Motion Picture Story Magazine (Feb-Jul 1911)

98 THE MOTION PICTURE STORY MAGAZINE fear, Cyril volubly cursed the peasants about him. It seemed an age since the blacksmith had dashed thru the smoke into the doomed and tottering building. All at once a great shout went up from the peasants. Bernard stood swaying silently before them, a limp, white-clad body in his arms. With one last mighty effort he laid her gently in the arms of the crowding women. Then he sank senseless to the earth at their feet. The sunlight was streaming in thru the lofty casements of the beautiful old Chateau de la Croix. The Countess Helene, still pale from her experience of the previous week, lay resting on a couch before the great fire-place. Her unusual pallor only served to accentuate her raven hair and dark lustrous eyes. As she lay quietly, her white costume relieved by the scarlet of the flowers at her breast, she was indeed a lovely vision. She glanced up languidly as a servant entered. "It is the blacksmith, Madame la Comptesse, Bernard le Fer." "Let him enter," said the Countess. One of Bernard's mighty arms was swathed in the white of a linen bandage. He advanced thru the room with a bold, free stride that betrayed an equal absence of embarrassment or effrontery. The Countess extended the back of her hand, and he knelt and kissed it reverently. He did not speak till he stood again before her. "I trust," said Bernard, with grave, inscrutable earnestness, "that Madame -la Comptesse has somewhat recovered." "I have to thank you," the Countess answered graciously, "for your great service in a time of grave peril. But have no fear. You shall be suitably rewarded." She took a bag of gold from the table beside her, and proffered it to him with queenly dignity. Something seemed to snap within the giant's chest, and release a torrent of pent-up. feeling. A sudden madness fired his brain as he gazed at the beautiful girl before him. He drew himself up to his towering height, and gazed at her in silent refusal. Surprise quickly followed by anger shone in the eyes of the fair Helene. "What do you mean?" she demanded haughtily. "Do you wish me to remain indebted to one of your station ?" Then the pent-up flood overflowed the rigid barriers, sweeping caste and social distinctions aside, and leaving simply primeval man talking to the only woman. "Station!" exclaimed Bernard le Fer. "Station!" His resonant tones rang thru the lofty hall-way. "Station! I am a man! What do I want with your paltry gold? It is I, now, who have given you life. Why, one of those flowers nestling at your bosom is worth ten million sacks of lucre ! Give me a flower, and let me go forth with that as my only treasure !" Helene started to her feet in outraged amazement. The thing would be ludicrous if it were not insulting. That he, a base-born peasant, should claim a flower from her breast! She recoiled with a look of unspeakable contempt. "Yes, yes !" he exclaimed, "I see how you look at me! I read disdain in your beautiful eyes. But I am a man, I tell you, not a beast. I was created by the same great God as you! I have the same sorrows, thoughts, desires ! Look !" He impetuously plucked forth from his bosom a pitiful handful of faded flowers. "Look ! These are the flowers you cast carelessly aside at my very doorway a week ago ! Day and night they have burned here against my bosom ! I ask not for a thought, but for simply a flower ! Give me only something you have worn since that time when I clasped you to my bosom. It is love, lady, love, and naught else that I bear for you ! Give me a memory to feed it!"" As he paused in his outburst with heaving breast, the door opened quickly, and Cyril de la Croix entered. The sound of Bernard's passionate pleading had carried beyond the oaken door. "Begone, sir !" the Countess com