Which? or, Between Two Women

Excerpt

CHAPTER I.

THE BOHEMIANS.

Early one morning in the month of March, 1770, a woman bearing in her arms a new-born infant, was hastening along the left bank of the Garden, a small river that rises in the Cevennes, traverses the department of the Gard, and empties into the Rhone, not far from Beaucaire. It would be difficult to find more varied and picturesque scenery than that which borders this stream whose praises have been chanted by Florian, and which certainly should not be unknown to fame since it was here the Romans constructed the Pont du Gard, that gigantic aqueduct which conveyed the waters of Eure to Nîmes.

The woman of whom we speak was at that moment very near the famous Pont du Gard—which is only a short distance from the spot on which the little village of Lafous now stands, and directly opposite Remoulins, a town of considerable size situated on the right bank of the river—and at a point where the highway from Nîmes to Avignon intersects the road leading up from the villages that dot the river banks. The woman paused on reaching the place where these roads meet, not to take breath, but to decide which course she should pursue. But she did not hesitate long. After casting an anxious glance behind her, she hastened on again, directing her steps toward the Pont du Gard, which was distant not more than half a mile.

The air was very cold; the wind had been blowing furiously all night, and at day-break it was still raging, ruffling the water, bending the trees, snatching up great clouds of dust, and moaning and shrieking through the clumps of willows that bordered the stream, while immense masses of gray and white clouds scudding rapidly across the sky, imparted to it the appearance of a tempest-tossed ocean. Some of these clouds were so low that they seemed almost to touch the earth as they rushed wildly on, pursued by the fury of the gale, and assuming strange and fantastic forms in their erratic course. Undeterred by the violence of the tempest, the stranger advanced steadily, apparently with but one aim in view: to reach her journey's end with all possible expedition in order to protect her sleeping infant from the inclemency of the weather.

She was a young woman, not yet twenty years of age. Her luxuriant golden hair hung in wild disorder from the brilliant-hued kerchief that was bound about her head; and her garments were as remarkable for their peculiarity of form as for their diversity of color. She wore a short, full dress of blue de laine bordered with yellow, and confined at the waist by a red silk girdle. Over this, she wore a gray cape of coarse woollen stuff. Her legs were bare, and her feet were protected only by rude sandals, held in place by leathern thongs. Many rents, more or less neatly repaired by the aid of thread or if material of another color, revealed the fact that these faded garments had been in long and constant use. Even the sandals were so dilapidated that the feet of their wearer were upon the ground. Her whole attire, in short, was wretched and poverty-stricken in the extreme.

But no face could be more charming. Her pure and delicate features shone out from their framework of golden hair with marvellous beauty, in spite of the sorrow and fatigue which had left their impress upon her face. Her eyes, shaded by long dark lashes and dewy with tears, were remarkably beautiful and expressive. The sunburn that disfigured her charming face, her exquisitely formed hands and her tiny feet, which were scarcely larger than those of a child, extended no further. Upon those portions of her body that were protected by her clothing, her skin was white and delicate, and scarcely colored by the young blood that coursed through her veins....