Nêne/Part 2/Chapter 1

N a shady spot on the short-cut grass of the meadow, Lalie was trying to manage a "ring around" dance. Her right hand held one of Jo's and in her left dangled Zine, the wooden doll. She had crowned Jo with a wreath of rushes and over Zinc's heart she had tied, with a bit of worsted thread, a big bunch of daisies. It was just like a wedding party.

Here Lalie stopped, not remembering how it went on.

"Nêne, what comes now?"

Madeleine sang the next lines, bent over her washing:

"Oh yes! I remember now!"

Lalie jumped with pleasure and went on, turning around more rapidly:

Again she stopped, memory failing, and began to lose her temper.

"It's Jo! You simply can't play with him! When I say 'wind!' we ought to run. Jo drags and drags! Are you going to run, yes or no, when it's the wind?"

She shook Jo, who gave Zine a kick, and the game was broken up.

Madeleine turned to look:

"Well? Aren't you going to go on playing?"

"It's Jo's fault!" said Lalie. "He has broken one of Zinc's legs … And he won't do anything but drag and drag!"

Jo said nothing but went to hide behind Madeleine's skirts. That made Lalie jealous. She began rocking her doll in her arms:

"Come here, poor little Zine!— Lalie loves only Zine, so there!"

"Is that so? Don't you love Nêne a little too?"

"Yes, I do!" said the little girl, running to the washing-plank by the stream and starting to jump up and down on it with her brother.

Madeleine kissed them both in turn, holding her hands back so as not to wet their clothes.

"You'll tumble into the water," she said, "and you'll make me fall in too!— Run away, now!"

"Will you dance with us?" begged Lalie: "Come on! I'll take your hand, and you can hold Zine on the other side."

"Jo, too," said the baby.

Madeleine hugged them both between her elbows, hands held away.

"I haven't time to-day! I have to wash your pinafores and stockings, you know."

"I wish somebody'd play!" said Lalie.

"There, there! Start your dance again. I'll sing for you!"

The little girl clapped her hands.

"All right! Come on, Jo! Come on, Zine! Sing the wind song, Nêne."

Madeleine began to sing:

"Go on!" called Lalie. "Go on, Nêne!"

Madeleine continued, marking the measure with her beetle and not losing a minute with her wash:

"Go on! Go on! We're having fun now!"

Madeleine thought:

"They'll drive me crazy!"

And her eyes danced with laughter.

She got to the end of the song and began it all over again. When she turned to see how the game was going, she found that the children weren't listening any more.

Lalie had seated Zine, whose knees wouldn't bend, and was making her recite her rosary. Jo was busy pulling up handfuls of grass, grunting at every pull with the effort of it, and sticking out his tongue.

"I'm like a blind fiddler who strikes up a dance after the wedding guests have gone. The children have more sense than I; if they'd kept hopping around all this time they'd have been in a sweat. Really now, I'm just a fool!"

She took her time wringing out some clothes, the better to listen to Lalie.

"Before long, that child will be giving me ideas about how to do 'most everything round the house."

A gust of pride swelled her breast, and her eyes became vague, and her thoughts frisked ahead into the years, as spry as a yearling.

"When Jo is grown up, I'll be an old woman. Perhaps I won't be at the Moulinettes any more— Lalie'll have taken my place.— Who knows where I'll be? Jo'll come to see me and I'll make him a cup of coffee.— He'll go away for his service in the army, but he'll get furloughs.— 'Hello, Nêne! So you're still at your spinning wheel!'— His sabre'll drag, clatter, clatter, behind him; then I'll ask him if they're giving him plenty to eat, and I'll give him a silver piece.— And then he'll have a sweetheart and they'll get married.— Dear Lord, make that I have money enough so he won't be ashamed of me at the wedding, and so I can make him a fine present!"

She gave a bunch of clothes their final wring and bent again over her wash.

It was a beautiful place for washing. The lively little stream rippled over its uneven bed with a jingling as of tiny bells. Above the rubbing plank the water was so clear that the bottom was plainly visible. Schools of minnows sailed across it, coming up close to the surface at times and there whirling round and round, all together.

Madeleine thought:

"Perhaps the little things are dancing a round too, and their mother leads the game from down below. How pretty all God's creatures are when they're young.— I'd like to know where the mother minnow is, and if she is looking out for her children."

Madeleine went about her work with the quick, telling movements of the experienced washerwoman. She wasn't afraid of wetting her arms nor of dashing the spray in her face. To save the clothes from wearing out too quickly, she rubbed them between her hands instead of on the board and she was very saving with the soap. She did the rinsing quickly, shaking out the linen with a lively snap that flung up the ends of it as high as her face.

She had washed first the men's clothes and the kitchen towels; remained the children's little things, and these she wanted particularly clean. On the following Sunday their cousin whose farm was called "L'Ouchette," or Little Pasture, was giving a dinner. Michael could not go, but Madeleine was to take the children there. She meant to do everything possible to make Jo and Lalie look handsomer than the other children.

