CHAPTER V.
"If I could save a centime a day, I could buy a pair of stockings thistime next year," thought Bebee, locking her shoes with her othertreasures in her drawer the next morning, and taking her broom and pailto wash down her little palace.
But a centime a day is a great deal in Brabant, when one has not alwaysenough for bare bread, and when, in the long chill winter, one must weavethread lace all through the short daylight for next to nothing at all;for there are so many women in Brabant, and every one of them, young orold, can make lace, and if one do not like the pitiful wage, one mayleave it and go and die, for what the master lacemakers care or know;there will always be enough, many more than enough, to twist the threadround the bobbins, and weave the bridal veils, and the trains for thecourts.
"And besides, if I can save a centime, the Varnhart children ought tohave it," thought Bebee, as she swept the dust together. It was soselfish of her to be dreaming about a pair of stockings, when thoselittle things often went for days on a stew of nettles.
So she looked at her own pretty feet,--pretty and slender, and arched,rosy, and fair, and uncramped by the pressure of leather,--and resignedher day-dream with a brave heart, as she put up her broom and went out toweed, and hoe, and trim, and prune the garden that had been for onceneglected the night before.
"One could not move half so easily in stockings," she thought with truephilosophy as she worked among the black, fresh, sweet-smelling mould,and kissed a rose now and then as she passed one.
When she got into the city that day, her rush-bottomed chair, which wasalways left upside down in case rain should fall in the night, was setready for her, and on its seat was a gay, gilded box, such as rich peoplegive away full of bonbons.
Bebee stood and looked from the box to the Broodhuis, from the Broodhuisto the box; she glanced around, but no one had come there so early asshe, except the tinker, who was busy quarrelling with his wife andletting his smelting fire burn a hole in his breeches.
"The box was certainly for her, since it was set upon her chair?"--Bebeepondered a moment; then little by little opened the lid.
Within, on a nest of rose-satin, were two pair of silk stockings!--realsilk!--with the prettiest clocks worked up their sides in color!
Bebee gave a little scream, and stood still, the blood hot in her cheeks;no one heard her, the tinker's wife, who alone was near, having justwished Heaven to send a judgment on her husband, was busy putting out hissmoking smallclothes. It is a way that women and wives have, and theynever see the bathos of it.
The place filled gradually.
The customary crowds gathered. The business of the day began underneaththe multitudinous tones of the chiming bells. Bebee's business began too;she put the box behind her with a beating heart, and tied up her flowers.
It was the fairies, of course! but they had never set a rush-bottomedchair on its legs before, and this action of theirs frightened her.
It was rather an empty morning. She sold little, and there was the moretime to think.
About an hour after noon a voice addressed her,--
"Have you more moss-roses for me?"
Bebee looked up with a smile, and found some. It was her companion of thecathedral. She had thought much of the red shoes and the silver clasps,but she had thought nothing at all of him.
"You are not too proud to be paid to-day?" he said, giving her a silverfranc; he would not alarm her with any more gold; she thanked him, andslipped it in her little leathern pouch, and went on sorting someclove-pinks.
"You do not seem to remember me?" he said, with a little sadness.
"Oh, I remember you," said Bebee, lifting her frank eyes. "But you know Ispeak to so many people, and they are all nothing to me."
"Who is anything to you?" It was softly and insidiously spoken, but itawoke no echo.
"Varnhart's children," she answered him, instantly. "And old Annemie bythe wharfside--and Tambour--and Antoine's grave--and the starling--and,of course, above all, the flowers."
"And the fairies, I suppose?--though they do nothing for you."
She looked at him eagerly,--
"They have done something to-day. I have found a box, and somestockings--such beautiful stockings! Silk ones! Is it not very odd?"
"It is more odd they should have forgotten you so long. May I see them?"
"I cannot show them to you now. Those ladies are going to buy. But youcan see them later--if you wait."
"I will wait and paint the Broodhuis."
"So many people do that; you are a painter then?"
"Yes--in a way."
