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But when she saw the girl reel and quiver in pain, when she saw her gasp for breath and self-control, when she saw the hunted agony in her eyes, a great light broke in upon the heart of Cynthe Cardinal. Here was not a pale girl of the convent who could not know what love was!
All the while they knew that she was not happy. And they had explained fully to the countryside just what was their opinion of the whole matter. Jeffrey, remembering these things, and suddenly understanding many things that had been hidden from him, was very humble as he wondered what he could say to Ruth. At the outskirts of the little unpainted village he met Cynthe.
They might as well have asked the stones on the top of the Gaunt Rocks to tell Rafe Gadbeau's secret as to ask it from the Bishop. But this girl was different. You could not tell what she might do under the test. If she stood the test, if she kept the seal unbroken upon her lips, then would Cynthe be her willing slave for life.
'What to do, mon Rafe? 'I do not know, he said, 'though I can guess. But I will not tell you, Cynthe. "'You will not go, mon Rafe. Promise me you will not go. Hide away, and we will slip down to the Falls of St. Regis and be married me, I do not care for the grand wedding in the church here and then we will get away to Beaupre. Promise me. "'Bien, Cynthe, I promise. I will not go to him.
Guilty as Rafe Gadbeau! But Rafe Gadbeau had found a way out. He was not guilty any more. Cynthe had said so. He had gotten past that wall of guilt somehow. He had merely come through the fire and thrown himself at a man's feet and had his guilt wiped away.
"Where is she?" he asked without preface. Cynthe looked at him curiously, a long, searching look, and was amazed at the change she saw. Here was not the heady, thoughtless boy to whom she had talked the other day. Here was a man, a thinking man, a man who had suffered and had learned some things out of unknown places of his heart. I hurt him, she thought. Maybe I said too much. But I am not sorry.
She had seen the Bishop come direct from the little church to the court. And as she watched his face when he came down from the stand, she knew instinctively that he was going back there. Cynthe understood. Even M'sieur the Bishop who was so wise and strong, he was troubled. He thought much of the young Whiting. He would have business with God.
And Cynthe hummed herself, a sad little song of old Beaupre which she had never seen, for Cynthe was born here in the hills. Cynthe was sad, beyond doubt; for here was the mating time, and But Cynthe was not unhappy. The Good God was still in his Heaven, and still good. Life beckoned. The breath of air was sweet. There was work in the world to do.
It was Cynthe Cardinal, though Ruth found it difficult to recognise in her the red-cheeked, sprightly French girl she had met in the early summer. "You saw Rafe Gadbeau die," the girl said roughly, as she faced Ruth sharply at a little distance from the crowd. "You were there, close? No?" "Yes, the fire was all around," Ruth answered, quaking. "How did he die? Tell me. How?"
But if the question came to her of a sudden, without warning, without time for thought? What then? Would that girl be strong enough to deny, to deny and to keep on denying? Who could tell? The girl was a Catholic. But she was a convert. She did not know the terrible secret of the confessional as they knew it who had been born to the Faith. Cynthe herself had meant to keep away from this trial.
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