Aurélie
Author: Hardy, Arthur Sherburne
Date: 2017-02-10T06:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Fiction
Description: Ebook prepared by crutledge@knology.net
Rights: Public Domain

LIST of ILLUSTRATIONS

- AFTER a NUMBER OF NIGHTS I DARED TO TOUCH HER HAND

- ‘ i AM ACCUSTOMED TO PRECIPICES,” THE WOODEN SOLDIER WOULD ANSWER

- ‘ AND INSTANTLY I WAS IN LOVE ”

- “AURÈLIE, I AM GOING TO ASK YOUR HAND IN MARRIAGE”

- A LITTLE BEDRAGGLED FIGURE STUMBLING HOMEWARD

AURÉLIE

SOME months before her death the Countess Anne gave to Antoine, the child of Père Bigot, chief of the wood-cutters of Freyr, a wooden soldier. Antoine was far too young at that time to play with so brave a toy, and later, after the Countess’s death, it became far too sacred a relic of that lady of blessed memory to be put to any common use. And thus it happened that it stood year after year on the black shelf above Antoine’s bed, beside the blue-robed image of the Virgin, and in Antoine’s eyes, being thus enshrined within the halo of forbidden things, acquired a sanctity equal to that of the Holy Virgin herself. It was a very martial soldier, erect and resolute of mien, its musket, the butt of which rested beside one gaitered foot, pressed firmly against the right shoulder, and having to Antoine the appearance of being loaded and ready for action.

Now one morning when Père Bigot, having finished his breakfast, was lighting his pipe preparatory to going to the wood and Antoine was being dressed, something very remarkable occurred. Mere Bigot was buttoning his blue blouse, and Antoine, standing on the bed, his eyes fixed on the wooden soldier, his lips close to his mother’s ear, whispered:

“ Mother, it talks.”

“Eh?” said Mere Bigot, struggling with an obstinate button which refused to enter its hole.

“It talks,” repeated Antoine.

“What talks, my child?”

“The soldier of the Countess Anne.” Madame Bigot first looked at Antoine in alarm, then she laughed.

“What does the child say?” asked Père Bigot, taking his ax from its nail.

“He says the soldier of the Countess talks.” “What an idea!” said the wood-cutter, and he went out the door chuckling to himself at so droll a thought.

“It is at night, is it not?” said Mere Bigot.

Antoine nodded.

“It is one of the dreams the good Virgin sends to well-behaved children,” said his mother; and, reassured by this inspiration, she went about her morning’s work.

Antoine was silent. He knew better, but, being wise for his years, knew better also than to argue the question.

When he was eight years old misfortune came. His mother died, and within a month Père Bigot was killed by a falling tree in the great forest of Freyr, and Aunt Pèlagie reigned in their stead. Perhaps it was because Mademoiselle Pèlagie had never known the pangs of motherhood that she had so little of a mother’s sympathy. Be that as it may, Antoine gave little love where little was asked, and became more passionately attached to the one companion left him. Every day he looked forward to the coming night; for when the house was still, the little wooden soldier laid down his musket, unslung his heavy goat-skin knapsack, and, after carefully placing his big black shako beside it, drew his pipe from his pocket and sat down on the edge of the mantel, his red-trousered legs dangling in space.

“Be careful not to fall,” Antoine would sometimes say.

“Be tranquil; I am accustomed to precipices,” the wooden soldier would answer.

When his pipe was well lighted he usually began by saying:

“Antoine, are you asleep?”

“No, Monsieur Nicolas,” Antoine would whisper, under his breath, for Aunt Pèlagie slept in the bed the other side of the Virgin. Why he called the wooden soldier Nicolas came about in this way: He had often heard his father speak of an uncle of that name who was killed at Sedan, and, having mentioned this fact one night and finding it inconvenient to converse with a soldier who had no name, he said: “ I would like to call you Nicolas, Monsieur.”

“ Very well,” said the wooden soldier; “ when a man is dead a name is a matter of no import.”

