If he had any
good thing, it was his first wish to share it with him; even to taking
him miles away to some simple home where a happy thing had come to poor
folk--the return of a prodigal son, a daughter's fortunate marriage, or
the birth of a child to childless people; and there together they
exchanged pinches of snuff over the event, and made compliments from the
same mould, nor desired difference of pattern. To the pretty lady's
words, Monsieur Garon blushed, and his thin hand fluttered to his lips.
As if in sympathy, the Cure's fingers trembled to his cassock cord.
"Madame, dear madame,"--the Cure approved by a caressing nod," we are all
the same here in our hearts and in our homes, and if anything seem good
in them to us, it is because you are pleased. You bring sunshine and
relish to our lives, dear madame."
The Cure beamed. This was after his own heart and he had ever said that
his dear avocat would have been a brilliant orator, were it not for his
retiring spirit.
For himself, he was no speaker at all; he could only do his duty and love
his people. So he had declared over and over again, and the look in his
eyes said the same now.
Madame's eyes were shining with tears. This admiration of her was too
real to be doubted.
"And yet--and yet"--she said, with a hand in the Cure's and the avocat's,
drawing them near her--"a heretic, a heretic, my dear friends! How
should I stand in your hearts if I were only of your faith? Or is it so
that you yearn over the lost sheep, more than over the ninety and nine of
the fold?"
There was a real moisture in her eyes, and in her own heart she wondered,
this fresh and venturing spirit, if she cared for them as they seemed to
care for her--for she felt she had an inherent strain of the actress
temperament, while these honest provincials were wholly real.
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