Emmenagogue

“ Not a sound or a breath stirred the deep peace of the windless dawn; flower-scents rose from gardens and lemon-trees set with blossom and fruit; the sea scarcely heaved in its sleep. Ermengarde leant on the balcony, lost in the beauty and calm, and wondered at the depth of magnificent velvety green beneath the orange sky. Some labourers came into the gardens and turned the hose over the thirsty flower-beds with a pleasant showering sound.
Suddenly a figure on the railed platform on the brink of the steep stood out against the dark blue shadow of the gorge ”

“ The mountains soared higher, and drew back from the land with ever greater majesty, and the headlands became more magically lovely as they stretched into the shining sea, the villas, the gardens, and groves ever richer; and, after having seemed to spend a brief but happy lifetime in traversing a beautiful dream, glorious with palm and olive and mimosa, the train again paused, and the woman of mystery suggested to Ermengarde that she had better get out. ”

“ This was succeeded by a thrill, rather too keen this time, at the expression, or rather succession of expressions, on Miss Boundrish's face when her roving glance took in gradually the whole inwardness of the group of two in the rose-covered corner. Life was becoming almost too real now; for Ermengarde knew perfectly well that before slumber fell upon the household at Les Oliviers that night, every creature in it would possess some version, with variations and embroideries, of the present meeting in the gardens. ”

“ The suddenness and unexpectedness of these apparitions, the feeling that anything—a wood-nymph, a fairy, a mountain gnome, a Greek faun, the face of an old friend, or the bearer of some new fresh happiness—might appear was a great charm. One afternoon Ermengarde had been sitting under a pine-tree on a sandy bank by the path, looking across the ravine at the great sweep of crag-peaked mountains running down to a broad blue space of sea, when the figure of M. Isidore issued from hidden depths, and was suddenly outlined on the sky in front of her. ”

“ Grass-widows who run about the Continent alone, and play at Monty to that extent that they have to pop their jewels——"
Ermengarde smiled at this. "After all, I'm not the only one who pops jewels here," she thought; "but who on earth can the Boundrish be going for now?" ”

“ The fool went with the Princess into the castle and beheld the apartments all magnificently furnished, and a number of persons, footmen and all kinds of officers, who waited for the fool's commands. When he saw that all these men were like men, and that he alone was ugly and stupid, he wished to be better, so he said: "At the pike's command, and at my desire, away! let me become a youth without an equal, and extremely wise!" And hardly had he spoken, when he became so handsome and so wise that all were amazed.
Emelyan now sent one of his servants to the King to invite him and all his Court. ”

“ Many thoughts were in Ermengarde's heart, while in response to the thin man's timely suggestion of tea at Rumpelmayer's, they slipped out of the press to the comparative quiet of the promenade by the sea, that glowed like a peacock's velvety throat on the horizon, with the near shallows of turquoise, and broke with a deep soft boom in snowy surf on the rocks. ”

“ Two red admirals fluttered past, one over the other, in pure joy of life; a lizard darted across the path at her feet. She saw the rosy bloom of a peach-tree far down on the last olive-terrace, and then became aware that the woman of mystery was agitated and the Anarchist silent and interested. There followed a brief bass murmur, and then something suddenly flashed in the sunlight, making Ermengarde's heart jump into her mouth. ”

“ But Nature worshipped alone; there was no sweet-toned Angelus floating over crest and gorge, from convent to church tower, and trembling far away over darkening waves, to give the antiphon and complete the evensong of the world. Republican France is too free to allow men to worship publicly as they please.
Ermengarde, uplifted, tranquillized, yet full of unrest and a sort of compunction mingled with longing, was like a wondering child at some solemn rite, dimly guessed at through the faces of those present. She lost herself completely in watching the moving drama of flushed sky and sea. ”