“Are you really dead?” asked Antoine. “Most certainly,” replied Nicolas. “I was killed at Marengo. That is to be regretted,” he added, sighing. “I should like to have seen Austerlitz.”

“Did it hurt you very much?” inquired Antoine.

“There are worse things, my child.”

“Will you tell me about one of them, Monsieur Nicolas?”

“Willingly.”

Thereupon Antoine folded his hands above the counterpane and composed himself to listen.

“I was bom on the fourteenth of July, the day of the taking of the Bastile, but fifteen years before, in the year 1774. My mother was a very pious woman, who kept a statue of the Virgin above her bed, as you do. That is why I am content to stand so many years on this shelf beside this image—not because I have any particular affection for the Virgin, but because I am reminded of many things which no longer exist except in memory.”

“But do you not love the Virgin?” interrupted Antoine.

“I am a practical man,” replied the wooden soldier, “therefore I concern myself only with what is to be seen.”

“But,” interrupted Antoine again, “the Virgin is sometimes to be seen. I have heard my mother say so often.”

“That is possible,” said Nicolas, shifting one leg over the other and pressing the tobacco down into the bowl of his pipe. “I will not deny that of which I know nothing. On that point you must consult Mademoiselle Pèlagie. I have noticed that women are more versed in such matters, and very probably she had some experience. Without experience it is impossible to affirm or even to invent anything worth listening to.”

“It must be Aunt Pèlagie has no experience,” replied Antoine, after a moment of reflection, “for she never tells me any stories.”

The epaulettes of the wooden soldier trembled with laughter.

“I would not address her on that subject,” he said. “The lack of experience is something of which ladies of her condition do not like to be reminded. Well, as I was saying, when I was nineteen years of age I fell in love. You have not yet fallen in love, Antoine?”

“I think not, Monsieur. Should I do so?”

“ As to that matter there are various opinions.

It is certain that without that experience you will remain in ignorance of many things, like Mademoiselle Pèagie. However, should you do so, have a care. It is a serious business.”

“I will recollect what you say,” replied Antoine, submissively.

“When that malady attacks you, you will know it. Yet it is the easiest thing in the world to fall in love. It seems only yesterday,” pursued the wooden soldier, laying down his pipe, “that I was walking down the Rue du Petit Savoyard. There was a pastry-shop on the comer of the Rue de la Tourelle—so called because of a little turret which ornamented one of its houses. I was looking at the big gingerbread cakes, made with honey and stuffed with nuts, when Aurèie stopped also before the same window. I knew her name, because presently the old servant who accompanied her said, ‘Mademoiselle Aurèlie, we shall be late.’ I turned to see whom she was addressing, and at that moment Aurèie turned also. We gazed into each other’s eyes the time it would take to discharge my musket—not more —and instantly I was in love. So was Aurèlie. She told me such was the case afterward.

There are moments in one's life so charged with wonderful revelations that we return to them again and again in the vain endeavor to understand their full meaning. I swear to you, Antoine, that if I had never seen those blue eyes again, the look which they lodged in my heart would have remained to this day, like the bullet which I have carried in my leg since Rivoli. Some day I will relate to you how I received that bullet.”

“To-night I prefer to hear about Mademoiselle Aurèlie, Monsieur Nicolas,” said Antoine, softly.

“It is very difficult to describe her to you,” continued the wooden soldier. “I have here”

—he tapped his tightly buttoned coat—“her miniature, which I would gladly show you if it were possible to light a candle without waking Mademoiselle Pèagie. But to know Aurèie a miniature is not sufficient. One must know her soul as I know it—” and in the darkness Antoine heard a deep sigh.

“But, Monsieur,” he ventured, “you said you concerned yourself only with what is to be seen.”

“Are we to converse on that subject, or shall I continue my story?” said the wooden soldier, severely.

“Excuse me, Monsieur Nicolas,” said Antoine.

