The Golden Lion of Granpere Part 21

'Ah, yes; in one thing. But that one thing is everything. Here I've been doing the best I could for both of you, striving to put you upon your legs, and make you a man and her a woman, and this is the return I get!'

'But what would you have had me do?'

'What would I have had you do? Not come here and oppose me in everything.'

'But when this Adrian Urmand--'

'I am sick of Adrian Urmand,' said Michel Voss. George raised his eyebrows and stared. 'I don't mean that,' said he; 'but I am beginning to hate the very sight of the man. If he'd had the pluck of a wren, he would have carried her off long ago.'

'I don't know how that may be, but he hasn't done it yet. Come, father; you don't like the man any more than she does. If you get tired of him in three days, what would she do in her whole life?'

'Why did she accept him, then?'

'Perhaps, father, we were all to blame a little in that.'

'I was not to blame--not in the least. I won't admit it. I did the best I could for her. She accepted him, and they are betrothed.

The Cure down there says it's nearly as good as being married.'

'Who cares what Father Gondin says?' asked George.

'I'm sure I don't,' said Michel Voss.

'The betrothal means nothing, father, if either of them choose to change their minds. There was that girl over at Saint Die.'

'Don't tell me of the girl at Saint Die. I'm sick of hearing of the girl at Saint Die. What the mischief is the girl at Saint Die to us? We've got to do our duty if we can, like honest men and women; and not follow vagaries learned from Saint Die.'

The two men walked down the hill together, reaching the hotel about noon. Long before that time the innkeeper had fallen into a way of acknowledging that Adrian Urmand was an incubus; but he had not as yet quite admitted that there was any way of getting rid of the incubus. The idea of having the marriage on the 1st of the present month was altogether abandoned, and Michel had already asked how they might manage among them to send Adrian Urmand back to Basle.

'He must come again, if he chooses,' he had said; 'but I suppose he had better go now. Marie is ill, and she mustn't be worried.'

George proposed that his father should tell this to Urmand himself; but it seemed that Michel, who had never yet been known to be afraid of any man, was in some degree afraid of the little Swiss merchant.

'Suppose my mother says a word to him,' suggested George.

'She wouldn't dare for her life,' answered the father.

'I would do it.'

'No, indeed, George; you shall do no such thing.'

Then George suggested the priest; but nothing had been settled when they reached the inn-door. There he was, swinging a cane at the foot of the billiard-room stairs--the little bug-a-boo, who was now so much in the way of all of them! The innkeeper muttered some salutation, and George just touched his hat. Then they both pa.s.sed on, and went into the house.

Unfortunately the plea of Marie's illness was in part cut from under their feet by the appearance of Marie herself. George, who had not as yet seen her, went up quickly to her, and, without saying a word, took her by the hand and held it. Marie murmured some pretence at a salutation, but what she said was heard by no one. When her uncle came to her and kissed her, her hand was still grasped in that of George. All this had taken place in the pa.s.sage; and before Michel's embrace was over, Adrian Urmand was standing in the doorway looking on. George, when he saw him, held tighter by the hand, and Marie made no attempt to draw it away.

'What is the meaning of all this?' said Urmand, coming up.

'Meaning of what?' asked Michel.

'I don't understand it--I don't understand it at all,' said Urmand.

'Don't understand what?' said Michel. The two lovers were still holding each other's hands; but Michel had not seen it; or, seeing it, had not observed it.

'Am I to understand that Marie Bromar is betrothed to me, or not?'

demanded Adrian. 'When I get an answer either way, I shall know what to do.' There was in this an a.s.sumption of more spirit than had been expected on his part by his enemies at the Lion d'Or.

'Why shouldn't you be betrothed to her?' said Michel. 'Of course you are betrothed to her; but I don't see what is the use of your talking so much about it.'

'It is the first time I have said a word on the subject since I've been here,' said Urmand. Which was true; but as Michel was continually thinking of the betrothal, he imagined that everybody was always talking to him of the matter. Marie had now managed to get her hand free, and had retired into the kitchen. Michel followed her, and stood meditative, with his back to the large stove. As it happened, there was no one else present there at the moment.

'Tell him to go back to Basle,' whispered Marie to her uncle.

Michel only shook his head and groaned.

'I don't think I am at all well-treated here among you,' said Adrian Urmand to George as soon as they were alone.

'Any special friends.h.i.+p from me you can hardly expect,' said George.

'As to my father and the rest of them, if they ill-treat you, I suppose you had better leave them.'

'I won't put up with ill-treatment from anybody. It's not what I'm used to.'

'Look here, M. Urmand,' said George. 'I quite admit you have been badly used; and, on the part of the family, I am ready to apologise.'

'I don't want any apology.'

'What do you want, M. Urmand?'

'I want--I want--Never mind what I want. It is from your father that I shall demand it, not from you. I shall take care to see myself righted. I know the French law as well as the Swiss.'

'If you're talking of law, you had better go back to Basle and get a lawyer,' said George.

There had been no word spoken of George returning to Colmar on that morning. He had told his father that he had brought nothing with him but what he had on; and in truth when he left Colmar he had not looked forward to any welcome which would induce him to remain at Granpere. But the course of things had been different from that which he had expected. He was much too good a general to think of returning now, and he had friends in the house who knew how to supply him with what was most necessary to him. n.o.body had asked him to stay. His father had not uttered a word of welcome. But he did stay, and Michel would have been very much surprised indeed if he had heard that he had gone. The man in the stable had ventured to suggest that the old mare would not be wanted to go over the mountain that day. To this George a.s.sented, and made special request that the old mare might receive gentle treatment.

