FullReads

The woman in the gallery was weeping silently behind her thick veil, and her worn hand clutched the desk in front of her convulsively. Presently she arose and made her way down the stair, almost unnoticed. Two or three times Luc tried to speak, but could not. “Lift me up,” he said brokenly, at last.

Parpon and the Little Chemist raised him to his feet, and held him, his shaking hands resting on their shoulders, his lank body tottering above and between them.

Looking at the congregation, he said slowly: “I’ll suffer till I die for cursing my baptism, and God will twist my neck in purgatory for–“

“Luc,” the Cure interrupted, “say that you repent.”

“I’m sorry, and I ask you all to forgive me, and I’ll confess to the Cure, and take my penance, and–” he paused, for breathing hurt him.

At that moment the woman in black who had been in the gallery came quickly forward. Parpon saw her, frowned, and waved her back; but she came on. At the chancel steps she raised her veil, and a murmur of recognition and wonder ran through the church. Pomfrette’s face was pitiful to see–drawn, staring.

“Junie!” he said hoarsely.

Her eyes were red with weeping, her face was very pale. “M’sieu’ le Cure” she said, “you must listen to me”–the Cure’s face had become forbidding–“sinner though I am. You want to be just, don’t you? Ah, listen! I was to be married to Luc Pomfrette, but I did not love him–then. He had loved me for years, and his father and my father wished it–as you know, M’sieu’ le Cure. So after a while I said I would; but I begged him that he wouldn’t say anything about it till he come back from his next journey on the river. I did not love him enough–then. He left all his money with me: some to pay for Masses for his father’s soul, some to buy things for–for our home; and the rest to keep till he came back.”

“Yes, yes,” said Pomfrette, his eyes fixed painfully on her face–“yes, yes.”

“The day after Luc went away John Dicey the Protestant come to me. I’d always liked him; he could talk as Luc couldn’t, and it sounded nice. I listened and listened. He knew about Luc and about the money and all. Then he talked to me. I was all wild in the head, and things went round and round, and oh, how I hated to marry Luc–then! So after he had talked a long while I said yes, I would go with him and marry him–a Protestant–for I loved him. I don’t know why or how.”

Pomfrette trembled so that Parpon and the Little Chemist made him sit down, and he leaned against their shoulders, while Junie went on:

“I gave him Luc’s money to go and give to Parpon here, for I was too ashamed to go myself. And I wrote a little note to Luc, and sent it with the money. I believed in John Dicey, of course. He came back, and said that he had seen Parpon and had done it all right; then we went away to Montreal and got married. The very first day at Montreal, I found out that he had Luc’s money. It was awful. I went mad, and he got angry and left me alone, and didn’t come back. A week afterwards he was killed, and I didn’t know it for a long time. But I began to work, for I wanted to pay back Luc’s money. It was very slow, and I worked hard. Will it never be finished, I say. At last Parpon find me, and I tell him all–all except that John Dicey was dead; and I did not know that. I made him promise to tell nobody; but he knows all about my life since then. Then I find out one day that John Dicey is dead, and I get from the gover’ment a hundred dollars of the money he stole. It was found on him when he was killed. I work for six months longer, and now I come back–with Luc’s money.”