"Thou art a happy woman, my sister," said the priest, who was well-nigh as old as herself. Reine Allix bowed her head and made the sign of the cross. "I am, praise be to God!" And being happy, she went to the hovel of poor Madelon Dreux, the cobbler's widow, and nursed her and her children through a malignant fever, sitting early and late, and leaving her own peaceful hearth for the desolate hut with the delirious ravings and heartrending moans of the fever-stricken. "How ought one to dare to be happy if one is not of use?" she would say to those who sought to dissuade her from running such peril. Madelon Dreux and her family recovered, owing to her their lives; and she was happier than before, thinking of them when she sat on the settle before the wood fire roasting chestnuts and spinning flax on the wheel, and ever and again watching the flame reflected on the fair head of Bernadou or in the dark, smiling eyes of Margot. Another spring passed and another year went by, and the little home under the sycamores was still no less honest in its labours or bright in its rest. It was one among a million of such homes in France, where a sunny temper made mirth with a meal of herbs, and filial love touched to poetry the prose of daily household tasks. A child was born to Margot in the springtime with the violets and daisies, and Reine Allix was proud of the fourth generation, and, as she caressed the boy's healthy, fair limbs, thought that God was indeed good to her, and that her race would live long in the place of her birth. The child resembled Bernadou, and had his clear, candid eyes. It soon learned to know the voice of "/gran'mere/," and would turn from its young mother's bosom to stretch its arms to Reine Allix. It grew fair and strong, and all the ensuing winter passed its hours curled like a dormouse or playing like a puppy at her feet in the chimney- corner. Another spring and summer came, and the boy was more than a year old, with curls of gold, and cheeks like apples, and a mouth that always smiled. He could talk a little, and tumbled like a young rabbit among the flowering grasses. Reine Allix watched him, and her eyes filled. "God is too good," she thought. She feared that she should scarce be so willing to go to her last sleep under the trees on the hillside as she used to be. She could not help a desire to see this child, this second Bernadou, grow up to youth and manhood; and of this she knew it was wild to dream. It was ripe midsummer. The fields were all russet and amber with an abundance of corn. The little gardens had seldom yielded so rich a produce. The cattle and the flocks were in excellent health. There had never been a season of greater promise and prosperity for the little traffic that the village and its farms drove in sending milk and sheep and vegetable wealth to that great city which was to it as a dim, wonderful, mystic name without meaning. One evening in this gracious and golden time the people sat out as usual when the day was done, talking from door to door, the old women knitting or spinning, the younger ones mending their husbands' or brothers' blouses or the little blue shirts of their infants, the children playing with the dogs on the sward that edged the stones of the street, and above all the great calm heavens and the glow of the sun that had set. Reine Allix, like the others, sat before the door, for once doing nothing, but with folded hands and bended head dreamily taking pleasure in the coolness that had come with evening, and the smell of the limes that were in blossom, and the blithe chatter of Margot with the neighbours. Bernadou was close beside them, watering and weeding those flowers that were at once his pride and his recreation, making the face of his dwelling bright and the air around it full of fragrance. The little street was quiet in the evening light, only the laughter of the children and the gay gossip of their mothers breaking the pleasant stillness; it had been thus at evening with the Berceau centuries before their time; they thought that it would thus likewise be when the centuries should have seen the youngest-born there in his grave. Suddenly came along the road between the trees an old man and a mule; it was Mathurin, the miller, who had been that day to a little town four leagues off, which was the trade-mart and the corn-exchange of the district. He paused before the cottage of Reine Allix; he was dusty, travel-stained, and sad. Margot ceased laughing among her flowers as she saw her old master. None of them knew why, yet the sight of him made the air seem cold and the night seem near.
"There is terrible news," he said, drawing a sheet of printed words from his coat-pocket--"terrible news! We are to go to war."
"War!" The whole village clustered round him. They had heard of war, far-off wars in Africa and Mexico, and some of their sons had been taken off like young wheat mown before its time; but it still remained to them a thing remote, impersonal, inconceivable, with which they had nothing to do, nor ever would have anything.
"Read!" said the old man, stretching out his sheet. The only one there who could do so, Picot, the tailor, took it and spelled the news out to their wondering ears. It was the declaration of France against Prussia. There arose a great wail from the mothers whose sons were conscripts. The rest asked in trembling, "Will it touch us?"
"Us!" echoed Picot, the tailor, in contempt. "How should it touch us? Our braves will be in Berlin with another fortnight. The paper says so." The people were silent; they were not sure what he meant by Berlin, and they were afraid to ask.
"My boy! my boy!" wailed one woman, smiting her breast. Her son was in the army.
"Marengo!" murmured Reine Allix, thinking of that far-off time in her dim youth when the horseman had flown through the dusky street and the bonfire had blazed on the highest hill above the river.
"Bread will be dear," muttered Mathurin, the miller, going onward with his foot-weary mule. Bernadou stood silent, with his roses dry and thirsty round him.
