‘How is it to be?’ said Michel to his niece the next morning. The question was asked downstairs in the little room, while Urmand was sitting at table in the chamber above waiting for the landlord. Michel Voss had begun to feel that his visitor would be very heavy on hand, having come there as a visitor and not as a man of business, unless he could be handed over to the woman-kind. But no such handing over would be possible, unless Marie would acquiesce. ‘How is it to be?’ Michel asked. He had so prepared himself that he was ready in accordance with a word or a look from his niece either to be very angry, thoroughly imperious, and resolute to have his way with the dependent girl, or else to be all smiles, and kindness, and confidence, and affection. There was nothing she should not have, if she would only be amenable to reason.

‘How is what to be, Uncle Michel?’ said Marie.

The landlord thought that he discovered an indication of concession in his niece’s voice, and began immediately to adapt himself to the softer courses. ‘Well, Marie, you know what it is we all wish. I hope you understand that we love you well, and think so much of you, that we would not intrust you to any one living, who did not bear a high character and seem to deserve you.’ He was looking into Marie’s face as he spoke, and saw that she was soft and thoughtful in her mood, not proud and scornful as she had been on the preceding evening. ‘You have grown up here with us, Marie, till it has almost come upon us with surprise that you are a beautiful young woman, instead of a great straggling girl.’

‘I wish I was a great straggling girl still.’

‘Do not say that, my darling. We must all take the world as it is, you know. But here you are, and of course it is my duty and your aunt’s duty —’ it was always a sign of high good humour on the part of Michel Voss, when he spoke of his wife as being anybody in the household —‘my duty and your aunt’s duty to see and do the best for you.’

‘You have always done the best for me in letting me be here.’

‘Well, my dear, I hope so. You had to be here, and you fell into this way of life naturally. But sometimes, when I have seen you waiting on the people about the house, I’ve thought it wasn’t quite right.’

‘I think it was quite right. Peter couldn’t do it all, and he’d be sure to make a mess of it.’

‘We must have two Peters; that’s all. But as I was saying, that kind of thing was natural enough before you were grown up, and had become — what shall I say?— such a handsome young woman.’ Marie laughed, and turned up her nose and shook her head; but it may be presumed that she received some comfort from her uncle’s compliments. ‘And then I began to see, and your aunt began to see, that it wasn’t right that you should spend your life handing soup to the young men here.’

‘It is Peter who always hands the soup to the young men.’

‘Well, well; but you are waiting upon them, and upon us.’

‘I trust the day is never to come, uncle, when I’m to be ashamed of waiting upon you.’ When he heard this, he put his arm round her and kissed her. Had he known at that moment what her feelings were in regard to his son, he would have recommended Adrian Urmand to go back to Basle. Had he known what were George’s feelings, he would at once have sent for his son from Colmar.

‘I hope you may give me my pipe and my cup of coffee when I’m such an old fellow that I can’t get up to help myself. That’s the sort of reward we look forward to from those we love and cherish. But, Marie, when we see you as you are now — your aunt and I— we feel that this kind of thing shouldn’t go on. We want the world to know that you are a daughter to us, not a servant.’

‘O, the world — the world, uncle! Why should we care for the world?’

‘We must care, my dear. And you yourself, my dear — if this went on for a few years longer, you yourself would become very tired of it. It isn’t what we should like for you, if you were our own daughter. Can’t you understand that?’

‘No, I can’t.’

‘Yes, my dear, yes. I’m sure you do. Very well. Then there comes this young man. I am not a bit surprised that he should fall in love with you — because I should do it myself if I were not your uncle.’ Then she caressed his arm. How was she to keep herself from caressing him, when he spoke so sweetly to her? ‘We were not a bit surprised when he came and told us how it was. Nobody could have behaved better. Everybody must admit that. He spoke of you to me and to your aunt as though you were the highest lady in the land.’

‘I don’t want any one to speak of me as though I were a high lady.’

‘I mean in the way of respect, my dear. Every young woman must wish to be treated with respect by any young man who comes after her. Well;— he told us that it was the great wish of his life that you should be his wife. He’s a man who has a right to look for a wife, because he can keep a wife. He has a house, and a business, and ready money.’

‘What’s all that, uncle?’

‘Nothing;— nothing at all. No more than that,’— saying which Michel Voss threw his right hand and arm loosely abroad;—‘no more than that, if he were not himself well-behaved along with it. We want to see you married to him,— your aunt and I,— because we are sure that he will be a good husband to you.’

‘But if I don’t love him, Uncle Michel?’

