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gr,-at surprise
of Vinrent, who was not used to see Iiis master
of inferior rnnU.
ii intimate, terms with persons
M. do Vedclles accompanied ,M. Lescalle to UK; gate of the
chateau. The last words that passed between them before they
separated, were these "He lias never opposed my will." The
Count was speaking of George.
"
She would never dream of disobeying me," the notary said,
alluding to Rose.
CHAPTER IX.
A TRIFLING OBSTACLE.
THE day on which this important conversation had taken place
was a Sunday. At eleven the notary had set out for La Pinede,
and at the same time his wife and daughter had gone to church.
It was one of the finest days of a beautiful spring.
THE NOTARY'S DAU0STS1S.
The abundant
and unusual quantity of rain which had fallen in the. early part
of the year, had made Provence as green as Normandy and as
nit as Spain. La Ciotat had never been in such beauty
before. The altar of the Blessed Virgin in the parish church
was so surrounded by a mass of lilacs and orange blossoms, that
the porfume of the flowers exceeded that of the incense.
After mass all the population flocked to the Tasse, a charming
promenade on a terrace near the sea. A number of pretty girls
in short petticoats, and youths with red fisherman's caps on their
heads, were strolling up and down in parties of seven or eight,
shaking hands and laughing
friends.
as they stopped to speak to their
Some of the consequential families of the town were walking
more sedately in the midst of that animated, picturesque, and
noisy crowd. Amongst the rest M. le Baron de Croixfouds and
hU family, M. Arnoux and his two daughters in very stiff muslin
gowns, M. Richer de Montlouis arm-in-arm with his wife, and
Madame Lescalle and Rose, escorted by M. Artemon Richer.
At La Ciotat, as in all small towns, the least little events assume
a great magnitude. Everything is made the subject of
comments and conjectures. Acts which in Paris no one would
take the least notice of, are immediately remarked, and give rise
to all kinds oE suppositions. It was accordingly a matter of great
astonishment to the big-wigs of La Ciotat when Madame and
Mademoiselle
Richer.
Lescalle were seen walking with M. Artemon
We must describe Artemon. He was a tall fellow, almost six
feet high, broad in proportion, with a brown and florid complexion
and dark hair. His features were symmetrical and heavy, his
countenance impudent, vulgar, and good humored. He was
always laughing and showing a row of fine white teeth. His
dress was in the worst possible taste. He wore diamond studf in
his shirt, had large, red ungloved hands, and was the very type
of a Provencal swell to use a slang word an overbearing, noisy,
cynical, insolent, dashing fellow, who carried all before him in
the little town of La Ciotat. Rich, handsome, and connected as
with some of the best families in the neighborhood, no-
body ventured to discountenance him. Laughing at everybody
and everything, with no deference for any one, smoking in the
presence of the finest ladies of his acquaintance, coarse in con-
versation, and familiar in his way of talking to women and girls,
he was. in spite of all this, or perhaps in consequence of it, rather
a favorite in the society he frequented, and supposed to have
broken the heart of more than one young lady who had fondly
anil vainly hoped to become Madame Artemon Richer.
After spending some years in Paris on the very specious pre-
text of studying for the bar, he had returned to La Ciotat, leav-
Ing behind him debts to the amount of thirty thousand frencs,
which his father had paid, stipulating, however, that there was to
end to his residence in Paris, so he was obliged to find
:nent in a small country town and its vicinity. For some
Kieber laughed nt the quarrels, the scrapes, the flirtaiad
the follies of his incorrigible son, but at last he became
us to get him married. Several attempts of the kind had
utterly failed. However, from the first dny lie had seen
Lescalle, A Memon had taken a great fancy to her, and her cold
ness and reserve ouly made him the more obstinately bent on
marrying I
he notary's pretty daughter.
Father Richer, as we have seen, hastened to take advan'
this position of things, and what wits going on that Sunday on the
promenade seemed a public manifestation of the intent urns of
both families.
ame Lescalle's
All the town was watching the parties, and Mad
attitude amounted to a first publication of bans.
There was a sort of official dignity in her way of receiving the indirect
congratulations of her friends, and an ironical condescension
in her manner of bowing to
temon had rejected.
the ladies whose daughters Ar-
Hose, who was that day an object of envy to all the young
girls Rose, the destined bride of one who had been sought after
by the most fashionable of the town beauties Rose, the heroine
of the day, did not seem to share Madame Lescalle's triumphant
self-complacency. She walked up and down by her mother's side
in a listless manner, without answering a word to the high-flown
compliment which Arttmon Richer was showering upon her.
All at once Madame Lescalle was interrupted in the middle of a
sentence. She fell l:cr aim laid hold of, and turning round saw
above her daughter's shoulder her husband s red and irate face.
"Good gracious! M. Lescalle," she exclaimed, "what is the
matter? You tumble upon us like a waterspout."
"Madame, you ought to have been at home long ago," the notary
answered, in a gruff voice very unusual to him.
"
Take my
arm, if you please, and let us be oft."
As Madame Lescalle, quite bewildered, was staring at him
without moving, he rather rudely separated her from Artemon,
took his daughter's arm under his own, and was going away,
when the young man, recovering from his first surprise, said to
him in a half jesting, half sneering lone
"
Upon my word, M. Lescalle, you seem to have lostyoirr eyesight
at La Pinede 1 Did not you see that these ladles were walking
with me?"
"
I saw it very well, M. Artemon."
" Then why are you carrying them off in this sudden manner?
You may esteem yourself fortunate that I have reasons which
"
make me unwilling to quarrel with you.
'
"Oh, pray do not have any scruples on the supject, M Les-
"
calle rejoined. I should like to know what right you have to
object to my taking my wife and my daughter home, if 1 do not
approve of their walking here? "
Artemon bit his lips as if to restrain a torrent of angry retort
which his rising anger was about to give vent to. He said ta.-
erably calmly: "Your conduct, sir, is quite inexplicable."
M. Richer de Montlouiscameupat that moment, and exclaimed;
"Is this the way you take, sir, of breaking off the negotiation
you so readily entered into? "
" You may think what you please about it, sir," M. Lescalle
answered, and then making a low bow to M. Richer, he hurried
away his wife and daughter.
Madame Lescalle was astounded. During eighteen years of
married life she had never seen her husband behave in such a
stranpe-and unwarrantable manner. She foresaw a quarrel with
the Richer family rendered inevitable, and all her hopes de-
stroyed by this unaccountable burst of temper. M. Lescalle's
conduct struck her as so extraordinary that she felt almost afraid
he had gone out of his mind. The more she thought of it, the
more her surprise and annoyance increased.
As the notary nnd his companions walked from the Tasse to
the Rue Droite, where they lived, not a word was snid. When
they arrived at their house. M. Lescalle, rod. breathless, nnd agitated,
stood opposite the couch on which his wife and Rose had
seated themselves. The mother and daughter were awaiting his
first words with equal, though a different kind of, anxiety.
But he remained silent for a few instants, as if hardly knowing
how to preface what he had to say.
Her husband's evident embarrassment inspired Madame Les
calle with courage, and in her most acrimonious voice she began
the afeok.