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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/15934-8.txt b/15934-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fd29213 --- /dev/null +++ b/15934-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,16376 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of His Excellency the Minister, by Jules Claretie + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: His Excellency the Minister + +Author: Jules Claretie + +Translator: Henri Roberts + +Release Date: May 29, 2005 [EBook #15934] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + + + + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + + +THIS EDITION +DEDICATED TO THE HONOR OF THE +ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE +IS LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND NUMBERED AND REGISTERED +SETS, OF WHICH THIS IS + +NUMBER 358 + + +THE ROMANCISTS +JULES CLARETIE +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER + + +BIBLIOTHÈQUE +DES CHEFS-D'OEUVRE +DU ROMAN +CONTEMPORAIN + +_HIS EXCELLENCY +THE MINISTER_ + +JULES CLARETIE + +OF THE ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE + + +PRINTED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY BY + +GEORGE BARRIE & SONS, PHILADELPHIA +COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY G.B. & SON + +THIS EDITION OF +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER +HAS BEEN COMPLETELY TRANSLATED +BY +HENRI ROBERTS + +THE ETCHINGS ARE BY +EUGENE WALLET +AND DRAWINGS BY +ADRIEN MARIE + + + + +TO ALPHONSE DAUDET + + +My dear friend, + +Ideas sometimes float about in the air like the pollen of flowers. For +years past I have been at work collecting notes for this book which I +have decided to dedicate to you. + +In one of your charming prefaces, you told us lately that you only +painted from nature. We are both of us, I imagine, in our day and +generation, quite captivated and carried away by that modern society +from which in your exquisite creations you have so well understood how +to extract the essence. + +What is it that I have desired to do this time? That which we have both +been trying to do at one and the same time: to seize, in passing, these +stirring times of ours, these modern manners, that society which +perpetuates the antediluvian uproar, that feverish, bustling world +always posing before the footlights, that market for the sale of +appetites, that kirmess of pleasure that saddens us a little and amuses +us a great deal, and allows us romance-writers, simple seekers after +truth, to smile in our sleeves at the constant seekers after portfolios. + +This book is true, I have seen the events narrated in it pass before my +own eyes, and I can say, as a spectator greatly interested in what I +see, that I am delighted, my old fellow-traveller, to write your great +and honored name on the first page of my book as a witness to the +sincere affection and true comradeship of + +Your devoted, + +JULES CLARETIE. + + + + +PREFACE + + +_There was once a Minister of State who presented to his native land the +astonishing spectacle of a Cabinet Minister dying whilst in office. This +action was so astounding to the nation at large that a statue has since +been erected to his memory._ + +_I saw his funeral procession defile past me, I think I even made one of +the Committee sent by the Society of Men of Letters to march in the +funeral convoy. It was superb. This lawyer from the Provinces, good +honest man, eloquent orator, honest politician that he was, who came to +Paris but to die there, was buried with the greatest magnificence._ + +_De Musset had eight persons to follow him to the grave; his Excellency +had one hundred thousand._ + +_I returned home from this gorgeous funeral in a thoughtful mood, +thinking how much emptiness there is in glory, and particularly in +political glory. This man had been "His Excellency the Minister" and not +only his own province, but the whole country had placed its hopes on +him. But what had he done? He had left his home to cast himself into the +great whirlpool of the metropolis. It was the romance of a great +provincial plunged in Paris into the reality of contemporary history, +and become as ordinary as the commonplace items of the Journals. "What a +subject for a study at once profoundly modern and perfectly lifelike!" +The funeral convoy had hardly left the church of the Madeleine when my +plot of this romance was thought out, and appeared clearly before me in +this title, very brief and simple: _His Excellency the Minister_._ + +_I have not drawn any one in particular, I have thought of no individual +person, I even forgot all about this departed Minister, whose face I +hardly caught even a glimpse of, and of whose life I was completely +ignorant; I had only in my mind's eye a hero or rather a heroine: +Politics with all its discouragements, its vexations, its treacheries, +its deceptions, its visions as fair as the blue sky of summer, suddenly +bursting like soap bubbles; and to the woes of Politics, I naturally +endeavored to add those of the pangs of love._ + +_And this is how my book came to see the light. I have been frequently +asked from what living person I borrowed the character of Vaudrey, with +its sufferings, its disappointments, its falterings. From whom? An +American translator, better informed, it appears, than myself, has, I +believe, brought out in New York a _key_ to the characters presented in +my book. I should have publicly protested against this _Key_ which +unlocks nothing, however, had it been published in France. Reader, do +not expect any masks to be raised here--there are no masks; it is only a +picture of living people, of passions of our time. No portraits, +however, only types. That, at least, is what I have tried to do. And if +I expected to find indulgent critics, I have certainly succeeded, and +the two special characters which I sought to portray in my romance--in +Parisian and political life--have been fortunate enough to win the +approval of two critics whose testimony to the truth of my portraitures +I have set down here._ + +_An author of rare merit and an authority on Statecraft, Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss, was kind enough one day to analyze and praise, apropos of the +comedy founded upon my book, the romance which I am to-day republishing. +It has been extremely pleasant for me to put myself under the +sponsorship of a man of letters willing to vouch for the truth of my +portrayals. I must beg pardon for repeating his commendations of my +work, so grateful are they to me, coming from the pen of a critic so +renowned, and which I take some pride in reading again._ + +_"I had already twice read _Monsieur le Ministre_," wrote Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss in the _Journal des Débats_ the day following the production at +the Gymnase, "before having seen the drama founded on the book, and I do +not regret having been obliged to read it for the third time. The +romance is both well conceived and admirably executed. To have written +it, a union of character and talent was necessary. A Republican tried +and proved, permitting his ideal to be tarnished and sullied; a patriot +wronged by the vices of the times in which he lived; an honest, +clean-handed man; the representative of a family of rigid morality; the +strict impartiality of the artist who cares for nothing but his ideas of +art, and who protects those ideas from being injured or influenced by +the pretensions of any group or coterie; a close and long +acquaintanceship with the ins and outs of Parisian life; an eye at once +inquiring, calm and critical, a courageous indifference, hatred for the +mighty ones of the hour, and a loftiness of soul which refuses to yield +to the unjust demands of timid friendship: such are the qualities that +make the value of this matchless book. Monsieur Claretie has been +accused of having gathered together and exposed to the public gaze two +or three more or less scandalous episodes of private life, and using +them as the foundation of his romance. The fictitious name of Vaudrey +has been held to cloak that of such and such a Minister of State. Those, +however, who search for vulgar gossip in this book, or who look for +private scandal are far astray. They are quite mistaken as regards the +tendency and moral of Monsieur Claretie's book. The Vaudrey of the +romance is no minister in particular, neither this statesman nor that. +He is the Minister whom we have had before our eyes for the last quarter +of a century. He is that one, at once potential and universal. In him +are united and portrayed all the traits by which the species may be +determined. He had been elected to office without knowing why, and to do +him this justice, at least without any fault of his; he was deposed from +power without knowing the reason, and we have no hesitation in saying, +without his having done anything either good or bad to deserve his fall. +There he is minister, however; Minister of the Interior, and who knows? +in a fair way, perhaps, to be swept by some favorable wind to the post +of President of the Council; while not so very long ago to have been +made sub-prefect of the first class, would have surpassed the wildest +visions of his youth. In Monsieur Claretie's romance it is the old +Member of Parliament, Collard--of Nantes--converted late in life to +Republicanism, who chose the provincial Vaudrey for his Minister of the +Interior; this may, with equal probability be Marshal MacMahon._ + +_"In Monsieur Claretie's romance, _Monsieur le Ministre_ is of the Left +Centre or the so-called Moderate Party, he is therefore on the side of +Law and Order. He enters into the Cabinet with the determination to +reform every abuse, to recast everything; to seek for honest men, to +make merit and not faction, the touchstone of advancement. In short, to +apply in his political life the glorious principles which--and the noble +maxims that--He is only, however, forty-eight hours in office when he +becomes quite demoralized, paralyzed and stultified for the rest of his +ministerial life. It is the phenomenon of crushing demoralization and of +complete enervation of which the public, from the situation in which it +is placed, sees only the results of which Monsieur Claretie, with a +skilful hand describes for us the mechanism and the cause. This Minister +of State, supposed to be omnipotent in office, has not even the power to +choose an undersecretary of State for himself. The Minister who only the +day before, from his seat upon one of the benches of the Opposition, sat +with his head held aloft, his long body erect, with rigid dignity, as if +made of triple brass, cannot now take the initiative in the appointment +of a '_garde champêtre_.' His undersecretaries of State, his _gardes +champêtres_, he himself, his whole environment, in fact, are only +painted dummies and the meek puppets that a director of the staff, a +chief of a division, or a chief of a bureau sets in motion, to the tune +he grinds out of his hand-organ, or moves them about at his will like +pawns upon a chess-board. The Minister will read with smiling confidence +the reports by which his subordinates who are his masters, inform +him--what no one until then had thought of--that he has been called by +the voice of the nation to his high office, and that he can in future +count upon the entire and complete confidence of the country. To please +these obliging persons, the hangers-on of governments that he has passed +a quarter of his life infighting against and whom he will call gravely, +and upon certain occasions, very drolly, the hierarchy, he will betray +without any scruples all those whose disinterested efforts and great +sacrifices have brought about the triumph of the cause which he +represents._ + +_"Monsieur le Ministre is from the Provinces! You understand. Solemn and +pedantic, if his youth has been passed upon the banks of the Isère, a +puppy with his muzzle held aloft and giddy, if Garonne has nourished +him, broad faced and vulgarly pedantic if his cradle has been rocked in +upper Limousin. But whether he comes from Corrèze, from Garonne or +Isère, it is always as a Provincial that he arrives in Paris, the air of +which intoxicates him. He is in the same situation and carries with him +the same sentiments as Monsieur Jourdain when invited to visit the +Countess Dorimène. For the first adventuress who comes along, a born +princess who has strayed into a house of ill fame, or one who frequents +such a house, who masquerades as a princess in her coquettish house in +Rue Brèmontier, he will forsake father, mother, children, state +documents, cabinet, councils, Chamber of Deputies, everything in fact. +He will break away from his young wife who has grown up under his eyes +in the same town with him, among all the sweet domestic graces, moulded +amid all the fresh and sapid delicacies of the provinces, but pshaw! too +provincial for a noble of his importance, and he will go in pursuit of +some flower, no matter what, be it only redolent of Parisian patchouli. +He will break the heart of the one, while for the other, he will bring +before the councils of administration suspected schemes, blackmailings, +concessions, treachery and ruin. Monsieur Claretie had shown us the +Vaudrey of his romance involved in all these degradations, although he +has checked him as to some, and in his novel, at least, with due +submission to the exalted truth of art, he has not shrunk from punishing +this false, great man and pretended tribune of the people, by the very +vices he espoused._ + +_"I do not stop to inquire if even in the story, Monsieur Claretie's +'Marianne Kayser' is frequently self-contradictory, and if in some +features I clearly recognize his Guy de Lissac; two characters that play +an important part in the narrative! But after all, what does it matter? +It suffices for me that his Excellency the Minister and all his +Excellency's entourage are fully grasped and clearly described. Granet, +the low _intriguer_ of the lobbies; Molina, the stock-company cut-throat +and Bourse ruffian; Ramel, the melancholy and redoubtable publicist, who +has made emperors without himself desiring to become one, who will die +in the neighborhood of Montmartre and the Batignolles, forgotten but +proud, poor, and unsullied by money, true to his ideals, among the +ingrates enriched by his journal and who have reached the summit only by +the influence of his authority with the public; Denis Garnier, the +Parisian workman who has had an experience of the hulks as the result of +imbibing too freely of sentimental prose and of lending too ready an ear +to the golden speech of some tavern demagogue, who has now had enough of +politics and who scarcely troubles to think what former retailer of +treasonable language, what Gracchus of the sidewalk may be minister, +Vaudrey or Pichereau, or even Granet: all these types are separately +analyzed and vigorously generalized. Monsieur Claretie designated no one +in particular but we elbow the characters in his book every day of our +lives. He has, moreover, written a book of a robust and healthy novelty. +The picture of the greenroom of the Ballet with which the tale opens and +where we are introduced in the most natural way possible to nearly all +the characters that play a part in the story of Vaudrey is masterly in +execution and intention. It is Balzac, but Balzac toned down and more +limpid."_ + +_I will stop here at the greenroom of the Ballet commended by Monsieur +J.-J. Weiss, to give a slight sketch, clever as a drawing by Saint' Aubin +or a lithograph by Gavarni, which Monsieur Ludovic Halévy has +contributed to a journal and in which he also praises the romance that +the _feuilletoniste_ of the _Débats_ has criticized with an authority so +discriminating and a benevolence so profound._ + +_It was very agreeable for me to observe that such a thorough Parisian +as the shrewd and witty author of _Les Petites Cardinal_ should find +that the Opéra--which certainly plays a rôle in our politics--had been +sufficiently well portrayed by the author of _Monsieur le Ministre_. And +upon this, the first chapter of my book, Monsieur Ludovic Halévy adds, +moreover, some special and piquant details which are well worth +quoting:_ + +_"That which gave me very great pleasure in this tale of a man of +politics is that politics really have little, very little place in the +novel; it is love that dominates it and in the most despotic and +pleasant way possible. This great man of Grenoble who arrives at Paris +in order to reform everything, repair everything, elevate everything, +falls at once under the sway of a most charming Parisian adventuress. +See Sulpice Vaudrey the slave of Marianne. Marianne's gray eyes never +leave him--But she in her turn meets her master--and Marianne's master +is Adolphe Gochard, a horrid Parisian blackguard--who is so much her +master that, after all, the real hero of the romance is Adolphe Gochard. +Such is the secret philosophy of this brilliant and ingenious romance._ + +_"I have, however, a little quarrel on my own account with Monsieur +Jules Claretie. Nothing can be more brilliantly original than the +introductory chapter of _Monsieur le Ministre_. Sulpice Vaudrey makes +his first appearance behind the scenes of the Opéra, and from the sides +of the stage, in the stage boxes, opera-glasses are turned upon him, and +he hears whispered:_ + +_"'It is the new Minister of the Interior.'_ + +_"'Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?'_ + +_"'Yes, Monsieur Vaudrey--'_ + +_"In short, the appearance of his Excellency creates a sensation, and it +is against this statement that I protest. I go frequently to the Opéra, +very frequently. During the last ten years I have seen defile before me +in the wings, at least fifty Ministers of State, all just freshly ground +out. Curiosity had brought them there and the desire to see the dancers +at close quarters, and also the vague hope that by exhibiting themselves +there in all their glory, they would create a sensation in this little +world._ + +_"Well, this hope of theirs was never realized. Nobody took the trouble +to look at them. A minister nowadays is nobody of importance. Formerly +to rise to such a position, to take in hand the reins of one of the +great departments, it was necessary to have a certain exterior, a +certain prominence, something of a past--to be a Monsieur Thiers, +Monsieur Guizot, Monsieur Mole, Monsieur de Rémusat, Monsieur Villemain, +Monsieur Duchátel, Monsieur de Falloux or Monsieur de Broglie--that is +to say, an orator, an author, a historian, somebody in fact. But +nowadays, all that is necessary to be a minister is the votes of certain +little combinations of groups and subsidiary groups, who all expect a +share of the spoils. Therefore we are ruled by certain personages +illustrious perhaps at Gap or at Montélimar but who are quite unknown in +the genealogical records of the Boulevard Haussmann. Why should you +imagine that public attention would be attracted by news like this:_ + +_"'Look!--There is Monsieur X, or Monsieur Y, or Monsieur Z.'_ + +_"One person only during these last years ever succeeded in attracting +the attention of the songstresses and ballet-girls of the Opéra. And +that was Gambetta. Ah! when he came to claim Monsieur Vaucorbeil's +hospitality, it was useless to crouch behind the cherry-colored silk +curtains of the manager's box, many glances were directed toward him, +and many prowling curiosities were awakened in the vicinity of the +manager's box. Little lassies of ten or twelve came and seized your +hand, saying:_ + +_"'Please, monsieur, point out Monsieur Gambetta to me--he is here--I +would so much like to see him.'_ + +_"And then Gambetta was pointed out to them during the entr'acte--after +which, delighted, they went off caracoling and pirouetting behind the +scenes:_ + +_"'You did not see Monsieur Gambetta, but I saw him!'_ + +_"This was popularity--and it must be confessed that only one man in +France to-day receives such marks of it. This man is Gambetta._ + +_"Meanwhile Claretie's minister continues his walk through the corridors +of the Opéra house. He reaches the greenroom of the ballet at last and +exclaims:_ + +_"'And that is all!'_ + +_"Alas, yes, your Excellency, that is all!--"_ + +_And everything is only a _"that is all,"_ in this world. If one should +set himself carefully to weigh power or fame,--power, that force of +which Girardin said, however: "I would give fifty years of glory for one +hour of power,"--even if one tilted the scale, one would not find the +weight very considerable._ + +_It would be necessary to have the resounding renown of a personality +like that one who, if I am to believe Monsieur Halévy, alone enjoyed the +privilege of revolutionizing the foyer of the ballet, in order to boast +of having been someone, or of having accomplished something._ + +_A rather witty skeptic once said to a friend of his who had just been +appointed minister:_ + +_"My dear fellow, permit me as a practical man to ask you not to engage +in too many affairs. Events in this world are accomplished without much +meddling. If you attempt to do something to-day, everyone will cry out: +'What! he is going to demolish everything!' If you do nothing, they will +cry: 'What! he does not budge! If I were minister, which God forbid, I +would say nothing--and let others act--I would do nothing--and let +others talk.'"_ + +_Everybody, very fortunately--and all ministers do not reason like this +jester. But the truth is that it is very difficult for an honest man in +the midst of political entanglements as Vaudrey was, to realize his +dream. When opportunities arise--those opportunities that march only at +a snail's pace--one is not allowed to make use of them, they are +snatched from one. They arrive, only to take wings again. And in those +posts of daily combat, one has not only against one the enemies who +attack one openly, which would be but a slight matter, a touch with a +goad or a prick of the spur, at most--but one has to contend with +friends who compromise, and servants who serve one badly._ + +_Every man who occupies an office, whatever it may be, has for his +adversaries those who covet it, those who regret it, those who have once +filled it, and those who desire to fill it. What assaults too! Against a +successful rival, there is no infamy too base, no mine too deep, no +villainy too cruel, no lie too poisoned to be made use of--and the +minister, his Excellency, is like a hostage to Power._ + +_And yet one more point, it is not in his enemies or his calumniators +that his danger lies. The real, absolute evil is in the system of +routine and ill-will which attack the statesmen of probity. It will be +seen from these pages that there is a warning bell destined, alas! to +keep away from those in power the messengers who would bring them the +truth from outside, the unwelcome and much dreaded truth._ + +_The novel may sometimes be this stroke of the bell,--a stroke honest +and useful,--a disinterested _warner,_ and I have striven to make +_Monsieur le Ministre_ precisely that, in a small degree, for the +political world. I have essayed to paint this hell paved with some of +the good intentions. The success which greeted the appearance of this +book, might justify me in believing that I have succeeded in my task. I +trust that it will enjoy under its new form--so flattering to an author, +that an editor-artist is pleased to give it,--the success achieved under +its first form._ + +__Monsieur le Ministre_ is connected with more than one recollection of my +life. I was called upon one day to follow to his last resting-place--and +it is on an occasion like this that one discovers more readily and +perceives more clearly life's ironies--one of those men "who do nothing +but create other men," a journalist. It was bitterly cold and we stood +before the open grave, just in front of a railway embankment, in an out +of the way cemetery of Saint-Ouen,--the cemetery called _Cayenne,_ +because the dead are "deported" thither. We were but four faithful +ones. Yes, four, but amongst these four must be included a young man, +bare-headed and wearing the uniform of an officer, who stood by the +deceased man's son._ + +_Whilst one of us bade the last farewell to the departed on the brink of +the grave, the scream of the railway engine cut short his words, and +seemed to hiss for the last time the fate of the vanquished man lying +there. As we were quitting the cemetery, a worthy man, a song-writer, +observed to me: "Well, if all those whom Léon Plée helped during his +lifetime had remembered him when he was dead, this little _Campo Santo_ +of Saint-Ouen would not have been large enough to hold them all!"_ + +_Doubtless. But they did not remember him._ + +_And from the contrast between the shabby obsequies of the old +journalist and the solemn pomp of that of the funeral service of the +four days' minister came the idea of my book. It seemed to me that here +was an appropriate idea and a useful reparation. Art has nothing to +lose--rather the contrary, when it devotes itself to militant tasks._ + +_Ah! I forgot--When one mentions to-day the name of this illustrious +minister whose funeral convoy was in its day one of the great spectacles +of Paris, and one of the great surprises to those who know how difficult +it is for a minister to die in office--like the Spartan still grasping +his shield--those best informed, shaking their heads solemnly will say:_ + +_"Ricard?--Oh! he had great talent, Ricard--I saw lately a portrait of +Paul de Musset by him--It is superb!"_ + +_They confound him with the painter to whom no statue has been erected, +but whose works remain._ + +_Be, then, a Cabinet Minister!_ + +_JULES CLARETIE._ + +_Viroflay, September 1, 1886._ + + + + +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER + +PART FIRST + +I + + +The third act of L'Africaine had just come to a close. + +The minister, on leaving the manager's box, said smilingly, like a man +glad to be rid of the cares of State: "Let us go to the greenroom, +Granet, shall we?" + +"Let us go to the greenroom, as your Excellency proposes!" + +They were obliged to cross the immense stage where the stage carpenters +were busy with the stage accessories as sailors with the equipment of a +vessel; and men in evening dress, with white ties, looked natty without +their greatcoats, and with opera hats on their heads were going to and +fro, picking their way amongst the ropes and other impedimenta which +littered the stage, on their way to the greenroom of the ballet. + +They had come here from all parts of the house, from the stalls and +boxes; most of them humming as they went the air from Nélusko's ballad, +walking lightly as habitués through the species of antechamber which +separates the body of the house from the stage. + +A servant wearing a white cravat, was seated at a table writing down +upon a sheet of paper the names of those who came in. One side of this +sheet bore a headline reading: _Messieurs_, and the other _Médecin_, in +two columns. From time to time this man would get up from his chair to +bow respectfully to some official personage whom he recognized. + +"Have you seen Monsieur Vaudrey come in yet, Louis?" asked a still young +man with a monocle in his eye, who seemed quite at home behind the +scenes. + +"His Excellency is in the manager's box, monsieur!" answered the servant +civilly. + +"Thank you, Louis!" + +And as the visitor turned to go up the narrow stairway leading to the +greenroom, the servant wrote down in the running-hand of a clerk, upon +the printed sheet: _Monsieur Guy de Lissac_. + +Upon the stage, Vaudrey, the Minister whom Lissac had been inquiring +for, stood arm in arm with his companion Granet, looking in astonishment +at the vast machinery of the opera, operated by this army of workmen, +whom he did not know. He was quite astonished at the sight, as he had +never beheld its like. His astonishment was so evident and artless that +Granet, his friend and colleague in the Chamber of Deputies, could not +help smiling at it from under his carefully waxed moustaches. + +"I consider all this much more wonderful than the opera itself," +observed his Excellency. The floor and wings were like great yellow +spots, and the whole immense stage resembled a great, sandy desert. +Vaudrey raised his head to gaze at the symmetrical arrangement of the +chandeliers, as bright as rows of gas-jets, amongst the hangings of the +friezes. A huge canvas at the back represented a sunlit Indian +landscape, and in the enormous space between the lowered curtain and the +scenery, some black spots seemed as if dancing, strange silhouettes of +the visitors in their dress clothes, standing out clearly against the +yellow background like the shadows of Chinese figures. + +"It is very amusing; but let us see the greenroom," said the minister. +"You are familiar with the greenroom, Granet?" + +"I am a Parisian," returned the deputy, without too great an emphasis; +but the ironical smile which accompanied his words made Vaudrey +understand that his colleague looked upon his Excellency as fresh from +the province and still smacking of its manners. + +Sulpice hesitatingly crossed the stage in the midst of a hubbub like +that of a man-of-war getting ready for action, caused by the methodical +destruction and removal of the scenery comprising the huge ship used in +_L'Africaine_ by a swarm of workmen in blue vests, yelling and shoving +quickly before them, or carrying away sections of masts and parts of +ladders, hurrying out of sight by way of trap-doors and man-holes, this +carcass of a work of art; this spectacle of a great swarm of human ants, +running hither and thither, pulling and tugging at this immense piece of +stage decoration, in the vast frame capable of holding at one and the +same time, a cathedral and a factory, was rather awe-inspiring to the +statesman, who stopped short to look at it, while the tails of his coat +brushed against the fallen curtain. + +From both sides of the stage, from the stage-boxes, opera-glasses were +turned upon him here and there and a murmur like a breeze came wafted +towards him. + +"It is the new Minister of the Interior!" + +"Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?" + +"Monsieur Vaudrey." + +Vaudrey proudly drew himself up under the battery of opera-glasses +levelled at him, while Granet, smiling, said to the master of the chorus +who, dressed in a black coat, stood near him: + +"It can be easily seen that this is his first visit here!" + +Oh! yes, truly, it was the first time that the new minister had set his +foot in the wings of the Opéra! He relished it with all the curiosity of +a youth and the gusto of a collegian. How fortunate that he had not +brought Madame Vaudrey, who was slightly indisposed. This rapid survey +of a world unknown to him, had the flavor of an escapade. There was a +little spice in this amusing adventure. + +Behind the canvas in the rear, some musicians, costumed as Brahmins, +with spectacles on their noses, the better to decipher their score, +fingered their brass instruments with a weary air, rocking them like +infants in swaddling clothes. Actors in the garb of Indians, with +painted cheeks, and legs encased in chocolate-colored bandages, were +yawning, weary and flabby, and stretching themselves while awaiting the +time for them to present themselves upon the stage. Others, dressed like +soldiers, were sleeping on the wooden benches against the walls, their +mouths open, their helmets drawn down over their noses like visors. +Others, their pikes serving them for canes, had taken off their headgear +and placed it at their feet, the better to rest their heads against the +wall, where they leaned with their eyes shut. + +Little girls, all of them thin, and in short skirts, were already +pirouetting, and humming airs. Older girls stood about with their legs +crossed, or, half-stooping, displayed their bosoms while retying the +laces of their pink shoes. Others, wearing a kind of Siamese headdress +with ornaments of gold, were laughing and clashing together their little +silver cymbals. Awkward fellows with false beards, dressed like high +priests in robes of yellow, striped with red, elbowed past and jostled +against the girls quite unceremoniously. An usher, dressed à la +Française, and wearing a chain around his neck, paced, grave and +melancholy, amongst these shameless young girls. + +The greenroom at the end of the stage was entered through a large +vestibule hung with curtains of grayish velvet shot with violet, and at +the top of the steps where some men in dress-clothes were talking to +ballet-girls, Vaudrey could see in the great salon beyond, blazing with +light, groups of half-nude women surrounded by men, resembling, in their +black clothes, beetles crawling about roses, the whole company reflected +in a flood of light, in an immense mirror that covered one end of the +room. Little by little, Vaudrey could make out above the paintings +representing ancient dances, and the portraits by Camargo or Noverre, a +confusion of gaudy skirts, pink legs, white shoulders, with the +ubiquitous black coats sprinkled about here and there amongst these +bright colors like large blots of ink upon ball-dresses. + +Sulpice had often heard the greenroom of the ballet spoken about, and he +was at once completely disillusioned. The glaring, brutal light +ruthlessly exposed the worn and faded hangings; and the pretty girls in +their full, short, gauzy petticoats, with their bare arms, smiling and +twisting about, their satin-shod feet resting upon gray velvet +footstools, seemed to him, as they occupied the slanting floor, to move +in a cloud of dust, and to be robbed of all naturalness and freshness. + +"And is this all?" the minister exclaimed almost involuntarily. + +"What!" answered Granet, "you seem hard to please!" + +Amongst all these girls, there had been manifested an expression of +mingled curiosity, coquetry and banter on Vaudrey's appearance in their +midst. His presence in the manager's box had been noticed and his coming +to the greenroom expected. Every one had hurried thither. Sulpice was +pointed out. He was the cynosure of all eyes. On the divans beneath the +mirror, some young, well-dressed, bald men, surrounded--perhaps by +chance--by laughing ballet-girls, now half-concealed themselves behind +the voluminous skirts of the girls about them, and bent their heads, +thus rendering their baldness more visible, just as a woman buries her +nose in her bouquet to avoid recognizing an acquaintance. + +Vaudrey, observing this ruse, smiled a slight, sarcastic smile. He +recognized behind the shielding petticoats, some of his prefects, those +from the environs of Paris, come from Versailles and Chartres, or from +some sub-prefectures, and gallantly administering the affairs of France +from the heart of the greenroom. Amiable functionaries of the Ministry +of Fine Arts also came here to study æstheticism between the acts. + +All members of the different régimes seemed to be fraternizing in +ironical promiscuousness here, and Vaudrey in a whisper drew Granet's +attention to this. Old beaux of the time of the Empire, with dyed and +waxed moustaches, with dyed or grizzled hair flattened on their temples, +their flabby cheeks cut across by stiff collars as jelly is cut by a +knife, were hobnobbing, fat and lean, with young fops of the Republic, +who with their sharp eyes, wide-open nostrils, their cheeks covered with +brown or flaxen down, their hair carefully brushed, or already bald, +seemed quite surprised to find themselves in such a place, and chattered +and cackled among themselves like beardless conscripts, perverted and +immoral but with some scruples still remaining and less cunning than +these well-dressed old roués standing firmly at their posts like +veterans. + +"The licentiates and the pensioners," whispered Vaudrey. + +"You have a quickness of sight quite Parisian, your Excellency," +returned Granet. + +"There are Parisians in the Provinces, my dear Granet," replied Sulpice +with a heightened complexion, his blood flowing more rapidly than usual, +due to emotions at once novel and gay. + +"Ah! your Excellency," exclaimed a fat, animated man with hair and +whiskers of quite snowy whiteness, and smiling as he spoke, "what in the +world brought you here?" + +He approached Vaudrey, bowing but not at all obsequiously, with the air +of good humor due to a combination of wealth and embonpoint. Fat and +rich, in perfect health, and carrying his sixty years with the +lightness of forty, Molina--Molina the "Tumbler" as he was +nicknamed--spent his afternoons on the Bourse and his evenings in the +greenroom of the ballet. + +He had a small interest in the theatre, but a large one in the +coryphées, in a paternal way, his white hair giving him the right to be +respected and his crowns the right to respect nothing. Beginning life +very low down, and now enjoying a lofty position, the fat Molina haunted +the Bourse and the greenroom of the Opéra. He glutted himself with all +the earliest delicacies of the season, like a man who when young, has +not always had enough to satisfy hunger. + +Pictures that were famous, women of fashion, statues of marble and fair +flesh, he must have them all. He collected, without any taste whatever, +costly paintings, rare objects; he bought without love, girls who were +not wholly mercenary. At a pinch he found them, taking pleasure in +parading in his coupé, around the lake or at the races, some recruit in +vice, and in watching the crowd that at once eagerly surrounded her, +simply because she had been the mistress of the fat Molina. He had in +his youth at Marseilles, in the Jewish quarter of the town, sold old +clothes to the Piedmontese and sailors in port. Now it was his delight +to behold the Parisians of the Boulevard or the clubs buy as sentimental +rags the cast-off garments of his passion. + +"You in the greenroom of the ballet, your Excellency?" continued the +financier. "Ah! upon my word, I shall tell Madame Vaudrey." + +Sulpice smiled, the mere name of his wife sounded strange to his ears in +a place like this. It seemed to him that in speaking of her, she was +being dragged into a strange circle, and one which did not belong to +her. He had felt the same only a few days before upon his entrance into +the cabinet, on seeing a report of his marriage, his dwelling minutely +described, and a pen portrait of that Adrienne, who was the passion of +his life. + +"After all," continued Molina, "Madame Vaudrey must get used to it. The +Opéra! Why, it is a part of politics! The key of many a situation is to +be found in the greenroom!" + +The financier laughed merrily, a laugh that had the ring of the +Turcarets' jingling crowns. + +He went on to explain to his Excellency all the little mysteries of the +greenroom, as a man quite at home in this little Parisian province, and +lightly, by a word, a gesture even, he gave the minister a rapid +biography of the young girls who were laughing, jesting, romping there +before them; flitting hither and thither lightly across the boards, +barely touching them with the tips of their pink satin-shod feet. + +Sulpice was surprised at everything he saw. He did not even take the +pains to conceal his surprise. Evidently it was his first visit behind +the scenes. + +"Ah! your Excellency," said Molina, delighted with his rôle of +cicerone, "it is necessary to be at home here! You should come here +often! Nothing in the world can be more amusing. Here behind the scenes +is a world by itself. One can see pretty little lasses springing up like +asparagus. One sees running hither and thither a tall, thin child who +nods to you saucily and crunches nuts like a squirrel. One takes a three +months' journey, and passes a season at Vichy or at Dieppe, and when one +returns, presto! see the transformation. The butterfly has burst forth +from its cocoon. No longer a little girl, but a woman. Those saucy eyes +of old now look at you with an expression which disturbs your heart. One +might have offered, six months before, two sous' worth of chestnuts to +the child; now, however, nothing less than a coupé will satisfy the +woman. It used to jump on your knee at that time, now every one is +throwing his arms around its pretty neck. Thus from generation to +generation, one assists at the mobilization of a whole army of recruits, +who first try their weapons here, pass from here into the regiment of +veterans, build themselves a hospital in cut-stone out of their savings, +and some of them mount very high through the tips of their toes if they +are not suddenly attacked by _the malady of the knee_." + +"Malady of the knee?" inquired Vaudrey. + +"A phrase not to be found in the _Dictionary of Political Economy_ by +Maurice Block. It is a way of saying that ill-luck has overtaken one. A +very interesting condition, this malady of the knee! It often not only +shortens the leg but the career!" + +"Is this malady a frequent one at the Opéra?" + +"Ah! your Excellency, how can it be helped? There are so many slips in +this pirouetting business! It is as risky as politics!" + +Fat Molina shouted with laughter at this clumsy jest, and placing a +binocle upon his huge nose, which was cleft down the middle like that of +a hunting-hound, he exclaimed suddenly, turning towards the door as he +spoke: + +"Eh! Marie Launay? What is she holding in her hand?" + +Light, nimble and graceful in her costume of a Hindoo dancing girl, a +young girl of sixteen or seventeen summers, already betraying her +womanhood in the ardent glances half-hidden in the depths of her large, +deep-blue eyes, tripped into the greenroom, humming an air and holding +in her hand a long sheet of paper. + +She shook, as if embarrassed by it, the broad necklace of large +imitation pearls that danced on her fine neck and fell on her +undeveloped bosom; and looking in search of some one among the crowd of +girls, cried out from a distance to a plump little brunette who was +talking and laughing within a circle of dress-coats at the other end of +the room: + +"Eh! Anna, you have not subscribed yet!" + +The brunette, freeing herself unceremoniously enough from her living +madrigals, came running lightly up to Marie Launay, who held out towards +her an aluminum pencil-case and the sheet of paper. + +"What the devil is that?" asked Molina. + +"Let us go and see," said Granet. + +"Would it not be an indiscretion on our part?" asked Vaudrey, half +seriously. + +The financier, however, was by this time at the side of the two pretty +girls, and asked the blonde what the paper contained, the names on which +her companion was spelling out. + +Marie Launay, a lovely girl with little ringlets of fair hair curling +low down upon her forehead, smiled like a pretty, innocent and still +timid child, under the luring glances of the fat man, and glancing with +an expression of virgin innocence at Sulpice and Granet, who were +standing beside him, replied: + +"That--Oh! that is the subscription we are getting up for Mademoiselle +Legrand." + +"Oh! that is so," said Molina. "You mean to make her a present of a +statuette?" + +"On her taking her leave of us. Yes, every one has subscribed to +it--even the boxholders. Do you see?" + +Marie Launay quickly snatched the paper from her friend; on it were +several names, some written in ink, others in pencil, the whole +presenting the peculiar appearance of schoolboys' pot-hooks or the +graceful lines traced by crawling flies, while the fantastic spelling +offered a strange medley. Molina burst out laughing, his ever-present +laugh that sounded like the shaking of a money-bag,--when he ran his eye +over the list and found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and +members of the chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitués. + +"Look! your Excellency--It is stupendous! Here: _Amélie Dunois_, 2 +francs. _Jeanne Garnot_, 5 francs. _Bel-Enfant_--_Charles_--, 1 fr., 50 +centimes. _Warnier I._, 2 francs. _Warnier II._, 2 francs. _Gigonnet_, 4 +francs. _Baron Humann_, 100 francs. _The baron_!--the former prefect! +Humann writing his name down here with _Bel-Enfant_ and _Gigonnet_. +Humann inscribing above his signature--_I vill supscribe von +hundertfranc_! If one were to see it in a newspaper, one would not +believe it! If only a reporter were here now! For a choice _Paris echo_ +what a rare one it would be!" + +Granet examined little Marie Launay with sly glances, toying with his +black moustache the while, and the other young girl Anna, very much +confused at the coarse laughter of Molina the "Tumbler," kept turning +around in her slender fingers the aluminum pencil-case and looking at +Marie as much as to say: + +"You know I can never muster up courage to write down my name before all +these people!" + +"Lend me your pencil, my child," Molina said to her. + +She held it out towards him timidly. + +"Where the baron has led the way, Molina the Tumbler may certainly +follow!" said the financier. + +He turned the screw of the pencil-case to extend the lead, and placing +one of his huge feet upon a divan to steady himself, wrote rapidly with +the paper on his knee, as a man used to scribbling notes at the Bourse: + +"Solomon Molina, 500 francs." + +"Ah! monsieur," exclaimed Marie Launay upon reading it, "that is +handsome, that is! It is kind, very kind! If everybody were as generous +as you, we could give a statue of Terpsichore in gold to Mademoiselle +Legrand." + +"If you should ever want one of Carpeaux's groups for yourself, my +child," said Molina, "you may go to the studio in a cab to look at it, +and fetch it away with you in--your own coupé." + +The girl grew as red as a cherry under her powder, even her graceful, +childish shoulders turned pink, enhancing her blonde and childlike +beauty. + +Vaudrey was conscious of a strange and subtle charm in this intoxicating +circle,--a charm full of temptations which made him secretly uneasy. +There passed before his eyes visions of other days, he beheld the +phantoms of gay dresses, the apparitions of spring landscapes, he felt +the breezes of youth, laden with the scents of the upspringing grass, +the lilacs at Meudon, the violets of Ville-d'Avray, the souvenirs of the +escapades of his student days. Their short, full skirts reminded him of +white frocks that whisked gayly around the hazel-trees long ago, those +ballet-girls bore a striking resemblance to the pink and white grisettes +that he had flirted with when he was twenty. + +He extended his hand in turn towards the sheet of paper to which Molina +had just signed his name, saying to Marie Launay as he did so: + +"Let me have it, if you please, mademoiselle." + +Granet began to laugh. + +"Ah! ah!" he cried, "you are really going to write down under Monsieur +Gigonnet's signature the name of the Minister of the Interior?" + +"Oh! bless me!" said Vaudrey, laughing, "that is true! You will believe +it or not as you please, but I quite forgot that I was a minister." + +"It was the same with me when I was decorated," said Molina. "I would +not receive my great-coat from box-openers because I saw the morsel of +red ribbon hanging on it, and I was sure the garment was not mine. But +one grows used to it after a while! Now," and his laugh with the +hundred-sou piece ring grew louder than ever, "I am really quite +surprised not to find the rosette of red ribbon sticking to my flannel +waistcoats." + +Vaudrey left Marie Launay, greatly to her surprise, and listened to +Molina's chronicles of the ballet. + +Ah! if his Excellency had but the time, he would have seen the funniest +things. For instance, there was amongst the dancers a marble cutter, who +during the day sold and cut his gravestones and came here at night to +grin and caper in the ballet. He was on the scent of every funeral from +the Opéra; he would get orders for tombstones between two dances at the +rehearsals. One day Molina had been present at one of these. It seems +incredible, but there was a bank clerk in a gray coat, a three-cornered +hat upon his head and a brass buckler on his arm, who sacrificed to +Venus in the interval between his two occupations, dancing with the +coryphées; a dancer by night and a receiver of money by day. A girl was +rehearsing beside him, in black bands and skirt. Then Molina, +astonished, inquired who she might be. He was told that it was a girl in +mourning, whose mother had just died. The Opéra is a fine stage upon +which to behold the ironies and contrasts of life. + +The financier might have related to Sulpice Vaudrey a description of a +journey to Timbuctoo and have found him less amused and less interested +than now. It was a world new and strange to him, attractive, and as +exciting as acid to this man, still young, whose success had been +achieved by unstinted labors, and who knew Paris only by what he had +learned of it years ago, when a law student: the pit of the Comédie +Française, the Luxembourg galleries and those of the Louvre, the Public +Libraries, the Hall of Archives, the balls in the Latin Quarter, the +holidays and the foyer of the Opéra once or twice on the occasion of a +masked ball. And, besides that?--Nothing. That was all. + +The great man from Grenoble arrived in Paris with his appetite whetted +for the life of the city, and now he was here, suddenly plunged into the +greenroom of the ballet, and all eyes were turned towards him, almost +frightened as he was, on catching a glimpse of his own image reflected +in the huge mirror glittering under the numerous lights, in the heart of +this strange salon and surrounded by half-clad dancing girls. Then, too, +everybody was looking at him, quizzing him, shrinking from him through +timidity or running after him through interest. The new Minister of +State! The chief of all the personnel of prefects, under-prefects, and +secretaries-general represented there, lolling on these velvet divans in +this vulgar greenroom. + +All the glances, all the whisperings of the women, the frowns of his +enemies, the cringing attitudes of dandified hangers-on, were making +Vaudrey feel very uncomfortable, when to his great relief he suddenly +observed coming towards him, peering hither and thither through his +monocle, evidently in search of some one, Guy de Lissac, who immediately +on catching sight of Vaudrey came towards him, greeting him with evident +cordiality, tinged, however, with a proper reserve. + +Sulpice was not long in breaking through this reserve. He hurried up to +Guy, and seizing him by the hand, cried gayly: + +"Do you know that I have been expecting this visit! You are the only +one of my friends who has not yet congratulated me!" + +"You know, my dear Minister," returned Guy in the same tone, "that it is +really not such a great piece of luck to be made Minister that every one +of your friends should be expected to fall upon your neck, crying bravo! +You have mounted up to the capitol, but after all, the capitol is not +such a very cheerful place, that I should illuminate _à giorno_. I am +happy, however, if you are. I congratulate you, if you wash your hands +of it, and that is all." + +"You and my old friend Ramel," answered Sulpice, "are the two most +original men that I know." + +"With this difference however, Ramel is a Puritan, an ancient, a man of +marble, and I am a _boulevardier_ and a skeptic. He is a man of +bronze--your Ramel! And your friend Lissac of _simili-bronze_! The proof +of it is that I have been seeking you for half the evening to ask you to +do me a favor." + +"What favor, my dear fellow?" cried Vaudrey, his face lighting up with +joy. "Anything in the world to please you." + +"I was in Madame Marsy's box,--you do not know Madame Marsy? She is a +great admirer of yours and makes a point to applaud you in the Chamber. +She has prayed for your advent. She saw you in the manager's box a while +ago, and she has asked me to present you to her, or rather, to present +her to you, for I presume for your Excellency the ceremony is +modified." + +"Madame Marsy!" said Vaudrey. "Is she not an artist's widow? Her salon +is a political centre, is it not?" + +"Exactly. A recent salon opened in opposition to that of Madame Evan. An +Athenian Republic! You do not object to that?" + +"On the contrary! A republic cannot be founded without the aid of +women." + +"Ah!" cried Lissac, laughing. "Politics and honors have not changed you, +I see." + +"Changed me? With the exception that I have twenty years over my head, +and alas! not so much hair as I had then upon it, I am the same as I was +in 1860." + +"_Hôtel Racine! Rue Racine!_" said Lissac. "In those days, I dreamed of +being Musset, I a gourmand, and what have I become? A spectator, a +trifler, a Parisian, a rolling stone.--Nothing. And you who dreamed of +being a second Barnave, Vergniaud or Barbaroux, your dream is realized." + +"Realized!" said Vaudrey. + +He made an effort to shake his head deprecatingly as if his vanity were +not flattered by those honeyed words of his friend; but his glance +displayed such sincere delight and so strong a desire to be effusive and +in evidence, that he could not repress a smile upon hearing from the +companion of his youth, such a confirmation of his triumph. They are +our most severe critics, these friends of our youth, they who have +listened to the stammering of our hopes and dreams of the future. And +when at length we have conquered the future, these are often the very +ones to rob us of it! Lissac, however, was not one of these envious +ones. + +"Let us go to Madame Marsy's box, my dear Guy," said Sulpice. "The more +so because if she at all resembles her portrait at the last Salon, she +must be lovely indeed." + +He left the greenroom, leaning on the arm of Lissac, after throwing a +glance backward, however, at the girls whirling about there, and where +in the presence of their stiff, ancient superiors, the young +sub-prefects still hid their faces behind their opera hats. Granet with +Molina went to take leave of Vaudrey, leaving little Marie Launay +smiling artlessly because the financier, the _Tumbler_, had said to her, +in drawing down her eyelids with his coarse finger: "Will you close your +periwinkles--you _kid_?" + +"Your Excellency," the banker had said, cajoling his Excellency with his +meaning glance, "I am always at your orders you know." + +"To-morrow, at the Prisons' Commission, Monsieur le Ministre," said +Granet. And amid salutations on every side Vaudrey withdrew, smiling and +good-humored as usual. + +In order to reach the box, Vaudrey had to cross the stage. The new scene +was set. Buddhist temples with their grotesque shapes and huge statues +stood out against a background of vivid blue sky, and on the canvas +beyond, great pink flowers glowed amid refreshing verdure. Over all fell +a soft fairy-like light from an electric lamp, casting on the floor a +fantastic gleam, soft and clear as the rays of the moon. Sulpice smiled +as he passed beneath this flood of light and saw his shadow projected +before him as upon the glassy waters of a lake. It seemed to him that +this sudden illumination, a sort of fantastic apotheosis as it were, was +like the fairy-like aureole that attended his progress. + +At the very moment of leaving the greenroom, Sulpice had jostled +accidentally against a man of very grave aspect wearing a black coat +closely buttoned. He was almost bald save for some long, thin, gray +locks that hung about his huge ears, his cheeks had a hectic color and +his skull was yellow. He entered this salon in a hesitating, inquisitive +way, with wide-open eyes and a gourmand's movement of the nostrils, and +gazed about the room, warm with lights and heavy with perfume. + +Sulpice glanced at him carelessly and recognized him as the man whom he +himself had superseded on Place Beauvau--a Puritan, a Huguenot, a +widower, the father of five or six daughters, and as solemn and proper +in his ordinary demeanor as a Sunday-school tract. Sulpice could not +refrain from crying out merrily: "Bless me! Monsieur Pichereau!" + +The other shook his butter-colored skull as if he had suddenly received +a stinging blow on it with a switch, and his red face became +crimson-hued at the sight of Sulpice, his successor in office, standing +before him, politely holding out to him his two gloved hands. + +Guy de Lissac was no longer laughing. + +Their two Excellencies found themselves face to face at the foot of the +greenroom staircase, in the midst of a crowd of brahmins, dancers, +negresses, and female supernumeraries; two Excellencies meeting there; +one smiling, the other grimacing beneath the glance of this curious, +shrewd little world. + +"Ah! I have caught you, my dear colleague," cried Sulpice, very much +amused at Pichereau's embarrassed air, his coat buttoned close like a +Quaker's and his little eyes blinking behind his spectacles, and looking +as sheepish as a sacristan caught napping. + +"Me?" stammered Pichereau. "Me? But my dear Minister, it's you--yes, you +whom I came expressly to seek!" + +"Here?" said Vaudrey. + +"Yes, here!" + +"Really?" + +"I had something to say to you--I--yes, I wanted--" + +The unlucky Pichereau mechanically pulled and jerked at his waistcoat, +then assuming a dignified, grave air, he whistled and hesitated, and +finally stammered: + +"I wished to speak with you--yes--to consult with you upon a matter of +grave importance--concerning Protestant communities." + +Sulpice could not restrain his laughter. + +Pichereau, with his look of a Calvinistic preacher, was throwing from +behind his spectacles glowing looks in the direction where Marie Launay +stood listening to and laughing at the badinage of Molina. Some +newspaper reporters, scenting a handy paragraph, came sauntering up to +overhear some fragment of the conversation between the minister of +yesterday and him of to-day. + +Guy de Lissac stood carelessly by, secretly very much amused at +Pichereau, who did not move, but rubbing his hands nervously together +was trying to appear at ease, yet by his sour smile at his successor +allowing it to be plainly seen how gladly he would have strangled +Vaudrey. + +"My dear colleague," said Sulpice, gayly, "we will talk elsewhere about +your communities. This is hardly the place. _Non est hic locus!_ +Good-bye!" + +"Good-bye, your Excellency," replied Pichereau with forced politeness. + +Vaudrey drew Lissac away, saying with a suppressed laugh: + +"Oh! oh! the Quaker! He has laid down his portfolio, but he has kept the +key to the greenroom, it seems." + +"It would appear," replied Guy, "that the door leading into the +greenroom may open to scenes of consolation for fallen greatness. The +blue eyes of Marie Launay always serve as a sparadrap to a fallen +minister!" + +"Was the fat Molina right? To lose the votes of the majority is perhaps +the malady of the knee of ministers," said Vaudrey merrily. + +He laughed again, very much amused at the irritable, peevish yet +cringing attitude of Pichereau, the Genevan doctrinaire, who sought +consolation in the greenroom of the ballet, whilst his five or six +daughters sat at home, probably reading some chaste English romance, or +practising sacred music within the range of the green spectacles of +their governess. + +"But!" said he gayly, "to fall from power is nothing, provided one falls +into the arms of ballet-girls." + + + * * * * * + +_Molina burst out laughing ... when he ran his eye over the list and +found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and members of the +chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitués._ + +[Illustration: IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA] + + + + +II + + +Madame Marsy was awaiting Guy de Lissac's return from the greenroom. +From the moment she caught sight of Vaudrey standing within the range of +her opera-glasses, she was seized with the eager desire to make him an +habitué of her salon, the new salon that had just been launched. Madame +Marsy was bitten by that tarantula whose bite makes modern society move +as if afflicted with Saint Vitus's dance. A widow, rich and still +young, very much admired, she had set herself to play the rôle of a +leader in society to pass away the time. She was one of those women +forever passing before the reporters' note-book, as others pass in front +of a photographic apparatus. Of her inner life, however, very little was +known to the public. But the exact shade of her hair, the color of her +eyes, the cut of her gowns, the address of her tradesmen, the _menu_ of +her dinners, the programme of her concerts, the names of her guests, the +visitors to her salon, the address of her mansion, were all familiar to +every one, and Madame Marsy was daily reported by the chroniclers to the +letter, painted, dressed and undressed. + +There was some romantic gossip whispered about her. It was said that she +had formerly led Philippe Marsy, the artist, a _hard life_. This artist +was the painter of _Charity_, the picture so much admired at the +Luxembourg, where it hangs between a Nymph by Henner and a Portrait of a +Lady by Carolus Duran. She was pretty, free, and sufficiently rich since +the sale of the contents of Philippe Marsy's studio. His slightest +sketches had fetched enormous sums under Monsieur Pillet's hammer at the +Hôtel Drouot, and Sabine after an appropriate interval of mourning, +opened her salon. + +Solitary, though surrounded by friends, she created no jealousy among +her admirers, whose homage she received with perfect equanimity, as if +become weary and desirous of a court but not of a favorite. She had a +son at college who was growing up; he, however, was rarely to be met +with in his mother's little hôtel in the Boulevard Malesherbes. This +pale, slender youth in his student's uniform would sometimes steal +furtively up the staircase to pay his mother a visit as a stranger might +have done, never staying long, however, but hurrying off again to rejoin +an old woman who waited at the corner of the street and who would take +him by the arm and walk away with him--Madame Marsy, his grandmother. + +It was the grandmother who was bringing up the boy. She and a +kind-hearted fellow, François Charrière, a sculptor, who as he said +himself, was nothing of a genius, but who, however, designed models and +advantageously sold them to the manufacturers of lamps in the Rue +Saint-Louis au Marais. It was Charrière who, in fulfilment of a vow made +to his friend Marsy, acted as guardian to the boy. + +Nobody in Paris now remembered anything about Philippe Marsy. In the +course of time, all the little rumors are hushed in the roar and rattle +of Parisian life. Only some semi-flattering rumors were connected with +Sabine's name, together with some mysterious reminiscences. Moreover, +she had the special attraction of a hostess who imparts to her salon the +peculiar charm and flavor of unceremonious hospitality. One was only +obliged to wear a white cravat about his throat, he did not have to +starch his wits. + +Only very recently had Sabine Marsy's salon acquired the reputation of +being an easy-going one, where one was sure of a welcome, a sort of +rendezvous where every one could be found as in the corridor of a +theatre on the night of a first appearance, or on the sidewalk of a +boulevard; a salon well-filled, that could rank with the semi-official +and very distinguished one presided over by Madame Evan, and those +others quieter, more sober--if a little Calvinistic--of the select +Alsatian colony. + +Sabine Marsy must have had a great deal of tact, force of character and +perseverance in carrying out her plans, to have reached this point, more +difficult to her, moreover, than it would have been to any other, as she +had no political backing whatever. Her connection with society was +entirely through the world of artists. Many of these, however, had +brought to her salon some of the Athenians of the political world, +connoisseurs, good conversationalists, handsome men, who freely declared +with Vaudrey, that a republic could not exist without the assistance of +women, that to women Orleanism was due, and those charming fellows had +made Madame Marsy's hospitable salon the fashion. + +Besides it is easy enough in Paris to have a salon if one knows how to +give dinners. Some squares of Bristol board engraved by Stern and posted +to good addresses, will attract with an almost disconcerting facility, a +crowd of visitors who will swarm around a festive board like bees around +a honeycomb. + +Paris is a town of guests. + +Then too, Madame Marsy was herself so captivating. She was always on the +watch for some new celebrity, as a game-keeper watches for a hare that +he means to shoot presently. One of her daily tasks was to read the +_Journal Officiel_ in order to discover in the orator of to-day the +Minister of State of to-morrow. She was always well informed beforehand +which artist or sculptor would be likely to win the medal of honor at +the Salon, and was the first to invite such a one and to let him know +that it was she who had discovered him. In literature, she encouraged +the new school, liking it for the attention it attracted. It was also +her aim to give to her salon a literary as well as a political color. +Artists and statesmen elbowed one another there. + +For some days now, she had thought of giving a reception which was to be +a surprise to her friends. She had heard of Japanese exhibitions being +given at other houses. She herself was determined to give a _soirée +exotique_. It happened just then that a friend of Guy de Lissac, +Monsieur José de Rosas, a great lounger, had returned from a journey +around the world. What a piece of good fortune! She too had known De +Rosas formerly, and if she could only get him to consent, she could +announce a most attractive soirée: the travels of such a man as Monsieur +de Rosas: a rare treat! + +"The Comtesse d'Horville gives literary matinées," said Sabine, quite on +fire with the idea; "Madame Evan has poems and tragedies read at her +receptions, I shall have lecturers and savants, since that is +fashionable." + +And what a woman wishes, a grandee of Spain willed, it appeared. +Monsieur de Rosas decided, egged on a little by Guy de Lissac, to come +and relate to Madame Marsy's friends his adventures in strange lands. +The invitations to the soirée were already out. + +Madame Marsy had also obtained a promise from three Ministers of State +that they would be present. She had spread the news far and wide. A +little more and she would have had their names printed on the programmes +for the evening. She had had a success quite unlooked for--a promise +from Monsieur Pichereau to be present--from Pichereau, that starched +Puritan, and all the newspapers had announced his intention. When +suddenly--stupidly--a cabinet crisis had arisen at the most unexpected +moment, a useless crisis. Granet had interpellated Pichereau with a view +to succeed him, and Pichereau fell without Granet succeeding him. A +Ministry had been hastily formed, with Collard at its head, and Sulpice +Vaudrey as Minister of the Interior in place of Pichereau! And all those +Ministers of State who had promised to be present to hear Monsieur de +Rosas at Madame Marsy's, fell from power with Pichereau. + +"Such a Cabinet!" Sabine had exclaimed in a rage. "A Cabinet of +pasteboard capuchins." + +"A Ministry of pasteboard, certainly," Guy had answered. + +Madame Marsy was quite beside herself. Granet indeed! Why could he not +have waited a day or two longer before upsetting the whole +administration. It would have been quite as easy to have overthrown +Pichereau a day after her soirée as a few days before. Was Granet then, +in a great hurry to be made minister? Oh! her opinion of him had always +been a correct one! An ambitious schemer. He had triumphed, or at least +he had expected to triumph. And the consequence was that Sabine found +herself without a Minister to introduce to her guests. It was as if +Granet had purposely designed this. + +No, she did not know a single member of the new Cabinet. She had spoken +once to the President of the council, Collard, a former advocate of +Nantes, at a reception at the Élysée. Collard had even, in passing by +her, torn off a morsel of the lace of her flounce. How charmingly, too, +he had excused himself! But this acquaintanceship with him would hardly +justify her in asking him brusquely to honor her with his presence at +this soirée upon which her social success depended. + +Her intimate friend, pretty Madame Gerson, who assisted her in doing the +honors of her salon until the time when she herself would have a rival +salon and take Sabine's guests away from her, sought in vain to comfort +her by assuring her that Pichereau would be sure to come. He had +promised to do so. He was a sincere man, and his word could be relied +on. He would, moreover, bring his former colleagues from the +Departments of Public Instruction, and Post and Telegraph. He had +promised. Oh! yes, Pichereau! Pichereau, however, mattered very little +to Sabine now! _Ex_-ministers, indeed! she could always have enough of +them. It was not that kind that she wanted. She did not care about her +salon being called the _Invalides_ as that of a rival was called the +_Salon des Refuseès_. No, certainly not, that was something she would +never consent to. + +Granet's impatience had upset all her plans. + +So Madame Marsy, side by side in her box with Madame Gerson, whose dark, +brilliant beauty set off her own fair beauty, had listened with a bored +and sulky manner to the first act of _L'Africaine_, while Monsieur +Gerson conversed timidly, half under his breath, with Guy de Lissac, who +made the fourth occupant of the box. + +At the end of the second act, however, Lissac suddenly caught sight of +Vaudrey's smiling countenance beside Granet's waxed moustaches in the +manager's box. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed, "there is Vaudrey!" + +Madame Marsy, however, had already caught sight of him. She turned her +opera-glass upon the new Cabinet Minister, whose carefully arranged +blonde beard was parted in the middle and spread out in two light tufts +over his white necktie, his silky moustaches turned jauntily upwards +against his fleshy cheeks. Sabine, continuing to look at the newcomer +through her glass, saw as he moved within the shadow of the box, this +man of forty, with a very agreeable and still youthful face, and as he +leaned over the edge of the box to look at the audience, she noted that +he had a slight bald spot on the top of his skull between the fair tufts +that adorned the sides of his head. + +"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, "I thought that he was a dark man." + +"No, no," answered Lissac, "on the contrary, he was a fair, handsome +youth when we both studied law here in Paris together." + +Madame Marsy, as if she had been touched by an electric spark, turned +quickly round on her chair to look at Guy, displaying to him as she did +so, a lovely face, surmounting the most beautiful shoulders imaginable. + +"What! you know the minister so intimately?" + +"Very intimately." + +"Then, my dear Lissac, you can do me the greatest favor. No, I do not +ask you to do it, I insist on it." + +Over the pretty Andalusian features of Madame Gerson, a mocking smile +played. + +"I have guessed it," she exclaimed. + +"And so have I," said Lissac. "You wish me to present the new Minister +of the Interior to you? You have a friend you want appointed to a +prefecture." + +"Not at all. I only want him to take Pichereau's place at my reception. +My dear Lissac, my kind Lissac," she continued in dulcet tones, and +clasping her little gloved hands entreatingly, like a child begging for +a toy, "persuade Monsieur Vaudrey to accept this invitation of mine and +you will be a love, you understand, Lissac, a love!" + +But Guy had already risen and with a touch of his thumb snapping out his +crush hat, he opened the door of the box, saying to Sabine as he did so: + +"Take notice that I ask nothing in return for this favor!" + +Madame Marsy began to laugh. + +"Ah!" she cried, "that is discreet, but I am willing to subscribe to any +condition!" + +"Selika is cold beside you," said Lissac as he disappeared through the +open doorway, "I will bring you your minister in ten minutes." + +Sabine waited nervously. The curtain had just fallen on the third act. +The manager's box was empty. Guy would doubtless be obliged to rejoin +Vaudrey, and neither the minister nor his friend would be seen again. +Just then some one knocked at the door of the box. Monsieur Gerson, +overcome by fatigue, and weary as only a man can be who is dragged +against his will night after night to some place of amusement, was +dozing in the rear of the box. At a word from his wife he got up and +hastened to open the door. It proved to be an artist, an old friend of +Philippe Marsy, who came to invite Sabine to his studio to "admire" _his +Envoy_ that he had just finished for the Salon. Sabine received him +graciously, and promised him somewhat stiffly that she would do so. She +tapped impatiently with her fan upon her fingers as the orchestra began +to play the prelude to the fourth act. It was quite certain that Lissac +had failed in his mission. + +Suddenly, in the luminous space made by the open door, Guy's elegant +figure appeared for a moment, disappearing immediately to allow a man to +pass who entered, smiling pleasantly, and at whom a group of people, +standing in the lobby behind, were gazing. He bowed as Lissac said to +Sabine: + +"Allow me, madame, to present to you His Excellency the Minister of the +Interior." + +Sabine, suddenly beaming with joy, saw no one but Sulpice Vaudrey +amongst the group of men in dress-clothes who gave way to allow the +dignitary to pass. She had eyes only for him! + +She arose, pushing back her chair instinctively, as the Minister +entered, Monsieur and Madame Gerson standing at one side and Sabine on +the other and bowing to him,--Sabine triumphant, Madame Gerson curious, +Monsieur Gerson flattered though sleepy. + +Sulpice seated himself at Madame Marsy's side, with the amiable +condescension of a great man charmed to play the agreeable, and to +visit, at the solicitation of a friend, a fair woman whom all the world +delighted to honor. It seemed to him to put the finishing touch to that +success and power which had been his only a few days. + +He went quite artlessly and by instinct wherever he might have the +chance to inhale admiring incense. It seemed to him as if he were +swimming in refreshing waters. Everything delighted him. He wished to be +obliging to every one. It seemed to him but natural that a woman of +fashion like Sabine should wish to meet him and offer him her +congratulations, as he himself, without knowing her, should desire to +listen to her felicitations. To speak in complimentary terms was as +natural to him as to listen to the compliments of others. + +He delighted in the atmosphere of adulation which surrounded him, these +two pretty women who smiled upon him with a gratitude so impressive, +pleased him. Sabine appeared especially charming to him when, speaking +with the captivating grace of a Parisian, she said: + +"I hardly know how to thank my friend Monsieur de Lissac for inducing +you to listen to the entreaties of one who solicits--" + +"Solicits, madame?" said the minister with an eagerness which seemed +already to answer her prayer affirmatively. + +"I hope your Excellency will consent to honor with your presence a +reunion of friends at my house--a reunion somewhat trivial, for this +occasion, but clever enough." + +"A reunion?" replied Vaudrey, still smiling. + +"Monsieur de Lissac has not told you then, what my hopes are?" + +"We are too old friends, Lissac and I, for him not to allow me the +pleasure of hearing from your own lips, madame, in what way I may be of +service to you, or to any of your friends." + +Sabine smiled at this well-turned phrase uttered in the most gallant +tone. + +Who then, could have told her that Vaudrey was a provincial? An intimate +enemy or an intimate friend. But he was not at all provincial. On the +contrary, Vaudrey was quite charming. + +"Monsieur de Rosas has had the kindness, your Excellency, to promise to +come to my house next Saturday and give a chatty account of his travels. +He will be, I am quite sure, most proud to know that in his audience--" + +Sulpice neatly and half modestly turned aside the compliment that was +approaching. + +He knew Monsieur de Rosas. He had read and greatly admired some +translations of the Persian poets by that lettered nobleman, which had +been printed for circulation only amongst the author's most intimate +friends. Vaudrey had first met Monsieur de Rosas at a meeting of a +scientific society. Rosas was an eminent man as well as a poet, and one +whom he would be greatly pleased to meet again. A hero of romance as +erudite as a Benedictine. Charming, too, and clever! Something like a +Cid who has become a boulevard lounger on returning from Central Asia. + +This portrait of Rosas was a clever one indeed, and Sabine nodded +acquiescence again and again as each point was hit off by Vaudrey. He, +in his turn, basked comfortably in the light of her smiles, and listened +with pleasure to the sound of his own voice. He could catch glimpses +through the box curtains from between these two charming profiles--one a +brunette, the other a blonde--of the vast auditorium all crimson and +gold, blazing with lights and crowded with faces. From this well-dressed +crowd, from these boxes where one caught sight of white gleaming +shoulders, half-gloved arms, flower-decked heads, sparkling necklaces, +flashing glances, it seemed to Vaudrey as if a strange, subtle perfume +arose--the perfume of women, an intoxicating odor, in the midst of this +radiancy that rivaled the brilliant sun at its rising. + +Upon the stage, amid the dazzling splendor of the ballet, in the milky +ray of the electric light, the swelling skirts whirled, the pink +slippers that he had seen but a moment before near by, and the gleaming, +silver helmets, the tinfoil and the spangles shone in the dance. A fairy +light enveloped all these stage splendors; and this luxurious ensemble, +as seen from the depths of the box, seemed to him to be the glory of an +unending apotheosis, a sort of fête given to celebrate his entrance on +his public career. + +Then, in the unconcealed effusion of his delight, without any effort at +effect, speaking frankly to this woman, to Guy, and to Gerson, as if he +were communing with himself to the mocking accompaniment of this Hindoo +music, he revealed his joys, his prospects, and his dreams. He replied +to Sabine's congratulations by avowing his intention to devote himself +entirely to his country. + +"In short, your Excellency," she said, "you are really going to do great +things?" + +He gazed dreamily around the theatre, smiling as if he beheld some lucky +vision, and answered: + +"Really, madame, I accepted office only because I felt it was my duty +and as a means of doing good. I intend to be just--to be honest. I +should like to discover some unappreciated genius and raise him from the +obscurity in which an unjust fate has shrouded him, to the height where +he belongs. If we are to do no better than those we have succeeded, it +was useless to turn them out!" + +"Ah! _pardieu_," said Lissac, while Madame Marsy smiled and nodded +approval of Vaudrey's words, "you and your colleagues are just now in +the honeymoon of your power." + +"We will endeavor to make this honeymoon of as long duration as +possible," laughingly replied Sulpice. "I believe in the case of power, +as in marriage, that the coming of the April moon is the fault of the +parties connected with it." + +"It takes a shrewd person indeed to know why April moons rise at all!" +said Guy. Vaudrey's thoughts turned involuntarily toward Adrienne, his +own pretty wife, who was waiting for him in the great lonely apartments +at the Ministry which they had just taken possession of as they might +occupy rooms at a hotel. + +He felt a sudden desire to return to her, to tell her of the incidents +of this evening. Yes, to tell her everything, even to his visit behind +the scenes--but he remained where he was, not knowing how to take leave +of Madame Marsy just yet, and she, in her turn, divined from the +slackened conversation that he was anxious to be off. + +"I was waiting for that strain," said Madame Marsy to Guy, "now that it +is over, I will go." + +Vaudrey did not reply, awaiting Sabine's departure, so as to conduct her +to her carriage. + +People hurried out into the lobbies to see him pass by. Upon the +staircases, attendants and strangers saluted him. It seemed to Vaudrey +that he moved among those who were in sympathy with him. Lissac followed +him with Madame Gerson on his arm; her jaded husband sighed for a few +hours' sleep. + +In the sharp, frosty air of a night in January, Sulpice, enveloped in +otter fur, stood with Madame Marsy on his arm, waiting for the +appearance of that lady's carriage, which was emerging from the luminous +depths of the Place, accompanied by another carriage without a monogram +or crest; it was that of the minister. + +Sulpice gazed before him down the Avenue de l'Opéra, brilliant with +light, and the bluish tints of the Jablockoff electric apparatus flooded +him with its bright rays; it seemed to him as if all this brilliancy +blazed for him, like the flattering apotheosis which had just before +fallen upon him as he crossed the stage of the Opéra. It seemed like an +aureole lighted up especially to encircle him! + +Sabine asked Vaudrey as he escorted her to her carriage: + +"Madame Vaudrey will, I trust, do me the honor to accompany your +Excellency to my house? I will take the liberty to-morrow of calling on +her to invite her." + +The Minister bowed a gracious acquiescence. + +Sabine finally thanked him by a gracious smile: her small gloved hand +raised the window of the coupé, and the carriage was driven off rapidly, +amid the din of horses' hoofs. + +"Good-bye," said Lissac to Vaudrey. + +"Cannot I offer you a seat in my carriage?" + +"Thank you, but I am not two steps away from the Rue d'Aumale." + +Vaudrey turned towards Madame Gerson; she and her husband bowed low. + +"May I not set you down at your house, madame?" + +"Your Excellency is very kind, but we have our own carriage!" + +"Au revoir," said Vaudrey to Lissac, "come and breakfast with me +to-morrow." + +"With pleasure!" + +"To the ministry!" said Vaudrey to the coachman as he stepped into his +carriage. + +He sank back upon the cushions with a feeling of delight as if glad to +be alone. All the scenes of that evening floated again before his eyes. +He felt once more in his nostrils the subtle, penetrating perfume of the +greenroom, he saw again the blue eyes of the little danseuse. The +admiring looks, the respectful salutes, the smiles of the women, the +soft, caressing tones of Sabine, and Madame Gerson's pearly teeth, he +saw or heard all these again, and above all, this word clear as a +clarion, triumphant as a trumpet's blast: _Success!_ All this came back +again to him. + +"You have succeeded!" + +He heard Guy's voice again speaking this to him in joyous tones. +Succeeded! It was certainly true. + +Minister! Was it possible! He had at his beck and call a whole host of +functionaries and servitors! He it was who had the power to make the +whole machine of government move--he, the lawyer from Grenoble--who ten +years ago would have thought it a great honor to have been appointed to +a place in the department of Isère! + +All those people whom he could see in the shadow of the lighted +boulevards buying the newspapers at the kiosks, would read therein his +name and least gesture and action. + +_"Monsieur le Ministre has taken up his residence on the Place Beauvau. +Monsieur Vaudrey this morning received the heads of the Bureaus and the +personnel of the Department of the Ministry of the Interior. Monsieur +Vaudrey, with the assistance of Monsieur Henri Jacquier of Oise, +undersecretary of State, is actively engaged in examining the reports of +prefects and under-prefects. Monsieur will doubtless make some needed +reforms in the administration of the prefectures."_ Everywhere, in all +the newspapers, Monsieur Vaudrey! The Minister of the Interior! He, his +name, his words, his projects, his deeds! + +Success! Yes, it was his, it had come! + +Never in his wildest visions had he dreamed of the success that he had +attained. Never had he expected to catch sight of such bright rays as +those which now shone down upon him from that star, which with the +superstition of an ambitious man, he had singled out. Success! Success! + +And now all the world should see what he would do. Already in his own +little town, in his speeches, during the war, at the elections of 1871, +and especially at Versailles, during the years of struggle and political +intrigue, in the tribune, or as a commissioner or sub-commissioner, he +had given proofs of his qualifications as a statesman, but the +touchstone of man is power. Emerging from his semi-obscurity into the +sunshine of success, he would at last show the world what he was and +what he could do. Power! To command! To create! To impress his ideas +upon a whole nation! To have succeeded! succeeded! succeeded! Sulpice's +dreams were realized at last. + +And whilst the ministerial carriage was driving at a gallop towards the +Place Beauvau, Sabine, muffled up in her furs, her fine skin caressed by +the blue-fox border of her pelisse, said to herself, quite indifferent +to the man himself, but delighted to have a minister's name to enroll +upon her list of guests: + +"He is a simpleton--Vaudrey--but a very charming simpleton, +nevertheless." + +The iron gates of the Place Beauvau were thrown back for his +Excellency's carriage to enter. The gravel creaked under the wheels, as +the coupé turning off to the left, stopped under the awning over the +door. + +Sulpice alighted. The great door opened to admit him. Two +white-cravatted servants occupied a bench while awaiting the minister's +return. + +Sulpice ran lightly up the great marble staircase leading to his private +apartments. Handing his hat and coat to a servant in the antechamber, he +gayly entered the little salon, where he found his wife sitting by a +table reading _La Revue_ by the light of a shaded lamp. At the sight of +her pretty, fresh young face extended to greet him, with her blue eyes +and smiling air, at the sound of her clear, sweet, but rather timid +voice asking a little anxiously: "Well?" Sulpice took the fair face in +both his hands and his burning lips imprinted a long kiss on the white +forehead, over which a few curls of golden hair strayed. + +"Well, my dear Adrienne, I have been greatly interested. All the +kindness with which I was received, the evident delight with which the +new cabinet has been welcomed by the people, even the grimaces of +Pichereau whom I met,--if you only knew where--all gave me pleasure, +delighted me, and yet made me fear. Minister! Do you know what I have +been thinking of since I was made a minister?" + +"Of what have you been thinking?" asked the young wife, who, with her +hands folded, gazed trustingly and sweetly into Sulpice's feverish eyes. + +"I?--I have been telling myself that it is not enough to be a minister. +One must be a great minister! You understand, Adrienne, a great +minister!" + +As he spoke he took Adrienne's hands in his, and the young wife glanced +up admiringly at this young man burning with hope, who stood there +before her, declaring: "I will be great!" + +She had never dreamed of his reaching such heights as these on that day +when she felt the fingers of her fiancé trembling in her hand, the day +that Sulpice had whispered the words in her ear which made her heart +leap with joy: "I love you, Adrienne, I shall always love you--Always!" + + + + +III + + +Sulpice Vaudrey had married Adrienne for love. She brought to him from +the convent at Grenoble where she had been educated, the charming +innocence of a young girl and the innate devotion of a woman. She was an +orphan with a considerable fortune, but although Sulpice had only +moderate resources, he had scarcely thought of her wealth, not even +inquiring of her guardian, Doctor Reboux, on the occasion of his formal +demand for her hand, about the dowry of Mademoiselle Gérard. + +He had met her at more than one soirée at Grenoble, where she appeared +timid, dazzled and retiring, and quietly interrogating everything by her +sweet glance. Some few words exchanged carelessly, music which they had +listened to side by side, the ordinary everyday intercourse in society, +had made Sulpice acquainted with his wife; but the sight of the pretty +blonde--so sweet and gentle--the childlike timidity of this young girl, +something rather pensive in the confiding smile of this blooming +creature of eighteen summers, had won him completely. He was free, and +alone, for he had lost, but a short time before, the only creature he +loved in the world, his mother, of whom he was the son in the double +sense of flesh and spirit, by the nourishment of her breast and by the +patient teaching that she had implanted in his mind. + +He remembered only his father's dreamy and refined face in the portrait +of a young, sad-looking man in a lawyer's black gown, before which he +had stood when quite small, and spelled out as he might have lisped a +prayer, the four letters: _papa_. Alone in this little town of Grenoble, +for which he had left his native village of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, he +had, just before meeting Adrienne, fallen a victim to a profound +melancholy and realized the necessity of deciding upon his career. + +He was then thirty-four. Except the years spent in the study of law at +Paris amid the turmoil of the left bank of the Seine, he had always +lived in the province--his own province of Dauphiné. He had grown up in +the old house at Saint-Laurent, where every nook and corner kept for him +its own sweet memory of his childhood and youth. The great white +drawing-room with its wainscotings of the time of Louis XVI., which +opened out upon a flight of steps leading down into a terraced garden; +the portraits of obscure ancestors: lawyers in powdered wigs and wearing +the robes of the members of the Third estate, fat and rosy with double +chins resting upon their broad cravats, amiable old ladies with oddly +arranged hair and flowered gowns, coquettish still as they smiled in +their oval, wooden frames, and then the old books in their old-fashioned +bindings slumbering in a great bookcase with glass doors, or piled up on +shelves below the fowling-pieces, the game-bags and the powder-horns. + +With this dwelling of which he thought so often now, his whole past was +linked, about it still clung something of its past poetry, and it was +sacred through the memories it preserved, and as the scene of the +unforgotten joys of childhood. He could see again, the great +stone-flagged kitchen, where they sat up at nights telling stories, the +chamber above it, the bed with its heavy serge curtains, where he +lay--sometimes shaking with terror--all alone, adjoining the room once +occupied by his father, and the moonlight shining through the tall old +trees in the courtyard outside, that entering by the half-open blinds +cast shadows like trembling lace on the wall opposite to him. It seemed +to Sulpice then that he could hear the sounds of the weird demon's chase +as told by old Catherine, the cook, in bated tones during their vigils. + +It was there that he went every year to pass his holidays with his +mother, who had had the courage to send him away,--just as during winter +she had plunged him into cold water--to the Lyceum at Grenoble, whence +he would return to Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, "so thin, poor child!" as his +mother said. + +And how fat she would send him back again to school,--to make the +masters ashamed of their stinginess. + +How pleasant were the reminiscences of those sunny days amongst the +mountains, the excursions to Grande Chartreuse, where the murmuring +brook trickled among the rocks, the halts at Guiers-Mort or under the +trees in the stillness of a drowsy day in summer; how delightful to +stretch one's self out at the foot of the cliffs or on a grassy slope +with a book, pausing now and then to indulge in day-dreams or glance up +at the fleecy clouds floating in the blue sky above his head and watch +them gathering, then vanishing and melting away like smoke wreaths! Ah! +how sweet were those long, idle days full of dreams, when the noise of +the waterfall dashing over the rocks lulled the senses like some merry +song, or a nurse's tender, crooning lullaby. + +In those days Sulpice made no plans for his future, where he would go, +what he would do, or what would become of him; but he felt within +himself unbounded hope, a hope as limitless and bright as the azure sky +above him, the inspiration of devotion, love and poetry. He asked +himself whether he should be a missionary or a representative of the +people. It seemed to him that his heart was large enough to contain a +world, and as he grew up he began to ask himself the terrible question: +"Will a woman ever love me?" + +To be loved! What a dream! One day he put this question to one of his +comrades at college, Guy de Lissac, the son of a country gentleman in +the neighborhood, who answered: + +"Booby! every one is loved some day or other, and there are some who are +loved even too much!" + +Sulpice had received a patriarchal and half-puritanical training, but +softened materially by his mother's almost excessive care, it had left, +as it were, a kind of poetic perfume that clung about him and never left +him. + +Even during the days of his struggle in crowded Paris, in the heat of +political strife, his thoughts would fly back to the old home at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, recalling to mind the old armchair where his +father used to sit, the father whose kiss he had never known, hearing +again his mother's voice from the great oak staircase with its heavy +balusters, and he recalled at the same moment, the landscape with its +living figures, the spotted, steel-colored guinea-fowl screaming from +the branches of the elms, the vineyard hands returning from work, to +trample with bare feet the great clusters of grapes piled up in the +wine-vat in the cellar whose odor intoxicated! Even as a representative +or minister, musing over his past that seemed but yesterday, Sulpice +wandered again in thought to this quiet country spot, so loved by him, +so sweet, so still, reposing in the silence of provincial calm--far +away, removed from all the noise and bustle of Paris. + +The farmers of Dauphiné generally think of making their sons tillers of +the soil, sending them to school and to college, perhaps to begin later +the study of law or medicine, but welcoming them joyfully back again to +their native fields, to their farms, where the youths soon forget all +they may have learned of the Code or the Codex and lead the healthy, +hardy life of the country. Good, well-built fellows, their chests +enlarged by their daily exercise, their thighs strengthened by +mountain-climbing, gay young men, liking to hunt and drink on the banks +of the Isère and caring more for good harvests than for the songs of the +wind amongst the branches of the poplars upon the river-banks. + +Sulpice had an old uncle on his father's side who proposed to his +sister-in-law to give up his broad acres--a fortune in themselves--to +Sulpice, if his nephew would consent to marry his daughter. Sulpice +refused. He would not marry for money. + +"Fiddle-faddle!" cried his uncle. "Sickly sentimentality! If he +cultivates that _grain_, my brother's son will not make much headway." + +"There is where you are mistaken, brother-in-law. What my poor Raymond +had not time to become, his child will be: a lawyer at once eloquent and +honest." + +"Well, well," replied the uncle, "but he shall not have my girl." + +Sulpice, after finishing his studies at Paris, returned to his mother at +Grenoble, took her away from the old house at Saint-Laurent and +installed her in the town with himself, where he began the practice of +law and attracted everybody's attention from the first. He made pleading +a sacred office and not a trade. Everyone was astonished that he had not +remained in Paris. + +Why? He loved his native province, the banks of the Isère, the healthy, +poetic atmosphere hanging over the desert of the Chartreuse and the +snows of the Grand-Som. A talented man could make his way +anywhere,--moreover, it was his pleasure to consider it a duty not to +leave this secluded corner of the earth where he would cause freedom of +speech to be known. Sulpice, whose heart was open to every ardent and +generous manifestation of human thought, had imbibed from his mother, as +well as from his father's writings and books, and from the +_Encyclopædia_ that Raymond Vaudrey had interlined with notes and +reflections, not merely traditional information, but also, so to speak, +the baptism of liberty. He had lived in the feverish days of the past +eighty years, through his reading of the _Gazette Nationale_ of those +stormy days. The speeches that he found in those pages--speeches that +still burned like uncooled lava--of Mirabeau, Barnave, and Condorcet, a +son of Grenoble, seemed to impart a glow to his fingers and fire to his +glance. Then, too, the magnificent dreams of freedom proclaimed from the +tribune inflamed his mind and made his heart beat fast. He saw as in a +vision applauding crowds, tricolors gleaming in the clear and golden +sunlight, processions moving, files marching past, and heard eternal +truths proclaimed and acclaimed. + +His mother smiled at all this enthusiasm. She did not however try to +repress it. It would vanish at the touch of years, just as the leaves of +the trees fly before the winds of October. And besides, the dear woman +herself was in sympathy with his hopes, his dreams and visions, +remembering that her lost Raymond had loved what his son in his turn so +much adored. + +The termination of the war and the fall of the empire found Sulpice a +popular man at Grenoble; loved by all, by the populace who knew how +generous he was, and by the middle-class who regarded him as a prudent +man, hence the February elections saw him sent to Bordeaux, a member of +the National Assembly. He had just passed his thirty-fourth year. + +His mother lived long enough to see this event, and to be dazzled by +this brilliant launch on his career. + +With what deep emotion, even to-day, Vaudrey recalled that Sunday in +February, a foul, wet day, when he returned home in a closed carriage +with a friend, from an electioneering tour. The day before he had made a +speech in a wineshop to an audience of peasants, who listened, +open-mouthed, but withal suspicious, examining their candidate as they +would have handled a beast offered at the market, and who, step by step, +applauded his remarks, stretching out their rasp-like hands as he left +them, and crying out: "You are our man!" + +That very morning he returned to Grenoble in the rain, passing through +villages where the posters bearing his name and those of his friends, +half-demolished by the rain, flapped dismally in the wind. Before the +mayor's office, little groups were gathered, peaceful folk; a gendarme +paced slowly to and fro, and bulletins littered the muddy thoroughfare. +But there was no excitement. Nothing more. Not even a quickened +pulse-beat was felt by those stolid men upon whose votes depended the +fate of the nation. Sulpice could not help marvelling at so much +indifference, but he reflected that it was thus throughout all France, +and that not only his name but the destiny of the nation was involved in +the struggle. + +Moreover, at night, with what feverish transport he watched the returns +of the election as they reached the Palais de Justice, black with the +crowd, and filled with uproar! With what a fearfully fast-beating heart +he saw the rapidly swelling number of ballots cast for him! Dispatches +came, and pedestrians hurried in from the country, waving their +bulletins above their heads, and Sulpice heard on every lip the same +cry: "Vaudrey leads!" + +Some cried bravo, while others clapped their hands. A crowd quickly +gathered about Vaudrey. It already seemed to him that he was lifted up +by a great wave and carried to a new world. + +A friend seized him by the arm and drew him into a corner of the hall, +away from the others, and hurriedly said: "You know I am not one to ask +much of you, to ask anything of you, in fact. I merely reckon on a +receivership. That is easily done, eh? A mere nothing?" + +Sulpice, whose feelings were overcome by this great popular +consecration, felt a kind of anger stir his heart against this +solicitor, who, in the triumph of a great popular cause, saw only a +means of self-advancement, of securing an appointment. The deputy--for +he was a deputy now, each commune adding its total to the Vaudrey +vote--was moved by a feeling of disgust. + +The crowd followed him home that evening, shouting in triumph. + +Amid the joy of victory, Sulpice felt the burden of the anxiety caused +by duties to be done: a treaty of peace to be signed, and what a peace! +Must he, alas! append his signature to a document devoted to the +dismemberment of his country? Far into the night he stood in reverie in +his chamber, his brow resting against the cold window-pane. + +He retired to rest very late, and arose with the gray dawn of February, +but without having slept. + +He looked across the street to a convent garden, with its square and +lozenge-shaped beds regularly arranged, its bare trees and box-wood +borders, that he had often gazed upon. Some nuns in their black robes +passed slowly across this cold and calm horizon that for many years had +also been the range of his vision. + +Henceforth this familiar spot, this sad garden, whose cloistral +associations charmed him, would be lost to his view. It was Paris now +that awaited him, feverish Paris, burning with anger and odorous of +saltpetre. Its very pavements must burn. Sulpice was in haste, however, +to see it once more, to pass with head aloft beneath the garrets where +he had once dreamed as a student, fagging and striving to get knowledge. +How often he would regret that convent garden, those familiar +flower-beds, the deep silence that enveloped him as he sat working by +the open window, the passage of a bird near him, as if to fan him with +its wing, and the vague murmur of the canticles of the sisters ascending +to his window like the echo of a prayer! + +In the recess during one of the years following his election to the +Assembly, he married Mademoiselle Gérard. Doctor Reboux, her guardian, +charmed to give his ward to a man with a future like Vaudrey's, had not +hesitated long about consenting to the marriage. Adrienne delighted +Sulpice, and the young girl herself was quite happy to be chosen by this +good-natured, distinguished young man whom everybody at Grenoble, not +excepting his political adversaries, admired and spoke well of. With +large, brilliant, black eyes lighting up a thin, fair face, a full +beard, a high forehead with a deep furrow between the eyebrows, giving +to his usually wandering, keen and restless glance a somewhat +contemplative expression, Sulpice was a decidedly attractive man. He was +not a handsome or a charming fellow, but a good-natured, agreeable, +refined man, a fine conversationalist, persuasive, enthusiastic and +alert; learned without being pedantic, a man who could inspire in a +young girl a perfect passion. Adrienne joyfully married him, as he had +sought her from love. + +And now all the poetry and romance of his youth blossomed again in his +heart, in the thick of the political struggle in which he was engaged; +he forgot, amid the idyllic scenes of domestic life, the storms of +Versailles, the political troubles, forebodings as to the future, all +anxieties of the present, the routine life of the Assembly into which he +plunged with all his mind, and the excitement of his labors, his debates +and his duties. + +Sulpice thought again and again of the summer morning when he led his +wife to the altar, and compared it to a day's halt in the course of a +journey under the blaze of the sun; he recalled the old house full of +noisy stir, the crowd of relatives and friends in festive attire, the +stamping of the horses' feet before the great open gate, the neighbors +standing at the windows, and the little street-boys scuffling upon the +pavement, all the joyous bustle of that happy day. It seemed to Sulpice +that the sunlight came streaming in with Adrienne's entrance into the +vast salon, from the walls of which her pictured ancestresses in their +huge leg-of-mutton sleeves seemed to smile at her. + +Beneath the orange wreath sent from Paris, her face expressed the happy, +surprised, and sweetly anxious look of a young communicant wrapped in +her veil. + +Sulpice had never seen her look more beautiful. How prettily she came +towards him, blushing vividly, and holding out her two little white +gloved hands! He, somewhat bored by the company that surrounded them, +cast an involuntary glance at a mirror hanging opposite and decided that +he looked awkward and formal with his hair too carefully arranged. How +they had laughed since then and always with new pleasure at these +recollections, so sweet even now. + +His happiness on that joyous day would have been complete had his mother +been present, when in the presence of the old priest who had instructed +Adrienne in her catechism, Sulpice stood forward and took by its velvet +shield the taper that seemed so light to him, and awkwardly held the +wafer that the priest extended to him. It was a great event in Grenoble +when the leader of the Liberal Party, who headed the list at the last +election, was seen being married like a believing bourgeois. The organ +pealed forth its tender vibrations, some Christmas anthem, mysterious +and tremulous, like an alleluia sounding through the aisles of +centuries; the light streamed through the windows in floods and rested +upon Adrienne, who was kneeling with her childlike head leaning on her +gloved hands, kissing her fair locks with sunlight and illumining the +gleaming satin of her dress with its long train spreading out over the +carpet. + +Sulpice took away from this ceremony in the presence of a crowded +congregation an impression at once perfumed and dazzling: the perfumes +of flowers, the play of light, the greetings of the organ, and within +and about him, all the intoxication of love, singing a song of +happiness. + +All that was now far away! nearly six years had elapsed since that day, +six years of bitter struggle, during which Vaudrey fought the harder, +defended his ideas of liberty with fervid eloquence, disputed step by +step, and through intense work came to the front, living at Paris just +as he did in the province, having his books brought from there to his +apartment in the Rue de la Chaussée d'Antin, close to the railroad that +he took every morning when he regretfully left Adrienne, Adrienne to +whom he returned every evening that political meetings and protracted +sittings did not rob him of those happy evenings, which were in truth +the only evenings that he really lived. + +Adrienne seldom went out, not caring to display herself and shunning the +bustle, living at Paris, as at Grenoble, in peaceful seclusion, caring +only for the existence of her husband, his work, and his speeches that +he prepared with so much courageous labor. She sat up with him until +very late, glancing over the books, the summaries of the laws and the +old parliamentary reports. + +At times she was terrified at the ardor with which Sulpice devoted +himself to these occupations. She greatly desired to take her part and +was grieved at being unable to assist him by writing from his dictation, +or by examining these old books. She felt terribly anxious when Vaudrey +had to make a speech from the tribune. She dared not go to hear him, +but knowing that he was to speak, she had not the courage to remain at +home. Anxiously she ascended to the public gallery. She shuddered and +was almost ready to faint, when she heard the voice of the president +break what seemed to her an icy silence, with the words: _Monsieur +Vaudrey has the ear of the Assembly_. + +The sound of Sulpice's voice seemed changed to her. Fearfully she asked +herself if fright was strangling him. She dared not look at him. It +seemed to her that the people were laughing, making a disturbance and +coughing, but not listening to him. Why had she come? She would never do +so again. An icy chill took possession of her. Then suddenly she heard a +storm of applause that seemed like an outburst of sympathy. Hands were +clapped, voices applauded. She half raised herself, and leaning upon the +rail of the gallery, saw Sulpice between the crowded heads, towering +above the immense audience, radiant and calm, standing with his arms +folded or his hands resting on the tribune, below the chair occupied by +a motionless, white-cravatted man, and throwing back his fair head, +hurling, as from a full heart, his words, his wishes and his faith. All +this she saw with supreme happiness and felt proud of the man whose name +she bore. + +At that moment, she would fain have cried out to every one that she was +his, that she adored him, that he was her pride, even as she was his +joy! She would like to have folded him to her, to cling to his neck and +to repeat before all that crowd: _I love you!