“You foresee, doubtless, that I followed Aurèie at a respectful distance. She did not turn her head; nevertheless it seems she knew of my presence. Of all these things we talked in confidence afterward. To my surprise I discovered she lived within a stone’s throw of my father’s. It happens often that one’s joy or one’s woe is a near neighbor when one does not suspect it.

“The course of our love ran very smoothly. Aurèie had no mother, and her father, being a savant, lived very retired, immersed in his researches. These circumstances aided us greatly. The house in which she lived was situated on the outskirts of the city. Behind it was a garden, through which a straight walk, bordered with acacias, led to a small pavilion on the edge of a stream which was shadowed by willows, and beyond which stretched meadows where cattle were pastured. It was a spot made for lovers. A wooden bench, sheltered by climbing vines, rested against the wall of the pavilion, which was of two stories, and I soon ascertained that it was the habit of Aurèie to sit on this bench while her father was occupied in the room above with his studies. I also contracted the habit of coming to this spot in my skiff, and of passing the evening with Aurèie. In those days I was called Louis. The first time when, on approaching the spot, I said 'Mademoiselle’ very softly, she replied, ‘Is it you, Monsieur Louis?’

“You are not asleep, Antoine?”

“No, Monsieur,” replied Antoine.

“Well, then, I wish to observe to you that probably when Mademoiselle Pèagie gives you advice on the subject of love, she will have much to say upon the propriety which a young lady should maintain on such occasions. But do not give too much weight to what she will say. When love is innocent, like Aurèlie’s, everything is permitted. I remember, for example, on that first evening she said, ‘ Be careful, Monsieur Louis, the step is covered with moss and is very slippery.’ Do you think I reproached her because she thus naively invited me? Not at all. The thought ravished me. We sat a long time in silence—a silence in which, nevertheless, we said many things to each other. I think we did not speak at all until she said, ‘It is time to retire, Monsieur Louis.'

“After a certain number of nights I dared to touch her hand—a little hand, very soft and warm, whose touch was heaven to me. Sometimes M. Lebrun, her father, would open the window above and say: ‘Aurèlie, I shall remain late this evening. You had best go to bed.' Sometimes the old servant would appear at the door at the end of the path with a lighted candle and say: ‘Mademoiselle Aurèie, you will take a cold. It is more prudent to come indoors.’ Ah, those moments of parting, how sweet they were!”

The wooden soldier took so long a breath at this point that Antoine feared he was about to resume his shako and musket.

“Love like ours, my child, proceeds rapidly. It is impossible to resist it. Having once possessed myself of Aurèlie’s hand, I wished to possess myself of everything that was hers; and in the darkness of those summer nights we sat clasped in each other’s embrace, forgetting that there was any other world but ours or any other heaven than that of our lips and the pressure of our arms.

"One evening, as I heard the stream gliding by so swiftly and so silently, I thought that life too was passing in the same inexorable manner.

“ ‘Aurèie,’ I said, ‘I am going to ask my father to demand your hand in marriage.’

“ Until that moment the thought of marriage had not occurred to us, and I was astonished at the change which my observation wrought in her. She slipped from my arms without a word and vanished so quickly that I scarce heard her footsteps on the gravel of the path. The next evening she did not come, nor the next. I was desperate, and my despair gave me courage to speak to my father.

“I seized upon an occasion when my mother was present, for I had already confided to her my secret and counted upon her support.

“ ‘My father,’ I said, ‘I beg of you to request of Monsieur Lebrun the hand of his daughter.’

“ After what seemed to me an eternity, and after exchanging a glance with my mother which implied some previous understanding, he replied:

“‘Mademoiselle Aurèlie is a respectable girl. I will speak to Monsieur Lebrun on the subject, and if she is favorably disposed and he is inclined to make suitable provision, we have no objection. You are of an age to establish yourself.’

“‘I should be quite pleased to have for a daughter a person so modest and well-behaved,’ said my mother.

“I pressed her to my breast for joy. ‘Do not take this too much to heart,’ she said, seeing my emotion; ‘ between wishing and having many things are possible.’”

