CHAPTER VII

THE GREYHOUND

Towards the middle of September Emile Blondet, who had gone to Paris to publish a book, returned to refresh himself at Les Aigues and to think over the work he was planning for the winter.  At Les Aigues, the loving and sincere qualities which succeed adolescence in a young man’s soul reappeared in the used-up journalist.

“What a fine soul!” was the comment of the count and the countess when they spoke of him.

Men who are accustomed to move among the abysses of social nature, to understand all and to repress nothing, make themselves an oasis in the heart, where they forget their perversities and those of others; they become within that narrow and sacred circle,—­saints; there, they possess the delicacy of women, they give themselves up to a momentary realization of their ideal, they become angelic for some one being who adores them, and they are not playing comedy; they join their soul to innocence, so to speak; they feel the need to brush off the mud, to heal their sores, to bathe their wounds.  At Les Aigues Emile Blondet was without bitterness, without sarcasm, almost without wit; he made no epigrams, he was gentle as a lamb, and platonically tender.

“He is such a good young fellow that I miss him terribly when he is not here,” said the general.  “I do wish he could make a fortune and not lead that Paris life of his.”

Never did the glorious landscape and park of Les Aigues seem as luxuriantly beautiful as it did just then.  The first autumn days were beginning, when the earth, languid from her procreations and delivered of her products, exhales the delightful odors of vegetation.  At this time the woods, especially, are delicious; they begin to take the russet warmth of Sienna earth, and the green-bronze tones which form the lovely tapestry beneath which they hide from the cold of winter.

Nature, having shown herself in springtime jaunty and joyous as a brunette glowing with hope, becomes in autumn sad and gentle as a blonde full of pensive memories; the turf yellows, the last flowers unfold their pale corollas, the white-eyed daisies are fewer in the grass, only their crimson calices are seen.  Yellows abound; the shady places are lighter for lack of leafage, but darker in tone; the sun, already oblique, slides its furtive orange rays athwart them, leaving long luminous traces which rapidly disappear, like the train of a woman’s gown as she bids adieu.

On the morning of the second day after his arrival, Emile was at a window of his bedroom, which opened upon a terrace with a balustrade from which a noble view could be seen.  This balcony ran the whole length of the apartments of the countess, on the side of the chateau towards the forests and the Blangy landscape.  The pond, which would have been called a lake were Les Aigues nearer Paris, was partly in view, so was the long canal; the Silver-spring, coming from across the pavilion of the Rendezvous, crossed the lawn with its sheeny ribbon, reflecting the yellow sand.