_ + +But she reserved all her tender effusions for the intimacy of their +home, in order to calm the enthusiasm, oftentimes desperate, of this +nervous man whom everything threw into a feverish excitement, this grand +man, as they called him at Grenoble, who was for her only a great child +whom she adored and kept in check by her girlish devotion combined with +her motherly, delicate attentions. + +Vaudrey, however, more ambitious to do good than to obtain power, and +spending his life in the conflicts of the Chamber, saw the years +slipping away without realizing that he was making any progress, not a +single step forward in the direction of his goal. Since the war, the +years had passed for him as well as for those of his generation, with +confusing rapidity, and suddenly, all at once, after having been in some +sense slumbering, flattering himself that a man of thirty has a future +before him, he was rudely awakened to the astonishing truth that he was +forty. + +Forty! Sulpice had experienced a certain melancholy in advancing the +figure by ten, and whatever position he had acquired within his party, +within the circle of his friends, his dream was to reach still higher, +he was tired of playing second-rate parts, and eager to stand before the +footlights in full blaze, in the first rôle. + +In the snug interior that Adrienne furnished, he enjoyed all material +happiness. She soothed him, brought his dreams back to the region of the +real, terrified at times by his discouragements, his anger, and still +more by his illusions concerning men and things. + +Sulpice often reproached her for having clipped the wings of his +ambition. + +"I!" she would say, "it is rather the fans of your windmills that I +break, you Don Quixote!" + +He would then smile at her, and look earnestly into the depths of the +timid creature's lovely blue eyes, causing her to blush as if ashamed of +having seemed to be witty. + +Her chief aim was to be the devoted, loving friend of this man whom she +thought so superior to herself, and although she was totally ignorant of +political intrigues, she was by virtue of the mere instinct of love, his +best and most perspicacious adviser and felt delighted only when +Vaudrey, by chance, listened to her counsel. + +"I love you so dearly!" she confessed with the unlimited candor of a +poor creature who has but a single affection, a single pretext for +loving. + +He saw in the life he led, only the penumbra: his neglected youth, his +hopes fled, his fears, the disgust which at times filled him as he +thought of the never-ending recommencements and trickeries of political +life. So dearly cherished, so beloved, it seemed to him, nevertheless, +that his life lacked something. He would have liked a child, a son to +bring up, a domestic tie, since political conditions prevented him from +accomplishing a civic duty. Ah! yes, a son, a being to mould, a brow to +kiss, a soul to fashion after the image of his own, a child who would +not know all the sorrows of life that his own generation had laid on +him! Perhaps it was only a child that he needed. Something, however, he +evidently lacked. + +Still he smiled, always in love with that young woman of twenty-four +years, delicate, slender, and full of the fears and artlessness of a +child. Accustomed to the quiet solitude of the house of her guardian, +she, when at Paris, in her husband's study, arranging his books, his +papers, his legislative plans and reports, sought to surround her dear +Sulpice with the comforting felicity of bourgeois happiness that was +enjoyed calmly, like a cordial sipped at the fireside. + +Then suddenly one day, the news of a startling political change broke in +on this household. + +Sulpice reached home one evening at one and the same time nervous, +anxious, and happy. + +His name was on almost every lip, in connection with a ministerial +combination. His last speech on domestic policy had more than ever +brought him into prominence and he was considered to have boldly +contributed to the development of a fearful crisis. + +A minister! he might, before the morning, be a minister! His policy was +triumphant. + +The advocate Collard--of Nantes,--who was pointed out as the future head +of the Cabinet, was one of his intimate friends. It was +suggested--positively--that Sulpice should be intrusted with one of the +most _important portfolios_, that of the Interior or of Foreign Affairs, +the _lesser portfolios_ being considered those of Public Instruction and +of Agriculture and Commerce, the former of which concerns itself with +the spiritual welfare of the people, and the latter with their food +supply. + +Sulpice told all this to Adrienne while eating his dinner mechanically +and without appetite. + +There was to be a meeting of his coterie at eight o'clock. It was +already seven. He hurried. + +Adrienne saw that he was very pale. She experienced a strange sensation, +evidently a joyful one although mingled with anxiety. Politics drew him +away from his wife so frequently, and for so long a time, that she was +already compelled to live in such solitude that the secluded creature +wondered if in future she would not be condemned to still greater +isolation. But all anxiety disappeared under the influence of Sulpice's +manifest joy. He was feverishly impatient. It seemed to him that never +had he known so decisive a moment in his life. + +The sound of the bell, suddenly ringing out its clear note in the +silence, caused him to start. + +The dining-room door was opened by a servant, who handed a letter to +Vaudrey, bearing on one corner of the envelope the word: _Urgent_. + +Sulpice recognized the writing. + +It was from Collard of Nantes. + +Adrienne saw her husband's cheek flush as he read this letter, which +Sulpice promptly handed her, while his eyes sparkled with delight. + +"It is done! Read!" + +Adrienne turned pale. + +Collard notified his "colleague" that the ministerial combination of +which he was the head had succeeded. The President awaited at the Élysée +the arrival of the new ministers. He tendered Vaudrey the portfolio of +the Interior. + +"A minister!" said Adrienne, now overcome with delight. + +Vaudrey had risen and, a little uneasy, was mechanically searching for +something, still holding his napkin in his hand. + +"My hat," he said. "My overcoat. A carriage." + +Adrienne, with her hands clasped in a sort of childish admiration, +looked at him as if he had become suddenly transformed. All his being, +in fact, expressed complete satisfaction. He embraced Adrienne almost +frantically, kissed her again and again, and left her, then descended +the staircase with the speed of a lover hastening to a rendezvous. + +This political honeymoon was still at its height at the moment when the +delighted Vaudrey, seeing everything rosy-hued, was satisfying his +astonished curiosity in the greenroom of the ballet. He entered office, +animated by all the good purposes inspired by absolute faith. It seemed +to him that he was about to save the world, to regenerate the +government, and to destroy abuses. + +"It is very difficult to become a minister," he said, smiling, "but +nothing is easier than to be a great minister. It only demands a +determination to do good!" + +"And the power to do it," replied his friend Granet, somewhat +ironically. + +What! power? Nothing was more simple, since Vaudrey held the reins of +power!--If others wrecked the hopes of their friends, it was because +they had not dared, because they had not the will! + +They would now see what he would do himself! Not to-morrow either, nor +in a month--but at once. + +He entered the ministry boldly, like a good-natured despot, determined +to reform, study and rearrange everything; and a victim to the feverish +and glorious zeal of a neophyte, he was a little surprised to encounter, +at the very outset, the obstinate resistance of routine, ignorance, and +the unyielding mechanism of that vast machine, more eternal than +empires: Ad-min-is-tra-tion. + +Bah! he would have satisfaction! Patience would overcome all. After all, +time is on one's side. + +"Time? Already!" replied Granet, who was a perpetual scoffer. + +Adrienne, overwhelmed with surprise, enjoyed the reflections from the +golden aurora of power that so sweetly tinted Sulpice's life. She +shared her husband's triumphs without haughtiness, and now, however she +might love her domestic life, it was incumbent upon her to pass more of +her time in society than formerly, _to show herself_, as Sulpice said, +and, surrounded by the success and flattery she enjoyed, she felt that +that obligation was only an added joy, whose contentment she reflected +on her husband. + +When she entered a salon, she was greeted with a flattering murmur of +admiration and good-natured curiosity. The women looked at her and the +men surrounded her. + +"Madame Vaudrey?" + +"The minister's wife!" + +"Charming!" + +"Quite young!" + +"Somewhat provincial!" + +"So much the more attractive!" + +"That is true, as fresh as a peach!" + +She endeavored to atone by a gracious, very sincere modesty, for the +enviable position in which chance had suddenly placed her. It was said +of her that she accepted a compliment as timidly as a boarding-school +miss receives a prize. They forgave her for retaining her rosy cheeks +because of her white and exquisitely shaped hands. She was not +considered to be "_trop de Grenoble_." Witty people called her the +pretty _Dauphinoise_, and the flatterers the little Dauphine. + +In short, her _success_ was great! So said the chroniclers; the entrance +of a fashionable woman into a salon being daily compared with that of an +actress on the stage. + +It was especially because Vaudrey appeared to be so happy, that his +young wife was so contented. She felt none of the vainglory of power. +Generally alone in the vast, deserted apartments of the ministry, with +all their commonplace, luxurious appointments, she more than once +regretted the home in the Chaussée-d'Antin, where they enjoyed--but too +rarely--a renewal of the cherished solitude of the first months of their +union, the familiar chats of the Grenoble days, the prolonged +conversations, exchanges of thoughts, hopes and reminiscences--already! +only recollections,--and she sometimes said to Sulpice, who was +feverishly excited and glowed with delight at having reached the summit +of power: + +"Do you know what this place suggests to me? Why, living in a hotel!" + +"And you are right," Vaudrey gaily answered; "we are at a hotel, but it +is the hotel in which the will of France lodges!" + +"You understand, my dear, that if you are happy--" + +"Very happy! it is only now that I can show what I am made of. You shall +see, Adrienne, you shall see what I will do and become within a year." + +Within a year! + + + + +IV + + +Guy de Lissac occupied a small summer-house forming a residence situated +at the end of a court on Rue D'Aumale. He had given carte-blanche for +the arrangement of this bachelor's nest,--a nest in which sitting-hens +without eggs succeeded each other rapidly,--to one of those upholsterers +who installed, in regulation style, the knickknacks so much in vogue, +and who sell at very high prices to Bourse operators and courtesans the +spurious Clodions and imitation Boulles that they pick up by chance at +auction sales. + +Lissac, who had sufficient taste to discover artistic nuggets in the +gutters of Paris, had found it very convenient to wake up one fine +morning in a little mansion crowded with Japanese bric-à-brac, Chinese +satin draperies, tapestries, Renaissance chests and terra-cotta figures +writhing upon their sculptured bases. The upholsterer had taste, Lissac +had money. The knickknacks were genuine. There was a coquettish +attractiveness about the abode that made itself evident in every detail. + +This bachelor's suite lacked, however, something personal, something +living, some cherished object, the mark of some particular taste, some +passion for a period, for a thing, or pictures or books. In this jumble +of ill-matched curiosities, where ivory _netzkés_ on tables surrounded +Barye bronzes and Dresden figures, there lacked some evidence of an +individual character that would give a dominant tone, an original key, +to the collection. This worldly dwelling, with its white lacquered bed +and Louis XV. canopy and its heads of birds carved in wood like the +queen's bed at Trianon, vaguely resembled the apartments of a +fashionable woman. + +But Guy had hung around here and there a Samouraï sabre, Malay krises, +Oriental daggers in purple velvet sheaths, and upon the green tapestry +background of the antechamber a panoply on which keen-bladed swords with +steel guards were mingled with Scotch claymores with silver hilts, thus +giving a masculine character to this hôtel of a fashionable lounger, +steeped with the odor of ylang-ylang like the little house of a pretty +courtesan. + +This Guy enjoyed in Paris a free and easy life, leaving to Vaudrey, his +old college-comrade at Grenoble, the pursuit of the pleasures of +political life, and, as Lissac said in that bantering tone which is +peculiar to Parisian gossip, the relish of the "sweets of power"; for +himself, what kept him in Paris was Paris itself, just that and nothing +more:--its pleasures, its first nights, its surprises, its women, that +flavor of scandal and perfume of refined immorality that seemed peculiar +to his time and surroundings. + +He had squandered two fortunes, one after the other, without feeling any +regret; he had made a brush at journalism, tried finance, won at the +Bourse, lost at the clubs, knew everybody and was known by all, had a +smiling lip, was sound of tooth, loved the girls, was dreaded by the +men, was of fine appearance, and was unquestionably noble, which +permitted him to enjoy all the frolics of Bohemian life without sullying +himself, having always discovered a forgotten uncle or met some +considerate friend to pay his gambling debts and adjust his differences +on the Bourse speculations at the very nick of time; just now he was +well in the saddle and decidedly attractive, with a sound heart and a +well-lined pocket, enjoying, not disliking life, which seemed to him a +term of imprisonment to be passed merrily--a Parisian to the finger-tips +and to the bottom of his soul, worse than a Parisian in fact, a +Parisianized provincial inoculated with _Parisine_, just as certain sick +persons are with morphine, judging men by their wit, actions by their +results, women by the size of their gloves; as sceptical as the devil, +wicked in speech and considerate in thought, still agile at forty, +claiming even that this is man's best time--the period of fortune and +gallantry--sliding along in life and taking things as he found them, +wisely considering that a day's snow or rain lasts no longer than a +day's sunshine, and that, after all, a wretched night is soon over. + +On leaving Vaudrey the previous night, Lissac had passed part of the +night at his club on Place Vendôme. He had played and won. He had gone +to sleep over a fashionable novel, very faithfully written, but +wearisome in the extreme, and he had awakened late and somewhat +heavy-headed. There were fringes of snow upon the window-sills and upon +the house facing his little mansion. The roofs were hidden under a large +white sheet and half lost in the grayish-white background of the sky. + +"Detestable weather! So much the better," thought Lissac, "I shall have +no visitors." + +"I will see no one," he said to his servant. "In such weather no one but +borrowers will come." + +He had just finished his déjeuner, plunging a Russian enamelled silver +spoon into his egg, his tea smoking at his side in a burnished silver +teapot with Japanese designs, when, notwithstanding his orders, the +servant handed him a card written in pencil on a scrap of paper torn +from a note-book. + +"It is not a borrower, monsieur!" + +Guy seized the paper disdainfully, thinking, in spite of the servant's +opinion, that he would find the name of a beggar who had not even had +his name printed on a piece of Bristol-board, and, adjusting his glass, +he deciphered the fine writing on the paper; then after involuntarily +exclaiming: _Ah! bah_! and _well! well!_ greatly astonished, he said as +he rose: + +"Show her in!" + +He had thrown on a chair his damask napkin of Muscovite pattern, and +instinctively glanced at himself in the mirror, just as a coquette might +do before a rendezvous, smoothing out his flannel vest and spreading out +his cravat that only half-fastened the blue foulard collar of his +dressing-gown. + +At the moment that he was examining the folds made on his red leather +slippers by his ample flannel trousers, a woman half-raised the satin +portière, and, standing within a frame formed by the folds of yellow +satin, looked at the young man, displaying her brilliant teeth as she +smilingly said: + +"Good-morning, Guy!" + +Lissac went straight toward her with outstretched hands. + +She allowed the large satin portière to fall behind her, and after +having permitted her little suède gloved hands to be raised for a +moment, she boldly abandoned them to Guy, laughing the while, as they +looked at each other face to face. He betrayed some little astonishment, +gazing at her as a person examines one whom one has not seen for a long +time, and the young woman raised her head unabashed, displaying her +features in full light, as if submitting to an inspection with +confidence. + +"You did not expect me, eh?" + +"I confess--" + +"Doubtless it is a considerable time since you thought of me." + +Guy was inclined to bow and, as his only reply, to kiss the tips of her +fingers; but he reflected that, since they last met, the parting of his +brown locks had been devilishly widened, and he remained standing, +answering with the conceit of a handsome man: + +"You are mistaken, I often think of you." + +She had, with, a sweeping glance around the room, examined the furniture +of the apartment, the framed pictures, the designs and the gilding, and, +on sitting down near the fire with her little feet crossed, she +expressed her opinion: + +"Very stylishly ensconced! You always had good taste, I know, my dear +Guy." + +"I have less now than formerly, my dear Marianne," he said, giving to +this airy remark the turn of a compliment. + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders and smiled. + +"Do you find me very much altered?" she asked abruptly. + +"Yes, rejuvenated." + +"I don't believe a word of it." + +"Upon my honor. You look like a communicant." + +"Good heavens! what kind?" said Marianne, laughing in a clear, ringing, +but slightly convulsive tone. + +He was still looking at her curiously, seated thus near the fireplace. + +The bright and sparkling fire cast its reflections on the gold frames in +waving and rosy tints that brightened the somewhat pale complexion of +this young woman and imparted a warm tone to her small and brilliant +gray eyes. She half turned her fair face toward him, her retroussé nose +was tiny, spirituelle and mobile, her large sensuous mouth was provoking +and seductive, and suggested by its upturned corners, encouragement or a +challenge. + +She had allowed her cloak, whose fur trimming was well-worn, to slip +from her shoulders, exposing her form to the waist; she trembled +slightly in her tight-fitting dress, and golden tints played on her bare +neck, which was almost hidden under the waves of her copper-colored +hair. + +She had just taken off her suède gloves with a jerky movement and was +abstractedly twisting them between her fingers. + +In spite of the somewhat depressing effect of her worn garments, she +displayed a natural elegance, a perfect form and graceful movements, and +Guy, accustomed as he was to estimate at a glance the material condition +of people, divined that this woman felt some embarrassment. She whom he +had known four or five years previously so charming amid the din of a +life of folly, and the coruscation of an ephemeral luxury, was now +burned out like an exploded rocket. + +Marianne Kayser! + +Of all the women whom he had met, he had certainly loved her the most +sincerely, with an absolute love, unreflecting, passionate and half-mad. +She was not dissolute but merely turbulent, independent and impatient of +restraint. Too poor to be married, too proud to be a courtesan, too +rebellious to accept the humiliations of destiny. + +She was an orphan, and had been brought up by her uncle, Simon Kayser, a +serious painter, indifferent to all that did not concern his art,--its +morality, its dignity, its superiority--who had, under cover of his own +ignorance, allowed the ardent dreams of his niece and her wayward fits +to develop freely like poisonous plants; near this man, in the vicious +atmosphere of an old bachelor's disorderly household, Marianne had lived +the bitter life of a young woman out of her element, poor, but with +every instinct unswervingly leaning towards the enjoyments of luxury. + +She had grown up amid the incongruous society of models and artists and, +as it were, in the fumes of paradoxes and pipes. A little creature, she +served as a plaything for this painter without talent, and he allowed +her to romp, bound and leap on the divans like a kitten. Moreover, the +child lighted his stove and filled his pipe. + +The studio was littered with books. As chance offered, she read them all +eagerly and examined with curiosity the pictures drawn by an Eisen or a +Moreau, depicting passionate kisses exchanged under arbors, where +behind curtains, short silk skirts appeared in a rumpled state. She had +rapidly reached womanhood without Kayser's perceiving that she could +comprehend and judge for herself. + +This falsely inspired man, entirely devoted to mystical compositions, +vaguely painted--philosophical and critical, as he said--this thinker, +whose brush painted obscure subjects as it might have produced signs, +did not dream that the girl growing up beside him was also in love with +chimeras, and drawn toward the abyss, not however to learn the mysteries +hidden by the clouds, but the mystery of life, the secret of the visions +that haunted her, of the disquieting temptations that filled her with +such feverish excitement. + +If Uncle Kayser could for one moment have descended from the nebulous +regions, and touched the earth, he would have found an impatient ardor +in the depth of Marianne's glance, and something feverish and restless +in her movements. But this huge, ruddy, rotund man, speaking above his +rounded stomach, cared only for the morality of art, æsthetic dignity, +and the necessity of raising the standard of art, of creating a mission +for it, an end, an idea--_art the educator, art the moralizer_,--and +allowed this feverish, wearied, impulsive creature, moulded by vice, who +bore his name, to wander around his studio like a stray dog. + +Isolated, forgotten, the young girl sometimes passed whole days bending +over a book, her lips dry, her face pale, but with a burning light in +her gray eyes, while her fingers were thrust through her hair, or she +rested upon a window-sill, following afar off, some imaginary picture in +the depths of the clouds. + +The studio overlooked a silent, gloomy street in which no sound was +heard save the slow footfalls of weary and exhausted pedestrians. It was +stifling behind this window and Marianne's gloomy horizon was this frame +of stones against which her wandering thoughts bruised themselves as a +bird might break its wings. + +Ah! to fly away, to escape from the solemn egotism and the theories of +Simon Kayser, and to live the passionate life of those who are free, +loved, rich and happy! Such was the dream upon which Marianne nourished +herself. + +She had perpetually before her eyes, as well as before her life, the +gray wall of that high house opposite the painter's studio, pierced with +its many eyes, and whether on summer's stifling evenings, the shutters +closed--the whole street being deserted, the neighbors having gone into +the country--or in winter, with its gray sky, the roofs covered with the +snow that was stained all too soon, when the brilliant lights behind the +curtains looked like red spots on the varnished paper, Marianne ever +felt in her inmost being the bitter void of Parisian melancholy, the +overwhelming sadness of black loneliness, of hollow dreams, gnawing like +incurable sorrows. + +She grew up thus, her mind and body poisoned by this dwelling which she +never left except to drag her feet wearily through the galleries of the +Louvre, leaning on the arm of her uncle, who invariably repeated before +the same pictures, in the loud and bombastic tone of a _comediante_, the +same opinions, and grew enthusiastic and excited according as the +pictures of the masters agreed with his _style_, his _system_, his +_creed_. One should hear him run the gamut of all his great phrases: My +_sys-tem!_ Marianne knew when the expression was coming. All these +Flemish painters! Painters of snuff-boxes, without any ideal, without +grasp! "And the Titian, look at this Titian! Where is _thought_ +expressed in this Titian? And _mo-ral-i-ty?_ Titian! A vendor of pink +flesh! Art should have a majesty, a dignity, a purity, an ideality very +different." + +Ah! these words in _ty_, solemn, bombastic, pedantic, with a false ring, +they entered Marianne's ears like burning injections. + +These visits to the museum impressed her with a gloom such as a ramble +in a cemetery would create, she returned to the house with depressing +headaches and muttering wrathful imprecations against destiny. She even +preferred that studio with its worn-out divans and its worm-eaten +tapestries that were slowly shredding away. + +There, at least, she was all alone, face to face with herself, consumed +by a cowardly fear--the fear of the future--this young girl who had read +everything, learned everything, understood everything, knew everything, +sullied by all the jokes of the Kayser studio, which, in spite of the +exalted, sacrosanct, æsthetic discussions which took place therein, +sometimes shockingly resembled a smoking-room--this physical virgin +without any virginity of mind, could there take refuge in herself, and +there in the solitude to which she was condemned, she questioned herself +as to the end to which her present life would lead her. + +Of dowry she had none. Her father had left her nothing. Kayser was poor +and in debt. She had no occupation. To run about giving private lessons +on the piano, seemed to Marianne to degrade her almost to the level of +domestic service. Those who wished to pose for the Montyon prize might +do so! She never would! + +Ah! what sufferings! what would be the end of such a life? Marriage? But +who desired her? One of those talentless painters, who ventilated at +Kayser's house, not merely their contemptuous theories, but also their +down-at-the-heel shoes? To fall from one Bohemian condition to another, +from exigency to want, to be the wife of one of these greasy-haired +dreamers? Her whole nature shuddered in revolt at this idea. Through the +open window, the tepid breath of nature wafted toward her the odor of +the rising sap in gentle, warm whiffs that filled her with a feverish +astonishment. Stretched on the patched divan, her eyes closed and her +lovely form kissed by the tepid breeze, she dreamed, dreamed, dreamed-- + +The awakening was folly, a rash act, an elopement. + +In the house on Rue de Navarin there happened to be one fellow more +daring than the rest, he was an artist who, in the jostling daily life, +kindled his love at the strange flame that burned in the lustful +virgin's eyes. A glance revealed all. + +The meeting with a rake determined the life of this girl. She fell, not +through ignorance or curiosity, but moved by anger and, as it were, out +of bravado. Since she was without social position, motherless and +isolated, having no family, without a prop and unloved, well, she threw +off the yoke absolutely. She broke through her shackles at one bound. +She rebelled!-- + +She eloped with this man. + +He was a handsome fellow, who thirsted for pleasure, and took his prize +boldly about, plunging Marianne into the ranks of vulgar mistresses, and +had not the mad woman's superior intelligence, will, and even her +disgust, ruled at once over this first lover and the equivocal +surroundings into which he had thrust her, she would have become a mere +courtesan. + +Kayser had experienced only astonishment at the flight of his niece. How +was it that he had never suspected the cause that disturbed her +thoughts? "These diabolical women, nobody knows them, not even those who +made them. A father even would not have detected anything. The more +excuse therefore for an uncle!" So he resumed his musing on elevated +art, quieting his displeasure--for his comrades jeered him--by the +fumes of his pipe. + +Moreover, all things considered, the painter added, Marianne had +followed the natural law. Full liberty for everybody, was still one of +Simon Kayser's pet theories. Marianne was of age and could dispose of +her lot without the necessity of submitting to a strict endorsement of +her conduct. When she had "sounded all the depths of the abyss,"--and +Kayser pronounced these words while puffing his tobacco--she would +return. Uncle Kayser would always keep a place for her at what he called +_his fireside_. + +"The fireside of your pipe," Marianne once remarked to him. + +So Kayser consoled himself for this escapade by the sacredness of art, +the only sacredness he recognized. On that indeed he yielded nothing. +What mattered it to the world, if a girl went astray, even if that girl +were his niece? Public morality was not hurt thereby. Ah! if he, Kayser, +had exhibited to the world a lewd picture, it would have been "a horse +of a different color"! The dignity, seriousness, purity of art, that was +right enough!--But a woman! Pshaw! a woman!--Nor was he heard once to +express any uneasiness as to what might become of Marianne. + +In the course of her perilous career, which, however, was not that of a +courtesan, but that of a freed woman avenging herself, Marianne had met +Guy de Lissac and loved him as completely as her nature allowed her to +love. Guy entertained her. With him she talked over everything, she gave +herself up to him, and made plans for the future. Why should they ever +separate? They adored each other. Guy was rich, or at any rate he lived +sumptuously. Marianne was a lovely mistress, clever, in fact, ten women +in one. Guy became madly attached to her and he felt himself drawn +closer to her day by day. She often repeated with perfect sincerity that +she had never loved any one before. + +The first lover, then? She did not even know his name now! + +There was no reason why they should not live together for ever, a life +of mutual joy and happiness, led by the same fancies, stirred by the +same desires. Why ever leave each other, even once? But it was just this +that induced Guy to abandon this pretty girl. He was afraid. He saw no +end to such a union as theirs. The little love-affair that enticed him +assumed another name: _The Chain_. He sometimes debated with himself +seriously about marrying this Marianne, whose adventures he knew, but +who so intoxicated him that he forgot all the past. + +Uncle Kayser, entirely engrossed in the "dignity of art," and occupied +with the composition of an allegorical production entitled _The Modern +Family_,--a page of pure, mystic, social, regenerative art,--had +certainly forgotten his niece; nevertheless, Lissac at times felt +somewhat tempted to restore her to him. He was grieved at the thought +of abandoning Marianne to another. His dread of marriage triumphed over +his jealousy. One fine day, Guy suddenly brought about a separation. +Feeling ill, he took to his bed, when one morning Marianne came to him +and said in passionate tones: + +"Now I will never leave you again! You are in danger, and I am here to +save you!" + +Guy now felt himself lost. His rapid perception, whose operation was as +sudden as a blow of the fist, warned him that if he allowed this woman +to install herself in his house, he might say good-by to liberty, and +probably also to his life. This Parisian had laid down as a principle, +that a man should always be _unfettered_. He held in horror this +shameful half-marriage that the language of slang had baptized, as with +a stain: _Collage_. He therefore decided to play his life against his +liberty, and during the temporary absence of this nurse established at +his bedside, he packed his clothes in his trunk at random, shivering as +he was with fever, threw himself into a hack, and, with chattering teeth +and a morbid shudder creeping over his entire body, had himself driven +to the railroad station and departed for Italy. + +Marianne was heartbroken anew at this unexpected departure. A hope had +vanished. She loved Guy very sincerely, and she vainly hoped that she +would hold him. He fled from her! Whither had he gone? For a moment, +she was tempted to rejoin him when she received his letters. She +surmised, however, that Guy, desiring to avoid her, caused his brief +notes to be sent by some friend from towns that he had left. To play +there the absurd part of a woman chasing her lover would have been +ridiculous. She remained, therefore, disgusted, heartbroken for a moment +like a widow in despair, then she retraced her steps to the Rue de +Navarin, and returned to the fold, where she found Uncle Kayser still +quite unruffled, with the almost finished picture of _The Modern +Family_. + +"That is, I verily believe, the best I have done, the most moral," said +Kayser to her. "In art, morality before everything, my girl! Come, sit +down and tell me your little adventures." + +It was five years--five whole years--since Lissac had seen Marianne. +Their passion had subsided little by little into friendship,--expressed +though by letters. Marianne wrote, Guy replied. All the bitter reproofs +had been exchanged through the post, yet, in spite of this +correspondence, neither had sought the opportunity nor felt the desire +to meet. The fancy was dead! Nevertheless, they had loved each other +well! + +Suddenly, without overtures, on this bitingly cold morning, Marianne +arrived, half shivering, in the new apartment, warmed her tiny feet at +the fire and raised to him the rosy tip of her cold nose. + +Guy was somewhat surprised. + +He looked with a curiosity not unmixed with pain at that woman whom he +had loved truly enough to suffer love's pangs,--the innocents say to die +of it. He tried to find again in the depths of those gray eyes, +sparkling and malicious, the old burning passion, extinguished without +leaving even a fragment of its embers. To think that he had risked his +life for that woman; that he should have sacrificed his name; that he +should have torn himself from her with such harsh bravado; that he +should have cut deep into his own being in order to leave her; that he +had fled, leaving for Italy with a craving desire for solitude and +forgetfulness! Eh! yes, Marianne had been his true love, the true love +of this blasé Parisian sceptic and braggart, and he sought, while again +looking at the lovely girl, to recover some of the sensations that had +flown, to recall some of those reminiscences which more than once had +agreeably affected him. + +Marianne evidently understood what was passing in Guy's mind. She smiled +strangely. Buried in the armchair, whose back supported her own, and +half-bending her fair neck that reclined on the lace-covered head-rest, +she looked at Lissac fixedly with an odd expression, the sidelong glance +of a woman, that seems to be her keenest scrutiny. + +Through her half-closed lashes he seemed to feel that a malicious glance +embraced him. The mobile nostrils of her delicate nose dilated with a +nervous trembling that intensified the mocking smile betrayed by her +curling lips. Her hands were resting upon her plump arms, and with a +trembling motion of the fingers beat a feverish little march as if she +were playing a scale on a keyboard. + +Guy sought to evoke from the well-set, gracefully reclining form, from +the half-sly and half-concealed glance, from the palpitating nostrils, +something that reminded him of his former ecstasies. Again he saw, +shadowed by the chin, that part of her neck where he loved to bury his +brow and to rest his lips, greedily, lingeringly, as when one sips a +liqueur. A strange emotion seized him. All that had not yet been +gratified of his shattered, but not wholly destroyed love, surged within +him. + +Were it fancy or reminiscence, beside this woman he still felt as of +old, a feeling that oppressed his heart and caused him that delightful +sensation of uneasiness to which he had been a stranger in connection +with his many later easy love adventures. A light, penetrating and sweet +odor floated around Marianne, reminding Lissac of the intoxicating +perfume of vanished days, an irritating odor as of new-mown hay. + +He said nothing, while she awaited his remarks with curiosity. Guy's +mute interrogation possibly embarrassed her, for she suddenly shook her +head and rose to her feet. + +"May one smoke here?" she said, as she opened a Russia leather +cigarette-case bearing her monogram. + +"What next?" said Guy, lighting a sponge steeped in alcohol that stood +in a silver holder and offering it to Marianne. + +She quickly closed her fine teeth on the end of the paper cigarette that +she had rolled between her fingers and lighted it at the flame. The +gleam of the alcohol brightened her eyes and slightly flushed her pale +cheeks, which Guy regarded with strange feelings. + +"Your invention is an odd one!" she said, as she returned him the little +sponge upon which a tongue of blue flame played. + +He extinguished it, and abandoning himself to the disturbing charm of +reminiscences, watched Marianne who was already half-enveloped in a +light cloud of smoke. + +"There is one thing you do not know," he said. "More than once--on my +honor--at the corner of the street, at some chance meeting, my old +Parisian heart has beaten wildly on seeing in some coquettish outline, +or in some fair hair falling loosely over an otter-skin cloak, or in +some fair, vanishing profile with a pearl set in the lobe of the ear, +something that resembled you. Those fur toques with little feathers that +everybody wears now, you wore before any one else, on your fair head. +Whenever I see one, I follow it. On my word, though, not for her. The +fair unknown trotted before me, making the sidewalks echo to the touch +of the high heels of her little shoes, while I continued to follow her +under the sweet illusion that she would lead me at the end of the +journey to a spot where it seemed to me a little of paradise had been +scattered. It is thus that phantoms of loved ones course through the +streets of Paris in broad daylight, and I am not the only one, Marianne, +who has felt the anguish and heart-fluttering that I have experienced. +Often have I found my eyes moist after such an experience; but if it +were winter, I attributed my tears simply to a cold. Tell me, Marianne, +was it really the cold that moistened my eyes?" + +Marianne laughed. + +"Come, but you are idyllic, my dear Guy," said she, looking at Lissac. + +"Melancholy, nothing more." + +"Let us say elegiac. Those little fits have come upon you rather late in +the day, have they not? A little valerian and quinine, made up into +silver-coated pills, is a sovereign remedy." + +"You are making fun of me." + +"No," she said. "But it was so easy then, seeing that the recollection +of me could inspire you with so many poetic ideas and cause you to trot +along for such a distance behind plumed toques--it was so easy not to +take the train for Milan and not to fly away from me as one skips from a +creditor." + +Guy could not refrain from smiling. + +"Ah! it is because--I loved you too dearly!" + +"I know that!" exclaimed Marianne with a tone, in contrast with her +elegance, of an artist's model giving a pupil a retort. "A madrigal that +has not answered, no; does it rain?" + +"I have perhaps been stupid, how can it be helped?" said Lissac. + +"Do not doubt it, my dear friend. It is always stupid to deprive one's +self of the woman who adores one. Such rarities are not common." + +"You remember, dear Marianne," said Guy, "the day when you boldly wrote +upon the photographs to some one who loved you dearly: 'To him I love +more than every one else in the world?'" + +"Yes," said Marianne, blowing a cloud of smoke upward. "Such things as +that are never forgotten when one writes them with the least sincerity." + +"And you were sincere?" + +"On the faith of an honest man," she answered laughingly. + +"And yet I have been assured since that time, that you adored another +before that one." + +"It is possible," said Marianne with sudden bitterness; "but, in the +life that I have led, I have been so often purchased that I have been +more than once able to mistake for love the pleasure that I have +derived." + +In those words, uttered sharply, and in a hissing tone like the stroke +of a whip-lash in the air, she had expressed so much suffering and +hidden anger that Lissac was strangely affected. + +Guy, the Parisian, experienced a sentiment altogether curious and +unexpected, and this woman whose bare neck was resting on the back of +the armchair, allowing the smoke that issued from her lips in puffs to +enter her quivering nostrils, seemed to him a new creature, a stranger +who had come there to tempt him. In her languishing and, as it were, +abandoned pose, he followed the outline of her graceful body, blooming +in its youth, the fulness of her bust, the lines of her skirt closely +clinging to her exquisite hips, and the unlooked-for return of the lost +mistress, the forgotten one, assumed in his eyes the relish of a caprice +and an adventure. And then, that bitter remark, spoken in the course of +their light Parisian gossip, whetted his curiosity still further and +awoke, perhaps, all the latent force of a passion formerly suddenly +severed. + +He was seated on an ottoman beside Marianne, gazing into the young +woman's clear eyes, his hand endeavoring to seize a white hand that +nimbly eluded his grasp. The movement of his hands suggested the embrace +that his feelings prompted. + +Marianne suddenly looked him full in the face and curtly said, in a tone +of raillery, that suggested a past that refused to reopen an account for +the future: + +"Oh! oh! but is that making love, my friend?" + +Lissac smiled. + +"Come," she said, "nonsense! That is a romance whose pages you have +already often turned over." + +"The romance of my life," whispered Lissac in Marianne's ear. + +"The more reason that it should not be read again. It is true there are +books one never reads but once. And for that reason, probably, one never +forgets them." + +She rose abruptly, threw the stump of her cigarette into the fire and +looked with a bright, penetrating glance, into Lissac's surprised eyes. + +"Ah! it is a long while, you see, since you spoke laughingly--we have +both heartily laughed at it--of the 'caprices of Marianne.' Do you know +what I am, my dear Guy? Yes, where is the mad creature who was formerly +your mistress? Abandoned to dark, profound and incurable _ennui_, I yawn +my life away, as some one said, I yawn it away even to the point of +dislocating my jaw. The days seem dull to me, people stupid, books +insipid, while fools seem idiots and witty people fools. It is to have +the blues, if you will, or rather to have the grays, to hate colorless +objects, to be weary of the commonplace, to thirst for the impossible. A +thirst that cannot be allayed, let me add. The pure, fresh spring that +should slake my thirst has not yet gushed." + +She talked in a dry, bitter tone, with a smile that frequently gave way +to slight outbreaks of convulsive laughter almost as if she were +attacked with a fit of coughing. From time to time, she blew away a +cloud of smoke that escaped from her lips, for she had resumed her +cigarette, or with the tip of her nail struck her papelito, knocking the +ashes on the carpet. + +Moved and greatly puzzled, but no longer thinking of the temptation of a +moment before, Guy looked at her and nodded his head gravely, like a +physician who finds a patient's illness more serious than the latter is +willing to acknowledge. + +"You are very unhappy, Marianne!" he remarked. + +"I? Nonsense! Weary, disgusted, bored, yes; but not unhappy. There is +still something great in misery. That can be battled against. It is like +thunder. But the rain, the eternal rain, incessantly falling, with its +liquid mud, that--ah! that, ugh! that is crushing. And in my life it +rains, it rains with terrible constancy." + +As she uttered these words, she stretched her arms out with a movement +that expressed boundless weariness and disclosed to Guy the dull +dejection that followed a great deception and a hopeless fall. + +"Life? My life? A mere millstone mechanically revolving. A perpetual +round of joyless love-episodes and intoxication without thirst. Do you +understand? The life of a courtesan endured by a true woman. My soul is +mine, my spirit and my intellect, but these are chained to a body that I +abandon to others--whom I have abandoned, thank God! for I am satiated +at length and have now no lover, nor do I desire one. I desire to be my +own mistress, in short, and not the mistress of any person. I have but +one desire, hear--" + +"What?" asked Guy, who was deeply moved by this outburst of anger and +suffering, this cry of pain that declared itself involuntarily, his +feelings vacillating between doubt and pity. + +"My pleasure," Marianne replied, "is to shut myself up alone in a little +room that I have rented at the end of an unfrequented lane near the +Jardin des Plantes, whither I have had transported all the wreckage +saved from my past life: books, knickknacks, portraits, and I know not +what. My intention is that I shall remain there unknown to all, my name, +whence I come, where I go, my thoughts, my hatred, my past loves, +everything, in fact, a secret. I shall cloister myself. I shall stretch +myself out on a reclining-chair and think that if, by chance,--as +happens sometimes--an aneurism, a congestion, or I don't know what, +should strike me down in that solitude, no one would know who I am, +nobody, nobody, and my body would be taken to the Morgue, or to the +grave, it matters little to me, that body of which the little +otter-trimmed toques recall to you the graceful, serpentine line. Ah! +those plans are not very lively, are they? Well, my dear, such are my +good moments. Judge of the others, then." + +Lissac was profoundly stirred and very greatly puzzled. To call on him: +that implied a need of him. But there was no attempt to find the marker +at the place where the romance had been interrupted: therefore the visit +was not to renew the relations that had been severed, yet not broken. + +What, then, brought this creature, still charming and giddy, whose heart +was gnawed and wrung with grief? And was she the woman--Guy knew her so +well!--to return thus, only to conjure up the vanished recollections, to +communicate the secret of her present sorrows and to permit Lissac to +inhale the odor of a departed perfume, more airy than the blue +smoke-wreaths that escaped from her cigarette? + +After entrusting Guy with the secret of her yearning for solitude, she +again indulged in her sickly smile, and still looking at Guy: + +"You are, I am told, a constant guest at Sabine Marsy's receptions?" she +said abruptly. + +"Yes," replied Lissac. "But I have no great liking for political +salons." + +"It is a political centre, and yet not, seemingly. It is about to become +a scientific one, if one may believe the reporters--Monsieur de Rosas is +announced.--By the way, my dear Guy, you still see Monsieur de Rosas!" + +While Marianne uttered this name with an indifferent tone, she slightly +bent her head in order to scrutinize Guy. + +He did not reply at once, seeking first to discover what object +Marianne had in speaking to him about De Rosas. In a vague way he +surmised that the great Castilian noble counted for something in +Marianne's visit. + +"I always see him when he is in Paris," he said after a moment's pause. + +"Then you will see him very soon, for he will arrive to-morrow." + +"Who told you that?" + +"The newspapers. You don't read the newspapers, then?--He is returning +from the East. Madame Marsy is bent on his narrating his travels, on the +occasion of a special soirée. A lecture! Our Rosas must have altered +immensely. He was wild enough of old." + +"A shy fellow, which is quite different. But," asked Lissac after a +moment, "what about Rosas?" + +"Tell me, in the first place, that you know perfectly well that he will +arrive to-morrow." + +"I know it through the reporters, as you say. To-day, it is through the +reporters that one learns news of one's friends." + +"The important fact is that you know him, and it is because I am +particularly anxious to hear Monsieur de Rosas that I come to ask you to +present me at Madame Marsy's." + +"Oh! that is it?" Guy began. + +"Yes, that is it. I am weary. I am crazy over the Orient. You remember +Félicien David's _Desert_ that I used to play for you on the piano? I +would like to hear this story of travel. It would make me forget Paris." + +"You shall hear it, my dear Marianne. Madame Marsy asked me to introduce +Vaudrey to her the other evening. You ask me to present you to Madame +Marsy. I am both crimp and introducer; but I am delighted to introduce +you to a salon that you will, I trust, find less gloomy than your little +room of the Jardin des Plantes. In fact, I thought you were one of +Sabine Marsy's friends. Did I dream so?" + +"I have occasionally met her, and have found her very agreeable. She +invited me to call on her, but I have not dared--my hunger for +solitude--my den yonder--" + +"Is the little room forbidden ground, is one absolutely prohibited from +seeing it?" said Guy with a smile. + +"It is not forbidden, but it is difficult. Moreover, I have nothing +hidden from my friends," said Marianne, "on one condition, which is, +that they are my friends--" + +She emphasized the words: "Nothing but my friends." + +"Friendship," said Guy, "is all very well, it is very good, very +agreeable, but--" + +"But--?" + +"Love--" + +"Do not mention that to me! That takes wings, b-r-r! Like swallows. It +flits. It leaves for Italy. But friendship--" + +She extended her small firm hand as rigid as steel. + +"When you desire to visit me over there, I shall be at home. I will give +you the address. But it is not Guy who will come, but Monsieur de +Lissac, remember. Is that understood?" + +"I should be very silly if I answered _yes_." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +"Compliments! How foolish you are! Keep that sort of talk for others. It +is a long time since they were addressed to me." + +She took that man's face between her hands and kissed his cheeks in a +frank, friendly way. Guy became somewhat pale. + +"I have loved you, and truly, that is enough. Do not complain or ask +aught besides." + +Ah! what an eager desire now prompted him to possess her again, to find +in her his mistress once more, to restrain her from leaving until she +had become his, as of old. + +She had already thrown her cloak over her shoulders, and said, as she +gently pushed open the door: + +"So it is agreed? I am to go to Madame Marsy's?" + +"To Madame Marsy's. I will have an invitation sent you." + +"And I will call for you and take you. Yes, I, here, like a jolly +companion. Or I'll go with my uncle. You will present me to Rosas. We +shall see if he recognizes me." + +She burst out laughing. "You will also introduce me--since that is your +occupation--" and here her smile disclosed her pretty, almost +mischievous-looking teeth--"to Monsieur Vaudrey, your comrade. A +minister! Such people are always useful for something. _Addio, caro!_" + +Guy de Lissac had hardly taken two steps toward Marianne before she had +vanished behind the heavy folds of the Japanese portière that fell in +its place behind her. He opened the door. Mademoiselle Kayser was +already in the hall, with her hand on the handle of the door. + +"At nine o'clock I shall be with you," she said to Lissac as she +disappeared. + +She waved a salutation, the valet de chambre hastened to open the door, +and her outline, that for a moment stood out in the light of the +staircase, vanished. Guy was almost angry, and returned to his room. + +Now that she had left, he opened his window quickly. It seemed to him +that a little blue smoke escaped from the room, the cloud emitted by +Marianne's cigarette. And with this bluish vapor also disappeared the +odor of new-mown hay, bearing with it the passing intoxication that for +a moment threatened to ensnare this disabused man. + +The cold outside air, the bright sunshine, entered in quivering rays. +Without, the snow-covered roofs stood out clearly against a soft blue +sky, limpid and springlike. Light wreaths of smoke floated upward in the +bracing atmosphere. + +Guy freely inhaled this buoyant atmosphere that chased away the blended +odor of tobacco and that exhaled from the woman. It seemed to him that a +sort of band had been torn from his brow which, but a moment ago, felt +compressed. The fresh breeze bore away all trace of Marianne's kisses. + +"Must I always be a child?" he thought. "It is not on my account that +she came here, but on Rosas's. Our friends' friends are our lovers. +Egad! on my word, I was almost taken in again, nevertheless! Compelled, +in order to cut adrift again, to make another journey to Italy,--at my +age." + +Then, feeling chilly, he closed the window, laughing as he did so. + + + + +V + + +On the pavement of the Boulevard Malesherbes, two policemen, wrapped in +their hooded coats, restrained the crowd that gathered in front of the +huge double-door of the house occupied by Madame Marsy. A double row of +curious idlers stood motionless, braving benumbed fingers while +watching the carriages that rolled under the archway, which, after +quickly depositing at the foot of the brilliantly lighted perron women +enveloped in burnooses and men in white gloves, their faces half-hidden +by fur collars, turned and crossed the row of approaching coupés. + +For an hour past there had been a double file of carriages, and a +continuous stream of guests arriving on foot, who threw their cigars at +the foot of the perron, chatting as they ascended the steps, which were +protected by a covering of glass. The curious pointed out the faces of +well-known persons. It was said in the neighborhood that the greater +part of the ministers had accepted invitations. + +Madame Marsy's salons were brilliant under the blazing lights. Guests +jostled each other in the lobbies. Overcoats and mantles were thrown in +heaps or strung up in haste, the gloved hands reaching out as in the +lobby of a theatre to receive the piece of numbered pasteboard. + +"You have No. 113," said Monsieur de Lissac to Marianne, who had just +entered, wearing a pale blue cloak, and leaning on his arm. + +She smiled as she slipped the tiny card into her pocket. + +"Oh! I am not superstitious!" + +She beamed with satisfaction. + +People in the hall stood aside in order to allow this pretty creature +to pass by; her fair hair fell over her plump, though slender, white +shoulders, and the folds of her satin skirt, falling over her +magnificent hips, rustled as she walked. + +Lissac, with his eyeglass fixed, and ceremoniously carrying his +flattened opera-hat, advanced toward the salon, amid the greedy +curiosity of the guests who contemplated the exquisite grace of the +lovely girl as if they were inhaling its charm. + +Madame Marsy stood at the entrance of the salon, looking attractive in a +toilet of black silk which heightened her fair beauty, and, with +extended hands, smilingly greeted all her guests, while the charming +Madame Gerson, refined and tactful, aided her in receiving. + +Sabine appeared perfectly charmed on perceiving Marianne. She had felt +the influence formerly of this ready, keen and daring intelligence. She +troubled herself but little about Marianne's past. Kayser's niece was +received everywhere, and had not Kayser decided to accompany her? He +followed in the rear of the young girl. People had not observed him. He +chatted with a man about sixty years old, with a white beard and very +gentle eyes who listened to him good-naturedly while thinking perhaps of +something else. + +"Ah! my old Ramel, how glad I am to see you!" he said with theatrical +effusion. + +"It is a fact that we rarely see each other. What has become of you, +Kayser?" + +"I? I work. I protest, you know, I have never compromised--Never--The +dignity of art--" + +Their voices were drowned by the hubbub of the first salon, already +filled with guests; Sabine meanwhile took Marianne, whom Lissac +surrendered, and led her toward a larger salon with red decorations, +wherein the chairs were drawn up in lines before an empty space, +forming, thanks to the voluminous folds of the curtains, a sort of stage +on which, doubtless, some looked-for actor was about to appear. + +Nearly all these chairs were already occupied. The lovely faces of the +women were illuminated by the dazzling light. Everybody turned toward +Marianne as she entered the room, under the guidance of Sabine, who led +her quickly toward one of the unoccupied seats, close to the improvised +stage on which, evidently, Monsieur de Rosas was going to speak. + +Madame Gerson had taken her seat near Marianne, who searched her black, +bright eyes with a penetrating glance in order to interrogate the +thoughts of this friend of the family. Madame Gerson was delighted. +Sabine, dear Sabine, had achieved a success, yes, a success! Monsieur +Vaudrey was there! And Madame Vaudrey, too! And Monsieur Collard--of +Nantes--the President of the Council! And Monsieur Pichereau, who, after +all, had been a minister! + +"That makes almost three ministers, one of whom is President of the +Council! Sabine is overcome with joy, yes, absolutely crazy! Think of +it: Madame Hertzfield, Sabine's rival, never had more than two ministers +at a time in her salon." + +She added, prattling in soft, linnet-like tones, that Madame +Hertzfield's salon was losing its prestige. Only sub-prefects were +created there. But Sabine's salon was the antechamber to the +prefectures! + +"And if you knew how charming Monsieur Vaudrey is--a delightful +conversationalist--he has dined excellently--he was twice served with +an entrée!" + +Marianne listened, but her mind was wandering far away. She was debating +with herself as to when Monsieur de Rosas would appear on that narrow +strip of waxed floor before her. + +Guy had correctly surmised: it was Rosas and Rosas only whom this woman +was seeking in Sabine's salon. She wished to see him again, to talk to +him, to tempt destiny. A fancy.--A final caprice. Why not? + +Marianne thought that she played a leading part there. She remembered +this José very well, having met him more than once in former days with +Guy. A Parisian Castilian, more Parisian than Spanish, he spoke with +exquisite finish the classic tongue, and with the free-and-easy manner +of a frequenter of the boulevards, chatted in the slang of the pavement +or of the greenroom; he was an eminent virtuoso and collector, an author +when the desire seized him, but only in his own interest, liberal in +his opinions, lavish in his disposition, attractive in his manners; an +eager traveller, he had, at thirty years of age, seen all that was to be +seen, he had visited India and Japan, drunk camel's milk under the tents +of the Kirgheez, and eaten dates with the Kabyles, and narrated with a +sort of appetizing irony, love adventures which might have seemed +romantic brag, if it were not that he lessened their improbability by +his raillery. He was a kind of belated Byron, who might have been cured +of his romantic tastes by the wounds and contact of reality. + +She especially recalled a visit in Guy's company to José at an apartment +that the duke had furnished in Rue de Laval. He occupied a painter's +large studio, draping it with Oriental tapestry, crowding it with +knickknacks and panoplies of weapons: an extravagant luxury,--something +like the embarrassment of riches in a plundered caravansary. It was +there that José had regaled Marianne and Guy with coffee served in +Turkish fashion, and while they chatted, they had smoked that pale +Oriental tobacco, that the Spaniard, quoting some Persian poets, +gallantly compared to the perfumed locks of Mademoiselle Kayser. + +During her years of hardship, she had many a time recalled that +auburn-haired, handsome fellow, with his blue eye, pensive and +searching, and lower lip curled disdainfully over his tawny beard +trimmed in Charles V. style, as he reclined there, stretched on Hindoo +rugs, chanting some monotonous song as slow as the movement of a +caravan. + +"Isn't my friend Rosas a delightful fellow?" Guy had asked her. + +"Delightful!" + +"And clever! and learned! and entertaining! and, what is not amiss, a +multi-millionaire!" + +Marianne thought of the absolute power, satisfied desires, whims and +possible dreams that were linked with that man. He was a mass of +perambulating gold. How many times she had dreamed, in the mists of her +recollection, of that somewhat haughty smile that curled his delicate +mustache, and those keen-edged teeth gleaming though his reddish beard, +as if greedy to bury themselves deep in flesh! + +But where was the duke now? Among the Kabyles or the Mormons? At Tahiti, +Greenland, or gone to the devil? The papers had once announced that he +was organizing an expedition to the North Pole. Perhaps he was lost +among the icebergs in the Arctic Seas! She smiled at that, sighing +involuntarily with sincere emotion, but prompted by selfish regret. + +It had seemed to her that José had more than once permitted himself to +express his affection for her. Politely, correctly, of course, as a +gallant man addresses a friend's mistress, but manifesting in his +reserve a host of understood sentiments and tender restraint that +suggested hidden or implied declarations. Marianne had pretended not to +understand him. At that time, she loved Guy or thought that she loved +him, which amounts to the same thing. She contented herself with smiling +at the flirtation of Monsieur de Rosas. + +"I have perhaps been very stupid," she said to herself. "Pshaw! he might +have been as silly as I, if occasion demanded. The obligations of +friendship! The phantom of Guy!" + +She suddenly stopped and this name escaped her lips: _José_--_Joseph!_ + +Nevertheless, this was one of the vexations of this girl: she was angry +because she had acted rightly. Others suffer remorse for their ill +deeds, but she suffered for her virtue. She often thought of the Duc de +Rosas, as her mother Eve must have thought of Paradise lost. She would +have stirred, astonished, conquered, crushed Paris, if she had been the +mistress of Rosas. + +"What then! Whose fault was it? How foolish of one not to dare +everything!" + +Now see how suddenly and unexpectedly, just as an adversary might offer +an opportunity for revenge, chance, at the turning-point of her life, +had brought back to Paris this José whom she had never forgotten, and +who perhaps remembered her, and by whom she would be recognized most +assuredly, in any case. It was an unhoped, unlooked-for opportunity that +restored Marianne's faith in herself, superstitious as she was, like all +successful gamblers. + +She had fallen, but how she could raise herself by the arms of the duke! +One must be determined. + +Guy and Sabine were met on the way, like two helpers. She profited by +this circumstance, using the one to reach the other and to gain Rosas +from the latter. She bore a grudge, nevertheless, against Guy de Lissac, +the insolent and silly fellow who had formerly left her. Bah! before +taking vengeance on him, it was most important to make use of him, and, +after all, revenge is so wearisome and useless. + +Now Kayser's niece, Guy's mistress, a woman who had given herself or who +had been taken, who had sold herself or who had been purchased, a young +girl who remained so in features, gracefulness and the virgin charms +that clothed her courtesan's body--her smile a virgin's, her glance full +of frolic--Marianne was now within a few feet of him whom she expected, +wishing for him as a seducer desires a woman. + +"If he has loved me one moment, one single moment, Rosas will love me," +she thought. + +The salon was stiflingly hot, but Marianne was determined to keep +herself in the first row, to be directly under the eye of the duke. + +She felt the waves of over-heated air rise to her temples, and at times +she feared that she would faint, half-stifled as she was and +unaccustomed now to attend soirées. She remained, however, looking +anxiously toward the door, watching for the appearance of the traveller +and wondering when the pale face of the Spaniard would show itself. + +At a short distance from her there was a young woman of twenty-three or +twenty-four, courted like a queen and somewhat confused by the many +questions addressed to her; robed in a white gown, she was extremely +pretty, fair, and wore natural roses in her ash-colored hair, her eyes +had a wondering expression, her cheeks were flushed, and in her amiable, +gracious manner, she disclosed a touch of provincialism, modesty and +hesitation--Marianne heard Madame Gerson say to her neighbors: + +"It is the minister's wife." + +"Madame Vaudrey?" + +"Yes! Very charming, isn't she?" + +"Ravishingly pretty! Fresh-looking!" + +Then in lowered tone: + +"Too fresh!" + +"Rather provincial!" + +And one voice replied, in an ironical, apologetic tone: + +"Bless me, my dear, nothing dashing! Hair and complexion peculiarly her +own! So much the better." + +Notwithstanding the low tone of this conversation, Marianne heard it +all. One by one, every one looked at this young woman who borrowed her +golden tints from the rising sun. She bore the popular name of the new +minister. She entered into prominence with him, accepting gracefully and +unaffectedly the weight of his fame. Her timid, almost restless, +uncertain smile, seemed to crave from the other women pardon for her own +success, and there, surrounded by a group of men seated near the window, +were two persons for whom chairs had just been placed, one of whom was a +young, happy man, who exhaled an atmosphere of joy, and looked from time +to time toward Adrienne and Marianne as if to see if the young wife were +annoyed. + +"Where is Monsieur Vaudrey then?" Marianne asked Madame Gerson. + +"Why, he is just opposite to you! There on your right, beside Monsieur +Collard, and he is devouring you with his glances." + +"Ah, bah!" said Marianne with an indifferent smile. + +And she looked in her turn. + +She had, in fact, already noticed this very elegant man who had been +watching her for some time. + +But how could she know that he was Monsieur Vaudrey? He was delightful, +moreover, sprightly in manner and of keen intelligence. A few moments +before, she had heard him, as she passed by him under Sabine's guidance, +utter some flattering remarks which had charmed her and made her smile. + +Ah! that was Vaudrey? + +She had often heard him spoken of. She had read of his speeches. She had +even frequently seen his photograph in the stationers' windows. + +The determined air of this young man, whom she knew to be eloquent, had +pleased her. She ought then to have recognized him. He was exactly as +his photographs represented him. + +Of all the glances bestowed on the minister, Marianne's especially +attracted Sulpice. A moment previously he had felt a singular charm at +the appearance of this woman, threading her way directly between the +rows of men by whom she was so crowded as to be in danger of having her +garments pulled from her body. In his love of definitions and analyses, +Vaudrey had never pictured the Parisian woman otherwise, with her +piquant and instantaneous seductiveness, as penetrating as a subtle +essence. + +Marianne, smiling restlessly, looked at him and allowed him to look at +her. + +Her cheeks, which were extremely pale, suddenly became flushed as if +their color were heightened by some feverish attack, when, amid the stir +caused by the curiosity of the guests, and a greeting manifested by the +shuffling of feet and the murmuring of voices, Monsieur de Rosas +appeared; his air was somewhat embarrassed, he offered his arm to Madame +Marsy, who conducted him to the narrow stage as if to present him. + +"At last! ah! it is he!" + +"It is really the Duc de Rosas, is it not?" + +"Yes, yes, it is he!" + +"He is charming!" + +The name of Rosas, although only repeated in an undertone by the lips +of these women, rung in Marianne's ears, sounding like a quickstep +played on a clarion. It seemed to her that a decisive moment in her life +was announced fantastically in those utterances. Even now, while burning +with the very fever of her eagerness, she felt the gambler's +superstition. As soon as she saw José, she said to herself at once that +if he saw her and recognized her first glance, then he had not forgotten +her and she could hope for everything. Everything! "Men happily forget +less quickly than women," she thought. "Through egotism, or from regret, +some abandon themselves to their reminiscences with complacency, like +this Guy, and recognize on our countenances the lines of their own +youth. Others, perhaps, mourn over the lost opportunity, and the duke is +sentimental enough to be of that class." + +She thought that Rosas must look at her, yes, at any cost; and with body +inclined, her chin resting on her gloved right hand, while the other +handled her fan with the skill peculiar to the Spanish women, she darted +at the duke a rapid glance, a glance burning with desire and in which +she expressed her whole will. The human eye has within it all the power +of attraction possessed by a magnetic needle. As if he had experienced +the actual effect of that glance fixed on his countenance, the duke +raised his head after a polite but somewhat curtly elegant bow, to look +at the audience of lovely women whom Sabine had gathered to greet him, +and, as if only Marianne had been present, he at once saw the +motionless young woman silently contemplating him. + +Rosas, as he appeared within the frame formed by the red curtains, his +thin, regular and ruddy face looking pale against the white of his +cravat and the bosom of his shirt, looked like a portrait of a Castilian +of the time of Philip II., clothed in modern costume, his fashionable +black clothes relieved only by a touch of vermilion, a red rosette. But +however fashionable the cut of his clothes might be, on this man with +the vague blue eyes, and looking contemplative and sad with his upturned +moustache, the black coat assumed the appearance of a _doublet_ of old, +on which the red ribbon of the Legion of Honor looked like a diminutive +cross of Calatrava upon a velvet cloak. + +In fixing, to some extent, his wandering glance on the fervent look of +Marianne, this melancholy Spanish face was instinctively lighted up with +a fleeting smile that immediately passed and was followed by a slight, +respectful bow, quite sufficient, however, to surround the young woman +with an atmosphere that seemed to glow. + +"He has recognized me! at once! come!--I am not forgotten." + +As in the glorious moment of victory, her bloodless face was overspread +with a dazzling expression of joy. Boldly raising her head and inviting +his glances as she had braved them, she listened, with glowing eyes, +drinking each word that flowed from his lips, her nostrils distended as +if to scent the approach of an Oriental perfume, to the recital of the +narrative commenced by the duke in a measured, cajoling tone, which grew +animated and louder. + +Everybody listened to Rosas. Only the slight fluttering of fans was +heard like a beating of wings. Without changing the tone of his +discourse, and recounting his travels to his audience as if he were +addressing only Marianne, he told in a voice more Italian than Spanish, +in musical, non-guttural cadences, of his experiences on the borders of +the Nile, of the weariness of the caravans, of the nights passed under +star-strewn skies, of the songs of the camel-driver, slowly intoned like +prayers, of the gloom of solitary wastes and of the poetic associations +of the ruins slumbering amid the red sands of the desert. At times he +recited a translation of an Arabian song or remarked in passing, on some +mournful ballad, refined as a Sennett, deep as the infinite, in which +the eternal words of love, tender and affecting in all languages, +assumed an intensely poetic character under the influence of their +Semitic nature; songs in which passers-by, strangers, lovers dead for +centuries, who had strewed, as it were, their joys and their sobs over +the sands of the desert, told the color of the hair and of the eyes of +their dear ones, pleaded with their betrothed dead for the alms of love, +and promised to spectres of women rose-colored garments and flowers that +time would never wither. + +These songs of Arabs dying for Nazarenes, of sons of Mohammed +sacrificing themselves for the daughters of Aïssa were so translated by +this Castilian that the exquisite charm of the original, filtered +through his rendering, lost none,--even in French,--of the special +characteristics of his own nation, a half-daughter of the Orient. And +inevitably, with its melancholy repetition, the poetry he spoke of dwelt +on wounded, suffering love, on the anguish of timid hearts, and the sobs +of unknown despairing Arabs, buried for ages under the sands of the +desert. + +The duke seemed to take pleasure in dwelling on these poetic quotations +rather than on the reminiscences of his travels. His individuality, his +own impressions vanished before this passionate legacy bequeathed by one +human race to another. Marianne trembled, believing that she could see +even in Rosas's thoughts a desire to speak especially for her and to +her. Was it not thus that he spoke in his own house in the presence of +Lissac, squatting on his divan like an Arab story-teller? + +She felt her youth renewed by the memory of all those past years. She +thought herself back once more in the studio on Rue de Laval. Sabine +Marsy's salon disappeared, Rosas was whispering in her ear, looking at +her, and allowing the love that he felt to be perceived, in spite of +Guy. + +Guy! who was Guy? Marianne troubled herself about no one but De Rosas. +Only the duke existed now. Had Guy been blended with her life but for a +single moment? She embraced Rosas with her burning glance. + +She no longer saw Sulpice, but he never looked away from Mademoiselle +Kayser. He thought her a most charming woman. A magnetic fluid, as it +were, flowed from her to this man, and he, with wandering mind, did not +hear one word of Monsieur de Rosas's narrative, but concentrated his +thoughts upon that pretty, enticing woman, whom he could not refrain +from comparing with his wife, sitting so near her at this moment. + +Adrienne was very pretty, her beauty was more regular than the other's. +Her smooth, blond hair was in contrast with the tumbled, auburn locks of +Marianne, and yet, extraordinary as it was--Adrienne had never seemed to +be so cold as on that evening, as she sat there motionless, watching, +while a timid habitual smile played over her lips. + +Sulpice suffered somewhat in consequence of this awkwardness on +Adrienne's part, contrasted as it was with the clever freedom of manner, +graceful attitude, and flowing outlines of that disturbing neighbor, +with her dull white countenance, half-closed mouth, strange curl of her +lips, which seemed turned up as if in challenge. She was decidedly a +Parisian, with all her intoxicating charms, that alluring, if vicious +attraction that flows from the eyes of even modest girls. Some words +spoken by Monsieur de Rosas reaching Vaudrey's ears--a description of +the somewhat fantastical preparation of poison by the Indians, +explained by the duke by way of parenthesis--suggested to Sulpice that +the most subtle, the gentlest and most certainly deadly poison was, +after all, the filtering of a woman's glance through the very flesh of a +man, and he thirsted for that longed-for poison, intoxicating and +delicious-- + +He was anxious for the duke to finish his remarks. What interest had he +in all those travels, those Arabic translations, that Oriental poetry, +or that poison from America? He was seized with the desire to know what +such a charming creature as Marianne thought. Ah! what a pretty girl! He +had already inquired her name; he happened to know Uncle Kayser; the +painter had formerly sent him a printed memoir _On the Method of +Moralizing Art through the Mind_. + +The minister experienced on hearing Rosas the feeling of enervation that +attacked him in the Chamber when, near the dinner-hour, an orator became +too long-winded in his speech. He was unable to resist remarking in a +whisper to the President of the Council, who was near him: + +"Suppose we call for the clôture?" + +Monsieur Collard in a diplomatic way expressed his approval of Rosas by +a look that at the same time rebuked his colleague Vaudrey for his lack +of sufficient gravity. + +The duke did not tire any one except Sulpice. He was listened to with +delight. The sentimental exterior of this man concealed a jester's +nature, and the sober appearance of this Castilian wore all the +characteristics of a polished lounger. The least smile that animated his +passive countenance became at once attractive. Marianne thought him most +delightful, or rather, she found him just what she had formerly believed +him to be, a refined, delicate and very simple man in spite of his +graciously haughty manner. When he concluded, the room echoed with the +thunder of the applause. Even in the adjoining rooms the people +applauded, for silence had been secured so as to hear his remarks. With +a wave of his gloved hand, Rosas seemed to disclaim that his discourse +merited the applause, and he received the greetings as a man of the +world receives a salutation, not as a tenor acknowledging the homage +paid to him. He strove to make his way through the group of young men +who were stationed behind him. + +"At last!" said Vaudrey, in a half-whisper. + +It was the moment for which he had been waiting. He would be able now to +address himself to Mademoiselle Kayser! + +He hastened to offer his arm to Marianne. + +Madame Marsy, eagerly and quickly, had already appropriated Monsieur de +Rosas, who was moreover surrounded and escorted by a crowd who +congratulated him noisily. Except for that, Marianne would have gone +direct to him in obedience to her desires. + +Vaudrey's arm, however, was not to be despised. The new minister was +the leading figure in the assembly. She looked at Sulpice full in the +face as if to inquire the cause of his eagerness in placing himself at +her side, and observing that this somewhat mocking interrogation +disconcerted him, she smiled at him graciously. + +She passed on smiling, amid the double row of guests who bowed as she +passed. She suddenly felt a sort of bewilderment, it seemed to her that +all these salutations were for her benefit. She believed herself created +for adoration. Inwardly she felt well-disposed towards Sulpice now, +because he had so gallantly chosen and distinguished her among all these +women. + +After all, she would easily find Rosas again. And who knows? It would +perhaps be better that the duke should seek her. Meanwhile, she crossed +the salons, leaning on the arm of the minister. It was a kind of +triumph. + +Good-naturedly and politely, but without pride, the minister received +all these attentions, becoming as they were to him in his official +capacity, and as he moved on he uttered from time to time some +commonplace compliment to Marianne, reserving his more intimate remarks +for the immediate future. + +Before the buffet, brilliant with light and the gleaming of crystal, the +golden-tinted champagne sparkling in the goblets, the ruddy tone of the +punch, the many fruits, the bright-colored _granite_ and the ices, +Vaudrey stopped, releasing the arm of the young girl but remaining +beside her and passing her the sherbet which a lackey handed him over +the piled-up plates. + +Groups were always encircling him; searching, half-anxious glances +greeted his. An eager hunt after smiles and greetings accompanied the +hunt for _tutti frutti_. But the minister confined his attentions to +Marianne, chafing under the eagerness of his desires, though bearing +them with good grace, as if he were really the lover of the pretty girl. + +Marianne stood stirring the sherbet with the point of a silver-plated +spoon, examining this statesman, as seductive as a fashionable man, with +that womanly curiosity that divines a silent declaration. A gold weigher +does not balance more keenly in his scales an unfamiliar coin than a +woman estimates and gauges _the value_ of a stranger. + +Marianne readily understood that she had fascinated Vaudrey. This +Vaudrey! Notwithstanding that he possessed a charming wife, he still +permitted himself to recognize beauty in other women, and to tell them +so, for he so informed Marianne! He declared it by his smile, his +sparkling eyes, and the protecting bearing that he instinctively +manifested in the presence of this creature who glanced at him with +perfect composure. + +In the confusion attending the attack on the buffet and in the presence +of the crowd that formed a half-circle round the minister, it was not +possible for him to commit himself too much; and the conversation, +half-drowned by the noise of voices, was carried on by fits and starts; +but in order to make themselves understood, Vaudrey and Marianne drew +nearer each other and found themselves occasionally almost pressed +against each other, so that the light breath of this woman and the scent +of new-mown hay that she exhaled, wafted over Sulpice's face. He looked +at her so admiringly that it was noticeable. She was laced in a light +blue satin gown that showed her rosy arms to the elbows, and her +shoulders gleamed with a rosy tint that suggested the rays of a winter +sun lighting up the pure snow. A singular animation, half-feverish, +beamed in her small, piercing, restless eyes, and her delicate ears with +their well-marked rims were quite red. The light that fell from the wax +candles imparted to her hair a Titian red tint as if she had bound her +locks with henna during the night. She was visibly assured of her power +and smiled with a strange and provoking air. + +Vaudrey felt really much disturbed, he was attracted and half-angered by +this pretty girl with dilating nostrils who calmly swallowed her glass +of sherbet. He thought her at once exquisite and lovely, doubly charming +with her Parisian grace and in her ball costume, her bare flesh as +lustrous as mother-of-pearl under the brilliant light. + +Her corsage was ornamented on the left side by an embroidered black +butterfly, with outstretched wings of a brownish, brilliant tint, and +Vaudrey, with a smile, asked her, without quite understanding what he +said, if it were an emblematic crest. + +She smiled. + +"Precisely," she replied. "What I wear in my corsage I have in my mind. +Black butterflies--or _blue devils_, as you choose." + +"You are not exceptional," said Sulpice. "All women are such." + +"All women in your opinion then, are a little--what is it called? a +little out of the perpendicular--or to speak more to the point, a little +queer, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +The minister smiled in his turn, and looked at Marianne, whose eyes, +seen between the blinking lids, gleamed as the electric eyes of a cat +shine between its long lashes. + +"No," he said, "no, but I blame them somewhat for loving the blue only +in the butterflies of which you speak, the _blue devils_ that penetrate +their brain! They are born for blue, however, for that which the +provincial poets style 'the azure', and they shun it as if blue were +detestable. _Blue!_ Nonsense! Good for men, those simpletons, who in the +present age, are the only partisans of _blue_ in passion and in life." + +Whether he desired it or not, he had drawn still closer to this creature +who studied him like a strategist while he fawned on her with his +glances, losing himself in that "blue" of which he spoke with a certain +elegance, in which he desired to express mockery, but which was +nevertheless sincere. In the same jesting tone, pointing to the light +blue of her gown, she said: + +"You see, your Excellency, that all women do not dislike blue." + +"If it is fashionable, _parbleu!_ And if it becomes their beauty as well +as this stuff of yours, they would adore it, most assuredly." + +"They love it otherwise, too--In passion and in life. That depends on +the women--and on men," she added, showing her white teeth while smiling +graciously. + +She dropped her spoon in the saucer and handed the sherbet to a servant. +With an involuntary movement--or perhaps, after all, it was a shrewdly +calculated one--she almost grazed Sulpice's cheek and lips when she +extended her round and firm arm, and Sulpice, who was somewhat +bewildered, was severely tempted, like some collegian, to kiss it in +passage. + +He closed his eyes and a moment after, on reopening them, the disturbing +element having passed, he saw Marianne before him with her fan in her +hand, and as if the image of which he spoke only now recurred to his +memory, he said: + +"Mademoiselle, it seems to me that in this very costume and as charming +as you are at this moment, I have seen your portrait at the Salon; is it +not so?" + +"Yes," she said. "It is the very best painting that my uncle has +produced." + +"I thought it excellent before seeing you," said Sulpice, "but now--" + +She did not feel satisfied with the smile that accompanied the +compliment. She wished to hear the entire phrase. + +"Now--?" said she, as a most seductive smile played on her lips. + +"Now, I find it inferior to the original!" + +"One always says so, your Excellency, except perhaps to the artist; but +I was greatly afraid that you would not think me so, arrayed in +this--this famous blue--this sky-blue that you love so much." + +"And that I love a hundred times more from this evening forward," said +he, in a changed and genuinely affected tone. + +She did not reply, but looked at him full in the face as if to inform +him that she understood him. He was quite pale. + +"Would you not like to be one of the bright ornaments of my salon, as +you are of that of Madame Marsy?" said he, in a whisper. + +"With the greatest happiness, your Excellency." + +What Sulpice said was not heard by the others; but Marianne felt that +she was observed, envied already, and manifested her complete +satisfaction with a toss of her head. In this atmosphere of flattery, +oppressive as with the heavy odor of incense, she experienced a +sensation of omnipotence, the intoxication of that power with which +Vaudrey was invested, whose envied reflection was cast on her by that +simple aside spoken in the midst of the crowd. + +She was delighted and exceedingly proud. She almost forgot that her +visit had been made on Rosas's account. + +Vaudrey was about to add something, when Madame Marsy in passing to +greet her guests, noticed Marianne and grasping her hand: + +"I beg your pardon, your Excellency," she said, "but I must take her +away from you. I have been asked for her." + +"By whom?" said Vaudrey. + +"Monsieur de Rosas!" + +Vaudrey looked at Marianne. He observed distinctly a flash of joy +illuminate her pale face and he felt a sudden and singular discontent, +amounting almost to physical anguish. And why, great heavens? + +Marianne smiled a salutation; he half-bowed and watched her as she went +away, with a sort of angry regret, as if he had something further to say +to this woman who was almost a stranger to him, and who, guided by +Sabine, now disappeared amid the crowd of black coats and bright +toilets. And then, almost immediately and suddenly, he was surrounded +and besieged by his colleagues of the Chamber, men either indifferent or +seeking favors, who only awaited the conclusion of the conversation with +Mademoiselle Kayser, which they would certainly have precipitated, +except for the fear of acting indiscreetly, in order to precipitate +themselves on him. Amid all those unknown persons who approached him, +Vaudrey sought a friend as he felt himself lost and taken by assault by +this rabble. + +The sight of the face of a friend, older than himself, a spare man with +a white beard very carefully trimmed, caused him a feeling of pleasure, +and he joyfully exclaimed: + +"Eh! _pardieu!