The wooden soldier had risen to his feet and was walking to and fro before the image of the Virgin.

“Ah, my dear mother,” he exclaimed, “what sinister foreboding possessed your soul at that moment! Antoine,” he continued, stopping just above the bed at the end of the shelf, “when no cloud obscures the sky, when your heart is bursting with happiness and evil seems incredible, have a care! Fortune is about to play you a trick.”

Antoine made no answer, but he shivered under the bedclothes.

“You will not be surprised when I tell you that Aurèie had had other suitors. Rivals are not generally included among those things to which love is blind. But they did not trouble me. Absorbed in my own happiness and the certainty of Aurèie, the rest of the world was as if it did not exist. As I have told you, I was born in 1774. At the time of which I speak I was nineteen years of age. When you have mastered the science of numbers,” said the wooden soldier, counting his fingers, “you will find it was therefore the year 1793. In that year every man’s hand was turned against his neighbor in the name of fraternity, and tyrants preached the equality of man. It is fortunate for you that you live in days of peace and tranquillity. When you are older you will study that uprising of a nation and lament all those follies which stained the purity of its ambition and divided with the sublimest deeds the energy which so astonished the world. Our city of Lyons had revolted against the sanguinary policy of the Jacobins, but had at last been forced to open its gates to the armies of the Convention. And then came that monster of modem times, Couthon, to carry into execution the decree of the Convention, Lyons is no more!

“Both Monsieur Lebrun and my father were in too modest circumstances to fear the rage of parties, but so great was the injustice of those times, and so insecure the life of the humblest citizen, that we thought it more prudent to retire to a small vineyard which we possessed in a remote suburb of the city. I had begged permission of my mother for Aurèlie to take refuge with us, and it was arranged that after accompanying my parents to the country I should return for her. We had no difficulty in reaching the small farm-house situated among my father’s vines, for we had been in the habit of making frequent journeys to and fro, and this custom was well known to the authorities. So, the morning after our arrival, leaving my father as a protection for my mother should that need arise, I set out for Lyons in our high, two-wheeled cart with the peasant who cultivated the vineyard. You can imagine with what happiness I snapped my long whip as we jogged along the white road, and with what joy I anticipated the presence of Aurèie under our own roof, as if already the priest had united us and I were bringing my bride to my fireside. Monsieur Lebrun, although my father reminded him that he had once dedicated, by royal per mission, a treatise to the late king, had refused to abandon his investigations and was to remain in the city.

“You might suppose that, in times such as those through which we were passing, all the ordinary avocations of life would be suspended; that men and women, terrified by so much slaughter, would hide themselves. But it was not so. Women chatted in the doorways when heads were falling on the scaffold, and only on certain days of exceptional madness did the shopkeepers lower their shutters, waiting behind closed doors for the storm to pass. It was on one of those days that I returned to Lyons for Aurèie. Couthon had already begun his work of extermination, and as we drew near the city gate we met long files of wretches, chained together, whose clamor the grapeshot •of his cannon was soon to silence—for the guillotine was too slow for his vengeance. We passed, however, through this tumult in safety and came at last to my father’s house, on whose walls I observed with amazement were written the words, This house to let. ‘‘What is the meaning of these inscriptions?’ I asked of a citizen standing near, for I saw that other houses also bore the same words. ‘It is the new method of announcing that the owners of these houses have no further use for them,’ laughed the wretch. I leaped from the cart and ran with all speed to Aurèlie’s door. The same dread words were written on its portal. A frenzy of fear and rage seized me. I hurled myself against the door. It was bolted. I beat upon it with both hands—”

A loud crash, which almost stopped the beating of Antoine’s heart, followed. Had the wooden soldier fallen from the mantel? Was he killed for the second time? Mile. Pèlagie, startled from her sleep, had sprung from her bed, and in her long nightdress and blue cotton nightcap was tremblingly lighting a candle.