He sat down on an edge of the stall, and spread his things there, andsketched, whilst the traffic went on around them. He was very many yearsolder than she; handsome, with a dark, and changeful, and listless face;he wore brown velvet, and had a red ribbon at his throat; he looked alittle as Egmont might have done when wooing Claire.
Bebee, as she sold the flowers and took the change fifty times in thehour, glanced at him now and then, and watched the movements of hishands, she could not have told why.
Always among men and women, always in the crowds of the streets, peoplewere nothing to her; she went through them as through a field of standingcorn,--only in the field she would have tarried for poppies, and in thetown she tarried for no one.
She dealt with men as with women, simply, truthfully, frankly, with theinnocent fearlessness of a child. When they told her she was pretty, shesmiled; it was just as they said that her flowers were sweet.
But this man's hands moved so swiftly; and as she saw her Broodhuisgrowing into color and form beneath them, she could not choose but looknow and then, and twice she gave her change wrong.
He spoke to her rarely, and sketched on and on in rapid bold strokes thequaint graces and massive richness of the Maison du Roi.
There is no crowd so busy in Brabant that it will not find leisure tostare. The Fleming or the Walloon has nothing of the Frenchman'scourtesy; he is rough and rude; he remains a peasant even when town bred,and the surly insolence of the "Gueux" is in him still. He is kindly tohis fellows, though not to beasts; he is shrewd, patient, thrifty,industrious, and good in very many ways, but civil never.
A good score of them left off their occupations and clustered round thepainter, staring, chattering, pushing, pointing, as though a brush hadnever been seen in all the land of Rubens.
Bebee, ashamed of her people, got up from her chair and rebuked them.
"Oh, men of Brussels; fie then for shame!" she called to them asclearly as a robin sings. "Did never you see a drawing before? and arethere not saints and martyrs enough to look at in the galleries? and haveyou never some better thing to do than to gape wide-mouthed at astranger? What laziness--ah! Just worthy of a people who sleep and smokewhile their dogs work for them! Go away, all of you; look, there comesthe gendarme--it will be the worse for you. Sir, sit under my stall; theywill not dare trouble you then."
He moved under the awning, thanking her with a smile; and the people,laughing, shuffled unwillingly aside and let him paint on in peace. Itwas only little Bebee, but they had spoilt the child from her infancy,and were used to obey her.
The painter took a long time. He set about it with the bold ease of oneused to all the intricacies of form and color, and he had the skill of amaster. But he spent more than half the time looking idly at the humorsof the populace or watching how the treasures of Bebee's gardenwent away one by one in the hands of strangers.
Meanwhile, ever and again, sitting on the edge of her stall, withhis colors and brushes tossed out on the board, he talked to her, and,with the soft imperceptible skill of long practice in those arts, he drewout the details of her little simple life.
There were not always people to buy, and whilst she rested and shelteredthe flowers from the sun, she answered him willingly, and in one of herlonger rests showed him the wonderful stockings.
"Do you think it _could_ be the fairies?" she asked him a littledoubtfully.
&nb
sp; It was easy to make her believe any fantastical nonsense; but her fairieswere ethereal divinities. She could scarcely believe that they had laidthat box on her chair.
"Impossible to doubt it!" he replied, unhesitatingly. "Given a belief infairies at all, why should there be any limit to what they can do? It isthe same with the saints, is it not?"
"Yes," said Bebee, thoughtfully.
The saints were mixed up in her imagination with the fairies in anintricacy that would have defied the best reasonings of FatherFrancis.
"Well, then, you will wear the stockings, will you not? Only, believe me,your feet are far prettier without them."
Bebee laughed happily, and took another peep in the cosy rose-satin nest.But her little face had a certain perplexity. Suddenly she turned on him.
"Did not _you_ put them there?"
"I?--never!"
"Are you quite sure?"
"Quite; but why ask?"
"Because," said Bebee, shutting the box resolutely and pushing it alittle away,--"because I would not take it if you did. You are astranger, and a present is a debt, so Antoine always said."