_ why, here is Ramel!" + +He immediately extended both hands in warm greeting to this man of sixty +years, wearing a white cravat twisted round his neck, like a neckerchief +in the old-fashioned style, and whose black waistcoat with its standing +collar of ancient pattern was conspicuous amid the open waistcoats of +the fashionably-dressed young men who had been very eagerly surrounding +the minister for the last few moments. + +"Good day, Ramel!--How delighted I am to see you!"-- + +"And I also," said Ramel in a friendly and affectionate tone, while his +face, that seemed severe, but was only good-natured and masculine, +suddenly beamed. "It is not a little on your account that I came here." + +"Really?" + +"Really. I was anxious to shake hands with you. It is so long since I +saw you. How much has happened since then!" + +"Ah! Ramel, who the devil would have said that I should be minister when +I took you my first article for the _Nation Française_!" said Vaudrey. +"Bah! who is not a minister?" said Ramel. "You are. Remember what +Napoléon said to Bourrienne as he entered the Tuileries: 'Here we are, +Bourrienne! now we must stay here!'" + +"That is exactly what Granet said to me when he told me of the new +combination." + +"Granet expressed in that more of an after-thought than your old Ramel." + +"My best friend," said Sulpice with emotion, grasping this man's hands +in his. + +"It is so much more meritorious on your part to tell me that," said +Ramel, "seeing that now you do not lack friendships." + +"You are still a pessimist, Ramel?" + +"I--A wild optimist, seeing that I believe everything and everybody! But +I must necessarily believe in the stupidity of my fellows, and upon this +point I am hardly mistaken." + +"But what brings you to Madame Marsy's, you who are a perfect savage?" + +"Tamed!--Because, I repeat to you, I knew that you were coming and that +Monsieur de Rosas was to speak on the subject of savages, and these +please me. If I had been rich or if I only had enough to live on, I +should have passed my life in travelling. And in the end, I shall have +lived between Montmartre and Batignolles: a tortoise dreaming that he is +a swallow--" + +"Ramel, my dear fellow," said the minister, "would you wish me to give +you a mission where you could go and study whatever seemed good to you?" + +"With my rheumatism? Thanks, your Excellency!" said Ramel, smiling. "No, +I am too old, and never having asked any one for anything, I am not +going to begin at my age." + +"You do not ask, it is offered you." + +"Well, I have no desire for that. I am at the hour of the _far niente_ +that precedes the final slumber. It is a pleasant condition. One has +seen so many things and persons that one has no further desires." + +"The fact is," said the minister, "that if all the people you have +obligated in your life had solicited an invitation from Madame Marsy, +these salons would not be large enough to contain them." + +"Bah! they have all forgotten as I have, myself," said Ramel, with a +shake of his head and smiling pleasantly. + +Vaudrey felt intense pleasure in meeting, in the midst of this crowd of +indifferent or admiring persons, the man who had formerly seen him +arrive in Paris, and with whom he had corresponded from the heart of his +province, as with a kinsman. There was, in fact, between them, a +relationship of mind and soul that united this veteran of the press with +this young statesman. + +The ideal sought was the same, but the temperaments were different. +Ramel, although he had known them, had for a long time avoided those +excitements of struggle and power that inflamed Vaudrey's blood. + +"It was a glorious day when my pulse became regulated," he said. +"Experience brought me the needed tonic." + +Denis Ramel was a wise man. He took life as he found it, without +enthusiasm as without bitterness. He was not wealthy. More than sixty +years old, he found himself, after a life of hard, rough and continuous +struggle, as badly off as when he started out on his career, full of +burning hopes. He had passed his life honorably as a journalist--a +journalist of the good old times, of the school of thought, not of +news-tellers,--he had loyally and conscientiously exercised a profession +in which he took pleasure; he had read much, written much, consumed much +midnight oil, touched upon everything; put his fingers into every kind +of pie without soiling them, and after having valiantly turned the heavy +millstone of daily labor incessantly renewed for forty years, he had +reached the end of his journey, the brink of the grave, almost +penniless, after having skirted Fortune and seen Opportunity float +toward him her perfumed and intoxicating locks more than a hundred +times. Bent, weary, almost forgotten, and unknown and misunderstood by +the new generation, that styled this enthusiasm, more eager, moreover, +than that of juvenile faith, "old"--he saw the newcomers rise as he +might have beheld the descent of La Courtille. + +"It amuses me." + +Ramel had, in the course of his career as a publicist, as a dealer in +fame, assisted without taking part therein, in the formation of +syndicates, allotments of shares and financial intrigues; and putting +his shoulder to the wheel of enterprises that appeared to him to be +solid, while seeking to strike out those which appeared to be doubtful, +he had created millionaires without asking a cent from them, just as he +had made ministers without accepting even a thread of ribbon at their +hands. + +This infatuating craft of a maker of men pleased him. All those pioneers +in the great human comedy, he had seen on their entrance, hesitating and +crying to him for assistance. This statesman, swelling out with his +importance in the tribune, had received the benefit of his correction of +his earlier harangues. He had encouraged, during his competition for the +Prix de Rome, this member of the Institute who to-day represented +national art at the Villa Médicis; he had seen this composer, now a +millionaire, beg for a private rehearsal as he might ask alms, and slip +into one's hands concert tickets for the Herz hall. He was the first to +point out the verses of the poet who now wore _l'habit vert_. He had +first heralded the fame of the actor now in vogue, of the tenor who +to-day had his villas at Nice, yes, Ramel was the first to say: "He is +one of the chosen few!" + +Old, weary and knowing, very gentle and refined in his banter, and +refusing to be blinded or irritated by the trickeries of destiny, Denis +Ramel, when asked why, at his age and with his talents, he was neither a +deputy, nor a millionaire, nor a member of the Institute, but only a +Warwick living like a poor devil, smiled and said, with the tone of a +man who has probed to the bottom the affairs of life: + +"Bah! what is the use? All that is not so very desirable. Ministers, +academicians, millionaires, prefects, men of power, I know all about +them. I have made them all my life. The majority of those who strut +about at this very time, well! well! it is I who made them!" + +And, like a philosopher allowing the rabble to pass him, who might have +been their chief, but preferred to be their judge, he locked himself in +his apartments with his books, his pictures, his engravings, his little +collection slowly gathered year by year, article by article, smoking his +pipe tranquilly, and at times reviewing the pages of his life, just as +he might have fingered the leaves of a portfolio of engravings, thinking +when he chanced to meet some notable person of the day who shunned him +or merely saluted him curtly and stiffly: + +"You were not so proud when you came to ask me to certify your pay-slip +for the cashier of the journal." + +Ramel had always greatly esteemed Sulpice Vaudrey. This man seemed to +him to be more refined and less forgetful than others. Vaudrey had never +"posed." As a minister, he recalled with deep emotion the period of his +struggles. Ramel, the former manager of the _Nation Française_, was one +of the objects of his affection and admiration. He would have been +delighted to snatch this man from his seclusion and place him in the +first rank, to make this sexagenarian who had created and moulded so +many others, noteworthy by a sudden stroke. + +Amid the tumultuous throng, and feeling overjoyed to find once more one +whom he could trust, to whom he could abandon himself entirely, he +repeated to him in all sincerity: + +"Come, Ramel! Would you consent to be my secretary general?" + +"No! your Excellency," Ramel answered, as a kindly smile played beneath +his white moustaches. + +"To oblige me?--To help me?" + +"No--Why, I am an egotist, my dear Vaudrey. Truly, that would make me +too jealous. Take Navarrot," he added, as he pointed to a fashionable +man, elegantly cravatted, carrying his head high, who had just greeted +Vaudrey, using the same phrase eight times: "My dear minister--your +Excellency--my minister--" + +"Navarrot?" + +"He appears to be very much attached to you!" + +"You are very wicked, Ramel. He holds to the office and not to the man. +He is not the friend of the minister, but of ministers. He is one of the +ordinary touters of the ministry. He applauds everything that their +Excellencies choose to say." + +"Oh! I know those touters," said the old journalist. "When a minister is +in power, they cheer him to the echo; when he is down, they belabor +him." + +Vaudrey looked at him and laughingly said: "Begone, journalist!" + +"But at any rate,"--and here he extended his hand to Ramel,--"you will +see me this evening?" + +"Certainly." + +"And you still live at--?" + +"Rue Boursault, Boulevard des Batignolles." + +"Till then, my dear Ramel! If occasion require, you will not refuse to +give me your advice?" + +"Nor my devotion. But without office, remember without office," said +Ramel, still smiling. + +Vaudrey took great delight in chatting with his old friend, but for a +moment he had been seized with an eager desire to find amid the +increasing crowd that thronged the salons, the pretty girl who had +appeared to him like a statue of Desire, whetted desire, but even in her +charms somewhat unwholesome, yet disturbing and appetizing. + +He had come to Sabine Marsy's only by chance and as if to display in +public the joy of his triumph, just as a newly decorated man willingly +accepts invitations in order to show off his new ribbon, but he now felt +happy for having done so. He had promised himself only to put himself in +evidence and then disappear with Adrienne to the enjoyment of their +usual chats, to taste that intimacy that was so dear to him, but which, +since his establishment on Place Beauvau, had vanished. + +He habitually disliked such receptions as that in which he now took +part, those soirées as fatiguing as those crowds where one packs six +hundred persons in salons capable of holding only sixty: commonplace +receptions, where the master of the house is as happy when he refuses +invitations as a theatre-manager when his play is the rage; where one is +stifled, crushed, and where one can only reach the salon after a +pugilistic encounter, and where the capture of a glass of syrup entails +an assault, and the securing of an overcoat demands a battle. He held in +horror those salons where there is no conversation, where no one is +acquainted, where, because of the hubbub of the crowd or the stifling +silence attending a concert, one cannot exchange either ideas or +phrases, not even a furtive handshake, because of the packing and +crushing of the guests. It was a miracle that he had just been able to +exchange a few words with Mademoiselle Kayser and Ramel. The vulgarity +of the place had at once impressed him,--the more so because he was the +object of attraction for all those crowded faces. + +All that gathering of insignificant, grave and pretentious young men, +who, while they crowded, made their progress in the ranks of the +sub-prefects, councillors of prefectures, picking up nominations under +the feet of the influential guests as they would cigar stumps, disgusted +him; men of twenty years, born, as it were, with white cravats, +pretentious and pensive, creatures of office and not of work, haunting +the Chambers and the antechambers, mere collectors of ideas, repeaters +of serious commonplaces, salon democrats who would not offer their +ungloved hand to a workman on the street; staff-majors ambitious of +honors and not of devotion, whom he felt crowding around him, with +smiles on their lips and applications in their pockets. How he preferred +the quiet pleasure of reading at the fireside, a chat with a friend, or +listening to one of Beethoven's sonatas, or a selection from Mendelssohn +played by Adrienne, whose companionship made the unmarked flight of the +hours pass more sweetly. + +It was for that that he was created. At least he thought so and believed +it. And now this salon that he had simply desired to traverse, at once +seemed altogether delightful to him. And all this was due to his meeting +a divine creature in the midst of this crowd. He was eager to find +Marianne, to see her again. She aroused his curiosity as some enigma +might. + +What, then, was this woman, was she virtuous or of questionable status? +Ah! she was a woman, or rather ten women in one, at the very least! A +woman from head to foot! A woman to her finger tips, a refined, Parisian +woman, perverse even in her virginity, and a virgin perhaps in her +perversity. A problem in fair flesh. + +As Vaudrey hurriedly left the buffet, every one made way for him, and he +crossed the salons, eagerly looking out for Marianne. As he passed +along, he saw Guy de Lissac sitting on a chair upholstered in garnet +satin, his right hand resting on the gilded back and chatting with +Adrienne who was fanning herself leisurely. On noticing Sulpice, the +young woman smiled at him even at a distance, the happy smile of a +loving woman, and she embraced him with a pure glance, asking a question +without uttering a word, knowing well that he habitually left in great +haste. + +"Do you wish to return?" was the meaning of her questioning glance. + +He passed before her, replying with a smile, but without appearing to +have understood her, and disappeared in another salon, while Lissac said +to Adrienne: + +"What about the ministry, madame?" + +"Oh! don't speak to me of it!--it frightens me. In those rooms, it seems +to me that I am not at home. Do you know just what I feel? I fancy +myself travelling, never, however, leaving the house. Ministers +certainly should be bachelors. Men have all the honor, but their wives +endure all the weariness." + +"There must, however, be at the bottom of this weariness, some pleasure, +since they so bitterly regret to take leave of it." + +"Ah! _Dieu!_" said Adrienne. "Already I believe that I should regret +nothing. No, I assure you, nothing whatever." + +She, too, might have desired,--as Vaudrey did formerly--to leave the +soirée, to be with her husband again, and she thought that Sulpice found +it necessary to remain longer, since he had not definitely decided on +going away. + +The new salon that he entered, communicated with a smaller, circular +one, hung with Japanese silk draperies, and lighted by a Venetian +chandelier that cast a subdued light over the divans upon which some of +the guests sat chatting. Sulpice immediately divined, as if by instinct, +that Marianne was there. He went straight in that direction, and as he +entered the doorway, through the opening framed by two pale blue +portières, he saw in front of him, sitting side by side, the pretty girl +and the Duc de Rosas to whom she had listened so attentively, almost +devotedly, a little earlier; he recalled this now. + +The light fell directly on Mademoiselle Kayser's shoulders and played +over her fair hair. The duke was looking at her. + +Vaudrey took but a single step forward. + +He experienced an altogether curious and inexplicable sensation. This +tête-à-tête displeased him. + +At that moment, on half-turning round,--perhaps by chance--she perceived +the minister and greeting him with a sweet smile, she rose and beckoned +to him to approach her. + +The sky-blue satin hangings, on which the light fell, seemed like a +natural framework for the beautiful blonde creature. + +"Your Excellency," she said, "permit me to introduce my friend, the Duc +de Rosas, he is too accomplished not to appreciate eloquence and he +entertains the greatest admiration for you." + +Rosas had risen in his turn, and greeted the minister with a very +peculiar half-inclination, not as a suitor in the presence of a powerful +man, but as a nobleman greeting a man of talent. + +Vaudrey sought to discover an agreeable word in the remarks of this man +but he failed to do so. He had, nevertheless, just before applauded +Rosas's remarks, either out of condescension or from politeness. But it +seemed to him that here the duke was no longer the same man. He gave him +the impression of an intruder who had thrust himself in the way that led +to some possible opportunity. He nevertheless concealed all trace of the +ill-humor that he himself could not define or explain, and ended by +uttering a commonplace phrase in praise of the duke, but which really +meant nothing. + +As he was about to move away, Marianne detained him by a gesture: + +"Well, your Excellency," she remarked, with a charming play of her lips +as she smiled, "you see,"--and she pointed to the blue draperies of the +little salon, as dainty as a boudoir--"you see that there are some women +who like blue." + +"Yes, Madame Marsy!--" Vaudrey answered, with an entirely misplaced +irony that naturally occurred to him, as a reproach. + +"So do I," said Marianne. "We have only chatted together five minutes, +but I have found that time enough to discover that you and I have many +tastes in common. I am greatly flattered thereby." + +"And I am very happy," replied Vaudrey, who was disturbed by her direct +glances that pierced him like a blade. + +She had resumed her place on the divan, but Vaudrey had already forgiven +her tête-à-tête with Rosas--and in truth, what had he to forgive?--This +burning glance had effaced everything. He bore it away like a bright ray +and still shuddered at the sensation he experienced. + +He was in a hurry to leave. He now felt a sudden attack of nervousness. +He was at the same moment charmed and bored. Again he resumed--amid the +throng that made way for him, humbly performing its duty as a crowd--his +rôle of minister, raising his head, and greeting with his official +smile, but, at the bottom of his heart, really consumed by an entirely +different thought. His brain was full of blue, of floating clouds, and +he still heard Marianne's voice ringing in his ears with an insinuating +tone, whispering: "We have many tastes in common," together with all +kinds of mutual understandings which, as it were, burned like a fire in +his heart. + +He saw Adrienne still seated in the same place and smiling sweetly at +him,--a smile of ardent devotion, but which seemed to him to be +lukewarm. He leaned toward her, reached his hands out and said to De +Lissac, hurriedly, as he grasped his hand: "We meet later, do we not, +Guy?" Then he disappeared in the antechamber, while the servants +hurried toward Madame Vaudrey, bearing her cloak, and as Vaudrey put on +his overcoat, a voice called out: + +"His Excellency's carriage." + +"I am exhausted," said Adrienne, when she had taken her place in the +carriage. "What about yourself?" + +"I? not at all! I am not at all tired. It was very entertaining! One +must show one's self now--" + +"I know that very well," the young wife replied. + +Like a child who is anxious to go to sleep, she gently rested her +hood-covered head on Sulpice's shoulder. Her tiny hands sought her +husband's hand, to press it beneath her cloak, as warm as a nest; and +after she had closed her eyes, overcome as she was by weariness, her +breathing seemed to become gradually almost as regular as in slumber, +and Sulpice Vaudrey recalled once more, beneath the light of the +chandeliers, that pretty blonde, with her half-bare arms and shoulders, +and strange eyes, who moistened her dry lips and smiled as she swallowed +her sherbet. + + + + +VI + + +In the pretty little Japanese salon, with its panels of sky-blue satin, +framed with gilded bamboo, Marianne was seated on the divan, half-facing +the duke as if to penetrate his inward thoughts, and she seemed to the +Castilian as she did to Vaudrey, to be a most charming creature amid +all those surroundings that might have been made expressly to match her +fair beauty. Moreover, with Rosas, her freedom of manner was entirely +different from that which she manifested to Sulpice, and she embraced +the young man with a passionate, fervent glance. + +José felt himself grow pale in the presence of this exquisite creature +whose image, treasured in the depths of his heart, he had borne with him +wherever his fancy had led him to travel. He gazed at her as a man looks +at a woman whom he has long desired, but whom some urgent necessity has +kept out of his way, and who by chance is suddenly brought near him, +fate putting within our reach the dream-- + +She was prettier than ever, graceful and blooming, "more matured," like +a fruit whose color is more tempting to the appetite. Sabine had just +before very naturally brought these two together and instinctively, as +if they had to exchange many confidences, they had immediately sought a +retired spot away from that crowd and were seated there in that salon +where Vaudrey, already half-jealous, guessed that Marianne would be. + +Yes, indeed, she had many confidences to impart to that man who had +suddenly entered the sphere of her life and had suddenly disappeared, +remaining during several years as if dead to her. It seemed to her as +they sat face to face that this flight of wasted time had made her still +younger, and Rosas, notwithstanding his cold demeanor, allowed his +former passion to be divined: the women one loves unmask one's secret +before a man can himself explain what he feels. + +She felt a profound, sincere joy. She recalled a similar conversation +with José in his studio, that Oriental corner hidden in the Rue de +Laval. The Japanese satin enhanced the illusion. + +"Do you know that it seems to me," she said, "that I have been dreaming, +and that I am not a whit older?" + +"You are not altered, in fact," said Rosas. "I am mistaken--" + +"Yes, I know. I have grown lovelier. That is a compliment that I am used +to--Lissac has told me that already, only the other morning." + +She bit her lips almost imperceptibly, as if to blame herself for her +imprudence, but had she mentioned Guy's name designedly, she could not +have been better satisfied with the result. Monsieur de Rosas, usually +very pale, became pallid, and a slight curl of his lip, although +immediately suppressed, gave an upward turn to his reddish moustache. + +"Ah!" he said, "You still see Guy." + +"I!--I had not spoken a single word to him until I asked him to have an +invitation sent me for this soirée, and then it was merely because I +knew you would be here." + +"Ah!" said José again, without adding a word. + +Marianne was satisfied. She knew now that the duke still loved her, +since the mention of Lissac's name had made him tremble. Well! she had +shrewdly understood her Rosas. + +"And what have you been doing, my dear duke, for such an age?" she said. + +She looked at him as she had looked at Vaudrey, with her sweet and +shrewd smile, which moved him profoundly, and her glance penetrated to +the inmost depths of his being. + +"You know the old saying: 'I have lived.' It is great folly, perhaps, +but it is the truth." + +"And I wager," boldly said Marianne, "that you have never thought of +me." + +"Of you?" + +"Of me. Of that mad Marianne, who is the maddest creature of all those +you have met in your travels from the North Pole to Cambodia, but who +has by no means a wicked heart, although a sufficiently unhappy one, and +that has never ceased to beat a little too rapidly at certain +reminiscences which you do not recall, perhaps--who knows?" + +"I remember everything," replied the duke in a grave voice. + +Marianne looked at him and commenced to laugh. + +"Oh! how you say that, _mon Dieu!_ Do you remember I used to call you +Don Carlos? Well, you have just reminded me of Philip II. 'I remember +everything!' B-r-r! what a funereal tone. Our reminiscences are not, +however, very dramatic." + +"That depends on the good or ill effects that they cause," said Rosas +very seriously. + +"Ah! God forgive me if I have ever willingly done you the least harm, my +dear Rosas. Give me your hand. I have always loved you dearly, my +friend." + +She drew him gently toward her, half bending her face under the cold +glance of the young man: + +"Look at me closely and see if I lie." + +The duke actually endeavored to read the gray-blue eyes of Marianne; but +so strange a flash darted from them, that he recoiled, withdrawing his +hands from the pressure of those fingers. + +"Come, come!" she said, "I see that my cat-like eyes still make you +afraid. Are they, then, very dreadful?" + +She changed their expression to one of sweetness, humility, timidity and +winsomeness. + +"After all, that is something to be proud of, my dear duke. It is very +flattering to make a man tremble who has killed tigers as our sportsmen +kill partridges." + +"You know very well why I am still sufficiently a child to tremble +before you, Marianne," murmured José. "At my age, it is folly; but I am +as superstitious as gamblers--or sailors, those other gamblers, who +stake their lives, and I have never met you without feeling that I was +about to suffer." + +"To suffer from what?" + +"To suffer through you," said the duke. "Do you know that if I had +never met you, it is probable that I should never have seen all those +countries of which I spoke just now, and that I should have been married +long ago, at Madrid or at Toledo?" + +"And I prevented you?--" + +Rosas interrupted Marianne, saying abruptly, and smiling almost sadly: + +"Ah! my dear one, if you only knew--you have prevented many things." + +"If I have prevented you from being unhappy, I am delighted. Besides, it +is evident that you have never had a very determined inclination for +marriage, seeing that you have preferred to trot around the world." + +"Like Don Quixote, eh? Do you know, moreover, since we are talking of +all these things, that you have saved me from dying in the corner like +an abandoned dog?" + +"I?" said Marianne. + +"You or your songs, as you please. Yes, in Egypt I suffered from fever +something like typhus. They left me for dead, as after a battle, in the +most wretched and frightful of native villages. No doctors, who might, +perhaps, have cured me, not a bed, not even a mattress. My servants, +believing me past hope, abandoned me--or rather, for I prefer your +Parisian word--cast me adrift--there is no other expression. There I +was, stretched out on a heap of damp straw--in short, on a dunghill--" + +"You, Rosas?" + +"In all conscience, I correctly portrayed Job there; lean, with a three +months' old beard, and with the death-rattle in my throat; in the open +air--don't alarm yourself, the nights were warm. In the evening the +fellah-women gathered round me, while I watched the sun that tinted +their cheeks with bronze--there were some pretty ones among them, I have +painted them in water-colors from memory--they poured out their insults +upon me in guttural tones, which I unfortunately understood, as I am an +Orientalist,"--he smiled--"and in addition to those insults they threw +mud at me, a fetid mass of filth. The women were charming, although they +took part in it. These people did not like the _roumi_, the shivering +Christian. Besides, women do not like men who have fallen. They do not +like feeble creatures.--" + +"Bah!--and where were the hospitals, the Sisters of Charity?" + +"Are you quite sure that the Sisters of Charity are women, my dear +Marianne?--In a word, I swear that I asked only one thing, as I lay on +that devilish, poisonous dunghill, and that was, to end the matter in +the quickest possible way, that I might be no longer thought of, +when--don't know why, or, rather, I know very well--in my fever, a +certain voice reached me--whence?--from far away it commenced +humming,--I should proclaim it yours among a thousand--a ridiculously +absurd refrain that we heard together one evening at the Variétés, at +an anniversary celebration. And this Boulevard chant recurred to me +there in the heart of that desert, and transported me at a single bound +to Paris, and I saw you again and these fair locks that I now look at, I +saw them, too, casting upon your forehead the light shadow that they do +now. I heard your laugh. I actually felt that I had you beside me in one +of the stage-boxes at the theatre, listening to the now forgotten singer +humming the refrain that had so highly amused you, Guy and myself--" + +It seemed to Marianne that the duke hesitated for a moment before +pronouncing Guy's name. It was an almost imperceptible hesitation, +rather felt than seen. + +Rosas quickly recovered: + +"On my word, you will see directly that the Boulevard lounger was hidden +under your gloomy Castilian,--that refrain took such a hold on my poor +wandering brain, such an entire possession, that I clung to it when the +fever was at its height--I hummed it again and again, and on my honor, +it banished the fever, perhaps by some homeopathic process, for at any +other time, this deuced refrain would have aroused a fever in me." + +"Why?--Because it was I who formerly hummed it?" + +"Yes," said Rosas in a lowered tone. "Well! yes, just for that +reason!--" + +He drew closer to her on the divan, and she said to him, laughingly: + +"How fortunate it is that Faure is singing yonder! He attracts +everybody and so leaves us quite alone in this salon. It is very +pleasant. Would you like to go and applaud Faure? It is some years since +I heard him." + +"You are very malicious, Marianne," said the duke. "Let me steal this +happy, fleeting hour. I am very happy." + +"You are happy?" + +"Profoundly happy, and simply because I am near you, listening to you +and looking at you--" + +"My poor Job," she said, still laughing, "would you like me to sing you +the refrain that we heard at the Variétés?" + +De Rosas did not reply, but simply looked at her. + +He felt as if he were surrounded with all the perfume of youth. On a +console beside Marianne, stood a vase of inlaid enamel containing sprigs +of white lilacs which as she leaned forward, surrounded her fair head as +with an aureole of spring. Her locks were encircled with milk-white +flowers and bright green leaves, transparent and clear, like the limpid +green of water; and at times these sprigs were gently shaken, dropping a +white bud on Marianne's hair, that looked like a drop of milk amid a +heap of ruddy gold. + +Ah! how at this moment, all the poetry, all the past with its +unacknowledged love swelled Rosas's heart and rushed to his lips. In +this brilliantly-lighted salon, under the blaze of the lights, amid the +shimmering reflections of the satin draperies, he forgot everything in +his rapture at the presence of this woman, lovely to adoration, whose +glance penetrated his very veins and filled him with restless thoughts. + +The distant music, gentle, penetrating and languishing, some soothing +air from Gounod, reached them like a gentle breeze wafted into the room. + +José believed himself to be in a dream. + +"Ah! if you only knew, madame," he said, becoming more passionate with +each word that he spoke, as if he had been gulping down some liqueur, +"if you only knew how you have travelled with me everywhere, in thought, +there, carried with me like a scapular--" + +"My portrait?" said Marianne. "I remember it. I was very slender then, +prettier, a young girl, in fact." + +"No! no! not your portrait. I tore that up in a fit of frenzy." + +"Tore it up?" + +"Yes, as I thought that those eyes, those lips and that brow belonged to +another." + +Marianne's cheeks became pallid. + +"But I have taken with me something better than that portrait: I +preserved you, you were always present, and pretty, so pretty--as you +are now, Marianne--Look at yourself! No one could be lovelier!" + +"And why," she said slowly, speaking in a deep, endearing tone, "why did +you not speak to me thus, of old?" + +"Ah! of old!" said the duke angrily. + +She allowed her head to fall on the back of the divan; looking at this +man as she well knew how, and insensibly creeping closer to him, she +breathed in his ears these burning words: + +"Formerly, one who was your friend was beside me, is that not so?" + +"Do not speak to me of him," José said abruptly. + +"On the contrary, I am determined to tell you that even if I had loved +him, I should not have hesitated for a moment to leave him and follow +you. But I did not love him." + +"Marianne!" + +"You won't believe me? I never loved him. I have never been his +mistress." + +"I do not ask your secret. I do not speak of him," said the duke, who +had now become deadly pale. + +"And I am determined to speak to you of him. Never, you understand, +never was Guy de Lissac my lover. No, in spite of appearances; he has +never even kissed my lips. I thought I loved him, but before yielding, I +had time to discover that I did not love him! And I waited, I swear to +you, expecting that you would say to me: 'I love you!'" + +"I?" + +"You," said Marianne, in a feeble tone. "You never guessed then?" + +And she crept with an exquisitely undulating movement still closer to +Rosas, who, as if drawn by some magnetic fluid, surrendered his face to +this woman with the wandering eyes, half-open lips, from which a gentle +sigh escaped and died away in the duke's hair. + +He said nothing, but hastily seizing Marianne's hand, he drew her face +close to his lips, her pink nostrils dilated as if the better to breathe +the incense of love; and wild, distracted, intoxicated, he pressed his +feverish, burning lips upon that fresh mouth that he felt exhaled the +perfume of a flower that opens to the morning dew. + +"I love you now, I loved you then!--" Marianne said to him, after that +kiss that paled his cheeks. + +Rosas had risen: a thunder of applause greeted the termination of a song +in the other salon and the throng was pouring into the smaller salon. +Marianne saw Uncle Kayser, who was arguing with Ramel, whose kindly, +lean face wore an expression of weariness. She also rose, grasped the +duke's hands with a nervous pressure and said as she still gazed at him: + +"There is my uncle. We shall see each other again, shall we not?" + +She crushed Rosas with her electric glance. + +Preceding the duke, she went straight to Kayser and took his arm, +leaning on it as if to show that she was not alone, that she had a +natural protector, and was not, as Rosas might have supposed, a girl +without any position. + +Kayser was almost astonished at the eagerness of his niece. + +"Let us go!" she said to him. + +"What! leave? Why, there is to be a supper." + +"Well! we will sup at the studio," she replied nervously. "We will +discuss the morality of art." + +She had now attained her end. She realized that anything she might add +would cool the impression already made on the duke. She wished to leave +him under the intoxication of that kiss. + +"Let us go!" said Kayser, drawing himself up in an ill-humored way. +"Since you wish it--what a funny idea!--Ramel," he said, extending his +hand to the old journalist, "if your feelings prompt you, I should like +to show you some canvases." + +"I go out so rarely," said Ramel. + +"Huron!" said the painter. + +"Puritan!" said Marianne, also offering her hand to Denis Ramel. + +Rosas looked after her and saw her disappear amongst the guests in the +other salon, under the bright flood of light shed by the chandeliers; +and when she was gone, it seemed to him that the little Japanese salon +was positively empty and that night had fallen on it. Profound ennui at +once overcame him, while Marianne, in a happy frame of mind, on +returning to Kayser's studio, reviewed the incidents of that evening, +recalling Vaudrey's restless smile, and seeming again to hear Rosas's +confidences, while she thought: "He spoke to me of the past almost in +the same terms as Lissac. Is human nature at the bottom merely +commonplace, that two men of entirely different characters make almost +identical confessions?" While she was recalling that passionate moment, +the duke was experiencing a feeling of disappointment because of their +interrupted conversation, and he reproached himself for not having +followed Marianne, for having allowed her to escape without telling +her-- + +But what had he to tell her? + +He had said everything. He had entirely surrendered, had opened his +soul, as transparent as crystal. And this notwithstanding that he had +vowed in past days that he would keep his secret locked within him. He +had smothered his love under his frigid Castilian demeanor. And now, +suddenly, like a child, on the first chance meeting with that woman, he +had allowed himself to be drawn into a confession that he had been +rigidly withholding! + +Ah! it was because he loved her, and had always loved her. There was +only one woman in the whole world for him,--this one. He did not lie. +Marianne's smile haunted him, wherever he was. In her glance was a +poison that he had drunk, which set his blood on fire. He was hers. +Except for the image of Lissac, he would most certainly have returned +long since to Paris to seek Mademoiselle Kayser. + +But Lissac was there. He recalled how much Guy had loved her. He had +more than once made the third in their company. He had often accompanied +Lissac to Marianne's door. How then had she dared to say just now that +she had never been his mistress? + +But how was he to believe her? + +And why, after all, should she have lied? What interest had she?-- + +In proportion as Rosas considered the matter, he grew more angry with +himself, and in the very midst of the crowd, he was seized with a +violent attack of frenzy, such as at times suddenly determined him to +seek absolute solitude. He was eager to escape. + +In order to avoid Madame Marsy, who was perhaps seeking him, he slipped +through the groups of people and reached the door without being seen, +leaving without formal salutation, as the English do. + +He was in the hall, putting on his overcoat, while a servant turned up +its otter-fur collar, when he heard Guy say: + +"You are going, my dear duke? Shall we bear each other company?" + +The idea was not distasteful to Rosas. Involuntarily, perhaps, he +thought that a conversation with Lissac was, in some way, a _chat_ with +Marianne. These two beings were coupled in his recollections and +preoccupations; besides, he really liked Guy. The Parisian was the +complement of the Castilian. They had so many reminiscences in common: +fêtes, suppers, sorrows, Parisian sadnesses, girls who sobbed to the +measure of a waltz. Then they had not seen each other for so long. + +Rosas experienced a certain degree of pleasure in finding himself once +more on the boulevard with Guy. It made him feel young again. Every +whiff of smoke that ascended from his cigar in the fresh air, seemed to +breathe so many exhalations of youth. They had formerly ground out so +many paradoxes as they strolled thus arm in arm, taking their recreation +through Paris. + +In a very little time, and after the exchange of a few words, they had +bridged the long gap of years, of travel and separation. They expressed +so much in so few words. Rosas, as if invincibly attracted by the name +of Marianne, was the first to pronounce it, while Guy listened with an +impassive air to the duke's interrogations. + +In this way they went toward the boulevard, along which the rows of +gas-jets flamed like some grand illumination. + +"Paris!" said Rosas, "has a singular effect on one. It resumes its +dominion over one at once on seeing it again, and it seems as if one had +never left it. I have hardly unpacked my trunks, and here I am again +transformed into a Parisian." + +"Paris is like absinthe!" said Guy. "As soon as one uncorks the bottle, +one commences to drink it again." + +"Absinthe! there you are indeed, you Frenchmen, who everlastingly +calumniate your country. What an idea, comparing Paris with absinthe!" + +"A Parisian's idea, _parbleu!_ You have not been here two days and you +are already intoxicated with _Parisine_, you said so yourself. The +hasheesh of the boulevard." + +"Perhaps it is not _Parisine_ only that has, in fact, affected my +brain," said Rosas. + +"No doubt, it is also the _Parisienne_. Madame Marsy is very pretty." + +"Charming," said Rosas coldly. + +"Less charming than Mademoiselle Kayser!" + +Guy sent a whiff of smoke from his cigar floating on the night breeze, +while awaiting the duke's reply; but José pursued his way beside his +friend, without uttering a word, as if he were suddenly absorbed, and +Lissac, who had allowed the conversation to lapse, sought to reopen it: +"Then," he said suddenly,--dropping the name of Mademoiselle +Kayser:--"You will be in Paris for some time, Rosas?" + +"I do not in the least know." + +"You will not, I hope, set out again for the East?" + +"Oh! you know what a strange fellow I am. It won't do to challenge me +to!" + +Lissac laughed. + +"I don't challenge you at all, I only ask you not to leave the +fortifications hereafter. We shall gain everything. You are not a +Spaniard, you are a born Parisian, as I have already told you a hundred +times. If I were in your place, I would set myself up here and stick to +Paris. Since it is the best place in the world, why look for another?" + +"My dear Guy," interrupted the duke, who had not listened, "will you +promise to answer me, with all frankness, a delicate, an absurd +question, if you will, one of those questions that is not generally put, +but which I am going to ask you, nevertheless, without preface, +point-blank?" + +"To it and to any others that you put me, my dear duke, I will answer as +an honest man and a friend should." + +"Have you been much in love with Mademoiselle Kayser?" + +"Very much." + +"And has she loved you--a little?" + +"Not at all." + +"That is not what she has just told me." + +"Ah!" said Lissac, as he threw away his cigar. "You spoke of me, then?" + +"She told me that she believed she loved you sincerely." + +"That is just what I had the pleasure of telling you." + +"And--Marianne?--" + +"Marianne?" repeated Lissac, who perfectly understood the question from +De Rosas's hesitation. + +"My dear friend, when a man feels sufficiently anxious, or sufficiently +weak, or sufficiently smitten, whichever you please, to stake his life +on the throw of the dice, he is permitted to put one of those misplaced +questions to which I have just referred. Well! you can tell me what, +perhaps, none other than I would dare to ask you: Have you been +Marianne's lover?" + +Before replying, Guy took the arm of the duke in a friendly way, and, +leaning upon it, felt that it trembled nervously. Then, touching his +hand by chance, he observed that Rosas was in a burning fever. + +"My dear fellow, it is the everlasting question of honor between men and +of duty to a woman that you put before me. Had I been Marianne's lover, +I should be bound to tell you that Marianne had never been my mistress. +These falsehoods are necessary. No; I have not been Marianne's lover, +but I advise you, if you do not wish to be perfectly miserable, not to +seek to become so. You are one of those men who throw their hearts open +as wide as a gateway. She is a calculating creature, who pursues, madly +enough I admit, without consistency or constancy in her ideas, any plan +that she may have in view. She might be flattered to have you as a +suitor, as I was, or as a lover, as I have been assured others were. I +do not affirm this, remember; but she will never be moved by your +affection. She is a pure Parisian, and is incapable of loving you as +you deserve, but you could not deceive her, as they say she has been." + +"Deceived?" asked Rosas, in a tone of pity that struck Lissac. + +"Deceived! yes! deceit is the complementary school of love." + +"Then--if I loved Marianne?" asked Rosas. + +"I would advise you to tell it to her at first, and prove it afterward, +and finally to catalogue it in that album whose ashes are sprinkled at +the bottom of the marriage gifts." + +"You speak of Mademoiselle Kayser as you would speak of a courtesan," +said the duke, in a choking voice. + +"Ah! I give you my word," said Lissac, "that I should speak very +differently of Mademoiselle Alice Aubry, or of Mademoiselle Cora +Touchard. I would say to you quite frankly: They are pretty creatures; +there is no danger." + +"And Marianne, on the contrary, is dangerous." + +"Oh! perfectly, for you." + +"And why is she not dangerous for you?" + +"Why, simply, my dear duke, because I am satisfied to love her as you +have hitherto done and because I had, as I told you, the good fortune +not to be her lover." + +"But you brought her to Madame Marsy's this evening?" + +"Oh! her uncle accompanied us, but I was there." + +"You offer your arm then to a woman whom, as you have just told me, you +consider dangerous?" + +"Not for Sabine!--and then, that is a drop of the absinthe, a little of +the hasheesh of which I spoke to you. One sees only concessions in +Paris, and even when one is dead, one needs a further concession, but in +perpetuity. One only becomes one's self"--and Guy's jesting tone became +serious,--"when a worthy fellow like you puts one a question that seems +terribly like asking advice. Then one answers him, as I have just +answered you, and cries out to him: 'Beware!'" + +"I thank you," said Rosas, suddenly stopping short on the pavement. "You +treat me like a true friend." + +"And if I seem to you to be too severe," added Lissac, smiling, "charge +that to the account of bitterness. A man that has loved a woman is never +altogether just toward her. If he has ceased to love her, he slights +her, if he still loves her, he slanders her. I have perhaps, traduced +Marianne, but I have not slighted you, that is certain. Now, take +advantage of this gossip. But when?" + +"I don't know," replied the duke. "I will write you. I shall perhaps +leave Paris!" + +"What is that?" + +"Just what I say." + +"The deuce!" said Lissac. "Do you know that if you were to fly from the +danger in question, I should be very uneasy? It would be very serious." + +"That would not be a flight. At the most, a caprice," the duke replied. + +They separated, less pleased with each other than they were at the +commencement of their interview. Lissac felt that in some fashion or +other, he had wounded Rosas even in adopting the flippant tone of the +lounger, without any malice, and the Spaniard with his somewhat morose +nature, retired within himself, almost gloomy, and reproached Guy for +the first time for smiling or jesting on so serious a matter. + +Discontented with himself, he entered his house. His servant was waiting +for him. He brought him a blue envelope on a card-tray. + +"A telegram for monsieur le duc." + +Rosas tore it open in a mechanical way. It was from one of his London +friends, Lord Lindsay, who having learned of Rosas's return, sent him a +pressing invitation. If he did not hasten to Paris to welcome him, it +was simply because grave political affairs demanded his presence in +London. + +The duke, while taking off his gloves, looked at the crumpled despatch +lying under the lamp. He was, like most travellers, superstitious. +Perhaps this despatch had arrived in the nick of time to prevent him +from committing some act of folly. + +But what folly? + +He still felt Marianne's kiss on his lips, burning like ice. +To-morrow,--in a few hours,--his first thought, his only thought would +be to find that woman again, to experience that voluptuous impression, +that dream that had penetrated his heart. A danger, Lissac had said. The +feline eyes of Marianne had a dangerous ardor; but it was their charm, +their strength and their adorable seductiveness, that filtered like a +flame through her long, fair lashes. + +He closed his eyes to picture Mademoiselle Kayser, to inhale the +atmosphere, to enjoy something of the perfume surrounding her. + +A danger! + +Guy was perhaps right. The best love is that which is never gathered, +which remains immature, like a blossom in spring that never becomes a +fruit. Lord Lindsay's despatch arrived seasonably. It was a chance or a +warning. + +In any case, what would Rosas risk by passing a few days in London, and +losing the burning of that kiss? The sea-breezes would perhaps efface +it. + +"I am certainly feverish," the duke thought. "It was assuredly necessary +to speak to Lissac. It was also necessary to speak to her," he added, in +a dissatisfied, anxious, almost angry tone. + +A danger! + +Lissac had acted imprudently in uttering that word, which addressed to +such a man as Rosas, had something alluring about it. What irritated the +duke was Guy's reply, asserting that he had not been Marianne's lover, +but that Marianne had had other lovers. Others? What did Lissac know of +this? A species of jealous frenzy was blended with the feverish desire +that Marianne's kiss had injected into Rosas's veins. He would have +liked to know the truth, to see Marianne again, to urge Guy to further +confidences. And, then, he felt that he would rather not have come, not +have seen her again, not have gone to Sabine's. + +"Well, so be it! Lord Lindsay is right, I will go." + +The following morning, Guy de Lissac found in his mail a brief note, +sealed with the arms of the duke, with the motto: _Hasta la muerte_. + +José wrote to him as he was leaving Paris: + + "You are perhaps right. I am a little intoxicated with + _Parisine_. I am going to London to visit a friend and if I + ever recount my voyages there, it will only be to the + serious-minded members of the Geographical Society. There, at + least, there is no 'danger.' With many thanks and until we meet + again. + + "Your friend, + "J. DE R----" + +"Plague on it," said Lissac, who read the letter three times, "but our +dear duke is badly bitten! _Ohimé!_ Marianne Kayser has had a firm and +sure tooth this time!--We shall see!--" he added, as he broke the seal +of another letter, containing a request for a loan on the part of +someone richer than himself. + + + + +VII + + +The soirée at Sabine Marsy's had caused Vaudrey to feel something like +the enervation that follows intoxication. The next morning he awoke with +his head heavy, after a night of feverish sleep, interrupted by sudden +starts, wherein he saw that pretty, fair girl standing before him +devouring sherbet and smiling gayly. + +Every morning since he had been at the ministry, Sulpice had experienced +a joyous sensation at finding himself again on his feet and rejoicing in +life. He paced about his apartments, feeling a sort of physical delight, +opening his window and looking out on the commonplace garden through +which so many ministers had passed and which he called, as so many +before him had done: _My garden_. His thoughts took him back then to +that little convent garden at Grenoble. What a distance he had travelled +since then! and how good it was to live! + +That morning, on the contrary, the black and bare trees in the garden +appeared to him to be very gloomy. He felt morose. He had been awakened +early so that the despatches from the provinces might be laid before +him. The information in them was quite insignificant. But then his +spirit was not present. Once again he was at Sabine's, beside Marianne, +so lovely in her sky-blue gown, and with her wavy locks. + +If he had been free, he would have gladly sought the opportunity to see +that woman again as soon as the morning commenced. He felt a kind of +infantile joy in being thus perturbed and haunted. It seemed to him that +this emotion made him feel younger. Formerly, on awakening, the dream of +the night had followed him like some intoxication. + +Formerly! but "formerly" he was not the important man, the distinguished +personage of to-day.--He had not the charge of power as some others have +the charge of souls. A minister has something else to do than to be +under the sway of a vision. Sulpice dressed hurriedly, went down to his +office, where a huge log-fire flamed behind an antique screen. He sat +down in front of his large mahogany bureau, covered with papers, and on +which was lying a huge black portfolio stuffed with documents bearing +this title in stamped letters: _Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur_. In +the centre of the bureau had been placed a leather portfolio filled with +sheets of paper bearing the title: _Documents to be signed by Monsieur +le Ministre_. Beside this were spread out various reports, bearing upon +one corner of the sheet a printed headline: _Office of the Prefect of +Police_ and _Director-General of the Press_. + +Vaudrey settled down in his chair with the profound satisfaction of a +man who has not grown weary of an acquired possession. This huge salon +with its blackened pictures, cold marbles, and large, severe-looking +bookcases, presented a sober bourgeois harmony that pleased him. It was +like the salon of a well-to-do notary, with its tall windows overlooking +the courtyard, already full of the shadows of importunate callers and +favor seekers whom the secretary-general received in a room adjoining +the ministerial cabinet. The minister inhaled once more the atmosphere +of his new domicile before settling down to work. Every morning it was +his custom to read the reports of the Director of the Press and of the +Prefect of Police before all else. + +He took up the report of the Prefect. Nothing serious. A slight accident +on the Vincennes line near the fortifications of Paris. A train +derailed. A few injured. In the Passage de l'Opéra, the previous +evening, the early speech of the Minister of the Interior upon general +policy, and that of the Finance Minister, who was to reply to the rumor, +falsely or prematurely announcing the conversion of the five per cents, +had caused an upward movement in value. All was satisfactory, all was +quiet. The new minister enjoyed public confidence. Perfect. + +Sulpice was delighted and passed on to the report of the Director of the +Press. Except a small number of disgruntled and irreconcilable party +journals, all the French and foreign papers warmly praised and supported +the newly-created ministry. The _Times_ declared that the coalition +perfectly met the requirements of the existing situation. The Berlin +papers did not take umbrage at it, although Monsieur Vaudrey had more +than once declared his militant patriotism from the tribune. "In short," +the daily report concluded, "there is a concert of praise, and public +opinion is delighted to have finally secured a legitimate satisfaction +through the choice of a homogeneous ministry, such as has long been +desired." + +"What strange literature," muttered Sulpice, almost audibly, as he threw +the report with the other documents. + +He recalled how, on that morning when Sulpice Vaudrey sat there for the +first time, the morning following Pichereau's sudden dismissal from +office, the editor of this daily press bulletin, like an automaton, +mechanically and indifferently laid on the table of the minister a +report wherein he said in full: + +"Public opinion, by the mouth of the accepted journals, has for too long +a time reposed confidence in the Pichereau administration, for the +ministry to be troubled about the approaching and useless interpellation +announced some days ago by Monsieur Vaudrey--of Isère--." + +And it was to Vaudrey, the elected successor of Pichereau, that the +report was handed naturally and as was due. + +"The compilers of these little chronicles are very optimistic," thought +Sulpice. "After all, probably, it is the office that is responsible for +this, as, doubtless, ministers do not like to know the truth. I will +see, however, that I get it." + +He had, this time, a burdensome morning. Prefects were arriving by the +main entrance to the ministry, the vast antechambers on the left; and +friends, more intimate suitors, waited on the right, elbowing the +ushers, in order to have their cards handed to the secretary-general or +to the minister. There were some who, in an airy sort of way, said: +"Monsieur Vaudrey," in order to appear to be on familiar terms. + +Sulpice felt himself attacked on both sides at once; blockaded in his +office; and he despatched the petitioners with all haste, extending his +hand to them, smiling, cheerfully making them promises, happy to promise +them, but grieved in principle to see humbug depicted on the human face. +From time to time, in the midst of his ministerial preoccupations and +conversations, the disturbing smile of Marianne suddenly appeared like a +flash of lightning in a storm; and though shaking his head, to give the +appearance of listening and understanding, the minister was in reality +far away, near a brilliant buffet and watching a silver spoon glide +between two rosy lips. + +In that procession, which was to be a daily one, of petitioners, of +deputies urging appointments in favor of their constituents, asking the +removal of mayors, the decoration of election agents, harassing the +minister with recommendations and petitions which, although couched in +a humble tone, always veiled a threat, Vaudrey did not often have to do +with his friends. It was a wearisome succession of lukewarm friends or +recognized enemies, who rallied around a successful man. This man, +although a minister for so short a time, had already a vague, +disquieting impression that the administration was the property of a +great number of clients, always the same, frequenters of these +corridors, guests in these antechambers, well known to the ushers, and +who, whoever the minister might be, had the same access and the same +influence with the ministry. + +There were some whom the clerks saluted in a familiar way, as if they +were old acquaintances: intrepid office-seekers, unmoved by any changes +in ministerial combinations. Such entered Vaudrey's cabinet in a +deliberate, familiar manner, and as if feeling at home. Sulpice had once +heard one of them greet an usher by his first name: "Good-morning, +Gustave." + +The minister asked Gustave: "Who is that gentleman?" The usher replied, +with a tinge of respect in his tone: "It is one of our visitors, +Monsieur le Ministre, Monsieur Eugène Renaudin. We call him only +Monsieur _Eugène_. We have known him a long time." + +This "Monsieur Eugène" had already petitioned for a prefecture, or a +sub-prefecture, or--it mattered little--whatever place the minister +might choose to give him. + +His claims? None: he was an office-seeker. + +The minister was already overwhelmed by this vulgar procession of +petitioners and intermediaries, when an usher brought him a card bearing +this name: _Lucien Granet_. + +In the Chamber it was thought that Granet did not like Vaudrey too well, +and Sulpice vaguely scented in him a candidate for his office. The more +reason, then, that he should make himself agreeable. + +"What does he want?" the minister thought. + +This Granet was, moreover, a typical politician; by the side of the +minister of to-day, he was the inevitable minister of to-morrow, the +positive reformer, the man appointed to cleanse the Augean stables, +whose coming, it was said, would immediately mark the end of all abuses, +great and small. + +"Ah! when Granet is minister!" + +The artist without a commission consoled himself with the prospect of +the Granet ministry. He would decorate the monuments when Granet became +minister. The actress who looked with longing eyes toward the Comédie +Française, and dreamed of playing in Molière, had her hopes centered in +Granet. Granet promised to every actress an engagement at the Rue de +Richelieu. _I am waiting for the Granet ministry!_ was the consolatory +reflection, interrupted by sighs, of the licentiates in law. Meanwhile +those office-seekers danced attendance on Granet, and their smile was +worth to the future Excellency all the sweets of office. + +Granet had thus everywhere a host of clients, women and men, sighing for +his success, working to bring about his ministry, intriguing in advance +for his advent, and working together for his glory. + +"Ah! if Granet were in power!" + +"Such abuses would not exist under a Granet ministry!" + +"All will be changed when Granet becomes minister!" + +"That dear Granet! that good Granet! Long live Granet!" + +Vaudrey was not ignorant of the fact that for some time past, Lucien +Granet had been manoeuvring for his appointment to any office whatever, +the most important obtainable. He was within an ace of becoming a member +of the last Ministerial Coalition. He might have been Vaudrey's +colleague instead of his rival. Sulpice was as glad to have him as an +opponent in the Chamber as a colleague in the ministerial council. He +was, however, not an adversary to be trifled with. Granet was a power in +himself. + +"Well!" said the minister to Granet, who entered smiling, and with a +very polite greeting, "you come then to inspect your future office? +Already!--" + +"I?" said Granet, who did his best to be agreeable, "God prevent me from +thinking of this department. It is too well filled." + +"That is very gallant, my dear Granet." + +"Far from disputing your portfolio, I come, on the contrary, to give +you some advice as to strengthening your already excellent position." + +"Advice from you, my dear colleague, should be excellent. Let us hear +it." + +"My dear minister, it is about the appointment of an Under Secretary of +State for the Interior. Well! I have come to urge the claims of my +friend, our colleague Warcolier." + +While speaking, Granet, who was seated near the bureau of the minister, +with his hat on his knee, was watching Vaudrey through his eyeglass; he +saw that his lips twitched slightly as he hesitated before replying. + +"But I am bound to Jacquier--of l'Oise," Vaudrey said abruptly. + +Granet smiled. Certainly Jacquier would be a most excellent choice. He +was a cool, solid and remarkable man. But he had little influence with +the Chamber, frequented society rarely, was morose and exclusive, while +Warcolier was a most amiable man, an excellent speaker and one who was +well-known in the Chamber. He was a fine orator. He was highly esteemed +by the Granet group. + +"My personal friend, too, my dear minister. You would, I assure you, +displease me if you did not support Warcolier this morning at the +Ministerial Council, at which the nomination of under secretaries should +take place. It is this morning, isn't it?" + +"Certainly, in an hour's time." + +Granet left the minister, repeating with considerable emphasis, which +Vaudrey could not fail to remark, that the nomination of Warcolier would +be favorably viewed by the majority of the deputies. A hundred times +more so than that of Jacquier--of l'Oise. + +"Jacquier is a bear. They don't like bears," said Granet, tapping his +thumb lightly with his eyeglass. + +He left Vaudrey out of humor, and very much disgusted at finding that +Warcolier had already exploited the field. + +In truth, Vaudrey liked Warcolier as little as he did Granet. Warcolier +took life easily. He was naturally of a contented disposition. He liked +people who were easily pleased. An Imperialist under the Empire, he was +now a Republican under the Republic. Epicurean in his tastes, he was +agreeable, clever and fond of enjoyment, and he approved of everything +that went the way he desired. He sniffed the breeze light-heartedly and +allowed it to swell his sail and his self-love. He did not like +ill-tempered people, people who frowned or were discontented or gloomy. +Having a good digestion, he could not understand the possibility of +disordered stomachs. A free-liver, he could not realize that hungry +people should ever think of better food. Everything was good; everything +was right; everything was beautiful. Of an admirably tranquil +disposition, he felt neither anger nor envy. Thinking himself superior +to every one else, Warcolier never made comparisons, he did not even +prefer himself: he worshipped himself. The world belonged to him, he +trod the ground with a firm step, swinging his arms, his paunch smooth, +his head erect and his shoulders thrown forward. He seemed to inhale, at +every step, the odor of triumph. He was not the man to compromise with a +defeated adversary. + +Of Warcolier's literary efforts, people were familiar with his _History +of Work and Workers_ that he had formerly dedicated to His Majesty +Napoléon III. in these flattering terms: "To you, sire, who have +substituted for the nobility of birth, that of work, and for the pride +of ancestry, that of shedding blood for one's country." + +Later, in 1875, Warcolier had re-issued his _History of Work_ and his +dedication was anxiously awaited. It did not take him long to get over +the difficulty. He dedicated his work to another sovereign: "To the +People, who have substituted the nobility of work for that of birth, and +that of blood shed for the country for that of blood shed by ancestors." + +And that very name which was formerly read at the foot of professions of +faith:--_Appeal to Honest People. The Revolution overwhelms us!_ is now +found at the foot of proclamations wherein this devil of a Warcolier +exclaims:--_Appeal to Good Citizens. Reaction now threatens us!_ + +This was the man whom Granet and his friends had worked so hard to +thrust into the position of Undersecretary of State of the Interior. +Vaudrey reserved his opinion on this subject to be communicated to the +President by and by. + +The hour for the meeting of the Council drew near. Sulpice saw, through +the white curtains of the window, his horses harnessed to his coupé and +prancing in the courtyard, although it was but a short distance from +Place Beauvau to the Élysée. He slipped the reports of the Prefect of +Police and the Director of the Press into his portfolio and was about to +leave, when the usher brought him another card. + +"It is useless, I cannot see any one else." + +"But the gentleman said that if the minister saw his name, he would most +assuredly see him." + +Vaudrey took the card that was extended to him on the tray: + +"Jéliotte! He is right. Show him in." + +He removed his hat and went straight toward the door, that was then +opened to admit a pale-faced, lean man with long black whiskers that +formed a sort of horsetail fringe to his face. Jéliotte was a former +comrade in the law courts, an advocate in the Court of Appeal, and he +entered, bowing ceremoniously to Sulpice, who with a pleased face and +outstretched hands, went to welcome the old companion of his youth. + +Jéliotte bowed with a certain affectation of respect, and smiled +nervously. + +"How happy I am to see you," Vaudrey said. + +"You still address me in the old familiar way," Jéliotte answered, +showing his slightly broken and yellow teeth. + +"What an idea! Have I forfeited your good opinion, that I should abandon +our familiar form of address?" + +"Honors, then, have not changed you; well! so much the better," said +Jéliotte. "You ask me how I am? Oh! always the same!--I work hard--I am +out of your sight--but I applaud all your successes." + +While Jéliotte was speaking of Vaudrey's successes, he sat on the edge +of a chair, staring at his hat, and wagging his jaw as if he were +cracking a nut between his frail teeth. + +"I have been delighted at your getting into the cabinet. Delighted for +your sake--" + +"You ought also to be delighted on your own account, my good Jéliotte. +Whatever I may hereafter be able to do--" + +Jéliotte cut the minister short and said in a tone as dry as tinder: + +"Oh! my dear Sulpice, believe one thing,--that I ask you nothing." + +"Why?" + +"Because--no, nothing. And I repeat, nothing." + +"And you would be wrong if I could be friendly to you or useful." + +"I have said _nothing_, and I stick to _nothing_. You will meet quite +enough office-seekers in your career--" + +"Evidently!" + +"Petitioners also!" + +"Most assuredly!" + +"Well! I am neither a petitioner nor an office-seeker nor a sycophant. I +am your friend." + +"And you are right, for I have great affection for you." + +"I am your friend and your devoted friend. I should consider it a +rascally thing to ask you for anything. A rascally thing, I say! You are +in office, you are a minister, so much the better, yes, so much the +better! But, at least, don't let your friends pester you, like vermin +crawling before you, because you are all-powerful. I will never crawl +before you, I warn you. I shall remain just what I am. You will take me +just as I am or not at all. That will depend altogether upon the change +of humor that the acquisition of honors may produce in you--" + +"Jéliotte! we shall see, Jéliotte!" + +"Well! You can take me or leave me. And as I do not wish to be +confounded with the cringing valets who crowd your antechambers--" + +"You crowd nothing, you will not dance attendance. Have I asked you to +dance attendance?" + +"No, not yet--I called simply to see if I should be received. Yes, it is +merely in the nature of an experiment--it is made. It is to your honor, +I admit, but I will not repeat it--I shall disappear. It is more simple. +Yes, I have told you and I was determined to tell you that you will +never see me, so long as you are a minister." + +"Ah! Jéliotte! Jéliotte!" + +"Never--not until you have fallen--For one always falls--" + +"Fortunately," said Sulpice, with a laugh. + +"Fortunately or unfortunately, that depends. I say: when you have +fallen--then, oh! then, don't fear, I will not be the one to turn my +back on you--" + +"You are very kind." + +"Whatever you may have said or done, you understand, while you are in +power--and power intoxicates men!--I will always offer you my hand. Yes, +this hand shall always be extended to you. You will find plenty of +people who will turn their backs on you at that moment. Not I! I am a +friend in dark days--" + +"That is understood." + +"I will leave you to your glory, Vaudrey. I crave pardon for not styling +you: Monsieur le Ministre; I could not. It is not familiar to me. I +cannot help it. I am not the friend for the hour of success, but for +that of misfortune." + +"And you will return?" + +"When you are overthrown!--" + +"Thank you!" + +"That is like me! I love my friends." + +"When they are down!" said Sulpice. + +"That is so!" exclaimed Jéliotte. + +"And is that all you had to say to me?" the minister asked. + +"Is not that enough?" + +"Yes! yes! _Au revoir_, Jéliotte." + +"_Au revoir!_ Till--you know when." + +"Yes. When I feel my position threatened, I will call upon you. Don't be +afraid. That time will come." + +"The idiot!" said Sulpice, angrily shrugging his shoulders, when the +advocate was gone. + +He snatched his hat and went out hurriedly to his carriage, the +messengers rising to bow to him as he passed through the antechamber. + +It was hardly necessary for him to order his coachman to drive to the +Élysée. The duties of each day were so well ordered in advance, and +besides, the attendants at the department knew quite as well as the +minister if a Council was to be held at the Élysée. + +Sulpice was somewhat upset. Jéliotte's visit, following that of Granet, +presented the human species in an evil aspect. He had never felt envious +of any one, and it seemed to him that the whole world should be +gratified at his modest bearing under success. + +"For, after all, I triumph, that is certain!--That animal of a Jéliotte +is not such a simpleton!--There are many who, if they were in my place, +would swagger!" + +So he complacently awarded himself a patent of modesty. + +The carriage stopped at the foot of the steps of the Élysée. Sulpice +always felt an exquisite joy in alighting from his carriage, his +portfolio pressed to his side, and leaping over the carpet-covered steps +of the stone staircase leading to the Council Chambers. He passed +through them, as he did everywhere, between rows of spectators who +respectfully bowed to him. Devoted friends extended their hands +respectfully toward his overcoat. Certainly, he only knew the men by +their heads, bald or crowned with locks, as the case might be. His +colleagues were gathered together, awaiting him, and chatting in the +salon, decorated in white and gold, the invariable salon of official +apartments with the inevitable Sèvres vases with deep-blue, light-green +or buff color grounds, placed upon consoles or pedestals. The portfolios +appeared stuffed or empty, limp or bursting with paper bundles, under +the arms of their Excellencies. Suddenly a door was opened, the ushers +fell back and the President approached, looking very serious and taking +his accustomed place opposite to the President of the Council with the +formality of an orderly, the Minister of the Interior on the left of the +President of the Republic, with the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the +right. + +Then, in turn, each minister, beginning at the right, reported the +business of his department, sometimes debated in private council. Each +having completed his information, bowed to his neighbor on the right, +and said: + +"I have finished. It is your turn, my dear colleague." + +The President listened. Sulpice sometimes allowed himself to muse while +seated at this green-covered table, forgetting altogether the affairs +under consideration. Sometimes he recalled those green-covered tables of +the Council Chambers of the Grenoble Prefecture, finding that this +Ministerial Council recalled the mean impression invoked by his +provincial recollections, at other times, a vein of poesy would flit +across his mind, or an eloquent word would reach his ear, suggesting to +him the thought that, after all, these men seated there before their +open portfolios, turning over or scattering about the papers, +nevertheless represented cherished France and held in their leather +pouches the secrets, the destinies, aye, even the very fate of the +fatherland. + +And this Sulpice, overjoyed to expand at his ease in the delights of +power, sitting there in his accustomed chair,--a chair which now seemed +to be really his own--enjoying a sort of physical satisfaction ever new, +inhaling power like the fumes of a nargileh, forgot himself, however, +and suddenly felt himself recalled to the urgent reality when his +colleague, the Minister of War, a spare man with a grizzled moustache, +dropped an infrequent remark in which, in the laconic speech of a +soldier, could be comprehended some cause of anxiety or of hope. Sulpice +listened then, more moved than he was willing to have it appear, +trying, in his turn, to hide all his artistic and patriotic anxieties +under that firm exterior which his colleague of the Department of +Foreign Affairs wore, a dull-eyed, listless face, and cheeks that might +be made of pasteboard. + +The business of the Council was of little importance that morning. The +Keeper of the Seals, Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--a fat, puffing, +apoplectic man with somewhat glassy, round eyes, proposed to the +President, who listened attentively but without replying, some reform to +which Vaudrey was perfectly indifferent. He did not even hear his +colleague's dull speech, the latter lost himself in useless +considerations, while the Minister of War looked at him, as if his eyes, +loaded with grapeshot said, in military fashion: "_Sacrebleu!_ get +done!" + +Vaudrey looked out of the window at the dark horizon of the winter sky +and the gray tints of the leafless trees, and watched the little birds +that chased one another among the branches. His thoughts were far, very +far away from the table where the sober silence was broken by the +interminable phrases of the Minister of Justice, whose words suggested +the constant flow of an open spigot. + +The vision of a female form at the end of the garden appeared to him, a +form that, notwithstanding the cold, was clothed in the soft blue gown +that Marianne wore yesterday at Sabine's. He seemed to catch that +fleeting smile, the exact expression of which he sought to recall, that +peculiar glance, cunning and enticing, that exquisite outline of a +perfect Parisian woman. How charming she was! And how sweet that name, +Marianne! + +Let us see indeed, what in reality could such a woman be! Terrible, +perhaps, but certainly irresistible! + +Not for years had Vaudrey felt such an anxiety or allowed himself to be, +as it were, carried away by such a dominating influence. Waking, he +found Marianne the basis of all his thoughts, as she was during his +slumber. + +And so charming! + +"Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur is the next to address the +Council." + +Vaudrey had not noticed that Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--had finished +his harangue, and that after the Minister of Justice, the Minister of +Foreign Affairs had just concluded his remarks. Vaudrey, therefore, +needed a moment's reflection, a hasty self-examination to recognize his +own personality: _Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur!_ This title only +called up his _ego_ after a momentary reflection, a sort of simulated +astonishment under the cloak of a pensive attitude. Vaudrey's colleagues +did not perceive that this man seated beside them was, as it were, lost +in meditation. + +Sulpice, moreover, had little to say. Nothing serious. The confirmation +of the favorable reports that had been made to him. Within a week he +would finish his plan of prefectorial changes. He simply required the +Council to deal at once with the nomination of the Undersecretaries of +State. + +It was then that Vaudrey realized the extraordinary influence that +Lucien Granet must possess. From the very opening of the discussion, the +minister felt that his candidate, Jacquier--of l'Oise--was defeated in +advance by Warcolier. Granet must have laid siege to the ministers one +by one. The President was entirely in Warcolier's favor. Warcolier's +amiability, tact, the extraordinary facility with which he threw +overboard previous opinions, were so many claims in his favor. It was +necessary to give pledges to new converts, to prove that the government +was not closed against penitents. + +"That is a very Christian theory," said Vaudrey, "and truly, I am +neither in favor of jacobinism nor suspicion, but there is something +ironical in granting this amnesty to turncoats." + +"But it is decidedly politic," said Monsieur Collard--of Nantes. + +"It is a premium offered to the new converts." + +"Eh! eh! that is not so badly done!" + +Vaudrey knew perfectly well that it was useless to insist, he must put +up with Warcolier. It was his task to manage matters so that this man +should not have unlimited power in the ministry. + +Warcolier was elected and the President signed his appointment at the +earliest possible moment. + +"A nomination discounted in advance," thought Vaudrey, who again +recalled Granet's polite but threatening smile. + +He felt somewhat nervous and annoyed at this result. But what could be +done? To divert his thoughts, he listened to his colleagues' +communications. The Minister of War commenced to speak, and in a tone of +irritated surprise, instead of the lofty, patriotic considerations that +Vaudrey expected of him, Vaudrey heard him muttering behind his +moustache about soldiers' cap-straps, shakos, gaiter-buttons, +shoulder-straps, cloth and overcoats. That was all. It was the vulgar +report of a shoemaker or a tailor, or of a contractor detailing the +items of his account. + +Sulpice was anxious for the Council to be over. The President, before +the close of the session, repeated, with all the seriousness of a judge +of the Court of Appeal: "Above all, messieurs, no innovations, don't try +to do too well, let things alone. Don't let us trouble about business! +Let us be content to live! The session is ended." + +"Not about business?" said Vaudrey to himself. + +He understood power in quite a different way. Longing for improvements, +he did not understand how to let himself be dragged on like a cork upon +a stream, by the wave of daily events. He was determined to put his +ideas into force, to give life and durability to his ministry. There was +no use in being a minister if he must continue the habitual +go-as-you-please of current politics. In that case, the first chief of +bureau one might meet would make as good a minister as he. + +At the moment of leaving the Council Chamber, the Minister of War said +to him, in a jocose, brusque way: "Well! my dear colleague, Warcolier's +election does not seem to have pleased you? Bah! if he has changed +shoulders with his gun, that only proves that he knows how to drill." + +And the soldier laughed heartily behind his closely buttoned frock coat. + +Vaudrey got into his carriage and returned to the ministry to breakfast. + +Formerly the breakfast hour was generally the time of joyous freedom for +Sulpice. He felt soothed beside Adrienne and forgot his daily struggles. + +In their home on Chaussée d'Antin, he usually abandoned himself freely +to lively and cheerful conversation, to allow his wife to find in him, +the man of forty years, the fiancé, the young husband of former days. +But here, before these exclusive domestics, the familiars of the +ministry, planted around the table like so many inspectors, rather than +servants, he dared not manifest himself. He scarcely spoke. He felt that +he was watched and listened to. The valet who passed him the dishes +watched over Monsieur le Ministre. He imagined that _his attendants_ in +their silent reflections compared the present minister with those that +had gone before him. On one occasion, one of the domestics replied to a +remark made by Adrienne: "Monsieur Pichereau, who preceded Monsieur le +Ministre, and Monsieur le Comte d'Harville, who preceded Monsieur +Pichereau, considered my service very proper, madame." + +Adrienne accepted as well as she could the necessities of her new +position. Since that was power, let power rule! She was resigned to +those wastes whose luxury was apparent, since the political fortunes of +her husband cast her there, like a prisoner, in that huge, commonplace, +ministerial mansion, wherein none of the joys of home or of that +Parisian apartment that she had furnished with such refined taste were +left her. She felt half lost in those vast, cold salons of that ancient +Hôtel Beauvau,--cold in spite of their stoves, and which partook at one +and the same time of the provisional domicile and the furnished +apartment,--with its defaced gilded panels, and here and there a crack +in the ceiling, and those vulgar ornaments, those wearisome imitation +Chardins with their cracked colors and those old-fashioned pictures of +Roqueplan, giving to everything at once _one date_, a bygone style. With +what a truly melancholy smile Adrienne greeted the friends who came to +see her on her reception day, when they remarked to her: "Why, you are +in a palace!" + +"Yes, but I much prefer my accustomed furniture and my own house." + +Sulpice, free at last from that Council and the morning receptions, as +he alighted from his carriage, caused _Madame_ to be informed that he +had returned. + +Adrienne, who was looking pretty in a tight-fitting, black velvet gown, +approached him with a smile and was suddenly overcome with sadness on +seeing him absorbed in thought. She dared not question him, but being +somewhat anxious, she, nevertheless, inquired the cause of his frowning +expression. + +"You have your bad look, my good Sulpice," she smilingly said. + +He then quickly explained the Warcolier business. + +"Is that all? Bah!" she said, "you will have many other such +annoyances." + +She was smiling graciously. + +"That is politics!--And then you like it--At least, confine your likes +to that, Sulpice," she said, drawing near to Vaudrey. + +She was about to present her forehead for his kiss, as formerly, but she +drew back abruptly. A valet entered with a dignified air and +ceremoniously announced that breakfast was served. + +Vaudrey ate without appetite. Adrienne watched him tenderly, her eyes +were kind and gentle. How nervous he was and quickly disturbed! Truly, +Warcolier's appointment was not worth his giving himself the least +anxiety about. + +She was going to speak to him about it. Vaudrey imposed silence by a +sign. The motionless domestics were listening. + +Like Sulpice, Adrienne suffered the annoyance of a constant +surveillance. She was hungry when she sat down to table, but her +appetite had vanished. The viands were served cold, brought on plates +decorated with various designs and marked with the initials of Louis +Philippe, L.P., intertwined, or with the monogram of the Empire, N.; the +gilt was worn off, the fillets of gold half obliterated: a service of +Sèvres that had been used everywhere, in imperial dwellings, national +palaces, and was at last sent to the various ministries as the remnant +of the tables of banished sovereigns. + +Instead of eating, Adrienne musingly looked at the decorations. It +seemed to her that she was in a gloomy restaurant where the badly served +dishes banished her appetite. Sulpice, sad himself, scarcely spoke and +in mute preoccupation, in turn confused the shrewd, sly Granet, the +intriguing Warcolier, and Marianne Kayser, whose image never left him. +He was discontented with himself and excited by the persistency with +which the image of this woman haunted him. + +In vain did Adrienne smile and seek to divert him from the thoughts that +besieged him--she was herself in a melancholy mood, without knowing why, +and her endeavors were but wasted; if he abandoned the train of his +reflections, it was merely to express a thought in rapid tones, and he +seemed momentarily to shake off his torpor; he replied to his wife's +forced smile by a mechanical grimace, and immediately relapsed into his +nervously silent state. + +In the hours of anxious struggle, she had often seen him thus, hence she +was not alarmed. If she had been in her own home, instead of occupying +this strange mansion, she would have rushed to him, and seated on his +knees, taken his burning head between her little hands and said: "Come +now! what ails you? what is the matter? Tell me everything so that, +child as I may be, I may comfort my big boy." + +But there, still in the presence of those people, always in full view, +she dared not. She carefully and anxiously watched Sulpice's mortified +countenance. Since his entry on his ministerial functions, this was the +first occasion, probably, that he had been so preoccupied. + +"There is something the matter with you, is there not, my dear?" + +"No--nothing--Besides--" + +The minister's glance was a sufficient conclusion to his remark. +Moreover, how could he, even if he had some trouble to confide, make it +known before the ever watchful lackeys? Before these impassive +attendants, who, though apparently obsequious, might in reality be +hostile, and who looked at them with cold glances? What a distance +separated them from the old-time intimacies, the cherished interchange +of thought interrupted by piquant kisses and laughter, just like a +young husband and wife! + +In truth, Adrienne had not thought of it: Sulpice could not talk. + +"You will serve the coffee at once," she said. + +She made haste in order that she might take refuge in her own apartment +to be alone with her husband. He, however, as if he shunned this +tête-à-tête, eager as he was for solitude, quickly attributed his +unpleasant humor to neuralgia or headache. Too much work or too close +application of mind. + +"At the Ministerial Council perhaps?" remarked Adrienne inquiringly. + +"Yes, at the Council,--I must take a little fresh air--I will take a +round in the Bois--The day is dry--That will do me good!" + +"Will you take me?" she said gayly. + +"If you wish," he replied. Then, in an almost embarrassed tone, he +added: + +"Perhaps it will be better for me to go alone--I have to think--to +work--There is no sitting at the Chamber to-day; and the day is entirely +at my own disposal." + +"Just as you please," Adrienne replied, looking at Sulpice with a tender +and submissive glance. "It would, however, have been so delightful and +beneficial to have gone to the Bois together on such a bright day! But +you and your affairs before everything, you are right; take an airing, +be off, come, breathe--I shall be glad to see you return smiling +cheerfully as in the sweet days." + +Sulpice looked at his young wife with a fondness that almost inspired +him with remorse. In her look there was so complete an expression of her +love. Then her affection was so deep, and her calm like the face of a +motionless lake was so manifest, and she loved him so deeply, so +intelligently. And how trustful, too! + +He was impelled now to beg her don her cloak and to have a fur robe put +into the coupé and set out now, when the sun was gradually showing +itself, like two lovers bound for a country party. At the same time he +felt a desperate longing to be alone, to abandon himself to his new idea +and to the image that beset him. He felt that he was leaving Adrienne +for Marianne. + +He did not hold to the suggestion, in fact, he repeated that it would be +better if he were alone. As there would be no session of the Chamber for +a whole week, he would go out with Adrienne the next day. The coachman +could drive them a long distance, even to Saint-Cloud or Ville-d'Avray. +They would breakfast together all alone, unknown, in the woods. + +"Truly?" said Adrienne. + +"Truly! I feel the necessity of avoiding so many demonstrations in my +honor." + +Sulpice laughed. + +"I am stifled by them," he said, as he kissed Adrienne, whose face was +pink with delight at the thought of that unrestrained escapade. + +"How you blush!" said Sulpice, ingenuously. "What is the matter with +you?" + +"With me? Nothing." + +She looked at him anxiously. + +"You think my complexion too ruddy! I have not the Parisian tint. Only +remain a minister for some time, and that will vanish. There is no +dispraise in that." + +She again offered her brow to him. + +He left her, happy to feel himself free. + +At last! For an entire day he was released from the ordinary routine of +his life; from the wrangling of the assembly, the hubbub of the +corridors, the gossip of the lobbies, interruptions, interrupted +conversations, from all that excitement that he delighted in, but which +at times left him crushed and feverish at the close of the day. He +became once more master of his thoughts, of his meditation. He belonged +to himself. It was almost impossible to recover his self-mastery in the +stormy arena into which he was thrust, happy to be there, and where his +distended nostrils inhaled, as it were, the fumes of sulphur. + +At times, amid the whirlwind of politics, he suffered from a yearning +for rest, a sick longing for home quiet, a desire to be free, to go +between the acts, as it were, to vegetate in some corner of the earth +and to resume in very truth an altogether different life from the +exasperating, irritating life that he led in Paris, always, so to speak, +under the lash; or, still better, to change the form of his activity, to +travel, to feed his eyes on new images, the fresh verdure, or the varied +scenes of unknown cities. + +But the years had rolled by amid the excitement and nervous strain of +political life. He lived with Adrienne in an artificial and overheated +atmosphere. Happy because he was loved, that his ambitions were +realized, that he charmed an assembly of men by the same power that had +obtained him the adoration of this woman, yes, he was happy, very happy: +to bless life, to excite envy, to arouse jealousy, to appear simply +ridiculous if he complained of destiny; and nevertheless, at the bottom +of his soul, discontented without knowing why, consumed by intangible, +feverish instincts, ill-defined desires for Parisian curiosities, having +dreamed in his youth of results very inferior to those he had realized, +yet finding when he analyzed the realities that he enjoyed, that the +promises of his dreams were more intoxicating than the best +realizations. + +Vaudrey was an ambitious man, but he was ambitious to perform valiant +feats. Life had formerly seemed to him to be made up of glory, triumphal +entries into cities, accompanied by the fluttering of flags and the +flourish of trumpets. He pictured conquests, victories, exaltations! +Theatrical magnificence! But now, more ironical, he was contented with +quasi-triumphs, if his restless, anxious nature could be satisfied with +what he obtained. + +Adrienne loved him. He loved her profoundly. + +Why had the meeting with Marianne troubled him so profoundly, then? +Manifestly, Mademoiselle Kayser realized the picture of his vanished +dreams, and the desires of a particular love that the passion for +Adrienne, although absolute, could not satisfy. This man had a nature of +peculiar ardor--or rather, curious desires, a greedy desire to know, an +itching need to approach and peep into abysses. + +Sometimes it seemed to Vaudrey that he had not lived at all, and this +was the fear and desire of his life: to live that Parisian life which +flattered all his instincts and awoke and reanimated all his dreams. But +yesterday it had appeared to him when he met this young woman who raised +her eyes to him, half-veiled by her long eyelashes, that a stage-curtain +had been raised, disclosing dazzling fairy scenery, and since then that +scenery had been always before him. It banished, during his drive, all +peace, and while the coupé threaded its way along the Faubourg +Saint-Honoré toward the Arc-de-Triomphe, the minister who, but two hours +before, had been plunged in state affairs, settled himself down in a +corner of the carriage, his legs swaddled in a robe and his feet resting +on a foot-warmer, looking at, but without observing the cold figures +that walked rapidly past him, the houses lighted up by the sun's rays, +and the dry pavements, and he thought of those strange eyes and those +black butterflies, which seemed to him to flutter over that fair hair +like swallows over a field of ripe wheat. + +It pleased him to think of that woman. It was an entirely changed +preoccupation, a relaxation. A curious, strangely agreeable sensation: +his imagination thus playing truant, and wandering toward that vision, +renewed his youth. He experienced therein the perplexities that troubled +him at twenty. Love in the heart means fewer white hairs on the brow. +And then, indeed, he would never, perhaps, see Mademoiselle Kayser +again! He would, however, do everything to see her again at the coming +soirée at the ministry, an invitation--Suddenly his thoughts abruptly +turned to Ramel, whom he also wished to invite and meet again. He loved +him so dearly. It was he who formerly, in the journalistic days, and at +the time of the battles fought in the _Nation Française_, had called +Denis "a conscience in a dress-coat." + +Therefore, since he had an afternoon to spare, he would call on Ramel. +He was determined to show him that he would never preserve the dignity +of a minister with him. + +"Rue Boursault, Batignolles," he said to the coachman, lowering one of +the windows; "after that, only to the Bois!" + +The coachman drove the coupé toward the right, reaching the outer +boulevards by way of Monceau Park. + +Vaudrey was delighted. He was going to talk open-heartedly to an old +friend. Ah, Ramel! he was bent on remaining in the background, on being +nothing and loving his friends only when they were in defeat, as +Jéliotte had said. Well, Vaudrey would take him as his adviser. This +devil of a Ramel, this savage fellow should govern the state in spite of +himself. + +The minister did not know Ramel's present lodging which he had occupied +only a short time. He expected to find dignified poverty and a cold +apartment. As soon as Denis opened the door to him, he found himself in +a workman's dwelling that had been transformed by artistic taste into +the small museum of a virtuoso. After having passed through a narrow +corridor, and climbed a small, winding staircase, Vaudrey rang at the +third floor of a little house in Rue Boursault and entered a well-kept +apartment full of sunlight. + +Hanging on the walls were engravings and crayons in old-fashioned +frames. A very plain mahogany bookcase contained some select volumes, +which, though few, were frequently perused and were swollen with markers +covered with notes. The apartment was small and humble: a narrow bedroom +with an iron bedstead, a dressing room, a tiny dining-room furnished +with cane-seated chairs, and the well-lighted study with his portraits +and his frames of the old days. But with this simplicity, as neat as a +newly-shaved old man, all was orderly, and arranged and cared for with +scrupulous attention. + +This modest establishment, the few books, the deep peace, the oblivion +found in this Batignolles lodging, in this home of clerks, poor, petty +tradesmen and workmen, sufficed for Ramel. He rarely went out and then +only to take a walk from which he soon returned exhausted. He had +formerly worked so assiduously and had given, in and out of season, all +his energy, his nerves and his body, improvising and scattering to the +winds his appeals, his protests, his heart, his life, through the +columns of the press. What an accumulation of pages, now destroyed or +buried beneath the dust of neglected collections! How much ink spilled! +And how much life-blood had been mingled with that ink! + +Ramel willingly passed long hours every day at his study window, looking +out on the green trees or at the high walls of a School of Design +opposite, or at the end of a tricolored flag that waved from the frontal +of a Primary Normal School that he took delight in watching; then at the +right, in the distance, throbbing like an incessant fever, he saw the +bustling life of the Saint-Lazare Station, where with every shrill +whistle of the engines, he saw white columns of smoke mount skyward and +vanish like breaths. + +"Smoke against smoke," thought Ramel, with his pipe between his teeth. +"And it would be just as well for one to struggle--a lost unity--against +folly, as for a single person to desire to create as much smoke as all +these locomotives together!" + +Ramel appeared to be delighted to see Vaudrey, whose name the +housekeeper murdered by announcing him as _Monsieur Vaugrey_. He placed +a chair for him, and asked him smilingly, what he wanted "with an +antediluvian journalist." + +"A mastodon of the press," he said. + +What had Vaudrey come for? + +His visit had no other object than to enjoy again a former faithful +affection, the advice he used to obtain, and also to try to drag the +headstrong Ramel into the ministry. Would not the directorship of the +press tempt him? + +"With it, the directing of the press!" said Denis. "It is much better to +have an opposition press than one that you have under your thumb. +Friendly sheets advise only foolishly." + +"Why, Vaudrey, do you know," suddenly exclaimed the veteran journalist, +"that you are the first among my friends who have come into power--I say +the first--who has ever thought of me?" + +"You cannot do me a greater pleasure than tell me so, my dear Ramel. I +know nothing more contemptible than ingrates. In my opinion, to remember +what one owes to people, is to be scrupulously exact; it is simply +knowing orthography." + +"Well! mercy! there are a devilish lot of people who don't know if the +word gratitude is spelled with an _e_ or an _a_. No, people are not so +well skilled as that in orthography. There are not a few good little +creatures to be sent back to school. All the more reason to be thankful +for having learned by heart--by heart, that is the way to put it, my +dear Vaudrey--your participles." + +Sulpice was well acquainted with Ramel's singular wit, a little sly, but +tinged with humor, like pure water into which a drop of gin has been +poured, more perfumed than bitter. He knew no man more indulgent and +keen-sighted than him. + +"For what should I bear a grudge against people?" said the veteran. "For +their stupidity? I pity them, I haven't time to dislike them; one can't +do everything." + +Besides, the minister felt altogether happy to be with this man no +longer in vogue, but who might be likened to coins that have ceased to +be current and have acquired a higher value as commemorative medals. He +could unbosom himself to him: treachery was impossible. He longed to +have such a stay beside him, and still urged him, but Ramel was +inflexible. + +"But as I have already said--if I have need of you?" + +"Of me? I am too old." + +"Of your advice?" + +"Well! it is not necessary for me to give you my address, since you find +yourself here now, or to tell you that you can depend on me, seeing you +know me." + +Vaudrey felt that it was useless to pursue the matter further. He was +not talking with a misanthrope or a scorner, but with a learned man. He +would find at hand whenever he needed it, the old, ever faithful +devotedness of this white-haired man, who, with skull-cap on his head, +was smoking his pipe near the window when the minister entered. + +"Then, you are happy, Ramel?" said Sulpice, a little astonished, +perhaps. + +"Perfectly so." + +"You have no ambition for anything whatever?" + +"Nothing, I await philosophically the hour for the monument." + +He smiled when he saw that his own familiar remark was puzzling Vaudrey. + +"The monument, there, on one side: Villa Montmartre!