Amelie held her head between her palms for some moments. She was violently agitated, but she tried to consider, as best she might, the decision with regard to her brother.
"It is merciful in them," she said, "and it is just. The King will judge what is right in the sight of God and man. Le Gardeur was but a blind instrument of others in this murder, as blind almost as the sword he held in his hand. But shall I not see him, aunt, before he is sent away?"
"Alas, no! The Governor, while kind, is inexorable on one point.
He will permit no one, after this, to see Le Gardeur, to express either blame or approval of his deed, or to report his words. He will forbid you and me and his nearest friends from holding any communication with him before he leaves the Colony. The Count has remitted his case to the King, and resolved that it shall be accompanied by no self-accusation which Le Gardeur may utter in his frantic grief. The Count does this in justice as well as mercy, Amelie."
"Then I shall never see my brother more in this world,--never!" exclaimed Amelie, supporting herself on the arm of Heloise. "His fate is decided as well as mine, and yours too, O Heloise."
"It may not be so hard with him as with us, Amelie," replied Heloise, whose bosom was agitated with fresh emotions at every allusion to Le Gardeur. "The King may pardon him, Amelie." Heloise in her soul hoped so, and in her heart prayed so.
"Alas! If we could say God pardoned him!" replied Amelie, her thoughts running suddenly in a counter-current. "But my life must be spent in imploring God's grace and forgiveness all the same, whether man forgive him or no."
"Say not my life, but our lives, Amelie. We have crossed the threshold of this house together for the last time. We go no more out to look upon a world fair and beautiful to see, but so full of disappointment and wretchedness to have experience of!"
"My daughters," exclaimed the Lady de Tilly, "another time we will speak of this. Harken, Amelie! I did not tell you that Pierre Philibert came with me to the gate of the Convent to see you. He would have entered, but the Lady Superior refused inexorably to admit him even to the parlor."
"Pierre came to the Convent,--to the Convent?" repeated Amelie with fond iteration, "and they would not admit him. Why would they not admit him? But I should have died of shame to see him. They were kind in their cruelty. Poor Pierre! he thinks me still worthy of some regard." She commenced weeping afresh.
"He would fain have seen you, darling," said her aunt. "Your flight to the Convent--he knows what it means--overwhelms him with a new calamity."
"And yet it cannot be otherwise. I dare not place my hand in his now, for it would redden it! But it is sweet amid my affliction to know that Pierre has not forgotten me, that he does not hate me, nay, that he still loves me, although I abandon the world and him who to me was the light of it. Why would they not admit him?"
"Mere Migeon is as hard as she is just, Amelie. I think too she has no love for the Philiberts. Her nephew Varin has all the influence of a spoilt son over the Lady Superior."
Amelie scarcely regarded the last remark of her aunt, but repeated the words, "Hard and just! Yes, it is true, and hardness and justice are what I crave in my misery. The flintiest couch shall be to me a bed of down, the scantiest fare a royal feast, the hardest penance a life of pleasure. Mere Migeon cannot be more hard nor more just to me than I would be to myself."
"My poor Amelie! My poor Heloise!" repeated the lady, stroking their hair and kissing them both alternately; "be it as God wills.
When it is dark every prospect lies hid in the darkness, but it is there all the same, though we see it not; but when the day returns everything is revealed. We see naught before us now but the image of our Lady of Grand Pouvoir illumined by the lamp of Repentigny, but the sun of righteousness will yet arise with healing on his wings for us all! But oh, my children, let nothing be done hastily, rashly, or unbecoming the daughters of our honorable house."