Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1873-02-22


kindly took her duties on herself.
The consequence Of this placid, lazy ute
where ali her faculties we're, in manners
asleep, and where she was enjoying the reac-
ton from her late wears OF priv alton and anxie-
ty, vas, might be expected an increase in
physical beauty that made her freshness aud
were redder. her cheeks roster. her shoulders
bumper than ever; but as she wsxed the health
OF the little hamlet waned, and not the oldest
inhsbitant remembered 50 sickiy ayeason or 50
many deaths. The master. too. suffered sill yht-
Iy, and the little Adolphe desperately.
This failure OF general health i'm undI ain ID
hamlets Is not uncommon in France or in Eng
land; but Adele treated it as something out OF
normal experience, aud, breaking through her
habits OF retIcence, spoke to every one quite
hefceiy OF the strange sickness that had fallen
on Pieuvrot and the MaisOn Cabanel; aud how
she believed II was something more than COM
mon; while Is to her little nephew, she could
neither give name nor find remedy for the
disease That had attacked him. There were
strange things among them, she used to say, and
Pfeuvrot had never done wei since the old
times were changed. Jeanette used to notice
how she would sat gazing at the English lady,
with such deadly look on her handsome face,
when she turned from her fresh complexion and
grand physique to the pale face of the stunted,
meagre. faded child. II was look, she said af-
terward. that used to make her flesh get like
ice and creep like worms.
One night Adele, a. if she could bear il no
longer. dashed down to where old Martin Bri-
Ole lived, to ask him to tell her of his knowl-
edge how 1t had come about-and the remedy
'7Hold. Ma'ame Adele" said Martin. as he
shufed his greasy cards, and laid them out In
tripiets on the table; ''there is more in this
than one sees. One sees only poor little child
become suddenly sick; that may be, is il not so:
and no harm done by man? Heaven sends sick
n ness to us all; But the little Adoiphe has not
been touched by the Bon Diem. see the will
OF wicked woman in this. Hein!" Here she
shuffed the cards, and laid them out with kind
OF eager distraction of manner, his withered
hands trembling, and his mouth muttering
words Adele could not catch. ''Saint Joseph
ana all the saints protect u.s. he cried, ssthe
fo .,s Englishwoman! All, misery"
mean:' cried Adele. grasping his arm Her
black eyes were wild, her arched nostrils were
dilated, her lips thin. sinuous, flexible, were
pressed tight over her small, square teeth.
"Ietl me, ia plain words, what you would
saw"
'.fsroucolsque? VAMPIRE" said Martin. in a
..It is what believed - cried Adele. "It is
what | knew. All. my Adolphei woe on the
gay when the master brought the fair-skinnet
''Those red lips don't come by nothing.
Ma'ame Adele, said Martin, MODELLING his head
Look at them-.they glisten with blood! said
so from the beginning, and the cards, they said
50. too. drew blood and bad fair woman
On the evening the master brought her home,
aud said to myself, 'Ha, ha, Martin! YOU are
on the track. my boy and Ma'ame Adele.
the cards say, Ma'ame Adele. Watch and
true"
"And when we have found Martin9., sail
Adele, IN hoarse whisper.
The Old man shuffied his carts again.
Wnen we have found, Ma'ame Adele?" he
sad slowly. ''iou know the old pit ont there
by the forest-the old pit where the Iutins run
IA and out, and where the White Ladies wiring
the necks Of those who come upon them i'm thu
moonlight? PERHAPS the White Ladies' will do
a. mneh ior the English vile OF Monsieur Ca
banel; who knOws?"
They may said Adele. gloomily.
Courage, brave woman; they SHALL" said
The only really pretty place about Pieuyrot
was the cemetery. To be sure, there was tlr
dark gloomy forest. which was grand i'm its own
mysterious way, and there the broad yid.
plain, where you might wander for a long sum
mer's day; but these were scarcely places
where a young woman would care to go BY her
seII; ana Tor the rest the little patches of cul
tiyated ground, which the peasants had snatch
Ell from the surrounding waste and where they
raised their poor crops, were not very lovely
50 Madame Cabanel. who. for all the soft indO-
fence that had invaded her. had the Englshwo-
mans love for walking and fresh air. haunted
the pretty little graveyard a good deal She h adj
no sentiment connected with it. OF all the dead
who laid there in their narrow coffi ms, she knew
hone and cared for none; but she like, to see
the nower-beds and the wreaths of immortelles
ana the like. The distance, too, from her own
home was just enough for her. and the view
over the plain 10 the dark belt of forest and tbe
mountains beyond was fine.
The Pieuvrotines, however, did not under
one. not out of her mind, should 90 continually
To the cemetery, not on the day of the dead and
nor to adorn the grave of one she loved; ONLY to
slt there and wander among the tOmbs, looking
OUT on the pam and the mountains beyond when
she was tired.
at was just like The speaker. oneIe
souef, had got az far as this when she stopped
for word.
1t was down at La Veuve Prieur's where the
hamlet collected nightly to discuss the DAYS
small doings, AMI where the main theme, ever
,ihce sne had come among them, had been Ma |
Wander about among the tombs just like |
what, Jean IesOuef?" said Martin BriOlic. |
Then rising, he added, in a low but distinct
voice, every word falling clear and clean. ~ |
VIII tell you like what, Lesouef-like a YAM
pre-! La Femme Cabanel has red lips and red |
before your eyes. La Femme Caba- |
mel has red lips and red checks, and she sits |
TOR hours among the tOmbs- Can you read the |
riddle my friends? For me it is as clear as the |
'Ha, Father Martin. you have found the |
word-like yampire?' said Lesouef, with a |
'I.ike yamrire., they all echoed with a |
grOan.
"And l said vampire from the first said
Martin Brioi,c. Call it TO mind: / said it |
from the first"
Faith, and you did" they answered; "and |
you said true" |
So now the seed which Martin and Adele |
root. and the PieuYrotines would have been
ready to accuse of atheism and immortality any |
one who had doubted their decision, and had |
declared that pretty Nine. Cabanel was no |
vampire at all. but only young woman with |
nothing special TO do, a naturally fair CON-
plexiOn and superb health.
The little Adolphe grew paler and paler,
thinner and thinner; the fierce summer sun
told on the half-starved jewellers within those
foul mud kuts, surrounded by undrained
marshes; and Monsieur Jean Cabanei's former
solid health followed the law of the rest. The
doctor. who lived at Creche-en-bois, shook his
head at the look Of things, and said it was
grave. When Adele pressed him to tell her
what was the matter with the child and with
Monsieur, he eyaded the question or gave her
"a word she neither understood nor could pro-
nounce. The truth was he was a creduious
and intensely suspicious man; a man, too, who
made theories and then gave himself to the
task OF finding them true. He had made the
theory that Fanny was secretly poisoning both
her husband and the child; and though he
would not give Adele hint OF this. he would
not set her mind at rest by a definite answer
that went on any other line.
As for Monsieur Cabanel, he was rich man
without Imagination and without suspicion; a
man to take life easily and not distress himself
too much for fear Of wOunding others; a sell
fish man, but not a cruel one: a man whose own
pleasure was his supreme law, and who could
not imagine, still less brook, Opposition or the
want of love and respect for himself. Still he
loved his wife as he had never loved woman
before. Coarsely- moulded, cOmmon-natured as
he was, he loved her with what strength and