--Oh! I am not +anxious to have done with life. It is amusing enough at times. But, +after all, it is necessary to admit that the comedy ends when it is +finished. One fine day, I shall be found sleeping somewhere, here in my +armchair, or in my bed, suddenly, or perhaps after a long illness--this +would weary me, as a lingering illness is repugnant to me--and you will +read in one or two journals a short paragraph announcing that the +obsequies of Monsieur Denis Ramel, one-time editor of a host of +democratic newspapers, a celebrated man in his day, but little known +recently, will take place on such a day at such an hour. Few will +attend, but I ask you to be present--that is, if there is no important +sitting at the Chamber." + +Old Ramel twirled his moustache with his long, lean fingers as he spoke +these last words into which he infused a dash of irony. He nullified it, +however, as he extended his frankly opened hand and said to Sulpice +Vaudrey: + +"What I have said to you is very cheerful! A thousand pardons. The more +so that I do not think of doubting you for a single moment--You have +always been credulous. That is your defect, and it is a capital one. In +the world of business men and politicians, who are for the most part +egotists, of mediocrities, or to speak plainly--I know no more +picturesque term--of _dodgers_,--you move about with all the illusions +and tastes of an artist. You are like the brave fellows of our army, +poets of war, as it were, who hurled themselves to their destruction +against regiments of engineers. Certainly, my dear minister, I shall +always be delighted to give you my counsel, you whom I used to call my +dear child, and if the observations of a living waif can serve you in +anything, count on me. Dispose of me, and if by chance I can be useful +to you, I shall feel myself amply repaid." + +"Ah!" cried Sulpice, "if you only knew how much good it does me to hear +the sincere thoughts of a man one can rely on! How different is their +ring from that of others!" + +He then allowed himself to pass by an easy transition to the confessions +of his first deceptions or annoyances. + +The selection that very morning, of Warcolier as Under Secretary of +State in a Republican administration, a man who had played charades at +Compiègne, had thrown him into a state of angry excitement. + +Ramel, however, burst into laughter. + +"Ah, nonsense! You will see many other such! Why, governments always do +favors to their enemies when their opponents pretend to lower their +colors! What good is it to serve friends? They love you." + +"This does not vex you, then, old Republican?" + +"I, an old soldier grown white in harness," said Ramel, whose moustache +still played under his smile, "that doesn't disturb my peace in the +least. I comfort myself with the thought that my dream, my _ideal_, to +use a trite expression, is not touched by such absurdities, and I am +persuaded that progress does not lag and that the cause of liberty gains +ground, in spite of so much injustice and folly. I confess, however, +that I sometimes feel the strange emotion that a man might experience on +seeing, after the lapse of years, the lovely woman whom he loved to +distraction at twenty, in the arms of a person whom he did not +particularly respect." + +Ramel had lighted his pipe, and half-hidden by the bluish wreaths of +smoke, chatted away, quite happy on his side to give himself up to the +revelation of the secret of his heart without the least bitterness, and +like an elder brother, advised this man, who was still young and whom +he had compared formerly to one of those too fine pieces of porcelain +that the least shock would crack. + +"Ah!" he said abruptly, "above all, my dear Vaudrey, do not fear to +appear in the tribune more uncouth and assertive than you really are. In +times when the word _sympathetic_ becomes an insult, it is wiser to have +the manners of a boor. Tact is a good thing." + +"I shall never succeed in that," said Sulpice, smiling as usual. + +"So much the worse! What has been wanting in my case is not to have been +able to secure the title of _our antipathetic confrère_. The modest and +refined people are dupes. By virtue of swelling their necks, turkeys +succeed in resembling peacocks. Believe me, my dear friend, it is +dangerous to have too refined a taste, even in office, even in the rank +in which you are placed. One hesitates to proclaim the excessively +stupid things that stir the crowd, and the blockhead who is bold enough +to declare his folly creates a hellish noise with his nonsense, while a +man of refinement, who is not always a squeamish man, remains in his +corner unseen. Remember that more moths are caught at night with a +greasy candle than with a diamond of the first water." + +"You speak in paradox--" Sulpice began. + +"And you think I am making paradoxes? Not in the least, I will give +you--not at cost, for it has cost me dearly, but in block,--my stock of +experience. Do with it what you please, and, above all, beware of _alle +donne!_" + +"Women?" asked the minister, with involuntary disquiet. + +"Women, exactly. Encircling every minister there is a squadron of +seductive women, who though perhaps more fully clothed than the flying +squadron of the Medicis, is certainly not less dangerous. Women who +complain that they are denied political rights, have in reality all, +since they are able to rule administrations and knock ministers off, as +the Du Barry did her oranges! When I speak of women, you will observe +well that I do not speak of your admirable wife," said Ramel, with a +respect that was most touching, coming from this honest veteran. + +"While we are gossiping," he resumed, "I am going to tell you frankly +what strikes me most clearly in the present conjuncture. You will gather +from it what you choose. In these days, my dear Vaudrey, what is most +remarkable is the facility men have for destroying their credit and +wearing themselves out. Politics, especially, entails a formidable +consumption. It seems that the modern being is not cut out to wear long. +This, perhaps, is due to the fact that public business, whichever party +wins, is always committed to men who are ill-prepared for their good +fortune. I do not say this of you, who, intellectually speaking, are an +exception. But men are no longer bathed in the Styx, or perhaps they +show the heel too quickly. For some years, moreover, the strange +phenomenon has presented itself of the provincial towns being the prey +of Parisian manufacturers, who reconstruct them and demolish their +picturesque antiquity, in order to garnish their boulevards and fine +mansions, while Paris, on the contrary, is directed and governed by +provincials, who provincialize it just as the Parisian companies +parisianize the provinces. Our provincials, astonished to find +themselves at the head of Parisian movement, lose their heads somewhat +and rush with immoderate appetites at the delicate feast. They have the +gluttony of famished children, and on the most perilous question they +are simply gourmands. It is _woman_ again to whom I refer. The country +squires and gentlemen riders, who have grown old in their province with +the love of farm-wenches, or small tradesmen professing medicine or law +within their sub-prefectures, after having made verses for the female +tax-gatherer, all, you understand, all are hungry to know that unknown +creature: _woman_. And speedily enough the woman has drained their +Excellencies. Oh! yes, even to the marrow! She robs the Opposition of +its energy; the faithful to liberty, of the virility of their faith. +Energetic ministers or ministers with ideas are not long before woman +destroys both their strength and their ideas. Eh! _parbleu!_ it is just +because they do not rule Paris as one pleads a civil suit in a +provincial court." + +The minister listened with a somewhat anxious, sober air to these +truisms, clear-cut as with a knife, expressed by the old journalist +without passion, without exasperation, without anger. He was, in fact, +pleased that Ramel should speak to him so candidly. + +Yes, indeed, what the old "veteran,"--as Denis sometimes called +himself--said, were Vaudrey's own sentiments. These sufficiently +saddening observations he had himself made more than once. It was +precisely to put an end to such abuses, folly, and provincialism, this +hobbling spirit inculcated in a great nation, that he had assumed power, +and was about to increase his efforts. + +He thanked Ramel profusely and sincerely. This visit would not be his +last, he would often return to this Rue Boursault where he knew that a +true friend would be waiting. + +"And you will be right," said Denis. "Nowhere will you find a love more +profound, or hear truths more frankly spoken. You see, Vaudrey, the +walls of the ministerial apartments are too thick. There, neither the +noise of carriages nor the sound of street-cries is heard. I have passed +a few days in a palace--in '48,--at the Tuileries, as a national guard: +at the end of two hours, I heard nothing. The carpets, the curtains, +stifled everything, and, believe me, a cannon might have been fired +without my hearing anything more than an echo, much less could I hear +the truth! Besides, people do not like to pronounce truth too loudly. +They are afraid." + +"I swear to you that I will listen to everything," replied Sulpice, "and +I will strive to understand everything. And since I have the power--" + +Denis Ramel shook his head: + +"Power? Ah! you will see if that is ever taken in any but homoeopathic +doses! Why, you will have against you the _bureaux_, those sacrosanct +_bureaux_ that have governed this country since bureaucracy has existed, +and they will cram more than one Warcolier down your throat, I warn +you." + +"Yes, if I allow it," said Vaudrey haughtily. + +"Eh! my poor friend, you have already allowed it," said the veteran. + +He had risen, Vaudrey had taken his hat, and he said to the minister, +leaning on his arm, with gentle familiarity, as he led him to the door: + +"Power is like a kite, but there is always some rascal who holds the +thread." + +"Come, come," said Vaudrey, "you are a pessimist!" + +"I confess that Schopenhauer is not unpleasant to me--sometimes." + +Thereupon they separated, after a cordial grasp of the hand, and Denis +Ramel resumed his pipe and his seat at the window corner, while the +minister carried away from this interview, as if he had not already been +in the habit of a frank interchange of opinions, an agreeable though +perhaps anxious impression. + +He felt the need of _mentally digesting_ this conversation: the idea of +going back, on this beautiful February day, to his official apartments +did not enter his mind. He was overcome by a springtime hunger. + +"To the Bois! Around the Lake!" he said to the coachman, as he +re-entered his carriage. + +The air was as balmy as on an afternoon in May. Vaudrey lowered the +carriage window to breathe freely. This exterior boulevard that he +rolled along was full of merry pedestrians. One would have thought it +was a Sunday afternoon. Old people, sitting on benches, were enjoying +the early sun. + +Sulpice looked at them, his brain busy with Ramel's warnings. He had +just called him a pessimist, but inwardly he acknowledged that the old +stager, who had remained a philosopher, spoke the truth. Woman! Why had +Ramel spoken to him of woman? + +This half-disquieting thought speedily left Sulpice, attracted as he was +by the joyous movement, the delight of the eyes which presented itself +to his view. + +In thus journeying to the Bois, he felt a delightful emotion of solitude +and forgetfulness. He gradually recovered his self-possession and became +himself once more. He drew his breath more freely in that long avenue +where, at this hour of the day, few persons passed. There was no +petition to listen to, no salutation to acknowledge. + +Ah! how easy it would be to be happy, to sweetly enjoy the Paris that +fascinated him instead of burning away his life! Just now, at the foot +of the Arc de Triomphe, he had seen people dressed in blouses, sleeping +like Andalusian beggars before the walls of the Alhambra. Little they +cared for the fever of success! Perhaps they were wise. + +An almost complete solitude reigned over the Bois. Vaudrey saw, as he +glanced between the copsewood, now growing green, only a few isolated +pedestrians, some English governesses in charge of scampering children, +the dark green uniform of a guard or the blue blouse of a man who +trimmed the trees. + +The coachman drove slowly and Sulpice, enjoying the intoxication of this +early sun, lowered the shade and breathed the keen air while he repeated +to himself that peaceful joy was within the reach of everybody at Paris. + +"But why is this wood so deserted? It is so pleasant here." + +He almost reproached himself for not having brought Adrienne. She would +have been so happy for this advanced spring day. She required so little +to make her smile: mere crumbs of joy. She was better than he. + +He excused himself by reflecting that he would not have been able to +talk to Ramel. + +And then it would have been necessary to talk to Adrienne, whereas the +joy of the present moment was this solitary silence, the bath of warm +air taken in the complete forgetfulness of the habitual existence. + +The sight of the blue, gleaming lake before him, encircled with pines, +like an artificial Swiss lake, compelled him to look out of the window. + +The coachman slowly drove the carriage to the left in order to make the +tour of the Lake. + +Vaudrey looked at the sheet of water upon which the light played, and on +which two or three skiffs glided noiselessly, even the sound of their +oars not reaching his ears. + +At the extremity of the alley, a carriage was standing, a hackney coach +whose driver was peacefully sleeping in the sunshine, with his head +leaning on his right shoulder, his broad-brimmed hat, bathed in the +sunshine, serving him as a shade. + +It was the only carriage there, and a few paces from the border of the +water, standing out in dark relief against the violet-blue of the lake, +a woman stood surrounded by a group of ducks of all shades, running +after morsels of brown bread while uttering their hoarse cries. + +Two white swans had remained in the water and looked at her with a +dignified air, at a distance. + +At the first glance at this woman, Sulpice felt a strange emotion. His +legs trembled and his heart was agitated. + +He could not be mistaken, he certainly recognized her. Either there was +an extraordinary resemblance between them, or it was Mademoiselle Kayser +herself. + +Marianne? Marianne on the edge of this Lake at an hour when there was +no one at the Bois? Vaudrey believed neither in superstitions nor in +predestination. Nevertheless, he considered the meeting extraordinary, +but there is in this fantastic life a reality that brings in our path +the being about whom one has just been thinking. He had frequently +observed this fact. He had already descended from his carriage to go to +her, taking a little pathway under the furze in order to reach the +water's edge. There was no longer any doubt, it was she. Evidently he +was to meet Mademoiselle Kayser some day. But how could chance will that +he should desire to take that promenade to the Lake at the very hour +that the young woman had driven there? + +As he advanced, he thought how surprised Marianne would be. As he walked +along, he looked at her. + +She stood near a kind of wooden landing jutting out over the water. Over +her black dress she had flung a short cloak of satin, embroidered with +jet which sparkled in the sunlight. The light wind gently waved a black +feather that hung from her hat, in which other feathers were entwined +with a fringe of old gold bullion. Vaudrey noted every detail of this +living statuette of a Parisian woman: between a little veil knotted +behind her head and the lace ruching of her cloak, light, golden curls +fell on her neck, and in that frame of light, this elegant woman, this +silhouette standing out in full relief against the sky and the horizon +line of the water, with a pencil of rays gilding her fair locks, seemed +more exquisite and more the "woman" to Sulpice than in the décolleté +of a ball costume. + +When she heard the crushing of the sand by Sulpice's footsteps as he +approached her with timid haste, she turned abruptly. Under her small +black veil, drawn tightly over her face, and whose dots looked like so +many patches on her face, Vaudrey at first observed Marianne's almost +sickly paleness, then her suddenly joyous glance. A furtive blush +mounted even to the young girl's cheek. + +"You here?" she said--"you, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +She had already imparted an entirely different tone to these questions. +There was more abandon in the first, which seemed more like a cry, but +the second betrayed a sudden politeness, perhaps a little affected. + +Vaudrey replied by some commonplace remark. It was a fine day; he was +tired; he wished to warm himself in this early sunshine. But she?-- + +"Oh! I--really I don't know why I am here. Ask the--my coachman. He has +driven me where he pleased." + +She spoke in a curt, irritated tone, under which either deception or +grief was hidden. + +She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, which +were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks, white or gray, +black, spotted, striped like tulips, marbled like Cordovan leather, with +iridescent green or blue necks, whose tone suggested Venetian +glassware, all of them hurrying, stretching their necks, opening their +bills, or casting themselves at Marianne's feet, fighting, then almost +choking themselves to swallow the enormous pieces of bread that were +sold by a dealer close at hand. + +"Ah! bless me! I did not think I should have the honor of meeting you +here," she said. + +"The honor?" said Vaudrey. "I, I should say the joy." + +She looked straight into his eyes, frankly. + +"I do not know what joy is, to-day," she said. "I come from the +Continental Hotel, where I hoped to see--" + +"What is that?" + +"Nothing--" + +"If it were nothing, you would not have frowned so." + +"Oh! well! a friend--a friend whom I have again found--and who has +disappeared. Just so,--abruptly--No matter, perhaps, after all! What +happens, must happen. In short--and to continue my riddle, behold me +feeding these ducks. God knows why! I detest the creatures. The state +feeds them badly, Monsieur le Ministre, I tell you: they are famished. +Well? well?" she said to a species of Indian duck, bolder than the +others, who snapped at the hem of her skirt to attract attention and to +demand fresh mouthfuls. + +She commenced to laugh nervously, and said: + +"That one isn't afraid." + +She threw him a morsel that he swallowed with a greedy gulp. + +"Do you know, Monsieur le Ministre, that the story of these ducks is +that of the human species? There are some that have got nothing of all +the bread that I have thrown them, and there are others who have gorged +enough to kill them with indigestion. How would you classify that? Poor +political economy." + +"Oh, oh!" said Vaudrey. "You are wandering into the realms of lofty +philosophy!--" + +"Apropos of that, yes," said Marianne, as she pointed to the line of +birds that hurried on all sides, left the water, waddled about, uttering +their noisy cries. "You know that when one is sad, one philosophizes +anent everything." + +"And you are sad?" asked Sulpice, in a voice that certainly quivered +slightly. + +She threw away, without breaking it, the piece of bread that was left, +brushed her gloved fingers, and, turning toward the minister, said with +a smile that would make the flesh creep: + +"Very sad. Oh! what would you have? The black butterflies, you know, the +blue devils." + +He saw her again, just as she had appeared before him yesterday, with +arms and shoulders bare, lovely and seductive, and now, with her +shoulders hidden under her cloak, her face half-veiled and quite pale, +he thought her still more disquietingly charming. Moreover, the +strangeness of the situation, the chance meeting, imparted something of +mystery to their conversation and the attraction of an assignation. + +Ah! how happy he felt at having desired to breathe the air of the Bois! +It now seemed to him that he had only come there for her sake. Once more +it appeared to him that some magnetic thought led to this deserted spot +these two beings, who but yesterday had only exchanged commonplace +remarks and who, in this sunbathed solitude, under these trees, in the +fresh breeze of the departing winter, met again, impelled toward each +other, drawn on by the same sympathy. + +"Do you know what I was thinking of?" she said, smiling graciously. +"Yes, of what I was thinking as I cast the brown bread to those ducks? +An idyll, is it not? Well! I was thinking that if one dared--a quick +plunge into such a sheet of water--very pure--quite tempting--Eh! well! +it would end all." + +Vaudrey did not reply. He looked at her stupidly, his glance betraying +the utmost anxiety. + +"Oh! fear nothing," she said. "A whim! and besides, I can swim better +than the swans, there is no danger." + +He had seized her hands instinctively and he experienced a singular +delight in feeling the flesh of Marianne's wrists under his fingers. + +"You are feverish," he said. + +"I should be, at any rate." + +Her voice was still harsh, as if she were distressed. + +"The departure of--of that friend--has, then, caused you much +suffering?" + +"Suffering? No. Vexation, yes--You have built many castles of cards in +your life--Come! how stupid I am!" she said bitterly. "You still build +many of them. Well! there it is, you see!" + +She had withdrawn her hands from Sulpice, and walked away slowly from +the border of the lake, going toward the end of the path where her +coachman awaited her, his eyes closed and his mouth open. + +"Where are you going on leaving the Bois?" asked Vaudrey. + +"I? I don't know." + +He had made a movement. + +"Oh! once more I tell you, don't be afraid," she said. "I want to live. +Fear nothing, I will go home, _parbleu_." + +"Home?" + +"Or to my uncle's." + +"But, really, Monsieur le Ministre," she said, "you are taking upon +yourself the affairs of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police. I +know him well, and certainly he asks fewer questions than Your +Excellency." + +"That, perhaps," said Vaudrey, with a smile, "is because he has less +anxiety about you than I have." + +"Ah! bah!" said Marianne. + +She had by this time got close to her hackney coach and looked at the +coachman for a moment. "Don't you think it would be very wrong to waken +him?" she said. "Will you accompany me for a moment, Monsieur le +Ministre?" + +Vaudrey paled slightly, divining under this question a seductive +prospect. + +Marianne's gray eyes were never turned from him. + +They walked along slowly, followed by the coupé whose lengthened shadow +was projected in front of them along the yellow pathway, moving beside +the lake where the swans floated with their pure white wings extended +and striking the water with their feet, raising all around them a white +foam, like snow falling in flakes. The blue heavens were reflected in +the water. The grass, of a burnt-green, almost gray color, looked like +worn velvet here and there, showing the weft and spotted with earth. + +Side by side they walked, Vaudrey earnestly watching Marianne, while she +gazed about her and pointed out to him the gray, winter-worn rocks, the +smooth ivy, and on the horizon some hinds browsing, in the far distance, +as in a desert, the bare grass as yellow as ripe wheat, around a pond, +in a gloomy landscape, russet horizons against a pale sky, presenting a +forlorn, mysterious and fleeting aspect. + +"One would think one's self at the end of the world," said Sulpice, with +lowered voice and troubled heart. + +A slight laugh from Marianne was her only reply, as she pointed with the +tip of her finger to an inscription on a sign: + +"_To Croix-Catelan!_" she said. "That end of the world is decidedly +Parisian!" + +"Nevertheless, see how isolated we are to-day." + +It seemed as if she had divined his thought, for she took a path that +skirted a road and there, in the narrowest strip of soft, fresh soil, on +which the tiny heels of her boots made imprints like kisses upon a +cheek, she walked in front of him, the shadows of the small branches +dappling her black dress, while Vaudrey, deeply moved, still looked at +her, framed as she was by trees with moss-covered trunks and surrounded +with brambles, a medley of twisted branches. + +And Sulpice felt, at each step that he took, a more profound emotion. +Along this russet-tinted wood, stood out here and there the bright +trunks of birch-trees, and far above it, the pale blue sky; the abyss of +heaven, strewn with milky clouds and throughout the course of this +pathway arose like a Cybelean incense, a healthful and fresh odor that +filled the lungs and infused a desire to live. + +To live! and, thought Sulpice, but a moment ago this lovely, slender +girl spoke of dying. He approached her gently, walking by her side, at +first not speaking, then little by little returning to that thought and +almost whispering in her ear--that rosy ear that stood out against the +paleness of her cheek: + +"Is it possible to think of anything besides the opening spring, in this +wood where everything is awakening to life? Is it really true, +Marianne, that you really wished to die?" + +He did not feel astonished at having dared to call her by name. It +seemed as if he had known her for years. He forgot everything, as if the +world was nothing but a dream and that this dream presented this woman's +face. + +"Yes," she replied. "Upon my honor, I was weary of life, but I see that +most frequently at the very moment when one despairs--" + +She stopped suddenly. + +"Well?" he asked, as he waited for her to continue. + +"Nothing. No, nothing!" + +She commenced to laugh, calling his attention to the end of the path, to +a broader alley which brought them back to the edge of the lake, whose +blue line they saw in the distance. + +"Blue on blue," she said, pointing to the sky and the water. "You +reproach me for not liking blue, Monsieur le Ministre, see! I am taking +an azure bath. This horizon is superb, is it not?" + +Vaudrey debated with himself if she were jesting. Why should she give +him that title which here and at such a moment, had such an out-of-place +ring? + +She glanced at him sidelong with a little droll expression, her pretty +mouth yielding to a smile that enticed a kiss. + +"We shall soon have returned to my carriage," she said. "Already!" + +"That _already_ pleases me," said Sulpice. + +"It is true. This short promenade is nothing, but it suffices to make +one forget many things." + +"Does it not?" exclaimed Vaudrey. + +The shadow of his coupé was still projected between them along the +ochre-colored road. + +"Do you come to the Bois often?" asked the minister. + +"No. Why?" + +"Because I shall frequently return here," he said in a trembling voice. + +"Really!--Then, oh! why then, it would be love-making?" said Marianne, +who pierced him with her warm, tender glances. + +He wished to seize this woman's hand and print a kiss thereon, or to +press his lips upon her bare neck upon which the golden honey-colored +ringlets danced in the bright sunlight. + +"On these clear, fine days," she said in an odd tone, emphasizing every +word, "it is very likely that I shall return frequently to visit this +pathway. Eh! what is that?" she said, turning around. + +She was dragging a dry bramble that had fastened its thorns to the folds +of her satin skirt and she stopped to shake it off. + +"Stop," said Sulpice. + +He desired to tread on the russet-colored bramble. + +"You will tear my gown," said Marianne. "The bramble clings too +tightly." + +Then he stooped, gently removed the thorn, and Marianne, her bosom +turned toward him and half-stooping, looked at that man--a +minister--almost kneeling before her in this wood. + +He cast the bramble away from him. + +"There," he said. + +"Thanks." + +As he rose, he felt Marianne's fresh breath on his forehead. It fell on +his face, as sweet as new-mown hay. He became very pale and looked at +her with so penetrating an expression that she blushed slightly--from +pleasure, perhaps,--and until they reached the carriage where her +coachman was still sleeping, they said nothing further, fearing that +they had both said too much. + +At the moment when she entered her carriage, Sulpice, suddenly, with an +effort at boldness, said to her, as he leaned over the door: + +"I must see you again, Marianne." + +"What is the use?" she said, keeping her eyes fixed on his. + +"Where shall I see you?" he asked, without replying to her question. + +"I do not know--at my house--" + +"At your house?" + +"Wait," she added abruptly, "I will write to you." + +"You promise me?" + +"On my word of honor. At the ministry, _Personal_, isn't that so?" + +"Yes!--Ah! you are very good!" he cried, without knowing what he was +saying, while Marianne's coachman whipped his horses and the carriage +disappeared in the direction of Paris. + +It seemed to Vaudrey, who remained standing, that little gloved fingers +appeared behind the window and that he caught glimpses of a face hidden +under a black, dotted veil. + +The carriage disappeared in the distance. + +"To the ministry!" said the minister, as he got into his carriage. + +He stretched himself out as if intoxicated. He looked at all the +carriages along the drive of the Bois de Boulogne, the high life was +already moving toward the Lake. In calèches, old ladies in mourning +appeared with pale nuns, and old men with red decorations stretched out +under lap-robes. Pretty girls with pale countenances pierced with bright +eyes, like fragments of coal in flour, showed themselves at the doors of +the coupés, close to the muzzles of pink-nosed, well-combed, +white-haired little dogs. Vaudrey strove to find Marianne amid that +throng, to see her again. She was far away. + +He thought only of her, while his coupé went down the Avenue des +Champs-Élysées, bustling with noise and movement and flooded with light. +The coachman took a side street and the carriage disappeared through an +open gateway between two high posts surmounted by two lamps, in a +passage leading to a huge white mansion whose slate roof was ablaze +with sunlight. An infantry soldier in red trousers, with a shako on his +head, mounted guard and stood motionless beside a brown-painted +sentry-box that stood at the right. Above the gateways a new tricolor +flag, in honor of the new ministry, waved in the sunshine. + +Against the ministerial edifice were two gas fixtures bearing two huge +capital letters: R.F., ready to be illuminated on important reception +nights. + +Two lackeys hastily opening the door, rushed up to the halted carriage +and stood at its door. + +"Adieu! Marianne," thought Sulpice, as he placed his foot in the +antechamber of this vast mansion as cold as a tomb. + + + * * * * * + +_She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, +which were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks_ ... + +[Illustration: VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS] + + + + +VIII + + +Marianne Kayser was superstitious. She believed that in the case of +compromised affairs, salvation appeared at the supreme moment of playing +the very last stake. She had always rebounded, for her part,--like a +rubber-ball, she said--at the moment that she found herself overthrown, +and more than half conquered. Fate had given some cause for her +superstitious ideas. She thought herself lost, and was weary of +searching, of living, in fact, when suddenly Monsieur de Rosas reached +Paris from the other end of the world. That was salvation. + +The duke did not prove very difficult to ensnare. He had yielded like a +child in Sabine's boudoir. Marianne left that soirée with unbounded +delight. She had recovered all her hopes and regained her _luck_. The +next day she would again see Rosas. She passed the night in dreams. +Light and gold reigned upon her life. She was radiant on awaking. + +Her uncle, on seeing her, found her looking younger and superb. + +"You are as beautiful as a Correggio, who though a voluptuous painter, +must have been talented. You ought to pose to me for a Saint Cecilia. It +would be magnificent, with a nimbus--" + +"Oh! let your saint come later," said Marianne, "I haven't time." + +Simon Kayser did not ask the young woman, moreover, why "she had not +time." Marianne was perfectly free. Each managed his affairs in his own +way. Such, in fact, was one of the favorite axioms of this painter, a +man of principle. + +Marianne breakfasted quickly and early, and after dressing herself, +during which she studied coquettish effects while standing before her +mirror, she left the house, jumped into a cab and drove to the Hôtel +Continental. With proud mien and tossing her head, she asked for the +duke as if he belonged to her. She was almost inclined to exclaim before +all the people: "I am his mistress!" + +But she suddenly turned pale upon hearing that Monsieur de Rosas had +left. + +"What! gone?" + +Gone thus, suddenly, unceremoniously, without notice, without a word? It +was not possible. + +They were obliged to confirm this news to her several times at the hotel +office. Monsieur le duc had that very morning ordered a coupé to take +him to catch a train for Calais. It was true that he had left some +baggage behind, but at the same time he notified them that they would +perhaps have to forward it to him in England later. + +Marianne listened in stupid astonishment. She became livid under her +little veil. + +"Monsieur de Rosas did not receive a telegram?" + +"Yes, madame." + +"Ah!" + +Something serious had, perhaps, suddenly intervened in the duke's life. +Nevertheless, this abrupt departure without notification, following the +exciting soirée of the previous day, greatly astonished this woman who +but now believed herself securely possessed of José. + +"Nonsense!" she thought. "He was afraid of me--Yes, that's it!--Of +course, he was afraid of me. He loves me much, too much, and distrusts +himself. He has gone away." + +She commenced to laugh uneasily as she got into her carriage again. + +"Assuredly, that is part of my fate. That stupid Guy leaves for Italy. +Rosas leaves for England. Steam was invented to admit of escape from +dangerous women. I did not follow Lissac. What if I followed the duke?" + +She shrugged her shoulders, and gnawed her cambric handkerchief under +her veil, her head resting on the back of the coach, while the driver +waited, standing on the sidewalk in front of the hotel, ignorant of the +direction in which the young woman wished to go. + +Marianne felt herself beaten. She was like a gambler who loses a +decisive game. Evidently, Rosas only showed more clearly by the action +he had taken, how much he was smitten; she measured his love by her own +dismay; but what was the good of that love, if the duke escaped in a +cowardly fashion?--But where could she find him? Where follow him? Where +write to him?--A man who runs about as he does! A madman! Perhaps on +arriving at Dover he had already re-embarked for Japan or Australia. + +"Ah! the unexpected happens, it seems," thought Marianne, laughing +maliciously, as she considered the ludicrousness of her failure. + +"Madame, we are going--?" indifferently asked the coachman, who was +tired of waiting. + +"Where you please--to the Bois!" + +"Very good, madame." + +He looked at his huge aluminum watch, coolly remarking: + +"It was a quarter of twelve when I took Madame--" + +"Good! good!--to the Bois!" + +The movement of the carriage, the sight of the passers-by, the sunlight +playing on the fountains and the paving-stones of the Place de la +Concorde fully occupied Marianne's mind, although irritating her at the +same time. All the cheerfulness attending the awakening spring, +delightful as it is in Paris, seemed irony to her. She felt again, but +with increased bitterness, all the sentiments she experienced a few +mornings previously when she called on Guy and told him of her +burdensome weariness and distaste of life. Of what use was she now? She +had just built so many fond dreams on hope! And all her edifices had +crumbled. + +"All has to be recommenced. To lead the stupid life of a needy, lost, +harassed woman; no, that is too ridiculous, too sad! What then--" she +said to herself, as with fixed eyes she gazed into the infinite and +discovered no solution. + +She was savagely annoyed at Rosas. She would have liked to tear him in +pieces like the handkerchief that she shredded. Ah! if he should ever +return to her after this flight! + +But perhaps it was not a flight--who knows? The duke would write, would +perhaps reappear. + +"No," a secret voice whispered to Marianne. "The truth is that he is +afraid of you! It is you, you, whom he flees from." + +To renounce everything was enough to banish all patience. Yesterday, on +leaving Rosas, she believed herself to be withdrawn forever from the +wretched Bohemian life she had so painfully endured. To-day, she felt +herself sunk deeper in its mire. Too much mire and misery at last! +However, if she only had courage! + +It was while looking at the great blue lake, the snowy swans, the +gleaming barks, that she dreamed, as she had just told Vaudrey, of +making an end of all. Madness, worse than that, stupidity! One does not +kill one's self at her age; one does not make of beauty a valueless +draft. In order to occupy herself, she had bought some brown bread, +which she mechanically threw to the ducks, in order to draw her out of +herself. It was then that Sulpice saw her. + +"Assuredly," she thought, as she left the minister, "those who despair +are idiots!" + +In fact, it seemed that chance, as her fingers had cast mouthfuls of +bread to the hungry bills, had thrown Vaudrey to her in place of Rosas. + +A minister! that young man who smiled on her just now in the alleys of +the Bois and drew near her with trembling breath was a minister. A +minister as popular as Vaudrey was a power, and since Marianne, weary of +seeking love, was pursuing an actuality quite as difficult to +obtain--riches, Sulpice unquestionably was not to be despised. + +"As a last resource, one might find worse," thought Marianne, as she +entered her home. + +She had not, moreover, hesitated long. She was not in the mood for +prolonged anger. She was at an age when prompt decisions must be made on +every occasion that life, with its harsh spurs, proposed a problem or +furnished an opportunity. On the way between the Lake and Rue de +Navarin, Marianne had formed her plan. Since she had to reply to +Vaudrey, she would write him. She felt an ardent desire to avenge +herself for Rosas's treatment, as if he ought to suffer therefor, as if +he were about to know that Sulpice loved her. + +Had she found the duke awaiting her, as she entered the house, she would +have been quite capable of lashing his face with a whip, while making +the lying confession: + +"Ah! you here? It is too late! I love Monsieur Vaudrey." + +She would, moreover, never know any but gloomy feelings arising from her +poverty in that house. The thought suggested itself to her of at once +inviting Vaudrey to call on her. But surrounded by the vulgar +appointments of that poor, almost bare, studio, concealing her poverty +under worn-out hangings, indifferent studies, old, yellowed casts +covered with dust--to receive Vaudrey there would be to confess her +terribly straitened condition, her necessities, her eagerness, all that +repels and freezes love. In glancing around her uncle's studio, she +scrutinized everything with an expression of hatred. + +It smacked of dirty poverty, bourgeois ugliness. She would never dare to +ask Vaudrey to sit upon that divan, which was littered with old, torn +books and tobacco grains, and which, when one sat upon it, discharged a +cloud of dust whose atoms danced in the sunlight. + +"What are you looking at?" asked Kayser, as he followed his niece's +glances about the room. "You seem to be making an inspection." + +"Precisely. And I am thinking that your studio would not fetch a very +high figure at Drouot's auction mart." + +"Lofty and moral creations don't sell in times like these," gravely +replied the old dauber. "For myself, I am not a painter of obscene +subjects and lewd photography." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders and went out, coughing involuntarily. +Old Kayser passed his time steeped in the odors of nicotine. + +"I am lost, if Vaudrey comes here," she said to herself. + +She knew well enough that caprice, the love of those who do not love, +lives on luxury, intoxicating perfumes, shimmering silk, and all the +mysterious surroundings of draperies which are the accompaniment of the +adventure. Vaudrey would recoil before this Bohemian studio. The famous +"nimbus," of which Kayser spoke, was the creature of his tobacco smoke. +What was to be done, then? Receive the minister yonder in that remote +apartment where, all alone,--it was true--she went to dream, dream with +all the strange joys attending isolation? Draw this man to a distant +corner of Paris, in the midst of the ruins of former luxury, as mean as +the wretch's studio?--Eh! that was to acknowledge to Vaudrey that she +was intriguing for a liaison with the single object of quitting the +prison-walls of want. She realized that this man, full of illusions, +believing that he had to do with perhaps a virtuous girl, or, at least, +one who was not moving in her own circle, who was giving herself, but +not selling herself, would shrink at the reality on finding himself face +to face with an adventuress. + +"Illusion is everything! He must be deceived! They are all stupid!" she +mused. + +But how was she to deceive this man as to her condition, how cloak her +want, how cause herself to pass for what she was not? With Rosas it +would have been a simple matter. Poor, she presented herself to him in +her poverty. He loved her so. She could the better mislead him. But with +Vaudrey, on the contrary, she must dazzle. + +"Two innocents," Marianne said to herself, "the one thirsts for virtue, +the other for vice." + +Should she confess everything to Sulpice as she had done to Rosas? Yes, +perhaps, if she discovered no better way, but a better plan had to be +found, sought, or invented. Find what? Borrow? Ask? Whom? Guy? She would +not dare to do so, even supposing that Lissac was sufficiently well off. +Then she wished to keep up appearances, even in Guy's eyes. Further, +she had never forgiven him for running off to Italy. She never would +forget it. No, no, she would ask nothing from Guy. + +To whom, then, should she apply? She again found herself in the +frightful extremity of those who, in that almost limitless Paris, +involved in the terrible intricacies of that madly-directed machine, +seek money, a loan, some help, an outstretched hand, but who find +nothing, not an effort to help them in all its crowd. She was overcome +with rage and hatred. Nothing! she had nothing! She would have sold +herself to any person whatsoever, to have speedily obtained a few of the +luxuries she required. Yes; sold herself now, to sell herself more +dearly to-morrow. + +Sold! Suddenly from the depths of her memory she recalled a form, +confused at first, but quickly remembered vividly, of an old woman +against whom she had formerly jostled, in the chance life she had led, +and who, once beautiful, and still clever and rich, it was said, had +been seized with a friendly desire to protect Marianne. It was a long +time since the young woman had thought of Claire Dujarrier. She met her +occasionally, her white locks hidden under a copious layer of golden +powder, looking as yellow as sawdust. The old woman had said to her: + +"Whenever you need advice or assistance, do not forget my address: Rue +La Fontaine, Auteuil." + +Marianne had thanked her at the time, and had forgotten all about it +till now, when in the anguish of her pursuit she recalled the name and +features of Claire Dujarrier as from the memories of yesterday. Claire +Dujarrier, a former danseuse, whose black eyes, diamonds, wild +extravagance, and love adventures were notorious formerly, had for the +last two or three years buried herself in a little house, fearing that +she would be assassinated; she kept her diamonds in iron-lined safes +built in the wall, and had a young lover, a clerk in a novelty store, +who was stronger than a market-house porter, and who from time to time +assumed a high tone and before whom she stood in awe. + +"Claire Dujarrier! The very thing!--Why not?" thought Marianne. + +She had been introduced to the ex-danseuse by Guy de Lissac. He was +considered as one of Claire's old lovers. They quarrelled when the old +dame had heard one of Guy's bons mots that had become familiar at the +Club: + +"When I see her, I always feel a slight emotion: she recalls my youth to +me!--But alas! not hers!" + +Claire was well-off and perhaps miserly. Marianne instinctively felt, +however, that she would get help at her hands. + +Money! + +"I will return her all! It is usury. Her pledge is here!" + +With brazen front, Kayser's niece struck her bosom, looking at the same +time at the reflection of her fine bust and pale face in the mirror. + +The next day she went straight to the former danseuse's. + +Claire Dujarrier lived in that long Rue La Fontaine at Auteuil which +partook of the characteristics of a suburban main street and a +provincial faubourg, with its summer villas, its little cottages +enclosed within gloomy little gardens, railed-off flower-beds, +boarding-schools for young people, and elbowing each other as in some +village passage, the butcher's store, the pharmacy, the wine-dealer's +shop, the baker's establishment,--a kind of little summer resort with a +forlorn look in February, the kiosks and cottages half decayed, the +gardens full of faded, dreary-looking leaves. Marianne looked about, +seeking the little Claire house. She had visited it formerly. A +policeman wandered along sadly,--as if to remind one of the town,--and +on one side, a gardener passed scuffling his wooden shoes, as if to +recall the village. + +However, here it was that the formerly celebrated girl, who awoke storms +of applause when she danced beside Cerrito at the Opéra, now lived +buried in silence,--a cab going to the Villa Montmorency seemed an event +in her eyes,--forgotten, her windows shut, and as a diversion looking +through the shutters at the high chimneys of some factory in the +neighboring Rue Gras that belched forth their ruddy or bluish fumes, or +yellow like sulphuric acid, or again red like the reflection of fire. + +Marianne rang several times when she arrived at the garden railing of +the little house. The bells sounded as if they were coated with rust. An +ancient maid-servant, astonished and morose, came to open the door. + +She conducted the young woman into the salon where Claire Dujarrier sat +alone, eating cakes, with her terrier on her lap. + +The dog almost leaped at Marianne's throat while Claire, rising, threw +herself on her neck. + +"Ah! dear little one!--How pleased I am! What chance brings you?" + +Marianne looked at the Dujarrier. She might still be called almost +lovely, although she was a little painted and her eyes were swollen, and +her cheeks withered; but she knew so perfectly well all the secrets for +rejuvenating, the eyebrow preparation, the labial wash, that she was a +walking pharmaceutical painting done on finely sculptured features. The +statue, although burdened with fat, was still superb. + +She listened to Marianne, smiled, frowned and, love-broker and advisory +courtesan that she was, ended by saying to the "little one" that she had +a devilish good chance and that she had arrived like March in Lent. + +"It is true, it has purposely happened. Vanda, you know her well?" + +"No!" answered Marianne. + +"What! Vanda, whom that big viper Guy called the Walking Rain?" + +"I do not remember--" + +"Well! Vanda has gone to Russia, she left a month ago. She will be there +all the winter and summer, and part of next winter. Her _general_ +requires her. He is appointed to keep an eye on the Nihilists. So she +wishes to rent her house in Rue Prony. That is very natural. A charming +house. Very _chic_. In admirable taste. You have the chance. And not +dear." + +"Too dear for me, who have nothing!" + +"Little silly! You have yourself," said Claire Dujarrier. "Then you have +me, I have always liked you. I will lend you the ready cash to set +yourself up, you can give me bills of exchange, little documents that +your minister--pest! you are going on well, you are, ministers!--that +His Excellency will endorse. Vanda will not expect anything after the +first quarter. Provided that her house is well-rented to someone who +does not spoil it, she will be satisfied. If she should claim all, why, +at a pinch I can make up the amount. But, my dear,"--and the old woman +lowered her voice,--"on no account say anything to Adolphe." + +"Adolphe?" + +"Yes, my _husband_. You do not know him?" + +She took from the table a photograph enclosed in a photograph-case of +sky-blue plush, in which Marianne recognized a swaggering fellow with +flat face, large hands, fierce, bushy moustache, who leaned on a cane, +swelling out his huge chest in outline against a mean, gray-tinted +garden ornamented with Medicis vases. + +"A handsome fellow, isn't he? Quite young!--and he loves me--I adore +him, too!" + +The tumid eyes of Claire Dujarrier resembled lighted coals. She pressed +kiss after kiss of her painted lips on the photograph and reverently +laid it on the table. + +Marianne almost pitied this half-senile love, the courtesan's +terrifying, last love. + +She was, however, too content either to trouble herself, or even to +reflect upon it. She was wild with joy. It seemed to her that a sudden +rift had opened before her and a gloriously sunny future pictured itself +to her mind. What an inspiration it was to think of Claire Dujarrier! + +She would sign everything she wished, acknowledge the sums lent, with +any interest that might be demanded. Much she cared about that, +indeed!--She was sure now to free herself and to _succeed_. + +"You are jolly right," said the ancient danseuse. "The nest is entirely +at the birds' disposal. Your minister--I don't ask his name, but I shall +learn it by the bills of exchange--would treat you as a grisette if he +found you at your uncle's. Whereas at Vanda's--ah! at Vanda's! you will +have news to tell me. So, see this is all that is necessary. I will +write to Vanda that her house is rented, and well rented. Kiss me and +skip! I hear Adolphe coming. He does not care to see new faces. And +then, yours is too pretty!" she added, with a peculiar significance. + +She got the old servant to show Marianne out promptly, as if she felt +fearful lest her _husband_ should see the pretty creature. Claire +Dujarrier was certainly jealous. + +"It is not I that would rob her of her porter!" Marianne thought, as she +walked away from Rue La Fontaine. + +Evening was now darkening the gray streets. A faint bluish mist was +rising over the river and spreading like breath over the quays. Marianne +saw Paris in the distance, and her visit seemed like a dream to her; she +closed her eyes, and a voice within her whispered confusedly the names +of Rosas, Vaudrey, Vanda, Rue Prony; she pictured herself stretched at +length on a reclining chair in the luxurious house of a courtesan, and +she saw at her feet that man--a minister--who supplicatingly besought +her favor, while in the distance a man who resembled Rosas was +travelling, moving away, disappearing-- + +"Nonsense!" the superstitious creature said to herself, "it was one or +the other! The duke or the minister! I have not made the choice." + +Then looking at the confused image of herself thrown on the window of +the cab, she threw a kiss at her own pale reflection, happy with the +unbounded joy of a child, and cried aloud while laughing heartily: + +"Bonjour, Vanda! I greet you, Mademoiselle Vanda." + + + + + +PART SECOND + +I + + +The Monceau plain is the quarter of changed fortunes and dice-throwing. +An entire town given over to luxury, born in a single night, suddenly +sprung into existence. The unpremeditated offspring of the aggregation +of millions. Instead of the cobbler's stall, the red-bedaubed shop of +the dealer in wines, the nakedness of an outer boulevard, here in this +spot of earth all styles flourish: the contrast of fancy, the château +throwing the English cottage in the shade; the Louis XIII. dwelling +hobnobbing with the Flemish house; the salamander of Francis I. hugging +the bourgeois tenement; the Gothic gateway opening for the entry of the +carriages of the courtesan. A town within a town. Something novel, +white, extravagant, overdone: the colossal in proximity to the +attractive, the vastness of a grand American hotel casting its shadow +over an Italian loggia. It partook at once of the Parisian and the +Yankee. The Château de Chambord sheltering a chocolate maker, and the +studio of an artist now become the salon of a rich curbstone broker. + +The little Hôtel de Vanda,--_one of our charming fugitives_, as those of +the chroniclers who still remember Vanda, say of her in their articles +sometimes--is an elegant establishment, severe in external appearance, +but of entirely modern interior arrangements, with a wealth of choice +knickknacks, and is regarded as one of the most attractive houses in Rue +Prony. Since the flight of the pretty courtesan, it bears the sad +notice: _Residence to let_. Its fast closed shutters give it the gloomy +appearance of a deserted boudoir. Complete silence succeeds feverish +bustle! Vanda was a boisterous, madcap spendthrift. Through the old +windows with their old-fashioned panes there often used to escape +snatches of song, airs of waltzes, fragments of quadrilles. Vanda's +horses pawed the ground spiritedly as they started at the fashionable +hour for the Bois, through the great gateway leading to the stables. And +now, for months, a corner of Rue Prony had been silent and drowsy, and +weighted with the melancholy that surrounds forsaken objects. + +It was here that Marianne, in carrying out her determination, entered +with a high head, resolved to cast off her sombre misery or to sink, her +plans defeated. The Dujarrier had greatly assisted her in taking up her +abode, building her hopes on Mademoiselle Kayser's beauty as on some +temporary profitable investment. As the old woman looked at her, she +shook her head. Marianne had to be quick. She was pale, already weary, +and her beauty, heightened by this weariness, was "in full blast," as +the former bungling artiste said in her capacity of a connoisseur. + +"After all," Dujarrier said to herself, "it is the favorable moment for +success. One does not become a _general_ except through seniority." + +Marianne also experienced the same feelings as the Dujarrier. She +realized that she had reached the turning-point of her life, it was like +a game of baccarat that she was playing with fate. She might come out of +it rich and preserved from the possibility of dying in a hospital or a +hovel after having dragged her tattered skirts through the streets, or +overwhelmed with debts, ruined forever, strangled by liabilities. This +commercial term made her smile ironically when she thought of it. +Against her she had her past, her adventurous life, almost the life of a +courtesan, carried away by the current of her amorous whims; it now +needed only the burden of liabilities for her to become not only +completely disclassed, but ruined by Parisian life. She had given the +Dujarrier receipts for all that that quasi-silent-partner had advanced +her, the old lady excusing herself for the precaution she took by saying +precisely: + +"In that way one can hold people. Grateful acknowledgments are good; +written acknowledgments are better!" + +The Dujarrier considered herself witty. + +Marianne had signed, moreover, all that the other had asked. She still +needed, indeed, to make further outlay. And what mattered it if she +plunged deeper while she was _taking a dive_, as she expressed it in her +language, which was a mixture of street slang and the elegant +phraseology of the salon. + +"Bah! I know how to swim." + +She suddenly straightened herself under this anxiety, reassured, +moreover, and spurred on as she was by the Dujarrier herself, who said +as she shrugged her shoulders: + +"When a woman like you has a man like Vaudrey,--a minister,--she has her +nest lined." + +Sulpice was not the man long to resist so refined a Parisienne as +Marianne. In him, the repressed ardors, the poetic ideas of a man of +twenty, had become the appetites of a man of forty. This provincial, +hungry for Parisianism,--very young in feelings and soul,--felt, as soon +as he found himself in Marianne's company, mad with desire for a new +life. The dazzling honors attending his entry into the ministry found +their culmination in the burning glance of Marianne, as their eyes met. + +Hardly was she installed in Rue Prony than she reminded him of his +promise to call on her. He hastened to her with strange eagerness and he +left her more disturbed, as if he had just taken a peep at an unknown +world. The feminine elegance of the Hôtel de Vanda had suddenly +intoxicated him. Marianne played her part very calmly in producing the +daily ravage that passion was making on Sulpice. She studied its rapid +progress with all the sang-froid of a physician. She regulated the doses +of her toxicant, the poison of her glance instilled into the veins of +this man. Determined to become his mistress, she desired to fall in the +guise of a woman madly in love, and not as an ordinary courtesan. With +any other man than Vaudrey, she would, perhaps, have yielded more +quickly. But she acted with Vaudrey as formerly she had done with Rosas. +Seeing that these idealists caressed their dreams, she coquetted with +platonic love, besides, she preferred to remain free for a short time, +without the burden of those pleasures of which she had grown tired, and +which had always caused her more disgust than delight. + +Moreover, she said to herself that it was necessary in Sulpice's case to +have the appearance of playing frankly, of loving truly, as in the case +of Rosas. But, this time, she would not let Vaudrey escape her by +flight, as the duke did. She would yield at the desired moment, certain +that Sulpice would not leave her the next day. + +"Rosas would be here," she said to herself self-confidently, "if he had +been my lover." + +After a moment of regretful preoccupation, she shrugged her shoulders +and said quickly: + +"Bah! _what is written is written_, as he said. If I haven't him, I have +the other." + +The "other" grew day by day more deeply enamored. He rushed off in hot +haste to visit Marianne; his hired hack, in which he sometimes left his +minister's portfolio peacefully at rest, pending his return, stood +before the little door in the Avenue Prony. He was happier when he +thought he had made a forward step in Marianne's affections than when he +had acquired new votes from the minority in the Chamber. Ambitious +projects yielded to the consuming desire that he felt toward this woman. +At the ministry, during the familiar conversations at table with +Adrienne and even during the hurly-burly attendant on private receptions +and morning interviews, he sometimes remained silent, lost in thought, +his mind wandering and, in reality, with Marianne. + +Adrienne, at such times, with a sweet smile which made Sulpice shudder +with remorse, would beseech him to work less, to take some recreation, +and not allow himself to be so absorbed in politics. + +"You are extremely pale, I assure you. You look worn out. You work too +hard." + +"It is due to administrative changes. There are so many documents to +examine." + +"I know that very well, but isn't Monsieur Warcolier there? In what way +does he help you?" + +"In no way," replied the minister sharply, speaking with truth. + +Public affairs, in fact, absorbed him, and he found it necessary to +steal the precious time to make a hasty trip to Rue Prony. A vacation, +it is true, was near. In less than a month, Vaudrey would have more +time at his disposal. But for more than three weeks yet, the minister +would have everything to modify and change,--everything to put into a +healthy shape, as Warcolier said--in the Hôtel Beauvau. + +What matter! He found the time to fly incognito to the Maison de Vanda, +leaving his coupé at the ministry. Marianne was always there for him +when he arrived. The male domestic or the femme de chambre received him +with all the deference that "domestics" show when they suspect that the +visitor brings any kind of subsidy to the house. To Vaudrey, there was a +sort of mystery in Mademoiselle Kayser's life. Ramel, who knew her uncle +Kayser, had told him of the poverty of the painter. How then, seeing +that her uncle was so shabby, could the niece be so sumptuously +established? + +Kayser, whom he had once met at Marianne's, had answered such a question +by remarking that his niece was a _sly puss_ who understood life +thoroughly and would be sure to make headway. But that was all. + +"I have suspected for a long time that that little head was not capable +of much," the painter had added. "I considered her a light-headed +creature, nothing more. Fool that I was! she is a shrewd woman, a clever +woman, a true woman. I only find fault with her for one thing." + +"What?" asked Vaudrey. + +"Do you ask what, Monsieur le Ministre? The style of her establishment. +It is flashy, tawdry, noisy, it is boudoir art. It lacks seriousness! It +lacks morality! I would have in it figures that have style, character. I +don't ask for saintly pictures, but moral allegories, austere art. I +understand only the severe in art. I am a puritan in the matter of the +brush. For that reason, I shall attain nothing in these days of _genre_ +and water-color painting." + +And Kayser went on painting allegories, to digest his dinner, the pâté +de foie gras washed down with kummel, of which he had just partaken at +his niece's. + +Vaudrey himself viewed those Japanese trifles, those screens, those +carpets, those pedestals surmounted by terra-cotta figures presenting in +their nudity the flesh tints of woman, those clock-cases above the +doors, that profusion of knickknacks, of furniture, of ottomans, that +soft upholstery that seemed to be made only to excuse a fall--nay, even +urged to sudden temptations, to chance love, to violent caprices; and on +leaving the house, where he had spoken to Marianne only in compliments a +hundred times repeated, and where she had but re-echoed sarcasms full of +tender, double meanings, as a woman who would undoubtedly yield, but +would not offer herself, he bore away with him in his nostrils and, as +it were, in his clothes, a permeating, feminine odor, which would now +follow him everywhere, and everywhere float about him in whiffs, urging +him to return to that house in which a new world seemed to be opening to +him. + +He would not long persist in enquiring how Marianne Kayser had procured +all those baubles that so highly incensed the puritan instincts of her +honest uncle. He found himself urged forward with profound delight in +this adventure whose mysterious features pleased him. Bah! the very fact +that he found so much inexplicable in the life of this woman enticed him +all the more. It seemed to him that not only had he entered upon a +romantic course, but that he was himself the hero of the romance. Never, +in the days when he rolled about, an unknown student, on the Parisian +wave, and had lifted his thoughts toward some pale patrician girl, +toward some pretty creature he had caught a glimpse of, leaning back in +a dark-blue coupé, or framed in by the red velvet hangings of a +proscenium box, had he more perfectly incarnated the ideal of his desire +than in so charming a creature. Dreams of power, visions of love of his +twentieth year, had now become tangible to him and at forty he stretched +out his feverish hand toward them all. + +"Could Ramel have been right?" he said to himself, "and I, only a +provincial, athirst for Parisine? But what matter? Let Mademoiselle +Kayser be what she will and I what I may be, it seems to me that I have +never loved any one as I love this woman." + +"Not even Adrienne," added a faint, trembling voice from within. But +Sulpice had a ready answer to stifle it: Adrienne could not be compared +with any creature in the world. Adrienne was the charm, the daily +comfort of the domestic hearth. She was the wife, not the "woman." She +was the darling, not the love. Vaudrey would have severed one of his +arms to spare her any heavy sorrow, but he was not anxious about +Adrienne. She knew nothing, she would know nothing. And what fault, +moreover, had he committed hitherto? In that word _hitherto_, a host of +mental reservations were involved that Sulpice would gladly have +obliterated with his nails, he was ready to cry out with the same good +faith,--that of the husband who deceives the wife whom he loves: + +"What wrong have I done?" + +One afternoon,--there was no session of the Chamber that day,--Marianne +was seated in her little salon. She was warming the tips of her +slippers, that furtively peeped from beneath the lace of her skirt as a +little bird might protrude its beak from a nest, her right leg crossed +over the other, and she appeared to be musing, her chin resting on her +delicate hand. + +She was weary. Justine, her recently engaged femme de chambre, who, like +the silverware, was provided by the Dujarrier, came to announce with the +discreet, bantering little smile of servants, that Monsieur Dachet, the +upholsterer, had called twice. + +"The upholsterer!" + +Marianne frowned slightly. + +"What did he say?" + +"Nothing, that he would return to-morrow." + +"You call that nothing?" said Marianne, with a short laugh. + +When Justine had left the room, she went straight to a small, black, +Italian cabinet inlaid with ivory, of which one drawer was locked. In +opening it, the sound of gold coins rattling on the wood caused her to +smile; then, with the tips of her white fingers, she spread out the +louis at the bottom of the drawer, which she abruptly closed, making a +wry face, and folding her arms, she returned to her seat in front of the +fire, beating her right foot nervously upon the wrought-iron fender. + +"The Dujarrier's money will not go much further," she thought. "It is +finished." + +She thought of striking a decisive blow. Up to the present time, her +relations with Sulpice had floated in the regions of the +sentimentalities of the novel, or of romance. The minister believed +himself loved for love's sake. He saw in Marianne only an eccentric girl +free from all prejudices and every duty, who disposed of her life as +seemed best to her, without being under the necessity of accounting to +either husband or lover. Free, she made of her liberty pleasure or +passion according to her fancy. The frightful, practical questions, the +daily necessities, were lost sight of by this man who was burdened with +the governmental question of France. Again, he never asked himself the +source of Marianne's luxury. He delighted in it without thinking of +analyzing anything or of knowing anything, and this ingenuously. +Mademoiselle Kayser's first word must necessarily awaken him to the +situation. + +She knew that Vaudrey was to come, and suddenly leaving the fire, she +arrayed herself for him in a black satin peignoir lined with red surah, +with lapels of velvet thrown widely apart and allowing the whiteness of +her neck and chest to be seen under folds of old lace. Her fair hair +fell upon her velvet collar, and surmounting this strange costume, her +pale face against the background of the red-draped salon assumed the +disturbing charm of an apparition. + +On seeing her, Sulpice could not refrain from stopping short and looking +at her in admiration. Seated there, in the centre of her salon, she was +awaiting him and arranging bundles of papers in a basket with gilded +feet and lined with pink satin. She extended her hand to him. It was a +pale hand, as inanimate as the hand of a dead person, and she languidly +asked him why he remained there stupefied without approaching her. + +"I am looking," said the minister. + +"You are always the most gallant of men," said Marianne, and she added: + +"You are not already tired then of looking at me? Usually, caprices do +not last so long." + +"The affection that I have for you is not a caprice." + +"What is it, then? I am curious--" + +"It is a passion, Marianne, an absolute, deep, mad passion--" + +"Oh! nonsense! nonsense!" said Marianne. "I know that you speak +wonderfully well, I have heard you in the tribune. A declaration of love +costs you no more than a ministerial declaration. But to-day, my dear +minister, I am not disposed to listen to it even from you." + +In these last words, there was a certain tenderness that in a measure +modified the expression of weariness or sulkiness which Marianne +suggested. Sulpice inferred therefrom an implied acceptance of his +proffered love. + +"Yes," said she abruptly; "I am very sad, frightfully sad." + +"Without a cause?" asked Vaudrey. + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +"Oh! I am not of those who allow their nerves to control them. When I am +out of sorts, there is invariably a cause. Let that be understood once +for all." + +"And the cause?--I should be delighted to learn it, Marianne, for I +swear to you that I would always bear a half of your troubles and +pains." + +"Thanks!--But in life there are troubles so commonplace that one could +only acknowledge them to the most intimate friends." + +"You have no more devoted friend than I am," replied Vaudrey, in a tone +that conveyed unmistakable conviction. + +She knew it positively. She could read that heart like an open page. + +"When one meets friends like you, one is the more solicitous to keep +them and to avoid saddening them with stupid affairs." + +"But why?" asked Vaudrey, drawing close to Marianne. "What troubles you? +I beseech you to tell me!" + +He gazed earnestly at her eyes, seeking in the depths of their blue +pupils a secret or a confession that evaded him, and with an instinctive +movement he seized Marianne's hands which she abandoned to him; they +were quite cold. As he bent toward her to plead with her to speak, he +felt her gentle breath, inhaled the perfume of her delicate, fair skin, +and saw the exquisite curves of her body outlined beneath the black +folds of her satin peignoir. Marianne's knee gently pressed his own +while her heavy eyelids fell like veils over the young woman's eyes, in +which Vaudrey thought he observed tears. + +"Marianne, I entreat you, if you have any sorrow whatever, that I can +assuage, I pray you, tell me of it!" + +"Eh! if it were a sorrow!--" she said, quickly withdrawing her left hand +from Sulpice's warm grasp. "But it is worse: it is a financial worry, +yes, financial," she said brusquely, on observing that Vaudrey's face +depicted astonishment. + +She seized the handful of papers that she had thrown into the +work-basket, and said in a tone that was expressive of mingled wrath and +disgust: + +"There now, you see that? They are bills for this house: the accounts of +clamorous creditors, upholsterers, locksmiths, builders and I don't know +what besides!" + +"What! your house?" + +"You thought that I had paid for it? It is a rented one and nothing in +it is paid for. I owe for all, and to a hungry pack." + +She began to laugh. + +"Do you imagine then that old Kayser's niece could lead this life in +which you see her? Without a sou, should I possess all that you see +here?--No!--I have perpetrated the folly of ordering all these things +for which I am now indebted and which must be paid for at once, and now +I am about to be sued. There! you were determined to urge me to confess +all that--Such are my worries and they are not yours, so I ask your +pardon, my dear Vaudrey: so let us talk of something else. Well! how did +the Fraynais interpellation turn out?--What has taken place in the +Chamber?" + +"Let us speak only of you, Marianne," said the minister, who looked at +the young woman with a sort of frank compassion as a friendly physician +looks at a sick person. + +She nervously snapped her fingers and with her feet crossed, beat the +little feverish march that she had previously done. + +He drew still closer to her, trying to calm her and to obtain some +explanation, some information from her; and Marianne, as if she had +already yielded in at once confiding her secret unreflectingly, refused +at present to accord him the full measure of her confidence. She +repeated that nothing that could be a source of annoyance or sordid, +ought to sadden her friends. Besides, one ought to draw the line at +one's life-secret. She was entitled, in fact, to maintain silence. That +Vaudrey should question her so, caused her horrible suffering. + +"And you, Marianne," he said, "you torture me much more by not replying +to me, to whom the least detail of your life is interesting. To me who +see you preoccupied and distressed, when I wish, I swear to you, to +banish all your sadness." + +She turned toward him with an abrupt movement and with her gray, +gold-speckled eyes flashing, she seemed to yield to a violent, sudden +and almost involuntary decision and said to Sulpice: + +"Then you wish to know even the wretchedness of my life? So be it! But I +warn you that it is not very cheerful. For," said she, after a moment's +silence,--Sulpice shuddered under her glance,--"it is better to be +frank, and if you love me as you say you do, you should know me +thoroughly; you can then decide what course to take. For myself, I am +accustomed to deception." + +Ah! although this woman were ready to tell him everything, Vaudrey felt +sure that her confidence could only intensify the love that he felt. She +had risen, her arms were crossed over her black gown whose red velvet +trimming suggested open wounds, her ardent eyes were in strong contrast +with her pale face, her lips of unusually heightened color expressed a +strange sensuality that invited a kiss, while her nostrils dilated under +the impulse of bitter anger--standing thus, she began to narrate her +life to Vaudrey who was seated in front of her, looking up to her--as if +at her knees. Her story was a sad one of a wicked childhood, ignorant +youth, wasted early years, melancholy, sins, outbursts of faith, falls, +returns of love, pride, virtue, restitution through repentance, scourged +hopes, dead confidences, the entire heartrending existence of a woman +who had left more of her heart than of the flesh of her body clinging to +the nails of her calvaries:--all, though ordinary and commonplace, was +so cruel in its truth that it appealed at once to Sulpice's heart, a +heart bursting with pity, to that credulous man who was attracted by all +that seemed to him so exquisitely painful and new about this woman. + +"Perhaps I am worrying you?" she asked abruptly. + +"You!" said he. + +He looked at her with a tear in his eye. + +Marianne's eyes gleamed with a sudden light. + +"Well!" she said, "such is my life! I have loved, I have been betrayed. +I have had faith in some one and I awakened one fine morning with this +prospect before me: to sink in the deep mud or to do like so many +others,--to take a lover and save myself through luxury, since I could +not recover myself through passion. Bah! the world shows more leniency +toward those who succeed than toward those who repent. All that is +necessary is to succeed, and on my word--you know Monsieur de Rosas +well?" + +"No," stammered Vaudrey, before whose mind the duke's blond face +appeared. + +"You heard him the other evening!" + +"I mean that I have never spoken to him. Well! what of Monsieur de +Rosas?" + +"Monsieur de Rosas loved me. Oh!" she said, interrupting a gesture made +by Vaudrey, "wait. He said that he loved me. He is rich. Why should I +not have been Rosas's mistress? Deal for deal, that was a good bargain, +at least! I accept Rosas! It was to receive him that I was foolish +enough to make my purchases without reckoning, without knowing. What's +that for a Rosas?" she said, as she crushed the bundle of bills between +her fingers. + +"And--Monsieur de Rosas?" asked Vaudrey, who was quite pale. + +"He?" + +Marianne laughed. + +"Well, he has gone--I have told you as much. He has, moreover, perhaps, +done wisely. I regretted him momentarily--but, bah! I should have sent +him away--yes, very quickly, just so! without even allowing him to +touch the tips of my fingers." + +"Rosas?" repeated the minister, looking keenly into Marianne's eyes. + +"Rosas!" she again said, lowering her voice. "And do you know why I +would have done that?" + +"No--" answered Sulpice trembling. + +"Simply because I no longer loved him, and that I loved another." + +She had spoken these last words slowly and in such passionate, vibrating +tones that Sulpice felt himself shudder with delight. + +"Ah," he said, as he went toward her, "is that the reason? Truly, +Marianne, is that the reason?" + +She had not confessed whom she loved, she had spoken only by her looks. +But Sulpice felt that he belonged to her, he was burning with passion, +transported, insane from this avowal; his hands sought hers and drew her +to him. He clasped her to his bosom, intoxicated by the pressure of this +body against his own, and added in a very low tone while his fingers +alternately wandered over her satiny neck and her silky hair: + +"How can I help loving you, Marianne? Is it true, really true? You love +me?--Ah! what the great nobleman has not done, do you think I cannot do? +You are in your own home, you understand, Marianne.--Then, as he touched +the young woman's exquisite ears with his lips, he added: + +"Our home--will you have it so?--Our home!--" + +He felt, as she remained in his embrace with her body leaning against +his, that she quivered throughout her frame; his lips wandered from her +ear to her cheek and then to her lips, there they rested long in a +ravishing kiss that filled him with the languishing sensation of +swooning, he holding her so tightly that, with a smile, she disengaged +herself, pink with her blushes, and bright-eyed, said, with an +expression of peculiar delight: + +"It is sealed now!" + +Sulpice, even in his youthful days, had never felt so intoxicating a +sensation as that which he enjoyed to-day. It was a complete abandonment +of himself, a forgetfulness of everything in the presence of his +absolute intoxication. All the realities of life that were ready to take +possession of him on leaving this place melted before this dream: the +possession of that woman. He forgot the assembly, the foyer, that human +crowd that he ruled from the height of the tribune, and Adrienne, who +was seated yonder at the window, awaiting him. He forgot everything. +Like those who possess the singular faculty of easily receiving and +losing impressions, he fancied that his horizon was limited to these +walls with their silken hangings, these carpets, this feminine salon, +opening on a boudoir, a retreat whence escaped the odors of flowers and +perfume bottles. + +Then, too, a special feeling of pride entered his heart. He felt his joy +increased tenfold at the thought that he, the petty bourgeois from +Grenoble, had snatched this woman from a duke and, like a great +nobleman, had paid the debts that she had contracted. He raised his head +proudly from an instinctive impulse of vanity. Rosas! He, the son of +honest Dauphiny folks, would crush him with his liberality. + +"What shall I do to silence those creditors?" he said to +Marianne,--whose hands he held and whose face grazed his in a way that +almost made him frantic. + +"Nothing," she replied. "What you have promised me is enough. Now I feel +that I am saved. Our house, you said so, we are in our own house here. +If the creditors will not believe me when I tell them to have +patience--" + +"They will believe you," said Vaudrey. "Come, we will find the means--On +my signature, any one will lend me money." + +It seemed that Marianne was expecting this word _money_, coarse but +eloquent, in order to tell Vaudrey that an old friend, Claire Dujarrier, +was on intimate terms with a certain Adolphe Gochard, who upon the +endorsement of a responsible person, would certainly advance a hundred +thousand francs that he had at this moment lying idle. Gochard only +needed a bill of exchange in his favor for one hundred thousand francs +at three months' date, plus interest at five per cent. This Gochard was +a very straightforward capitalist, who did not make it a business to +lend money, but merely to oblige. It was Madame Dujarrier who had +introduced him and Marianne would have already availed herself of his +courtesy, if she had believed herself able to repay it at the appointed +date. + +"And where does this Monsieur Gochard live?" Vaudrey promptly asked. + +"Oh! it would not be necessary for you to go to see him," replied +Marianne. "On receipt of a bill of exchange from me, Madame Dujarrier +would undertake to let me have a hundred thousand francs from hand to +hand." + +"A hundred thousand francs!--In three months," said Vaudrey to himself, +"in a vast placer like Paris, one can find many veins of gold." + +He had, besides, his personal property and land in Dauphiny. If need be, +without Adrienne's even knowing it, he could mortgage his farms at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont! + +"Monsieur de Rosas would not have hesitated. But in his case there would +have been no merit," said Mademoiselle Kayser. + +At the name of that man, coupled with the recollection of him, Sulpice +felt himself spurred to a decision. Clearly the great millionaire noble +would not have delayed before snatching this woman from the claws of her +creditors. A hundred thousand francs, a mere trifle for the count! Well, +Vaudrey would give it as the Spaniard would have done. He would find it. +Within three months, he would have put everything right; he did not +know how, but that mattered little. + +"Have you a pen, Marianne?" + +The minister had not noticed the sheet of white paper that was lying on +the blotting pad of Russia leather, among the satin finished envelopes +and the ivory paper-cutters. + +"What are you going to do, my friend?" + +She pretended to put away the green, sharkskin penholder lying near the +inkstand, but drew it imperceptibly nearer to Sulpice, who with a quick +movement had already seated himself in front of the secrétaire. + +"A minister's signature is sufficient, I suppose?" he said with a smile. + +He commenced to write. + +"What did you say?--Gochard?--" + +She was quite pale as she looked over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him +rapidly write several lines on the paper, then she spelled: + +"Adolphe Gochard--Go-go-c-h-ar-d." + +"There it is!" he said, as he handed her the sheet of paper. + +"I wish to know what is thereon, or I would never consent." + +She took the paper between her fingers as if to tear it to pieces. +Sulpice prevented her. + +"No," he said, "I request you to keep it; it is the best reply you can +give to those people.--Rely on me!" + +"Do you wish it?" asked Marianne, with a toss of her head, speaking in a +very sweet voice. + +"Decidedly. It is selfish, but I wish to feel myself not a little at +home here," Sulpice replied. + +He seized her hands, her plump, soft, coaxing hands, and as he clasped +them within his own, he carried them to his lips and kissed them, as +well as her face, neck, ear and mouth, which he covered with kisses; and +Marianne, still holding the satin paper that the minister had just +signed, said with a laugh as she feebly defended herself: + +"Come--come--have done with it! Oh! the big boy!--You will leave nothing +for another time!" + +He left the house, his head was swimming, and he was permeated with +strong odors. He flung to the coachman an address half-way to the +ministry. + +"Place de la Madeleine." + +He shut his eyes to picture Marianne. + +As soon as she was alone, her lips curled as a smile of satisfied vanity +played over them. She began by reading the lines that he had so hastily +written: _I guarantee to Monsieur Adolphe Gochard a bill of exchange at +three months, if he agrees to advance that amount to Mademoiselle +Dujarrier who will hand it to Mademoiselle Marianne Kayser_. + +"Well! the Dujarrier was right," she said; "a woman's scheming works +easier than a sinapism." + +Then, after a slight toss of the head and still smiling, she opened one +of the drawers of the small Inaltia cabinet and slipped into it the +satin paper to which the minister had affixed his signature and which +she had carefully folded four times. She considered that autograph worth +a thousand times more gold than the few pieces that remained scattered +about the drawer, like so many waifs of luxury. Then, slowly returning +to her armchair, she sank into it, clasping her two hands behind her +head and gazing at the ceiling, her thoughts wandered in dreams--a crowd +of little ambitious thoughts passed through her brain like drifting +clouds across the sky--and while with the top of her foot she again beat +her nervous march on the hem of her petticoat, her lips, the lips whose +fever had been taken away by Vaudrey, still preserved the strange turn +of the corners that indicated the unsatiated person who sees, however, +his opportunity arrive. + +She was as fully mistress of herself as Vaudrey was embarrassed and +unbalanced. He seemed to hear voices laughing and singing within him and +his brain was inflamed with joy. Before him opened the immense prospects +of his dreams. Glorious as it was to be all-powerful, it was better to +be loved. Everything whirled about within his brain, he thought he still +heard Denis Ramel talking to him, and in a twinkling, Marianne's smiling +face appeared, and with a kiss she interrupted the old journalist's +sallies, and Sulpice saw her, too, as it were half-fainting, through the +window of her fiacre, like a pastel half-hidden beneath the glass. + +He was delighted to walk about for a moment when the carriage had set +him down on the asphalted space that surrounds the Madeleine. The walk +was beneficial. He raised his head instinctively, expanded his lungs +with the air, and threw out his chest. He thought that people looked at +him attentively. Some passers-by turned round to see him. He would have +felt prouder to have heard them say: "That is Mademoiselle Kayser's +lover!" than: "That is Monsieur Vaudrey, the minister!" + +He felt a kind of annoyance on returning to Place Beauvau. He was still +with Marianne. He recalled her attitudes, her smile, the tone of her +voice. Public matters now fastened their collar on him, there were +signatures to be subscribed, reports to be read, telegrams, routine +work; in a word, vulgar professional duties were to be resumed. He did +not at once go to his cabinet. Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State, +received and despatched ordinary matters. + +Through some strange caprice, he felt a desire to see Adrienne very soon +after leaving Marianne, perhaps to know how he would feel and if "_cela +se voyait_" as they say. There was also a feeling of remorse involved in +this eagerness. He wished to satisfy himself that Adrienne was not +suffering, and as formerly, to smile on her as if redoubled affection +would, in his own eyes, obliterate his fault. + +Adrienne was in her salon. Sulpice heard the sound of voices beyond the +door. Some one was talking. + +"Madame has a visitor?" he inquired of the domestic. + +"Yes, Monsieur le Ministre--Monsieur de Lissac." + +"What! Guy! what chance brings him here!" Sulpice thought. + +He opened the door and entered, extending his hand to his friend. + +"How lucky! it is very kind of you to come." + +Guy stood, hat in hand, while Vaudrey stooped toward Adrienne to kiss +her brow unceremoniously in the presence of his friend. + +"Oh!" said Lissac, "I have not come to greet Your Excellency. It is your +charming wife that I have called on." + +"I thank you for it," said Sulpice, "my poor Adrienne does not receive +many visits outside the circle of official relations." + +"And she does not get very much entertainment! So I promise myself to +come and pay court to her--or such court as you would wish--from time to +time. Madame," said Lissac jocosely, "it is a fact that this devilish +minister deserves that you should receive declarations from morning to +night while he is over yonder ogling his portfolio. Such a husband as he +is, is not to be found again--" + +Adrienne, blushing a little, looked at Vaudrey with her usual expression +of tender devotion as profound as her soul. Sulpice made an effort to +smile at Lissac's pleasantries. + +"No, take care, you know!" added Guy. "As Madame Vaudrey is so often +alone, I shall allow myself to come here sometimes to keep her company, +and I won't guarantee to you that I won't fall in love with her." + +He turned respectfully toward Adrienne and added, with the correct +bearing of a gentleman: + +"Madame, all this is only to make him comprehend that nothing in the +world, not even a rag of morocco,--is his portfolio a morocco one?--is +worth the happiness of having such a wife as you. And the miserable +fellow doesn't suspect it. You see, I speak of you as the Opposition +journals do." + +Sulpice tried to smile but he divined under Guy's jesting, a serious and +truthful purpose. Perhaps Adrienne had just been allowing herself to +complain of the sadness and dreariness of her life. He was hurt by it. +After all, he did all that he could to gratify his wife. But a man like +him was not, in fact, born to remain forever tied down. The wife of a +minister must bear her part of the burden, since there must be a burden. + +As if Adrienne had divined Sulpice's very thoughts, she quickly added, +interrupting the jester who had somewhat confused the minister: + +"Don't pay any attention to Monsieur de Lissac. I am very happy just as +I am." + +Vaudrey had taken her hand to clasp it between his fingers with a +slightly nervous grasp. The trustful, good-natured, pure smile that +Adrienne gave him, recalled the anxious, distracted expression on +Marianne's lip. + +"Dear wife!" + +He sought to find a word, a cry, some consolation, a sort of caress, +proceeding from one heart and penetrating the other. He could find none. + +"Come!" said Guy. "I am going to leave you, and if you will allow me, +madame, I will occasionally come here and tell you all the outside +tittle-tattle." + +"You will always be welcome, Monsieur de Lissac," Adrienne said, as she +extended her hand to him. + +Guy bowed to Madame Vaudrey in a most profoundly respectful way. + +Sulpice accompanied him through the salons as far as the hall. + +"Do you want me to tell you?" said Lissac. "Your wife is very weary, +take care! This big mansion is not very cheerful. One must inevitably +catch colds in it, and then a woman to be all alone here! A form of +imprisonment! Do not neglect to wheedle the majority, my dear minister, +but don't forget your wife. Come! I will not act traitorously toward +you, but I warn you that if I often find your wife melancholy, as she is +to-day, I will tell her that I adore her. Yes! yes! your wife is +charming. I would give all the orders in the world for a lock of her +hair. Adieu, Monsieur le Ministre." + +"Great idiot," said Vaudrey, giving him a little friendly, gentle tap on +the neck. + +"Be it so, but if you do not love her well enough, I shall fall in love +with her, and I forewarn you that it is much better that I should than +any other. Au revoir." + +"Au revoir!" Sulpice repeated. + +He tried now to force a smile and went down to his cabinet, where he +found heaped-up reports awaiting his attention and he turned the pages +over nervously and read them in a very bad humor. + + + * * * * * + +_She was quite pale as she looked +over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him rapidly write several lines on the +paper, then she spelled: + +"Adolphe Gochard--Go-go-ch-a-r-d."