"Why take a present then from the Varnhart children, or your old friendwho gave you the clasps?"
"Ah, that is very different. When people are very, very poor, equallypoor, the one with the other, little presents that they save for andmake with such a difficulty are just things that are a pleasure;sacrifices; like your sitting up with a sick person at night, and thenshe sits up with you another year when you want it. Do you not know?"
"I know you talk very prettily. But why should you not take any oneelse's present, though he may not be poor?"
"Because I could not return it."
"Could you not?"
The smile in his eyes dazzled her a little; it was so strange, and yethad so much light in it; but she did not understand him one whit.
"No; how could I?" she said earnestly. "If I were to save for two years,I could not get francs enough to buy anything worth giving back; and Ishould be so unhappy, thinking of the debt of it always. Do tell me ifyou put those stockings there?"
"No"; he looked at her, and the trivial lie faltered and died away; theeyes, clear as crystal, questioned him so innocently. "Well, if I did?"he said, frankly; "you wished for them; what harm was there? Will you beso cruel as to refuse them from me?"
The tears sprang into Bebee's eyes. She was sorry to lose the beautifulbox, but more sorry he had lied to her.
"It was very kind and good," she said, regretfully. "But I cannot thinkwhy you should have done it, as you had never known me at all. And,indeed, I could not take them, because Antoine would not let me if hewere alive; and if I gave you a flower every day all the year round Ishould not pay you the worth of them, it would be quite impossible; andwhy should you tell me falsehoods about such a thing? A falsehood isnever a thing for a man."
She shut the box and pushed it towards him, and turned to the selling ofher bouquets. Her voice shook a little as she tied up a bunch ofmignonette and told the price of it.
Those beautiful stockings! why had she ever seen them, and why had hetold her a lie?
It made her heart heavy. For the first time in her brief life theBroodhuis seemed to frown between her and the sun.
Undisturbed, he painted on and did not look at her.
The day was nearly done. The people began to scatter. The shadows grewvery long. He painted, not glancing once elsewhere than at his study.Bebee's baskets were quite empty.
She rose, and lingered, and regarded him wistfully: he was angered;perhaps she had been rude? Her little heart failed her.
If he would only look up!
But he did not look up; he kept his handsome dark face studiously overthe canvas of the Broodhuis. She would have seen a smile in his eyes ifhe had lifted them; but he never raised his lids.
Bebee hesitated: take the stockings she would not; but perhaps she hadrefused them too roughly. She wished so that he would look up and saveher speaking first; but he knew what he was about too warily and well tohelp her thus.
She waited awhile, then took one little red moss-rosebud that she hadsaved all day in a corner of her basket, and held it out to him frankly,shyly, as a peace offering.
"Was I rude? I did not mean to be. But I cannot take the stockings; andwhy did you tell me that falsehood?"
He took the rosebud and rose too, and smiled; but he did not meet hereyes.
"Let us forget the whole matter; it is not worth a sou. If you do nottake the box, leave it; it is of no use to me."
"I cannot take it."
She knew she was doing right. How was it that he could make her feel asthough she were acting wrongly?
"Leave it then, I say. You are not the first woman, my dear, who hasquarrelled with a wish fulfilled. It is a way your sex has of rewardinggods and men.--Here, you old witch, here is a treasure-trove for you. Youcan sell it for ten francs in the town anywhere."
As he spoke he tossed the casket and the stockings in it to an olddecrepit woman, who was passing by with a baker's cart drawn by a dog;and, not staying to heed her astonishment, gathered his colors and easeltogether.
The tears swam in Bebee's eyes as she saw the box whirled through theair.
She had done right; she was sure she had done right.
He was a stranger, and she could never have repaid him; but he made herfeel herself wayward and ungrateful, and it was hard to see the beautifulfairy gift borne away forever by the chuckling, hobbling, greedy oldbaker's woman. If he had only taken it himself, she would have been gladthen to have been brave and to have done her duty.
But it was not in his design that she should be glad.
He saw her tears, but he seemed not to see them.