Antoine, scarcely daring to look, gazed with the fascination of fear through the shadows at the mantel, and, when the flame of the candle had become steady, there stood the wooden soldier, his shako on his head, his musket pressed firmly against his shoulder, his coat tightly buttoned over the miniature of Aurèie.

“God preserve us!” cried Mile. Pèlagie. “The Blessed Virgin has fallen and is dashed into a thousand pieces.”

By one of those coincidences which give rise to the idea of fate, on the very morning of the fall of the Virgin a wandering vender of images stopped before Mile. Pèlagie’s door. Antoine, on his way to school, had met this erect figure, bearing aloft its tray of images, under the arcade of the Hotel de Ville, and to his vivid imagination it seemed as if one of the caryatides sculptured by Jean Goujon for the chimney of the great hall in the Mairie had eluded the vigilance of the concierge and had stepped out into the street with its frieze of dancing figures for a morning’s walk. All the heroes of history and legend elbowed one another on the carefully poised shelf; but most wonderful of all was a Virgin wearing a mantle studded with stars and having a golden aureole about her head. Mile. Pèlagie had just removed the last traces of the night’s tragedy when the shadow of this image fell upon her threshold. Certainly it was nothing less than providential that almost at the very moment she was consigning the shattered fragments of one Virgin to the dust-heap another should appear at the open door. Skilled in reading the eyes of his customers, the peddler care fully disengaged the Holy Mother from her dangerous position between a Cupid and a Satyr and, glancing about the room, observed, with an air of apparent surprise:

“ Madame has no image of the Blessed Mary!”

“How much is it?” asked Mile. Pèagie, who was of a practical turn of mind.

“A mere nothing—a hundred sous,” replied the peddler.

Mile. Pèlagie’s countenance fell, and she straightway began to busy herself at her oven, as if the matter possessed no further interest for her.

“Very cheap — hundred sous — very fine image,” persisted the tempter.

Mile. Pèlagie made no answer.

“Look very nice here,” he continued, enthroning the statue on the now empty pedestal beside the wooden soldier—“very nice. You look here,” he exclaimed, with sudden interest, “you no want soldier—soldier no good—you give me soldier and three francs—I give you Our Lady.”

Mile. Pèlagie closed the oven door and went over to the mantel.

“I no like wooden image—wooden image no good—I only wish to please you.”

Mile. Pèagie was reflecting. Antoine was certainly too old now to care for such a toy. For a long time, it is true, he had been too young to appreciate it. That this reasoning left no time at all for him to possess the gift of his benefactor did not occur to her. The sole question now was to make a good bargain. “For two francs, yes,” she said, crisply. And the wily son of the South, who was also a good bargainer, shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “Very good—to please Madame.”

Thus it happened that the wooden soldier took the vacant place between the Satyr of Praxiteles and the Cupid of Lysippus, marched down the winding street, and, after a glass of wine at the Sign of the White Fawn, disappeared with the miniature of Aurèie on the road through the meadows.

Never before had Antoine so studied the clock as on that morning at school. On his way thither he heard the drum of the town-crier in the great square and saw the army of Couthon defiling through the streets of Lyons. He had lingered for a moment before the gingerbread cakes in the window of the grocer, with an occasional wistful glance behind him, as if at any instant Aurèie might suddenly appear at his elbow. More than half of the Departments of France, which he usually enumerated so glibly, refused that morning to answer the roll-call, and the figures on his slate assumed strange, ungainly shapes. Never had the wooden soldier interrupted a narrative in so agonizing a manner, and in spite of the respect he felt for the Virgin he could not forgive her for taking so inopportune a moment to precipitate herself from the mantel! Or had Monsieur Nicolas himself been the cause of the catastrophe?

“Antoine,” exclaimed his teacher, “pay attention! You are dipping your pencil in the ink-well.”