_ + +[Illustration: SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE] + + + + +II + + +Madame Vaudrey drew no real pleasure from the commonplace receptions at +the ministry, or at her Wednesday _at homes_, except when by chance, +Denis Ramel permitted himself to abandon the Batignolles to call at +Place Beauvau, or when Guy enlivened this dull spot by recounting the +happenings of the outside world. + +Adrienne felt herself terribly isolated; she knew hardly any one in +Paris. Since Vaudrey had installed himself in Rue de la +Chaussée-d'Antin, she had not had time to form acquaintances among the +wives of the deputies to the Assembly, the majority of whom lived in the +provinces or dwelt at Versailles for economical reasons. + +Evidently the residence at the ministry had only brought her ready-made +relations, depressingly inevitable visitors who resembled office-seekers +or clients. These official receptions filled her with sadness. The +conversation always took the same hackneyed tone, disgusting in its +flattery or disquieting by reason of its allusions. People discussed +coming interpellations of ministers; government majorities, projected +legislation; the same phrases, as dreary as showers, fell with all the +regularity of drops of rain. Even young girls, brought up in this centre +of infuriated politicians, spoke of the breaking up of the majority, +reports or ballots, in the same manner as shopkeepers talk of their +trade. + +Poor Adrienne exerted herself to acquire an interest in these matters. +Since her husband's very existence was involved therein, hers should +also be. She had, however, formerly dreamed of an entirely different +youth and on bright, sunshiny days she reflected that yonder on the +banks of the Isère, it was delightful in her sweet, little, provincial +house. + +Besides, she carefully concealed her melancholy. She knew that she was +already reproached for being somewhat sad. A minister's wife should know +how to smile. This was what Madame Marsy never failed to repeat to her +as often as possible when she visited her at Place Beauvau. This woman +who hardly concerned herself at all about her son, allowing him to grow +up badly enough and committing all her maternal duties to the +grandmother, was perpetually cheerful, notwithstanding that her life had +been chequered by chance and her widowhood of sufficiently dramatic +character, as was said. She endeavored to play the part of an adviser, +an intimate friend to Adrienne. She frequently said to Madame Gerson, +who rarely left her, that Madame Vaudrey would be altogether charming if +she had _chic_. + +"Unfortunately, she is provincial; not in her element. She still smacks +of Dauphiny. And then--what is the funniest thing: she knows nothing of +politics." + +"She does not even concern herself about it," said the pretty Madame +Gerson, laughing heartily. + +According to these ladies she did not take the trouble to fulfil the +rôle of a minister's wife faultlessly. Ah! if only Sabine or Blanche +Gerson occupied the position filled by this _petite bourgeoise_ of +Grenoble! Well! Paris would have seen what an Athenian Republic was. + +Sabine Marsy was decidedly clever. She politely advised Adrienne, +without appearing to do so, as to many matters, in such a way as to +convey reproof under the guise of kindness. Madame Vaudrey would have +done well, as Madame Gerson also observed, to have studied the _Code du +Cérémonial_ on reaching Place Beauvau. + +Like Madame Marsy, Madame Gerson had gradually gained Adrienne's +friendship. From an ostentatious desire to be able to tell of what +happened at the ministry; to be on the first list of guests, when the +minister received or gave a ball, Sabine Marsy, who had suffered from +the mania of aspiring to become an artist, patronized the +_intransigeant_ painters and exhibited at the salon, now set her mind on +playing the rôle of a political figure in Paris. Madame Gerson, +_Blanche_, as Sabine called her, had a similar ambition, but simply from +a desire to be in fashion. + +She wished to bring herself into notice. Everything attracted her, +tempted her. She belonged, body and soul, to that machine with its +manifold gearing, brilliant, noisy, active, puffing like a locomotive, +that is called _chic_. _Chic_, that indefinite, indefinable word, +changeable and subtle like a capillary hygrometer, is a Parisian tyranny +that grinds out more fashionable lives than the King of Dahomey offers +as victims on his great feast days. For Blanche, everything in this most +stimulated, over-excited, feverishly deranged life, was reduced to these +two inevitable conclusions: what was _chic_ and what was not _chic_. Not +only was this the inevitable guide in reference to style, clothing, hat, +gloves, costume, material, jewelry, the dress that she should wear, but +also the book that should be read, the play that should be heard, the +operatic score that should be strummed on the piano, the bonbon that +should be presented, the opinion that one should hold, the picture one +should comment upon, all was hopelessly a question of _chic_. + +Madame Gerson would have preferred to be compromised in the matter of +her honor rather than to be ridiculed as to her opinions or to express +an idea that was not chic. The necessary result was that all this +woman's conversation--and she often came to see Madame Vaudrey,--was on +well-known topics; so that Adrienne knew in advance what Blanche's +opinion was upon such and such a matter, and that ideas could only pass +muster with Madame Gerson when they bore the stamp of chic, just as a +coin, to escape suspicion of being counterfeit, must bear the stamp of +the mint. + +Blanche would have been heartbroken if she had not been seen in the +President's salon on the occasion of a great reception at the Élysée; at +the ministry, on the evening of a comedy; if she had not been in the +front rank of the ladies' gallery on the day of interpellation at the +Assembly; if she had not been greeted from the top of the grand stand by +some minister, on Grand Prix day; if she had not been the first at the +varnishing; the first at the general rehearsals, a little _chic_,--the +first everywhere. Slender, delicate, but hardy as a Parisian, she +dragged her exhausted husband, with her hand of fine steel, through +receptions, balls, soirées, salons, talking loudly, judging everything, +chattering, cackling and haranguing, delighted to mount, with head +erect, the grand staircase of a minister and feel the joy of plunging +her little feet into the official moquettes as if her heels had been +made for state carpets; swelling with pride when she heard the usher, +amid the hubbub of the reception, call loudly the name which meant the +fashionable couple, a couple found at every fête: + +"Monsieur and Madame Gerson!" + +While the husband, fatigued, weary, left his office heavy-headed, after +having eaten a hasty meal, put on his dress coat and white tie in +haste, got into his carriage in haste, hurriedly accompanied his wife, +left her in order to take a doze on an armchair during the height of the +ball, woke in haste, returned home in haste, slept hurriedly, rose the +same, dragging this indefatigable creature about with him like a +convict's chain, she smiled at others, enticed others, waltzed with +others, adorned herself for others, keeping for him only her weariness, +her yawns, her pallor and her sick-headaches. + +For these two galley-slaves of _chic_, the winter passed in this manner, +as fatiguing as months of penal servitude, and they went none too soon, +when the summer arrived, to breathe the sea air or enjoy the sunshine of +the country, in order to restore their frames, wan, worn-out, seedy and +"gruelled," as Sabine Marsy said, when she recalled her connection with +the artists. + +"Ah! how much better I like my home!" thought Madame Vaudrey. + +Sabine and Madame Gerson, with the wives of the ministers, those of the +chiefs of departments, and the regular visitors, were the most assiduous +in their attentions to Adrienne, whom they considered decidedly +provincial. She, stupefied, was alarmed by these Parisian bustlers, that +resembled machines in running order, jabbering away as music-boxes play. + +"Do they tire you?" said Guy de Lissac to her bluntly one evening, +succumbing to a feeling of pity for this pensive young woman,--who was a +hundred times prettier than Madame Gerson, whose beauty was so highly +extolled in the journals,--this minister's wife, who voluntarily kept +herself in the background with a timidity that betrayed no awkwardness, +but was in every way attractive, especially to a man about town like +Guy. + +"They do not tire me, they upset me," Adrienne replied. + +"Ah! they are in full _go_, as it is called. An express train. But they +amuse themselves so much that they have not even time to smile. When the +locomotive spins along too rapidly, try to distinguish the scenery!" + +Adrienne instinctively felt that under his irony this sceptic disguised +a sort of sincerity. Lissac's wit pleased her. He surprised her somewhat +at times, but the probably assumed raillery of the young man compensated +for the insipid nonsense of the conversation to which she listened +daily. + +At first from mere curiosity and after from a sentiment of respectful +devotion, Guy was impelled to study that delicate and sensitive nature, +entirely swayed by love of Sulpice, that suffered at times a vague +pressure as of some indefinable anguish at the throat, as if a vacuum--a +choking vacuum--had been created about her by some air-pump. + +This huge mansion seemed to her to be entirely innocent of all memories, +and though peopled with phantoms, was as commonplace and vulgar as an +apartment house. There were no associations save dust and cracks. These +salons, built for the Maréchal de Beauvau, these walls that had +listened to the sobs of Madame d'Houdetot at the death-bed of +Saint-Lambert, appeared to Adrienne to exude ennui, strangling and +inevitable ennui, solemn, official, absolute ennui, nothing but ennui in +the very decorum of the place, and isolation in the midst of power. + +She cursed her loneliness, she felt lost amid the salons of this +furnished ministerial mansion, whose cold, gloomy apartments, with the +chairs symmetrically arranged along the walls, she wandered through, but +evidently without expecting any one: state chairs lacking +occupants,--ordinary chairs, domestic chairs seem to have tongues--that +never exchanged conversation. Vast, deserted rooms where the green +curtains behind the glass doors of the bookcases were eternally drawn, +bookcases without books, forever open, mournful as empty sepulchres. + +Yes, this immense gilded dwelling with its Gobelins tapestries stifled +her with its terrifying gloom, where nothing, not a single article, +recalled her charming provincial home, her Grenoble house with its +garden filled with lilacs where she was often wont to read while Sulpice +worked upstairs, bent over his table crowded with papers, before his +open window. Ah! those cherished rooms, in the humble corner of the +provincial home, their happy crouching in the peaceful nest; aye, even +the happy first days in Paris, in the Chaussée-d'Antin apartments, in +which Adrienne at least felt herself in her own home, free in her +actions and thoughts, and where she could talk aloud without feeling +that an eye was constantly watching her, and ears were always strained, +in fact, a perpetual espionage upon all her actions and a criticism of +all her words. + +She had reached a point when she asked herself if, even for Sulpice, +happiness was not far removed from this life of slavery, of feverish +politics, which for some time past had been visibly paling his cheeks +and rendering him nervous and altogether different from of old. + +"If you did not love me so much," she said with a sweet smile, "I could +believe that you loved me no longer." + +"What folly! you have only one rival, Adrienne." + +"Ah! I know that very well, but that robs me of everything. It is +politics. Come! be great, and I shall be happy or resigned, as you wish. +I adore you so much! I would give you my life, so I would gladly give +you my days of weariness!" + +Although she was rich, she strove to introduce into her official +surroundings the bourgeois and provincial orderly methods that she had +been so virtuously taught. She found that her desserts vanished with +frightful rapidity, that dishes scarcely touched and bottles whose +contents had only been tasted, were removed to the kitchen. She +commented thereon, but the somewhat contemptuous smile of her domestics +was her only reply and it made her feel ashamed. + +Vaudrey's predecessor, Monsieur Pichereau, was exacting, +_close-fisted_. His table was meagre but there was nothing astonishing +in that, Monsieur Pichereau had a delicate stomach. Well and good, but +the predecessors of Monsieur Pichereau, they had given fêtes, they had! +It is true that one was a count and the other a marquis. One can always +tell a gentleman anywhere. + +One evening, they heard one of the domestics of the ministry say to +another: + +"As if it were not our money that the ministers spend! It is the +electors' money. They give us wages: we give them salaries. There it +is!" + +The domestic was discharged immediately, but these remarks, however, +recurred to Adrienne's memory and filled her with dislike for the +flunkeyism that surrounded her, waiting on her with cold civility, but +without any attachment, like hotel waiters or girls at an inn that one +will leave the next day, giving them a gratuity. + +Vaudrey saw much less of these daily little wounds. He lived in an +atmosphere of constant flattery, favor-begging cloaked under +complimentary phrases. Had he leisure, he would have been able to +calculate with mathematical exactitude how many angles the human form +would describe in the process of bowing and scraping. In his department, +everybody asked for something or got someone else to ask. _Promotion_, +that insatiable hunger, was the greedy dream of all that little world of +intriguing, underhand, begging employés, who opened up around the new +minister so many approaches, like military lines around a redoubt. + +Sulpice felt himself besieged and the target for a crowd of greedy +ambitions. The sub-heads of departments cast bitterly envious glances at +the offices of chiefs, like hungry beggars hypnotized by the display at +Chevet's. Commendatory letters rained on him. This shower of +begging-missives nauseated the minister to such an extent that he +endeavored to arrest the stream, ordering Warcolier, the Under Secretary +of State, to be called and requesting him to reply to the deputies, to +the senators, to everybody, in fact: that he had no influence to use, +that the era of favoritism was over; that he, Vaudrey, understood that +only merit would receive official gifts. "Merit only. You understand, +Monsieur Warcolier?" + +Warcolier rolled his huge eyes in astonishment; then, with the +self-satisfied smile of an expressionless beau, after passing his fat +hand through his long whiskers, yellow and streaked with gray, that +decorated his rosy cheeks, he remarked doctorally, that Monsieur le +Ministre was entering on a path that, in all conscience, he could +qualify as being only dangerous. Eh! _bon Dieu!_ one must do something +for one's friends!--Vaudrey's accession to the Department of the +Interior had given birth to many new hopes; on all grounds they must be +satisfied. Vaudrey would never be forgiven for such deception. + +"What deception?" asked Sulpice. "I promised reforms and I am going to +carry them out, but people laugh at my reforms and ask what?--Places." + +"Bless me!" replied Warcolier, "entirely logical." + +"Be it so! but there are places and places. I cannot, however, retire a +whole staff of employés to give place to a new one. That's precisely +what they want. There is not a deputy who has not one candidate to +recommend to me." + +"That's very natural, Monsieur le Ministre, seeing that there is not a +deputy who may not himself be a candidate." + +"Still, he should be independent of his electors, but in truth, it is +not the rights of those who have elected them that my colleagues defend, +it is their own interests." + +"Every man for himself, Monsieur le Ministre. Yesterday, even yesterday, +one of my electors whose wife has just given birth to a child, wrote me, +asking for a good nurse. That is like one of our colleagues, Perraud--of +the Vosges.--One of his electors commissioned him to take back an +umbrella with him upon his early return. The electors regard their +deputies in the light of commission merchants." + +"And as tobacco bureaus! Well, I wish to have more morality than that in +State affairs. I like giving, but I know how to refuse," said Vaudrey. + +"That will be easy enough so long as you are popular and solid in +Parliament; but on the day that it is clearly proved that such and such +a future minister can make himself more useful than you to the personal +interests of everybody--and there are such ministers in sight--" + +"Granet, yes, I know! He promises more butter than bread, to cry quits +later in giving more dry crusts than fresh butter. But I don't care to +deceive any one." + +"As you please, Monsieur le Ministre, as you please," answered +Warcolier, in a mocking and gentle tone. + +Sulpice did not like this man. He was a phrase-maker. He had a vague +feeling that this Warcolier who in public affected strictly severe +principles was privately undermining him and that he yielded to favors +in order to win support. It was enough for the minister to discourage +coarse, greedy ambitions, provided that the Under Secretary of State +encouraged unsavory, eager hopes by shrewd smiles and silence that +assented to all that was desired. This little underhand work going on in +his office was unknown to Vaudrey; he did not know that out of every +refusal he gave, Warcolier secured friends; but he maintained a watchful +distrust for this republican who had become so stanch a supporter of the +Republic only since that form of government had triumphed. Besides, what +had he to fear? The President of the Council, Monsieur Collard, of +Nantes, had the unbounded confidence of the head of the State and of the +Chamber; and he was Collard's intimate friend. The majority of the +cabinet was compact. The perfect calm of the horizon was undisturbed by +a cloud. Vaudrey could rule without fear, without excitement and give +all his spare time to that woman whose piercing glance, wandering smile, +palpitating nostrils, dishevelled, fair hair, kisses, fondness, cries, +and tones pursued him everywhere. + +Marianne, how he loved her! From day to day, how his love of her +increased like a madman's! It seemed to him that he suddenly found +himself in the presence of the only woman who could possibly understand +him, and in the only world in which he could live; his petty bourgeois, +sensual inexperience flourished in the little hôtel of the courtesan. + +He had doubtless loved; often enough he had thought himself once more in +love; the poor grisettes, to whom he had written in verse, as he might +have sung songs to them, were gone from his thoughts, though they had +occupied his heart for a short time. He had profoundly loved her who +bore his name, perhaps he loved her still as warmly, as sincerely--the +unfortunate man!--as of old. He sometimes recalled with tearful eye, how +his whole frame trembled with love in the presence of that young girl +who had given herself entirely to him, in all her trust and sincerity, +in all her candor, and all her chastely-timid innocent modesty. But +Adrienne's love was insipid compared with the intoxicating and +appetizing voluptuousness of this woman, so adorable in her exquisite +luxury, the refinements of her charm, the singular grace of her +attitudes, of her mind, of her disjointed conversation which dared +everything, mocked, caressed, beginning with a pout and ending with some +drollery, and challenged passion by exasperating it with refusals and +mockery that changed into distracting lasciviousness. + +When she extended to Vaudrey her little hand, covered with rings, and +indolent and soft, he felt as if he had received an electric shock and +that his marrow had been touched. This man of forty felt all the +enthusiasm and distraction of a youth. It seemed to him that this was +the only woman that he possibly could love, and in truth she was the +only one that he could have loved as he did, with his forgetfulness of +self, his outbursts of madness, the distracted sentiment of a love for +which he would have braved and risked everything. + +When he confessed it frankly, she had a way of answering with a +questioning manner full of doubt, which conveyed the delicacy of the +woman's self-love and the intentionally refined doubt of the coquette, a +questioning _yes_: + +"Yes?" + +Simply that. + +And in this _yes_, there was a world of tenderness, excitement and +burning promises for Sulpice. + +Then he drew her to him: + +"Yes, yes, yes, yes!" he repeated in burning tones, as he thrust his +head between her shoulders that emerged from her embroidered chemise, +and her neck perfumed and satiny, that he covered with eager kisses. + +Yes! And he would have uttered this _yes_ before every one like a +bravado. _Yes!_ It was his delight to give himself wholly to Marianne +and to tell her again and again that nothing in the whole world could +take the place of this mistress who made him forget everything: +politics, the home, the ambition that had been his life, and his +affection for Adrienne that had been his joy. + +Thanks to the Dujarrier, Marianne had paid the rent of the house, the +servants and the pressing debts. Claire Dujarrier advanced the hundred +thousand francs demanded by Mademoiselle Kayser, and which she had +apparently--in reality she took them from her own funds--borrowed from +Adolphe Gochard, her lover, who had not a sou, and in whose favor +Vaudrey signed in regular legal form, a bill of exchange at three +months' date _value received in cash_. The Dujarrier merely retained +twenty thousand francs as her commission and handed only eighty thousand +to Marianne. + +"But Vaudrey's acceptance to Gochard is for one hundred thousand!" + +"You are silly, my girl! What if I lose the balance? If your minister +should not pay?" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Stranger things have happened, my little one." + +Vaudrey having paid, given his name, signed this bill of exchange, felt +the extreme joy arising from the base self-love of the man who pays a +lovely creature and who, nevertheless, believes himself loved. + +In the early days, Sulpice went to Rue Prony only during the day or at +night after dinner, or on leaving a reception or the theatre. Marianne +awaited him. He came stealthily, distracted with joy. There, in the +closed chamber he remained with Marianne, who was full of pride at the +complete subjugation of the will of this man in her embrace. She amused +herself occasionally by calling him _Your Excellency_, in reading to him +from some book which spun out the ceremonial necessary in applying for +an interview with a minister: + +"If ever I ask you for an audience, do you know how I must address +myself to the secretary? Listen to this book, it is funny: 'Ordinary +toilet. The etiquette for the toilet is not very strict, but it is, +however, in good taste to appear dressed as for a ceremonious call. For +women, the toilet should be simple and the gloves new.'" + +She laughed as she rested almost naked in Sulpice's arms, and repeated, +looking into his eyes: + +"A simple toilet!" + +"And again, listen!" she said, as she resumed the book. "'In speaking to +a minister as in writing to him, one should address him as _Monseigneur_ +or _Your Excellency_. On reaching the door as you leave the salon, you +should again bow respectfully.' That is amusing, ah! how amusing it +is!--Then they respect you as much as that? Your Excellency! +Monseigneur! Shall I be obliged to courtesy to you?--Your lips, give me +your lips, Monseigneur! I adore you!--You are my own minister; my +finance minister, my lover, my all! I do not respect you, but I love +you, I love you!" + +He trembled to the very roots of his hair when she spoke to him thus. He +felt transports of joy in clasping her in his arms and genuine despair +when he left her. Leave her! leave her there under that lamp alone, in +that low bed where he had just forgotten that there existed anything +else in the world besides that apartment, warm with perfumes. He would +have liked to pass the whole night beside her, separating only when +satiated and overwhelmed with caresses. But how could he leave Adrienne +alone over there in the ministerial mansion? However trustful this young +wife might be, and innocent, credulous and incapable of suspicion, if he +had passed a night absent from her, she would have been terrified and +warned. + +He easily invented prolonged receptions and night sessions that detained +him until an advanced hour. + +"One would say that the evening sessions grow more frequent than +formerly," Adrienne remarked gently at breakfast. + +"Don't talk to me about it," replied Sulpice. "In order to reach the +vacation sooner, the deputies talk twice as long." + +Adrienne never opened the _Officiel_, which Vaudrey received in his +private office, pretending that the sight of a newspaper too vividly +recalled the fatiguing political life that absorbed him. One day, +however, he allowed the journals to be brought into the salon and to lie +about in Madame's room. He informed Adrienne that he was going to pass +the day in Picardy, at Guise or at Vervins, where an important deputy +had invited him to visit his factory. He would leave in the morning and +could not return until the following day toward noon. + +"What a long time!" said Adrienne. + +"It is still longer for me than for you, since you remain here, in our +home." + +"Oh! our home! we have only one home: in Chaussée-d'Antin, or the house +at Grenoble, you know." + +"Dear wife!" cried Vaudrey, as he embraced her tenderly,--sincerely, +perhaps. + +And he left. He set out for Guise, returned in the evening and ordered +the Director of the Press to send to all the journals by the Havas +agency, a message which ran: _The Minister of the Interior passed the +entire day yesterday at Guise, at Monsieur Delair's, the deputy from +L'Aisne. He dined and slept at the house of his host. Monsieur Vaudrey +is to return to Paris this morning, at eleven o'clock._ + +Then he showed the news to Adrienne, and laughed as he said: + +"It is surprising! one cannot take a single step without it appears in +print and the entire population is informed at once!" + +"Tell me everything," Adrienne replied, as she embraced him with her +glance. "Are you tired? You look pale. How did you spend the day? You +made a speech? Were you applauded?" + +It was mainly by kisses that Vaudrey answered. What could he say to +Adrienne? She knew perfectly well how similar all these gatherings were, +with their official routine. Monsieur Delair had been very agreeable, +but the minister had necessarily had to endure much talk, much +importunity. + +"The day seemed very long to me!" + +"And to me also," she said. + +Sulpice indeed returned from Guise, but the last train on the previous +night had taken him to Rue Prony, at Marianne's. He had then found out +the secret of remaining at her side undisturbed for a long time, and the +telegraph, managed by the Director of the Press, enabled him to prove an +alibi to Adrienne from time to time. He had taken to Marianne a huge +bouquet of fresh flowers gathered in the park at Guise for Madame +Vaudrey by Monsieur Delair's two daughters. That appeared to him to be +quite natural. + +Marianne, who was waiting for him, put the flowers in the Japanese vases +and said to him as she threw her bare arms around him: + +"Very good! You thought of me!----" + +The next morning Vaudrey left, more than ever enchained by the delight +of her embraces. He sometimes returned on foot, to breathe the +vivifying freshness of the roseate dawn, or taking a cab, he stretched +himself out wearily therein, as he drove to the ministry, musing over +the hours so recently passed and striving to arrest them in their +flight, to enjoy again their seductive joy and to squeeze as from a +delicious fruit, all their intoxicating poetry, delight and fascination. + +He closed his eyes. He saw Marianne again with her eyes veiled as he +kissed her, he drank in the odor of her hair that fell like a sort of +fair cover over the lace pillow. It seemed that he was permeated with +her perfume. He breathed the air with wide-open nostrils to inhale it +again, to recover its scent and preserve it. His whole frame trembled +with emotion at the recollection of that lovely form that he had left +whiter than the sheet of the bed, in the dim light that filtered through +the opal-shaded lamp. + +Then he thought that he must forget, and invent some tale for Adrienne. +Again he opened his eyes and trembled in spite of himself, as he saw, on +both sides of the cab, workmen slowly trudging along the sidewalks with +their hands in their pockets, their noses red, a wretched worn-out silk +scarf about their necks and swinging on their arms the supply of food +for the day, or again with their fingers numb with the cold, holding +some journal in their hands in which they read as they marched along, +the speech of "Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur," that magnificent +speech not made during the night session as Sulpice had told Adrienne, +but the day before yesterday, in broad day, when the majority, +faithfully grouped about him, had applauded this phrase: _I, whose hours +are consecrated to the amelioration of the lot of the poor and who can +say with the poet,--I shall be pardoned for this feeling of vanity:_ + +"What I steal from my nights, I add to my days!" + +Sulpice heard again the applause that he received. He saw those devoted +hands reached out to him as he descended from the tribune; he again +experienced a feeling of pride, and yet he felt dissatisfied with +himself now that he saw the other hands, the servile hands of the +applauders, hidden by the red, cold hands of a mason who held this +speech between his horny fingers. + +Sulpice returned to the ministry, shaking himself as if to induce +forgetfulness, busy, weary, and still,--eternally,--as if immovably +fixed in an antechamber of Place Beauvau, he found the inevitable +place-hunters, the hornets of ministries. + +Vaudrey caused these urgent people, as well as some others, to be +received by Warcolier, who asked nothing better than to make tools, to +sow the seed of his clientage. Guy de Lissac and Ramel had +simultaneously called Vaudrey's attention to the eagerness which +Warcolier manifested in toying with popularity. + +"He is not wholly devoted to you, is this gentleman who prefers every +government!" said Guy. + +"He will undermine you quietly!" added Ramel. + +"I am satisfied of that. But I am not disturbed: I have the majority. +Oh! faithful and compact." + +"Woman often changes," muttered Ramel. + +Guy was troubled about Vaudrey for another reason. He vaguely suspected +that Sulpice was neglecting Adrienne. Political business, doubtless. +Vaudrey unquestionably loved his wife, who adored him and was herself +adorable. But he manifestly neglected her. + +Lissac found them one day smilingly discussing a question that was +greatly occupying the journalists: divorce. Apropos of a trifle, of a +suit for separation that Adrienne had just read in the _Gazette +Tribunaux_. It referred to an adulterous husband, a pottery dealer in +Rue Paradis, Monsieur Vauthier, the lover of a singer at a rather +notorious _café-concert_, named Léa Thibault. The wife had demanded a +separation. Adrienne had just read the pleadings. + +"Poor woman!" she said. "She must have suffered, indeed." + +Sulpice did not reply. + +"Do you know that if that were my case, I could never forgive you?" + +"You are mad! What are you thinking of?" + +"Oh! it is true, the idea that you could touch another woman, that you +could kiss her as you kiss me, that would make me more than angry, +horrified and disgusted. I tell you, I would never forgive you." + +"Who puts all this stuff in your head? Come, I will do as I used to do," +said Vaudrey. "Not another paper shall enter your house! What an idea, +to read the _Gazette des Tribunaux_!" + +"It is because this name: _Vauthier_, somewhat resembles your own that I +was induced to read it. And then this very mournful title: _Separation +de corps_. I would prefer divorce myself. A complete divorce that severs +the past like a knife-cut." + +"But what an idea!" repeated Sulpice, who was somewhat uneasy. + +Vaudrey was delighted to hear Guy announced in the midst of this +discussion. They would then change the topic. But Adrienne, who was much +affected by her reading, returned to the same subject in an obstinate +sort of way and Lissac commenced to laugh. + +"What a joke! To speak of divorce between you two! Never fear, madame, +your husband will never present to the Chamber a law in favor of +divorce." + +"Who knows?" Sulpice answered. "I am in favor of divorce myself, yes, +absolutely." + +"And I cannot understand, for my part, how a woman can belong to two +living men," said Adrienne. + +"You reason for yourself. But the unhappy women who suffer--and the +unhappy men--The existing law, in fact, seeing that it admits +separation, permits divorce, but more cruel, heartrending, and unjust. +Divorce without freedom. Divorce that continues the chain." + +"Sulpice is right, madame, and sooner or later, we shall certainly +arrive at that frightful divorce." + +"After all, what does it matter to me?" Adrienne replied. + +She threw the accursed _Gazette des Tribunaux_ into the waste basket +with its _Suit of Vauthier vs. Vauthier_. "We are not interested, +neither my husband nor I; he loves me and I love him. I am as sure of +him as he is sure of me. He may demand all the laws that are possible: +it would not be for selfish interest, for he would not profit by them." + +"Never!" said Sulpice with a laugh, delighted to be released from the +magnetic influence of Adrienne's strange excitement. + +There was, however, a somewhat false ring in this laugh. Face to face +with the avowed trustfulness of his wife, Sulpice experienced a slight +pricking of conscience. He thought of Marianne. His passion increased +tenfold, but this very increase of affection made him afraid. He +hastened to find himself again at Rue Prony. The Hôtel Beauvau depressed +him. It became more than ever a prison. How gladly he escaped from it! + +Yes, it was a prison for him as it was for Adrienne; a prison that he +fled from to seek Marianne's boudoir, to enjoy her kisses and mirth, +while, at the same moment, his wife, the dear abandoned, disdained +creature, sad without being cognizant of the cause of her melancholy, +terrified by the emptiness of that grand ministerial mansion, that +"sounded hollow," as she said, quietly and stealthily took the official +carriage that Vaudrey sent back to her from the Chamber, and had herself +driven--where?--only she knew! + +"You ought to make a great many calls," the minister had frequently +said. "It would divert your mind and it is well to appear to know a +great many persons." + +But she only found pleasure in making one visit, she gave the coachman +the address of the apartments on Chaussée-d'Antin, where she had lived +long, happy years with Sulpice, sweet and peaceful under the clear light +of the lamp. She entered this deserted apartment, now as cold as a tomb, +and had the shutters opened by the concierge in order that she might see +the sunlight penetrate the room and set all the motes dancing in its +cheerful rays. She shut herself in and remained there happy, consoled; +sitting in the armchair formerly occupied by Sulpice, she pictured him +at the table at which he used to work, his inkstand before him and +surrounded by his books, his cherished books! She lived again the +vanished life. "Return!" she said to the dream, the humble dream she had +at last recovered. She rambled about those deserted rooms that on every +side reminded her of some sweet delight, here it was a kiss of chaste +and eternal love, there a smile. Ah! how easy life would have been there +all alone, happy for ever! + +The Ministry! Power! Popularity! Fame! Authority! What were they worth? + +Is all that worth one of the blessed hours in this little dwelling, +where the cup of bliss would have been full if the wife could have heard +the clear laugh or the faint cry of a child? + +Poor Sulpice! how he was exhausting himself now in an overwhelming task! +He was giving his health and life to politics, while here he only +experienced peace, consoling caresses and the quieting of every +excitement. On the study-table there still remained some pens and some +books that were formerly in constant use. + +Adrienne went away with reddened eyes from these pilgrimages, as it +were, to her former happiness. She returned to her carriage and +moistened her cambric pocket handkerchief with her warm breath, in order +to wipe her eyes so that Sulpice might not see that she had been +weeping. Then when her well-known carriage passed before the shops in +the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, the wives of mercers or booksellers, +dressmakers, young girls, all of whom enviously shook their heads, said +to each other: + +"The minister's wife!--Ah! she has had a glorious dream!--She is +happy!" + + + + +III + + +Marianne was contented. Not that her ambition was completely satisfied, +but after all, Sulpice in place of Rosas was worth having. Though a +minister was only a passing celebrity, he was a personage. From the +depths of the bog in which she lately rolled, she would never have dared +to hope for so speedy a revenge. + +Speedy, assuredly, but perhaps not sufficient. Her eager hunger +increased with her success. Since Vaudrey was hers, she sought some +means of bringing about some adventure that would give her fortune. What +could be asked or exacted from Sulpice? She recalled the traditions of +fantastic bargains, of extensive furnishings. She would find them. She +had but to desire, since he had abandoned himself, bound hand and foot, +like a child. + +She knew him now, all his candor, all his weakness, for, in the presence +of this blasé woman, weary of love, Vaudrey permitted himself to confide +his thoughts with unreserved freedom, opening his heart and disclosing +himself with a clean breast in this duel with a woman:--a duel of +self-interest which he mistook for passion. + +She had studied him at first and speedily ranked him, calling him: + +"An innocent!" + +She felt that in this house in Rue Prony, where she was really not in +her own home but was installed as in a conquered territory, Sulpice was +dazzled. Like a provincial, as Granet described him so often, he entered +there into a new world. + +Uncle Kayser frequently called to see his niece. Severe in taste, he +cast long, disdainful looks at the tapestries and the artistic trifles +that adorned the house. In his opinion, it was rubbish and the luxury of +a decaying age. He never changed his tune, always riding the hobby-horse +of an æsthetic moralist. + +"It lacks severity, all this furnishing of yours," was his constantly +repeated criticism to Marianne, as he sat smoking his pipe on a divan, +as was his custom in his own, wretched studio. + +Then, in an abrupt way, with his eye wandering over the ceiling as if he +were following the flight of a chimera, he would say: + +"Why! your minister must do a great deal, if all this comes from the +ministry!" + +Marianne interrupted him. It was no business of his to mix himself up +with matters that did not concern him. Above all, he must hold his +tongue. Did he forget that Vaudrey was married? The least indiscretion-- + +"Oh! don't alarm yourself," the painter broke in, "I am as dumb as a +carp, the more so since your escapade is not very praiseworthy!--For you +have, in fact, deserted the domestic hearth--yes, you have deserted the +hearth.--It is pretty here, a little like a courtesan's, perhaps, but +pretty, all the same.--But you must acknowledge that it is a case of +interloping. It is not the genuine home with its dignity, its virtuous +severity, its--What time does your minister come? I would like to speak +to him--" + +"To preach morality to him?" asked Marianne, glancing at her uncle with +an ironical expression. + +"Not at all. I am considered to be ignorant--No, I have a plan to +decorate in a uniform way, all the mayors' offices in Paris and I want +to propose it to him--_The Modern Marriage_, an allegorical +treatment!--_Law Imposing Duty on Love_. Something noble, full of +expression, moralizing. Art that will set people thinking, for the +contemplation of lofty works can alone improve the morals and the +masses--You understand?" + +"Perfectly. You want a commission!" + +"Ah! that's a contemptible word, hold! A commission! Is a true artist +commissioned? He obeys his inspiration, he follows his ideal--A +commission! a commission! Ugh!--On my word, you would break the wings of +faith! Little one, have you any of that double zero Kummel left, that +you had the other day?" + +Marianne sought to spare Sulpice the importunities of her uncle. She +wished to keep the minister's entire influence for herself. + +She had nothing to fear, moreover. Sulpice was hers as fully as she +believed. Like so many others who have lived without living, Sulpice +did not know _woman_, and Marianne was ten times a woman, woman-child, +woman-lover, woman-courtesan, woman-girl, and every day and every night +she appeared to her lover renewed and surprising, freshly created for +passion and pleasure. Everything about her, even the frame that +surrounded her beauty, the dwelling, perfumed with passionate love, +distractedly captivated Sulpice. Behind the dense curtains in the +dressing-room upholstered like a boudoir, with its carpet intended only +for naked feet, as the reclining chair with its extra covering of +Oriental silk was adapted to moments of languishing repose, Sulpice saw +and contemplated the vast wardrobe with its three mirrors reflecting the +huge marble washstand with its silver spigots, its silver bowl, wherein +the scented water gleamed opal-like with its perfumes, the gas +illuminating the brushes decorated with monograms, standing out against +the white marble, the manicure sets of fine steel, the dark-veined +tortoise-shell combs, the coquettish superfluity of scissors and files +scattered about amongst knickknacks, inlaid enamels, and Japanese ivory +ornaments, and there, stretched out and watching Marianne, who came and +went before him with a smile on her face, her hair unfastened, sometimes +with bare shoulders, Sulpice saw, through a half-open door in the middle +of a bathroom floored with blue Delft tiles, the bath that steamed with +a perfumed vapor, odorous of thyme, and the water which was about to +envelop in its warm embrace that rosy form that displayed beneath the +lights and under the full blaze of the gas, the nudity of her flesh +beneath a transparent Surah chemise, silky upon the living silk. + +Milk-white reflections seemed to play on her shoulders and Sulpice never +forgot those ardent visions that followed him, clung to him, thrust +themselves before his gaze and into his recollections, never leaving +him, either at the Chamber, the Council Board or even when he was with +Adrienne.--The young woman, seeing his absorption, hesitated to disturb +his thoughts, political as they were, no doubt, while he mused upon his +hours of voluptuous enjoyment, forever recalling the youthful roundness +of her shoulders, and the inflections of her body, the ivory-like curve +of her neck, whose white nape rested upon him, and her curls escaped +from the superb arrangement of her hair, held in its place at the top by +a comb thrust into this fair mass like a claw plunged into flesh. + +Vaudrey must have had an active and prompt intelligence at times to +forget suddenly these passionate images, when he unexpectedly found +himself compelled to ascend the tribune during a discussion or to +express his opinion clearly at the Ministerial Council. He increased his +power, finding, perhaps, a new excitement, a new spur in the love that +renewed his youth. He had never been seen more active and more stirring +in the Chamber, though he was somewhat nervous. He determined to put +himself in evidence at the Ministry and to prove to the phrase-monger +Warcolier that he knew how to act. The President of the Council, +Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--said several times to Sulpice: + +"Too much zeal, my dear minister. A politician ought to be cooler." + +"I shall be cooler with age!" Sulpice replied with a laugh. + +From time to time he went to seek advice from Ramel, as he had promised. +The little shopkeepers and laundresses of Rue Boursault hardly suspected +when they saw a coupé stop at the door of the old journalist, that a +minister alighted from it. + +Sulpice felt amid the bustle of his life, amid the spurring and +over-excited events of his existence, the need of talking with his old +friend. Besides, Rue Boursault was on the way to Rue Prony. As Marianne +was frequently not at home, Sulpice would spend the time before her +return in chatting with Ramel. + +"Well! Ramel, are you satisfied with me?" + +"How could I be otherwise? You are an honest man and faithful and +devoted to your ideas. I am not afraid of you, but I am of those by whom +you are surrounded." + +"Warcolier?" + +"Warcolier and many others, of those important fellows who ask me--when +they deign to speak to me--with an insignificant air of superiority and +almost of pity, the idiots: 'Well! you are no longer doing anything! +When will you do something?' As if I had not done too much already, +seeing that I have made them!" + +Denis Ramel smiled superciliously and the minister looked with a sort of +respect at this vanguard warrior, this laborer of the early morn who had +never received his recompense or even claimed it. + +"I should like you to resume your journal in order to announce all these +truths," Vaudrey said to him. + +"Do you think so? Why, a journal that would proclaim the truth to +everybody would not last six months, since no one would buy it." + +As Sulpice was about to go, there was a ring at Ramel's door. + +"Ah! who can it be? A visit. I beg you will excuse me, my dear Vaudrey." + +Denis went to open the door. + +It was a man of about fifty, dressed in the garb of a poor workman, +wearing a threadbare greatcoat and trousers that were well polished at +the knees, who as he entered held his round, felt hat in his hand. He +was thin, pale and tired-looking, with a dark, dull complexion and a +voice weak rather than hoarse. He bowed timidly, repeating twice: "I +earnestly ask your pardon;" and then he remained standing on the +threshold, without advancing or retiring, in an embarrassed attitude, +while a timid smile played beneath his black beard, already sprinkled +with gray. + +"Pardon--I disturb you--I will return--" + +"Come in, Garnier," said Ramel. + +The man entered, saluting Vaudrey, who was not known to him, and at a +gesture from Denis, he took a seat on the edge of a chair, scarcely +sitting down and constantly twirling his round-shaped hat between his +lean fingers. From time to time, he raised his left hand to his mouth to +check the sound of a dry cough which rose in his muscular throat, that +might be supposed to be a prey to laryngitis. + +"You ask for the truth--Listen a moment, a single moment," Ramel +whispered in the ear of the minister. + +Without mentioning Sulpice's name, he began to question Garnier, who +grew bolder and talked and gossiped, his cheek-bones now and then +heightened in color by small, pink spots. + +"Well! Garnier, about the work?--Oh! you may speak before monsieur, it +interests him." + +The man shrugged his shoulders with a sad, somewhat bitter smile, but +resigned at least. He very quietly, but without any complaint, +acknowledged all that he was enduring. Work was in a bad way. It +appeared that it was just the same everywhere in Europe, in fact, but +indeed that doesn't provide work at the shop. The master, a kind man, in +faith, had grown old, and was anxious to sell his business of an art +metal worker. He had not found a purchaser, then he had simply closed +his shop, being too ill to continue hard work, and the four or five +workmen whom he employed found themselves thrown into the street. There +it is! Happily for Garnier, he had neither wife nor child, nothing but +his own carcass. One can always get one's self out of a difficulty, but +the others who had households and brats! Rousselet had five. Matters +were not going to be very cheerful at home. He must rely on charity or +credit, he did not know what, but something to stave off that distress, +real and sad distress, since it was not merited. + +"Do you interest yourself in politics?" asked Vaudrey curiously, +surmising that this man was possessed of strong and quick intelligence, +although he looked so worn and crushed and his cough frequently +interrupted his remarks. + +Garnier looked at Ramel before replying, then answered in a quiet tone: + +"Oh! not now! That is all over. I vote like everybody else, but I let +the rest alone. I have had my reckoning." + +He had said all this in a low tone without any bitterness and as if +burdened with painful memories. + +"It is, however, strange, all the same," added the workman, "to observe +that the more things change, the more alike they are. Instead of +occupying themselves over there with interpellations and seeking to +overthrow or to strengthen administrations, would it not be better if +they thought a little of those who are dying of hunger? for there are +some, it is necessary to admit that such are not wanting! What is it to +me whether Pichereau or Vaudrey be minister, when I do not know at the +moment where I shall sleep when I have spent my savings, and whether +the baker will give me credit now that I am without a shop?" + +At the mention of Vaudrey's name, Ramel wished to make a sign to this +man, but Sulpice had just seized the hand of his old friend and pressed +it as if to entreat him not to interrupt the conversation. The voice +that he heard, interrupted by a cough, was the voice of a workman and he +did not hear such every day. + +"Note well that I am not a blusterer or a disturber, isn't that so, +Monsieur Ramel? I have always been content with my lot, myself--One +receives and executes orders and one is satisfied. Everything goes on +all right--My politics at present is my work; when I shall have broken +my back to bring journalists into power--I beg your pardon, Monsieur +Ramel, you know very well that it is not of you that I speak thus--I +shall be no fatter for it, I presume. I only want just to keep life and +soul together, if it can be done. I suppose you could not find me a +place, Monsieur Ramel? I would do anything, heavy work if need be, or +bookkeeping, if it is desired. I would like bookkeeping better, although +it is not my line, because the forge fire, the coal and heat, as you +see, affect me there now--he touched his neck--it strangles me and +hastens the end too quickly. It is true for that I am in the world." + +Vaudrey felt himself stirred even to his bones by the mournful, musical +voice of the consumptive, by this true misery, this poverty expressed +without phrases and this claim of labor. All the questions _yonder_, as +Garnier said, in the committees and sub-committees, in the tribune and +in the lobbies, discussions, disputes, personal questions cloaked under +the guise of the general welfare, suddenly appeared to him as petty and +vain, narrow and egotistical beside the formidable question of bread +which was propounded to him so quietly by this man of the people, who +was not a rebel of the violent days, but the unfortunate brother, the +eternal Lazarus crying, without threat, but simply, sadly: "And I?" + +He would have liked, without making himself known, to give something to +this sufferer, to promise him a position. He did not dare to offer it or +to mention his name. The man would have refused charity and the +minister, in all the personnel of bustling employés, often useless, that +fill the ministry, had not a single place to give to this workman whose +chest was on fire and whose throat was choking. + +"I will return and we will talk about him," he said to Ramel, as he +arose, indicating Garnier by a nod. "Do not tell him who I am. On my +word, I should be ashamed--Poor devil!" + +"Multiply him by three or four hundred thousand, and be a statesman," +said Ramel. + +Vaudrey bowed to the workman, who rose quickly and returned his salute +with timid eagerness, and the minister went rapidly down the stairs of +the little house and jumped into his carriage, making haste to get +away. + +He bore with him a feeling akin to remorse, and in all sincerity, for he +still heard ringing in his ears, the poor consumptive's voice saying: + +"What is it to me, who am suffering, whether Vaudrey or Pichereau be +minister?" + +On reaching Place Beauvau, he found a despatch requesting his immediate +presence at the Élysée. At the Palace he received information that +surprised him like a thunderbolt. Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--had just +been struck down by apoplexy in the corridors of the ministry. The +President of the Council was dead and the Chief of the State had turned +to Vaudrey to fill the high position which, but two hours before, had +been held by Monsieur Collard. + +President of the Council! He, Vaudrey! Head of the Ministry! The first +in his country after the supreme head? The joyful surprise that such a +proposition caused him, so occupied his mind that he was unable to feel +very much moved by the loss of Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--. Sulpice, +moreover, had never profoundly cared for this austere advocate, although +he had been much associated with him. His liking for this man who +brought to the Council old-time opinions and preconceived ideas was a +merely political affection. The President's offer proved to him that his +own popularity, as well as his influence over parliament, had only +increased since his recent entry on public life. He was then about to be +in a position to assert his individuality still better. What a glorious +time for Grenoble and what wry faces Granet would make! + +Sulpice hastened to announce this news to Adrienne, although it would +not become official until after Collard's funeral obsequies. He returned +almost triumphantly to the Hôtel Beauvau. Only one thought, a sombre +image, clouded his joy: it was not the memory of Collard, but the sad +image of the man whom he had met at Ramel's, and who, when the +_Officiel_ should speak, should make the announcement, would shrug his +shoulders and say ironically: + +"Well! and what then?" + +He had scarcely whispered these words to Adrienne: "President of the +Council! I am President of the Council!" when, without being astonished +at the faint, almost indifferent smile that escaped the young wife, he +suddenly thought that he was under obligation to make a personal visit +to the Ministry of Justice where Collard was lying dead. + +He ordered himself to be driven quickly to Place Vendôme. + +At every moment, carriages brought to the ministry men of grave mien, +decorated with the red ribbon, who entered wearing expressions suitable +to the occasion and inscribed their names in silence on the register, +passing the pen from one to another just as the aspergillus is passed +along in church. Everybody stood aside on noticing Vaudrey. It seemed to +him that they instinctively divined that Collard being out of the way +it was he who must be the man of the hour, the necessary man, the +President of the Council marked out in advance, the chief of the coming +_ministry_. + +"Poor Collard!" thought Sulpice, as he inscribed his name on the +register. "One will never be able to say: the _Collard Administration_. +But it would be glorious if one day history said: the _Vaudrey +Administration_." + +He re-entered the Hôtel Beauvau, inflated with the idea. In the +antechamber, there were more office-seekers than were usually in +attendance. One of them, on seeing Vaudrey, rose and ran to him and said +quickly to Sulpice, who did not stop: + +"Ah! Monsieur le Ministre--What a misfortune--Monsieur Collard--If there +were no eminent men like Your Excellency to replace him!--" + +Vaudrey bowed without replying. + +"What is the name of that gentleman?" said he as soon as he entered his +cabinet, to the usher who followed him. "I always find him, but I cannot +recognize him." + +"He! Monsieur le Ministre? Why, that is, _Monsieur Eugène_!" + +"Ah! very good! That is right! The eternal Monsieur Eugène!" + +Just then Warcolier opened the door, looking more morose than sad, and +holding a letter that he crushed in his hand, while at the same time he +greeted Vaudrey with a number of long phrases concerning the dreadful, +unexpected, sudden, unlooked-for, crushing death--he did not select his +epithets, but allowed them to flow as from an overrunning cask--the +dramatic decease of Collard--of Nantes--. From time to time, Warcolier, +while speaking, cast an involuntary, angry glance at the paper that he +twisted in his fingers, so much so that Vaudrey, feeling puzzled, at +last asked him what the letter was. + +"Don't speak to me about it--" said the fat man. "An imbecile!" + +"What imbecile?" + +"An imbecile whom I received with some little courtesy the other +morning--I who, nevertheless, go to so much trouble to make myself +agreeable." + +"And that is no sinecure!--Well, the imbecile in question?" + +"Left furious, no doubt, because of the reception accorded him--and to +me, me, the Under-Secretary of State, this is the letter that he writes, +that he dares to write! Here, Monsieur le Ministre, listen! Was ever +such stupidity seen? '_Monsieur le Secrétaire d'Etat, you have under +your orders a very badly trained Undersecretary of State, who will make +you many enemies, I warn you. As you are his direct superior, I permit +myself to notify you of his conduct_,' etc., etc. You laugh?" said +Warcolier, seeing that a smile was spreading over Vaudrey's +blond-bearded face. + +"Yes, it is so odd!--Your correspondent is evidently ignorant that there +are only Under-Secretaries of State in the administration!--unless this +innocent is but simply an insolent fellow." + +"If I thought that!" said Warcolier, enraged. "No, but it is true," he +said with astonishing candor, a complete overflowing of his satisfied +egotism, "there are a lot of people who ask for everything and are good +for nothing!--Malcontents!--I should like to know why they are +malcontents!--What are they dreaming about, then? What do they want? I +am asking myself ever since I came into office: What is it they want? +Doesn't the present government carry out the will of the majority?--It +is just like those journalists with their nagging articles!--They squall +and mock! What they print is disgusting! Granted that we have demanded +liberty, but that does not mean license!" + +While Warcolier, entirely concerned about himself, with erect head and +oratorical gesture, spoke as if in the presence of two thousand hearers, +Sulpice Vaudrey again recalled, still sad and sick, the dark and sunken +cheeks and the colorless ears, the poor projecting ears of the +consumptive Garnier with whom he had come in contact at Ramel's. + +He was anxious to be with Adrienne again, and above all, with Marianne. +What would his mistress say to him when she knew of his reaching the +presidency of the Council? + +Adrienne had certainly received the news with little pleasure. + +"If you are happy!"--was all she said, with a sigh. + +It was the very expression she had used at the moment when, on the +formation of the "Collard Cabinet," he had gone to her and cried out: "I +am a minister!" + +Adrienne was impassive. + +In truth, Sulpice was beginning to think that she was too indifferent to +the serious affairs of life. The delightful joys of intimacy, now, +moreover, discounted, ought not to make a woman forget the public +successes of her husband. Instinctively comparing this gentle, slender +blonde, resigned and pensive, with Marianne, with her tawny locks and +passionate nature, whom he adored more intensely each day, Vaudrey +thought that a man in his position, with his ambition and merit, would +have been more powerfully aided, aye, even doubled in power and success +by a creature as strongly intelligent, as energetic and as fertile in +resource as Mademoiselle Kayser. + +He still had before him a peculiar smile of indefinable superiority +expressed by his mistress when Adrienne and Marianne chanced to meet one +evening at the theatre, which made him feel that his mistress was +watching and analyzing his wife. The next day, Marianne with exquisite +grace, but keen as a poisoned dart, said to him: + +"Do you know, my dear, Madame Vaudrey is charming?" + +He felt himself blush at these words hurled at him point-blank, then his +cheeks grew cold. Never, till that moment, had Mademoiselle Kayser +mentioned Adrienne's name. + +"You like blondes, I see!" said Marianne. "I am almost inclined to be +jealous!" + +"Will you do me a great favor?" then interrupted Sulpice. "Never let us +speak of her. Let us speak of ourselves." + +"Yes," continued the perfidious Marianne in a patronizing tone, as if +she had not heard him, "she is certainly charming! A trifle--just a +trifle--bourgeoise--But charming! Decidedly charming!" + +Knowing Vaudrey well, she understood what a keen weapon she was plunging +straight into him. A little _bourgeoise_! This conclusion rendered by +the Parisienne with a smile now haunted Sulpice, who was annoyed at +himself and he sought to discover in his wife, the dear creature whom he +had so tenderly loved, whom he still loved, some self-satisfying excuse +for his passion and adultery. + +"Bah!" he thought. "Is it adultery? There is no adultery save for the +wife. The husband's faithlessness is called a caprice, an adventure, a +craving or madness of the senses. Only the wife is adulterous." + +In all candor, what sin had he committed? Was Adrienne less loved? He +would have sacrificed his life for her. He overwhelmed her with +presents, created surprises for her that she received without emotion, +and simply said in a doleful tone: + +"How good you are, my dear!" + +He was ruining neither her nor his children! Ah! if he but had children! +Why had not Adrienne had children? A woman should be a mother. It is +maternity that in the marriage estate justifies a man in abandoning his +freedom and a woman her shame. + +A mother! And was Marianne a mother? + +No, but Marianne was Marianne. Marianne was not created for the domestic +fireside and the cradle. Her statuesque and seductively lovely limbs +only craved for the writhings of pleasure, not the pangs of maternity. +Adrienne, on the contrary, was the wife, and the childless wife soon +took another name: the friend. No, he robbed her of nothing, Adrienne +lost none of his affection, none of his fortune. The money squandered at +Rue Prony, Vaudrey had acquired; it was the savings of the honest people +of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, the parents, the _old folks_, that he +threw--as in smelting--into the crucible of the girl's mansion. + +Adrienne expressed no desire that was not fulfilled, and Sulpice who +was, moreover, confident and lulled by her quietude, felt no remorse. He +did not enquire if his passion for Marianne would endure. He flung +himself upon this love as upon some prey; nor was desire the only +influence that now attached him to this woman, he was drawn to her also +by the admiration that he felt for her boldness of thought, her +singular opinions, her careless expressions, her devilish spirit; her +appetizing and voluptuous attractions surprised and ensnared him-- + +What a counselor and ally such a woman would be! + +Well and good! When Vaudrey informed her that he was about to become +first minister, to preside over the Council, to show his power--this was +his eternal watchword--Marianne immediately comprehended the new +situation and what increase of influence in the country such a fortunate +event would give him. + +He observed with pleasure that something like a joyful beam gleamed in +Mademoiselle Kayser's gray eyes. + +She also doubtless thought that it was desirable to take advantage of +the occasion, to seize and cling to the opportunity. + +"Then it is official?" she asked. + +"Not yet. But it is certain." + +What could Marianne hope for? Again, she had no well-defined object; but +she watched her opportunity, and since Vaudrey's power was enlarged, +well, she was to profit by it. Claire Dujarrier, who had already served +her so well, could be useful to her again and advise her advantageously. +That will be seen. + +"Are you desirous of attending Collard's funeral?" Vaudrey asked +Marianne. + +She laughed as she asked: + +"Why! what do you think that would be to me?" + +"It will be very fine. All the authorities, the magistrates, the +Institute, the garrison of Paris will be present." + +"Then you think it is amusing to see soldiers file past? I am not at all +curious! You will describe it all to me and that will be quite +sufficient for me." + +Vaudrey walked at the head of the cortége that accompanied through Place +Vendôme and Rue de la Paix, black with the crowd, the funeral procession +of Collard--of Nantes--to the Madeleine. Troops of the line in parade +uniforms lined the route. From time to time was heard the muffled roll +of drums shrouded in crêpe. The funeral car was immense and was crowded +with wreaths. As with bowed head he accompanied the funeral procession +of his colleague, almost his friend,--but, bah! friendship of committees +and sub-committees!--Sulpice was sufficiently an artist to be somewhat +impressed with the contrast afforded by the display of official pomp +crowning the rather obscure life of the Nantes advocate. He had ever +obtrusively before him, as if haunted by the spectre of the Poor Man +before Don Juan, the lean face of Garnier and the white moustache of +Ramel. Which of the two had better served his cause, Ramel vanquished or +Collard--of Nantes--dying in the full blaze of success? + +He pondered over this during the whole of the ceremony. He thought of it +while the notes of the organ swelled forth, while the blue flames of the +burning incense danced, and while the butts of the soldiers' muskets +sounded from time to time on the flagstones, as the men stood around +the bier and followed the orders of the officer who commanded them. + +On leaving the ceremony, Granet approached Sulpice while gently stroking +his waxed moustache, and said in an ironical tone: + +"Do you know that it is suggested that a statue be raised in Collard's +honor?" + +"Really?" + +"Yes, because he is considered to have shown a great example." + +"What?" + +"He is one of those rare cases of ministers dying in office. Imitate +him, my dear minister,--to the latest possible moment." + +Sulpice made an effort to smile at Granet's pleasantry. This cunning +fellow decidedly displeased him; but there was nothing to take offence +at, it was mere diplomatic pleasantry expressed politely. + +Before returning to the ministry, Vaudrey had himself driven to Rue +Prony. Jean, the domestic, told him that Madame had gone out; she had +been under the necessity of going to her uncle's. After all, Sulpice +thought this was a very simple matter; but he was determined to see +Marianne, so he ordered his carriage to be driven to the artist's +studio. Uncle Kayser opened the door, bewildered at receiving a call +from the minister and, at the same time, showing that he was somewhat +uneasy, coughing very violently, as if choked with emotion, or perhaps +as a signal to some one. + +"Is Mademoiselle Kayser here?" asked Sulpice. + +"Yes--Ah! how odd it is--Chance wills that just now one of our +friends--a connoisseur of pictures--" + +Vaudrey had already thrust open the door of the studio and he perceived, +sitting near Marianne and holding his hat in his hand, a young man with +pale complexion and reddish beard, whom Mademoiselle Kayser, rising +quickly and without any appearance of surprise, eagerly presented to +him: + +"Monsieur José de Rosas!" + +In the simple manner in which she had pronounced this name, she had +infused so triumphant an expression, such manifest ostentation, that +Vaudrey felt himself suddenly wounded, struck to the heart. + +He recalled everything that Marianne had said to him about this man. + +He greeted Rosas with somewhat frigid politeness and from the tone in +which Marianne began to speak to him, he at once realized that she had +some interest in allowing the Spaniard to surmise nothing. She unduly +emphasized the title by which she addressed him, repeating a little too +frequently: "Monsieur le Ministre."--Whenever Vaudrey sought to catch +her glance she looked away in a strange fashion and managed to avoid +carrying on any formal conversation with Sulpice. On the contrary, she +addressed Rosas affably, asking what he had done in London, what he had +become and what he brought back new. + +"Nothing," José answered with a peculiar expression that displeased +Vaudrey. "Nothing but the conviction that one lives only in Paris +surrounded by persons whom one vainly seeks to avoid and toward whom one +always returns--in spite of one's self, at times." + +Vaudrey observed the almost proud, triumphant expression that flashed in +Marianne's eyes. He vaguely realized an indirect confession expressed in +that trite remark made by Rosas. The Spaniard's voice trembled slightly +as he spoke. + +Marianne smiled as she listened. + +"You have taken a new journey, monsieur?" asked Sulpice, uncertain what +bearing to assume. + +"Oh! just a temporary absence! A trip to London--" + +"Have you returned long?" + +"Only this morning." + +His first call was at Simon Kayser's house, where perhaps, he expected +to see Marianne. And the proof-- + +Vaudrey instinctively thought that it was a very hasty matter to call so +soon on Uncle Kayser. This man's first visit was not to the painter's +studio, but in reality to the woman who--Sulpice still heard Marianne +declare that--who would not become his mistress. There was something +strange in that. Eh! _parbleu!_ it was perhaps Monsieur de Rosas who had +sent for Marianne. + +She endeavored to make it clear that only chance was responsible for +bringing them together here, but Sulpice doubted, he was uneasy and +angry. + +He felt almost determined to declare, if it were only by a word, the +prize of possession, the conquest of this woman, whom he felt that Rosas +was about to contend with him for. + +She surmised everything and interrupted Sulpice even before he could +have spoken and, with a sort of false respect, displayed before Rosas +the friendship which Monsieur le Ministre desired to show her and of +which she was proud. + +"By the way, my dear minister, as to your appointment as President of +the Council?" + +Vaudrey knit his brows. + +"That is so! I ask your pardon. I am betraying a state secret. Monsieur +de Rosas will not abuse it. Isn't that so, Monsieur le Duc?" + +Rosas bowed; Vaudrey was growing impatient. + +"Madame Vaudrey will, of course, be delighted at this appointment, +Monsieur le Ministre?" continued Marianne. + +She smiled at Sulpice who was greatly astonished to hear Adrienne's name +mentioned there; then, turning to Rosas, she charmingly depicted a +quasi-idyllic sketch of the affection of Monsieur le Ministre for Madame +Vaudrey. A model household. There was nothing surprising in that, +moreover. "Monsieur le Ministre" was so amiable--yes, truly amiable, +without any flattery,--and Madame Vaudrey so charming! + +Sulpice, who was very nervous and had become slightly pale, endeavored +to discover the meaning of this riddle. He asked himself what Marianne +was thinking about, what she meant to say or dissimulate. + +Monsieur de Rosas sat motionless on his chair, very cool, looking calmly +on without speaking a word. + +He seemed to await an opportunity to leave the studio, and since Vaudrey +had arrived he had only spoken a few brief phrases in strict propriety. + +Marianne, all smiles and happy, with beaming eyes, interrogated Vaudrey +and sought to provide a subject of conversation for the unexpected +interview of these two men. Was there a great crowd at Collard's +funeral? Who had sung at the ceremony? Vaudrey answered these questions +rapidly, like a man absorbed in other thoughts. + +After a moment's interval, Monsieur de Rosas arose and bowed to Marianne +with gentlemanly formality. + +"Are you going, my dear duke?" + +"Yes, I have seen you again. You are getting along well. I am +satisfied." + +"You will come again, at any rate? My uncle has some new compositions to +show you." + +"Oh! great ideas," began Kayser. "Things that will make famous +frescoes!--For a palace--or the Pantheon!--either one!" + +He had looked alternately at the duke and Vaudrey. + +Rosas bowed to the minister and withdrew without replying, followed by +Kayser and Marianne who, on reaching the threshold of the salon, seized +his hand and pressed it nervously within her own soft one and said +quickly: + +"You will return, oh! I beg you! Ah! it is too bad to have run away! You +will come back!" + +She was at once entreating and commanding him. Rosas did not reply, but +she felt in the trembling of his hand, as he pressed her own, in his +brilliant glance, that she would see him again. And since he had +returned to Paris alone, weary of being absent from her, perhaps, seeing +that he had hastened back after having desired to free himself from her, +did it not seem this time that he was wholly captivated? + +All this was expressed by a pressure of the fingers, a glance, a sigh. + +Rosas went rapidly away, like one distracted. Marianne, who motioned to +Uncle Kayser to disappear, reappeared in the studio, entirely +self-possessed. + +Vaudrey had risen from the divan on which he had been sitting and he was +standing, waiting. + +"I believed that I understood that you had dismissed Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"I might have told you that I did so, since it is true." + +"You smiled at him, nevertheless, just now." + +"Yes." + +"A man who begged you to be his mistress!" + +"And whom I rejected, yes!" + +She looked at Sulpice with her winsome, sidelong glance, curling her +lovely pink lips that he had kissed so many times. + +"Then you love that man?" + +"I! not at all, only it is flattering to me to have him return like +that, just like some penitent little boy." + +"I do not understand--" + +"_Parbleu!_ you are not a woman, that is all that that proves!--It is +irritating to our self-love to see people too promptly accept the +dismissal one gives them. What! Don't they suffer? Don't they say +anything? Don't they complain? Monsieur de Rosas comes back to me, that +proves that he was hurt, and I triumph. Now, do you understand?" + +"And--that joy that I observed is--?" + +"It is because Monsieur de Rosas is in Paris." + +"And you don't love him? You don't love him?" asked Vaudrey, clasping +Marianne's hands in his. + +She laughed and said: + +"I do not love him in the least." + +"And you love me?" + +"Yes, you, I love you!" + +"Marianne, you know that it would be very wicked and wrong to lie! It is +not necessary to love me at all if you must cease to love me!" + +"In other words, one should never lend money unless one is obliged to +lend one's whole fortune." + +He felt extremely dissatisfied with Marianne's ironical remark. She +looked at him with an odd expression which was all the more disquieting +and intoxicating. + +"Let us speak no more about that, shall we?" she said. "I repeat to you +that I am satisfied at having seen Monsieur de Rosas again, because it +affords my self-love its revenge. Now, whether he comes back or not, it +matters little to me. He has made the _amende honorable_. That is the +principal thing, and you, my dear, must not be jealous; I find Othello's +rôle tiresome; oh! yes, tiresome!--The more so, because you have no +right to treat me as a Desdemona. The Code does not permit it." + +"You want to remind me again, then, that I am married? A moment ago, you +stabbed me by pin-thrusts." + +"In speaking of your household? Say then with knife-thrusts." + +"Why did you mention my wife before Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"Why," said Marianne, "you do not understand anything. It was for your +sake, for you alone, in order to explain the presence in Marianne's +house, of a minister who is considered to lead a puritan life. Nothing +could be more simple!--Would you have me tell him that you neglect your +wife and that you are my lover? Perhaps you would have liked that +better!" + +"Yes, perhaps," said Vaudrey passionately. + +"Vain fellow!" the pretty girl said as she placed upon his mouth her +little hand which he kept upon his lips. "Then you would like me to +parade our secrets everywhere and to publicly announce our happiness?" + +"I should like," he said, as he removed his lips from the soft palm of +her hand, "that all the world should know that you are mine, mine +only--only mine, are you not?--That man?" + +His eyes entreated her and lost their fire. + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +"Let Monsieur de Rosas alone in tranquillity and let us return to my +house, _our house_," she said, with a tender expression in her eyes. + +"You do not love him?" + +"No." + +"And you love me?" + +"I have told you so." + +"You love me? You love me?" + +"I love you!--Ah!" she said, "how unhappy you would be, nevertheless, if +I told you aloud some day in one of the lobbies of the Assembly what you +ask me to repeat here in a whisper." + +"I should prefer that to losing you and to knowing that you did not love +me." + +"He is telling the truth, however, the great fool!" cried Marianne, +laughing. + +"The real, sincere, profound truth!" + +He drew her to him, seated on the vulgar divan where Simon Kayser was +wont to display his paradoxes, and encircling her waist with both arms +he felt her yielding form beneath her satin gown, and wished her to bend +her fair face to his lips that were craving a kiss. + +Marianne took his face between her soft hands, and looking at him with +an odd smile, tender and ironical at once, at this big simpleton who was +completely dominated by her mocking tenderness, she said: + +"You are just the same Sulpice!"--as she spoke, she bent over him +engagingly, and laughed merrily while he kissed her. + + + + +IV + + +José de Rosas thought himself much more the master of himself than he +actually was. + +This energetic man, firm as a very fine steel blade, had hoped to find +that in living at a distance from Marianne, he might forget her or at +least strengthen himself against her influence. He found on his return +that he was, however, more seduced by her than before, his heart was +wholly filled and gnawed by the distracting image of the pretty girl. He +had borne away with him to London, as everywhere in fact, the puzzling +smile, the sparkling glance of this woman's gray eyes that ceaselessly +appeared to him at his bedside, and beside him, like some phantom. + +The phantom of a living creature whose kiss still burned his lips like a +live coal. A phantom that he could clasp in his arms, carry away and +possess. All the virgin sentiments of this man whose life had been the +half-savage one of a trapper, a savant or a wanderer, turned toward +Marianne as to an incarnated hope, a living, palpitating chimera. + +José felt certain that if he returned to Paris it was all over with him, +and that he was giving his life to that woman. But he returned. His +fight against himself over, the first visit he made, once again, was to +the den where he knew well that he could discover Marianne's +whereabouts. He went to her as he might walk to a gulf. Under his cold +demeanor of a Castilian of former days, he was intensely passionate and +would neither reflect nor resist. He had experienced that delightful +sensation of impulse when, upon the rapids at the other end of the +globe, the river carried into a whirlpool his almost engulfed boat. He +would doubtless have been stupefied had he found Marianne installed in a +fashionable little mansion. She promised herself to explain that to him +when she next saw him while informing him, there and then, that she had +taken up her abode there. A mere whim: Mademoiselle Vanda having gone +away, the idea had attracted her of sleeping within a courtesan's +curtains. "I will tell him that this transient luxury recalls my former +follies when I made him believe that I was spending an inheritance from +my grandmother." + +She had, indeed, already lied to him, for the money she had formerly +squandered had been provided by De Lissac, but even then it was +necessary--for the duke was in expectancy--to conceal its source from +Rosas, hence the story of the inheritance that never existed. But she at +once thoroughly realized that the surroundings which were favorable to +the progress of the duke's love were not the bedroom and the +dressing-room of Mademoiselle Vanda. What difference would Rosas have +found between her and the fashionable courtesans whom he had loved, or +rather, enriched, in passing? He would not believe this new lie this +time. + +All that luxury might seduce Sulpice Vaudrey; it would have disgusted +José. What satisfied the appetite of the little, successful bourgeois +would nauseate the gentleman. + +As soon as Rosas returned to her, happy and stupefied at the same time, +extravagantly happy in his joy, her plan of campaign was at once +arranged. She did not wish to receive him in the vulgar hôtel, where the +clubmen had wiped their feet upon the carpets. She entreated him, since +he wished to see her again, to see her at her "own house," yes, really, +at her own house, in that little, unknown room, in Rue Cuvier, far from +the noise of Paris and near the Botanical Garden, a kind of hidden cell +into which no one entered. + +"No one but me," she said. + +The order had been given to Uncle Kayser in advance: in case Rosas +should reappear, Simon was to at once inform his niece and prevent the +duke from discovering Marianne's new address. And this had been done. + +The duke was then going to see Mademoiselle Kayser only at Rue Cuvier, +after having rediscovered her at Uncle Simon's. + +He felt in advance a kind of gratitude to this woman who thus abandoned +the secret of her soul to him; giving him to understand that it was +there that she passed her days, buried in her recollections, dreaming of +her departed years, of that which had been, of that which might be, a +living death. + +Marianne had shrewdly divined the case. For this great soul, mystery +added a new sentiment to the feelings that Rosas experienced. The first +time that he found himself in that little abode where Simon Kayser's +niece awaited him, he was deeply moved, as if he had penetrated into the +pure chamber of a young girl. There, yonder, in that distant quarter, he +found a peaceful retreat for one wounded by life, thirsting for solitude +and passing there secret hours in the midst of loved books; in fact, the +discreet dwelling of a poor teacher who had collected some choice +_bibelots_ that she had found by chance. Rosas there felt himself +surrounded by perfect virtue, amid the salvage of a happier past. +Marianne thus became what he imagined her to be, superior to her lot, +living an intellectual life, consoling herself for the mortification of +existence and the hideous experiences of life by poet's dreams, in +building for herself in Paris itself a sort of Thebais, where she was +finally free and mistress of herself and where, when she was sad, she +was not compelled to wear a mask or a false smile, and was free from all +pretended gaiety. And she was so often sad! + +She had occasionally mentioned to Rosas the assumed name under which she +lived at that place. + +"Mademoiselle Robert!" + +He had manifested surprise thereat. + +"Yes, I do not wish them to know anything of me, not even my name. You +should understand the necessity that certain minds have for repose and +forgetfulness. Did not one of your sovereigns take his repose lying in +his coffin? Well! I envy him and when I have pushed the bolt of my +little room in Rue Cuvier, I tremble with delight, just as if I felt my +heart beating in a coffin. Do not tell any one. They would desire to +know and see. People are so curious and so stupid!" + +Marianne now seemed to be still more strange and seductive to Rosas. All +this romantic conduct, commonplace as it was, with which she surrounded +herself, exalted her in the estimation of the duke. She became in that +little chamber where she was simply Mademoiselle Robert, a hundred times +more charming and attractive to him than any problem: a veritable +Parisian sphinx. + +She was not his mistress. He loved her too deeply, with a holy, +respectful passion, to take her hastily, as by chance, and Marianne was +too skilful to risk any imprudent act, well-knowing that if she yielded +too quickly, it would not be a woman who would fall into the duke's +arms, but an idol that descended from its pedestal. + +In the silence of the old house in the deserted quarter, they held +conversations in the course of which Rosas freely abandoned himself, and +through which she gained every day a more intimate knowledge of the +character of that man who was so different from those who hitherto had +sought her for pleasure. + +Thus, the very respect that he instinctively felt for her, impelled her +to love him. + +She had not been accustomed to such treatment. Every masculine look that +since her puberty she had felt riveted upon her, clearly expressed even +before the lips spoke: "You are beautiful. You please me. Will you?" +Rosas, at least, said: "I love you," before: "I desire you." + +Tainted in the body which she had given, offered, abandoned, sold, she +felt that she was respected by him even in that body, and although she +considered him silly, she thought him superior to all others, or at +least different, and that was a sufficient motive for loving him. + +One day she said to him in a peculiar tone and with her distracting +smile: + +"Do you know, my dear José, there is one thing I should not have +believed? You are bashful!" + +He turned slightly pale. + +"Sincere love is always bashful and clumsy. By that it may be known." + +"Perhaps!" said Marianne. + +Their conversations, however, only concerned love, so that Rosas might +speak of his passion or of his reminiscences. + +She once asked him if he would despise a woman if she became his +mistress. + +"No!" he said, with a smile, "it is only a Frenchman who would despise +the woman who surrendered herself. Other nations treat love more +seriously. They do not consider the gift of one's self in the light of a +fall." + +Marianne looked at him full in the face with a strange expression. + +"What, then, if I love you well enough to become your mistress?" + +"I should still esteem you enough to become your husband!" + +She felt her color change. + +Was it a sport on the part of Monsieur de Rosas? Why had he spoken to +her thus? Had he reflected upon what he had just said? + +José added in a very gentle tone: + +"Will you permit me to ask you a question, Marianne?" + +"You may ask me anything. I will frankly answer all your questions." + +"What was Monsieur Sulpice Vaudrey doing at your uncle's the other day? +Was he there to see you?" + +Marianne smiled. + +"Why, the minister simply came to talk of business matters. I hardly see +him except for Uncle Kayser, who is soliciting an official +commission,--you heard him--" + +"Does Monsieur Vaudrey pay his addresses to you?" + +"Necessarily. Oh! but only out of pure French gallantry. Mere +politeness. He loves his wife and he knows very well that I don't love +any one." + +"No one?" asked Rosas. + +"I do not love any one yet," repeated Marianne, opening her gray eyes +with a wide stare under the Spaniard's anxious glance. + +From that day, her mind was possessed of a new idea that imperiously +directed it. When Rosas had returned to her, she had only regarded him +as a possible lover, rich and agreeable. The mistress of a minister, she +would become the mistress of a duke. A millionaire duke. The change +would be profitable, assuming that she could not retain both. Her +calculations were speedily made. She would only make Rosas pay more +dearly for the resistance he had offered before surrendering himself. + +But now, abruptly and without her having thought of it, he had, with the +incautiousness of a soldier who discloses his attack and lays himself +open to a bully who tries to provoke him, the duke showed her the +extent of his violent passion by a single phrase that feverishly +agitated her. + +His mistress! Why his mistress, since he had shown her that perhaps?-- + +"Idiot that I am!" thought Marianne. "Suppose I play my cards for +marriage?" + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +"It will cost no more!" + +Married! Duchess! and Duchesse de Rosas! At first she laughed. Duchess! +I am asking a little from you! The mistress of Pierre Méran, the +artist's drudge, the wretch who abducted her and debauched her, adding +his depravity to hers, and who died of consumption while quite young, +after having plunged this girl into vice, this Marianne Kayser, born and +moulded for vice: she a duchess! + +"It would be too funny, my dear!" she thought. + +Never had Vaudrey, whom she saw that evening at Rue Prony, seemed so +provincial, or, as she said, so _Sulpice_. Besides, he was gloomy and +unable to express himself clearly at first, but finally he brought +himself to acknowledge that he was embarrassed about providing for the +bill of exchange--she understood-- + +"No, I do not know!" + +"The bill of exchange in favor of Monsieur Gochard!" + +"Ah! that is so. Well! if you cannot pay it, my dear, I will advise--I +will seek--" + +There was nothing to seek. Vaudrey would evidently get himself out of +the affair--but the document matured at an unfortunate time. He did not +dare to mortgage La Saulière, his farm at Saint-Laurent-du-Pont. He had +reflected that Adrienne might learn all about it. And then-- + +Marianne broke in upon his confidences. + +"Don't speak to me about these money matters, my friend, you know that +sort of thing disgusts me!--" + +"I understand you and ask your pardon." + +They were to see each other again the next day, as parliament was to +take a rest. + +"What joy! Not to be away from you for the whole of the day!" remarked +Vaudrey. + +"Well then, till to-morrow!" + +She felt intense pleasure in being alone again, wrapped in her sheets, +with the light of the lamp that ordinarily shone upon her hours of love +with Sulpice, still burning, and to be free to dream of her Spanish +grandee who had said, plainly, with the trembling of passion on his +lips: "I should esteem you enough to become your husband!" + +She passed the night in reverie. + +Vaudrey, in spite of the joy of the morrow,--a long tête-à-tête with his +mistress,--thought with increasing vexation of the approaching maturity +of his bill of exchange; within two months he would have to pay the +hundred thousand francs which he had undertaken to pay Marianne's +creditor. + +"It is astonishing how quickly time passes!" + +At breakfast the following day, Adrienne saw that her husband was more +than usually preoccupied. + +"Are political affairs going badly?" + +"No--on the contrary--" + +"Then why are you melancholy?" + +"I am a little fatigued." + +"Then," said Madame Vaudrey, "you will scold me." + +"Why?" + +"I have led Madame Gerson to hope--You know whom I mean, Madame Marsy's +friend,--I have almost promised her that you would accept an invitation +to dine at her house." + +For a moment Vaudrey was put out. + +Another evening taken! Hours of delight stolen from Marianne! + +"I have done wrong?" asked Adrienne, as she rested her pretty but +somewhat sad face on her husband's bosom. "I did it because it is so +great a pleasure to me to spend an entire evening with you, even at +another's house. Remember you have so many official dinners, banquets +and invitations that you attend alone. When the minister's wife is +invited with him, it is a fête-day for the poor, little forsaken thing. +I do not have much of you, it is true, but I see you, I hear you talking +and I am happy. Do not chide me for having said that we would go to +Madame Gerson's. The more so, because she is a charming woman. Ah! when +she speaks of you! 'So great a minister!' Don't you know what she calls +you?--'A Colbert!'" + +Vaudrey could not restrain a smile. + +"Come, after that, one cannot refuse her invitation. It is the +_Monseigneur_ of the beggar," said he, kissing Adrienne's brow. "And +when do we dine at Madame Gerson's?" + +"On Monday next; I shall have at least one delightful evening to see +you," said the young wife sweetly. + +The minister entered his cabinet. Almost immediately after, a messenger +handed him a card: _Molina, Banker_. + +"How strange it is!" thought Sulpice. "I had him in mind." + +In the course of his troublesome reflections concerning the Gochard +paper, Vaudrey persistently thought of that fat, powerful man who +laughed and harangued in a loud voice in the greenroom of the ballet, as +he patted with his fat fingers the delicate chin of Marie Launay. + +Why! if he were willing, this Molina--Molina the Tumbler!--for him it is +a mere bagatelle, a hundred thousand francs! + +Salomon Molina entered the minister's cabinet just as he made his way +into the foyer of the Opéra, with swelling chest, tilted chin and +stomach thrust forward. + +"Monsieur le Ministre," he said in a clear voice, as he spread himself +out in the armchair that Vaudrey pointed out to him, "I notify you that +you have my maiden visit!--I am still in a state of innocency! On my +honor, this is the first time I have set my foot within a minister's +office!" + +He manifested his independence--born of his colossal influence--by his +satisfied and successful air. The former Marseillaise clothes-dealer, in +his youth pouncing upon the sailors of the port and Maltese and +Levantine seamen, to palm off on them a second-hand coat or trousers, as +the wardrobe dealers of the Temple hook the passer-by, Salomon Molina, +who had paraded his rags and his hopes on the Canebière, dreaming at the +back of his dark shop of the triumphs, the pleasures, the revels and the +indigestions that money affords, had, moreover, always preserved the +bitterness of those wretched days and his red, Jewish lip expressed the +gall of his painful experiences. + +His first word as he entered Vaudrey's cabinet, asserting the virginity +of his efforts at solicitation, betrayed his bitterness. + +Now, triumphant, powerful, delighted, feasted and fat, his massive form, +his gross flesh and his money were in evidence all over Paris. His huge +paunch, shaking with laughter, filled the stage-boxes at the theatres. +He expanded his broad shoulders as he reclined in the calèche that +deposited him on race-days at the entrance of the weighing-enclosure. He +held by the neck, as it were, everything of the Parisian quarry that +yelps and bounds about money, issues of stock, and the food of public +fortune: bankers, stock-brokers, and jobbers, financial, political and +exchange editors, wretches running after a hundred sous, statesmen in a +fair way to fortune; and he distributed to this little crowd, just as he +would throw food into a kennel, the discounts and clippings of his +ventures, taking malicious pleasure, the insolent delight of a fortunate +upstart, in feigning at the moment when loans were issued, sickness that +had no existence, in order to have the right of keeping his chamber, of +hearing persons of exalted names ringing at his door and dancing +attendance upon him,--powerful, influential and illustrious +persons,--him, the second-hand dealer and chafferer from Marseilles. + +It was then that he tasted the joy of supreme power, that delight which +titillated even his marrow, and after having rested all day, the prey of +a convenient neuralgia, he experienced the unlimited pleasure of force +overcoming mind, the blow of a fist crushing a weakling, as with a white +cravat he appeared in some salon, in the greenroom of the ballet, or in +the dressing-room of a _première_, saying with the mocking smile of +triumph and the assurance attending a gorged appetite: + +"I was sick to-day, I suffered from neuralgia! The Minister of Finance +called on me!--Baron Nathan came to get information from me!" + +Among all the pleasures experienced by this man, he valued feminine +virtue occasionally purchased with gold as little in comparison with the +virgin souls, honor and virtue that he often succeeded in humiliating, +in bending before him like a reed, and snuffing out with his irony, +whenever necessity placed at his mercy any of those puritanical beings +who had passed sometimes with haughty brow before the millions of this +man of money. It was then that the clothes-dealer took his revenge in +all its hideousness. There was no pity to be expected from this fat, +smiling and easy-going man. His fat fingers strangled more certainly +than the lean hands of a usurer. Molina never pardoned. + +Ah! if this fellow went to see the minister, most assuredly he wanted a +favor from him. + +But what? + +It was extraordinary, but before Vaudrey, Molina who could hold his own +among rascals, found himself ill at ease. There was in the frank look of +this _ninny_, as Molina the _Tumbler_ had one evening called him while +talking politics, such direct honesty that the banker, accustomed as he +was to dealings with sharks and intriguers, did not quite know how to +open the question, nevertheless a very important matter was in hand. + +"A rich plum," thought Molina. + +A matter of railways, a concession to be gained. A matter of private +interest, disguised under the swelling terms of the public welfare, the +national needs. Millions were to be gained. Molina was charged with the +duty of sounding the President of the Council and the Minister of Public +Works. Two honest men. The _dodge_, as the _Tumbler_ said, was to make +them swallow the affair under the guise of patriotism. A strategical +railroad. The means of rapid locomotion in case of mobilization. With +such high-sounding words, _strategy_, _frontier_, _safety_, they could +carry a good many points. + +Unfortunately, Vaudrey was rather skittish on these particular +questions, besides he was informed on the matter. He felt his flesh +creep while Molina was speaking. Just before, on seeing the banker's +card, the idea of the money of which the fat man was one of the +incarnations, had suddenly dawned upon him as a hope. Who knows? By +Molina's aid, he might, perhaps, free himself from anxiety about the +Gochard bill of exchange!--But from the minister's first words, although +the banker could not get to the point, intimidated as he was by +Sulpice's honest look, it was clear that Vaudrey surmised some repugnant +suggestions in the hesitating words of this man. + +What! Molina hesitating? He did not go straight to the point, squarely, +according to his custom, Molina the illustrious _Tumbler_? Eh! no! the +intentionally cold bearing of the minister decidedly discomposed him. +Vaudrey's glance never wandered from his for a moment. When the promoter +pronounced the word Bourse, a disdainful curl played upon Sulpice's +lips, but not a word escaped him. Molina heard his own voice break the +silence of the ministerial cabinet and he felt himself entangled. He +came to propose a combination, a bonus, and he did not suspect that +Vaudrey would refuse to have a hand in it. And here, this devilish +minister appeared not to understand, did not understand, perhaps, or +else he understood too well. Molina was not accustomed to such +hard-of-hearing people. With his fat hand, he had dropped into the hands +of senators and ministers of the former régime, a sum for which the only +receipt given was a smile. He was accustomed to the style of +conversation carried on by hints and ended between intelligent people by +a _shake of the hand_, that in which some bits of paper rested: +bank-notes or paid-up shares. And this Vaudrey knew nothing! So he felt +himself obliged to explain himself clearly, to stoop to dotting every +_i_, at the risk of being shown out of doors. + +Molina was too shrewd to run this risk. He would return at another time, +seeing that the minister turned a deaf ear, but _pécaïre_! he sweat huge +drops in seeking roundabout phrases, this man who never minced his words +and habitually called things by their proper names. Was the like ever +seen! A pettifogger from Grenoble to _floor_ Salomon Molina! + +"It made me warm," said the money-maker, on leaving the cabinet, "but, +deuce take it! I'll have my revenge. One is not a minister always. You +shall pay me dearly, my little fellow, for that uncomfortable little +time." + +Vaudrey had thoroughly understood the matter, but he did not intend to +allow it to be seen that he did. That was a simpler way. He had not had +to dismiss the buyer of consciences; he had enjoyed his embarrassment +and that was sufficient. + +"What, however, if I had spoken to him of money before he had shown his +hand! If I had accepted from him--!" he said to himself. + +He shuddered at the thought as he had previously done while Molina was +talking to him. A single imprudence, a single confidence might easily +have placed him under the hand of this fat man. He must, however, find +some solution. The days were rolling away and the bills signed for +Marianne would in a very short time reach maturity. + +"When I think that this Molina could in one day enable me to gain three +times this sum." + +Salomon had just told him: "To forestall the news on the Bourse is +sometimes worth gold ingots!" A _forestaller_! As well say the +revelation of a State secret, base speculation, almost treachery! And +yet on hearing these words that covered up an insult, he had not even +rung for the messenger to show Molina out, but had striven to comprehend +nothing! + +As the result of this conversation, he felt uncomfortable. The man had +left an odor of pollution, as it were, behind him. + +Vaudrey must needs be soon reassured respecting the Gochard paper. In +visiting Marianne, he observed that his mistress was a shrewd woman. She +informed him immediately that Claire Dujarrier whom she had seen, would +secure a renewal from Gochard, who was unknown to Vaudrey, from three +months to three months until the expiration of six months in +consideration of an additional twenty thousand francs for each period of +ninety days. + +"I did not understand that at first," Marianne began by remarking. + +"Oh!" said Sulpice, "I understand perfectly, it is absolute usury. But +time is ready money, and in six months it will be easier for me to pay +one hundred and forty thousand francs than a hundred thousand to-day. I +have plans." + +"What?" + +"Very difficult to explain, but quite clear in my mind! The important +part is not to have the date of maturity on the first of June, but on +the first of December." + +"Then nothing is more simple. Madame Dujarrier will arrange it." + +"Is Madame Dujarrier a providence then?" + +"Almost," said Marianne coldly. + +Sulpice was intoxicated with joy, realizing that he had before him all +the necessary time in which to free himself from his embarrassment, when +Marianne should have returned him his first acceptance for one hundred +thousand francs against a new one for one hundred and forty thousand. He +breathed again. From the twenty-sixth of April to the first of December, +he had nearly seven months in which to free himself. He repeated the +calculation that he had formerly made when he said: "I have ample time!" + +He reëntered the Hôtel Beauvau in a cheerful mood, Adrienne was +delighted. She feared to see him return nervous and dejected. + +"Then you will be brilliant presently at Madame Gerson's." + +"Stop! that's so. It is this evening in fact!