Pierre and Jean

“Tschah!” exclaimed old Roland suddenly, after he had remained motionless for a quarter of an hour, his eyes fixed on the water, while now and again he very slightly lifted his line sunk in the sea.

Mme. Roland, dozing in the stern by the side of Mme. Rosémilly, who had been invited to join the fishing-party, woke up, and turning her head to look at her husband, said:

“Well, well! Gérôme.”

And the old fellow replied in a fury:

“They do not bite at all. I have taken nothing since noon. Only men should ever go fishing. Women always delay the start till it is too late.”

His two sons, Pierre and Jean, who each held a line twisted round his forefinger, one to port and one to starboard, both began to laugh, and Jean remarked:

“You are not very polite to our guest, father.”

M. Roland was abashed, and apologized.

“I beg your pardon, Mme. Rosémilly, but that is just like me. I invite ladies because I like to be with them, and then, as soon as I feel the water beneath me, I think of nothing but the fish.”

Mme. Roland was now quite awake, and gazing with a softened look at the wide horizon of cliff and sea.

“You have had good sport, all the same,” she murmured.

But her husband shook his head in denial, though at the same time he glanced complacently at the basket where the fish caught by the

The lawyer went on:

“Did you, in Paris, know a certain M. Maréchal⁠—Léon Maréchal?”

M. and Mme. Roland both exclaimed at once: “I should think so!”

“He was a friend of yours?”

Roland replied: “Our best friend, monsieur, but a fanatic for Paris; never to be got away from the boulevard. He was a head clerk in the exchequer office. I have never seen him since I left the capital, and latterly we had ceased writing to each other. When people are far apart you know⁠—”

The lawyer gravely put in:

“M. Maréchal is deceased.”

Both man and wife responded with the little movement of pained surprise, genuine or false, but always ready, with which such news is received.

Maître Lecanu went on:

“My colleague in Paris has just communicated to me the main item of his will, by which he makes your son Jean⁠—Monsieur Jean Roland⁠—his sole legatee.”

They were all too much amazed to utter a single word. Mme. Roland was the first to control her emotion and stammered out:

“Good heavens! Poor Léon⁠—our poor friend! Dear me! Dear me! Dead!”

The tears started to her eyes, a woman’s silent tears, drops of grief from her very soul, which trickle down her cheeks and seem so very sad, being so clear. But Roland was thinking less of the loss than of the prospect announced. Still, he dared not at once inquire into the clauses of the will and the amount of the fortune, so to work round to these interesting facts he asked:

What had her thought been, what had been her meaning under those words? There was certainly some malice, some spite, something shameful in it. Yes, that hussy must have fancied, no doubt, that Jean was Maréchal’s son. The agitation which came over him at the notion of this suspicion cast at his mother was so violent that he stood still, looking about him for some place where he might sit down. In front of him was another café. He went in, took a chair, and as the waiter came up, “A bock,” he said.

He felt his heart beating, his skin was gooseflesh. And then the recollection flashed upon him of what Marowsko had said the evening before. “It will not look well.” Had he had the same thought, the same suspicion as this baggage? Hanging his head over the glass, he watched the white froth as the bubbles rose and burst, asking himself: “Is it possible that such a thing should be believed?”

But the reasons which might give rise to this horrible doubt in other men’s minds now struck him, one after another, as plain, obvious, and exasperating. That a childless old bachelor should leave his fortune to a friend’s two sons was the most simple and natural thing in the world; but that he should leave the whole of it to one alone⁠—of course people would wonder, and whisper, and end by smiling. How was it that he had not foreseen this, that his father had not felt it?

And this thought rushed into Pierre’s soul, as abrupt and violent as a cannonball rending and piercing it: “Since he knew me first, since he was so devoted to me, since he was so fond of me and petted me so much, since I⁠—I was the cause of his great intimacy with my parents, why did he leave all his money to my brother and nothing to me?”

He asked no more questions and remained gloomy; absentminded rather than thoughtful, feeling in his soul a new anxiety as yet undefined, the secret germ of a new pain.

He went out early, wandering about the streets once more. They were shrouded in the fog which made the night heavy, opaque, and nauseous. It was like a pestilential cloud dropped on the earth.

She raised herself, she sat up, looked in his face, and with an effort of courage such as it must cost in some cases to kill one’s self, she said:

“No, my child; it is true.”

And they remained speechless, each in the presence of the other. For some minutes she seemed again to be suffocating, craning her throat and throwing back her head to get breath; then she once more mastered herself and went on:

“It is true, my child. Why lie about it? It is true. You would not believe me if I denied it.”

She looked like a crazy creature. Overcome by alarm, he fell on his knees by the bedside, murmuring:

“Hush, mother, be silent.” She stood up with terrible determination and energy.

“I have nothing more to say, my child. Goodbye.” And she went towards the door.

He threw his arms about her exclaiming:

“What are you doing, mother; where are you going?”

“I do not know. How should I know⁠—There is nothing left for me to do, now that I am alone.”

She struggled to be released. Holding her firmly, he could find only words to say again and again:

“Mother, mother, mother!” And through all her efforts to free herself she was saying:

“No, no. I am not your mother now, poor boy⁠—goodbye.”

It struck him clearly that if he let her go now he should never see her again; lifting her up in his arms