouchette's, from his warm lips!

Yes, it was finished.

There was nothing to live for now. Her sun had set. The light had gone out, leaving her alone, friendless, without a future.

The fact that she had herself willed it, brought it about, and that she earnestly desired their happiness, made her despair none the less dark and profound.

She felt that she must get away,--must escape in some way from the consequences of her own folly.

She precipitated herself down the narrow stairs at the risk of her neck and darted down the Rue St. Jacques half crazed with grief. She had made no change in her attire, had not even paused to restrain the blonde hair that fell over her face.

Rue St. Jacques is in high feather at this hour in the evening. It is the hour of the jolly roysterer, male and female. Students, soldiers, bohemians, and b.u.ms jostle each other on the corners, while the dame de trottoir stealthily lurks in the shadows with one eye out for possible victims and the other for the agents de police. The cafes and wine-shops are aglare and the terra.s.se chairs are crowded to their fullest of the day.

The spectacle, therefore, of a pretty bonne racing along the middle of the street very naturally attracted considerable attention.

This attention became excitement when another woman, who seemed to spring from the same source, broke away in hot pursuit of the servant.

Nothing so generously appealed to the sensitiveness of Rue St. Jacques as a case of jealousy, and women-baiting was a favorite amus.e.m.e.nt of the quarter.

There was now a universal howl of delight and approbation. When the pursuing woman tripped and fell into the gutter the crowd greeted the unfortunate with a shower of unprintable pleasantries.

"Ma foi! but she is outcla.s.sed!"

"Oh, she's only stopped to rest."

"Too much absinthe!"

"The cow can never catch the calf!"

"The fat salope! To think she could have any show in a race or in love with the pretty bonne!"