LAbbe Constantin | Page 6

and the latter replied:
"The wife and the girls go for me. You know very well, Monsieur le Cure, that is how it is with us. The women have enough religion for the men. They will open the gates of paradise for us."
And he added maliciously, while giving a touch of the whip to his old black mare:
"If there is one!"
The Cure sprang from his seat.
"What! if there is one! Of a certainty there is one."
"Then you will be there, Monsieur le Cure. You say that is not certain, and I say it is. You will be there, you will be there, at the gate, on the watch for your parishioners, and still busy with their little affairs; and you will say to St. Peter--for it is St. Peter, isn't it, who keeps the keys of paradise?"
"Yes, it is St. Peter."
"Well, you will say to him, to St. Peter, if he wants to shut the door in my face under the pretense that I did not go to mass--you will say to him: 'Bah! let him in all the same. It is Bernard, one of the farmers of Madame la Marquise, an honest man. He was common councilman, and he voted for the maintenance of the sisters when they were going to be expelled from the village school.' That will touch St. Peter, who will answer: 'Well, well, you may pass, Bernard, but it is only to please Monsieur le Cure.' For you will be Monsieur le Cure up there, and Cure of Longueval, too, for paradise itself would be dull for you if you must give up being Cure of Longueval."
Cure of Longueval! Yes, all his life he had been nothing but Cure of Longueval, had never dreamed of anything else, had never wished to be anything else. Three or four times excellent livings, with one or two curates, had been offered to him, but he had always refused them. He loved his little church, his little village, his little vicarage. There he had it all to himself, saw to everything himself; calm, tranquil, he went and came, summer and winter, in sunshine or storm, in wind or rain. His frame became hardened by fatigue and exposure, but his soul remained gentle, tender, and pure.
He lived in his vicarage, which was only a larger laborer's cottage, separated from the church by the churchyard. When the Cure mounted the ladder to train his pear and peach trees, over the top of the wall he perceived the graves over which he had said the last prayer, and cast the first spadeful of earth. Then, while continuing his work, he said in his heart a little prayer for the repose of those among his dead whose fate disturbed him, and who might be still detained in purgatory. He had a tranquil and childlike faith.
But among these graves there was one which, oftener than all the others, received his visits and his prayers. It was the tomb of his old friend Dr. Reynaud, who had died in his arms in 1871, and under what circumstances! The doctor had been like Bernard; he never went to mass or to confession; but he was so good, so charitable, so compassionate to the suffering. This was the cause of the Cure's great anxiety, of his great solicitude. His friend Reynaud, where was he? Where was he? Then he called to mind the noble life of the country doctor, all made up of courage and self-denial; he recalled his death, above all his death, and said to himself:
"In paradise; he can be nowhere but in paradise. The good God may have sent him to purgatory just for form's sake--but he must have delivered him after five minutes."
All this passed through the mind of the old man, as he continued his walk toward Souvigny. He was going to the town, to the solicitor of the Marquise, to inquire the result of the sale; to learn who were to be the new masters of the castle of Longueval. The Abbe had still about a mile to walk before reaching the first houses of Souvigny, and was passing the park of Lavardens when he heard, above his head, voices calling to him:
"Monsieur le Cure, Monsieur le Cure."
At this spot adjoining the wall, a long alley of limetrees bordered the terrace, and the Abbe, raising his head, perceived Madame de Lavardens, and her son Paul.
"Where are you going, Monsieur le Cure?" asked the Countess.
"To Souvigny, to the Tribunal, to learn--"
"Stay here--Monsieur de Larnac is coming after the sale to tell me the result."
The Abbe Constantin joined them on the terrace.
Gertrude de Lannilis, Countess de Lavardens, had been very unfortunate. At eighteen she had been guilty of a folly, the only one of her life, but that one--irreparable. She had married for love,