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Then, with a wave of his hand, he seemed to put all this away from him, and with a livelier air asked the stranger to take supper with us. Abby had been laying the cloth quietly while we were talking, and my father would have asked her to sit down with us, but she slipped away while his face was turned in the other direction, and though he looked once or twice, he soon forgot. Poor Abby! I had seen her looking at him as he talked, and was struck by her intent expression, as if she would not lose a word he might say. It seemed natural, though, that he should be her first thought; he had always been, since my mother died.
So presently we three sat about the little table, that was gay with flowers and pretty dishes. I saw Ste. Valerie's wondering glances; was it thus, he seemed to ask, that a farmer lived, who had no woman to care for him? My father saw, too, and was pleased as I had rarely seen him. He did not smile, but his face seemed to fill with light.
"My wife, sir," he said, "loved to see things bright and adorned. I try my son and I try to keep the table as she would like it. I formerly thought these matters sinful, but I have been brought to a clearer vision, through affliction." (Strange human nature, Melody, my child! he was moved to say these words to a stranger, which he could not have said to me, his son!) "She had the French taste and lightness, my wife Mary. I should have been proud to have you see her, sir; the Lord was mindful of His own, and took her away from a world of sin and suffering."
The light died out; his eyes wandered for a moment, and then set, in a way I knew; and I began to talk fast of the first thing that came into my mind.
CHAPTER VI
him come; he knew it would be a great thing for me, and he thought it would not hurt the young gentleman to live for a time with plain folks. But if he thought Yvon would look down on our village people, or hold himself better than they, he was mistaken. In a week the young Frenchman was the son and brother of the whole village. Our people were dear, good people, Melody; but I sometimes thought them a little dull; that was after my mother's death. I suppose I had enough of another nature in me to be troubled by this, but not enough to know how to help it; later I learned a little more; but indeed, I should justly say that my lessons were begun by Yvon de Ste. Valerie. It was from him I learned, my dear, that nothing in this world of God's is dull or common, unless we bring dull hearts and dim eyes to look at it. It is the vision, the vision, that makes the life; that vision which you, my child, with your sightless eyes, have more clearly than almost any one I have known.
He was delighted with everything. He wanted to know about everything. He declared that he should write a book, when he returned to France, all about our village, which he called Paradise. It is a pretty place, or was as I remember it. He must see how bread was made, how wool was spun, how rugs were braided. Many's the time I have found him sitting in some kitchen, winding the great balls of rags neatly cut and stitched together, listening like a child while the woman told him of how many rugs she had made, and how many quilts she had pieced; and she more pleased than he, and thinking him one wonder and herself another.
He was in love with all the girls; so he said, and they had nothing to say against it. But yet there was no girl could carry a sore heart, for he treated them all alike. In this I have thought that he showed a sense and kindness beyond his years or his seeming giddiness; for some of them might well enough have had their heads turned by a gentleman, and one so handsome, and with a tongue that liked better to say "Angel!" to a woman than anything more suited to the average of the sex. But no girl in the village could think herself for a moment the favoured maiden; for if one had the loveliest eyes in the world, the next had a cheek of roses and velvet, and the third walked like a goddess, and the fourth charmed his soul out of his body every time she opened her lips. And so it went on, till all understood it for play, and the pleasantest play they ever saw. But he vowed from the first that he would marry Abby Rock, and no other living woman. Abby always said yes, she would marry him the first Sunday that came in the middle of the week; and then she would try to make him eat more, though he took quite as much as was good for him, not being used to our hearty ways, especially in the mornings. Abby was as pleased with him as a child with a kitten, and it was pretty to see them together.
"Light of my life!" Yvon would cry. "You are exquisite this morning! Your eyes are like stars on the sea. Come, then, angelic Rock, Rocher des Anges , and waltz with your Ste. Valerie!" And he would take Abby by the waist, and try to waltz with her, till she reached for the broomstick. I have told you, Melody, that Abby was the homeliest woman the Lord ever made. Not that I ever noticed it, for the kindness in her face was so bright I never saw anything but that; but strangers would speak of it, and Yvon himself, before he heard her speak, made a little face, I remember, that only I could see, and whispered, had I brought him to lodge with Medusa? Medusa, indeed! I think Abby's smile would soften any stone that had ever had a human heart beating in it, instead of the other way.