--" + +He had forgotten it. + +Marianne, too, was not free. She was going, she said, to Auteuil for +that bill of exchange. Vaudrey did not therefore, regret the soirée. His +going to Madame Gerson's was now a matter of indifference to him. + +"As for me, I am so happy, oh! so happy!" said Adrienne, clapping her +little hands like a child. + +In undressing, Vaudrey fortunately found this document which he had +folded in four and left in his waistcoat pocket: + + "On the first of June next, I will pay to the order of Monsieur + Adolphe Gochard of No. 9, Rue Albouy, the sum of One Hundred + Thousand Francs, value received in cash. + + "SULPICE VAUDREY, + "Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, 37." + +He turned pale on reading it. If Adrienne had seen it!-- + +He burned the paper at a candle. + +"I am imprudent," he said to himself. "Poor Adrienne! I should not like +to cause her any distress." + +She was overjoyed as she made the journey in the ministerial carriage +from Place Beauvau to the Gersons' mansion. At last she had a rapid, +stolen moment in which she could recover the old-time joy of happy +solitude, full of the exquisite agitation of former days. + +"Do you recall the time when you took me away like this, on the evening +of our marriage?" she whispered to him, as the carriage was driven off +at a gallop. + +He took her hands and pressed them. + +"You still love me, don't you, Sulpice?--You believe too, that I love +you more than all the world?" + +"Yes, I believe it!" + +"You would kill me if I deceived you?--I, ah, if you deceived me, I do +not know what I should do.--Although I think that you are here, that I +hold you, that I love you, you may still belong to another woman--" + +"Again! you have already said that. Are you mad?" said Sulpice. "See! we +have reached our destination." + +Madame Gerson had brilliantly illuminated her house in Rue de Boulogne +with lights, filled it with flowers, and spread carpets everywhere to +receive the President of the Council. The house was too small to +accommodate the guests, who were about to be stifled therein. She packed +them into her dining-room. For the soirée which was to follow, she had +sounded the roll-call of her friends. She was bent on founding a new +salon, on showing Madame Marsy that she was not alone to be the rival of +Madame Evan. + +Madame Gerson was not on friendly terms with Sabine Marsy. People were +ignorant as to the cause. Adrienne, who was not familiar with the +history of such little broils, was very much surprised to learn of this +fact. + +"She claims that we take away all her _personnel_," said Madame Gerson. +"It is not my fault if people enjoy themselves at our house. I hope that +you will find pleasure here, Monsieur le Président." + +Vaudrey bowed. "Madame Gerson could not doubt it." + +The guests sat down to dinner. Madame Gerson beamed with joy beside the +minister. Guy de Lissac, Warcolier, some senators and some deputies were +of the dinner party. Monsieur and Madame Gerson never spoke of them by +their names but: _Monsieur le Sénateur, Monsieur le Député!_ They +lubricated their throats with these titles, just as bourgeois who come +in contact with highnesses swell out in addressing a prince as +_Monseigneur_, absolutely as if they were addressing themselves. + +Sulpice felt in the midst of this circle in which everything was +sacrificed to _chic_, as he invariably did, the painful sensation of a +man who is continually on show. He never dined out without running +against the same menu, the same fanfare, and the same conversation. + +Monsieur Gerson endeavored to draw the President of the Council into +political conversation. He wished to know Vaudrey's opinion as to the +one-man ballet. Sulpice smiled. + +"Thanks!" he said. "We have just been dealing with that. I prefer +truffles, they are more savory." + +Through the flowers, Adrienne could see her husband who was seated +opposite to her beside Madame Gerson. She conversed but little with Guy +de Lissac, who was sitting on her right, although the formalities of the +occasion would have suggested that Monsieur le Senator Crépeau and +Monsieur de Prangins, the deputy, should have been so placed. Madame +Gerson, however, had remarked with a smile, that Madame Vaudrey would +not feel annoyed at having Monsieur de Lissac for her neighbor. "I have +often met Monsieur de Lissac at the ministry; he is received noticeably +well there." + +Not knowing any one among the guests, Adrienne was, in fact, charmed to +have Guy next to her. He was decidedly pleasing to her with his sallies, +his skepticism which, as she thought, covered more belief than he wished +to disclose. For a long time, he had felt himself entirely captivated by +her cheerful modesty and the grace of her exquisite purity. She was so +vastly different from all the other women whom he had known. How the +devil could Vaudrey bring himself to neglect so perfect a creature, who +was more attractive in her fascinating virtue than all the damsels to be +met with in society, among the demi-monde, or those of a still lower +grade? For Vaudrey remained indifferent to Adrienne; and this was a +further and manifest blow. A specialist in matters of observation like +Guy was not to be deceived therein. Madame Vaudrey had not yet +complained, but she was already suffering. Was it merely politics, or +was it some woman who was taking her husband from Adrienne? Guy did not +know, but he would know. The pretty Madame Vaudrey interested him. + +"If that idiot Sulpice were not my friend, I would make love to her. +Besides," he said to himself, as he looked at Adrienne's lovely, limpid +eyes, "I should fail; there are some lakes whose tranquillity cannot be +disturbed." + +Adrienne, pleased to have him beside her, enquired of him the names of +the guests. On the left of Madame Gerson sat a little, broad-backed man, +with black hair pasted over his temples, long leg-of-mutton whiskers +decorating his bright-colored cheeks, and a keen eye: he was Monsieur +Jouvenet, formerly an advocate; to-day Prefect of Police. + +Senator Crépeau sat further away. He was a fat manufacturer, who talked +about alimentary products and politics. In the _Analytical Table of the +Accounts of the Sittings of the Senate_, his name shone brilliantly, +with the following as his record: "CRÉPEAU, of L'Ain, Life +Senator--Apologizes for his absence--8 January--. Apologizes for his +absence--20 February--. Member of a commission--_Journal Officiel_, p. +1441. Apologizes for not being able to take part in the labors of the +commission--4 March--. Apologizes for his absence--20 March--. Asks for +leave of absence--5 April--." Such were his services during the ordinary +work of that year. Monsieur Crépeau--of L'Ain--had earned the right to +take a rest. + +"He eats very heartily," said Lissac. "His appetite is better than his +eloquence." + +Next to Crépeau was another legislator, Henri de Prangins, a publicist, +an old, wrinkled, stooping, dissatisfied grumbler. + +"Ah! that is Monsieur de Prangins," said Adrienne, "I have heard much +about him." + +"He is a typical character," Lissac said, with a smile. "You know +Granet, _the gentleman who will become a minister_; well, Prangins is +the gentleman who would be a minister, but who never will be! Moreover, +he is five hundred times more remarkable than a hundred others who have +been in office ten times, for what reason cannot be said." + +For nearly half a century Prangins, the old political wheel-horse, had +plotted and jockeyed in politics, set up and overthrown ministries, +piled up review articles on newspaper articles, contradiction on +contradiction, page on page, spoiled cartloads of paper in his vocation +of daily or fortnightly howler, and withal he was applauded, rich and +popular, famous and surrounded by flatterers, knife-and-fork companions, +without friends but not wanting clients, as he had made and spoiled +reputations, ministers, governments, and although he well knew the +vanity and nothingness of power, he aspired to secure that vain booty, +oft alleging, with bitter enviousness of authority and impatient of +tyranny, that to enjoy popularity uninterruptedly was not worth a +quarter of an hour of power, approaching with greedy eagerness the +desired lot, yet seeing it inevitably, eternally, relentlessly escape +and recede from him, plucked from his grasp as it were, like a shred of +flesh from the jaw of a Molossian. And now, in his unquenchable lust of +power, amid the monuments of combination and deception he had created, +this man was weary, disgusted and irritated,--believing himself +vanquished and smothering the anger of defeat in the luxurious isolation +of his wealth. He was neither officially influential nor liked. Feared +he was, probably, and envied because of his good fortune, recognized, +too, as a _force_, but only as acting in the whirlwind of his ideas and +struggling in the emptiness of his dreams. After having immolated +everything, youth, family, friendship, love, to this chimera: power, he +found himself old, worn-out, broken by his combats, face to face with +the folly of his hopes and the worthlessness of his will. Never had his +nervous hand been able to grasp in its transition, the fragment of +morocco of a portfolio and now that his parchment-like fingers were old +and feeble, they would never cling to that shred of power! And now this +Prangins avenged himself for the contempt or the injustice of his +colleagues and the folly of circumstances, by criticism, defiance, +mockery, denial and by loudly expressing his opinion: + +"The defect of every government is that it will try to play new airs on +an old violin! Your violin is cracked, Monsieur Vaudrey! I do not +reproach you for that, you did not make it!" + +Vaudrey laughed at the sally, but Warcolier felt that he was choking. +How could the minister allow his policy to be thus attacked at table? +Ah! how Warcolier would have clinched the argument of this Prangins. + +Madame Gerson was delighted. The dinner was served sumptuously and went +off without a hitch. The _maître d'hôtel_ directed the service +admirably. The soirée that was to follow it would be magnificent. The +journals would most certainly report it. Gerson had invited one reporter +in spite of his dislike of journalists. Ah! those gossipers and foolish +fellows, they never forgot to describe the toilettes worn by "the pretty +Madame Gerson" at _first nights_, at the Élysée or at Charity Bazaars. +Occasionally, her husband pretended to be angered by the successes of +his wife: + +"Those journalists! Just imagine, those journalists! They speak about my +wife just as they would about an actress! 'The lovely Madame Gerson wore +a gown of _crêpe de Chine_!' The lovely Madame Gerson! What has my +wife's beauty or her toilette to do with them?" + +In truth, however, he felt flattered. He was only sincerely annoyed +when people respected the devilish wall of private life, the cement of +which he would have stripped off himself, in order to show his wife's +beauty. To be quoted in the paper, why! that is _chic_. + +Adrienne felt a little stunned by the noise of the conversation which +increased in proportion as the dinner advanced. She was also very much +astonished and not a little grieved when Madame Gerson abruptly spoke in +a loud voice before all the guests concerning Madame Marsy, at whose +house it was, in fact, that she made the acquaintance of Vaudrey. Madame +Gerson showed her pretty teeth in a very charming manner as she tore her +old friend Sabine to pieces, as it were. In a tenderly indulgent tone +which was the more terrible, she repeated the tales that were formerly +current: the affecting death of Philippe Marsy, the painter of +_Charity_, and a particular escapade in which Sabine was involved with +Émile Cordier, one of the leaders of the _intransigeante_ school of +painters. + +"What! you did not know that?" said the pretty Madame Gerson in +astonishment. + +Adrienne knew nothing. She was delighted moreover to know nothing. She +heard this former friend relate how Sabine had, at one time, exhibited +at the Salon. Oh! mere students' daubs, horrid things! Still-life +subjects that might have passed for buried ones, and yet, perhaps, +Cordier retouched them. + +"I thought that Madame Gerson was on the best of terms with Madame +Marsy," whispered Adrienne to Lissac, who replied: + +"They have been on better! They perhaps will be so again. That is of +very little importance. Women revile each other and associate at the +same time." + +Adrienne decided that she would not listen. She knew Sabine Marsy only +slightly; she was not interested as a friend; but this little execution, +gracefully carried out here by a woman who recently did the honors at +the Salon of Boulevard Malesherbes seemed to her as cowardly as +treachery. This, then, was society! And how right was her choice in +preferring solitude! + +Then, in order that she might not hear the slander that was greeted with +applause by those very persons who but yesterday besieged Madame Marsy's +buffet, and who would run to-morrow to pay court to that woman, she +conversed with Lissac. She frankly told him what she suffered at Place +Beauvau. She spoke of Sulpice, as Sulpice was loved by her beyond all +else in the world. + +"Fancy! I do not see him, hardly ever! The other week he passed two days +at Laon, where an exposition was held at which he was present." + +"An exposition at Laon?" asked Lissac, astonished. "What exposition?" + +"I do not know. I know nothing myself. Perhaps it is wrong of me not to +keep myself informed of passing events, but all that wearies me. I +detest politics and journals--I am told quite enough about them. +Politics! that which takes my husband from me! My uncle, Doctor Reboux, +often said to me: 'Never marry a doctor; he is only half a husband.' +Vaudrey is like a doctor. Always absent, with his everlasting +night-sessions." + +"Night-sessions?" asked Lissac. + +"Yes, at the Chamber--continually--" + +Guy determined to betray nothing of his astonishment; but he knew now as +surely as if he had learned everything, why Sulpice neglected Adrienne. +The fool! some girl from the Opéra! some office-seeker who was skilfully +entangling His Excellency! That appertained to his functions then? He +was exasperated at Vaudrey and alternately looked at him and at +Adrienne. So perfect a woman! Ravishing. What an exquisite profile, so +delicate and with such a straight nose and a delightful mouth! Was +Vaudrey mad then? + +The guests rose from the table, and, as usual, the men went into the +smoking-room, leaving the salon half-empty. Madame Gerson profited +thereby to continue distilling her little slanders about Sabine, which +she did while laughing heartily. In the smoking-room the men chatted +away beneath the cloud that rose from their _londrès_. The clarion tones +of Warcolier rung out above all the other voices. + +Guy, seated in a corner on a divan, was still thinking of Adrienne, of +those _night-sessions_, of those expositions, of those agricultural +competitions invented by Sulpice, and caught but snatches of the +conversation, jests, and nonsensical stories which were made at the cost +of the colleagues of the Chamber and political friends: + +"You know how Badiche learned at the last election that he was not +elected?" + +"No, how?" + +"He returned to his house, anxious as to the result of the ballot. And +he heard, what do you think? His children, a little boy and a little +girl, who on receipt of the telegram that papa was waiting for and that +mamma in her feverish expectation had opened, had already composed a +song to the air of _The Young Man Poisoned_: + + Résultat très négatif, + Ballottage positif! + Badiche est ballo-- + Bâté, + Est ballotté! + Oui, Badiche est ballotté; + C'est papa qu'est ballotté! + +Happy precocity! genuine frightful gamins!" + +"_Du Gavarni_!" + +"Apropos, on what majority do you count, Monsieur le Président?" + +"One hundred and thirty-nine." + +"That is a large one." + +"I! my dear fellow,"--it was old Prangins speaking to Senator +Crépeau,--"I do not count myself as likely to be included in the next +ministry, no! I do not delude myself, but I shall be in the second--or +rather in the third--no, in the fourth--yes, in the fourth +ministry--Assuredly!" + +An asthmatic cough, the cough of an old man, interrupted his remarks. + +Guy heard Warcolier, as he held a small glass of kirsch in his hand, say +with a laugh: + +"I have a way of holding my electors in leash. Not only when I visit +them do I address them as _my friend, my brave_, which flatters them, +but from time to time, I write them autograph letters. They look upon +that like ready money. Some of them, the good fellows, are flattered: +'He has written to me, he is not proud!' Others, the suspicious fellows, +are reassured: 'Now--I have his signature, I have him!' And there you +are!" + +They laughed heartily. + +"How they laugh _afterward_," thought Lissac, "at the electors whose +shoes they would blacken _beforehand_." + +"The course that I have followed is very simple," said another. "I +desired to become sub-prefect so as to become a prefect and a prefect to +become a deputy, and a deputy so as to reach a receiver-generalship. The +salaries assured, why, there's the crowning of a career." + +"Why, that fellow _plays the whole gamut_," again thought Guy, "but he +is frank!" + +"I read very little," now replied Crépeau to Warcolier--"I do not much +care for pure literature--we politicians, we need substantial reading +that will teach us to think." + +"I believe you!--" murmured this Parisian Guy, still smoking and +listening. "Go to school, my good man!" + +The conversation thus intermingled and confused, horrified and irritated +this _blasé_ by its gravity and selfishness. He summed up an entire +character in a single phrase and shook his head as he very shrewdly +remarked: "Suppose _Universal Suffrage_ were listening?" + +Lissac did not take any part in these conversations. It was his delight +to observe. He drew amusement from all these wearisome commonplaces, +according to his custom as a curious spectator. + +He was about, however, to rise and approach Vaudrey, who was +instinctively coming toward him, when the Prefect of Police, Monsieur +Jouvenet, without noticing it, placed himself between the minister and +his friend. + +Jouvenet spoke in a low tone to Vaudrey, smiling at the same time very +peculiarly and passing his fingers through his whiskers. Whatever +discretion the prefect employed, Guy was near enough to him to hear the +name of Marianne Kayser, which surprised him. + +Marianne! what question of Marianne could there be between these two +men? + +Lissac observed that Vaudrey suddenly became very pale. + +He drew still nearer, pretending to finish a cup of coffee while +standing. Then he heard these words very distinctly: + +"A reporter saw you leave her house the other evening!" + +Guy moved away very quickly. He felt a sort of sudden bewilderment, as +if the few words spoken by the Prefect of Police were the natural result +of his conversation with Adrienne, an immediate response thereto. + +"It would be astonishing if Marianne--" thought Lissac. + +Besides, he would know soon. He would merely question Vaudrey. + +As soon as Jouvenet, always polite, grave and impassive, had left +"Monsieur le Ministre" in a state of visible nervousness, almost of +anxiety, he entered upon his plan. + +"You know Mademoiselle Kayser intimately then?" he asked Vaudrey, who, +taken aback, looked at him for a moment without replying and endeavored +to grasp Lissac's purpose. + +"Am I imprudent?" further asked Guy. + +"No, but who has told you--?" + +"Nothing, your Prefect of Police only spoke a little too loud. He seemed +to me to understand." + +Vaudrey's hand rapidly seized Lissac's wrist. + +"Hush! be silent!" + +"Very well! Good!" said Lissac to himself. "Poor little Adrienne." + +"I will tell you all about that later. Oh! nothing is more simple! It +isn't what you think!" + +"I am sure of that!" answered Lissac, with a smile. + +In a mechanical way, and as if to evade his friend, Sulpice left the +smoking-room for the salon, tritely observing: + +"We must rejoin the ladies--the cigar kills conversation--" + +He felt uncomfortable. It was the first time that Jouvenet had informed +him that there are agents for learning the movements of ministers. The +Prefect of Police, in a chance conversation at the Opéra with the +editor-in-chief of a very Parisian journal, had suppressed a rumor which +stated that a minister hailing from Grenoble set propriety at defiance +in his visits to Rue Prony. It would have been as well to print +Vaudrey's name. + +Hitherto he had been able to enjoy his passion for Marianne without +scandal and secretly. His mysterious intrigue was now known to the +police, to everybody, to a reporter who had stumbled against him on +leaving a supper-party at the house of a courtesan in the neighborhood. + +The minister was bitterly annoyed. The very flattering applause that +the women bestowed upon him when he returned to the salon could not +dissipate his ill-humor. He tried to chat and respond to the affected +remarks of Madame Gerson and to the smiles of the women; but he was +embarrassed and nervous. Adrienne thought he looked ill. + +Everything was spoken of in the light but pretentious, easy tone of the +conversation of those second-rate salons where neither ideas nor men are +made, where, on the contrary, they are accepted, ready-made and _en +bloc_. On every question, the picture in vogue, the favorite book, the +man of the hour, they expressed themselves by the same stereotyped, +expected word, borrowed from the ceaseless repetition of current +polemics. Nothing was new. The conversation was as well worn as an old +farthing. Adrienne was pained to see a man of Vaudrey's intelligence +compelled to listen to these truisms and wondered if he would presently +reproach her for having brought him into the suffocating void of this +Parisian establishment where all was superficial, glittering and _chic_. + +She was in a hurry to get away. She saw that Sulpice was growing weary, +and took advantage of the first opportunity to whisper to him: + +"Would you like to go?" + +"Yes, let us go!" he said. + +He sought Lissac and repeated to him that he would have something to say +to him, and Guy bowed to the Minister and Madame Vaudrey, who left too +early to please the Gersons. + +Adrienne, out of heart and discouraged by commonplace gossip and +slander, was eager to be again with her husband, to tell him that +nothing could compensate her for the deep joy of the tête-à-tête, their +evenings passed together as of old--he remembered them well,--when he +read to her from the works of much-loved poets. + +"Poetry!" said Vaudrey. "Will you be quiet! The Gersons would find me as +antiquated as Ramel. It is old-fashioned." + +"I am no longer surprised," added the young wife, "at being so little +fashionable. Morally speaking, those hot-houses of platitudes stifle +one. Never fear, Sulpice, I shall not be the one to ever again drag you +into salons. Are you tired? Are you weary?" + +"No, I was thinking of something else," replied Vaudrey, who really was +thinking of Marianne. + +Madame Vaudrey had not left Madame Gerson's salon before that pretty +little Parisian whispered imprudently enough in the ear of a female +friend: + +"Our ministers' wives are always from Carpentras, Pont-à-Mousson, or +Moulins; don't you think so?" + +"And what would you have!" said Lissac, who on this evening heard +everything that he ought not to hear, "it is as good as being from the +_Moulin-Rouge_!" + +Madame Gerson smiled, thought the expression charming, very apt, very +happy, but again reflected that Lissac was exceedingly considerate +toward Adrienne and that Madame Vaudrey was a little too indulgent +toward Monsieur de Lissac. + + + + +V + + +Since the moment when it had entered her mind that she might find +something more than a lover in Monsieur de Rosas, Marianne had been +sorely puzzled. She was playing a strong hand. Between the minister and +the duke she must make a choice. + +She did not care seriously for Vaudrey. In fact she found that he was +ridiculously unreserved. "He is a simple fellow!" she said to Claire +Dujarrier. But she had sufficient _amour-propre_ to retain him, and she +felt assured that Sulpice was weak enough to obey her in everything: +such an individual was not to be disdained. As to Rosas, she felt a +sentiment which certainly was not love, but rather a feeling of +astonishment, a peculiar affection. Rosas held her in respect, and she +was flattered by his timid bearing, as he had in his veins the blood of +heroes. He spoke almost entirely of his love, which, however, he never +proposed to her to test, and this platonic course, which in Vaudrey's +case she would have considered _simple_, appeared to her to be "good +form" in the great nobleman's case. The duke raised her in her own +eyes. + +He had never repeated that word, doubtless spoken by him at random: +marriage, and Marianne was too discreet and shrewd to appear to have +specially noticed it. She did not even allude to it. She waited +patiently. With the lapse of time, she thought, Rosas would be the more +surely in her grasp. Meantime it was necessary to live and as she was +bent on maintaining her household, she kept Vaudrey, whom she might need +at any moment. + +Her part was to carry on these two intrigues simultaneously, leading +Rosas to believe that the minister was her friend only, nothing more, +the patron of Uncle Kayser, and making Vaudrey think that since she had +dismissed the duke he had become resigned and would "suppress his +sighs." She could have sworn, in all sincerity, that José was not her +lover. + +To mislead Vaudrey was not a very difficult task. Sulpice was literally +blinded by this love.--For a moment, he had been aroused by Jouvenet's +intimation that his secret was known to others. For a while he seemed to +have kept himself away from Marianne; but after taking new precautions, +he returned trembling with ardent passion to Mademoiselle Vanda's hôtel, +where his mistress's kiss, a little languid, awaited him. + +Months passed thus, the entire summer, the vacation of the Chamber, the +dull season in Paris. Adrienne set out for Dauphiny, where Vaudrey was +to preside over the Conseil-Général, and she felt a childish delight on +finding herself once more in the old house at Grenoble, where she had +formerly been so happy! Yet even beneath this roof, within these walls, +the mute witnesses of his virtuous love, especially when alone, Vaudrey +thought of Marianne, he had but one idea, that of seeing her again, of +clasping her in his arms, and he wrote her passionate letters each day, +which she hardly glanced over and with a shrug of her shoulders burned +as of no importance. + +In the depths of his province he grew weary of the continual bustle of +fêtes, receptions held in his honor, addresses delivered by him, +ceremonies over which he had to preside, deputations received, statues +inaugurated. Statues! always statues! In the lesser towns, at Allevard +or Marestel, he was dragged from the _mairie_ to the _Grande Place_, +between rows of firemen, in noisy processions, whose accompanying brass +instruments split his ears, under pink-striped tents, draped with +tricolor flags, before interminable files of gymnastic societies, glee +clubs, corporate bodies, associations, Friends of Peace, or Friends of +War societies! Then wandering harangues; commonplace remarks, spun out; +addresses, sprinkled with Latin by professors of rhetoric; declarations +of political faith by eloquent municipal councillors, all delighted to +grab at a minister when the opportunity offered. How many such harangues +Vaudrey heard! More than in the Chamber. More thickly they came, more +compressed, more severe than in the Chamber. What advice, political +considerations and remonstrances winding up with demands for offices! +What cantatas that begged for subsidies! Everywhere demands: demands for +subsidies, demands for grants, demands for help, demands for +decorations! Nothing but harass, enervation, lassitude, deafening +clamor. They wished to kill him with their shouts: _Vive Vaudrey!_ + +The Prefect and the Commandant General of the division were constantly +on guard about Vaudrey, who was dragged about in torture between these +two coat-embroidered officers. From the lips of the prefect, Vaudrey +heard the same commonplace utterances: progress, the future, the fusion +of parties and interests, the greatness of the department, the cotton +trade and the tanneries, the glory of the minister who--of the minister +whom--of the glorious child of the country--of the eagle of Dauphiny. +_Vive Vaudrey! Vive Vaudrey!_ The general, at least, varied his effects. +He grumbled and wrung his hands, and on the day of the inauguration of +the statue of a certain Monsieur Valbonnans, a former deputy and +celebrated glove manufacturer,--also the glory of the country,--Vaudrey +heard the soldier murmur from morning till night, with a movement of his +jaw that made his imperial jerk: "_I love bronze! I love bronze!_" with +a persistency that stupefied the minister. + +This was, perhaps, the only recollection of a cheerful nature that +Vaudrey retained of his trips in Isère. This eternal murmuring of the +general: _I love bronze! I love bronze!_ had awakened him, and he gayly +asked himself what devilish sort of appetite that soldier had who +continually repeated his phrase in a ravenous tone. Seated beside him on +the platform, while the glee-club sung an elegy in honor of the late +Monsieur Valbonnans, which was composed for the occasion by an amateur +of the town: + + Monsieur Valbonnans' praise let's chant, yes, chant! + His gloves the best, as all must grant, + The best extant! + +while the flourish of trumpets took up the refrain and the firemen +unveiled, amid loud acclamations, the statue of Monsieur Valbonnans, +which bore these words on the pedestal: _To the Inventor, the Patriot, +the Merchant_; while, too, the prefect still poured in Vaudrey's left +ear his inexhaustible observations: the glove trade, the glory of Isère; +the progress, the interest, the greatness of the department, the +minister who--the minister whom--(_Vive Vaudrey!_) Sulpice still heard, +even amid the acclamations, the mechanical rumbling of the general's +voice, repeating, reasserting, rehearsing: "_I love bronze! I love +bronze!_" + +On the evening of the banquet, the minister at length obtained an +explanation of this extraordinary affection. The general rose, grasping +his glass as if he would shiver it, and while the _parfait_ overflowed +on to the plates, he cried in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head +of his division: + +"I love bronze--I love bronze--because it serves for the erection of +statues and the casting of cannon. I love bronze because its voice wins +battles, the artillery being to-day the superior branch, although the +cavalry is the most chivalrous! I love bronze because it is the image of +the heart of the soldier, and I should like to see in our country an +army of men of bronze who--whom--" + +He became confused and muddled, and rolled his white eyes about in his +purpled face and to close his observations brandished his glass as if it +had been his sword, and amid a frenzy of applause from the guests, he +valiantly howled: "I love bronze! I love bronze!" + +Vaudrey could scarcely prevent himself from laughing hysterically, in +spite of his ministerial dignity, and when he returned to Grenoble, his +carriage full of the flowers that they had showered on him, he could +only answer to Adrienne, who asked him if he had spoken well, if it had +been a fine affair, by throwing his bouquets on the floor and saying: + +"I have laughed heartily, but I am crushed, stupefied! What a headache!" + +And Sulpice wrote all that to Marianne, and innocent that he was, told +her: "Ah! all those applauding voices are not worth a single word from +you! When shall I see you, Marianne, dear heart?" + +"At the latest possible date!" _the dear heart_ said. + +She regarded the close of summer and the beginning of autumn with +extreme vexation, for it would bring with it the parliamentary session +and Vaudrey, and inflict on her the presence of her lover. + +Sulpice provided her liberally with all that her luxurious appetites +demanded, and it was for good reasons that she decided not to break with +him, although for a long time she had sacrificed this man in her +inclinations. "Ah! when I shall be able to bounce him!" she said, +expressing herself like a courtesan. She could not, she would not accept +anything from Rosas. On that side, the game was too fine to be +compromised. She could with impunity accept the position of mistress of +Vaudrey, but with José she must appear to preserve, as it were, an +aureole of modesty, of virginal charms, that she did not possess. + +In fact, the Spaniard's mind became singularly crystallized, and she +turned this result to good account: in proportion as he associated +himself with the real Marianne, he created a fictitious Marianne, ideal, +kind, _spirituelle_, perhaps ignorant, but subtile and corrupted in +mind, who amused and disconcerted him at one and the same time. He had +left the Continental Hotel, and rented a house on Avenue Montaigne, +Champs-Élysées, where he sometimes entertained Marianne as he might have +done a princess. At such times she gossiped while smoking Turkish +tobacco. Her Parisian grace, her champagne-like effervescent manner, +seduced and charmed this serious, pale traveller, whose very smile +was tinged with melancholy. + +He completely adored this woman and no longer made an effort to resist. +He entirely forgot that it was through Guy that he had known her. It +seemed to him that he had himself discovered her, and besides, she had +never loved Guy. No, certainly not. She was frank enough to acknowledge +everything. Then she denied that Lissac ever--Then what! If it should be +true? But no! no! Marianne denied it. He blindly believed in Marianne. + +All the conflicting, frantic arguments that men make when they are about +to commit some foolish action were at war in José's brain. The more so +as he did not attempt to analyze his feelings. He passed, near this +pretty woman whose finger-tips he hardly dared kiss, the most delicious +summer of his life. Once, however, on going out with Marianne in the +Champs-Élysées, he had met the old Dujarrier with the swollen eyelids +and the yellow hair that he had known formerly. One of his friends, the +Marquis Vergano, had committed suicide at twenty for this woman who was +old enough to be his mother. The Dujarrier had stopped and greeted +Marianne, but as she remarked herself, a thousand bows and scrapes were +thrown away, for Rosas had hardly noticed her with a glacial look. + +"Why do you return that woman's salutation?" he at once asked Marianne. + +"I need her. She has done me services." + +"That is surprising! I thought her incapable of doing anything but +harm." + +He did not dream of Mademoiselle Kayser's coming in contact with +courtesans. In the tiny, virtuous room in Rue Cuvier, Rosas thought that +Marianne was in her true surroundings. She would frequently sit at the +piano--one of the few pieces of furniture contained in this +apartment,--and play for Rosas Oriental melodies that would transport +him far away in thought, to the open desert, by the slow lulling of +David's _Caravane_, then abruptly change to that familiar air, that +rondeau of the Variétés that he hummed yonder, on his dunghill, +forsaken-- + + "Voyez-vous, là-bas, + Cette maison blanche--" + +"I love that music-hall air!" she said. + +He now no longer meditated resuming travel, or quitting Paris. +Mademoiselle Kayser's hold on him grew more certain every day. The +suspicion of odd mystery that enveloped this girl intensified his +passion. + +He sometimes asked her what her uncle was doing. + +"He? Why, he has obtained, thanks to Monsieur Vaudrey, the decoration of +a hydropathic establishment, _Les Thermes des Batignolles_. He has +commenced the cartoon for a fresco: _Massage Moralizing the People_. We +shall see that in his studio." + +"Do you know," Marianne continued, "what I would like to see?" + +"What, then?" + +"Spain, your own country. Where were you born, Rosas?" + +"At Toledo. I own the family château there." + +"With portraits and armor?" + +"Yes, with portraits and armor." + +"Well, I would like to go to Toledo, to see that château. It must be +magnificent." + +"It is gloomy, simply gloomy. A fortress on a rock. Gray stone, a red +rock, scorched by the sun. Huge halls half Moorish in style. Walls as +thick as those of a prison. Steel knights, standing with lance in hand +as in _Eviradnus_! Old portraits of stern ancestors cramped in their +doublets, or Duchesses de Rosas, with pale faces, sad countenances, +buried in their collars whose _guipures_ have been limned by Velasquez +or Claude Coëllo. Immense cold rooms where the visitors' footfalls echo +as over empty tombs. A splendor that savors of the vault. You would die +of ennui at the end of two hours and of cold at the end of eight days." + +"Die of cold in Spain?" + +"There is a cold of the soul," the duke replied with a significant +smile. "That I have travelled so much, is probably due to my desire to +escape from that place! But you at Toledo, at Fuentecarral,--that is the +name of my castle,--a Parisian like you! It would be cruel. As well +shut up a humming-bird in a bear-pit. No! thank God, I have other nooks +in Spain that will shelter us, my dear sparrow of the boulevards! Under +the Andalusian jasmines, beneath the oleanders of Cordova or Seville, +under the fountains whose basins are decorated with azulejos, and in +which sultanas bathe, my jasmins could never sufficiently exhale their +perfume, my fountains could never murmur harmoniously enough to furnish +you a joyous welcome--when you go--if you go--But Toledo! My terrible +castle Fuentecarral! It is in vain that I am impenitently romantic, I +would not take you there for anything in the world. It would be as if +ice fell on your shoulders. Fuentecarral? Ugh!--that smacks of death." + +While he spoke, Marianne looked at him with kindling eyes and in thought +roamed through those sweet-scented gardens, and she craved to see +herself in that tomblike fortress Fuentecarral, passing in front of the +pale female ancestors of Rosas, aghast at the _froufrou_ of the +_Parisian woman_. + +José thought Marianne's burning glance was an expression of her love. +Ah! how completely the last six months in Paris had riveted him to this +woman, who was the mistress of another! One day,--Vaudrey had just left +Marianne at the _rond-point_ of the Champs-Élysées,--the duke seeing her +enter his house, said abruptly to her: + +"I was about to write you, Marianne." + +"Why, my dear duke?" + +"To ask an appointment." + +"You are always welcome, my friend, at our little retreat." + +He made her sit down, seized both her hands, and looked at her earnestly +as he said: + +"Swear to me that you have never been Lissac's mistress!" + +She did not even quiver, but was as calm as if she had long awaited this +question. + +She boldly met José's glance and said: + +"Does one ask such a question of the woman one loves?" + +"Suppose that I ask this question of the Duchesse de Rosas!" said the +Spaniard, with quivering lip. + +She became as pale as he. + +"I do not understand--" she said. + +The duke remained silent for a moment; then his entire soul passed into +his voice: + +"I have no family, Marianne. I am entirely my own master, and I love +you. If you swear to me that you have not been Guy's mistress--" + +"Nobody has the right to say that he has even touched my lips," replied +Marianne firmly. "Only one man, he who took me, an innocent girl, and +left me heart-broken, disgusted, believing I should never again love, +before I met you. He is dead." + +"I know," said Rosas, "you confided that to me formerly.--A widow save +in name, I offer you, yes, I! my name, my love, my whole life--will you +take them?" + +"Eh! you know perfectly well that I love you!" she exclaimed, as she +frantically gave him the burning and penetrating kiss that had never +left his lips since the soirée at Sabine's. + +"Then, no one--no one?" José repeated. + +"No one!" + +"On honor?" + +"On honor!" + +"Oh! how I love you!" he said, distractedly, all his passion shattering +his coldness of manner, as the sun melts the snow. "If you but knew how +jealous and crazed I am about you!--I desire you, I adore you, and I +condemn myself to remain glacial before you, beneath your glance that +fires my blood--I love you, and the recollection of Guy hindered me from +telling you that all that is mine belongs to you--I am a ferocious +creature, you know, capable of mad outbursts, senseless anger, and +unreasoning flight--Yes, I have wished to escape from you again. Well! +no, I remain with you; I love you, I love you!--You shall be my wife, do +you hear? My wife!--Ah! what a moment of bliss! I have loved you for +years! Have you not seen it, Marianne?" + +"I have seen it and I loved you! I also have kept silence! I saw plainly +that you believed that I had given myself to another--No, no, I am +yours, nothing but yours! All my love, all myself, take it; I have kept +it for you; for I hate the past, more than that, I do not know that it +exists--It is despised, obliterated, it is nothing! But you, ah! you, +you are my life!" + +She left José's, her youth renewed, haughty, intoxicated with delight. +She walked along alone, in the paths of the Champs-Élysées, the rusty +leaves falling in showers at the breath of the already cold wind, her +heels ringing on the damp asphalt. She marched straight ahead, her +thoughts afire from her intoxicating emotions. It seemed that Paris +belonged to her. + +That evening, she was to go to the theatre. It was arranged that Vaudrey +should wait for her at the entrance with a hired carriage and take her +to Rue Prony. She wrote to him that she could not leave the house. A +slight headache. Uncle Kayser undertook to have the letter taken by a +commissionaire. + +"Unless you would rather have me go to the ministry!" + +"Are you mad?" Marianne said. + +"That is true, it would be immoral." + +She wished to have the evening to herself, quite alone, so that she +could let her dreams take flight. + +Dreams? Nonsense! On the contrary, it was a dazzling reality: a fortune, +a title, a positive escape from want and the mire. What a revenge! + +"It is enough to drive one mad!" + +Sudden fears seized her; the terror of the too successful gambler. What +if everything crumbled like a house of cards! She wished that she were +several weeks older. + +"Time passes so quickly, and yet one has a desire to spur it on." + +Now in the solitude of her house she felt weary. She could neither read +nor think, and became feverish. She regretted that she had written to +Vaudrey. She wished to go to the theatre. A new operetta would be a +diversion, and why should she not go? She had the ticket for her box. +She could at once inform Vaudrey that her headache had vanished. + +"And then he bores me!--Especially now." + +Matters, however, must not be abruptly changed. Suppose Rosas should +take a sudden fancy to fly off again! Besides, she had mutual interests +with the minister, there was an account to be settled. + +"The Gochard paper?--Bah! he will pay it. More-ever, I am not involved +in that." + +Suddenly she thought that she would act foolishly if she did not go +where she pleased. Sulpice might think what he pleased. She got her maid +to dress her hair. + +"Madame is going to the theatre?" + +"Yes, Justine. To the Renaissance!" + +She was greatly amused at the theatre, and was radiant with pleasure. +She was the object of many glances, and felt delighted at being alone. +One of the characters in the operetta was a duchess whose adventures +afforded the audience much diversion. She abandoned herself to her +dreams, her thoughts wandering far from the theatre, the footlights and +the actors, to the distant orange groves yonder. + +During an entr'acte some one knocked at the door of her box. She turned +around in surprise. It was Jouvenet, the Prefect of Police, who came to +greet her in a very gallant fashion. The prefect--he had gained at the +palais in former days, the title of _L'Avocat Pathelin_,--with +insinuating and wheedling manners, hastened to pay his meed of respect +to Marianne when he met her. There was no necessity to stand on ceremony +with him. He knew all her secrets. Such a man, more-ever, must be +treated prudently, as he can make himself useful. Never had Jouvenet +spoken to her of Vaudrey, he was too politic in matters of state. But as +a man who knows that everything in this world is transient, he skilfully +maintained his place in the ranks, considering that a Prefect of Police +might not be at all unlikely to succeed a President of the Council. + +Marianne permitted him to talk, accepted all his gallantries as she +might have done bonbons, and with a woman's wit kept him at a distance +without wounding his vanity. + +Jouvenet with the simple purpose of showing her that he was +well-informed, asked her, stroking his whiskers as he did so, if she +often saw the Duc de Rosas. What a charming man the duke was! And while +the young woman watched him as if to guess his thoughts, he smiled at +her. + +The prefect, not wishing to appear too persistent, changed the +conversation with the remark: + +"Ah! there is one of our old friends ogling you!" + +"An old friend?" + +It was in fact Guy de Lissac who was standing at the balcony training +his glass upon the box. + +Marianne had only very occasionally met Lissac, but for some time she +had suspected him of being secretly hostile to her. Guy bore her a +grudge for having taken Sulpice away from Adrienne. He pitied Madame +Vaudrey and perhaps his deep compassion was blended with another +sentiment in which tenderness had taken the place of a more modified +interest. He was irritated against the blind husband because he could +not see the perfect charms of that delicate soul, so timid and at the +same time so devoted. Although he had not felt justified in showing his +annoyance to Vaudrey, he had manifested his dislike to Marianne under +cover of his jesting manner, and she had been exceedingly piqued +thereby. Wherefore did this man who could not understand her, interfere, +and why did he add to the injuries of old the mockery of to-day? + +"After all, perhaps it is through jealousy," she thought. "The dolt!" + +Guy did not cease to look at her through his glass. + +"Does that displease you?" Jouvenet asked. + +"Not at all. What is that to me?" + +"This Lissac was much in love with you!" + +"Ah! Monsieur le Préfet!" Marianne observed sharply. "I know that your +office inclines you to be somewhat inquisitive, but it would be polite +of you to allow my past to sleep in your dockets. They are famous +shrouds!" + +Jouvenet bit his lips and in turn brought his glass to bear on Lissac. + +"See," he said, "he makes a great deal of the cross of the Christ of +Portugal! It is in very bad taste! I thought he was a shrewder man!" + +"The order of Christ is then in bad odor?" + +"On the contrary; but as it is like the Legion of Honor in color, he is +prohibited from wearing it in his buttonhole without displaying the +small gold cross--And I see only the red there--" + +"I beg your pardon, Monsieur le Préfet, there is one." + +"Oh! my glass is a wretched one!--But even so, I do not believe Monsieur +de Lissac is authorized by the Grand Chancellor to wear his decoration. +That is easily ascertained!--I will nevertheless not fail to insert in +the _Officiel_ to-morrow a note relative to the illegality of wearing +certain foreign decorations--" + +"Is this note directed against Lissac?" + +"Not at all. But he reminds me of a step that I have wished to take for +a long time: the enforcement of the law." + +The entr'acte was over. Jouvenet withdrew, repeating all kinds of +remarks with double meanings that veiled declarations of love; that if +the occasion arose, he would place himself entirely at her service, and +that some day she might be very glad to meet him-- + +"I thank you, Monsieur le Préfet, and I will avail myself of your +kindness," replied Marianne, out of courtesy. + +Something suggested to her that Guy would pay his respects to her during +the next entr'acte, were it only to jest about Jouvenet's visit, seeing +that he was regarded as a compromising acquaintance, and she was not +wrong. + +Behind his monocle, his keen, mocking glance seemed like a taunting +smile. + +"Well," he said, in a somewhat abrupt tone, as he sat near Marianne, "I +congratulate you, my dear friend." + +"Why?" she answered with surprise. + +"On the great news, _parbleu!_ Your marriage." + +She turned slightly pale. + +"How do you know?--" + +"I have seen the duke. He called on me." + +"On you? What for?" + +"Can't you make a little guess--a very little guess--" + +"To ask you if I had been your mistress? Lissac, you are very silly." + +"Yes, my dear Marianne, prepare yourself somewhat for the position of a +duchess. A gentleman, to whom you have sworn that I have never been +your lover, could not doubt your word!--José asked me nothing. He simply +stated his determination to see what I would say, or gather from my +looks what I thought of it." + +"And you said?" + +"What I had to say to him: I congratulated him!" + +Marianne raised her gray eyes to Lissac's face. + +"Congratulate?" she said slowly. + +"The woman he marries is pretty enough, I think?" + +"Ah! my dear, a truce to insolent trifles!--what is it that has +possessed you for some time past?" + +"Nothing, but something has possessed you--or some one." + +"Rosas?" + +"No, Vaudrey!" + +"I will restore him to you. Oh! oh! you are surprisingly interested in +Vaudrey. Vaudrey or his wife?" she remarked. + +She smiled with her wicked expression. + +"Duchess," said Lissac, "accustom yourself to respect virtuous women!" + +"Is it to talk of such pleasant trifles that you have gained access to +my box?" + +"No, it is to ask you for some special information." + +"What?" + +"Is it true, is it really true that you are about to wed Rosas?" he +asked in an almost cordial tone. + +"Why not?" she replied, as she raised her head. + +"Because--I am going to be frank--I have always regarded you as an +absolutely straightforward woman, a woman of honor--You once claimed so +to be. Mad, fantastic, you often are; charming, always; but dishonest, +never. To take Rosas's love, even his fortune, would be natural enough, +but to take his name would be a very questionable act and a skilful one, +but lacking in frankness." + +"That is to say that I may devour him like a courtesan, but not marry +him as a--" + +"As a young girl, no, you cannot do that. And you put me--I am bound to +tell you so and I take advantage of the intermission to do so--in a +delicate position. If I declared the truth to Rosas, I act toward you as +a rascal. If I keep silent to my friend, my true friend, I act almost +like a knave." + +"Did Rosas ask you to speak to me?" + +"No, but there is a voice within me that pricks me to speech and tells +me that if I allow you to marry the duke, I am committing myself to a +questionable affair--Do you know what he asked me?--To be his witness." + +If Marianne had been in a laughing mood, she would have laughed +heartily. + +"It is absurd," she said. "You did not consent?" + +"Yes, indeed, I have consented. Because I really hoped that you would +relieve me from such an undesirable duty, a little too questionable." + +"You would like?--What would you like?" + +"I wish--no, I would have you not marry Monsieur de Rosas." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +She clearly felt the threat conveyed in Lissac's words, but she desired +to show from the first that she disdained them. What right, after all, +had this casual acquaintance to mix himself up in her life affairs? +Because, one day, she had been charitable enough to give him her youth +and her body! The duty of friendship! The rights of friendship! To +protect Vaudrey! To defend Rosas! Words, tiresome words! + +"And what if I wish to marry him, myself?--Would you prevent it?" + +"Yes, if I could!" he said firmly. "It is time that to the freemasonry +of women we should oppose the freemasonry of men." + +"You are cruelly cowardly enough when you are alone, what would you be +then when you are together?" said Marianne, with a malignant expression. +"In fact," said she, after a moment's pause, "what would you have? What? +Decide!--Will you send my letters to the duke?" + +"That is one way," said Lissac, calmly. "It is a _woman's_ way, that!" + +"You have my letters still?" + +"Preciously preserved." + +He had not contemplated such a threat, but she quickly scented a danger +therein. + +"Suppose I should ask the return of those letters, perhaps you would +restore them to me?" + +"Probably," he said. + +"Suppose I asked you to bring them to me, you know, in that little out +of the way room of which I spoke to you one day?" + +She had leaned gently toward Lissac and her elbows grazed the knees of +her former lover. + +"I would wear, that day, one of those otter-trimmed toques that you have +not forgotten." + +She saw that he trembled, as if he were moved by some unsatisfied desire +for her. She felt reassured. + +"Nonsense!" she said with a smiling face. "You are not so bad as you +pretend to be." + +The manager tapped the customary three blows behind the curtain, and the +orchestra began the prelude to the third act. + +"Adieu for a brief period, my enemy!" said Marianne, extending her hand. + +He hesitated to take that hand. At length, taking it in his own, he +said: + +"Leave me Rosas!" + +"Fie! jealous one! Don't I leave Vaudrey to you?" + +She laughed, while Lissac went away dissatisfied. + +"I will have my letters, at all risks," thought Marianne when he had +disappeared. "It is more prudent." + +That night she slept badly, and the following morning rose in a very +ill-humor. Her face expressed fatigue, her eyes were encircled with dark +rings and burned feverishly, but withal, her beauty was heightened. All +the morning she debated as to the course she should take, and finally +decided to write to Guy, when Sulpice Vaudrey arrived, and beaming with +delight, informed Marianne that he had the entire day to spend with her. + +"I learned through Jouvenet this morning that you were able to go to the +theatre. Naughty one, to steal an evening from me. But I have all +to-day, at least." + +And he sat down in the salon like a man spreading himself out in his own +house. Marianne was meditating some scheme to get rid of him when the +chamber-maid entered, presenting a note on a tray. + +"What is that?" + +"A messenger, madame, has brought this letter." + +Marianne read the paper hurriedly. + +Vaudrey observed that she blushed slightly. + +"Is the messenger still there, Justine?" + +"No, madame, he is gone. He said that there was no reply." + +Marianne quickly tore in small pieces the note she had just read. + +"Some annoyance?" asked Vaudrey. + +"Yes, exactly." + +"May I know?" + +"No, it does not interest you. A family affair." + +"Ah! your uncle?" asked Vaudrey, smiling. + +"My uncle, yes!" + +"He has asked that he be permitted to exhibit at the Trocadero the +cartoons that he has finished: _The Artist's Mission_, _Hydropathy the +Civilizer_, I don't know what in fact, a series of symbolical +compositions--" + +"With the _mirliton_ device underneath?--Yes, I know," said Marianne. + +She snapped her fingers in her impatience. + +The letter that she had torn up had been written by Rosas, and received +by Uncle Kayser at his studio, whence he had forwarded it to his niece. +The duke informed Marianne that he would wait for her at five o'clock at +Avenue Montaigne. He had something to say to her. He had passed the +entire night reflecting and dreaming. She remembered her own wild +dreams. Had Rosas then caught her thought floating like an atom on the +night wind? + +At five o'clock! She would be punctual. But how escape Vaudrey? She +could not now feign sickness since she had received him! Moreover, he +would instal himself near her and bombard her with his attentions. Was +there any possible pretext, any way of getting out now? Her lover had +the devoted, radiant look of a loved man who relied on enjoying a long +interview with his mistress. He looked at her with a tender glance. + +"The fool--The sticker!" thought Marianne. "He will not leave!" + +The best course was to go out. She would lose him on the way. + +"What time have you, my dear minister?" + +"One o'clock!" + +"Then I have time!" she said. + +Vaudrey seemed surprised. Marianne unceremoniously informed him, in +fact, that she had some calls to make, to secure some purchases. + +"How disagreeable!" + +"Yes, for me!" + +"I beg your pardon," said Sulpice, correcting himself. + +She sent for a coupé and damp and keen as the weather was, she +substituted for the glorious day of snug, intimate joy that Vaudrey had +promised himself, a succession of weary hours passed in the draught +caused by badly-fitting windows, while making a series of trips hither +and thither, Marianne meantime cudgelling her brains to find a way to +leave her lover on the way, or at least to notify Rosas. + +But above all to notify Lissac! It was Lissac whom she was determined to +see. Yes, absolutely, and at once. The more she considered the matter, +the more dangerous it appeared to her. + +Sulpice had not given her a moment of freedom at her house, in which to +write a few lines. He might have questioned her and that would be +imprudent. + +"I wish, however, to tell Guy to expect me!--Where? Rue Cuvier? He +would not go there!--No, at his house!" + +On the way she found the means. + +Vaudrey evidently was at liberty for the day and, master of his time, he +would not leave her. This he repeated at every turn of the wheel. She +ordered the driver to take her to _The Louvre_. + +"I have purchases to make!" + +Sulpice could not accompany her, so he waited for her at the entrance on +Place du Palais-Royal, nestled in a corner of the carriage, the blinds +of which were lowered in order that he might not be seen. He felt very +cold. + +Marianne slowly crossed between the stalls on the ground floor, hardly +looking at the counters bearing the Japanese goods, the gloves and the +artificial flowers. She ascended a winding iron stairway draped with +tapestries, her tiny feet sinking into the moquette that covered the +steps, and entered a noiseless salon where men and women were silently +sitting before three tables, writing or reading, just as in the +_drawing-room_ of a hotel. At a large round table, old ladies and young +girls sat looking at the pictures in _Illustration_, the caricatures in +the _Journal Amusant_, and the sketches in _La Vie Parisienne_. Others, +at the second table, were reading the daily papers, some of which were +rolled about their holders like a flag around its staff, or the _Revue +des Deux Mondes_. Further on, at a red-covered table furnished with +leather-bound blotters and round, glass inkstands in which the ink +danced with a purple reflection, people were writing, seated on chairs +covered in worn, garnet-colored velvet, with mahogany frames. This +gloomy apartment was brightened by broad-leaved green plants, and was +lighted from the roof by means of a flat skylight. + +Marianne walked direct to the table on which the paper was symmetrically +arranged in a stationery rack, and quickly seating herself, she laid her +muff down, half-raised her little veil, and beat a tattoo with her tiny +hand on the little black leather blotter before her, then taking off her +gloves, she took at random some sheets of paper and some envelopes +bearing the address of the establishment on the corners. As she looked +around for a pen, Marianne could not refrain from smiling, she thought +of that poor Sulpice down there, waiting in the carriage and probably +shivering in the draughts issuing from the disjointed doors. And he a +minister! + +"Such is adultery in Paris!" she said to herself, happy to make him +suffer. + +She did not hurry. She was amused by her surroundings. A uniformed man +promenaded the salon, watching the stationery in the cases and replacing +it as it was used. If required, he sold stamps to any one present. A +letter-box was attached near the tall chimney, bearing the hours of +collection. + +Beside Marianne, elbow to elbow, and before her, were principally women, +some writing with feverish haste, others hesitatingly, and amongst them +were two girls opposite her, who as they finished their letters chuckled +in a low tone and passed them one to the other, say-to each other, as +they chewed their plaid penholders: + +"It is somewhat cold, eh! He will say: _Eh, well, it is true then!_" + +The two pretty, cheerful girls before her were doubtless breaking in +this way some liaison, amusing themselves by sending an unexpected blow +to some poor fellow, and enjoying themselves by spoiling paper; the one +writing, the other reading over her companion's shoulder and giving vent +to merry laughter under her Hungarian toque, a huge Quaker-collar almost +covering her shoulders and her little jacket with its large steel +buttons. + +This feminine head-gear made Marianne think of Guy. Her eyes, catlike in +expression, gleamed maliciously. + +She took some paper and essayed to frame some tempting, tender phrases, +something nebulous and exciting, but she could not. + +"What I would like to write him is that he is a wretch and that I hate +him!" she thought. + +Then she stopped and looked about her, altogether forgetting Vaudrey. + +The contrast between that silent reading-room and the many-colored crowd +in that Oriental bazaar, whose murmurs reached her ears like the roaring +of a distant sea, and of which she could see only the corner clearly +defined by the framework of the doors, amused Marianne, who with a smile +on her lips, enjoyed the mischievous delight of fooling a President of +the Council. + +"At least that avenges me for the cowardice that the _other_ forced me +to commit!" + +Then mechanically regarding the crowd that flowed through these _docks_, +that contained everything that could please or disgust a whole world at +once, the crowd, the clerks, the carpets, the linen, the crowding, the +heaping,--all seemed strange and comic to her, novel and not Parisian, +but American and up-to-date. + +"Oh! decidedly up-to-date!--And so convenient!" she said, as she heard +the young girls laugh when they finished their love-letters. + +Then she began to write, having surely found the expressions she sought. +She sent Rosas a letter of apology: she would be at his house to-morrow +at the same hour. To-day, her uncle took up her day, compelling her to +go to see his paintings, to visit the Louvre, to buy draperies for an +Oriental scene that he intended to paint. If Rosas did not receive the +letter in time, it mattered little! To Lissac,--and this was the main +consideration,--she intimated that she would call on him the next +morning at ten o'clock. + +"Rendezvous box!" she said, as she slipped her two letters into the +letter-box. "This extreme comfort is very ironical." + +She smiled as she thought how long it would take to count the number of +the little hands, some trembling, some bold, that had slipped into the +rectilinear mouth of the letter-box some little missive that was either +the foretaste or the postscript of adultery. + +Then she went downstairs and rejoined Vaudrey, who was impatiently +tapping the floor of the carriage with his foot. + +"I was a long time there, I ask your pardon," said Marianne. + +"At any rate, I hope you have bought something that suited you?" asked +Vaudrey, who seemed to have caught a cold. + +"Nothing at all. There is nothing in that store!" + +Vaudrey was alarmed. Were they to visit one after the other all the +fancy goods stores? + +Marianne took pity on him. + +"Let us return, shall we?" she asked. + +She called to the coachman: "Rue Prony!" while Sulpice, whom she +unwillingly took with her, though he wearily yawned, seized her hand and +said as he sneezed: + +"Ah! how kind you are!" + +The next day, Marianne rang the bell of Lissac's house in Rue d'Aumale, +a little before the appointed hour. + +"Punctual as a creditor!" she thought. + +She reached Guy's, ready for anything. She was very pale and charming in +her light costume, and she entered as one would go into a fray with +head high. She would not leave the place until she had recovered her +letters. + +It was only for those scraps of paper that she again, as it were, bound +and tied herself to her past; she wished to cut herself away from it and +to tear them to pieces with her teeth. But what if Guy should refuse to +give them up to her? That could not be possible, although he was +sincerely attached to Rosas. Still, between gratitude to a woman and +duty to a friend, a man might hesitate, when he is a corrupted Parisian +like Lissac. + +"His affection for José will not carry him to the length of forgetting +all that I have given him of myself!" Marianne thought. + +Then shrugging her shoulders: + +"After all, these men have such a freemasonry between them, as _he_ +said!--And they speak of our fraternity, we women!--It is nothing +compared with theirs!" + +Guy did not show any displeasure on hearing Mademoiselle Kayser +announced. He was waiting for her. As Marianne could not feel free so +long as he held the proof of her imprudence, some day or other she must +inevitably seek him to supplicate or threaten him. The letter received +overnight had apprised him that that moment had arrived. + +He had just finished dressing when she entered. His suède gloves were +laid out flat on a little table beside his hat, his stick and a small +antique cloisonné vase into which were thrown the many-colored rosettes +of his foreign decorations, some of them red, amid which a little gold +cross glistened like some brilliant beetle settled on a deep-hued rose. + +"I wager that you are going out!" Marianne remarked abruptly. "Clearly, +you did not expect me!--Haven't you received my letter?" + +"My dear Marianne," he replied, as he slowly finished adjusting the knot +of his cravat, "that is the very remark you made when you condescended +to reappear at my house after a lapse of some years. You have too modest +a way of announcing yourself; I assure you that, for my part, I always +expect you--and that with impatience. But to-day, more than on any other +occasion, because of your charming note." + +She knew Guy well enough to perceive that his exquisite politeness only +concealed a warlike irony. She did not reply, but stood smiling in front +of the fireplace and warmed her toes at the light flames that leapt +about the logs. + +"You are exceedingly polite," she said at last. "On honor, I like you +very much--you laugh? I say very much--Yes, in spite--In no case, have +you had aught to complain of me." + +She half turned, resting her left hand on the edge of the velvet-covered +mantel, and cast a furtive, gentle glance at Lissac that recalled a +multitude of happy incidents. + +"I have never complained," said the young man, "and I have frequently +expressed my thanks!" + +Marianne laughed at the discreet manner so ceremoniously adopted by +Lissac. + +"You are silly, come!--We have a great liking for each other, and it is +in the name of that affection that I come to ask a service." + +"You have only to speak, my dear Marianne," Lissac answered, as if he +had not noticed the intimacy her words expressed. + +He affected a cold politeness; Marianne replied to him with apparent +renewed tenderness. She looked at him for some time as if she hesitated +and feared, her glance penetrating Lissac's, and begging with a tearful +petition that wished to kindle a flame in his eyes. + +"What I have to say to you will take some time. I am afraid--" + +"Of what?" he asked. + +"I don't know. You are in a hurry? I interfere with you, perhaps!" + +"Not the least in the world. I breakfast at the Club, take a turn in the +Bois, and drop in at the _Mirlitons_ to see the opening. You see that I +should be entitled to very little merit in sacrificing to you a +perfectly wasted day." + +"Is the present Exposition of the _Mirlitons_ well spoken of?" asked +Marianne, indifferently. + +"Very. It is a collection of things that are to be sold for the benefit +of a deceased artist. Would you like to go there at four o'clock?" + +"No, thanks!--And I repeat, my dear Guy, that I will not hinder you, you +know, if I have been indiscreet in giving you an appointment!--" + +She seemed to be mechanically toying with the silk rosettes in the +little vase; she picked them up and let them drop from her fingers like +grains. + +"These are yours?" she asked.--"Come near that I may put them on!" + +She went to Guy, smilingly, and resting her body against his for its +entire length, she paused for a moment while she held the lapel of his +jacket, and from head to foot she gazed at him with a look that seemed +to impregnate him with odor and turned him pale. + +"What an idea, Marianne! I do not wear these ribbons now." + +"A childish one. I remember that I was the first to place in this +buttonhole some foreign decoration that Monsieur de Rosas brought you--" + +She pronounced this name boldly, as if she would bring on the battle. + +"That suits you well," she continued. "Orders on your coat are like +diamonds in our ears--they are of no use, but they are pretty." + +She had passed a red rosette through the buttonhole, and lowering his +head, Guy saw her fair brow, her blond locks within reach of his lips. +They exhaled a perfume--the odor of hay, that he liked so well--and +those woman's fingers on his breast, the fingers of the woman whom he +had mocked the previous night at the theatre, caused him a disturbing +sensation. He gently disengaged himself, while Marianne repeated: "That +suits you well--" Then her hand fell on his and she pressed his fingers +in her burning and soft palm and said, as she half lowered her head +toward him: + +"Do you know why I have come? You know that I am silly. Well, naughty +one, the other evening in that box when you punished me with your irony, +all my love for you returned!--Ah! how foolish we are, we women! Tell +me, Guy, do you recall the glorious days we have spent? Those +recollections retain their place in the heart! Has the idea of living +again as in the past never occurred to you? It was so sweet!" + +Lissac laughed a little nervously and trembled slightly, trying to joke +but feeling himself suddenly weakening in the presence of this woman +whose wrath or contemptuous smile he preferred. + +He recognized all the vanished perfumes. The sensation of trembling +delight that years had borne away now returned to him. The silent +pressure of the hands recalled nights of distraction. He half shut his +eyes, a sudden madness overcame him, although he was sufficiently calm +to say to himself that she had an end in view, this woman's coming to +him, loveless, to speak of love to him, herself unmoved by the senses, +to awaken vanished feelings, to offer herself with the irresistible +skill of desire: a dead passion born of caprice. + +"Nevertheless, it is you who left me, satiated after taking from me all +that you were capable of loving," she said. "Do you know one thing, +however, Guy? There is more than one woman in a woman. There are as many +as she possesses of passions or joys, and the Marianne of to-day is so +different from the one who was your mistress formerly!--You would never +leave me, if you were my lover now!" + +She tempted this man whose curiosity was aroused, accustomed as he was +to casual and easy love adventures. He foresaw danger, but there within +reach of his lips were experienced kisses, an ardent supplicant, a +proffered delight, full of burning promise. In a sort of anger, he +seized the woman who recalled all the past joys, uttered the well-known +cries, and who suddenly, as in a nervous attack, deliriously plucked the +covering from her bosom, and bared with the boldness of beauty that +knows itself to be irresistible, her white arms, her brilliant, +untrammeled breasts, the sparkling splendor of her flesh, with her +golden hair unfastened, as she used to appear lying on a pillow of fair +silk, almost faint and between her kisses, that were as fierce as bites, +uttering: "I love you--you--I adore you--" And the lovely, imperious +girl again became, almost without a word having been exchanged, the +submissive woman carried away by lascivious ardor; and Guy, confused and +speechless, no longer reasoning, was unable to say whether Marianne +belonged to him, or he to the mistress of former days, become the +mistress of to-day. + +He held her clasped to him, his hand raising her pale, languishing face +about which her fair hair fell loosely; to him she looked like one +asleep, her pink nostrils still dilating with a spasmodic movement, and +it seemed to him that he had just suffered from the perturbing contact +of a courtesan in the depths of some luxurious den. + +It was an immediate reawakening, enervating but furious. She had given +herself impulsively. He recovered himself similarly. The sudden contact +of two bodies resulted in the immediate recoil of two beings. + +With more bitter shame, he had had similar morose awakenings after a +dissipated night, his heart, his brave heart thumping against the +passionate form, often lean and sallow, of some satiated girl, fearfully +weary. + +What cowardice! Was it Vaudrey's mistress or the future wife of Rosas +who had clung to his lips? + +He felt disgusted at heart. + +Yet she was adorable, this still young and lovely Marianne. + +With cruel perspicacity, he already foresaw that he would be guilty of +cowardly conduct in yielding to this sudden weakness, and ashamed of +himself he disengaged himself from her hysterical embrace, while +Marianne squatted on his bed, throwing back her hair from her face, +still smiling as she looked at him and asked: + +"Well--what? What is the matter with you, then?" + +She rose slowly, slipping upon the carpet while he went to the window to +look mechanically into the yard. Between these two creatures but a +moment before clasped together, a sudden icy coldness sprung up as if +each had divined that the hour was about to sound, terrible as a knell, +when their affairs must be settled. The kisses of love are to be paid +for. + +Standing before the mirror, half undressed, Marianne was arranging her +hair. Her white shoulders, her still heaving and oppressed bosom were +still exposed within the border of her fine chemisette. She felt her +wrists, instinctively examining her bracelets, and looked toward the bed +in an absent sort of way as if to see if some charm had not slipped from +them. + +"Guy," she said abruptly, but in a tone which she tried to make +endearing, "promise me that you will not refuse what I am about to ask +you." + +"I promise." + +They now quite naturally substituted for the "thou" of affectionate +address, the more formal "you," secretly realizing that after the +intertwining of their bodies, their real individualities independent of +all surprises or sensual appetite, would find themselves face to face. + +"I could wish that our affection--and it is profound, is it not, +Guy?--dated only from the moment that we have just passed." + +"I do not regret the past," he said. + +"Nor I! Yet I would like to efface it--yes, by a single stroke!" + +She held between her white fingers some rebellious little locks of hair +that had come out, which she had rolled and twisted, and casting them +into the clear flame, she said: + +"See! to burn it like that!--_Pft!_--" + +"Burn it?" Lissac repeated. + +He had left the window, returned to Marianne and smiling in his turn, he +said: + +"Why burn it?--Because it is tiresome or because it is dangerous?" + +"Both!" she replied. + +She paused for a moment before continuing, drew up over her arms the +lace of her chemisette, then half bending her head, and looking at Guy +like a creditor of love she said: + +"You still have my letters, my dear?" + +"Your letters?" + +"Those of the old days?" + +"That is so," he said. "The past." + +He understood everything now. + +"You came to ask me to return them?" + +"I have been, you must admit, very considerate, not to have claimed +them--before!" + +"You have been--generous!" answered Lissac, with a gracious smile. + +He opened his secrétaire, one of the drawers of which contained little +packages folded and tied with bands of silk ribbon, that slept the sleep +of forgotten things. + +"There are your letters, my dear Marianne! But you have nothing to fear; +they have never left this spot." + +The eyes of the young woman sparkled with a joyous light. Slowly as if +afraid that Guy would not give them to her, she extended her bare arm +toward the packet of letters and snatched it suddenly. + +"My letters!" + +"It is an entire romance," said Lissac. + +"Less the epilogue!" she said, still enveloping him with her intense +look. + +She placed the packet on the velvet-covered mantelpiece and hastily +finished dressing. Then taking between her fingers those little letters +in their old-fashioned envelopes bearing her monogram, and that still +bore traces of a woman's perfume, she looked at them for a moment and +said to Lissac: + +"You have read them occasionally?" + +"I know them by heart!" + +"My poor letters!--I was quite sincere, you know, when I wrote you +them!--They must be very artless! Yours, that I have burned, were too +clever. I remember that one day you wrote me from Holland: 'I pass my +life among chefs-d'oeuvre, but my mind is far away from them. I have +Rembrandt and Ruysdaël; but the smallest millet seed would be more to my +liking: millet is _fair!_' Well, that was very pretty, but much too +refined. True love has no wit.--All this is to convey to you that +literature will not lose much by the disappearance of my disconnected +scrawls." + +She suddenly threw the packet into the fire and watched the letters as +they lightly curled, at first spotted with fair patches, and enveloped +in light smoke, then bursting into flame that cast its rosy reflection +on Marianne's face. Little by little all disappeared save a patch of +black powder on the logs, that danced like a mourning veil fluttering in +the wind and immediately disappeared up the chimney:--the dust of dead +love, the ashes of oaths, all black like mourning crêpe. + +Marianne watched the burning of the letters, bending her forehead, while +a strange smile played on her lips, and an expression as of triumphant +joy gleamed in her eyes. + +When the work was done, she raised her head and turned toward Guy and in +a quivering voice, she said proudly and insolently: + +"_Requiescat!_ See how everything ends! It is a long time since lovers +who have ceased to love invented cremation! Nothing is new under the +sun!" + +She was no longer the same woman. A moment before she manifested a sort +of endearing humility, but now she was ironically boastful, looking at +Lissac with the air of one triumphing over a dupe. He bit his lips +slightly, rubbing his hands together, while examining her sidelong, +without affectation. Marianne's ironical smile told him all that she now +had to say. + +It was not the first time that he had been a witness to such a +transformation of the feminine countenance before and after the return +of letters. Guy for some time had ceased to be astonished at anything in +connection with women. + +"Now, my dear," said Marianne, "I hope that you will do me the kindness +of allowing me to go on in my own way in life, and that I shall not have +the annoyance of finding you again in the way of my purpose." + +"I confess," Lissac replied, "that I should be the worst of ingrates if +I did not forget many things in consideration of what I owe you, both in +the present and in the past. Your burned letters still shed their +fragrance!" + +Marianne touched the half-consumed logs with the tip of her foot and the +débris of the paper fluttered around her shoe like little black +butterflies. + +"I wish I could have destroyed the past as I have made those letters +flame! It weighs on me, it chokes me! You do not imagine, perhaps," she +said, "that I have forgiven you for your flight and all that followed +it?--If, for a moment, I almost stumbled in the mire, the fault was +yours, for I loved you and you abandoned me, as a man forsakes a +strumpet.--So, you see, my dear, a woman never forgets it, and I would +have cried out long before, if I had felt myself free, free as I am now +that those letters are burned, the poor letters of a stupid mistress, +confiding in her lover who is overcome with weariness, and who is only +thinking of deserting her, while she is still intoxicated in yielding to +him--and because I adored you--yes, truly--because I was your mistress, +do you arrogate to yourself the right of preventing me from marrying as +I wish, and of drawing myself out of the bog into which, perhaps, by +your selfishness, I have fallen? Ah, my dear fellow, really I am +somewhat surprised at you, I swear!--I said nothing because of those +scraps of paper, that you would have been cowardly enough, I assert, to +show Rosas and every line of which told how foolish I had been to love +you." + +"Monsieur de Rosas would never have seen them!" said Lissac severely. + +She did not seem to hear him. + +"But now, what? Thank God," she continued, "there is nothing, and you +have delivered those letters to me that you ought never to have +returned. And I have paid you for them, paid for them with new caresses +and a last prostitution! Well! that ends it, doesn't it? There is +nothing more between us, nothing, nothing, nothing!--And these two +beings, who exchanged here their loveless kisses, the kisses of a +debauchee and a courtesan, will never recognize each other again, I +hope--you hear, never recognize each other again--when they meet in +life. Moreover, I will take care to avoid meetings!" + +Guy said nothing. + +He twirled his moustache slightly and continued to look at Marianne +sideways without replying. + +This indifference, though doubtless assumed, nevertheless annoyed the +young woman. + +"Go, find Monsieur de Rosas now!" she said. "Tell him that you have been +my lover, he will not believe you." + +"I am satisfied of that," Lissac replied very calmly. + +She realized a threat in his very calmness. But what had she to fear +now? + +She fastened her ironical glance on Lissac, the better to defy him, and +to enjoy his defeat. + +With extended hands, he noiselessly tapped his fingers together, the +gesture of a person who waits, sure of himself and displaying a mocking +silence. + +"Then adieu!" she said abruptly. "I hope that we shall never see each +other again!" + +"How can you help it?" said Lissac, smiling. "In Paris!" + +He sat down on a chair, while Marianne stood, putting on her gloves. + +"On my word, my dear Marianne, for a clever woman you are outrageously +sanguine." + +"I?" + +"And credulous! You credit me with the simplicity of the Age of Gold, +then?--Is it possible?--Do you think a corrupted Parisian like myself +would allow himself to be trifled with like a schoolboy by a woman as +extremely seductive as I confess you are? But, my dear friend, the first +rule in such matters is only to completely disarm one's self when it is +duly proved that peace has been definitely signed and that a return to +offensive tactics is not to be feared. You have shown your little pink +claws too nimbly, Marianne. Too quickly and too soon. In one of those +drawers, there are still one or two letters left, I was about to say, +that belong to the series of letters that are slumbering: exquisite, +perfumed, eloquent, written in that pretty, fine and firm writing that +you have just thrown into the fire, and those letters I would only have +given you on your continuing to act fairly. They were my reserve. It is +an elementary rule never to use all one's powder at a single shot, and +one never burns _en bloc_ such delicate autographs. They are too +valuable! Tell me, will you disdain to recognize me when you meet me, +Miss Marianne?" + +She remained motionless, pale and as if frozen. + +"Then you have kept?--" she said. + +"A postscriptum, if you like, yes." + +"Are you lying now, or did you lie in giving me the packet that has been +burned?" + +"I did not tell you that the packet was complete, and what I now tell +you is the simple truth! I regret it, but you have compelled me to keep +my batteries, in too quickly unmasking your own." + +Marianne pulled off her gloves in anger. + +"If you do not give me everything here that belongs to me, you are a +coward; you hear, a coward, Monsieur de Lissac!" + +"Oh! your insults are of as little importance as your kisses! but they +are less agreeable!" + +She clearly saw that she had thrown off the mask too soon, and that +Lissac would not now allow himself to be snared by her caresses or +disarmed by her threats. The game was lost. + +Lost, or merely compromised? + +She looked about her with an expression of powerless rage, like a very +graceful wild beast enclosed in a cage. Her letters, her last letters +must be here, in one of those pieces of furniture whose drawers she +might open with her nails. She threw her gloves on the floor and +mechanically tore into shreds--as she always did when in a rage--between +her nervous fingers, her fine cambric handkerchief reduced to rags. + +"Be very careful what you are doing, Guy," she said at last, casting a +malicious look at him, "I have purchased these letters from you, for I +hate you, I repeat it, and these letters you owe to me as you would owe +money promised to a wench. If you do not give them to me, I will have +them, notwithstanding." + +"Really?" + +"I promise you I will." + +"And suppose I have burned them?" + +"You lie, you have them here, you have kept them. You have behaved +toward me like a thief." + +"Nonsense, Marianne," said Lissac coldly, "on my faith, I see I have +done well to preserve some weapon against you. You are certainly very +dangerous!" + +"More than you imagine," she replied. + +He moved slightly backward, seeing that she wished to pass him to reach +the door. + +"You will not give me back my letters?" she asked in a harsh and +menacing tone as she stood on the threshold of the room. + +Guy stooped without heeding her and picked up the gloves that were lying +on the carpet and handed them to the young woman: + +"This is your property, I think?" + +This was said with insolently refined politeness. + +Marianne took the gloves, and as a last insult, like a blow on the +cheek, she threw them at Guy's face, who turned aside and the gloves +fell on the bed where just before these two hatreds had come together in +kisses of passion. + +"Miserable coward!" said Marianne, surveying Lissac from head to foot +with an expression of scorn, while he stood still, his monocle dangling +at the end of a fine cord on his breast, near the buttonhole of his +jacket that bore the red rosette; his face was pale but wore a sly +expression. + +That silk rosette looked there like a vermilion note stamped on a dark +ground, and it seemed to pierce like a luminous drill into Marianne's +eyes; and with her head erect, pallid face and trembling lip she passed +before the domestic who hastened to open the door and went downstairs, +repeating to herself with all the distracted fury of a fixed idea: + +"To be avenged! To be avenged! Oh! to be avenged!" + +She jumped into a cab. + +"Well?"--said the coachman, looking with blinking eyes at this +pale-faced, distraught-looking woman. + +She remained there as if seeking an idea, a purpose. + +"Where shall we go?" repeated the driver. + +Suddenly Marianne's face trembled with a joyous expression and she +abruptly said: + +"To the Prefecture of Police!" + + + * * * * * + +_The general rose, grasping his glass as if he would shiver it, +and while the _parfait_ overflowed on to the plates, he cried +in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head of his division:_ + +_"I love bronze--I love bronze--...."_ + +[Illustration: THE BANQUET] + + + + +VI + + +There was a crowd at the _Mirlitons_ Exposition. + +A file of waiting carriages lined the kerbstone the whole length of +Place Vendôme. Beneath the arch and within the portal, groups of +fashionable persons elbowed each other on entering or leaving, and +exchanged friendly polite greetings; the women quizzing the new hats, +little hoods of plush or large _Rembranesque_ hats in which the +delicate Parisian faces were lost as under the roof of a cabriolet. The +liveried lackeys perfunctorily glanced at the cards of admission that +the holders hardly took the trouble to present. One was seated at a +table mechanically handing out catalogues. Through the open door of the +Club's Theatre could be seen gold frames suspended from the walls, terra +cottas and marbles on their pedestals, and around the pictures and +sculptures a dense crowd, masses of black hats inclined toward the +paintings, side by side with pretty feminine heads crowned with +Gainsborough hats adorned with plumes. It was impossible to see at close +quarters the pieces offered for the sale that was for that day the +engrossing topic of conversation of _All Paris_. + +"A veritable salon in miniature!" said Guy aloud to an art critic who +was taking notes. "But to examine it comfortably one should be quite +alone. For an hour past I have been trying to get a look at the +Meissonier, but have not been able to do so. It is stifling here. I will +return another time." + +He quickly grasped the hand that held the pencil, and which was extended +to him, and tried to make a passage through the crowd to the exit. +Pushed and pushing, he smiled and apologized for his inability to +disengage his arms that were held by the crowd as if in a vise, in order +to salute the friends he recognized. At length he reached, giving vent +to a grunt of satisfaction, the hall where visitors were sitting on +divans, chatting, either less eager to view the pictures or satisfied +in their desires. There, Guy instinctively looked at a mirror and +examined the knot of his cravat. He did not notice that a gentleman with +a closely buttoned frock-coat, on seeing him, quietly rose from the +divan on which he had been sitting, and approached him, mechanically +pulling the skirts of his coat meanwhile, so as to smooth the creases. + +He simply touched Monsieur de Lissac's shoulder with the tip of his +finger. + +Guy turned round, expecting to recognize a friend. + +"You are surely Monsieur de Lissac?" said the man in the frock-coat, +with the refined manners of a gentleman. + +"Yes!" said Lissac, somewhat astonished at the coldness of his manner. + +"Be good enough to accompany me, monsieur, I am a Commissioner of the +Judiciary Delegations!" + +Lissac thought he misunderstood him. + +"I confess that I don't quite understand you," he began, with a rather +significant smile. + +"I am a Commissioner of Police," the other replied, "and I am ordered to +arrest you." + +He suddenly exposed his insignia like the end of a sash, and by a very +polite gesture, with an amiable and engaging manner, pointed to the way +out by the side of the archway of the hôtel. + +"I have two of my men yonder, monsieur, but you will not place me under +the necessity of--" + +"What is this, monsieur?" said Lissac. "I frankly confess that I +understand nothing of this enigma. I hope you will explain it to me." + +All this was said in a conversational tone, _mezzo voce_, and +accompanied with smiles. No one could have guessed what these two men +were saying to each other. Only, Guy was very pale and his somewhat +haughty glance around him seemed to indicate that he was seeking some +support or witness. + +He uttered a slight exclamation of satisfaction on perceiving the +journalist to whom he had just before spoken a few words before a little +canvas by Meissonier. + +"My dear Brévans," he said in a loud voice, "here is an unpublished item +for your journal. This gentleman has laid his hand on my collar." + +With a sly look he indicated the Commissioner of Police, who did not +budge. + +"What! my dear fellow?" + +"They have arrested me, that is all," said Lissac. + +"Monsieur," the Commissioner quickly interrupted in a low voice, "no +commotion, please. For my sake--and for yours." + +He lightly touched Lissac's buttonhole with the end of his finger, as if +to intimate that there was the explanation of his arrest, and Guy +suddenly became very red and stamped his foot. + +"Idiot that I am!--I am at your orders, monsieur," he said, making a +sign to the Commissioner to pass out. + +He again saluted the stupefied journalist, and the Commissioner bowing +to him, out of politeness or prudence, Guy passed before him, angrily +twirling his mustache. + +Besides Brévans, nobody in all that crowd suspected that a man had just +been arrested in the midst of the Exposition. Unless the journalist had +hawked the news from group to group, it would not have been suspected. + +Lissac found at the door of the Club on Place Vendôme a hired carriage +which had come up as soon as the driver saw the Commissioner. Two +agents, having the appearance of good, peaceable bourgeois, were walking +about, chatting together on the sidewalk, as if on duty. The +Commissioner said to one of them: + +"I have no further need of you, Crabot will do." + +Crabot, a little man with the profile of a weasel, slowly mounted the +box beside the coachman, and the Commissioner of Police took his seat +next to Lissac, who had nervously plucked the rosette of the Portuguese +Order of Christ from his buttonhole. + +"What!" he said. "Really, then, it is for this? Because I wear this +ribbon without having paid five or six louis into the Chancellery?--I +have always intended to do so, but, believe me, I have not had the time. +But a fiscal question does not warrant publicly insulting--" + +"I do not know if it is for that," interrupted the Commissioner; "but it +is evident that a recent note in the _Officiel_ points directly to the +illegal wearing of foreign decorations. You do not read the _Officiel_, +Monsieur de Lissac." + +Guy shrugged his shoulders as if he considered the matter perfectly +ridiculous. It seemed to him that behind the alleged pretext there was +some secret cause, something like a feminine intrigue. He vaguely +recalled that he had seen Marianne one evening at Madame de Marsy's +smile at the Prefect of Police, that Jouvenet who flirted so agreeably +with that pretty girl in a corner of the salon. And then, too, at the +theatre, in Marianne's box, the prefect found his way. At the first +moment, the idea that Marianne had a hand in this arrest took possession +of his mind. He saw her standing before him at his house, posing her +little nervous, fidgety hand on his breast at the very spot occupied by +this rosette; again he saw her smiling mysteriously, accompanying it +with a caress which seemed to suggest the desire to end in a scratch. + +Was it really true that Marianne was sufficiently audacious to have +brought about this coup de théâtre? No, there was some error. The stupid +zeal of some subordinate officer was manifested in this outrage. Some +cowardly charge had perhaps been made against him at the prefecture. +Every man who crosses a street has so many enemies that look at him as +he passes as if they would spy on him! There are so many undeclared +hatreds crawling in the rotten depths of this Parisian bog! One fine +morning one feels one's self stung in the heel. It is nothing: only +some anonymous gossip; some unknown person taking revenge! + +At the prefecture, they would doubtless inform Guy as to the cause of +the attack: in questioning him, he would himself certainly be permitted +to interrogate. He was stunned on arriving at the clerk's office to find +that they took his description, just as they would that of a common +offender, a night-walker or a rascal. He wished to enter a protest and +became annoyed. He flew into a rage for a moment, then he reflected that +there was nothing to be done but to submit to the bites of the iron +teeth of the police routine in which he was suddenly entangled. They +searched his pockets and he felt their vile hands graze his skin. He +experienced a strongly rebellious sentiment and notwithstanding his +present enforced calm, from time to time he demanded to see the Prefect +of Police, the Chief of the Municipal Police, the _Juge d'Instruction_, +he did not know whom, but at least some one who was responsible. + +"You have my card, send my card to Monsieur Jouvenet; he knows me!" + +They made no reply. + +The Commissioner who had arrested him was not there. Guy found himself +in the presence of what were as pieces of human machinery, working +silently, without noise of wheels, and caring for his protests no more +than they did for the wind that blew through the corridors. + +"See, on my honor, I am not a rascal!" he said. "What have I done? I +have stupidly passed this bit of red ribbon into my buttonhole. Well! +that is an offence, it is not a crime! People are not arrested for that! +I will pay the fine, if fine there is! You are not going to keep me here +with thieves?" + +In that jail, he endeavored to preserve his appearance as a fashionable +elegant and an ironical man of the world, treating his misadventure in a +spirit of haughty disdain; but his overstrained nerves led him to act +with a sort of cold fury that gave him the desire to openly oppose, as +in a duel, his many adversaries. + +"I beg you to remain calm," one of these men repeated to him from time +to time in a passionless way. + +"Oh! that is easy enough for you to say," cried Lissac. "I ask you once +more, where is Monsieur Jouvenet?--I wish to see Monsieur Jouvenet!" + +"Monsieur le Prefect cannot be seen in this way," was the reply. +"Moreover, you haven't to see any one; you have only to wait." + +"Wait for what?" + +They led Guy de Lissac through the passages to the door of a new cell, +which they opened before him. + +"Then," he said, as he tried to force a troubled smile, "I am a +prisoner? Quite seriously? As in melodrama? This is high comedy!" + +He asked if he would soon be examined, at least. They didn't know. They +hardly replied to him. Could he write, at any rate? Notify any one? +Protest? What should he do? He heard from the lips of a keeper who had +the appearance of a very honest man, the information, crushing as a +verdict: "You are in close confinement, as it is called!" + +_In close confinement?