Frank L. Packard

“ I have taught her as the bon Dieu has shown me the way to teach her to be a true daughter of France—to love God and be never afraid. Jean"—he reached out his other hand suddenly and clasped it over Jean's—"do you love Marie-Louise?"
"Yes," said Jean simply.
"She will be alone now," said Gaston, and his eyes filled. "She is a good girl, Jean. She is pure and innocent, and her heart is so full of love, there was never such love as hers, and she is so gay and bright like the flowers and like the birds—and happy—and sorrow has not come to her." ”

“ No; it was not true—something only had happened to the boat—no man in Bernay-sur-Mer would have been so mad as to have ventured out!
Far to the south the heavens opened in a burst of flame, and, travelling far and fast, a zigzag tongue of lightning, like the venomous thrust of a serpent's fang, leaped across the skies. It lighted up the beach, and, further out over the waters, a quarter of a mile away, played upon the smother of spray that like a shroud flung itself over the Perigeau Reef—and the cry that came from Jean Laparde was wild, hoarse-throated now. ”

“ As wide as the world was the distance that lay now between Marie-Louise and Jean—but it was not that, not even that Jean was openly attentive to Myrna Bliss—that was only a little thing. Jean was not the Jean of Bernay-sur-Mer. The man was glutted now with power and wealth. And swaying him was not the love of art that might have lifted him to a loftier plane, it was the prostitution of that divine, God-given genius for the lust of fame. ”

“ Look, Myrna!"—his face flushed, his eyes lighted with the fire of an enthusiast, he was at the table, lifting up the little clay figure of the fisherwoman with the outstretched arms, the beacon, in his hands again. "Look, Myrna! No, I am not mad—I am only a fool. I, who pride myself as a critic, was fool enough for a moment to think this the work of perhaps Demaurais, or Lestrange, or Pitot—when no one of the three even in his greatest moment of inspiration could approach it! There is life in it. You feel the very soul. It is sublime! ”

“ You shall know, Marie-Louise—to-night, when Father Anton is there to hear, and has blessed us, and made Marie-Louise my little wife! And then that little while in Paris that you will understand—and then—home! Ah, Marie-Louise, can you not see it now—the blue water, blue with the wonderful colour that only God can make, and the white beach where we played when we were little children, and the boats, Marie-Louise, and the brave, true, loyal friends! Home, Marie-Louise, home, home, home—to Bernay-sur-Mer! Ah, is not God good? ”

“ He is not merely a paltry millionaire to-day—he is a famous man! The debt is paid a thousandfold—even to the money, franc for franc, that he has spent. You know well enough why I have done this! It is not like the days of Bernay-sur-Mer when the poor fisherman dared only dream and smother the passion in him like some mean, crawling thing, and thank the God who made him, and hold himself blessed for the crumbs that were flung to him—a smile from those lips of yours—a finger touch upon the sleeve, when it seemed all heaven and hell could not keep my arms back from you! ”

“ They were always coming between Jean and herself! They were always there! They made of Jean a different man; they made him one of themselves, and in doing that they were snatching him away from her, taking him across what seemed like some vast gulf that she could not traverse herself. She hated this Monsieur American, and this mademoiselle; and she hated the day they had come, for it had all begun that day. The red burned angrily in her cheeks, the lithe form quivered in a quick rush of passion—and then, instantly penitent, with a little sob, she flung herself down upon the grass. ”

“ Do you find it a pitiful affair, then, my 'Fille du Régiment'?"
"Ah, Jean! Ah, no! Ah, no!" old Bidelot had cried. "It is not that! It is exquisite, it is magnificent, it is superb, it transcends anything the world has ever seen. It is so great that if only there were a little something, ah, mon Jean, a little something, it would be the work of a god and not a man!"
"And that something? What is it?" he had demanded.
And old Bidelot had wrung his hands, and the tears had coursed down his cheeks. ”

“ That must not make any difference. Never, never, Jean! One does not marry for that—it is only if there is love."
"Mais, 'cré nom!" exclaimed Jean, suddenly setting aside his clay and catching Marie-Louise's face between his hands. "Why do you talk like that? What queer fancies are in that little head? Now, tell me"—he kissed her lips, while the blood rushed crimson to her cheeks—"tell me, is that not answer enough? And have we not loved each other long before that night, and does not all Bernay-sur-Mer know that it will dance at the noces?" ”