‘Ah, my dear; that’s where I think it is that you are dreaming, and will go on dreaming till you’ve lost yourself, unless your aunt and I interfere to prevent it. Love is all very well. Of course you must love your husband. But it doesn’t do for young women to let themselves be run away with by romantic ideas;— it doesn’t, indeed, my dear. I’ve heard of young women who’ve fallen in love with statues and men in armour out of poetry, and grand fellows that they put into books, and there they’ve been waiting, waiting, waiting, till some man in armour should come for them. The man in armour doesn’t come. But sometimes there comes somebody who looks like a man in armour, and that’s the worst of all.’

‘I don’t want a man in armour, Uncle Michel.’

‘No, I daresay not. But the truth is, you don’t know what you want. The proper thing for a young woman is to get herself well settled, if she has the opportunity. There are people who think so much of money, that they’d give a child almost to anybody as long as he was rich. I shouldn’t like to see you marry a man as old as myself.’

‘I shouldn’t care how old he was if I loved him.’

‘Nor to a curmudgeon,’ continued Michel, not caring to notice the interruption, ‘nor to an ill-tempered fellow, or one who gambled, or one who would use bad words to you. But here is a young man who has no faults at all.’

‘I hate people who have no faults,’ said Marie.

‘Now you must give him an answer today or tomorrow. You remember what you promised me when we were coming home the other day.’ Marie remembered her promise very well, and thought that a great deal more had been made of it than justice would have permitted. ‘I don’t want to hurry you at all, only it makes me so sad at heart when my own girl won’t come and say a kind word to me and give me a kiss before we part at night. I thought so much of that last night, Marie, I couldn’t sleep for thinking of it.’ On hearing this, she flung her arms round his neck and kissed him on each cheek and on his lips. ‘I get to feel so, Marie, if there’s anything wrong between you and me, that I don’t know what I’m doing. Will you do this for me, my dear? Come and sit at table with us this evening, and make one of us. At any rate, come and show that we don’t want to make a servant of you. Then we’ll put off the rest of it till tomorrow.’ When such a request was made to her in such words, how could she not accede to it? She had no alternative but to say that she would do in this respect as he would have her. She smiled, and nodded her head, and kissed him again. ‘And, Marie darling, put on a pretty frock,— for my sake. I like to see you gay and pretty.’ Again she nodded her head, and again she kissed him. Such requests, so made, she felt that it would be impossible she should refuse.

And yet when she came to think of it as she went about the house alone, the granting of such requests was in fact yielding in everything. If she made herself smart for this young man, and sat next him, and smiled, and talked to him, conscious as she would be — and he would be also — that she was so placed that she might become his wife, how afterwards could she hold her ground? And if she were really resolute to hold her ground, would it not be much better that she should do so by giving up no point, even though her uncle’s anger should rise hot against her? But now she had promised her uncle, and she knew that she could not go back from her word. It would be better for her, she told herself, to think no more about it. Things must arrange themselves. What did it matter whether she were wretched at Basle or wretched at Granpere? The only thing that could give a charm to her life was altogether out of her reach.

After this conversation, Michel went upstairs to his young friend, and within a quarter of an hour had handed him over to his wife. It was of course understood now that Marie was not to be troubled till the time came for her to sit down at table with her smart frock. Michel explained to his wife the full amount of his success, and acknowledged that he felt that Marie was already pretty nearly overcome.

‘She’ll try to be pleasant for my sake this evening,’ he said, ‘and so she’ll fall into the way of being intimate with him; and when he asks her tomorrow she’ll be forced to take him.’

It never occurred to him, as he said this, that he was forming a plan for sacrificing the girl he loved. He imagined that he was doing his duty by his niece thoroughly, and was rather proud of his own generosity. In the afternoon Adrian Urmand was taken out for a drive to the ravine by Madame Voss. They both, no doubt, felt that this was very tedious; but they were by nature patient — quite unlike Michel Voss or Marie — and each of them was aware that there was a duty to be done. Adrian therefore was satisfied to potter about the ravine, and Madame Voss assured him at least a dozen times that it was the dearest wish of her heart to call him her nephew-inlaw.

At last the time for supper came. Throughout the day Marie had said very little to any one after leaving her uncle. Ideas flitted across her mind of various modes of escape. What if she were to run away — to her cousin’s house at Epinal; and write from thence to say that this proposed marriage was impossible? But her cousin at Epinal was a stranger to her, and her uncle had always been to her the same as a father. Then she thought of going to Colmar, of telling the whole truth to George, and of dying when he refused her — as refuse her he would. But this was a dream rather than a plan. Or how would it be if she went to her uncle now at once, while the young man was away at the ravine, and swore to him that nothing on earth should induce her to marry Adrian Urmand? But brave as Marie was, she was afraid to do this. He had told her how he suffered when they two did not stand well together, and she feared to be accused by him of unkindness and ingratitude. And how would it be with her if she did accept the man? She was sufficiently alive to............