_ Were they mocking him? In secret, he, Lissac? +Evidently, they wanted to make fun; it was absurd, it was unlikely, such +things only happened in operettas. He would heartily relish it at the +Café Riche presently, when he went to dine. _In close confinement?_ He +was no longer annoyed at the jest, so amusing had it become. For an old +Parisian like him, it was a facetious romance and almost amusing. + +"A climax!" + +Evening passed and night came. They brought Lissac a meal, and the +_jest_, as he called it, in no way came to an end. He did not close his +eyes for the whole night. He was stifled, and grew angry within the +narrow cage in which they had locked him. All sorts of wild projects of +revenge passed through his brain. He would send his seconds to Monsieur +Jouvenet, he would protest in the papers. He would have public opinion +in his favor. + +Then his scepticism came to his aid, and shrugging his shoulders, he +said: + +"Bah! public opinion! It will ridicule me, that's all! It will accuse me +of desiring to make a stir, to cut off my dog's tail. To-day, Alcibiades +would thus cut off his, but the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to +Animals would bring an action against him." + +He waited for the next morning with the feverish anxiety of those who +cannot sleep. Certainly he would be examined at the first moment. They +did so in the case of the vagabonds gathered in during the night and +dumped into the _lions' den_. The whole day passed without Lissac's +seeing any other faces than those of his turnkeys, and these men were +almost mutes. Then his irritation was renewed. He turned his useless +anger against himself, as he could not insult the walls. + +Night came round, and spite of himself, he slept for a short time on the +wretched prison pallet. He began to find the facetious affair too +prolonged and too gloomy. They took him just in time, the second day +after his arrest, before a kind of magistrate or police judge, who, +after having reminded him that the law was clear in respect of the +wearing of foreign orders, announced that the matter was settled by a +decree of _nolle prosequi_. + +"That is to say," said Lissac, in anger, "that two nights passed in +close confinement is regarded as ample punishment? If I am guilty of a +crime, I deserve much more than that. But, if only a mere peccadillo is +attributable to me, I consider it too much; and I swear to you that I +intend, in my turn, to summon to justice for illegal arrest--" + +"Keep quiet," curtly interrupted the magistrate. "That is the best thing +you can do!" + +Lissac, meantime, felt a sort of physical delight in leaving those cold +passages and that stone dwelling. + +The fresh breeze of a gray November day appeared to him to be as gentle +as in spring. It seemed that he had lived in that den for weeks. He +flung himself into a carriage, had himself driven home, and was received +by his concierge with stupefied amazement. + +"You, monsieur?" he said. "Already!" + +This _already_ was pregnant with suggestiveness, and puzzled Lissac. The +rumor had, in fact, spread throughout the quarter, and probably the +porter had helped it along--that Guy had been arrested for complicity in +some political intrigue, though of what nature was unknown. +Nevertheless, the previous evening, the agents of police had come to the +apartments in Rue d'Aumale and had searched everything, moved, tried and +probed everything. Evidently they were in quest of papers. + +"Papers?" cried Lissac. "Her letter, _parbleu!_" + +He was no longer in doubt. The delicate, dreaded hand of Marianne was at +the bottom of all that. She had made some bargain with Monsieur +Jouvenet, as between a woman and a debauchee! The Prefect of Police was +not the loser: Marianne Kayser had the wherewithal to satisfy him. + +"The miserable wench!" Lissac repeated as he went up to his apartment. + +He rang and his servant appeared, looking as bewildered as the porter. + +The apartment was still topsy-turvy. The valet de chambre had not dared +to put the things in order, as if there reigned, amid the scattered +packages and the yawning drawers, the majesty of the official seal. + +They had examined everything, forced locks and removed packets of +letters. + +The small Italian cabinet, that contained Marianne's letter, had had its +drawers turned over, like pockets turned inside out. Marianne's letter +to Lissac, the scrap of paper which the police hunted, without knowing +whose will they were obeying, that confession of a crazy mistress to a +lover who was smitten to his very bones, was no longer there. + +"Ah! I will see Vaudrey! I will see him and tell him!" said Lissac +aloud. + +"Will monsieur breakfast?" + +"Yes, as quickly as possible. Two eggs and tea, I am in a hurry." + +He was anxious to rush off to the ministry. Was the Chamber sitting +to-day? No. He would perhaps then find Sulpice at his first call. The +messengers knew him. + +He speedily hastened to Place Bréda, looking for a carriage. On the way, +he stumbled against a man who came down on the same side, smoking a +cigar. + +"Oh! Monsieur de Lissac!" + +Guy instinctively stepped back one pace; he recognized Uncle Kayser. +Then, suddenly, his anger, which up to that time he had been able to +restrain, burst forth, and in a few words energetic and rapid, he told +Simon, who remained bewildered and somewhat pale, as if one had tried +to force a quarrel on him, what he thought of Marianne's infamy. + +The uncle said nothing, regretted that he had met Lissac, and contented +himself with stammering from time to time: + +"She has done that?--What! she has done that?--Ah! the rogue." + +"And what do you say about it, you, Simon Kayser?" + +"I?--What do I say about it?--Why--" + +Little by little he recovered his sang-froid, looking at matters from +the lofty heights of his artist's philosophy. + +"It is rather too strong. What do you want?--It is not even moral, but +it has _character!_ And in art, after the moral idea comes _character!_ +Ah! bless me! character, that is something!--Otherwise, I disapprove. It +is brutal, vulgar, that lack of ideal. I defy you to symbolize that. +_Love Avenging Itself Against Love_--_Jealousy Calling the Police to Its +Aid in Order to Triumph over Dead Love!_ It is old, it lacks +originality, it smacks of Prud'hon!--The Correggio of the décolleté!--It +is like Tassaert, it is of the sprightly kind!--I would never paint so, +that is what I say about it!" + +Guy had no reply for this imperturbable moralist and he regretted that +he had lost time in speaking to him. But his uncontrollable rage choked +him. Enough remained however to show all his feelings to Vaudrey. + +The minister was not in his cabinet. A messenger asked Lissac if he +would speak to Monsieur Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State. + +"I, I," then said a man who rose from the chair in which he had been +sitting in the antechamber, "I should be glad to see Monsieur +Warcolier--Monsieur Eugène, you know." + +"Very well, Monsieur Eugène, I will announce you." Lissac explained that +his visit was not official, he called on a personal matter. + +"Is the minister in his apartments?" + +"Yes, monsieur, but to-day, you know--" + +What was going on to-day, then? Lissac had not noticed, in fact, that a +marquee with red stripes was being erected at the entrance to the hôtel, +and that upholsterers were bringing in wagons benches covered with red +velvet with which they were blocking the peristyle. There was a +reception at the ministry. + +"That will not prevent Monsieur Vaudrey from seeing me," he said. + +One of the messengers opened the doors in front of him and conducted him +to the floor above, where Monsieur le Ministre was then resting near the +fire and glancing over the papers after breakfast. + +He appeared pleased but a little astonished at seeing Lissac. + +"Eh! my dear Guy, what a good idea!--Have you arrived already for the +soirée? You received your invitation?" + +"No," answered Lissac, "I have received nothing, or if the invitation +arrived, the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet have taken it away with many +other things." + +"The agents! what agents?" asked the minister. + +He had risen to receive Guy and remained standing in front of the +fireplace looking at his friend, who questioned him with his glance to +discover if Vaudrey could really be in ignorance as to such a matter. + +"Ah, so! but," said Lissac with trembling voice and in a tone of angry +bitterness, "do you not know then, what takes place in Paris?" + +"What is happening?" asked Sulpice, who had turned slightly pale. + +"They arrest men for nothing, and keep them in close confinement for two +days in order to have time to search their correspondence for a document +that compromises certain persons. It is very proper, no doubt; but that +smacks too much of romanticism and the Bridge of Sighs. It is very +old-fashioned and worn-out. I would not answer for your long employing +such methods of government." + +"Come, are you mad? What does it all signify?" asked the minister, in +astonishment. + +He appeared as if he really did not understand. It was clear that he did +not know what Guy meant. + +"Don't you read the papers, then?" Lissac asked him. + +"I read the reports of the Director of the Press." + +"Well, if those reports have not informed you of my arrest in the heart +of the Exposition des Mirlitons, on Wednesday, they have told you +nothing!--" + +"Arrested! you?" + +"By the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police, to gratify +your mistress, Mademoiselle Kayser!" + +"Ah! my dear Guy!" said the minister, whose cheek became flushed in +spots. "I should be glad if you--" + +He paused for a phrase to express clearly and briefly that he required +Lissac to be silent, but could not frame one. He received, as it were, a +sudden and violent blow on the head. Beyond question, he did not know a +word of all that Lissac had informed him. And yet this was the gossip of +Paris for two days! Either naming in full, or in indicating him +sufficiently clearly, the newspapers had related the adventure on their +front page. Moreover, much attention had been attracted to an article in +a journal with which Lucien Granet was intimately connected, wherein, in +well-turned but perfidious phrases, a certain Alkibiades--Lissac had +guessed that this name was applied to him--had been arrested by the +orders of the archon Sulpicios at the instance of a certain Basilea, one +of the most charming hetaires of the republic of Perikles. Under this +Greco-Parisian disguise it was easy for everyone to discover the true +names and to see behind the masks the faces intended. + +At the very moment that Lissac called to ask the minister for an +explanation of the acts of the Prefect Jouvenet, Madame Vaudrey was +opening a copy of a journal in which these names travestied by some +Hellenist of the boulevard were underlined in red pencil. The article +entitled _The Mistress of an Archon_, had been specially sent to her +under a cover bearing the address in a woman's handwriting, Sabine Marsy +or Madame Gerson! Some friend. One always has such. + +It was of Adrienne that Vaudrey thought while Lissac was giving vent to +his ironical, blunt complaint. Was Guy mad to speak of Marianne aloud in +this way, and in this place, a few feet away from his wife, who could +hear everything? Yes, Lissac was over-excited, furious and apparently +crazy. He did not lower his tone, in spite of the sudden terror +expressed by Vaudrey, who seized his hand and said to him eagerly: "Why, +keep quiet! Suppose some one is listening?" + +He felt himself, moreover, impelled by a violent rage. If what Guy told +him were correct, Marianne had made use of him and of the title of +mistress that she ought to have concealed. She had played it in order to +compel Jouvenet to commit an outrage. + +"Nonsense!" said Lissac, sneeringly. "Are you innocent enough to believe +that she has seduced the Prefect of Police by simply telling him that +she was your mistress? You don't know her. She only did this in becoming +his!" + +Sulpice had become livid, and he looked at Lissac with a sudden +expression of hatred, as if this man had been his enemy. Guy had +directly attacked his vanity and his heart with a knife-thrust, as it +were, without sparing either his self-love or his passion. + +"Ah! yes," said Lissac, "I know very well that that annoys you, but it +is so! I knew this young lady before you did. Let her commit all the +follies that she chooses with others and throw me overboard at a pinch, +as she did three days ago, all is for the best. She is playing her rôle. +I am only an imbecile and I am punished for it, and it is well; but, in +order to attack me, to secure a very tiny paper, which put her very +nicely at my mercy, that she should commit a foolish and brutal outrage +against you who answer for the personnel of your administration, I +cannot forgive. She thought then that I would make use of this note +against her? She takes me for a rascal? If I wished to commit an act of +treachery, could I not go this very moment, even without the weapon that +Jouvenet's agents have taken from me, straight to her Rosas?" + +"Rosas?" asked Sulpice, whose countenance contorted, and who feverishly +twisted his blond beard. + +"Eh! _parbleu_, yes, Rosas! On my honor, one would take you for the +Minister of the Interior of the Moon! Rosas, who perhaps is her lover, +but will be her husband if she wishes it! and she does!" + +Poor Sulpice looked at Lissac with a terrified expression which might +have been comic, did it not in its depth portray a genuine sorrow. He +was oblivious to everything now, where he was, if Guy spoke too loudly, +or if Adrienne could hear. He was only conscious of a terrible strain of +his mind. This sudden revelation lacerated him--as if his back received +the blows of a whip. He wished to know all. He questioned Lissac, +forcing him into a corner, and making him hesitate, for he now feared +that he would say too much, and limited himself to demanding Jouvenet's +punishment. + +"As to Marianne, one would see to that after," he said. + +Ah! yes, certainly, Jouvenet should be punished! How? Vaudrey could not +say, but from this moment the Prefect of Police was condemned. Guy's +arrest, which was an act of brutal aggression, was tantamount to a +dismissal signed by the Prefect himself. And Marianne! she then made a +sport of Sulpice and took him for a child or a ninny! + +"Not at all. For a man who loves, that is enough," replied Lissac. + +Vaudrey had flung himself into an armchair, striking his fist upon the +little table, covered with the journals that he had scarcely opened, and +absent-mindedly pushing the chair back, the better to give way to his +excessively violent threats, after the manner of weak natures. + +"Do you want my advice?" Lissac abruptly asked him. "You have only what +you deserve, ah! yes, that is just it! I tell you the sober truth. A +wife like yours should never be forsaken for a creature like Marianne!" + +"I love Adrienne sincerely!" replied Vaudrey eagerly. + +"And you deceive her entirely. That is foolish. You deserve that +Mademoiselle Kayser should have ridiculed, deceived and ruined you +irretrievably, and that your name should never be uttered again. When +one has the opportunity to possess a wife like yours, one adores her on +bended knees, you understand me, and one doesn't destroy her true +happiness to divert it in favor of the crowd. And what pleasure! +Jouvenet has had the same dose at a less cost!" + +"You abuse the rights of friendship, somewhat," said Sulpice, rising +suddenly. "I do what pleases me, as it pleases me, and I owe no account +to any one, I think!" + +He stopped suddenly. His feet were, as it were, nailed to the floor and +his mouth closed. He seized Guy's hand and felt his flesh creep, as he +saw Adrienne standing pale, and supporting herself against the doorpost, +as if she had not the strength to proceed, her eyes wide open, like +those of a sick person. + +Assuredly, beyond all possible doubt, she had heard everything. + +She was there! she heard! + +She said nothing, but moved a step forward, upheld by a terrible effort. + +Her look was that of a whipped child, of a poor creature terrified and +in despair, and expressed not anger but entire collapse. She was so wan, +so sad-looking, that neither Lissac nor Vaudrey dared speak. A chill +silence fell upon these three persons. + +While Adrienne approached the table upon which the journals were piled, +Guy was the first to force a smile to throw her off the scent; Adrienne +stopped him with a gesture that was intended to express that to +undeceive her, that is to say, to deceive her afresh, would be a still +more cowardly act. She took from among the journals that which she had +just been reading without at first quite understanding it, the one that +had been sent to her, underlined as with a venomous nail, and showing to +Vaudrey the article that spoke of Sulpicios and Basilea, she said gently +in a feeble voice, crushed by this crumbling of her hopes: + +"That is known then, that affair!" + +Then she sunk exhausted into the armchair in which Sulpice had been +sitting, and her breast heaved with a violent sob that tore it as if it +would rend it. + +Sulpice looked at Lissac who was standing half-inclined, as in the +presence of a misfortune. He instinctively seized the minister by the +shoulder and gently forced him toward Adrienne, saying to him in a +whisper, in ill-assured tones: + +"Kiss her then! One pardons when one loves!" + +With a supplicating cry, Vaudrey threw himself on his knees before +Adrienne, while Lissac hastily opened the door and left, feeling indeed +that he could not say a word and that Vaudrey only could obtain +Vaudrey's pardon. + +"I, in my anger," he said, "he, in his jealousy, have allowed ourselves +to get into a passion. It is stupid. One should speak lower." + +He went away, much dissatisfied with himself and but little less with +Vaudrey. Again he considered this man foolish, adored as he was by such +a wife, whom he deceived. He was not sure that at the bottom of his own +heart he did not feel a sentiment of love toward Adrienne. Ah! if he had +been loved by such a creature, he would have been capable of great +things!--He would have arranged and utilized his life instead of +spoiling it. In place of vulgar love, he would have kept this unique +love intact from the altar to the tomb! + +Pale and tottering, and a child once more under her sorrow, as he had +just seen her, she was so adorably lovely that he had received an +entirely new impression, one of almost jealousy against Sulpice, and +therefore, brusquely overcoming this strange, unseemly emotion, he had +himself thrust Vaudrey toward his wife and had departed hastily, as if +he felt that he must hurry away and never see them again. But as he +left, on the contrary, he saw her again with her sad, wretched, +suffering look and the young wife's sorrowful voice went with him, +repeating in a tone of broken-hearted grief: + +"That is known then!" + +"Ah! that miserable fellow, Vaudrey!" thought Guy. + +In going out, he had to wait a moment in the antechamber, to admit of +the passage of some vases of flowers, green shrubs and variegated +foliage plants that were being brought in to decorate the salons. A +fête! And this evening! In the arrival of those flowers for decoration, +at the moment when chance, clumsily or wickedly, so suddenly revealed +that crushing news, Guy saw so much irony that he could not forbear +looking at them for a moment, almost insulting in their beauty and their +hothouse bloom. + +Would Adrienne have the courage or strength to undertake the reception +of the evening, within a few hours? Guy was annoyed at having come. + +"I could well have waited and kept my anger to myself. The unhappy woman +would have known nothing." + +"Bah!" he added. "She is kind, she adores Sulpice, it is only a passing +storm. She will forgive!" + +He promised himself, moreover, to return in the evening, to excuse +himself to Adrienne, to comfort her if he could. + +"There is some merit, after all, in that," he thought again. "On my +word! I believe I love her and yet I am angry with that animal Vaudrey +for not loving her enough." + +She will forgive!--Lissac knew courtesans but he did not know this +woman, energetic as she was under her frail appearance, a child, a +little provincial lost in the life of Paris, lost and, as it were, +absorbed in the hubbub of political circles, smitten with her husband, +who comprehended in her eyes every seduction and superiority, having +given herself entirely and wishing to wholly possess the elect being who +possessed her, in whom she trusted and to whom she gave herself, body +and soul, with all her confidence, her innocence and her modesty. He did +not know what such a sensitive, nervously frail nature could feel on the +first terrible impulses, full of enthusiasm under her exterior coldness, +of resolution concealed under her timid manners, capable of madness, +distracted in spite of her reason and calm; this candor of thought, of +education, and associations that made her, with all her irresistible +attractiveness, the virtuous woman with all her charm. + +Adrienne had at first read the journal that had been sent to her without +understanding anything about it. Alkibiades, Basilea, the mistress of +the Archon, what signified that to her? What did it mean? Then suddenly +her thought rested on the name of Sulpice, travestied in the Greek of +parody, Sulpicios. Was it of her husband that they intended to speak? +She immediately felt a bitter anguish at heart, but it was a matter only +of allowing one's self to be impressed by a journalistic pleasantry, as +contemptible as an anonymous letter! She would think no more about it. +She must concentrate her thoughts on the evening's reception. There was +to be an official repast, followed by a soirée. She had nothing to +concern herself about in regard to the menu; Chevet undertook that. For +the ministerial dinners there was a fixed price as in restaurants. Hosts +and guests live _au cabaret_, they dine at so much a head. Adrienne +endeavored to occupy herself with the musical soirée, with the +programmes that they brought her, with the names of comedians and female +singers, printed on vellum, and with those bouquets with which the vases +of her little salon were decorated. Ah! well, yes, in spite of the +feverish activity, she could think only of that article in the journal, +that miserable article, every line of which flamed before her eyes just +as when one has looked too long at a fire. She had been seized with the +temptation there and then to openly ask Sulpice what these veiled +illusions meant. + +"I hope, indeed," she thought, with her contempt of all lying, "that he +will not charge me with suspecting him. No, certainly, I do not suspect +him." + +She went to the little cabinet where Sulpice sometimes read or worked +after breakfast, and there, as if she had thrown herself upon an open +knife, she suddenly heard those sinister words which pierced her very +flesh like pointed blades. + +They were speaking of another woman. Lissac said in a loud tone: Your +mistress! and Vaudrey allowed it to be said!-- + +A mistress! what mistress? Marianne Kayser! Oh, that woman of whom +Sulpice had so often spoken in an indifferent manner, that pretty +creature, so often seen, seductive, wonderfully beautiful, terrifyingly +beautiful, it was she! Your mistress! Sulpice had a mistress! He lied, +he deceived. He? She was betrayed! Was it possible? If it were possible? +But it was true! Eh! _parbleu_, yes, it was true--And this, then, was +why they had sent her this horrible article! She knew now. + +She had been tempted to enter the room suddenly, to throw herself +between these men and interrupt their conversation. She had not the +strength. And then, what Lissac said had the effect of consoling +her!--Guy's reproaches to Sulpice were such as she would have liked to +cast at him, if she could have found speech now. But not a word could +she frame. She was stunned, dumb and like a crushed being. She knew only +one thing, that she suffered horribly, as she had never before suffered. + +At first she allowed Vaudrey, who knelt at her feet, as Lissac had told +him on going away, to take her hand that hung listlessly down. Then she +gently withdrew it as if she felt herself seized by an instinctive sense +of outraged modesty. + +Vaudrey tried to speak. At first only confused words, silly excuses, +clumsy falsehoods, cruelly absurd phrases--_caprices_, _nothing serious_, +_whim_, _madness_--so many avowals, so many insults, came to his lips. But +then, before the silence of Adrienne, he could say nothing more, he was +speechless, overwhelmed, and sought a hand that was refused. + +"Will you never forgive me?" he asked at last, not knowing too well what +he said. + +"Never!" she said coldly. + +She rose and with as much sudden energy as but a moment before she had +felt of weakness, she crossed the room. + +"Are you going away?" stammered Sulpice. + +"Yes, I must be alone--Ah! quite alone," she said, with a sort of +gesture of disgust as she saw her husband approach her. + +He stopped and said, as if by chance: + +"You know that--this evening--" + +"Yes, yes," she replied, "do not be anxious about anything! I am still +the minister's wife, if I am Madame Vaudrey no longer." + +He tried in vain to reply. + +Adrienne had already disappeared. + +"There is the end of my happiness!" Sulpice stammered as he suddenly +confronted an unknown situation dark as an abyss. "Ah! how wretched I +am! Very wretched! whose fault is it?" + +He plunged gladly into the work of examining the bundles of reports from +the prefects, feverishly inspecting them to deafen and blind his +conscience, and seized at every moment with a desire to make an appeal +to Adrienne or to go and insult Marianne. Oh! especially to tell +Marianne that she had betrayed him, that she was a wretch, that she was +the mistress of Rosas, the mistress of Jouvenet, a strumpet like any +other strumpet, yes, a strumpet! + +Amid all the disturbance of that day of harsh misfortune, perhaps he +thought more of the Marianne that he had lost than of the Adrienne that +he had outraged; while the wife questioned with herself if it were +really she coming and going, automatically trying on her ball costume, +abandoning her head to the hair-dresser, feeling that in two hours she +would be condemned to smile on the minister's guests, the senators and +the deputies and play the part of a spectre, marching in the land of +dreams, in a nightmare that choked her, fastened on her throat and heart +and prompted her to cry and weep, all her poor nerves intensely strained +and sick, subdued by the energy of a tortured person, imposing on +herself the task of not appearing to suffer and--a still more atrocious +thing--of not even suffering in reality and waiting, yes, waiting to +sob. + +In the evening, everything blazed on the façade of the ministry. The +rows of gas-jets suggested that a public fête was being held in the +Hôtel Beauvau. The naming capital letters R.F. were boldly outlined +against the dark sky, the three colors of the flags looked bright in the +ruddy light of the gas. Carriages rolled over the sanded courtyard, +giving up at the carpeted entrance to the hôtel the invited guests +dressed in correct style, the women wrapped in ample cloaks with gold +fringe or trimmed with fur, and all poured into the antechamber, +brushing against the _Gardes de Paris_ in white breeches, with grounded +arms, forming a row and standing out like Caryatides against the +shining, large leaved green flowers on which their white helmets shone +by the light of the lustres. In the dressing-room, the clothing was +piled up, tied together in haste; the antechamber was quickly crossed, +the women in passing casting rapid glances at the immense mirrors; a +servant asked the names of the guests and repeated them to an usher, +whose loud voice penetrated these salons that for many years had heard +so many different names, of all parties, under all régimes, and +proclaimed them in the usual commonplace manner, while murdering the +most celebrated of them. Upon the threshold of the salon, filled with +fashionable people and flooded with intense light, stood the minister, +who had been receiving, greeting, bowing, ever since the opening of the +soirée, to those who arrived, some of whom he did not know; crowding +behind him, correctly dressed, stood his secretaries, the members of his +cabinet appropriating their shares of the greetings extended to the +Excellency, and at his side stood Madame Vaudrey, pale and smiling as +the creatures of the other world; she also bowed and from time to time +extended her gloved hand mechanically; pale she looked in her décolleté +gown of white satin, clasped at the shoulders with two pearl clasps, a +bouquet of natural roses in her corsage, and standing there like a +melancholy spectre on the very threshold of the festive salons. + +When she perceived Guy enter, she greeted him with a sad smile, and +Vaudrey eagerly offered his hand to him as if he relied greatly on him +to arrange matters. + +Adrienne's repressed grief had pained Lissac. While to the other guests +she appeared to be only somewhat fatigued, to him the open wound and +sorrow were visible. He plunged into the crowd. Beneath the streaming +light the diamonds on the women's shoulders gleamed like the lustres' +crystals. Within a frame of gobelins and Beauvais tapestry taken from +the repository, was an improvised scene that looked like a green and +pink nest of camellias, dracænas and palms. The bright toilettes of the +women already seated before this scenic effect presented a wealth of +pale blue, white or pink silk, mother-of-pearl shoulders, diamonds, and +bows of pink or feather headdresses. Guy recognized Madame Marsy in the +front row, robed in a very low-cut, sea-green satin robe with a bouquet +of flowers at the tip of the shoulder, who while fanning herself looked +with haughty impertinence at the pretty Madame Gerson, her former +friend. Madame Evan was numerously surrounded, she was the most charming +of all the stylish set and the woman whom all the others tried to copy. + +Behind this species of female flower-bed the black coated ranks crowded, +their sombre hue relieved here and there by the uniform of some French +officer or foreign military attaché. There was a profusion of orders, +crosses and strange old faces, with red ribbons at the neck, deputies +evidently in dress, youthful attachés of the ministry or embassy, +correct in bearing and officious, their crush-hats under their arms and +holding the satin programme of the _musicale soirée_ in their hands, +some numbers of which were about to be rendered. Under the ceilings that +were dappled with painted clouds, surrounded by brilliant lights and a +wealth of flowers, this crowd presented at once an aspect of luxury and +oddity, with its living antitheses of old parliamentarians and tyros of +the Assembly. + +Intermingled with strains of music, were whisperings and the confused +noise of conversations. + +Guy watched with curiosity, as a man who has seen much and compares, all +this gathering of guests. From time to time he greeted some one of his +acquaintance, but this was a rare occurrence. He was delighted to see +Ramel whom he had often met at Adrienne's _Wednesdays_, and whom he +liked. He appeared to him to be fatigued and sick. + +"I am not very well, in fact," said Ramel. "I have only come because I +had something serious to say to Vaudrey." + +"What then?" asked Lissac. + +"Oh! nothing! some advice to give him as to the course to be followed. +There is decidedly much underhand work going on about the President." + +"Who is it?" + +"Most of them are here!" + +"His guests?" + +"You know very well that when one invites all one's friends, one finds +that three-quarters of one's enemies will be present." + +"At least," said Lissac. + +He continued to traverse the salons, always returning instinctively +toward the door at which Adrienne stood, with pale face and wandering +look, and scarcely hearing, poor woman, the unfamiliar names that the +usher uttered at equal intervals, like a speaking machine. + +"Monsieur Durosoi!--Monsieur and Madame Bréchet!--Monsieur the Minister +of Public Works!--Monsieur the Prefect of the Aube!--Monsieur the Count +de Grigny!--Monsieur Henri de Prangins!--Monsieur the General +d'Herbecourt!--Monsieur the Doctor Vilandry!--Monsieur and Madame +Tochard!" + +She had vowed that she would be strong, and allow nothing to be seen of +the despair that was wringing her heart. She compelled herself to smile. +In nightmares and hours of feverish unrest, she had suffered the same +vague, morbid feeling that she now experienced. All that passed about +her seemed to be unreal. These white-cravatted men, these gaily-dressed +women, the file of guests saluting her at the same spot in the salon, +with the same expression of assumed respect and trite politeness, +appeared to her but a succession of phantoms. Neither a name nor an +association did she attach to those countenances that beamed on her with +an official smile or gravely assumed a correct seriousness. She felt +weary, overwhelmed and heavy-headed at the sight of this continued +procession of strangers on whom it was incumbent that she should smile +and to whom she must bow out of politeness, in virtue of that duty of +state which she wished to fulfil to the last degree, poor soul! + +The distant music of Fahrbach's polkas or Strauss's waltzes seemed like +an added accompaniment that mocked the sadness of her unwholesome dream. + +"And yet, in all that crowd of women who salute her, there are some who +are jealous of her! Many envy her!" thought Guy, who was looking on. + +Adrienne did not look at Vaudrey. She was afraid that if her eyes met +her husband's fixed on her own, she would lose her sang-froid and +suddenly burst into sobs, there before the guests. That would have been +ridiculous. This blonde, so feebly gentle, isolated herself, therefore, +with surprising determination and seemed to see nothing save her own +thought, the unique thought: "Be strong. You shall weep at your ease +when you are alone, far away from these people, far away from this +crowd, alone with yourself, entirely alone, entirely alone!" + +Vaudrey was very pale, but carried away, in spite of himself, by the joy +which he felt in receiving all the illustrious and powerful men of the +state, foreign ambassadors, the Presidents of the Senate and the +Chamber, the ministers, his colleagues, deputies, wealthy financiers, +renowned publicists, in fact, everything that counts and has a name in +Paris,--this minister, happy to see the crowd running to him, at his +house, bowing, paying homage to him, for a moment forgot the crushing +events of that day, the sudden thunderbolt falling on him and perhaps, +as he had said, crushing his hearthstone. + +He no longer thought of anything but what he saw: salutations, bowed +heads, inclinations that succeeded each other with the regularity of a +clock, that succession of homages to the little Grenoble advocate, now +become Prime Minister. + +Oblivious of everything else, he had lost the recollection of his +mistress, and he suddenly grew pale and looked instinctively with terror +at Adrienne, who was as pale as a corpse.--A visitor had just been +announced by the usher, in his metallic voice, and the name that he +cried mechanically, as he had uttered all the others, echoed there like +an insult. + +Guy de Lissac shook through his entire frame, as he too heard it. + +"Monsieur Simon Kayser and Mademoiselle Kayser!"--cried the usher. + +Still another name rang out from that clarion voice: + +"Monsieur le Duc de Rosas!" + +Neither Vaudrey nor Adrienne heard this name. Sulpice felt urged to rush +toward Marianne to entreat her to leave. It is true, he had invited her. +In spite of Jouvenet who knew all, and in spite of so many others who +suspected the truth, she desired to be present at that fête at the +ministry and to show herself to all. Vaudrey had warned her, however. He +had written to her a few hours before, entreating her, nay, almost +commanding, her, not to come, and she was there. She entered, advancing +with head erect, leaning on the arm of her uncle, his white cravat +hidden by his artist's beard and on his lips a disdainful smile. + +Adrienne asked herself whether she was really dreaming now. Approaching +her, she saw, crossing the salon with a queenly step, that lovely, +insolent creature, trailing a long black satin skirt, her superb bosom +imprisoned in a corsage trimmed with jet, and crossed, as it were, with +a blood-red stripe formed by a cordon of roses. Marianne's fawn-colored +head seemed to imperiously defy from afar the pale woman who stood with +her two hands falling at her side as if overwhelmed. + +The vision, for vision it was, approached like one of the nightmares +that haunt people's dreams. Adrienne's first glance encountered the +direct gaze of Marianne's gray eyes. Behind Mademoiselle Kayser came De +Rosas, his ruddy Castilian face that was ordinarily pensive beamed +to-day, but Madame Vaudrey did not perceive him. She saw only this +woman, the woman who was approaching her, in her own house, insolently, +impudently, to defy her after having outraged her, to insult her after +having deceived her! + +Adrienne felt a violent wrath rising within her and suddenly her entire +being seemed longing to bound toward Marianne, to drive her out after +casting her name in her teeth. + +Instinctively she looked around her with the wild glance of a wretched +woman who no longer knows what to do, as if seeking for some assistance +or advice. + +Vaudrey's wan pallor and Lissac's supplicating gesture appealed to her +and at once restored her to herself. It was true! she had no right to +cause a scandal. She was within the walls of the ministry, in a common +salon into which this girl had almost a right to enter, just like so +many others lost in the crowd of guests. For Adrienne, it was not merely +a question of personal vanity or honor that was at stake, but also +Vaudrey's reputation. She felt herself _in view_, ah! what a word:--in +view, that it to say, she was like an actress to whom neither a false +step nor a false note is permitted; compelled to smile while death was +at her heart, to parade while her entrails were torn with grief, forced +to feign and to wear a mask in the presence of all who were there, and +to lie to all the invited guests, indifferent and inimical, as Ramel +said, and who were looking about ready at any moment to sneer and to +hiss. + +She recovered, by an effort that swelled her heart, strength to show +nothing of the feeling of indignant rebellion that was stifling her. + +She closed her eyes. + +Marianne Kayser passed onward, losing herself with Simon and De Rosas in +the human furrow that opened before her and immediately closed upon her, +and followed by a murmur of admiration. + +Adrienne had not however seen the pale, insolent countenance of the +young woman so closely approach her suffering and disconsolate face. +Above all, she had not seen the jealous, rapid glance that flashed +unconsciously in Vaudrey's eyes when he saw José de Rosas triumphantly +following the imperious Marianne. Ah! that look of sorrowful anger would +have penetrated like a red-hot iron into Adrienne's soul. That glance +that Guy caught a glimpse of told eloquently of wounded love and bruised +vanity on the part of that man who, placed here between these two women, +his mistress and the other, suffered less from the sorrow caused to +Adrienne than from Marianne's treason in deserting him for this +Spaniard. + +Lissac was exasperated. He felt prompted to rush between Marianne and +Rosas and say to him: + +"You are mad to accompany this woman! Mad and ridiculous! She is +deceiving you as she has deceived Vaudrey, as she has deceived me, and +as she will deceive everybody." + +He purposely placed himself in Mademoiselle Kayser's way. She had +appeared scarcely to recognize him and had brushed against him without +apparent emotion, but with a disdainful pout. Her arm had sought that +of Rosas, as if she now were sure of her duke. + +Guy too, felt that he could not cause a scene at the ball, for this +would have brought a scandal on Vaudrey. He had just before repeated to +Adrienne: "Courage." This was now his own watchword, and yet he sought +out Jouvenet to whisper to the Prefect of Police what he thought of his +conduct. Jouvenet had come and gone. Granet, as if he had divined +Lissac's preoccupation, looked at him sneeringly as he whispered to the +fat Molina who was seated near him: + +"Alkibiades!" + +The soirée, moreover, was terribly wearisome to Lissac. He wandered from +group to group to find some one with whom to exchange ideas but he +hardly found anyone besides Denis Ramel. The same political commonplaces +retailed everywhere, at Madame Gerson's or at Madame Marsy's, as in the +corridors of the Chamber, were re-decocted and reproduced in the corners +of the salon of the Ministry, and around the besieged buffet attacked by +the most ferocious gluttony. _Interpellation_, _Majority_, _New +Cabinet_, _Homogeneous_, _Ministry of the Elections_, _Ballot_, _One Man +Ballot_. Guy went, weary of the conflict, to the room in which the +concert was given and listened to some operatic piece, or watched +between the heads, the hidden profile of some female singer or an actor +and heard the bursts of laughter that greeted the new monologue _The +Telephone_, rendered in a clear voice with the coolness of an English +clown, by a gentleman in a dress coat: _See! I am Monsieur Durand--you +know, Durand--of Meaux?--Exactly--A woman deceives me--How did I learn +it?--By the telephone. My friend Durand--Durand--of Etampes--We are not +related--Emile Durand said to me: Durand, why haven't you a +telephone?--It is true, I hadn't one--Durand--the other +Durand--Durand--of Etampes--has one--Then--_And Lissac, somewhat +listless, left this corner of the salon and stumbled against a group of +men who surrounded an old gentleman much decorated, wearing the _grand +cordon rouge_ crosswise, a yellow ribbon at his neck, who, with the +gravity of an English statesman, said, thrusting his tongue slightly +forward to secure his false teeth from falling: + +"I like monologues less than chansonnettes!--I, who address you, have +taken lessons from Levassor." + +"Levassor, Your Excellency?" answered in chorus a lot of little +bald-headed young men--diplomats. + +"Levassor," replied the old gentleman who was the very celebrated +ambassador of a great foreign power. "Oh! I was famous in the song: _The +Englishman Who Was Seasick_!" + +While the little young men smiled, approved and loudly applauded, the +old ambassador to whom the interests of a people were entrusted, hummed +in a low tone, amid the noise of the reception: + + "Aoh! aoh! Je suis _mélède_, + Bien _mélède_! Très _mélède_!" + +Guy de Lissac shrugged his shoulders. He had heard a great deal of this +man. This diplomat of the chansonnette evoked his pity. Where was he +then? At Paris or at Brives-la-Gaillarde? At a ball at the Hôtel Beauvau +or in some provincial sub-prefecture? + +Just before, he had heard Warcolier utter this epic expression: + +"If I were minister, I would give fireworks. They are warlike and +inoffensive at the same time!" + +The voice of a young man with a Russian accent who talked politics in a +corner, pleased him: + +"I am," he said aloud, "from a singular country: the Baltic provinces, +where society is governed by deputies who, by birth, have the right to +make laws, and I consider politics so tiresome, fatiguing and full of +disgust and weariness as an occupation, that one ought to consider one's +self most fortunate that there are people condemned to take hold of this +rancid pie, while others pass their lives in thinking, reading, talking +and loving." + +"That is good," thought Lissac. "There is one, at least, who is not so +stupid. It is true, perhaps because I think just the same." + +Nevertheless, he went and listened, mixing with the crowd, haphazard. +His preoccupation was not there. In reality, he thought only of +Adrienne. How the poor woman must suffer! + +With a feeling of physical and moral overthrow, she had left the +threshold of the salon, where she had been standing since the +commencement of the soirée. She was mixing with the crowd in her desire +to forget her sorrows amid the deafening of the music, the songs, the +laughter, and the murmur of the human billows that filled her salons. +She had taken her place in front of the little improvised theatre, +beside all those ladies who dissected her toilette, scanned her pallid +face, analyzed and examined her piece by piece, body and soul. But +there, seated near the stage, exactly in front of her, exposing, as in a +stall, her blonde beauty, and radiant as a Titian, was that Marianne +whose gleaming white shoulders appeared above her black satin corsage. +Again she saw her, as but a little while before, unavoidable, haughty +and bold, smiling with insolence. + +At every minute she was attracted by a movement of a head, or fan, or a +laugh from this pretty creature, who leaned toward Sabine Marsy, then +raised her brow and showed, in all the brilliancy of fatal beauty, her +black corsage, striped with those fine red roses. And now Adrienne's +anger, the grief that she had trampled under for some hours, increased +from moment to moment, heightened and stung by the sight of this +creature, by all kinds of bitter thoughts and by visions of treason and +baffled love. She felt that she was becoming literally mad at the +thought that, upon those red and painted lips, Sulpice had rested his, +that his hands had stroked those shoulders, unwound that hair, that +this woman's body had been folded in his arms. Ah! it was enough to make +her rise and cry out to that creature: "You are a wretch. Get you gone! +Get you gone, I say!" + +And if she did so? + +Why not? Had they the right to scorn her thus in public because she +owned an official title and position? Was not this vulgar salon of a +furnished mansion _her_ salon then? + +Now it seemed to her that they were whispering about her; that they were +sneering behind their fans, and that all these women knew her secret and +her history. + +Why should they not know them? All Paris must have read that mocking, +offensive and singular article: _The Mistress of an Archon_! All these +people had, perhaps, learned it by heart. There were people here who +frequented the salons and who probably kept the article in their +pockets. + +Yes, that would be to commit a folly, to brave everything and to destroy +all! + +Sulpice, then, did not know her; he believed her to be insignificant +because she was gentle, resigned to everything because she was devoted +to his love and his glory?--Ah! devoted even to the point of killing +herself, devoted to the extent of dying, or living poor, working with +her own hands, if only he loved her, if only he never lied to her! + +"And here was his mistress!" + +His mistress! His mistress! + +She repeated this name with increasing rage, reiterating it, inwardly +digesting it, as if it were something terribly bitter. His mistress, +that lovely, insolent creature! Yes, very lovely, but manifestly +terrible and capable of driving a feeble being like Vaudrey to commit +every folly, nay, worse, infamy. + +"And it is such women that are loved! Ah! Idiots! idiots that we are!" + +The first part of the concert was terminating. Happily, too, for +Adrienne was choking. The minister must, as a matter of politeness, +express his thanks to the cantatrices from the Opéra, and to the +actresses from the Comédie Française, the artistes whose names appeared +on the programme. Vaudrey was obliged to pass the rows of chairs in +order to reach the little salon behind the stage, which served as a +foyer. Adrienne saw him coming to her side, and looking very pale, +though he made an effort to smile. He was uncomfortable and anxious. In +passing before Marianne, he tried to look aside, but Mademoiselle Kayser +stopped him in spite of himself, by slightly extending her foot and +smiling at him, when he turned toward her, with a prolonged, interested +and strange expression. + +Adrienne felt that she was about to faint. She took a few tottering +steps out of the salon, then she stopped as if her head were swimming. +Some one was on hand to support her. She felt that a hand was holding +her arm, she heard some one whisper in her ear: + +"It is too much, is it not?" + +She recognized Lissac's voice. + +Guy looked at her for a moment, quite prepared for this great increase +of suffering. + +"Take me away," she murmured. "I can bear no more!--I can bear no more!" + +She was longing to escape from all that noise, that atmosphere that +lacked air, and from Marianne's look and smile that pierced her. She +went, as if by chance, instinctively guiding Lissac, led by him to a +little, salon far from the reception rooms, and which was reserved for +her and protected by a door guarded by an usher. It might have been +thought that she expected this solitude would be necessary to her as an +escape from the fright of that reception, to which her overstrained and +sick nerves made her a prey. + +In passing, Lissac had whispered to Ramel, who was at his elbow: + +"Tell Sulpice that Madame Vaudrey is ill!" + +"Ill?" + +"You see that she is!" + +When Adrienne was within the little salon hung with garnet silk +draperies, in which the candelabras and sconces were lighted, she sank +into an armchair, entirely exhausted and overwhelmed by the fearful +resistance she had made to her feelings. She remained there motionless, +her eye fixed, her face pale, and both hands resting on the arms of her +chair, abstractedly looking at the pattern of the carpet. + +Guy stood near, biting his lips as he thought of the madman Vaudrey and +that wretched Marianne. + +"She at least obeys her instincts! But he!" + +"Ah! it is too much; yes, it is too much!" repeated Adrienne, as if +Lissac were again repeating that phrase. + +It seemed to her that she had been thrust into some cowardly situation; +that she had been subjected to a shower of filth! It was hideous, +repugnant. She now saw, in the depths of her life, events that she had +never before seen; her vision had suddenly become clear. Dark details +she could now explain. Vaudrey's falsehoods were suddenly manifested. + +"He lied! Ah! how he had lied!" + +She recalled his anxiety to hide the journals from her, his oft-repeated +suggestions, his precautions, the increasing number of his +night-sessions that made him pale. Pale from debauchery! And she pitied +him! She begged him not to kill himself for the politics that was eating +his life. Again she saw on the lips of her _Wednesday's_ guests the +furtive smiles that were hidden behind muffs when she spoke of those +nocturnal sessions of the Chamber, which were only nights passed in +Marianne's bed! How those Parisians must have laughed at her and +ridiculed the credulity of the woman who believes herself loved, but who +is deceived and mocked at! Madame Gerson, Sabine! How overjoyed they +must have been when, in their salons, they referred to the little, +stupid Provincial who was ignorant of these tricks! + +She felt ridiculed and tortured, more tortured than baffled, for her +vanity was nothing in comparison with her love, her poor, artless and +trusting love! + +"Sulpice, I should never have believed--Never!--" + +Why had they left Grenoble, their little house on the banks of the +Isère? They loved each other there, it was Paris that had snatched him +away! Paris! She hated it now. She hated that reputation that had +carried Vaudrey into office, the politics that had robbed her of a kind +and loving husband,--for he had loved her, she was sure of that,--and +which had made him the lover of a courtesan, the liar and coward that he +was! + +"Do you see?" she said to Lissac suddenly. "I detest these walls!" + +She pointed to the gilded ceilings with an angry gesture. + +"Since I entered here, my life has come to a close!--It is that, that +which has taken him from me!--Ah! this society, this politics, these +meannesses, this life exposed to every one and everything, to temptation +and to fall, I am entirely sick of, I am disgusted with. Let me be +snatched from it, let me be taken away! Everywhere here, one might say, +there is an atmosphere of lying!" + +"Do you hear? She laughs, she is happy! She! And I, ah! I!" + +She had risen to her feet, suddenly recovering all her energy, as if +stirred by the air of a Hungarian dance, whose strains dimly reached +them from the distant, warm salons, where Marianne was disporting her +beauty-- + +"Ah! I hate this hôtel, the noise and the women!" said Adrienne. "This +horde ranged about the buffet, this salon turned into a restaurant, the +false salutations, the commonplace protestations,--this society, all +this society, I detest it!--I will have no more of it!--It seems to me +that it all is mocking me, and that its smiles are only for that +courtesan!--But if I had driven her out?--Who brought her?" + +"Her uncle and Monsieur de Rosas!" + +"Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"Who marries her!" + +Adrienne nervously uttered a loud, harsh laugh, as painful as if it were +caused by a spasm. + +"Who marries her! Then these creatures are married?--Ah! they are +married--They are honored, too, are they not? And because they are more +easy of approach, they are thought more beautiful and more agreeable +than those who are merely honest wives? Ah! it is too silly!--Rosas! I +took him for a man of sense!--If I were to tell him myself that she is +my husband's mistress, what would the duke answer?" + +"He would not believe you, and you would not do that, madame!" said +Lissac. + +"Why?" + +"Because it would be an act of cowardice, and because you are the best, +the noblest of women!" + +Instinctively he drew near her, lowering his voice, embracing with his +glance that fine, charming beauty, that grief heightened by a burning +brilliancy. + +She raised her fine, clear eyes to Lissac, whose look troubled her, and +said: + +"And how have these served me?--Kindness, trickery!--Trickery, +chastity!--Ask all these men! All of them will go to Mademoiselle Kayser +and not to me!" + +"To you, madame," murmured Guy, "all that there is of devotion and +earnestness, yes, all of the tenderest and the truest will go to you as +respectful homage." + +"Respect?--Yes, respect to us!--And with it goes the home! But to her! +Ah! to her, love! And what if I wish to be loved myself?" + +"Loved by him!" said Lissac in a low tone, as if he did not know what he +said; and his hands instinctively sought Adrienne's. They trembled. + +A woman's perfume and something like the keen odor of flowers assailed +his nostrils. He had never felt the impulse of burning compassion which +at a sign from this saint, would have driven him to attempt the +impossible, to affront the noisy throng yonder. + +"Loved by him, yes, by him!" answered Adrienne, with the mournful shake +of the head of one who sees her joy vanish in the distance like a +sinking bark. + +She had been so happy! She had thought herself so dearly loved! Ah! +those many cowardly lies uttered by Sulpice! + +"Do not speak to me of him!" she suddenly said. "I hate him, too!--I do +more than that! I despise him! I never wish to see him again!--never. +You hear! never!" + +"What will you do?" Lissac asked. + +"I know nothing about it!--I wish to leave! Now, I have no more parading +to make in this ball, I think, I have no longer to receive the guests +whose insulting smiles were like blows! I will go, go!" + +"Adrienne!" + +"Will go at once!" + +She felt no astonishment at hearing the name Adrienne spoken suddenly +and unreflectingly by Guy de Lissac. + +She looked at him with a glance that reached his soul, not knowing what +she said: + +"Leave now! While the ball is in progress. To leave solitude to him, +suddenly--here! And that woman, if he wishes her, and if the other who +is marrying her will yield her to him!" + +She was carried away, her mind wandered, as if unbalanced by her grief, +all her efforts at self-control ending in a relaxation of her strained +nerves. + +"I will leave!--I do not wish to see him again!" + +"Leave to-night?" + +"For Grenoble--I don't know where!--But to fly from him; ah! yes; to +escape from him! Take me away, Monsieur de Lissac!" she said +distractedly, as she seized his hand. "I should go mad here!" + +She had unconsciously taken refuge, as it were, in the arms of the man +who loved her, and Lissac felt the exquisite grace of the body abandoned +to him, without the woman's reflecting upon it, without loving him, +lost-- + +It is quite certain that in her nervous, heart-broken condition, +Adrienne was not considering whether his affection for her sprung from +friendship or from love. + +For a moment this master skeptic, Guy, felt that he was committing the +greatest folly of his life. + +The young woman did not understand; nevertheless, even without love, he +clearly felt that this chasteness and grace, all that there was +exquisitely seductive about her, belonged to him--if he dared-- + +"You are feverish, Adrienne," he said, as he took her hands as he would +a child's. + +"I am choking here!--I wish to leave!--take me away!" + +"Nonsense," said Lissac. "What are you thinking about? They are calling +for you, yonder." + +"It is because they call for me that I wish to escape. Don't you see +that I abhor all those people; that I detest them as much as I despise +them? Take me away!" + +Lissac had become very pale. He tried to smile at Adrienne--the heroic +smile of a wounded man undergoing amputation--and he whispered: + +"Don't you know very well, madame, that you would not have taken two +steps in the street, on my arm, before you would become a lost woman?" + +"Well," she said, "what of that, since it is they who are loved!--" + +"No, madame," Guy replied, "I love you. I may say so, because you are a +virtuous woman, and I have no right to take you away, do you understand? +because I love you." + +He, too, had summoned all his strength to impart to his confession, +which he would have expressed with ardor, the cold tone of a phrase. + +But that was enough. Adrienne recoiled before this avowal. + +He loved her. He told her so! + +It is true, she could not leave the mansion on his arm. + +She rested her glance on Lissac and extended her hand to him, saying, as +she felt suddenly recalled to herself: + +"You are an honest man!" + +"According to my moods," said Guy, with a sad smile. + +The door of the little salon opened, and Ramel entered. + +"I have called in a doctor," he said. + +"For me?" asked Adrienne. "Thanks! I am quite strong!" + +Then boldly going to Ramel: + +"Will you have the goodness to take me to Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, +Monsieur Ramel?" + +"Why?" + +"Because I will not remain one hour longer in a house where my husband +has the right to receive his mistress!--Monsieur de Lissac refuses to +accompany me. Your arm, Ramel!" + +"Madame," Ramel answered gently, "I knew that Monsieur de Lissac was a +man of intelligence. It seems to me that he is a man of heart. You +should remain here for your own sake, for your name's sake, for your +husband's. It is your duty. As to Mademoiselle Kayser, you can return to +the salons, for she has just left with Monsieur de Rosas." + +Adrienne remained for a moment with her sad eyes fixed on Ramel; then +shaking her head: + +"You knew it also? Everybody knew it then, except me?" + +"Well!" said Ramel, a good-natured smile playing in his white mustache, +"now it is necessary to forget." + +"Never!" replied Adrienne. + +Then proudly drawing herself up, she took Denis's arm and without even +glancing in her mirror, she went off toward the salons. + +"Your bouquet, madame," said Lissac, who was still pale and his voice +trembled. + +"True!" said Adrienne. + +She fastened her bouquet of drooping roses to her corsage and without +daring to look at Lissac again, she re-entered, leaning on Ramel's arm. + +Left alone in the salon, Guy remained a moment to shake his head. + +"Poor, dear creature!" he said. "If I had been young enough not to +understand the position in which her madness placed me, or base enough +to profit by it, what a pretty little preface to a great folly she was +about to commit this evening! Well! this attack of morality will perhaps +count in my favor some day." + +He stooped down and picked up a rose that had fallen from Adrienne's +bouquet to the carpet. + +He smiled as he took up the flower and looked at it. + +"One learns at any age!" he thought, as he put the flower in his coat. +"That, at least, is a love souvenir that they will not send the police +to rob me of." + + + + +VII + + +On rising the following morning, after a feverish night, Sulpice +realized a feeling of absolute moral destruction. It seemed to him that +he had lost a dear being. In that huge, silent hôtel one would have +thought that a corpse was lying. He did not dare to present himself to +Adrienne. He could not tell what to say to her. He went downstairs +slowly, crossing the salons that were still decorated with the now +fading flowers, to reach his cabinet. The carpet was littered with the +broken leaves of dracænas and petals that had fallen from the azaleas, +and presented the gloomy, forsaken aspect peculiar to the morrow of a +fête. The furniture, stripped of its coverings, offered the faded tint +of old maids at their rising. With heavy head, he sat at his desk and +looked at the piled-up documents with a vague expression. Always the +eternal pile of despatches, optimistic reports, and banal summaries of +the daily press. Nothing new, nothing interesting, all was going well. +This tired world had no history. + +The minister still remained there, absorbed as after an unhealthy +insomnia, when Warcolier entered, ever serious, with his splendid, +redundant phrases and his usual attitude of a pedantic rhetor. He came +to inform the minister that a matter of importance, perhaps of a +troublesome nature, loomed on the horizon. Granet was preparing an +interpellation. Oh! upon a matter without any real importance. An affair +of a procession that had taken place at Tarbes, accompanied by some +little disturbance. It was only a pretext, but it was sufficient, +perhaps, to rally a majority around the _minister of to-morrow_. Old +Henri de Prangins, with his eye on a portfolio, and always thirsting for +power, was keeping Granet company: the man who would never be a minister +with the man who was sure to be. + +"Well, what has this to do with me?" asked Vaudrey indifferently. + +Granet! Prangins! He was thinking of a very different matter. Adrienne +knew all and Marianne deceived him. She was to marry Rosas. + +The very serious Warcolier manifested much surprise at the little energy +displayed by Monsieur le Ministre. He expected to see him bound, in +order to rebound, as he said, believing himself witty. Was Vaudrey +himself giving up the game? Was Granet then sure of the game? He +surmised it and had already taken the necessary measures in that +direction. But surely if Granet were the rising sun, Vaudrey was himself +abandoning his character of the setting sun. He was not setting, he was +falling. A sovereign contempt for this man entered Warcolier's lofty +soul, Warcolier the friend of success. + +"Then you do not understand, Monsieur le Président?" + +Vaudrey drew himself up with a sudden movement that was frequent with +him. He struck the table on which his open portfolio rested, and said: + +"I understand that Granet wants that portfolio! Well, be it so! I set +little store by it, but he does not have it yet!" + +"That is something like it! It is worthy of a brave man to show a +resolute front to his enemies! It is in battle that talent is +retempered, as formerly in the Styx were tempered--" + +"I know," said Sulpice. + +Warcolier's intelligent smile was not understood by the minister. + +Sulpice, who was in despair over his shattered domestic joys, had no +wish to enter on a struggle except to bring about a reaction on himself. +To hold his own against Granet, was to divert his own present sadness. + +"All right," he said to Warcolier. "Let Granet interpellate us when he +pleases--In eight days, to-morrow, yes, to-day even, I am ready!" + +"Interpellate _us_!" thought Warcolier. "You should say, interpellate +_you_." + +He had already got out of the scrape himself. + +Vaudrey debated with himself as to whether he would try to see Adrienne. +No? What should he say to her? It would be better to let a little time +shed its balm upon the wound. Then, too, if he wished to bar the way to +Granet, he had not too much time before him. The shrewd person should +act promptly. + +"I shall see him on the Budget Committee!" thought Vaudrey. + +He found it necessary now to force an interest in the struggle which a +few months before would have found him eagerly panting to enter on. The +honeymoon of his love of power had passed. He had too keenly felt, one +after another, the discouragements of the office that he sought in order +to _do good_, to reform, to act, in the pursuit of which he found +himself, from the first moment, clashing with routine, old-fashioned +ideas, petty ambitions, the general welfare, all the brood of selfish +interests. It had been his to dream a sort of Chimera bearing the +country toward Progress on outstretched wings: he found himself +entangled in the musty mechanism of a worn-out and rancid-smelling +engine, that dragged the State as a broken-winded horse might have done. +Then, little by little, weariness and disgust had penetrated the heart +of this visionary who desired to live, to assert himself in putting an +end to so many abuses, and whom his colleagues, his chiefs of division, +his chief of service, the chief of the State himself cautiously advised: +"Make no innovations! Let things go! That has gone on so for so long! +What is the use of changing? It will still do very well!" + +Ah! it was to throw off the shackles and to try the impossible! Vaudrey +found himself hemmed in between his dearest hopes and the most +disheartening realities. He was asked for offices, not reforms. The men +charged with the fate of the country were not straggling after progress, +they were looking after their own interests, their landed and +shopkeeping interests. He felt nauseated by all this. He held those +deputies in contempt who besieged his cabinet and filled his antechamber +in order to beg, claim and demand. All of them sought something, and +they were almost strangled by the solicitations of their own +constituents. They appeared to Sulpice to be rather the commissionaires +of universal suffrage than the servants. This abasement before the +manipulators of the votes made Vaudrey indignant. He felt that France +was becoming by degrees a vast market for favors, a nation in which +everyone asked office from those who to keep their own promised +everything, and the thought filled him with terror. The ministers, +wedded to their positions, became the mere servants of the deputies, +while the latter obeyed the orders of their constituents. All was kept +within a vast network of office-seeking and trafficking. And with it +all, a hatred of genuine talent, bitter selfishness and the crushing +narrowness of ideas! + +Vaudrey recalled a story that had been told him, how during the Empire, +the Emperor, terrified, feeling himself isolated, asked and searched for +a man, and how a certain little bell in the Tuileries was especially +provided to warn the chamberlains of the entry into the château of a new +face, of the visit of a stranger, in order that the camarilla, warned by +the particular ring, would have time to place themselves on their guard, +and to send the newcomer to the right about if he might become an aid to +the master and a danger to the servants. Well! Sulpice did not hear that +invisible and secret bell, but he guessed its presence, he divined its +presence around him, warning the interested, always ready to chase away +the stranger; he felt that its secret thread was everywhere thrown +around the powerful, the mighty of four days or a quarter of a century +and that, so long as influence existed in the world, there would be +courtiers and that these courtiers, eager for a crumb, would prevent the +stranger, that is to say, truth, from reaching the light, fearing that +this stranger might play the part of the lion and chase the flies away +from the honeycomb. + +Thus, how much nausea and contempt he felt for that transient power +which in spite of himself was rendered useless! A power that placed him +at the mercy of the bawling of a colleague or an enemy, and even at the +mercy of that all-powerful master so readily dissatisfied: everybody. He +had seen, at too close quarters, the vile intrigues, the depressing +chafferings, the grinding of that political kitchen in which so many +people,--this Warcolier with his voluble rhetoric, this Granet with his +conceited smile of superiority,--were hungering to hold the handle of +the saucepan. He recalled a remark that Denis Ramel had often repeated +to him: "What is the use of putting one's self out in order to bask in +the sunshine? The best are in the shade." + +He was seized with lawful indignation against his own ambitions, against +the lack of energy that prevented him from sweeping away all +obstacles,--men, and routine,--and he recalled with afflicting +bitterness his entry on public life, in the blaze of divine light, and +his dreams, his poor noble dreams! "A great minister! I will be a great +minister!" + +"Ah! yes, indeed! one is a minister, that is all! And that is enough! It +is often too much! We shall see indeed what he will do, that Granet who +ought to do so much!" + +Vaudrey laughed nervously. + +"What he will do? Nothing! Nothing! Still nothing! That is very easy! To +do anything, one should be a great man and not a politician captivated +with the idea of reaching the summit of power. Ah! _parbleu!_ to be a +great man! 'That is the question.'" + +He grew very excited over the proud rebellion of his old faith and +shattered hopes against the negative success he had obtained. Besides, +there was no reason for giving up the struggle. There was a council to +be held at the Élysée. He went there, but at this moment of disgust, +disgust of everything and himself, this palace like all the rest, seemed +to him to be gloomy and mean. An usher in black coat and white cravat, +wearing a chain around his neck, wandered up and down the antechamber, +according to custom, his shoes covered with the dust from the carpet +trodden upon by so many people, either applicants or functionaries. The +gaslight burning in broad day as in the offices in London was reflected +on the cold walls that shone like marble. Doors ornamented with gilt +nails and round, ivory knobs and without locks, were noiselessly +swinging to and fro. Wearied office-seekers with tired countenances were +spread out upon the garnet-colored velvet chairs, which were like those +of a middle-class, furnished house. + +From time to time, the tiresome silence was broken by the sound of near +or distant electric bells. Vaudrey, who arrived before his colleagues, +studiously contemplated the surroundings ironically. An estafette, a +gendarme, arrived with a telegram; the usher signed a receipt for it. +That was all the life that animated this silent palace. A man with a +military air, tall, handsome and in tightly-buttoned frock-coat, passed +and saluted the President of the Council; then, Jouvenet, the Prefect of +Police, looking like a notary's senior clerk, his abundant black hair +plastered on his head, a large, black portfolio under his arm, +approached the minister and bowed. Vaudrey, having Lissac in mind, +returned his salutation coldly. + +"I will speak to you presently, Monsieur le Préfet." + +"Good! Monsieur le Ministre!" + +In spite of the foot-soldier and the Parisian guard on duty at the door +of the palace, all that now seemed to Vaudrey to lack official +solemnity, and resembled rather a temporary and melancholy occupation. + +"Bah! And if I should never set my foot in this place again," he +thought, as he remembered Granet's interpellation, "what would it matter +to me?" + +He was informed first at the Council and then at the Chamber, that +Granet would not introduce his question until the next day. Vaudrey had +the desired time to prepare himself. In the Budget Committee, where he +met Granet, the _minister of to-morrow_ asked him an inopportune +question concerning the expenses of the administration. Vaudrey was +angered and felt inclined to treat it as a personal question. It now +only remained for his adversaries to begin to suspect him! To appear so +was even now too much. Sulpice took Granet up promptly, the latter +assured him that "his colleague and friend, the President of the +Council," had entirely misconstrued the meaning of his words. + +"Well and good!" said Vaudrey. + +He was not sorry that the interpellation was not to take place at once. +Before to-morrow, he would have placed his batteries. And then he would +think of quieting Adrienne, of regaining her, perhaps. On returning to +the ministry, he caused some inquiries to be made as to whether Madame +were not sick. Madame had gone out. She had gone out as if she were +making a pilgrimage to a cemetery, to the apartment in Rue de la +Chaussée-d'Antin, whereon might have been written: _Here lies_. It was +like the tomb of her happiness. + +She would not see Sulpice again. In the evening, however, she consented +to speak to him. + +Her poor, gentle face was extremely pale, and as if distorted by some +violent pain. + +"You will find some excuse," she said, "for announcing that I am ill. I +am leaving for Grenoble. I have written to my uncle, the Doctor expects +me, and all that now remains to me is a place in his house." + +"Adrienne!" murmured Sulpice. + +She closed her eyes, for this suppliant voice doubtless caused her a +new grief, but neither gesture nor word escaped her. She was like a +walking automaton. Even her eyes expressed neither reproach nor anger, +they seemed dim. + +There was something of death in her aspect. + +After a few moments, she said: "I hope that my resolve will not work any +prejudice to your political position. In that direction I will still do +my duty to the full extent of my strength. But people will not trouble +themselves to inquire whether I am at Grenoble or Paris. They trouble +themselves very little about me." + +By a gesture, he sought to retain her. She had already entered her room, +and Vaudrey felt that between this woman and him there stood something +like a wall. He had now only to love Marianne. + +To love Marianne, ah! yes, the unhappy man, he still loved her. When he +thought of Marianne, it was more in wrath, when he thought of Adrienne, +it was more in pity; but, certainly, his wife's determination to leave +Paris caused him less emotion than the thought that his mistress was to +wed Rosas. + +That very evening he went to Marianne's. + +They told him that Madame was at the theatre. Where? With whom? Neither +Jean nor Justine knew. + +Vaudrey despised himself for jealously questioning the servants who, +when together, would burst with laughter in speaking of him. + +"Oh! miserable fool!" he said to himself. "There was only one woman who +loved you:--Adrienne!" + +Nevertheless, he recalled Marianne in the hours of past love, and the +recollection of her kisses and sobs still made his flesh creep. The +tawny tints that played in her hair as it strayed unfastened over the +pillow, the endearing caresses of her bare arms, he wished to see and +feel again. He calculated in his ferocious egotism that Adrienne's wrath +would afford him more complete liberty for a time, and that he would +have Marianne more to himself, if she were willing. + +He had written to Mademoiselle Kayser, but his letter had remained +unanswered. He thought that he would go to Mademoiselle Vanda's house +the next day, after the Chamber was up. Very late, he added, since the +sitting would be prolonged. Long and decisive, as the fate of his +ministry was at stake. + +Granet's interpellation did not make him unusually uneasy. He had +acquainted himself in the morning with a résumé of the journals. Public +opinion seemed favorable to the Vaudrey ministry, _except in the case of +some insufferable radical organs, and with which he need not in anyway +concern himself_, read the report. Vaudrey did not remember that it was +in almost these very terms that the daily résumé of the press expressed +itself on the eve of Pichereau's fall, to the Minister of the Interior, +in speaking of Pichereau's cabinet. + +"I shall have a majority of sixty votes," he said to himself. +"Everything will be carried--save honor!" + +He thought of Adrienne as he thus wished. + +The session of the Chamber was to furnish him the most cruel deception. +Granet had most skilfully prepared his plan of attack. Vaudrey's +ministry was threatened on all sides by lines of approach laid out +without Sulpice's knowledge. Granet had promised, here and there, new +situations, or had undertaken to confirm the old. He came to the assault +of the ministry with a compact battalion of clients entirely devoted to +his fortunes, which were their own. They did not reproach Vaudrey too +strongly with anything, unless it was that these impatient ones +considered that he had given away all that he had to give, prefectures, +sub-prefectures, councillors' appointments, crosses of the Legion of +Honor, and especially for having lasted too long. Vaudrey would fall +less because he had forfeited esteem than because others were impatient +to succeed him. Granet was tired of being only the _minister of +to-morrow_, he wished to have his day. He had just affirmed his policy, +he asserted that the whole country, weary of Vaudrey's compromises, +demanded a more homogeneous ministry. Homogeneity! Nothing could be said +against such a word. Granet favored the policy of homogeneity. This +vocable comprehended his entire programme. The Vaudrey Cabinet lacked +homogeneity! The President of the Republic decidedly ought to form a +homogeneous cabinet. + +"Granet is then homogeneous?" said Sulpice, with a forced laugh, as he +sat on the ministerial bench while Lucien Granet was speaking from the +tribune, his right hand thrust into his frock-coat. + +The _bon mot_ uttered by the President of the Council, although spoken +loudly enough, did not enliven any one, neither his colleagues who felt +themselves threatened nor his usual _claqueurs_ who felt themselves +vanquished. Navarrot, the ministerial claqueur, was already applauding +Granet most enthusiastically. _Monsieur le Ministre_ felt himself about +to become an ex-minister. He vaguely felt as if he were in the vacuum of +an air-pump. + +The order of the day of distrust, smoothed over by Granet with the +formulas of perfidious politeness--castor-oil in orange-juice, as +Sulpice himself called it, trying to pluck up courage and wit in the +face of misfortune,--that order of the day that the Vaudrey Cabinet +would not accept, was adopted by a considerable majority: one hundred +and twenty-two votes. + +For Sulpice, it was a crushing defeat. + +"One hundred and twenty-two deputies," he said, still speaking in a loud +voice in the corridors, "to whom I have refused the appointment of some +mayor or the removal of some rural guard!" + +Warcolier, ever dignified, remarked in his usual style, that this manner +of defending himself probably lacked some of that nobility which becomes +a defeat bravely endured. + +Vaudrey had only one course open, to send in his resignation. He was +beaten, thoroughly beaten. He returned to the Hôtel Beauvau and after +preparing his letter he took it himself to the President at the Élysée. + +The President accepted it without betraying any feeling, as an employé +at the registry office receives any deed of declaration. Two or three +commonplace expressions of regret, a diplomatic shake of the hand, +expressive of official sympathy, that was all. Vaudrey returned to the +ministry and ordered his servants to prepare everything for leaving the +ministerial mansion. + +"When is that to be, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +"To-morrow," answered Vaudrey, to whom the title seemed ironical and +grated on his nerves. + +He caused himself to be announced to Adrienne. + +Adrienne, weary looking, was seated before a small desk writing, and +beneath her fair hair, her face still looked as white as that of a +corpse. + +"There is some news," Vaudrey said to her abruptly. "I am no longer +minister!" + +"Ah!" she said. + +Not a tremor, not a word of consolation. Three days previously, she +would have leaped to his neck and said: "How happy we shall be! I have +you back; I have found you again! What joy!" + +Again, she would have tried to console him had he been suffering. + +Now, she remained passive, frozen, indifferent to that news. + +"We shall leave the Hôtel Beauvau!" said Sulpice. + +"I am already preparing to leave," she replied. "My trunks are packed." + +"Will you do me the kindness of leaving here with me and of going back +to Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin with me?--After that, you can set out at +once for Grenoble. But let us have no sign of scandal. The world must be +considered." + +She had listened to him coldly, unmoved by his trembling voice. + +"That is proper," she said ironically. "The world must be thought of. I +will wait then before leaving." + +He was stupefied to find so much coldness and so unswerving a +determination in this woman, as gentle as a child--my _wife-child_, he +so frequently said to her of old. In her presence he felt ill at ease, +discontented, hesitating whether he should throw himself at her feet and +wring pardon from her, or fly from her and be with Marianne, perhaps +forever. But no, it was Adrienne, his poor, his dear Adrienne that he +would keep and love! Ah! if she pardoned him! If he had dared to kneel +at her feet, to plead and to weep! But this living corpse froze him, he +was afraid of her, of that gentle and devoted creature. + +He went downstairs again, saying to himself that he would take a hurried +dinner and then go to Rue Prony. + +He was, however, obliged to occupy himself in despatching the last +current business. He must hand over his official duties to his +successor. There was a mocking expression in these words: _his +successor!_ + +"After all, he will have one also!" + +He still had unexpected heartbreakings to experience. People to whom he +had promised appointments and decorations came, almost breathless, +suddenly stirred by the news, to entreat him to sign the nominations and +to prepare the decrees while he was _still_ minister. The ravens were +about the corpse. _Monsieur Eugène_, still bowing low, although not +quite so low as heretofore, endeavored to dismember Vaudrey the +Minister. He wanted a little piece, only one piece! A sub-prefecture of +the third class! + +He had already been informed at the Élysée that Granet was to be his +successor. _Parbleu!_ he expected it! But the realization of his fears +annoyed him. And who would Granet keep for his Secretary of State? +Warcolier, yes Warcolier, with the promise of giving him the first +vacant portfolio. + +"How correct was Ramel's judgment?" thought Sulpice. + +Vaudrey, with a sort of rage urging him, immediately set himself about a +task as mournful as a funeral: packing up. It now seemed to him that he +had just suffered a total overthrow. Books and papers were being packed +in baskets. Before he was certain of his fall, he thought it was +delightful to escape from so much daily bother, but now he felt as if he +were being discrowned and ruined. Ruin! It truly threatened him indeed +and held him by the throat. He had realized on many pieces of property +within the past year for Marianne! + +Adrienne, on the contrary, left this great cold hôtel of Place Beauvau, +as if she were leaving a prison, with a comforting sense of deliverance. +A bad dream was ended. She could lay down her official mask, weep at +ease, complain at will, fly to that Dauphiny where her youth was left. +She would leave to-morrow. Doctor Reboux awaited her in ignorance. + +After having given his first orders and arranged his most important +documents, Sulpice went out to walk to Marianne's. At first he wandered +along mechanically without realizing that he was going toward the quays, +almost fearing the interview with his mistress, now that he was only a +defeated man. He had nearly reached the Seine before he was aware of it. +He looked at his watch. + +Eleven o'clock. + +Marianne had been awaiting him for some time. + +He now followed, with the slow march of persons oppressed with a sense +of weariness, these deserted quays, that terrace on the bank of the +river, whose balustrades permitted glimpses of the silhouettes of +slender trees. He met no one. Upon the Place de la Concorde, still wet +with the scarce dried rain of this November night, as mild as an evening +in spring, permeated by a warm mist, he looked for a moment at the +Palace of the Corps Législatif, gloomy-looking and outlining its roofs +against the misty sky, whose gleams fell on the horizon with a bluish +tint, while upon the broad sidewalks, the jets of gas magnified the +reddened reflections with their own ruddy hues. Along the grand avenue +of the Champs-Élysées there were only two immense parallel rows of +gas-lamps and here and there, moving, luminous points that looked like +glow-worms. Vaudrey mechanically stopped a moment to contemplate the +scene. + +That did not interest him, but something within him controlled him. He +continued to walk unwittingly in the direction of Parc Monceau. The +solitude of the Champs-Élysées pleased him. While passing before an +important club with its windows lighted, he instinctively shuddered. +Through the lace-like branches of the trees, he looked at the green +shades, the lustres, the unpolished sconces, with the backgrounds of red +and gold hangings, and the great, gold frames, and he imagined that they +were discussing the causes of his defeat and the success of Granet. + +"They are speaking of me, in there! They are talking about my fall! He +is fallen! Fallen! Beaten!--They are laughing, they are making jokes! +There are some there who yesterday were asking me for places." + +He continued on his way without quickening his pace; the deserted café +concerts, as melancholy-looking as empty stages, the wreaths of +suspended pearl-like lamps illuminated during the summer months but now +colorless, seemed ironical amid the clumps of bare trees as gloomy as +cemetery yews, exhaling a sinister, forsaken spirit as if this solitude +were full of extinct songs, defunct graces, phantoms, and last year's +mirth. And Vaudrey felt a strangely delicious sensation even in his +bitterness at this impression of solitude, as if he might have been +lost, forgotten forever, in the very emptiness of this silent corner. + +Going on, he passed before the Élysée. + +A _sergent de ville_ who was slowly pacing up and down in front of an +empty sentry-box, his two hands ensconced in the sleeves of his coat, +the hood of which he had turned up, cast a sidelong glance at him, +almost suspiciously, as if wondering what a prowler could want to do +there, at such an hour. + +"He does not know whom he has looked at," he said. "And yesterday, only +yesterday, he would have saluted me subserviently!" + +The windows of the Élysée facing the street were still lighted up and +Vaudrey thought that shadows were moving behind the white curtains. + +"The President has not yet retired! He has probably received Granet! And +Warcolier!--Warcolier!" + +Before the large door opening on Faubourg Saint-Honoré, four lamps were +burning over the head of a Parisian guard on duty, with his musket on +his shoulder, the light shining on the leather of his shako. Some +weary-looking guardians of the peace were chatting together. At the end +of the court before the perron, a small, red carpet was laid upon the +steps and in front of the marquee faint lights gleamed. Vaudrey recalled +that joyous morning when he entered there, arriving and descending from +his carriage with his portfolio under his arm. + +He hurried his steps and found himself on Place Beauvau. His glance was +attracted by the grille, the hôtel, the grand court at the end of the +avenue. Sulpice experienced a feeling of sudden anger as he passed in +front of the Ministry of the Interior whose high grille, now closed, he +had many times passed through, leaning back in his coupé. He pictured +himself entering there, where he would never again return except as a +place-seeker like those eternal beggars who blocked its antechambers. He +still heard the cry of the lackey when the coachman crushed the sand of +the courtyard under the wheels of the carriage: "Monsieur le Ministre's +carriage!"--He went upstairs, the lackeys saluted him, the coupé rolled +off toward the Bois. + +Now, here in that vulgar mansion another was displaying himself, seated +on the same seats, eating at the same table, sleeping in the same bed +and giving his orders to the same servants. He experienced a strange +sensation, as of a theft, of some undue influence, of suffering an +ejectment by a stranger from some personal property, and this Granet, +the man sent there as he had been, by a vote, seemed to him to be a +smart fellow, a filibuster and an intruder. + +"How one becomes accustomed to thinking one's self at home everywhere!" +thought Vaudrey. + +He partially forgot the keen wound given to his self-love by the time +that he found himself close to Parc Monceau approaching Rue Prony. In +Marianne's windows the lights were shining. To see that woman and hold +her again in his arms, overjoyed, that happiness would console him for +all his mortifications. Marianne's love was worth a hundred times more +than the delights of power. + +Marianne Kayser was evidently waiting for Sulpice. She received him in +her little, brilliantly-lighted salon, superb amid these lights, in a +red satin robe de chambre that lent a strange seductiveness to her bare +arms and neck which shone with a pale and pearly lustre beneath the +light. + +Vaudrey felt infinitely moved, almost painfully though deliciously +stirred, as he always did when in the presence of this lovely creature. + +She extended her hand to him, saying in a singular tone that astonished +him: + +"_Bonjour, vous!_" + +"Well!" she said at once, pointing to a journal which was lying on the +carpet, "is there anything new?" + +"Yes," he said. "But what is that to me? I don't think of that when I am +near you!" + +"Oh! besides, my dear," Marianne continued, "your darling sin has not +been to think of two things at one time! I don't understand anything of +politics, it bothers me. I have been advised, however, that you have +been thrashed by that Granet!" + +"Thrashed, yes," said Sulpice, laughing, "you use peculiar phrases!--" + +"Topical ones. I am of the times! But it appears that one must read the +journals to learn about you. I am going to tell you some news however, +before it appears in print." + +"That interests me?" + +"Perhaps, but it most assuredly interests me!" + +"Important news?" asked Sulpice. + +"Important or great, as you will!" + +He nibbled his blond moustache nervously. + +Guy had not deceived him. + +"Then I think I know your news, my dear Marianne!" + +"Tell me!" she said, as she stretched herself on a divan, her arms +crossed, looking ravishingly lovely in her red gown. + +He sought some forcible phrase that would crush her, but he could find +none. His only desire was to take that fair face in his hands and to +fasten his lips thereon. + +Marianne smiled maliciously. + +"It is true then," Vaudrey exclaimed, "that you love Monsieur de +Rosas?" + +"There, you are well-informed! It is strange! Perhaps that is because +you are no longer a minister!" + +"You love Rosas?" + +"Yes, and I am marrying him. I have the honor to announce to you my +marriage to Monsieur le Duc José de Rosas, Marquis de Fuentecarral. It +surprises me, but it is so!--I have known days when I have not had six +sous to take the omnibus, and now I am to be a duchess! This does not +seem to please you? Are you selfish, then?" + +Stretched on her divan, her neck and arms sparkling under the light of +the sconces, she appeared to make sport of Vaudrey's stupefaction as he +looked at her almost with fright. + +"Now, my dear," she said curtly, but politely, as she toyed with a ring +on her finger, "this is why I desired to see you to-day. It is to tell +you that if you care to remain friendly on terms that forbid sensual +enjoyment, which is not objectionable in putting a lock on the past, you +may visit the Duchesse de Rosas just as you have Mademoiselle Kayser. +But if you are bent on finding in the Duchesse de Rosas the good-natured +girl that I have been toward you, and you are quite capable of it, for +you are a sentimental fellow, then it will be useless to even appear to +have ever known each other. I am turning the key on my life. _Crac! +Bonsoir_, Sulpice!" + +The unhappy man! He had cherished the thought of still visiting his +mistress, but he found there an unlooked-for being, a new creature, who +was unmistakably determined, in spite of her cunning charm, and she +spoke to him in stupefying, ironical language. + +"You would have me go mad, Marianne?" + +"Why! what an idea! The phrase is decidedly romantic.--You should +dispense with the blue in love as well as the exaggeration in politics." + +"Marianne," Vaudrey said abruptly, "do you know that for your sake I +have destroyed my home and mortally wounded my wife?" + +"Well," she replied, "did I ask you to do so? I pleased you, you pleased +me; that was quite enough. I desire no one's death and if you have +allowed everything to be known, it is because you have acted +indiscreetly or stupidly! But I who do not wish to mortally wound," she +emphasized these words with a smile--"my husband, I expect him to +suspect nothing, know nothing, and as you are incapable of possessing +enough intelligence not to play Antony with him, let us stop here. +Adieu, then, my dear Vaudrey!" + +She extended her hand to him, that soft hand that imparted an electrical +influence when he touched it. + +"Well, what!--You are pouting?" + +"I love you," he replied distractedly. "I love you, you hear, and I wish +to keep you!" + +"Ah! no, no! no roughness," she said with a laugh, as he, taking a seat +near her, tried to draw her to him in his arms. + +"To keep you, although belonging to another," whispered Vaudrey slowly. + +"For whom do you take me?" said Marianne, proudly drawing herself up. +"If I have a husband, I require that he be respected. A man who gives +his name to a woman is clearly entitled to be dealt with truthfully!" + +"Then," stammered Sulpice, "what?--Must we never see each other again?" + +"We shall recognize each other." + +"You drive me away?" + +"As a lover!" + +"Ah! stay," said Vaudrey, as, pale with anger, he walked across the +room, "you are a miserable woman, a courtesan, you understand, a +courtesan!--Guy has told me everything! You gave yourself to Jouvenet to +avenge yourself on Lissac, you made a tool of me and you are making a +sport of Rosas who is marrying you!--What have I not done for you!--I +have ruined myself! yes, ruined myself!" + +"My dear," interrupted Marianne, "see the difference between a gentleman +like Monsieur de Rosas and a little bourgeois like yourself. The duke +might have ruined himself for me but he would never have reproached me. +One never speaks of money to a woman. You are a very honest, domestic +man and you were born to worship your wife! You should stick to her! You +are not made of the stuff of a true-born lover. What you have just told +me is the remark of a loon!" + +"Ah! if I had only known you!" + +"Or anything! But I am better than you, you see. I was better advised +than you. The bill of exchange that you owe to the Dujarrier or to +Gochard,--whichever you like--it inconveniences you, I know!" + +"Yes," said Vaudrey, "but--" + +"You would not, I think, desire me to pay it with the duke's money, that +Monsieur de Rosas should pay your debts?" + +"Marianne," cried Sulpice, livid with rage. + +"Bless me! you speak to me of money? You chant your ruin to me! The _De +Profundis_ of your money-box, should I know that? I question with myself +as to what it means!--However, knowing you to be financially +embarrassed, I have myself found you help--Yes, I told someone who +understands how to extricate business men, that you were embarrassed!" + +"I?" + +"There is nothing to blush about. I told Molina the _Tumbler_--You know +him?" + +Did he know him! At that very moment he saw the ruddy gold moon that +represented the banker's face amid all the expanse of his shining flesh. +He trembled as if in the face of temptation. + +"Molina is a man of means," said Marianne. "If you need money, you can +have it there! And now, once more, leave me to my new life! The past is +as if it had never been!--_Bonjour, Bonsoir!_--and adieu, go!--Give me +your hand!" + +She smiled so strangely, half lying on the divan, and stretched out her +white hand, which he covered with kisses, murmuring: + +"Well, yes, adieu! Yes, adieu!--But once more--once!--this evening--I +love you so dearly!--Will you?" + +She quietly reached out her bare arm toward a silk bell-rope that she +jerked suddenly and Vaudrey rose enraged and humiliated. + +"Show Monsieur Vaudrey out," Marianne said to Justine, as she appeared +at the door. "Then you may go to bed, my girl!" + +Vaudrey left this woman's house in a fit of frenzy. She had just treated +him who had paid for the divan on which she was reclining as a genuine +duchess might have treated a man who had been insolently disrespectful +toward her. He was almost inclined to laugh at it. + +"It is well done! well done for you! Ah! the dolt! To trust a wanton! To +trust Warcolier! To trust everybody! To trust everybody except +Adrienne!