The Country Doctor

“Little Jacques is to be buried to-day, and I am going to the funeral. He was my nephew, poor little chap; he had been ailing for a long while, and he died yesterday morning. It really looked as though it was M. Benassis who kept him alive. That is the way! All these younger ones die!” Moreau added, half-jestingly, half-sadly.

Genestas reined in his horse as he entered the town, for he met Gondrin and Goguelat, each carrying a pickaxe and shovel. He called to them, “Well, old comrades, we have had the misfortune to lose him – ”

“There, there, that is enough, sir!” interrupted Goguelat, “we know that well enough. We have just been cutting turf to cover his grave.”

“His life will make a grand story to tell, eh?”

“Yes,” answered Goguelat, “he was the Napoleon of our valley, barring the battles.”

As they reached the parsonage, Genestas saw a little group about the door; Butifer and Adrien were talking with M. Janvier, who, no doubt, had just returned from saying mass. Seeing that the officer made as though he were about to dismount, Butifer promptly went to hold the horse, while Adrien sprang forward and flung his arms about his father’s neck. Genestas was deeply touched by the boy’s affection, though no sign of this appeared in the soldier’s words or manner.

“Why, Adrien,” he said, “you certainly are set up again. My goodness! Thanks to our poor friend, you have almost grown into a man. I shall not forget your tutor here, Master Butifer.”

“Oh! colonel,” entreated Butifer, “take me away from here and put me into your regiment. I cannot trust myself now that M. le Maire is gone. He wanted me to go for a soldier, didn’t he? Well, then, I will do what he wished. He told you all about me, and you will not be hard on me, will you, M. Genestas?”

“Right, my fine fellow,” said Genestas, as he struck his hand in the other’s. “I will find something to suit you, set your mind at rest – And how is it with you, M. le Cure?”

“Well, like every one else in the canton, colonel, I feel sorrow for his loss, but no one knows as I do how irreparable it is. He was like an angel of God among us. Fortunately, he did not suffer at all; it was a painless death. The hand of God gently loosed the bonds of a life that was one continual blessing to us all.”

“Will it be intrusive if I ask you to accompany me to the cemetery? I should like to bid him farewell, as it were.”

Genestas and the cure, still in conversation, walked on together. Butifer and Adrien followed them at a few paces distance. They went in the direction of the little lake, and as soon as they were clear of the town, the lieutenant-colonel saw on the mountain-side a large piece of waste land enclosed by walls.

“That is the cemetery,” the cure told him. “He is the first to be buried in it. Only three months before he was brought here, it struck him that it was a very bad arrangement to have the churchyard round the church; so, in order to carry out the law, which prescribes that burial grounds should be removed a stated distance from human dwellings, he himself gave this piece of land to the commune. We are burying a child, poor little thing, in the new cemetery to-day, so we shall have begun by laying innocence and virtue there. Can it be that death is after all a reward? Did God mean it as a lesson for us when He took these two perfect natures to Himself? When we have been tried and disciplined in youth by pain, in later life by mental suffering, are we so much nearer to Him? Look! there is the rustic monument which has been erected to his memory.”

Genestas saw a mound of earth about twenty feet high. It was bare as yet, but dwellers in the district were already busily covering the sloping sides with green turf. La Fosseuse, her face buried in her hands, was sobbing bitterly; she was sitting on the pile of stones in which they had planted a great wooden cross, made from the trunk of a pine-tree, from which the bark had not been removed. The officer read the inscription; the letters were large, and had been deeply cut in the wood.

D. O. M

HERE LIES

THE GOOD MONSIEUR BENASSIS

THE FATHER OF US ALL

PRAY FOR HIM

“Was it you, sir,” asked Genestas, “who – ?”

“No,” answered the cure; “it is simply what is said everywhere, from the heights up there above us down to Grenoble, so the words have been carved here.”

Genestas remained silent for a few moments. Then he moved from where he stood and came nearer to La Fosseuse, who did not hear him, and spoke again to the cure.

“As soon as I have my pension,” he said, “I will come to finish my days here among you.”

ADDENDUM

The following personage appears in other stories of the Human Comedy

Murat, Joachim, Prince

The Vendetta

The Gondreville Mystery

Colonel Chabert

Domestic Peace