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A numerous company was assembled under the Surprenant roof: several of the villagers, the three Frenchmen who had bought his nephew Lorenzo's farm, and also, to the Chapdelaines' great surprise, Lorenzo himself, back once more from the States upon business that related to the sale and the settling of his father's affairs. He greeted Maria very warmly, and seated himself beside her.
"And look," said Ephrem Surprenant, "how many young fellows and only one girl!" The young men were duly counted: three Chapdelaines, Eutrope Gagnon, Lorenzo Surprenant, Francois Paradis. As for the one girl ... Every eye was turned upon Maria, who smiled feebly and looked down, confused.
Maria saw that her father's head had fallen, and that he was very still; she thought his evening drowsiness was mastering him again, but when about to waken him with a word, he it was who sighed and began to speak. "Ephrem. Surprenant said no more than the truth. Your mother was a good woman, Maria; you will not find her like." Maria's head answered him "Yes," but her lips were pressed close.
Thus she too could live; but ... it was not as yet in her heart so to do ... In a little while, this season of mourning at an end, Lorenzo Surprenant would come back from the States for the third time and would bear her away to the unknown delights of the city away from the great forest she hated away from that cruel land where men who go astray perish helplessly, where women endure endless torment the while ineffectual aid is sought for them over the long roads buried in snow.
Francois had come in the full tide of summer, from the land of mystery at the headwaters of the rivers; the memory of his artless words brought back the dazzling sunshine, the ripened blueberries and the last blossoms of the laurel fading in the undergrowth; after him appeared Lorenzo Surprenant offering other gifts, visions of beautiful distant cities, of a life abounding in unknown wonders.
Do you earn handsome wages? Not too handsome, eh! ... At any rate you are well educated, you and your sons; you can read and write and cipher? And here am I, not able even to read!" "Nor I!" struck in Ephrem Surprenant, and Conrad Neron and Egide Racicot added: "Nor I!" "Nor I!" in chorus, whereupon the whole of them broke out laughing.
He would rescue her from this oppression of frozen earth and gloomy forest. She could not as yet resolve to say to herself: "I will marry Lorenzo Surprenant," but her heart had made its choice.
EPHREM SURPRENANT pushed open the door and stood upon the threshold. "I have come."
Ephrem Surprenant began anew to praise her who was departed. "In all the parish there was not a braver-spirited woman than she, nor a cleverer housewife. How friendly too, and what a kind welcome she always gave a visitor! In the old parishes yes! and even in the towns on the railway, not many would be found to match her.
All the stories have too near a resemblance with those of other romances, there is nothing new or surprenant in them; the ladies are all so kind they make no sport, and I meet only with one that took me by doing a handsome thing of the kind.
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