Ah! will he meet me thus at the gates of Paradise? It
cannot be far off now!
I knew I should weep all the way if I set out with my mother to meet
her son; and Cecile was afraid both of the disappointment if she did
not meet her husband, and of his being displeased if he should come.
So she only took with her Annora and M. de Solivet's two daughters,
Gabrielle and Petronille, who were fetched from the Convent of the
Visitation. There they sat in the carriage, Nan told me, exactly
alike in their pensionnaire's uniform, still and shy on the edge of
the seat, not daring to look to the right or left, and answering
under their breath, so that she longed to shake them. I found
afterwards that the heretic Mademoiselle de Ribaumont was a fearful
spectacle to them, and that they were expecting her all the time to
break out in the praises of Luther, or of Henry VIII., or of some one
whom they had been taught to execrate; and whenever she opened her
lips they thought she was going to pervert them, and were quite
surprised when she only made a remark, like other people, on the
carriages and horsemen who passed them.
Meanwhile Cecile saw her little girl and boy dressed in their best,
and again rehearsed the curtsey and the bow and the little speeches
with which they were to meet their father. She was sure, she said,
that whatever he might think of her, he must be enchanted with them;
and truly they had beautiful eyes, and Armantine was a charming
child, though Maurice was small and pale, and neither equaled my
Gaspard, who might have been White Ribaumont for height and
complexion, resembling much his uncle Walwyn, and yet in countenance
like his father.
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