“ But Ermengarde's heart sank, and she felt herself a lone, lorn female, utterly incapable of confronting the unknown perils and discomforts of travel after this bad beginning. She was pulling herself together with delicious dreams of the artistic Train de Luxe, when the lady who had ejected her from her corner, and who evidently regarded her with wrath and indignation as an interloper and semi-swindler, suddenly shivered and commanded her maid, sitting opposite, to shut the little saving chink in the window. ”

“ Bright-eyed and lazily smiling, the youth strode slowly along the quiet platform, carelessly glancing at the windows, when a sudden thrill of sympathy made Ermengarde turn to see the woman of mystery, who was standing leaning against their door and looking across her at the people passing, start with a crimson face and eyes of flame, and crush herself suddenly far back in the corner of her seat, holding a paper of far-off yesterday before her eyes, with a quick, deep sigh. ”

“ The whole world being the exclusive heritage of the travelling Briton, he naturally looks upon all other travellers as intruders. The appearance of a moustached face, with laughing dark eyes and a gay smile, at the window, followed by a request in a velvety voice, half-pleading, half-humorous, of "Place pour Madame, Messieurs et Madame, s'il vous plait," and accompanied by a forcible transposition of some of these mountains of parcels, resulted in a clearance of about six inches of cushion, upon which Ermengarde accommodated as much of a wearied frame as circumstances permitted ”

“ Some time afterwards Emelyan's brothers took a fancy to go to the city and trade with the hundred roubles their father had left them. So they said to Emelyan: "Hark ye, fool! we are going to the city, and will take your hundred roubles with us; and, if we prosper in trade, we will buy you a red coat, red boots, and a red cap. But do you stay here at home; and when our wives, your sisters-in-law, desire you to do anything, do as they bid you." ”

“ Ermengarde repeated slowly and thoughtfully, as if wondering to whom she referred.
"I don't think much of her," continued Dorris. "You know you can't be too particular who you get to know in places like this. Very queer people in these cheap Continental pensions."
"How true!" Ermengarde murmured thoughtfully. "I've never seen a Carnival, have you?"
"You ought to see the Nice Carnival; this is a very one-horse thing. Did you know Miss Somers in England?" ”

“ The lady of ample proportions meanwhile expressed herself strongly in very plain English upon the unpleasantness of having to "herd" with Germans, and said with bitter reproach to the fair-sized man that she had understood Les Oliviers to be an English house; while the thin man, who was helplessly pinned in the inmost corner by packages, vainly tried in a gentle, ineffectual voice, totally ignored by the stout lady, to pacify her apprehensions; and the fair-sized man entreated Ermengarde almost with tears to "parlez Français," of which she was just then totally incapable from sheer fatigue. ”

“ Ermengarde was absorbed in the silent symphony of melting and mingling colour to that degree she scarcely seemed to breathe, when voices jarred suddenly into the stillness from beneath her feet, where the mule-path ran unseen under the rocky steep.
With the voices came the soft patter of asses' feet, and the firm step of a man, light laughter, and then a single voice, cheerful, masculine, English. ”

“ Oh, my word, I didn't think as you'd treat me as bad as that! Why, I might have been—I thought I was to be suffocated, miss."
"Never mind now," said Ermengarde. "I'm ever so sorry; I——" Her voice faltered. ”

“ A woman who could invent aunts and male connexions by marriage on the spur of the moment, who wrote and received surreptitious letters in cipher—only that afternoon she had been perusing one by the fire, when Ermengarde opened her eyes after a doze, and had quickly pocketed it on discovering that she was watched. ”

“ But few travellers are without a watch and at least some little money. Ermengarde's was safely sewn up in some inaccessible portion of her attire, and when her companion plausibly suggested the comfort of undressing before going to bed, and volunteered to help her out of her clothes, she was glad to be able to point out that there was not room enough to undress oneself in, much less anyone else. ”