All the way home he sang happily, for half the day was gone; and, though he feared what he should see behind that door on which Couthon had inscribed those terrible words, to let, as with many older and wiser than he, the desire to know the worst was irresistible. His first glance on his return was for Monsieur Nicolas. He was gone! For an instant An toine remained stupefied. Except at night the wooden soldier had never before moved from his place. Without this silent figure, faithful and vigilant, like a sentry at his post, the room no longer seemed familiar. There was, moreover, a strange Virgin on the shelf. He turned a bewildered face to Mile. Pèlagie.

“ Where is Monsieur Nicolas?” he stammered.

“Monsieur who?” said his aunt, not comprehending.

“The soldier of the Countess Anne.”

“He has gone to take a promenade,” replied Mile. Pèlagie, evasively.

Antoine was dumfounded. The real and the unreal danced wildly together in his little brain. A vague fear began to take possession of him, for Mile. Pèlagie’s manner inspired no confidence.

“Come, come,” she said, at the sight of two gathering tears in his eyes, “be a man! Of what use is a wooden soldier?”

To be a man! He desired nothing better. All the teaching of Monsieur Nicolas was an inspiration to manhood. Anger began to swell in his heart. His little fists were clenched.

Be a man! Rage made him one. ‘ ‘ What have you done with Monsieur Nicolas?” he demanded, choking back the sob rising in his throat.

“I know nothing of your Monsieur Nicolas,” replied Mile. Pèlagie, tranquilly, for she much preferred anger to tears; “but if you mean that ugly little soldier of the Countess Anne, I have exchanged it for the Virgin you see on the shelf. Perhaps you will cease now to destroy things in your sleep.”

Antoine did not even notice so unjust an accusation. The one friend of his life was gone. Anguish struggled with anger, but a fixed determination began to take shape in his mind. He remembered now the Italian peddler seen on his way to school. He recalled even the figure of the Virgin whose shining aureole had towered above the head of Cupid. The whole nefarious transaction was revealed with a startling lucidity.

You who are now a man, accustomed to sorrow, to whom disappointment is no stranger, who can now sigh when formerly you cried out, and who have tamed the rebellious crew that once threatened your reason, recall one of those bitter griefs of childhood when the very structure of the world seemed tottering to its fall with the loss of a wooden soldier. Yes, he would be a man! He would follow that brigand peddler to the ends of the universe.

“He will have a good cry,” thought Mile. Pèlagie, as he disappeared through the door, “then all will be over.”

But the soup grew cold, and Antoine did not return. In the afternoon it began to rain. As evening approached, alarm, rather than affection, prompted frequent excursions to the door-step, where Mile. Pèlagie’s gaunt figure was to be seen peering into the gathering darkness. “Have you seen my Antoine?” she asked of a neighbor. And again, of a farmer returning from the country, “You have not perchance seen a little boy with a brown velvet cap?” No, they had seen nothing. While eating her supper in silence a kind of panic seized her. After all, she was responsible for the little imp. Where was he? She resolved to consult Madame Berger, and, throwing her skirt over her head, she. made her way down the deserted street to the narrow line of light shining between her neighbor’s closed shutters. She made no mention of the wooden soldier; and Madame Berger, the mother of so large a family that the temporary disappearance of one of its members was not a matter for great concern, comforted her somewhat.

Meanwhile a little bedraggled figure was stumbling homeward along the uneven pavement. Stained with mud, his blue blouse discolored by the rain, Antoine was scarcely recognizable. So furious was the wind that only by pushing with all his strength could he close the door behind him. Out of breath, surprised and pleased at finding himself alone, he stood for a moment rubbing away the drops which trickled into his eyes from the visor of his cap, two little pools of water forming on the floor from his dripping clothes. Exhausted as he was, it was evident that his mind still struggled with a purpose not yet accomplished; for as soon as breath was recovered he pushed a chair under the mantel and climbed upon the seat. Tired, cold, soaked to the skin, triumph shone in his eyes, for beneath his blouse, close to his heart, was the wooden soldier. Carefully uncovering his precious treasure, he set it in its accustomed place, and then, at last satisfied, sitting down before the shelf, he contemplated his friend with a smile of supreme contentment. It was in this attitude Mile. Pèlagie found him. To her inquiries and reproaches he made no answer. He submitted without resistance to the removal of his drenched clothes, to the hot tisane prepared for him, in spite of which, even in his warm bed, a cold chill shook him at times from head to foot. But that did not matter. Monsieur Nicolas was safe!