“ And then Jean spoke again.
"Look, Marie-Louise!" he said, and pointed out far over the waters to the horizon line ahead. "It is the dawn. Our dawn, Marie-Louise. The dawn of the day when we shall be together always."
Grey it was in the east; faint and timorous streaks of light that seemed like skirmishers flung out in tentative attack upon the massed blackness of the night.
Her hands tightened about him.
"To-day! Oh, Jean! It is like a dream—like a wonderful dream that the bon Dieu has brought to us." ”

“ Paris—she would be there, she who held him in a spell, who made him forget Marie-Louise. And there was fame and glory there, honour and wealth—all, all, everything that the world could give. And it was his, all his—he had only to reach out and take it. There, all France would be at his feet. It made his brain swim with the mad intoxication of it. It was as a man dying with thirst who sees afar the water that is life to him. Here, he could never be contented now, he could never be happy, and in a year, two years, Marie-Louise, therefore, would be unhappy, too. ”

“ It is you—you—your eyes, your face, your lips, your beauty, that has made the name of Jean Laparde! It is you that I have been modelling all this time—it is you who have been my model—you, my Marie-Louise! And I in my blind conceit did not realise it, and dreamed that I was creating out of my own genius the true, perfect, glorious womanhood of France—and it was you! ”

“ It was battle—and some consciousness inborn in Jean Laparde awakened and filled him with understanding, and in the terror; and dismay and awe and strife and fierce elation was the great allegory of life, and suddenly he knew a lowly reverence for Him who had depicted this, and a joy, full of a strange indefinable yearning, in the divine genius of its execution.
"It is the great art of the bon Dieu," said Jean simply. ”

“ I am Myrna Bliss. My father is Henry Bliss—I wonder if you have ever heard of him? We have lived for years and years in Paris."
Father Anton was genuinely embarrassed.
"I—I am afraid I never have," he admitted.
"Oh, well," she cried gaily, "you mustn't feel badly about it. His is entirely a reflected glory—that is what I tell him. Art! Everything is art with him, painting, sculpture, literature; and, as he can do neither one nor the other himself, he endows a school for this, or a société for that, and money exists for only one reason—the advancement of art. ”

“ Does a man dare to save his soul from torment? See—your lips! Your lips! Ah, God—your lips!"
She was his—his! She was in his arms, crushed to him! His—as his mad desire had bade him crush her in his arms long since in that other life in Bernay-sur-Mer; his—as he had dreamed of crushing her in his arms, of crushing her ravishing form close to him in the dreams of the days and nights, every day and night since then. It was all blind madness, a delirium of ecstasy. How warm and hot those lips of hers from which his soul was drinking! ”

“ It was playfully that Jean turned his back upon her, hiding his work, but as his fingers began again to draw and model the clay and his knife to chisel it, the smile went slowly from his face and his lips grew firmly closed. It was strange that Marie-Louise should have known! It was true, the fishing grew irksome too often now; for those moods, like the mood in the storm, came very often, much more often than they had been wont to do. ”

“ He turned then, and started back along the road toward Bernay-sur-Mer; now walking slowly, now suddenly changing his pace to a quick, impulsive stride. His eyes were on the road before him, but he saw nothing. Her voice was ringing in his ears again, and again he was living in that golden land of dreams—with her.
Paris! The City Beautiful! Paris—where he should know fame and power, where his genius should kindle a flame of enthusiasm that would spread throughout all France! Paris—where men should do him honour! Paris—where riches were! Paris—where she was! ”

“ They watched and marvelled; and at night they carried him back with them to Marseilles to fête him, until indeed to Jean the world of yesterday was as some vast haze, befogged, that had shut down behind him.
"In a year, with the study of technique in Paris!" murmured Henry Bliss ecstatically.
And old Bidelot, seventy years of age, grizzle-haired, the most caustic, bitter critic of them all, stormed in his wrath.
"Technique! You talk of technique—for him! He is a school in himself—a school that will revolutionise the art. ”

“ Marie-Louise's face blanched.
"Yes," she said faintly.
"And so"—the scathing tones were back in Myrna's voice—"and so you were just playing with fire! Well, are you satisfied with what you have done? If Jean Laparde lives it will be no thanks to you; if he dies it will be you who—"
Marie-Louise put out her hands as though to ward off a blow. She was swaying upon her feet.
"Not that—not that, mademoiselle!"—she could scarcely force the words to her lips. "Do not say it, mademoiselle! I know that it is true—God in his infinite pity, have pity on me!—but do not say it! ”