And so the day pa.s.sed away. Marie, who had recovered her health, was busy as usual about the house. George and Urmand, though they did not a.s.sociate, were rarely long out of each other's sight; and neither the one nor the other found much opportunity for pressing his suit. George probably felt that there was not much need to do so, and Urmand must have known that any pressing of his suit in the ordinary way would be of no avail. The innkeeper tried to make work for himself about the place, had the carriages out and washed, inspected the horses, and gave orders as to the future slaughter of certain pigs. Everybody about the house, nevertheless, down to the smallest boy attached to the inn, knew that the landlord's mind was pre-occupied with the love affairs of those two men. There was hardly an inhabitant of Granpere who did not understand what was going on; and, had it been the custom of the place to make bets on such matters, very long odds would have been wanted before any one would have backed Adrian Urmand. And yet two days ago he was considered to be sure of the prize. M. le Cure Gondin was a good deal at the hotel during the day, and perhaps he was the staunchest supporter of the Swiss aspirant. He endeavoured to support Madame Voss, having that strong dislike to yield an inch in practice or in doctrine, which is indicative of his order. He strove hard to make Madame Voss understand that if only she would be firm and cause her husband to be firm also, Marie would, of course, yield at last. 'I have ever so many young women just in the same way,' said the Cure, 'and you would have thought they were going to break their hearts; but as soon as ever they have been married, they have forgotten all that.' Madame Voss would have been quite contented to comply with the priest's counsel, could she have seen the way with her husband.

But it had become almost manifest even to her, with the Cure to support her, that the star of Adrian Urmand was on the wane. She felt from every word that Marie spoke to her, that Marie herself was confident of success. And it may be said of Madame Voss, that although she had been forced by Michel into a kind of enthusiasm on behalf of the Swiss marriage, she had no very eager wishes of her own on the subject. Marie was her own niece, and was dear to her; but the girl was sure of a well-to-do husband whichever way the war went; and what aunt need desire more for her most favourite niece than a well-to-do husband?

The day went by, and the supper was eaten, and the cigars were smoked, and then they all went to bed. But nothing more had been settled. That obstinate young man, M. Adrian Urmand, though he had talked of his lawyer, had said not a word of going back to Basle.

CHAPTER XX.

It is probable that all those concerned in the matter who slept at the Lion d'Or that night, made up their minds that on the following day the powers of the establishment must come to some decision. It was not right that a young woman should have to live in the house with two favoured lovers; nor, as regarded the young men, was it right that they should be allowed to go on glaring at each other.

Both Michel and Madame Voss feared that they would do more than glare, seeing that they were so like two dogs with one bone between them, who, in such an emergency, will generally fight. Urmand himself was quite alive to the necessity of putting an end to his present exceptionally disagreeable position. He was very angry; very angry naturally with Marie, who had, he thought, treated him villainously. Why had she made that little soft, languid promise to him when he was last at Granpere, if she had not then loved him?

And of course he was angry with George Voss. What unsuccessful lover fails of being angry with his happy rival? And then George had behaved with outrageous impropriety. Urmand was beginning now to have a clear insight of the circ.u.mstances. George and Marie had been lovers, and then George, having been sent away, had forgotten his love for a year or more. But when the girl had been accommodated with another lover, then he thrust himself forward and disturbed everybody's arrangements! No conduct could have been worse than this. But, nevertheless, Urmand's anger was the hottest against Michel Voss himself. Had he been left alone at Basle, had he been allowed to receive Marie's letter, and act upon it in accordance with his own judgment, he would never have made himself ridiculous by appearing at Granpere as a discomfited lover.

But the innkeeper had come and dragged him away from home, had misrepresented everything, had carried him away, as it were, by force to the scene of his disgrace, and now--threw him over! He, at any rate, he, Michel Voss, should, as Adrian Urmand felt very bitterly, have been true and constant; but Michel, whose face could not lie, whatever his words might do, was clearly as anxious to be rid of his young friend as were any of the others in the hotel.

Urmand himself would have been very glad to be back at Basle. He had come to regard any farther connection with the inn at Granpere as extremely undesirable. The Voss family was low. He had found that out during his present visit. But how was he to get away, and not look, as he was going, like a dog with his tail between his legs? He had so clear a right to demand Marie's hand, that he could not bring himself to bear to be robbed of his claim. And yet he had come to perceive how very foolish such a marriage would be. He had been told that he could do better. Of course he could do better.

But how could he be rid of his bargain without submitting to ill-treatment? If Michel had not come and fetched him away from his home the ill-treatment would have been by comparison slight, and of that normal kind to which young men are accustomed. But to be brought over to the house, and then to be deserted by everybody in the house! How, O how, was he to get out of the house? Such were his reflections as he sat solitary in the long public room drinking his coffee, and eating an omelet, with which Peter Veque had supplied him, but which had in truth been cooked for him very carefully by Marie Bromar herself. In her present frame of mind Marie would have cooked ortolans for him had he wished for them.

And while Urmand was eating his omelet and thinking of his wrongs, Michel Voss and his son were standing together at the stable door.

Michel had been there some time before his son had joined him, and when George came up to him he put out his hand almost furtively.

George grasped it instantly, and then there came a tear into the innkeeper's eye. 'I have brought you a little of that tobacco we were talking of,' said George, taking a small packet out of his pocket.