Poor Antoine! It was so much easier to be a man in spirit than in strength.

Although wanting in affection, Mile. Pèagie was not without a conscience. Under its goadings she sat far into the night by Antoine’s bedside holding his feverish hand in hers. From time to time she looked up at the wooden soldier. Had pleadings softened the peddler’s heart, or had the little rascal stolen it from some dark comer where it reposed while its owner was finishing a glass of wine? At all events there on the shelf were both images— for two francs! She had just fallen into a doze when a piercing cry brought her to her feet. Antoine, standing upright on the bed, was beating the wall with his clenched fists, crying: “Open! It is I. It is Louis!” With much persuasion she induced him to lie down again, and now, thoroughly frightened, having carefully secured the covering under his chin, she ran for Madame Berger.

“Watch with him, dear Madame,” she begged, “while I go for Doctor Leroux. The child is gone clean out of his head.”

Day was breaking before Doctor Leroux arrived. It was not necessary to explain to him that the child had “taken cold.”

“You will explain all this to me,” he said, gruffly, “after you have done what I tell you.” When his instructions had been carried out he turned angrily to Mile. Pèagie. “On what miserable errand did you send this child in such a storm?”

“Monsieur,” she whimpered, “I did not send him. He went without my consent. He has caused me great anxiety.”

“Well, he will cause you no more,” was the stern reply.

Mile. Pègie sank trembling into a chair. The oppressive silence was broken only by Antoine’s labored breathing.

“Monsieur le Docteur,” began Madame Berger, “when my Ambrose had pneumonia we rubbed his chest with tallow—”

“Hush!” Antoine was raising himself on one elbow. “What do you wish, my little man?” said Doctor Leroux, forcing him back gently on the pillow.

“I wish—I wish—to speak to Monsieur Nicolas.”

“Who is Monsieur Nicolas?” asked Doctor Leroux, looking up at Mile. Pèlagie.

“The soldier of the Countess Anne,” she whispered.

“ Give it to him.”

She took the wooden soldier from the shelf and gave it into Antoine’s outstretched hand. He nestled it in the pillow beside his cheek with a deep sigh of content.

Doctor Leroux was thinking of the Countess Anne, of the day when she had lifted her little protege in her arms, lavishing love on what was not her own, as now he saw it lavished on a wooden toy. He looked at Mile. Pèlagie and frowned. “ Love that might have been yours,” he thought.

Three times again the next day he stood at Antoine’s bedside. It was the old story— a little success here and there, but in the end Death always victorious. The lesson was as bitter to him now as when he first learned it. The soldier and the Countess Anne stared at him from the pillow. For the sake of his old friend he stooped and kissed gently the hot brow. A faint smile spread over the little face and the lips parted—“Aurèle,” they murmured.

But Doctor Leroux did not understand. The next time he came the brow was cold. Beside the

But Doctor Leroux did not understand. The next time he came the brow was cold. Beside the tangled hair the black shako of the wooden soldier lay quietly, the tightly buttoned coat, under which the miniature of Aurèie was to remain forever concealed, pressed against the still, white cheek.

Table of Contents

- TITLE PAGE

- LIST of ILLUSTRATIONS

- AURÉLIE

- ILLUS: “AFTER A NUMBER OF NIGHTS I DARED TO TOUCH HER HAND”

- ILLUS: “I AM ACCUSTOMED TO PRECIPICES,” THE WOODEN SOLDIER WOULD ANSWER.

- ILLUS: “AND INSTATLY I WAS IN LOVE”

- ILLUS: “AURÈLIE, I AM GOING TO ASK YOUR HAND IN MARRIAGE”

- ILLUS: A LITTLE BEDRAGGLED FIGURE STUMBLING HOMEWARD