So she spread a petticoat of flowered stuff over her board and began to soap it with great care; then she rubbed it a long while, but very gently. This was the kind of work she enjoyed, and she would have liked to prolong it.

The roundelay had come back to her lips, as sweet as a chocolate drop. On she went, rubbing, rubbing; between her big fingers the thin stuff disappeared in a mass of foamy suds.

Zine having finished reciting her rosary, Lalie had laid her flat on her back, pretending the poor thing was very ill, and had gone to fetch Jo. He had come with a bunch of grass in both his fists.

"Jo, let's play Zine has a tummy-ache. I'll be her mamma; I'll rock her on my lap—you'll bring her some tisane. Let's play like that!"

Jo was not in a mood for it and shook his head.

"Nêne didn't say!"

"Never mind!—Zine will cry. I'll dry her eyes and wipe her nose."

"Nêne didn't say!"

Lalie pulled Jo by the arm.

"You're a bad boy, that's what you are!"

Jo tried to give Zine a kick; he didn't reach her because she was lying flat on the grass and he lifted his foot very high, intending to kick hard. So he leaned down quickly and rubbed Zinc's face with a handful of grass.

Lalie gave him a push that made him roll over. Jo set up a howl and Lalie howled the louder.

"Nêne!" cried Jo.

"Nêne! Nêne!" cried Lalie.

Madeleine sprang to her feet and ran towards them, with her hands all white with suds.

Whatever she was doing, now-a-days, she dropped everything the minute the children cried for her. It made her lose much time every day and she reproached herself for it, but that never kept her from doing it again; their cries echoed in her breast; they hurt her.

"Yes, they'll drive me crazy all right, poor darlings!"

She wiped her hands and covered the children with hugs and kisses. Then she joined in their game, played being Zinc's mamma, while Lalie showed Jo what to do with the tisane.

When they were well started again, she ran back to her work. Time was flying; she was all upset about having wasted those few moments.

"If I had a mistress, she'd give me a fine scolding!— Playing with dolls—that's going too far! Well, now I'd better hurry and get done!"

She plunged her arms into the stream and began rinsing one of Lalie's little shifts in lively fashion. But no, it wouldn't do to hurry over work like this! As she was wringing it out, she saw the water dripping still soapy from it; so she rinsed it all over again. How soft the fine wisp felt to her hands!

"Little shift, come out nice and white. Pretty lace, I'll dip you in starch so you'll stand out as neat as a daisy's little collar."

"Ha-a-h!" A scream rose from near by, along the stream, while Lalie called out in great fright:

"Nêne! Nêne!"

Madeleine was up in a flash, her legs shaking, her heart standing still. The baby was nowhere to be seen.

"Jo, where are you? Jo!"

Lalie pointed to the stream. Another, sharper scream pierced the air.

Madeleine rushed forward, bumping against her tressel and spilling all the clean clothes in the mud, leaving her wooden shoes behind so she could run faster.

Jo had fallen into the stream. Fortunately he had picked out a calm spot. Two yards further on, the current would have tossed him, but here his head was above water, poor duckling, and God knows if he didn't open his bill!

Madeleine pulled him out on the grass and took off his clothes. He was yelling his head off, and he would have yelled still louder if he hadn't been shivering so with cold. When she had him lying naked in the grass, he went right on yelling while Madeleine rubbed his back to warm him. She herself was whiter than a sheet.

"He's frozen to the bone! Pray God he doesn't fall ill, now!" She untied her apron to wrap around the baby, but it was wet. There was nothing at hand but her skirt that was dry and woolly. Not for an instant did she hesitate, nor even glance up to see if there was anyone in sight: her hands flew to take off her skirt and throw it over the baby like a bell. Then, finding herself with nothing on but a chemise, she rushed to the overturned tressel and tied one of the newly washed petticoats around her waist.

"Come, little Jo. Let's run home! Are you still cold?"

She ran to the house, taking the shortest way, jumping across the ditches. As she passed by a hedge, a thorn buried itself so deep in her bare heel that her heart went cold and tears shot to her eyes. But she ran on, limping, with her wet petticoat slapping about her legs. Crossing the goat-pasture, her foot sank ankle-deep in a manure drain, but on she went.

The baby had quieted down now, feeling warm and at ease in the folds of the soft woollen skirt; her running jogged him and he enjoyed it hugely. When Madeleine reached the house and wanted to put him to bed, he protested and struggled and clung to her neck.

"More run, Nêne, more run!"

But this time she did not give in, she was too afraid he might have caught a chill. She put him in his cradle and warmed him between two pillows. Then she dressed him in dry clothes and his Sunday smock.

"Are you still cold, Jo, darling? If you are, I'll heat you some sugared wine."

"Yes, Jo is cold."

She ran to get the sugar, the spirit lamp, the bottle of wine.

"There, now! Drink, darling! Does it taste good?"

Jo kept his nose in his cup and replied between swallows: "Jo'll do it again!"

Madeleine bent over him, worried.

"What's that? What will you do again?"

"The water—Jo'll fall in again!" he said with a determined air.