"Good night, Bebee," he said carelessly, as he sauntered aside from her."Good night, my dear. To-morrow I will finish my painting; but I will notoffend you by any more gifts."
Bebee lifted her drooped head, and looked him in the eyes eagerly, with acertain sturdy resolve and timid wistfulness intermingled in her look.
"Sir, see, you speak to me quite wrongly," she said with a quickaccent, that had pride as well as pain in it. "Say it was kind tobring me what I wished for; yes, it was kind I know; but you never sawme till last night, and I cannot tell even your name; and it is verywrong to lie to any one, even to a little thing like me; and I am onlyBebee, and cannot give you anything back, because I have only just enoughto feed myself and the starling, and not always that in winter. I thankyou very much for what you wished to do; but if I had taken those things,I think you would have thought me very mean and full of greed; andAntoine always said, 'Do not take what you cannot pay--not ever what youcannot pay--that is the way to walk with pure feet.' Perhaps I spoke ill,because they spoil me, and they say I am too swift to say my mind. But Iam not thankless--not thankless, indeed--it is only I could not take whatI cannot pay. That is all. You are angry still--not now--no?"
There was, anxiety in the pleading. What did it matter to her what astranger thought?
And yet Bebee's heart was heavy as he laughed a little coldly, and badeher good day, and left her alone to go out of the city homewards. A senseof having done wrong weighed on her; of having been rude and ungrateful.
She had no heart for the children that evening. Mere Krebs was sittingout before her door shelling peas, and called to her to come in and havea drop of coffee. Krebs had come in from Vilvoeorde fair, and brought astock of rare good berries with him. But Bebee thanked her, and went onto her own garden to work.
She had always liked to sit out on the quaint wooden steps of the milland under the red shadow of the sails, watching the swallows flutter toand fro in the sunset, and hearing the droll frogs croak in the rushes,while the old people told her tales of the time of how in their babyhoodthey had run out, fearful yet fascinated, to see the beautiful ScotsGrays flash by in the murky night, and the endless line of guns andcaissons crawl black as a snake through the summer dust and thetrampled corn, going out past t
he woods to Waterloo.
But to-night she had no fancy for it: she wanted to be alone with theflowers.
Though, to be sure, they had been very heartless when Antoine's coffinhad gone past them, still they had sympathy; the daisies smiled at herwith their golden eyes, and the roses dropped tears on her hand, just asher mood might be; the flowers were closer friends, after all, than anyhuman souls; and besides, she could say so much to them!
Flowers belong to fairyland; the flowers and the birds and thebutterflies are all that the world has kept of its Golden Age; the onlyperfectly beautiful things on earth, joyous, innocent, half divine,useless, say they who are wiser than God.
Bebee went home and worked among her flowers.
A little laborious figure, with her petticoats twisted high, and her feetwet with the night dews, and her back bowed to the hoeing and clippingand raking among the blossoming plants.
"How late you are working to-night, Bebee!" one or two called out, asthey passed the gate. She looked up and smiled; but went on working whilethe white moon rose.
She did not know what ailed her.
She went to bed without supper, leaving her bit of bread and bowl ofgoat's milk to make a meal for the fowls in the morning.
"Little ugly, shameful, naked feet!" she said to them, sitting on theedge of her mattress, and looking at them in the moonlight. They werevery pretty feet, and would not have been half so pretty in silk hose andsatin shoon; but she did not know that: he had told her she wanted thosevanities.
She sat still a long while, her rosy feet swaying to and fro like tworoses that grow on one stalk and hang down in the wind. The littlelattice was open; the sweet and dusky garden was beyond; there was ahand's breadth of sky, in which a single star was shining; the leavesof the vine hid all the rest.
But for once she saw none of it.
She only saw the black Broodhuis; the red and gold sunset overhead; thegray stones, with the fallen rose leaves and crushed fruits; and in theshadows two dark, reproachful eyes, that looked at hers.
Had she been ungrateful?
The little tender, honest heart of her was troubled and oppressed. Foronce, that night she slept ill.