Uncle Silas, J. Sheridan Le Fanu [10 ebook reader .txt] 📗

“I don’t care to cross the stile, thank you, Madame. I shall remain at this side.”

“You shall do wat I tell you!” exclaimed she.

“Let go my arm, Madame, you hurt me,” I cried.

She had gripped my arm very firmly in her great bony hand, and seemed preparing to drag me over by main force.

“Let me go,” I repeated shrilly, for the pain increased.

“La!” she cried with a smile of rage and a laugh, letting me go and shoving me backward at the same time, so that I had a rather dangerous tumble.

I stood up, a good deal hurt, and very angry, notwithstanding my fear of her.

“I’ll ask papa if I am to be so ill-used.”

“Wat ’av I done?” cried Madame, laughing grimly from her hollow jaws; “I did all I could to help you over⁠—’ow could I prevent you to pull back and tumble if you would do so? That is the way wen you petites Mademoiselles are naughty and hurt yourself they always try to make blame other people. Tell a wat you like⁠—you think I care?”

“Very well, Madame.”

“Are a you coming?”

“No.”

She looked steadily in my face and very wickedly. I gazed at her as with dazzled eyes⁠—I suppose as the feathered prey do at the owl that glares on them by night. I neither moved back nor forward, but stared at her quite helplessly.

“You are nice pupil⁠—charming young person! So polite, so obedient, so amiable! I will walk towards Church Scarsdale,” she continued, suddenly breaking through the conventionalism of her irony, and accosting me in savage accents. “You weel stay behind if you dare. I tell you to accompany⁠—do you hear?”

More than ever resolved against following her, I remained where I was, watching her as she marched fiercely away, swinging her basket as though in imagination knocking my head off with it.

She soon cooled, however, and looking over her shoulder, and seeing me still at the other side of the stile, she paused, and beckoned me grimly to follow her. Seeing me resolutely maintain my position, she faced about, tossed her head, like an angry beast, and seemed uncertain for a while what course to take with me.

She stamped and beckoned furiously again. I stood firm. I was very much frightened, and could not tell to what violence she might resort in her exasperation. She walked towards me with an inflamed countenance, and a slight angry wagging of the head; my heart fluttered, and I awaited the crisis in extreme trepidation. She came close, the stile only separating us, and stopped short, glaring and grinning at me like a French grenadier who has crossed bayonets, but hesitates to close.

What had I done to excite this ungovernable fury? We had often before had such small differences, and she had contented herself with being sarcastic, teasing, and impertinent.

“So, for future you are gouvernante and I the cheaile for you to command⁠—is not so?⁠—and you must direct where we shall walk. Très-bien! we shall see; Monsieur Ruthyn he shall know everything. For me I do not care⁠—not at all⁠—I shall be rather pleased, on the contrary. Let him decide. If I shall be responsible for the conduct and the health of Mademoiselle his daughter, it must be that I shall have authority to direct her wat she must do⁠—it must be that she or I shall obey. I ask only witch shall command for the future⁠—voilà tout!”

I was frightened, but resolute⁠—I dare say I looked sullen and uncomfortable. At all events, she seemed to think she might possibly succeed by wheedling; so she tried coaxing and cajoling, and patted my cheek, and predicted that I would be “a good cheaile,” and not “vex poor Madame,” but do for the future “wat she tell a me.”

She smiled her wide wet grin, smoothed my hand, and patted my cheek, and would in the excess of her conciliatory paroxysm have kissed me; but I withdrew, and she commented only with a little laugh, and a “Foolish little thing! but you will be quite amiable just now.”

“Why, Madame,” I asked, suddenly raising my head and looking her straight in the face, “do you wish me to walk to Church Scarsdale so particularly today?”

She answered my steady look with a contracted gaze and an unpleasant frown.

“Wy do I?⁠—I do not understand a you; there is no particular day⁠—wat folly! Wy I like Church Scarsdale? Well, it is such pretty place. There is all! Wat leetle fool! I suppose you think I want to keel a you and bury you in the churchyard?”

And she laughed, and it would not have been a bad laugh for a ghoul.

“Come, my dearest Maud, you are not a such fool to say, if you tell me me go thees a way, I weel go that; and if you say, go that a way, I weel go thees⁠—you are rasonable leetle girl⁠—come along⁠—alons donc⁠—we shall ’av soche agreeable walk⁠—weel a you?”

But I was immovable. It was neither obstinacy nor caprice, but a profound fear that governed me. I was then afraid⁠—yes, afraid. Afraid of what? Well, of going with Madame de la Rougierre to Church Scarsdale that day. That was all. And I believe that instinct was true.

She turned a bitter glance toward Church Scarsdale, and bit her lip. She saw that she must give it up. A shadow hung upon her drab features. A little scowl⁠—a little sneer⁠—wide lips compressed with a false smile, and a leaden shadow mottling all. Such was the countenance of the lady who only a minute or two before had been smiling and murmuring over the stile so amiably with her idiomatic “blarney,” as the Irish call that kind of blandishment.

There was no mistaking the malignant disappointment that hooked and warped her features⁠—my heart sank⁠—a tremendous fear overpowered me. Had she intended poisoning me? What was in that basket? I looked in her dreadful face.