“ How easily the rift widens in the conjugal lute! Ermengarde sank in the Chesterfield by the fire, and wondered why she had been allowed to marry in her teens. She had had no youth, she told herself; all her brightest years had been sacrificed—to an elderly man, devoid of sympathy. Her health was gone; she was prematurely aged; she thought she had detected a grey hair while brushing her locks that morning; she was almost sure that crow's feet were gathering round her eyes; her face was thin, pale, and haggard, her beauty lost; the elderly man she had thoughtlessly married already neglected her. ”

“ It was becoming dangerous to be mixed up with a woman who had actually gone the length of trying to make her an accomplice in selling priceless jewels, of which she was obviously not the rightful owner.
It was while inditing this sentence that a beautiful thought flashed upon Ermengarde's mental vision, and, laying aside pen and paper, and sweeping her hair back from her shoulders, she leant her chin on her hands and looked out upon the silver-steeped olive-groves and pine-woods and the broad, bright path of sea trembling in silvery sparkles beneath the moon. ”

“ The Monte Carlo yellows are famous, you know——"
"Cat!" murmured Ermengarde. "How I should enjoy the twisting of yours!"
"But what I simply can't stand," pursued the injured maiden plaintively, "is her making herself out to be somebody—pretending to be that man's wife——"
"Ah, well! this can't be me. I don't pretend to be anybody's wife," thought Ermengarde.
"She is his wife," Agatha said.
"Or one of his wives. He may have dozens for all we know——"
"Dorris, my dear," faltered her poor mother, blushing wildly.
"Well, mater, so he may; that kind of man often does. ”

“ When he came to the village where Emelyan lived, he summoned before him the Starosta (Head-man) of the village, and said to him—
“I am sent by the king to take a certain fool, and bring him before his majesty.”
The Starosta at once showed him the house where Emelyan lived, and the officer, entering it, asked where the fool was. Emelyan, who was lying on the stove, made answer and said—
“What is it you want with me?”
“How!” said the officer. “What do I want with you? Get up and dress yourself. I must take you to the king.” ”

“ It was then, after long and vain search and countless wild and polyglot inquiries of unsympathizing foreigners, and endless courses up and down and round the crowded, many-voiced Douane, that the hapless Ermengarde began to ask herself why she had left the safe and comfortable precincts of her native land, and braved cold and famine and the terrors of the deep, only to become the prey of grinning brigands upon savage and inhospitable shores. Poor little Charlie, unwilling victim of enforced football, but at least happy in ignorance of his mother's fate! ”

“ So modern in tone is his section on the management of servants, both in his account of their ways and in his advice upon dealing with them, that one often rubs one's eyes to be sure that what one is reading is really a book written over five centuries ago by an old burgess of Paris. The Ménagier evidently had a fairly large household, and he probably owned a country as well as a town house, for he speaks several times of overseeing the farm-hands 'when you are in the village'. ”

“ And also when you give a general order to every one, each will wait for the other to do it, and it is the same.' Not only is the work of the servants to be carefully superintended by the mistress and by Dame Agnes, 'who is with you', the Ménagier tells his wife, 'in order to teach you wise and ripe behaviour and to serve and instruct you and to whom in particular I give the charge of this matter', but she is to show herself careful and benevolent in looking after their health and happiness. ”

“ If only he had not said "dear," that commonplace symbol of conjugal indifference; "Ermengarde," with the faintest inflection of tenderness, would have made all the difference—she could even have borne the reference to hats had he said something nicer than "dear."
The twilight deepened, and the train became a flying meteor of linked lights; she grew more and more inclined to accept the rift in the lute and make the best of it. Her man had his good points, and all men seemed to be made of hard, unloving stuff; why seek sympathy in the impossible region of rocky male hearts? ”

“ So speaking, he sank gracefully before her, his voice now sweet and low, his gestures supplicatory, even caressing. "Pardon me," he murmured, with clasped hands and a face all sunshine, while poor Ermengarde was white and trembling and as scared as some small and mischievous boy meddling with prohibited gunpowder and hearing it bang and go off in all directions—"pardon me. The overwhelming force of my passion is my one, my ample, excuse." ”