“ It always seemed that in the glowing coals and the little spurts of flames one could picture so much more clearly the blue of the Mediterranean, the sunny skies, the clean white cottages of Bernay-sur-Mer, the boats dotting the sea and beach, and Papa Fregeau standing in the doorway of the Bas Rhône, and Pierre Lachance trudging along the street with a great pile of nets slung over his shoulders. ”

“ If mademoiselle would not believe her, the shame would be Jean's too, and the guilt that mademoiselle imagined would be Jean's guilt too. And even if she must tell all about Father Anton bringing her to Hector and Madame Mi-mi, she must make mademoiselle believe. "Mademoiselle"—she was pleading now, her voice choking as she spoke—"mademoiselle, see—listen! You must—you must believe! It is true, every word I have said is true! And it is true that I love Jean, and that that is why I came, but—but Jean has never seen me since that day he left Bernay-sur-Mer. ”

“ But it was little Marie-Louise, whom he loved so tenderly, whose future was at stake. It must not always be as it was to-day—sadness and hopelessness for the brave young heart that should be so full of joy and life.
He halted before Marie-Louise. Yes, it was the right thing to do; there was no other way; she must be disillusioned; she should see Jean's life at the studio; and to-night at the great reception she should see Jean himself. Only his heart was very heavy—it was so hard a thing to do. ”

“ His eyes were drinking in the contour of Marie-Louise's face in a rapt, eager, subconscious way. There was something deeper there than the mere prettiness of feature, something that was impressing itself in an absorbing, insistent way upon him. Her face made him think of the face of that statue—there was a hint of masculinity that brought with it no coarseness, nor robbed it of its sweetness or its charm, but like that massive face of bronze that towered high, that people with uplifted heads stood and gazed upon, that none passed by without a pause, stamped it with calm fearlessness ”

“ I love art—for many years I have devoted myself to it. I cannot create myself—God knows the miserable attempts and the miserable failures that have been mine!—and so I have tried to help others to do what I could not do myself"—Henry Bliss was smiling now in a kindly, wistful way. "And now to discover the greatest sculptor of the age, to bring him out of obscurity into fame and power—can you not see, Jean, how selfish I am? ”

“ Have you forgotten what—what you owe to my father—that—that I am his daughter?"
"Ah, you will twist and wriggle, and you will not answer, eh?"—the words seemed to scorch and burn on his lips. "It is always like this! You evade, you elude, you ask other questions. You know why I have done this! I have told you. I owe your father nothing—nothing! Do you hear—nothing! It is he who owes! Ask him! They are his own words come true. Ask him what the name of Jean Laparde has done for him! ”

“ But Jean, though he had heedlessly hurt her so when he had given away again the little beacon, would never speak to her of this, because this was a much greater thing which was to change all their lives. It was she who must speak to Jean, it was she who must tell him that she understood that the great future which lay before him must not be harmed; that she must not hold him back; that she must not stand in his way; that she would only hurt him in that dazzling, bewildering world that would disdain a fishergirl; that it was France, not she, who came first. ”

“ For a moment's space Jean stood there measuring, as it were, the sweep of waters, as one might measure the strength of some antagonist thrust suddenly upon him—and then, turning, he ran back to the boats, and began to drag one down the beach.
No man in all Bernay-sur-Mer would dare to venture out. He had said that himself—but there was no thought of that now. Marie-Louise was on the Perigeau Reef. He was strong, strong as a young bull, and he tugged now at the heavy boat with the added nervous strength of a man near mad with desperation, heaving it swiftly across the sand. ”

“ That face and form is the face and form of France! It is the womanhood of France, the glory of my country! No man before has ever conceived it. It was for me—for me—Jean Laparde—to do! Do you hear—it is the face and the womanhood of France! You do not understand—you are not a Frenchwoman. ”

“ And out of them all, with the exception of Henry Bliss, there was none who—ah, yes! Ironically, as the grim humour of it struck him, a smile curled Jean's lips. The stewards who had looked after him would care very much! That one might die, if one wished, was all very well; but to be inconsiderate enough to jump overboard without leaving the douceurs of the voyage behind, could be construed as nothing less than a personal affront! He reached suddenly into his pocket, the irony of the thought lost in a flash of inspiration, and pulled out his pocketbook. ”