--" + +He, mechanically and without thought, resumed the way to Place Beauvau, +forgetting that the ministerial home was no longer his. The porter--who +knows? might not have opened the gate to him. The lackeys would have +driven him off as the girl had done whom he had paid, yes, paid, paid! +For she was a harlot, nothing more! + +Gradually, the thought of that debt swelled by successive bills of +exchange, and almost forgotten during the recent days of feverish +excitement, took possession of his mind, he remembered that it must be +discharged on the first day of December, in five days, and the thought +troubled him like an impending danger. The prospect had often, during +the last few weeks, made him anxious. He saw the months pass, the days +flit with extraordinary rapidity, and the maturity, the inevitable due +date draw near with the mathematical regularity of a clock. So long as +months were ahead he felt no anxiety. Like gamblers he counted on +chance. Besides, he still had some farms in Dauphiny. In short, a word +to his notary and he could speedily get out of danger. Then, too, the +date of payment was far away. He calculated that by economy as to his +personal income and his official salary he could meet the bill to +Gochard, whose very name sometimes made him laugh. But Marianne's +exactions, unforeseen outlays, the eternal _leakage_ of Parisian life +had quite prevented saving, and had dissipated in a thousand little +streams the money that he wished to pay out in a lump in December. He +soon grew alarmed by degrees at the approach of the maturity of the +debt. He had written to his notary at Grenoble, and this old friend had +replied that the farms of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, mortgaged and cut up +one after another, now represented only a ridiculous value, but that +after all, Vaudrey had nothing to be concerned about, seeing that +Madame Vaudrey's fortune was intact. + +Adrienne's fortune! That then was all that remained to Vaudrey, and that +might be his salvation. A fortune that was not very considerable, but +still solid and creditable. But even if he were strangled by debt, +dunned and driven into a corner, could he pay the debts he had +contracted for his mistress by means of his wife's fortune? He was +disgusted at the thought. It was impossible. + +Vaudrey felt his head turn under the humiliation of his double defeat, +the loss of parliamentary confidence, and Marianne's insulting laugh, +and urged by the anxiety he felt about the obligation to be met in eight +days, in his bewilderment he thought of writing to Gochard of Rue des +Marais, to ask for time. This Gochard must be a half-usurer. Certain of +being paid, some day, he would perhaps be delighted to renew the bill of +exchange in inordinately swelling the amount. The letter was written and +Vaudrey mailed it himself the following morning. + +That very evening Adrienne was to leave. He endeavored to dissuade her +from her plan. She did not even reply to him. She stood looking at a +crystal vase on the chimney-piece in which were some winter roses, +Christmas roses, fresh and milk-white, that had been sent as a souvenir +from yonder Dauphiny. Her glance rested fixedly on that fair bouquet +that seemed like a bursting cloud of whiteness. + +"Then," said Vaudrey, "it is settled--quite settled--you are going?" + +"I am." + +"In three hours?" + +"In three hours!" + +"I know where those roses were gathered," said Sulpice tenderly. "It was +at the foot of the window where we leaned elbow to elbow and dreamed." + +"Yes," Adrienne answered, in a broken voice whose sound was like that +which might have been given out by the vase had it been struck and +shattered. "We had lovely dreams! The reality has indeed belied them!" + +"Adrienne!" he murmured. + +She made no reply. + +He tried to approach her, feeling ashamed as he thought that he had +similarly wished to approach Marianne. + +She instinctively drew back. + +"You remember," she said coldly, "that one day when we were speaking +about divorce, I told you that there was a very simple way of divorce? +It was never to see each other again, never, to be nothing more to each +other from the day on which confidence should die?--You have deceived +me, it is done. I am a stranger to you! If I were a mother, I should +have duties to fulfil. I would not have failed therein. I would have +endured everything for a son!--Nothing is left to me. I have not even +the joy of caressing a child that would have consoled me. I am your +widow while you yet live. Well, be it so. You have willed it, there, +then, is divorce!" + +For the third time since Adrienne had learned everything, he tried to +stammer the word _pardon_. He felt it was useless. This sensitive being +had withdrawn within herself and wrapped herself, as with a cloak, in +all her outraged chastity. He could only humiliate himself without +softening her. All Adrienne's deceived trustfulness and insulted love +strengthened her in her determination never to forgive. + +She would go. + +Vaudrey in despair returned to his study, where the books that had been +sent from the ministry were piled upon the carpet in all the confusion +attending an entry into occupation. The servant at once brought him his +lamp and handed him a package of cards in envelopes,--cards of +condolence as for a death--and a large card, saying: "That gentleman is +here!" + +"Molina!" said Vaudrey, becoming very pale. "Show him in!" + +The fat Salomon entered puffing and smiling, and spread himself out on +an armchair as he said to the former minister: + +"Well, how goes it?--Not too badly crushed, eh?--Bah! what is it after +all to quit office?--Only a means for returning to it, sometimes!" + +"All the same," he said with his cackling laugh that sounded like the +jingling of a money-bag, "there are too many changes of ministers! They +change them like shirts! It puts me out. I get used to one Excellency +and he is put aside! So it is settled, henceforth I will not say +Excellency save to the usher or an office-boy!" + +He accompanied his clumsy jests with a loud laugh, then, changing his +tone: + +"Come, that is not all. I came to speak of business to you." + +He looked Vaudrey full in the face with his piercing glance, took from +his pocketbook a printed sheet and said in a precise tone: + +"Here is an opportunity where your title of former minister will serve +you better than that of minister. So much is being said of Algeria, its +mines and its fibre. Well, read that!" + +Vaudrey took the paper. It was the prospectus, very skilfully drawn, of +a company established to introduce gas into Algeria, almost as far as +the Sahara. They promised the subscribers wonders and miracles: acres +upon acres of land as a bonus. There was a fortune to be made. Meantime, +they would issue six thousand shares of five hundred francs. It was +three millions they were asking from the public. A mere trifle. + +"They might ask ten," said Molina, smiling. "They would give it!" + +"And you wish me to subscribe to your Algerian gas?" asked Vaudrey. + +The fat Molina burst out into loud laughter this time. + +"I? I simply wish to give you the opportunity to make a fortune!" + +"How?" + +"That is one scheme. I will bring you four, five, ten of them! I have +another, the Luxemburg coal. A deposit equal to that of Charleroi. You +have only to allow me to print in the list of directors: Monsieur +Sulpice Vaudrey, former President of the Council." + +Vaudrey looked the fat man squarely in the face. + +"Besides you will be in good company!" said the banker as he read over +the names of deputies, senators, statesmen, coupled with those of +financiers. + +Sulpice knew most of them. + +He despised nearly all of them. It was such that Molina styled _good +company!_ + +"And those mines, are you certain they will produce what you promise?" + +"Ah!" said Salomon, "that is the engineers' matter! Here is the report +of a mining engineer who is perhaps straining after effect and doing a +little puffing up! But one must go with the times! He who ventures +nothing, has nothing. In war, one risks one's skin; in business, one +risks one's money. That is war." + +Vaudrey debated with himself whether he should tear the prospectus in +pieces and throw them in the face of the fat man. + +"My dear Vaudrey," said the _Tumbler_, "you have a vein that is +entirely your own. A former minister remains always a former minister. +Well, such a title as that is turned to account. It is quoted, like any +other commodity. You are not rich, that fact proves your honesty, +although in America, and we are Americanizing ourselves devilishly much, +that would only be the measure of your stupidity. You can become rich, I +have the means of making myself agreeable to you and you have the +opportunity of becoming useful to us." + +"In a word, you buy my name?" + +"I hire it from you! Very dearly," said Molina, still laughing. + +"Certainly," said Vaudrey, "you did not understand me on the first +occasion that you called on me to speak about money, and when I +questioned with myself whether I should ask you not to call again." + +Molina interrupted him abruptly by rising. He felt that an insult was +about to be uttered. He parried it by anticipating it. + +"Stupidity!" he said. "Here is the prospectus. There are the names of +the directors. You will consider. It has never injured any one to take +advantage of his position. The puritans, in an age of trickery, are +idiots; I say so. What I propose to you surprises you. To place your +name beside that of Monsieur Pichereau or Monsieur Numa de Baranville! +It is as simple as saying good-day. Perhaps you think then that you will +be the only one? They all do it, all those who are extravagant and +shrewd. It is a matter of coquetting in these days over a hundred-sou +piece! Come, I will wager that Monsieur Montyon would not mince +matters--especially if he had transferable paper in circulation!" + +"You know that?" said Vaudrey, turning pale. + +"Ah! I know many others in like condition! Come, no false modesty! It is +a matter of business only! I tell you again, I have many other cases. +All this is in order to have the pleasure of offering you certificates +for attendance fees. I will open a credit for you of two hundred +thousand francs, if you wish. We will arrange matters afterwards." + +"I will leave you these declarations of faith!" added Molina, showing +the prospectus of the gas undertaking. "Fear nothing! It is not more +untruthful than the others! It is unnecessary to show me out. _A la +revista!_" + +He disappeared abruptly, Vaudrey hearing the floor of the hall creak +under this man's hippopotamus feet, and the unhappy Sulpice who had spun +so many, such glorious and grand dreams, dreams of liberty, freedom and +virtue, civic regeneration, reconstructed national morals and character, +the sacredness of the hearth and the education of the conscience; this +Vaudrey, bruised by life, overthrown by his vices, was there under the +soft light of his lamp, looking with staring eye, as a being who wishes +to die contemplates the edge of an abyss, looking at that printed paper +soliciting subscriptions, beating the big drum of the _promoter_ in +order to entrap the vast and ever-credulous horde. + +His name! To put his name there! The name of Vaudrey that he had dreamed +of reading at the foot of so many noble, eternal and reforming laws, to +inscribe it upon that paper beneath so many cunning names, jugglers, +habitual drainers of the public cash-box. To fall to that! To do that! + +To lend himself? + +To sell himself! + +And why not sell himself? Who would discharge this bill of exchange? The +Gochard paper! The debt of the past! The price of the nights spent with +Marianne! The hundred thousand francs for that girl's kisses! + +Sulpice felt in the weakness increased by a growing fever, that his +self-possession was leaving him. All his ideas clashed confusedly. Amid +the chaos, only one clear idea remained; a hundred and sixty thousand +francs had to be found. Where were they to be found? Yes, where? Through +Molina, who offered him two hundred thousand! This open credit seemed to +him like an opened-up placer in which he had only to dig with his nails. +The cunning and thick voice of the Hebrew banker echoed in Sulpice's +ears: "They all do it!" It was not so difficult to give his name, or to +_hire_ it, as Salomon said. Who the devil would notice it at a time when +indifference passes over scandals as the sea covers the putrid +substances on the shore and washes them with its very scum? + +"They all do it!" + +No, despite the irony of the handler of money, there are some +consciences that refuse to yield: and then, what then?--Vaudrey had +desired virtue of a different kind and other morals! Ah! how he had +suffered the poison to penetrate him; even to his bones! How Marianne +had deformed and moulded him at her fancy, and he still thought of her +only with unsatisfied longings for her kisses and ardor! Ah! women! +Woman! Yes, indeed, yes, woman was the great source of moral weakness +and inactivity. She used politics in her own way, in destroying +politicians. If he had only left office with head erect and not dragging +the chain-shot of debt! But that bill of exchange! Who would pay that? + +"Eh! Molina, _parbleu!_ Molina! Molina!" + +He was right, too, that triumphant Jew with his insolent good humor. It +is an absurd thing, after all, to be prudish and to thrust away the dish +that is offered you. To be rich is, in fact, quite as good as to be +powerful! Money remains! That is the only real thing in the world! It +would be a fine sight to see a man refuse the opportunity to make a +fortune, and to refuse it--why? For a silly, conscientious scruple. And +after all, business was the very life of modern society. This Molina, +circulating his money, was as useful as many others who circulate +ideas. + +"His Algerian gas is a work of civilization just like any other!" + +Urged by the necessity of escaping from that debt that strangled him +like a running noose, Sulpice gradually arrived at argumentative +sophistries, which were but capitulations to his own probity, cowardly +arrangements with his own conscience. His name? Well, he would turn it +into money since it was worth a gold ingot! The journalist who sells his +thought, the artist who sells his marble, the writer who sells his +experiences and his recollections, equally sell their names and for +money, the flesh of their flesh. Like a living answer and a remorse, he +saw the lean face and white moustache of Ramel, who was seated at the +window, breathing the warm rays of the sun, in the little room on Rue +Boursault, but he answered, speaking aloud: + +"Well, what?--Ramel is a saint, a hero!--But I am no saint. I am a man +and I will live!" + +Somewhat angered, he took the prospectus that Molina had left him and +rereading it again and again, he relapsed into a sitting posture and +with haggard eyes scanned the loud-swelling lines of that commercial +announcement, seeking therein some pretext for accepting. For he would +accept, that was done. Nothing more was to be said, his conscience +yielded. He was inclined to laugh. + +"Still another victim caught and floored by Molina the _Tumbler!_" + +He remained there, terrified at the prospect of the quasi-association he +had determined on and by his complicity with a jobber of questionable +business. + +With his eye fixed upon this solicitation for capital, wherein were the +words which would formerly have repelled him: _joint stock company_, +_capital stock_, _public subscription_, _subscription certificate_, and at +the head of which he was about to inscribe his name as one of the +directors, at the foot of a capitulation, as it were, Sulpice had not +seen, standing in the doorway of his half-lighted study, a woman in +travelling costume, who stopped for a moment to look at the unfortunate, +dejected man within the shade of the lamp which made him look more bald +than he was, then advanced gently toward him, coughing slightly--for she +did not dare to call him by his name or touch him with her gloved +hand--to warn him that she was there. + +Vaudrey turned round abruptly, instinctively pushing aside Molina's +prospectus, as if he already felt some shame in holding it in his hands. + +He flushed as he recognized Adrienne. + +The young woman's reserved attitude showed absolute firmness. She came +to say adieu, she was about to leave. + +He had not even the energy to keep her. He was afraid of an unbending +reply that would have been an outrage. + +"Do you intend to become associated with Molina?" Adrienne asked in a +clear voice, as she looked at Sulpice, who had risen. + +"What! Molina?" he stammered. + +"Yes, oh! he understands business. On leaving, he called on me. He +thought that I had still sufficient influence over you to urge you, as +he says, to make your fortune. He told me that you were in want of +money, and after having been sharp enough to try the husband, he offered +me, as you might give a commission to a courtesan, I do not know what +emerald ornament, if I would advise you to accept his proposals!--That +gentleman does not know the people with whom he is dealing!" + +"Wretch!" said Vaudrey. "He did that?" + +"And I thanked him," Adrienne replied calmly. "I did not know that you +had debts and that, in order to pay them, you had come so near accepting +the patronage of such a man. He told me so and he rendered me and you a +service." + +"Me?" + +Vaudrey snatched up the prospectus of the Algerian gas and angrily tore +it in pieces. + +"We shall probably not see each other again," said Adrienne, in a firm +voice that contrasted strangely with her gentle grace; "but I shall +never forget that I bear your name and that being mine, I will ever +honor it." + +She handed Sulpice a document. + +"Here is a power of attorney to Monsieur Beauvais, my notary. All that +you need of my dowry to free yourself from liabilities is yours. I do +not wish to know why you have incurred debts, I am anxious only to know +that you have paid them, and my signature provides you with the means to +do so." + +Dejected, his heart burning, and his sobs rising, Sulpice uttered a loud +cry as he rushed toward her: + +"Adrienne!" + +She withdrew her hand slowly while he was trying to seize it. + +"You have nothing to thank me for," she said. "I am a partner, saving, +as I best can, the honor of the house. That association is better than +Molina's." + +"Adieu," she added bitterly. + +"Are you going--? Going away?" asked Sulpice, trying to give to his +entreaty something like an echo of the love of the former days. + +"Whose fault is it?" replied the young woman, in a voice as chilly as +steel. + +She was no longer the Adrienne of old, the little timid provincial with +blushing cheek and trembling gesture. Sorrow, the most terrible of +disillusions, had hardened and, as it were, petrified her. Vaudrey felt +that to ask forgiveness would be in vain. Time only could soften that +poor woman, obstinately unbending in her grief. He needed but to observe +her attitude and cutting tones to fully realize that. + +"It is quite understood," she continued, treating this question of her +happiness as if she were cutting deep into her flesh and severing the +tenderest fibres of her being, but without trembling,--"it is quite +understood, is it not, that we shall make no scene or scandal? We are +separated neither judicially nor even in appearance. We live apart by +mutual consent, far from each other, without anything being known by +outsiders of this definitive rupture." + +"Adrienne!" Sulpice repeated, "it is impossible, you will not leave!" + +"Oh!" she said. "I gave myself and I have taken myself back. Your +entreaties will not now alter my determination. I am eager to leave +Paris. It seems to me that I have regained myself and that I escape from +falsity, lies, and infamy, and from a swarm of insects that crawl over +my body!--I bid you farewell, and farewell it is!" + +"Well, let it be so!" exclaimed Vaudrey. "Go! But if it is a stranger +who leaves me, I will accept nothing from her. Here is the authority. +Will you take it back?" + +"I? No, I will not take it back! If you desire me to be worthy of the +name that you have given me, keep it honored, at least, in the sight of +the world, since to betray a woman, to mock and insult her, is not +dishonoring. I alone have the right to save you from shame. Do not deny +me the privilege that I claim. I do not desire that the man who has been +my husband should descend to the questionable intrigues of a Molina. +You have outraged me enough, do not impose this last insult on me!" + +"For the last time, adieu!" + +She went out, and he allowed her to disappear, overwhelmed by this +living mourning of a faith. She fled and he allowed her to descend the +stairway, followed by her femme de chambre. She entered the carriage +that was waiting for her below, in Rue Chaussée-d'Antin, but he had not +the courage, hopeless as he was, to follow the carriage whose rumbling +he heard above the noise of the street as it rolled away more quickly +and more heavily than the others, and it seemed to him that its wheels +had crushed his bosom. + +"Ah! what a wretch I have been!" he said as he struck his knee with his +closed fist. "How unhappy I am! Adrienne!" + +He rose abruptly, as if moved by a spring, and bounded toward a window +which he threw wide open to admit the cold wind of this November +evening, and tried to distinguish among the many carriages that rolled +through the brownish mud, with their lighted lamps shining like so many +eyes, to discover, to imagine the carriage that was bearing Adrienne +away. He believed that he recognized it in a vehicle that was threading +its way, loaded with trunks, almost out of sight yonder. + +He leaned upon the window-sill, and like a shipwrecked sailor who sees a +receding ship, he called out, with a loud cry lost in the tempest of +that bustling and busy street: + +"Adrienne! Adrienne!" + +No reply! The carriage had disappeared in the distance, in the fog. + +For a moment, Sulpice remained there crushed but drawn by the noise of +the street, as if by some whirlpool in the deep sea. Had he been thrown +out and been dashed upon the pavements, he would have been happy. Only a +void seemed about him, and before him that black hollow in which moved +confusedly only strangers who in no way formed part of his life. + +This isolation terrified him. At last, he went downstairs in haste, +threw himself into a carriage and had himself driven to the railway, +intending to see Adrienne again. + +"Quickly! quickly! at your best speed!" + +The driver whipped up his horses and the carriage-windows clattered with +the noise of old iron. + +Vaudrey arrived too late. The train had left twenty minutes before. He +had reflected too long at his window. + +"Besides," he said to himself sadly, "she would not have forgiven me! +She will never forget!" + +Buried in the corner of the coach that took her away, and closing her +eyes, recalling all her past life, so cruelly ironical to-day, Adrienne, +disturbed by the noise and rolling of the train that increased her +feverish condition, felt her heart swell, and poor, broken creature +that she was, called all her strength to her aid to refrain from +weeping, from crying out in her grief. She was taking away, back to the +country, the half-withered Christmas roses received from Grenoble, and +in the morbid confusion of the ideas that clashed in her poor brain, she +saw once more Lissac's blanched face and heard Guy tell her again: "It +is because you are a virtuous woman that I love you!" + +"A virtuous woman! Does he know how to love as well as the others?" she +murmured, as she thought of Vaudrey whom she would never see again, and +whom she no longer loved. + +"See! I am a widow now, and a widow who will never love anyone, and who +will never marry again." + + + + +VIII + + +Alone in Paris now, a body without a soul, distracted, and the prey of +ennui, with sad and bitter regret for his wasted life, repeating to +himself that Adrienne, far away from him, would never forgive, and was +doubtless, at this moment, saying and saying again to herself in her +solitude at Grenoble, that these politicians, at least, owed her +divorce, Vaudrey, not knowing what to do after a weary day of troubled +rest, mechanically entered the Opéra House to distract his eyes if not +his mind. + +They were rendering _Aida_ that evening, and a débutante had been +announced as a star. + +Sulpice Vaudrey, since Adrienne's departure,--already two weeks!--had +wandered about Paris like a damned soul when he did not attend the +Chamber, where he experienced the discomforts and the weakness of a +fallen man. Weary, disgusted and melancholy, Vaudrey took his seat in +the theatre to kill an evening. + +There was what was called in the language of a Paris editor, a _swell +house_. In front of the stage there was literally a shower of diamonds +and the boxes were gaily adorned. The _fauteuils_ were occupied by +Parisian glories and foreign celebrities. Not a stall in the +amphitheatre without its _celebrity_. Chance had placed in this +All-Paris gathering, Madame Sabine Marsy and Madame Gerson, the two +friends who detested each other. The pretty little Madame Gerson +occupied and filled with her prattle, the box of the Prefect of +Police--No. 30, in which Monsieur Jouvenet showed his churchwarden's +profile. She was talking aloud about her salon, her receptions, her +acquaintances. She was eclipsing Madame Marsy with her triumphs. At the +back of the box, Monsieur Gerson was sleeping, overcome by fatigue. +Madame Gerson laughed on observing Sulpice in the orchestra-stalls. + +"See! there is Monsieur Vaudrey! He still looks a little _beaten!_" she +said. + +And she told her friends, crowded in the box, leaning over her and +looking at the pretty, plump bosom of this little, well-made brunette, +how Vaudrey was to dine at her house on the very evening when he fell +from power. + +"Of course, he did not come!" she said. "I remember what Madame Marsy +advised me, one day,--she has passed through that in her time: one +should think of the invitations to dinner before dismissing a ministry! +Oh! it is tiresome; think of it!--One invites the Secretary of the +President of the Council to dinner. He is named on the card. He comes. +It is all over; he is no longer Secretary of the President, the +President of the Council is no longer President, there is no longer a +President, perhaps not even a Council; one should be certain of one's +titles and rank before accepting an invitation to dinner!" + +She laughed heartily and loud, and Madame Marsy, who was half dethroned, +fanned herself nervously in her box, or levelled her glass at some one +in the audience, affecting a little disdainful manner toward her fair +neighbor. A friendship turned to acid. + +Vaudrey, looking fatigued and abstracted, sat in his stall during the +entr'acte. He looked unconsciously about the theatre and still felt +surprised at not receiving salutations and bows, as formerly. He felt +that he was becoming a waif. Bah! he consoled himself with the thought +that the human race is thus constructed: everything is in success, he +gets most who offers most. Why then trouble about it? + +His eyes followed the movement of his glass and one after another he saw +Madame Marsy, Jouvenet, Madame Gerson, so many living and exceedingly +taunting recollections, when suddenly Sulpice trembled, shaken by a +keener and almost angry feeling as his glance was directed to a box +against the dark-red of which two faces were boldly outlined: those of +Rosas and Marianne. + +He was excited and unpleasantly piqued. + +There before him he saw, between two large pillars, bearing gigantic, +gilded masts that seemed to mock at him, the woman whom he had adored +and the sight of whom still tore his heart. Pale and dressed in a white +gown, she was leaning toward Rosas in a most adorable attitude, with her +fair hair half-falling on her white shoulders--those shoulders that he +still saw trembling under his kisses, those shoulders on which he might +have pressed his burning lips and his teeth. + +That livid beauty, strangely adorable, with her hair and ears dazzling +with jewels, stood clearly out against the background of the box in +which, like an enormous Cyclopean eye, appeared the round, ground glass +let into the door, forming a nimbus of light around Marianne's brow. +Paler than her, with a sickly but smiling countenance, Rosas showed his +bloodless, pale, Spanish face beside that of Marianne, as tragic looking +as a portrait by Coello. His tired-looking, pensive, thin face was +resting on his hand, which through the opera-glass looked a transparent +hand of wax, on which an enormous emerald ring flashed under the +gaslight. Monsieur de Rosas did not move. + +She, on the contrary, at times inclined toward him, bringing her mouth +close to the Castilian's ear, standing out against his reddish beard as +if detached therefrom, and she whispered to Rosas words that Vaudrey +surmised, and which caused a spark of feverish delight to lighten up +José's sad eyes. As she leaned back tilting her chair, her satin corsage +below the bust was hidden from Sulpice by the edge of the box and he saw +only her face, neck and white shoulders, and she seemed to him to be +quite naked, the lines of her serpentine body sharply marked by the red +line of the velvet border. And with his greedy glance he continued to +trace the curves of that exquisite torso, the back that he had pressed, +all the being moulded by voluptuousness, that had been his. + +This was the vanishing of his last dream! This love gone, this deception +driven into his heart like a knife, his last faith mocked at, insulted, +and branded with its true name, _folly_, he felt as if a yawning chasm +had been opened in him. Life was over! He was old now and he had wasted, +yes, wasted his happiness in playing at youth. He had believed himself +loved! Loved! Imbecile that he was! + +He felt himself urged by a strong temptation to go to that box and open +its door and cry out to that man who had not yet given his name to that +woman: + +"You do not know her! She is debauchery and falsehood itself!" + +It seemed to Vaudrey that at times a bearded face, surmounting a white +cravat, appeared behind Rosas and Marianne: the haughty face of Uncle +Simon. + +While the throng of Egyptians filed on the stage, Sulpice endeavored to +turn away his thoughts and remove his glances from that group that +attracted him. He still, however, looked at it, in spite of himself, and +voluntarily wounded his own heart. + +Marianne did not seem to have even noticed him. + +The curtain fell and he wandered into the wings, less to be there than +to escape that irritating sight. In breathing that atmosphere of a +theatre, he experienced a strange sensation that pained and consoled him +at the same time. The scene-shifters were rolling back the illuminating +apparatus pierced with light, and dragged to the rear the huge white +sphinxes and the immense canvas on which the palm-trees were outlined +upon a blue sky. Sulpice felt the cruelly ironical sensation of finding +himself, disheartened and defeated, once more on the very boards where +he had entered the first time, smiling, swelling with joy, saluting and +saluted and hearing on every side the same murmur, sweet as a May +zephyr: + +"Monsieur le Ministre." + +It was the same scene, the same dress-coats upon the same luminous +boards, the same electric rays that fell around him in the hour of his +accession, creating the same vulgar aureole. Some firemen crossed the +stage slowly and with a wearied expression made their examinations; some +water-carriers were sprinkling the parquet, while others were brushing +away the dust. And as if these common duties interested Sulpice, he +looked on with a vacant expression, as if his thoughts had taken wing. + +Suddenly, in the centre of a group, with his hat on, escorted by bending +men, whose lips expressed flattery, Sulpice recognized Lucien Granet, +who in the dazzling triumph of his new kingdom, crossed and recrossed +the stage, distributing here and there patronizing bows. + +The coarse Molina accompanied the new minister, laughing in a loud tone +like the sound of a well-filled cash-box suddenly shaken. + +Vaudrey felt just as if he had received a blow full in the chest. + +He recalled his own meeting as a successful man with Pichereau the +beaten one, on these very boards and almost in the same place, and in +order to avoid having to endure the friendly ironical hand-shake that +Pichereau was approaching him to give--the hand-shake formerly given to +Pichereau--he quickly hid himself behind a wing, receiving as he did so, +a blow, accompanied with a: _Pardon, monsieur_, from a workman who was +pushing along a piece of scenery, and a: _What a clumsy fellow!_ from a +little danseuse, the tip of whose pink slipper he had unwittingly grazed +with his heel. + +He turned to the danseuse to apologize, when he perceived a young girl, +all in pink, whose blue eyes looked frightened and her cheeks reddened +when she recognized Vaudrey. It was Marie Launay, whom he had seen in +the greenroom the previous year, who had not yet scored a _success_, +while he was _retired_. + +"Oh! I did not recognize you," she said. "I beg your pardon, Monsieur le +Ministre!" + +He wished to make some reply; but this title used by the young girl, +ignorant of the political change, grated on his heart like the +scratching of a nail and he saw on the other side of the stage, reaching +the house by the communicating door, Lucien Granet, surrounded by his +staff, and followed by the eternal cortége of powerful ones, among whom +Warcolier was talking loudly, and Molina the Tumbler was recognizable by +his enormous paunch and loud laugh. + +"Perhaps Madame Marsy has asked that this Granet be presented to her," +thought Vaudrey as he mockingly recalled how Guy de Lissac ran after him +there in order to conduct him to the fashionable woman's box. + +How long it was since then! + +Sabine Marsy was dethroned. And he!-- + +He felt a friendly tap on the shoulder as he was moving away, and +turning around he saw Warcolier who, having seen him in the distance, +doubtless came to him to enjoy the simple pleasure of treating him +patronizingly, he who had so long called him _Monsieur le Ministre_. + +"Well, my dear Vaudrey, what is the news?" said Warcolier, bearing his +head high and smiling with a silly, but an aggressively benign +expression, with the superior tone of satisfied fools. + +"Nothing!" said Sulpice. "I think Verdi's music is superb!" + +"Oh! a little Wagnerian," Warcolier replied, repeating what he had +heard. "But what of politics?" + +"Ah! politics concerns you now!" + +"Well! why," Warcolier replied, "that goes on well. There is a little +relaxation! a ministry more--more--" + +"More homogeneous!" said Vaudrey, in a slightly mocking tone. + +"Exactly. And, after all, the duty of every good citizen is to defend +the government under which we live." + +Ah! assuredly, Vaudrey considered that his former Secretary of State, +now become the vassal of Granet, displayed a rather ridiculous +assurance. He smiled as if he would have laughed in his face and turned +his back upon him. + +Warcolier was not annoyed, for he felt certain that he had angered the +former minister, and he was delighted. It was a kick from an ass. The +witticism of a fool. + +Vaudrey regained his place, much dissatisfied at having come and furious +at this pretentious imbecile, when, on leaving the wings, he ran against +Lissac who was entering a sort of hall where Louis sat writing the names +of the entrances on the sheet. + +Guy flushed slightly on seeing him. + +"In order to see you, one has to meet you here," said Sulpice. "Why have +you not called on me? Is it because I am no longer a minister?" + +"That would be a reason for seeing me more frequently," said Lissac. +"But it is not that. What do you want me to tell you? You know my +sentiments. I don't care to become a bore, as it is called, or a +ceaseless prater of morality, which is the same thing. Besides, morality +to me is something like the Montyon prize to a harlot! Then, too, I am +keeping in my corner and I shall stick to it hereafter closer than ever. +I have put the brake on. I am getting old, and I shall bury myself in +some suburb and look after my rheumatism." + +In Lissac's tone there was an unexpected melancholy. + +"Then you will not call on me again?" + +"What is the use of worrying you?--Reflect for yourself, my good man! +You don't need me to emphasize your blunders. By the way, you know, our +mad mistress?--She is in the theatre." + +"I have seen her!" said Vaudrey, turning very pale. + +"She is not yet a duchess, but that will be patched up in four days. If +one were only a rascal, how one could punish the hussy! But what is the +use? And this devilish Rosas, who is mad enough over her to tie himself +to her and to overlook everything he ought to know, would be capable of +marrying her all the same! Much good may it do him!" + +"But, tell me," continued Lissac, whose cutting tone suddenly became +serious, "have you read the paper?" + +"No! What is there in it?" + +They were then in the corridor of the Opéra, and heard the prelude to +the curtain-raising. Guy took the _Soir_ from his pocket and handed it +to Vaudrey: + +"Here, see!--That poor Ramel!--You were very fond of him, were you not?" + +"Ramel!" + +Vaudrey had no need to read. He knew everything as soon as Guy showed +him the paper and mentioned Denis's name in a mournful tone. + +Dead!--He died peacefully in his armchair near the window, as if falling +asleep.--"The death is announced," so read the paragraph, "of one of the +oldest members of the Parisian press, Monsieur Denis Ramel, who was +formerly a celebrated man and for a long time directed the _Nation +Française_, once an important journal, now no longer in existence."--Not +a word beyond the brief details of his death. No word of praise or +regret, merely the commonplace statement of a fact. Vaudrey thought it +was a trifling notice for a man who had held so large a place in the +public eye. + +"What do you think of it?" he said to Lissac. "People are ungrateful." + +"Why, what would you have? Why didn't he write operettas?" + +They parted after exchanging almost an ordinary grasp of the hand, +though, perhaps, somewhat sad. Sulpice wished to cast a last look at +Rosas's box. Marianne was standing, her outline clearly defined against +the brightly-lighted background of the box. She was holding a saucer in +her hand, eating an ice. He saw her once more as she stood near the +buffet at Madame Marsy's, stirring her sherbet, a silver-gilt spoon +smoothly gliding over her tongue. He closed his eyes, and with a nervous +start quickly descended the grand stairway, where he found himself +alone. + +In order to forget Marianne, he turned his thoughts to Ramel. + +Denis had been suffering for a long time. He smiled as he felt the hour +of his departure draw near. He wished to disappear without stir, and in +a civil way as he said, without attracting attention, _à l'Anglaise_. +Poor man! his wish was accomplished. + +Vaudrey threw himself into a carriage and was driven to Batignolles. On +the way he thought of the eternal antitheses of Parisian life: the news +of the death of a friend communicated to him at the Opéra while a +waltz-tune was being played! + +And thinking to himself: + +"_From the Opéra to the Opéra!_ That, moreover, is the history of my +ministry--and that of the Granet administration, probably!" + +The portress at Rue Boursault led him to Denis Ramel's apartment. Lying +on his bed with a kindly smile on his face, the old journalist seemed +as if asleep. The cold majesty of death gave a look of power to his +face. One might almost believe at times, from the scintillating light +placed near his bony brow, that its rigid muscles moved. + +Denis Ramel! the sure guide of his youth and his counsellor through +life! He recalled his entry on public life, his arrival in Paris, the +first articles brought into the old editorial rooms of the _Nation +Française_! If for a moment he had been one of the heads of the State, +it was due to the man stretched out before him now! + +He gently stooped over the corpse and pressed a farewell kiss on the +dead man's brow. + +As he turned round, he saw a man whom he had not at first seen and who +had risen. + +The man was very pale and greeted him with a timid air. + +Vaudrey recognized Garnier, the man whom he had seen previously at +Ramel's, a cough-racked, patient, dying man. + +The consumptive had nevertheless outlived the old man. + +"It is good of you to have come, monsieur," said the workman. "He loved +you dearly." + +"He died suddenly then?" + +"Yes, and quite alone, while reading a book. He was found thus. They +thought he was sleeping. It is all over, he is to be buried to-morrow. +Will you come, monsieur?--I did not know who you were when--you know--I +said--In fact, it is kind--let us say no more about it--I beg your +pardon--There will be a vast gathering at Denis Ramel's funeral, if +there are present only a quarter of those whom he has obliged." + +Vaudrey was heartbroken the next day. Behind Ramel's coffin, not a +person followed. Himself, Garnier, and one or two old women from the +house on Rue Boursault, who did not go all the way to the cemetery of +Saint-Ouen because it was too far, were all that were present. At the +grave Sulpice Vaudrey stood alone with the grave-digger and the workman +Garnier. They buried Ramel in a newly-opened part close to the foot of a +railway embankment. + +For years Ramel had been forgotten, had even forgotten himself, he had +let ambitious men pass beyond him, ingrates succeed and selfish men get +to the top! He no longer existed! And those very men who had entreated +him and called him _dear master_ in the old days, soliciting and +flattering him, now no longer knew his name. Had he disappeared, or did +he still live, that forerunner, a sort of Japanese idol, an ancient, a +useless being who had known neither how to make his fortune nor his +position, while building up that of others? Nobody knew or cared. +Occasionally when circumstances called for it, they laughed at this +romantic figure in politics, living like a porter, poor, lost, and +buried under a mass of unknown individuals, after having made ministers +and unmade governments. Yet, at the news of his death, not one of those +who were indebted to him for everything, not a single politician who was +well in the saddle, and for whom he had held the stirrup, not a comedian +of the Chambers or the theatre who had pleaded with him, urged and +flattered him, was to be found there to pay the most ordinary respects +of memory to the man who had disappeared. That fateful solitude, added +to a keen winter's wind, appeared to Sulpice to be a cruel abandonment +and an act of cowardice. Two men followed the cortége of that maker of +men! + +"Follow journalism and you make the fame of others," said Vaudrey, +shaking his head. + +"After all," answered Garnier, "there are dupes in every trade, and they +are necessarily the most honest." + +When this man, who had been a minister, left the grave above which the +whistling trains passed, a freezing rain was falling and he passed out +of the cemetery in the company of the poor devil who coughed so sadly +within the collar of his overcoat that was tightly drawn up over his +comforter. + +Before leaving him, Vaudrey, with a feeling of timidity, desired to ask +him if work was at least fairly good. + +"Thanks!" replied Garnier. "I have found a situation--And then--" he +shook his head as he pointed out behind the black trees and the white +graves, the spot where they had lowered Ramel--"One has always a place +when all is over, and that perhaps is the best of all!" + +He bowed and Vaudrey left in a gloomy mood. It seemed to him that his +life was crumbling away, that he was sowing, shred by shred, his flesh +on the road. The black hangings of Ramel's coffin--and he smiled sadly +at this new irony--recalled to him the bills of the upholsterers that he +still owed for the furnishing of that fête at the ministry on the last +day of his power and his happiness. The official decorations of Belloir +and the Gobelins were not sufficient for him. He had desired more modern +decorations. He gave the coachman the upholsterer's address, Boulevard +des Capucins. He hardly dared to enter and say: "I have come to pay the +account of the furnishing supplied at the ministry!" It still seemed +like a funeral bill he was paying. This upholsterer's account, paid for +forgotten display, seemed to him a sort of mortuary transaction. + +When he paid the upholsterer, the latter seemed to wear a cunning smile. + +On finding himself again outside, he felt a sensation of relief; being +cold, he was inclined to walk with a view to warming his chill blood. + +On hearing his name spoken by some one, he turned round and perceived +before him his compatriot Jéliotte, the friend of his childhood, the +comrade, who, with a smile, cordially extended his hands toward him. + +"I told you that you would always find me when I should not appear +before you as a courtier! Well, then, here I am," said Jéliotte. "Now +you may see me as much as you please!" + +"Ah!" said Vaudrey. + +Jéliotte took his arm. + +"Probably you are going to the Chamber?" + +"Yes, exactly." + +"Well, I will accompany you!--Ah, since you are no longer minister, my +dear friend, and that one does not appear to be a flatterer or a seeker +of patronage, one can speak to you--You have faults enough!--You are too +confident, too moderate--It is necessary to have a firm hand--And then +that could not last. Those situations are all very fine but they are too +easily destroyed!--They are like glass, my old friend!--A place is +wanted for everybody, is it not?--Bah! must I tell you?--Why, you are +happier! I like you better as it is!" + +Vaudrey felt strongly inclined to shake off this pretentious ninny who +was clinging to his arm. + +"That is like me!" continued Jéliotte. "I like my friends better when +they are down! What would you have? It is my generous nature. By the +way, do you know that the reason I have not seen you before is because I +have not been in Paris! I have returned from Isère!" + +"Ah!" said Vaudrey, thinking of Adrienne. + +"Well, you know, I have still some good news for you. If you have had +enough of politics, you can retire at the approaching election!" + +"How?" asked Sulpice. + +"Why, Thibaudier is stirring up Grenoble. He has got the whole city with +him. He is very much liked and is a model mayor. He is a very +_mère_--mother--that mayor!--Jéliotte laughed heartily, believing that +he was funny.--If there is a list balloted for, and there certainly will +be, Thibaudier will head the list. If they had maintained the _scrutin +d'arrondissement_, he would have been capable of passing muster, all the +same!" + +"Against me?" + +"Against you. Thibaudier is very popular!--And as firm as a rock!--He +thinks you moderate, too moderate, as everybody else does!" + +"He?--He was a member of the Plebiscite Committee under the Empire!" + +"Exactly! He is an extreme Republican, just as he was an extreme +Bonapartist. Oh! Thibaudier is a man, there is no concession with him. +Never! He is always the same. He will beat you. Moreover, in Isère, they +want a homogeneous representation--" + +"Again!" said Vaudrey, who felt that he was pursued by this word. + +After all, what did Thibaudier matter to him, or the deputation, the +election or politics? Denis Ramel had sounded its depths in his grave in +the cemetery of Saint-Ouen. + +"Let us drop Thibaudier. By the way," said Jéliotte, "I saw your wife at +Grenoble." + +Vaudrey grew pale. + +He again repeated: "Ah!" + +"She is greatly changed. She doesn't leave the house of her uncle, the +doctor, nor does she receive any one." + +"Is she sick, then?" + +"Yes, slightly." + +"And you are separated, then?" + +"No," replied Sulpice. + +Jéliotte smiled. + +"Ah! joker, I understand!--Your wife was too strict!--Bless me, a +provincial! Bah! that will come right! And if it doesn't, why, you will +be free, that's all! But, say, then, if you are not re-elected, you will +rejoin her at Grenoble. Oh! your clients will return to you. You are +highly esteemed as an advocate, but as a minister, I ought to say--" + +"I shall be re-elected," said Vaudrey, in a decisive tone, so as to cut +short Jéliotte's interminable phrases. + +He was exceedingly unnerved. This man's stupidity would exasperate him. +He would never come across any but subjects of irritation or +disheartenment. He felt inclined to seek a quarrel with some one. He +would have liked to wrench Marianne's wrist with his fingers. + +As he entered the hall leading to the assembly, he unwittingly stumbled +against a gentleman who was walking rapidly and without saluting him, +although he thought that he recognized him. + +"Yet I know him!" + +He had not gone three steps before he perfectly recalled this eternal +lobbyist, always bending before him and clinging to the armchairs of the +antechambers, like an oyster to a rock, and whom the messengers, +accustomed to his soliciting, bowing and scraping for years past, called +_Monsieur Eugène_--out of courtesy. + +It was too much! And, in truth, this strange fellow's impoliteness was +ill-timed. + +Sulpice suddenly turned round, approached Renaudin, and said to him +sharply: + +"You bowed more obsequiously to me a short time since, monsieur! It +seems to me that you were in the ministerial antechambers every +morning!" + +He expected a haughty reply from Renaudin, and that this man would have +compensated him for the others. + +_Monsieur Eugène_ smiled as he answered: + +"Why, I am still there, monsieur!" + +Vaudrey looked at him with a stupefied air, then in an outburst of +anger, as if he conveyed in the reply that he hurled at this +contemptible fellow, all the projects of his future revenge upon the +fools, the knaves, the dull valets and the ungrateful horde, he said, +boldly: + +"Well, you will salute me again, for I shall return there." + +He turned on his heels away from this worthless fellow, and entered the +Chamber. + +He heard an outburst of bravos; a perfect tempest of enthusiasm reached +him. He looked on and bit his lips. + +Lucien Granet was in the tribune, and the majority were applauding him. + + + + +IX + + +Marianne Kayser had the good taste, and perhaps the good sense not to +desire a solemnized marriage. It mattered little to her if she entered +her duchy surreptitiously, provided she was sovereign there. She would +have time later to assume a lofty air under her ducal coronet; +meanwhile, she would act with humility while wearing the wreath of +orange blossoms. She had discharged Jean and Justine with considerable +presents, thinking it undesirable to keep any longer about her people +who knew Vaudrey. She had advised Justine to marry Jean. + +"Marriage is amusing!" she had said. + +"Madame is very kind," answered Justine, "but she sees, herself, that it +is better to wait sometimes. There is no hurry, one does not know what +may happen." + +The future duchess showed that she was but little flattered by the +girl's reflections. It was scarcely worth while not to put on airs even +with servants, to meet such fools who become over-familiar with you +immediately. So, in future, she would strive to be not such a +kind-hearted girl. She would keep servants at a distance. They would +see. Meanwhile, she was delighted to have made a clean sweep in the +house, she could now lie to Rosas as much as she pleased. + +Besides, the duke, who was madly in love and whose desire was daily +whetted by Marianne, would have been capable, as Lissac said, of +accepting everything and forgetting all, so that he might clasp the +woman in his arms. She held him entirely in her grasp, under the +domination of her intoxicating seductiveness, skilfully granting by a +kiss that kindled the blood in José's veins the promise of more ardent +caresses. In this very exercise, she assumed a passionate tenderness +like a courtesan accustomed to easy defeat who resists her very +disposition so that she may not be too soon vanquished. She had +ungovernable impulses that carried her toward Rosas as to an unknown +pleasure. + +The ivory-like pallor of this red-haired man with sunken eyes and +trembling lips, almost cold when she sought them under his tawny +moustache, pleased her. She sometimes said to him that under his gentle +manner he had the appearance of a tiger. "Or of a cat, and that pleases +me, for I am myself of that nature. Ah! how I love you!" She felt +herself tremble with fear of that being whom she felt that she had +conquered and who was entirely hers, but she was strangely troubled in +divining some of his secret thoughts. + +She was in a hurry to have the marriage concluded. Secretly if it were +desired, but legally and positively. She dreaded José's reawakening, as +it were. She did not know how, perhaps an anonymous letter, a chance +meeting with Guy, an explanation, who knows? + +"Although, after all," she thought, "I have been foolish to trouble +myself about this Guy. Word threats, that's all!" + +The duke had treated her as a virtuous girl, requiring her to declare +that she had never loved any but him, or that, at least, no living +person had the right to say that he had possessed her. She had sworn all +that he desired, saying to Uncle Kayser: "Oaths like that are like +political promises, they bind one to nothing!" + +The uncle began to entertain an extravagant admiration for his "little +Marianne." There is a woman, sure enough! Wonderful elegance! She had +promised to have a studio built for him, in which he could, instead of +painting, take his ease, stretched on a divan, smoking his pipe, and +pass his days in floating to the ceiling his theories of high and moral +art! An ideal picture! + +He also was in favor of prompt action in respect to the marriage. As +little noise as possible. The least hitch and all was lost. What a pity! + +"Do you wish me to tell you? It seems to me that you are walking to the +mayor's office on eggs!" + +"Be easy," Marianne replied, laughing heartily, "there will be none +broken." + +The marriage was celebrated. At last! as Kayser said. It was a formality +rather than a ceremony. Marianne, ravishingly beautiful, was exultant at +realizing her dream. Her pale complexion took on tints of the bloom of +the azalea pierced by the rays of the sun. Never had Rosas seen her so +lovely. How stupidly he had acted formerly in yielding to appearances +and flying from her, instead of telling her that he loved her. He had +lost whole years of love that he would never recover, even in the +blissful fever of this union. Those joys, formerly disdained, were, +alas! never to be restored. + +Ah! how he would love her now, adore her and keep her with him as his +living delight! They would travel; in three days they would set out for +Italy. The baggage already filled the house in the Avenue Montaigne, +their nuptial mansion. Marianne would take away all the souvenirs that +she had preserved in the grisette's little room at Rue Cuvier, where +Rosas had so often seen her and where he had said to her: "I love you!" + +"People took their pénates," she said, "but I take my fetishes!" + +Rosas was wild with joy. The possession of this woman, sought after as +mistress, but more intensely ardent than a mistress, with her outbursts +of tears and kisses, threw him into ecstasies and possessed him with +distracting joy. Something within him whispered, as in the days of early +manhood, at the ecstatic hour of sunrise. Already he wished to be on +the way to Italy with Marianne, far from the mire and mists of Paris. + +"These rain-soaked sidewalks on which the gaslight is reflected seem +gloomy to me," he said. "Let us seek the blue skies, Marianne, the +orange groves of Nice, the stars of Naples." + +She smiled. + +"The _blue_ again!" she thought. "They all desire it, then?" + +She desired to remain a few days longer in Paris, delighted to proclaim +her new name in its streets, its Bois and its theatres, where she had +been known in her sadness, displaying her desperate melancholy. It +seemed to her that, in her present triumph, she crushed both men and +things. What was Naples to her? She had not miserably dragged her +disillusions and her angers along the Chiaja. Florence might take her +for a duchess, as well as any other, but Paris, every corner of which +was familiar to her, and where every scene had been, as it were, a frame +for her follies, her hopes, her failures, her heartbreaks, her +deceptions, all her sorrows of an ambitious woman, which had made her +the daring woman that she was,--those boulevards, those paths about the +Lake, those proscenium boxes at the theatre, she would see them in her +triumph, as she had seen them in her untrammelled follies or in the +moments of her ruin and abandonment. + +"Two days more! One day more," she said. "After the first +representation at the Variétés, we will leave, are you willing?" + +"Ah! you Parisienne! Hungry Parisienne!" José replied. + +She looked at him with her gray eyes sparkling, and smiling. + +"The Variétés?--Don't you know the old rondel?--The one you hummed when +you were sick, you know?--It seems to me that I can hear it yet: + + Do you see yonder + That white house, + Where every Sunday + Under the sweet lilacs--" + +Uncle Kayser, ever prudent, advised a speedy departure. He feared he +scarcely knew what. He feared everything, "like Abner, and feared only +that." Every morning he dreaded seeing some indiscreet articles in the +papers respecting the Duke and the Duchesse de Rosas. + +"These journalists disregard, without scruple, the wall of private life! +It is a moral wall, however!" + +At last, they would leave in two days, so it was determined. Rosas had +wished to see Guy again for the last time. At Rue d'Aumale they informed +him that Monsieur de Lissac was travelling. The shutters of the +apartment were not, however, closed. The duke had for a moment been +tempted to insist on entering; then he withdrew and returned home +without analyzing too closely the feeling of annoyance that came over +him. The weather was splendid and dry. He returned on foot to Avenue +Montaigne, where he expected to find Marianne superintending her trunks. + +On entering the house, the doors of which were open, as at the hour of +packing and removing, giving the whole house the appearance of neglect +and flight, he was astonished to hear a man's voice, which was neither +that of Simon Kayser nor that of the valet, and evidently answering in a +violent tone the equally evident angry voice of Marianne. + +He did not know this voice, and the noise of a bell-rope hastily pulled, +in a fit of manifest anger, made him quicken his steps, as if he +instinctively felt that the duchess was in danger. + +In the shadow of a dull December evening, the house, with its disordered +appearance that resembled a sacking, assumed a sinister aspect. José +suddenly felt a sentiment of anguish. + +He quickly reached the salon, where Marianne was in a robe de chambre of +black satin, and was standing near the chimney with an expression of +anger in her eyes, holding the bell-rope, whose iron chain had struck +against the wall. + +Before her stood a young man with a heavy moustache, his hat tilted over +his ear, whom Monsieur de Rosas did not know. + +His manner was insolent and he looked thick-set in his black, +close-buttoned frock-coat. His style was vulgar, and, with his hands in +his pockets, he appeared both low and threatening. + +Marianne rang for a servant. She was flushed with rage. She became livid +on seeing José. + +"What is the matter, then?" asked Rosas coldly, as he stepped between +the duchess and the man. + +The man looked at him, took off his hat, and in a loud voice that was +itself odoriferous, said: + +"You are Monsieur le Duc de Rosas, doubtless?" + +"Yes," said José, "and may I know--?" + +"Nothing! it is nothing!" cried Marianne, running hastily to José and +taking his hands as if she desired to drag him away. + +"How, nothing?" the man then said, as he took a seat, holding his hat in +his hand and placing his fist on his left hip, in the attitude of a +fencing-master posing for an elegant effect. "To treat a gentleman as +you have just treated me; you call that nothing?" + +He turned to Rosas and said, as he saluted him with the airs of a _sub. +off._ on the stage: + +"Adolphe Gochard! You do not know me, Monsieur le duc?" + +"No," said José. + +"What do you want?--" + +"Ah! pardon me," said Gochard, as he interrupted Marianne. "You rang, +you wished to have the presence of the servants. You threatened to have +me pitched out of the door by the shoulders. Since you have called, +they shall hear me." + +The servants, hurrying to the spot, now appeared in the indistinct +shadow of the doorway. + +"Be off!" cried Marianne. + +"Why?" asked the duke severely, and astonished. + +"Because madame prefers that I should only tell you what I have to say +to you," said Gochard. "Ah! you claimed that I wanted to extort +blackmail. I, an old brigadier, extort blackmail? Well, so let it be! +Let us sing our little song!" + +"Monsieur," said the duke, who had become pallid and whose clenched +teeth showed beneath his red beard, "I do not know what Madame la +Duchesse de Rosas has said to you, or what you have dared to say to her, +but you will leave this place instanter!" + +"Is that so?" said the man, as he shrugged his shoulders, which were +like those of a suburban bully. + +"Just so!" + +"That would surprise me!" said Gochard. "But, _saperlipopette_, you are +not very polite in your set!" + +"Not very polite with boors! You are in my house!" + +"Oh! you can't teach me where I am!" said the Dujarrier's lover, with a +wink of his eye. "But, madame has been perching at my cost for a long +time at Rue Prony and it is upon my signature, yes, my own signature, if +you please, that she has obtained the means of renting the Hôtel Vanda. +She has not so much to be impudent about!" + +"Your signature?--The Hôtel Vanda?" + +The duke looked at Marianne, who, as white as a corpse, instead of +becoming indignant, entreated and tried to lead her husband away from +this man, as if they were in the presence of grave danger. + +"Ah! bless me!" cried José, "you will explain to me--!" + +"That is very easy!--I was in want of money. The Dujarrier furnished me +with a little for that affair. She is too niggardly. I ask madame for +some. She assumes a haughty tone, and, instead of comprehending that I +come as a friend, she threatens to have me put out of doors. Blackmail! +I?--I?--What nonsense!" + +A friend! This man dared to say before her who bore the name of Duchesse +de Rosas that he came to her as an intimate. This alcoholic braggart had +assisted Marianne in sub-renting, he knew not what hôtel, from a +wanton!--Rue Prony!--Vanda!--What was there in common between these +names and that of the duchess? And the Dujarrier, that Dujarrier whose +manner of living was known to the Castilian, how had she become +associated with Marianne's life? + +Ah! since he had commenced, this Gochard would make an end of it. He +would tell everything! Even if he did not wish it, he would speak now. +Rosas, frightened himself, and terrified at the prospect of some +unknown baseness and doubtful transaction, felt Marianne's hand tremble +in his, and by degrees, as Gochard proceeded, the duke realized that +Marianne wished to get away and it was he who now retained her; holding +the young woman's wrist tightly within his fingers, he forcibly +prevented her from escaping, insisting that she should listen and hear +everything. + +"Ah! if you think that I am afraid of speaking," said Gochard, "you will +soon see!" + +And then with a sort of swaggering air like that of a fencing-master or +tippler, searching for some droll expressions, cowardly avenging himself +by jests ejected like so many streams of tobacco, against this woman who +had just insulted him, who spoke of blackmail and the police, and of +thrusting the miserable fellow out of doors, he told everything that he +knew; Marianne's neediness, her weariness, her loves, the Dujarrier +connection, the renting of the Hôtel Vanda, the Vaudrey paper and its +renewals, his own foolishness as a too artless and tender, good sort of +fellow, relying on Claire Dujarrier's word, and not reserving to himself +so much per cent in the affair! + +Rosas listened open-mouthed, his ears tingling and his blood rushing to +his temples, while he sunk his fingers into Marianne's arms, she, +meanwhile, glaring at Gochard. + +When he had finished, she disengaged herself from Rosas's clutch by an +extreme effort, and ran to the rascal and spat in his face. + +He lifted his hand to her and said: + +"Ah! but!--" + +"Begone!" said the duke. "You wish to be paid?" + +"The money is not all. I demand respect!" replied Gochard, as he wiped +his cheek. + +He placed his card on the mantelpiece. + +"Adolphe Gochard! there is my address. Besides, Madame knows it. With +the pistol, the sabre, or the espadon, as you please! I am afraid of no +one." + +"You will be paid, you have been told, you shall be paid!" cried +Marianne, absolutely crazy and ready to tear him with her nails. "Be +off! ruffian! begone, thief!" + +"Fiddle-faddle!" replied Adolphe, as he replaced his hat on the side of +his bald head. "I have said what I have to say. I do not like to be made +a fool of!" + +He disappeared, waddling away like a strolling player uncertain of his +exit. + +Rosas did not even see him go. + +He had seized Marianne by both hands and was dragging her toward the +window, through which the daylight still entered, and convulsed with +rage he penetrated her eyes with his glance, his face looking still more +pallid, in contrast with his red beard. + +She was terrified. She believed herself at the point of death. She felt +that he was going to kill her. + +She suddenly fell on her knees. + +He still looked at her, leaning over her with the appearance of a +madman. + +"Vaudrey?--Vaudrey? The man whom I saw at your uncle's?--The man whom I +have elbowed with you?--Vaudrey?--This man was your lover, then?" + +She was so alarmed that she did not reply. + +"You have lied to me, then? But, tell me, wretched woman, have you not +lied to me?" + +"I loved you and I desired you!" said Marianne. + +"Nonsense!" said Rosas, in a strident, deep-chested voice. "You wanted +what that rascal wanted: money! You should have asked me for it! I would +have given you everything, all my fortune, all! But not my name! Not my +name!" + +He roughly repelled her. + +She remained on her knees. Her hands hung down and rested on the carpet. +She looked at it stupefied, hardly distinguishing its rose pattern. + +She was certain that she was about to die. José's sudden anger had the +fitfulness of a wild beast's. He crushed her with a terrible glance from +his bloodshot eyes. + +Then he began to laugh hysterically, like a young girl. + +"Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!--In a wanton's house yonder in Rue Prony, at +Vanda's! Vanda's! At Vanda's, in a harlot's bed, she gave herself, sold +herself!--A Rosas, for she is a Rosas! A Duchesse de Rosas now! Idiot! +Idiot that I am!" + +Marianne would have spoken, entreated, but fear froze her, coming over +her flesh and through her veins. She realized that an implacable +resolution possessed this trusting man. She found a master this time. + +"José!" said Marianne softly, in a timid voice. + +He drew himself up as if the mention of this name were an insult. + +"Come!" he said calmly, "so let it be. What is done, is done. So much +the worse for the fools! But listen carefully." + +This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame. + +His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists. + +"You are called the Duchesse de Rosas?--You were ambitious for that +name, you eagerly desired and struggled hard for that title, did you +not? Well, I will not, at least, suffer you to drag it like so many +others into intruders' salons, under ironical glances, before mocking +smiles and lorgnettes, in view of the papers, and into the gossip of the +Paris whose gutter-odor tempts you so strongly that you have not yet +been able to leave it. _Parbleu!_ you have another lover in it, I +wager!--Vaudrey!--Or Lissac and many others!--Is it as I say?" + +"I swear to you--" + +"Ah! you have lied to me, do not swear! We are about to leave. Not for +Italy. It is good for those who love each other. You do not know +Fuentecarral?--You are about to make its acquaintance. It is your +château now. Yours, yours, since you are a Rosas!" + +He again broke into laughter, such as a judge might indulge in who +should mock at a condemned man. + +"We are about to leave for Toledo. You asked me, one day, about the +castle in which I was born. It is a prison, simply a prison. It is +habitable nevertheless. But when one enters it, one rarely leaves it. +The device that you will bear is not very cheerful, but it is eloquent, +you know it: _Hasta la muerte!_--"Until death!"--What do you say about +it?--We shall be at Toledo in three days. There are Duchesses de Rosas +who will look on you, as you pass, over their plaited collars, and as +there were neither adulteresses nor courtesans among them, they will +probably ask what the Parisian is doing among them. Well, I will answer +them myself, that she is there to live out her life, you understand, +there, face to face with me, as you have _desired_, as you said, and no +one will have the right to sneer before the Duc de Rosas, who will see +no one. Oh! yes, I know that I belong to another period! I am +ridiculous, romantic!--I am just that!--You have awakened the half-Arab +that lurks in the Castilian. So much the worse for you if you have made +me remember that I am a Rosas!" + +She remained there, thunderstruck, hearing the duke come and go, his +heels ringing in spite of the muffling of the carpet, like the heels of +an armed man. + +At times, when he passed quite close to her, his attenuated shadow was +cast at full length over her and she was filled with terror. + +She experienced a feeling of fear, as if she were before an open tomb, +or that a puff of damp air chilled her face, or that she was suddenly +enveloped by the odor of a cellar. She shuddered and wished to plead +with him, murmuring: + +"Pity!--Pardon!--" + +"Madame la duchesse," Rosas replied coldly, "I am one of those who may +be deceived, no one is beyond the reach of treason; but I am not one of +those who pardon. I have been extremely foolish, ridiculous, credulous! +So much the worse for me! So much the worse for you! Rosas you are, +Rosas you will be! I have been your victim, eh? Exactly, that is +admitted: you shall be mine! Nothing could be juster, I think! I wish no +scandal resulting from a lawsuit or the notoriety of one or more duels. +I should become ridiculous in the eyes of others. But in my own and your +eyes, I do not propose to be! I did not desire to be your lover, I have +hardly been your husband. Now I am your companion forever. _Hasta la +muerte!_ For me, the cold of an Escurial has no terror. I am accustomed +to it. If it makes you quake, whose fault is it? You willed it. A double +suicide! We leave this evening!" + +"This evening!" repeated Rosas, terribly, while Marianne, terrified, +felt stifled under the crushing weight of that name: _Duchesse de +Rosas!_ + +Simon Kayser came to dine. He was deeply moved when he learned that the +housekeeping was upset. + +What! the devilish duke knew all then? + +And he has taken the matter up in a dramatic fashion? + +"Folly!" + +"It is a serious matter, all the same!" said the uncle, after debating +with himself as to where he should dine. "He will break her heart as he +said, immured yonder within his four walls!--Ah! it was hardly worth +while to handle her affairs so cleverly for a Gochard to come on the +scenes and spoil everything, the rascal! For myself, I pity the little +Marianne!--Her plan of battle was excellently arranged, well disposed +and admirably put together! It was superb! And it failed!--Come, it +amounts to this in everything: it is said that the pursuit of a great +art is to ply the trade of a dupe! Destiny lacks morality! We should +perhaps be happier, both, if she were simply a _cocotte_ and I engaged +in photography!--But!" the brave fellow added: "one has lofty ideas, +as-pi-ra-tions, or one has not!--One cannot remake one's self when one +is an artist!" + +PARIS, 1880-1881. + + + * * * * * + +_This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame._ + +_His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists._ + +[Illustration: MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT] + + + + +List of Illustrations + + PAGE + +IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA _Fronts._ + +VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS 216 + +SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE 272 + +THE BANQUET 376 + +MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT 544 + + +[Transcriber's Note: Illustrations have been moved to appropriate +positions.] + +[Transcriber's Note: The following apparent misprints have been +corrected for this electronic edition: + +"antechamber"--from "ante-chamber" +"knickknacks"--from "knick-knacks" +"of the Opéra house"--from "of the Opera house" +"wings of the Opéra"--from "wings of the Opera" +"wrote Monsieur J.-J. Weiss in the Journal des Débats"--from "Debats" +"The President awaited at the Élysée"--from "Elysée" +"above all, my dear Vaudrey, do not fear to appear"--from + "Vaudrey, "do not fear" +"He shut his eyes to picture Marianne."--from ""He shut his eyes" +"asserting the virginity of his efforts"--from "assertting" +"There was a council to be held at the Élysée"--from "Elysée" +"he took it himself to the President at the Élysée."--from "Elysée" +"He had already been informed at the Élysée"--from "Elysée" +"Along the grand avenue of the Champs-Élysées"--from + "Champs-Elysées" +"The solitude of the Champs-Élysées pleased him."--from + "Champs-Elysées"] + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's His Excellency the Minister, by Jules Claretie + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + +***** This file should be named 15934-8.txt or 15934-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/9/3/15934/ + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: His Excellency the Minister + +Author: Jules Claretie + +Translator: Henri Roberts + +Release Date: May 29, 2005 [EBook #15934] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + + + + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<p class="frmatter">THIS EDITION</p> +<p class="center">DEDICATED TO THE HONOR OF THE</p> +<p class="frmatter">ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE</p> +<p class="center">IS LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND NUMBERED AND REGISTERED +SETS, OF WHICH THIS IS</p> + +<p class="center">NUMBER <span style="text-decoration: underline;">358</span><br /><br /><br /></p> + + +<p class="frmatter">THE ROMANCISTS</p> +<p class="frmatter">JULES CLARETIE</p> +<p class="center">HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER<br /><br /><br /><a name="Page_fronts" id="Page_fronts"></a></p> + + +<p class="frmatter">BIBLIOTHÈQUE +DES CHEFS-D'ŒUVRE +DU ROMAN +CONTEMPORAIN</p> + +<hr style="width: 20%;" /> +<p class="frmatter"><i>HIS EXCELLENCY +THE MINISTER</i></p> +<hr style="width: 20%;" /> + +<p class="frmatter">JULES CLARETIE</p> +<p class="center">OF THE ACADÉMIE FRANÇAISE</p> + +<p class="center"><br /><br /><br />PRINTED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY BY</p> +<p class="center" style="font-variant: small-caps;">GEORGE BARRIE & SONS, Philadelphia<br /><br /></p> +<p class="center" style="font-size: smaller;">COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY G.B. & SON</p> + +<p class="center"><br /><br /><br /><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i"></a>THIS EDITION OF</p> +<p class="frmatter">HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER</p> +<p class="center">HAS BEEN COMPLETELY TRANSLATED</p> +<p class="center">BY</p> +<p class="frmatter">HENRI ROBERTS</p> + +<p class="center"><br /><br />THE ETCHINGS ARE BY</p> +<p class="frmatter">EUGENE WALLET</p> +<p class="center"><br /><br />AND DRAWINGS BY</p> +<p class="frmatter">ADRIEN MARIE<br /><br /></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><a name="TOC" id="TOC" ></a></p> +<div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><table border="0" cellpadding="5%" summary="Table of Contents" title="Table of Contents" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right:auto; font-variant: small-caps;"> +<tr><td colspan="5"><a href="#TO_ALPHONSE_DAUDET">To Alphonse Daudet</a></td> +<td colspan="4"><a href="#PREFACE">Preface</a></td> +</tr> +<tr><td><a href="#PART_FIRST">Part First</a></td> +<td><a href="#I">I</a></td> +<td><a href="#II">II</a></td> +<td><a href="#III">III</a></td> +<td><a href="#IV">IV</a></td> +<td><a href="#V">V</a></td> +<td><a href="#VI">VI</a></td> +<td><a href="#VII">VII</a></td> +<td><a href="#VIII">VIII</a></td> +</tr> +<tr><td><a href="#PART_SECOND">Part Second</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_I">I</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_II">II</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_III">III</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_IV">IV</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_V">V</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_VI">VI</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_VII">VII</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_VIII">VIII</a></td> +<td><a href="#II_IX">IX</a></td> +</tr> +<tr><td colspan="9"><a href="#List_of_Illustrations">List of Illustrations</a></td> +</tr></table></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="TO_ALPHONSE_DAUDET" id="TO_ALPHONSE_DAUDET"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h2><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii"></a><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii"></a>TO ALPHONSE DAUDET</h2> + + +<p>My dear friend,</p> + +<p>Ideas sometimes float about in the air like the pollen of flowers. For +years past I have been at work collecting notes for this book which I +have decided to dedicate to you.</p> + +<p>In one of your charming prefaces, you told us lately that you only +painted from nature. We are both of us, I imagine, in our day and +generation, quite captivated and carried away by that modern society +from which in your exquisite creations you have so well understood how +to extract the essence.</p> + +<p>What is it that I have desired to do this time? That which we have both +been trying to do at one and the same time: to seize, in passing, these +stirring times of ours, these modern manners, that society which +perpetuates the antediluvian uproar, that feverish, bustling world +always posing before the footlights, that market for the sale of +appetites, that kirmess of pleasure that saddens us a little and amuses +us a great deal, and allows us romance-writers, simple seekers after +truth, to smile in our sleeves at the constant seekers after portfolios.</p> + +<p>This book is true, I have seen the events narrated in <a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv"></a>it pass before my +own eyes, and I can say, as a spectator greatly interested in what I +see, that I am delighted, my old fellow-traveller, to write your great +and honored name on the first page of my book as a witness to the +sincere affection and true comradeship of</p> + +<p>Your devoted,</p> + +<p>JULES CLARETIE.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="PREFACE" id="PREFACE"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h2><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v"></a>PREFACE</h2> + + +<p><i>There was once a Minister of State who presented to his native land the +astonishing spectacle of a Cabinet Minister dying whilst in office. This +action was so astounding to the nation at large that a statue has since +been erected to his memory.</i></p> + +<p><i>I saw his funeral procession defile past me, I think I even made one of +the Committee sent by the Society of Men of Letters to march in the +funeral convoy. It was superb. This lawyer from the Provinces, good +honest man, eloquent orator, honest politician that he was, who came to +Paris but to die there, was buried with the greatest magnificence.</i></p> + +<p><i>De Musset had eight persons to follow him to the grave; his Excellency +had one hundred thousand.</i></p> + +<p><i>I returned home from this gorgeous funeral in a thoughtful mood, +thinking how much emptiness there is in glory, and particularly in +political glory. This man had been "His Excellency the Minister" and not +only his own province, but the whole country had placed its hopes on +him. But what had he done? He had left his home to cast himself into the +great whirlpool of the <a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi"></a>metropolis. It was the romance of a great +provincial plunged in Paris into the reality of contemporary history, +and become as ordinary as the commonplace items of the Journals. "What a +subject for a study at once profoundly modern and perfectly lifelike!" +The funeral convoy had hardly left the church of the Madeleine when my +plot of this romance was thought out, and appeared clearly before me in +this title, very brief and simple: </i>His Excellency the Minister<i>.</i></p> + +<p><i>I have not drawn any one in particular, I have thought of no individual +person, I even forgot all about this departed Minister, whose face I +hardly caught even a glimpse of, and of whose life I was completely +ignorant; I had only in my mind's eye a hero or rather a heroine: +Politics with all its discouragements, its vexations, its treacheries, +its deceptions, its visions as fair as the blue sky of summer, suddenly +bursting like soap bubbles; and to the woes of Politics, I naturally +endeavored to add those of the pangs of love.</i></p> + +<p><i>And this is how my book came to see the light. I have been frequently +asked from what living person I borrowed the character of Vaudrey, with +its sufferings, its disappointments, its falterings. From whom? An +American translator, better informed, it appears, than myself, has, I +believe, brought out in New York a </i>key<i> to the characters presented in +my book. I should have publicly protested against this </i>Key<i> which +unlocks nothing, however, had it been published in France. Reader, do +not expect any masks to be raised here—there are no masks; it is only a +picture of living people, of passions of our time. No portraits, +however, only types. That, at least, is what I have tried to do. And if +I expected to find indulgent <a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii"></a>critics, I have certainly succeeded, and +the two special characters which I sought to portray in my romance—in +Parisian and political life—have been fortunate enough to win the +approval of two critics whose testimony to the truth of my portraitures +I have set down here.</i></p> + +<p><i>An author of rare merit and an authority on Statecraft, Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss, was kind enough one day to analyze and praise, apropos of the +comedy founded upon my book, the romance which I am to-day republishing. +It has been extremely pleasant for me to put myself under the +sponsorship of a man of letters willing to vouch for the truth of my +portrayals. I must beg pardon for repeating his commendations of my +work, so grateful are they to me, coming from the pen of a critic so +renowned, and which I take some pride in reading again.</i></p> + +<p><i>"I had already twice read </i>Monsieur le Ministre<i>," wrote Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss in the <a name="typo_1" id="typo_1"></a></i>Journal des Débats<i> the day following the production at +the Gymnase, "before having seen the drama founded on the book, and I do +not regret having been obliged to read it for the third time. The +romance is both well conceived and admirably executed. To have written +it, a union of character and talent was necessary. A Republican tried +and proved, permitting his ideal to be tarnished and sullied; a patriot +wronged by the vices of the times in which he lived; an honest, +clean-handed man; the representative of a family of rigid morality; the +strict impartiality of the artist who cares for nothing but his ideas of +art, and who protects those ideas from being injured or influenced by +the pretensions of any group or coterie; a close and long +acquaintanceship with the ins and outs of Parisian life; <a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii"></a>an eye at once +inquiring, calm and critical, a courageous indifference, hatred for the +mighty ones of the hour, and a loftiness of soul which refuses to yield +to the unjust demands of timid friendship: such are the qualities that +make the value of this matchless book. Monsieur Claretie has been +accused of having gathered together and exposed to the public gaze two +or three more or less scandalous episodes of private life, and using +them as the foundation of his romance. The fictitious name of Vaudrey +has been held to cloak that of such and such a Minister of State. Those, +however, who search for vulgar gossip in this book, or who look for +private scandal are far astray. They are quite mistaken as regards the +tendency and moral of Monsieur Claretie's book. The Vaudrey of the +romance is no minister in particular, neither this statesman nor that. +He is the Minister whom we have had before our eyes for the last quarter +of a century. He is that one, at once potential and universal. In him +are united and portrayed all the traits by which the species may be +determined. He had been elected to office without knowing why, and to do +him this justice, at least without any fault of his; he was deposed from +power without knowing the reason, and we have no hesitation in saying, +without his having done anything either good or bad to deserve his fall. +There he is minister, however; Minister of the Interior, and who knows? +in a fair way, perhaps, to be swept by some favorable wind to the post +of President of the Council; while not so very long ago to have been +made sub-prefect of the first class, would have surpassed the wildest +visions of his youth. In Monsieur Claretie's romance it is the old +Member of Parliament, Collard—of Nantes—<a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix"></a>converted late in life to +Republicanism, who chose the provincial Vaudrey for his Minister of the +Interior; this may, with equal probability be Marshal MacMahon.</i></p> + +<p><i>"In Monsieur Claretie's romance, </i>Monsieur le Ministre<i> is of the Left +Centre or the so-called Moderate Party, he is therefore on the side of +Law and Order. He enters into the Cabinet with the determination to +reform every abuse, to recast everything; to seek for honest men, to +make merit and not faction, the touchstone of advancement. In short, to +apply in his political life the glorious principles which—and the noble +maxims that—He is only, however, forty-eight hours in office when he +becomes quite demoralized, paralyzed and stultified for the rest of his +ministerial life. It is the phenomenon of crushing demoralization and of +complete enervation of which the public, from the situation in which it +is placed, sees only the results of which Monsieur Claretie, with a +skilful hand describes for us the mechanism and the cause. This Minister +of State, supposed to be omnipotent in office, has not even the power to +choose an undersecretary of State for himself. The Minister who only the +day before, from his seat upon one of the benches of the Opposition, sat +with his head held aloft, his long body erect, with rigid dignity, as if +made of triple brass, cannot now take the initiative in the appointment +of a '</i>garde champêtre<i>.' His undersecretaries of State, his </i>gardes +champêtres<i>, he himself, his whole environment, in fact, are only +painted dummies and the meek puppets that a director of the staff, a +chief of a division, or a chief of a bureau sets in motion, to the tune +he grinds out of his hand-organ, or moves them about at his will like +pawns upon a chess-board. The Minister will read with smiling confidence +the reports by which his subordinates who are <a name="Page_x" id="Page_x"></a>his masters, inform +him—what no one until then had thought of—that he has been called by +the voice of the nation to his high office, and that he can in future +count upon the entire and complete confidence of the country. To please +these obliging persons, the hangers-on of governments that he has passed +a quarter of his life infighting against and whom he will call gravely, +and upon certain occasions, very drolly, the hierarchy, he will betray +without any scruples all those whose disinterested efforts and great +sacrifices have brought about the triumph of the cause which he +represents.</i></p> + +<p><i>"Monsieur le Ministre is from the Provinces! You understand. Solemn and +pedantic, if his youth has been passed upon the banks of the Isère, a +puppy with his muzzle held aloft and giddy, if Garonne has nourished +him, broad faced and vulgarly pedantic if his cradle has been rocked in +upper Limousin. But whether he comes from Corrèze, from Garonne or +Isère, it is always as a Provincial that he arrives in Paris, the air of +which intoxicates him. He is in the same situation and carries with him +the same sentiments as Monsieur Jourdain when invited to visit the +Countess Dorimène. For the first adventuress who comes along, a born +princess who has strayed into a house of ill fame, or one who frequents +such a house, who masquerades as a princess in her coquettish house in +Rue Brèmontier, he will forsake father, mother, children, state +documents, cabinet, councils, Chamber of Deputies, everything in fact. +He will break away from his young wife who has grown up under his eyes +in the same town with him, among all the sweet domestic graces, moulded +amid all the fresh and sapid delicacies of the provinces, but pshaw! too +provincial for a noble of his importance, and he will go <a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi"></a>in pursuit of +some flower, no matter what, be it only redolent of Parisian patchouli. +He will break the heart of the one, while for the other, he will bring +before the councils of administration suspected schemes, blackmailings, +concessions, treachery and ruin. Monsieur Claretie had shown us the +Vaudrey of his romance involved in all these degradations, although he +has checked him as to some, and in his novel, at least, with due +submission to the exalted truth of art, he has not shrunk from punishing +this false, great man and pretended tribune of the people, by the very +vices he espoused.</i></p> + +<p><i>"I do not stop to inquire if even in the story, Monsieur Claretie's +'Marianne Kayser' is frequently self-contradictory, and if in some +features I clearly recognize his Guy de Lissac; two characters that play +an important part in the narrative! But after all, what does it matter? +It suffices for me that his Excellency the Minister and all his +Excellency's entourage are fully grasped and clearly described. Granet, +the low </i>intriguer<i> of the lobbies; Molina, the stock-company cut-throat +and Bourse ruffian; Ramel, the melancholy and redoubtable publicist, who +has made emperors without himself desiring to become one, who will die +in the neighborhood of Montmartre and the Batignolles, forgotten but +proud, poor, and unsullied by money, true to his ideals, among the +ingrates enriched by his journal and who have reached the summit only by +the influence of his authority with the public; Denis Garnier, the +Parisian workman who has had an experience of the hulks as the result of +imbibing too freely of sentimental prose and of lending too ready an ear +to the golden speech of some tavern demagogue, who has now had enough of +politics and who scarcely troubles to think what former retailer of +treasonable <a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii"></a>language, what Gracchus of the sidewalk may be minister, +Vaudrey or Pichereau, or even Granet: all these types are separately +analyzed and vigorously generalized. Monsieur Claretie designated no one +in particular but we elbow the characters in his book every day of our +lives. He has, moreover, written a book of a robust and healthy novelty. +The picture of the greenroom of the Ballet with which the tale opens and +where we are introduced in the most natural way possible to nearly all +the characters that play a part in the story of Vaudrey is masterly in +execution and intention. It is Balzac, but Balzac toned down and more +limpid."</i></p> + +<p><i>I will stop here at the greenroom of the Ballet commended by Monsieur +J.-J. Weiss, to give a slight sketch, clever as a drawing by Saint' Aubin +or a lithograph by Gavarni, which Monsieur Ludovic Halévy has +contributed to a journal and in which he also praises the romance that +the </i>feuilletoniste<i> of the </i>Débats<i> has criticized with an authority so +discriminating and a benevolence so profound.</i></p> + +<p><i>It was very agreeable for me to observe that such a thorough Parisian +as the shrewd and witty author of </i>Les Petites Cardinal<i> should find +that the Opéra—which certainly plays a rôle in our politics—had been +sufficiently well portrayed by the author of </i>Monsieur le Ministre<i>. And +upon this, the first chapter of my book, Monsieur Ludovic Halévy adds, +moreover, some special and piquant details which are well worth +quoting:</i></p> + +<p><i>"That which gave me very great pleasure in this tale of a man of +politics is that politics really have little, very little place in the +novel; it is love that dominates it and in the most despotic and +pleasant way possible. This great man of Grenoble who arrives at Paris +in order to reform <a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii"></a>everything, repair everything, elevate everything, +falls at once under the sway of a most charming Parisian adventuress. +See Sulpice Vaudrey the slave of Marianne. Marianne's gray eyes never +leave him—But she in her turn meets her master—and Marianne's master +is Adolphe Gochard, a horrid Parisian blackguard—who is so much her +master that, after all, the real hero of the romance is Adolphe Gochard. +Such is the secret philosophy of this brilliant and ingenious romance.</i></p> + +<p><i>"I have, however, a little quarrel on my own account with Monsieur +Jules Claretie. Nothing can be more brilliantly original than the +introductory chapter of </i>Monsieur le Ministre<i>. Sulpice Vaudrey makes +his first appearance behind the scenes of the Opéra, and from the sides +of the stage, in the stage boxes, opera-glasses are turned upon him, and +he hears whispered:</i></p> + +<p><i>"'It is the new Minister of the Interior.'</i></p> + +<p><i>"'Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?'</i></p> + +<p><i>"'Yes, Monsieur Vaudrey—'</i></p> + +<p><i>"In short, the appearance of his Excellency creates a sensation, and it +is against this statement that I protest. I go frequently to the Opéra, +very frequently. During the last ten years I have seen defile before me +in the wings, at least fifty Ministers of State, all just freshly ground +out. Curiosity had brought them there and the desire to see the dancers +at close quarters, and also the vague hope that by exhibiting themselves +there in all their glory, they would create a sensation in this little +world.</i></p> + +<p><i>"Well, this hope of theirs was never realized. Nobody took the trouble +to look at them. A minister nowadays is nobody of importance. Formerly +to rise to such a position, to take in hand the reins of one of the +great departments,<a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv"></a> it was necessary to have a certain exterior, a +certain prominence, something of a past—to be a Monsieur Thiers, +Monsieur Guizot, Monsieur Mole, Monsieur de Rémusat, Monsieur Villemain, +Monsieur Duchátel, Monsieur de Falloux or Monsieur de Broglie—that is +to say, an orator, an author, a historian, somebody in fact. But +nowadays, all that is necessary to be a minister is the votes of certain +little combinations of groups and subsidiary groups, who all expect a +share of the spoils. Therefore we are ruled by certain personages +illustrious perhaps at Gap or at Montélimar but who are quite unknown in +the genealogical records of the Boulevard Haussmann. Why should you +imagine that public attention would be attracted by news like this:</i></p> + +<p><i>"'Look!—There is Monsieur X, or Monsieur Y, or Monsieur Z.'</i></p> + +<p><i>"One person only during these last years ever succeeded in attracting +the attention of the songstresses and ballet-girls of the Opéra. And +that was Gambetta. Ah! when he came to claim Monsieur Vaucorbeil's +hospitality, it was useless to crouch behind the cherry-colored silk +curtains of the manager's box, many glances were directed toward him, +and many prowling curiosities were awakened in the vicinity of the +manager's box. Little lassies of ten or twelve came and seized your +hand, saying:</i></p> + +<p><i>"'Please, monsieur, point out Monsieur Gambetta to me—he is here—I +would so much like to see him.'</i></p> + +<p><i>"And then Gambetta was pointed out to them during the entr'acte—after +which, delighted, they went off caracoling and pirouetting behind the +scenes:</i></p> + +<p><i>"'You did not see Monsieur Gambetta, but I saw him!'</i></p> + +<p><a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv"></a><i>"This was popularity—and it must be confessed that only one man in +France to-day receives such marks of it. This man is Gambetta.</i></p> + +<p><i>"Meanwhile Claretie's minister continues his walk through the corridors +of the <a name="typo_12" id="typo_12"></a>Opéra house. He reaches the greenroom of the ballet at last and +exclaims:</i></p> + +<p><i>"'And that is all!'</i></p> + +<p><i>"Alas, yes, your Excellency, that is all!—"</i></p> + +<p><i>And everything is only a </i>"that is all,"<i> in this world. If one should +set himself carefully to weigh power or fame,—power, that force of +which Girardin said, however: "I would give fifty years of glory for one +hour of power,"—even if one tilted the scale, one would not find the +weight very considerable.</i></p> + +<p><i>It would be necessary to have the resounding renown of a personality +like that one who, if I am to believe Monsieur Halévy, alone enjoyed the +privilege of revolutionizing the foyer of the ballet, in order to boast +of having been someone, or of having accomplished something.</i></p> + +<p><i>A rather witty skeptic once said to a friend of his who had just been +appointed minister:</i></p> + +<p><i>"My dear fellow, permit me as a practical man to ask you not to engage +in too many affairs. Events in this world are accomplished without much +meddling. If you attempt to do something to-day, everyone will cry out: +'What! he is going to demolish everything!' If you do nothing, they will +cry: 'What! he does not budge! If I were minister, which God forbid, I +would say nothing—and let others act—I would do nothing—and let +others talk.'"</i></p> + +<p><i>Everybody, very fortunately—and all ministers do not <a name="Page_xvi" id="Page_xvi"></a>reason like this +jester. But the truth is that it is very difficult for an honest man in +the midst of political entanglements as Vaudrey was, to realize his +dream. When opportunities arise—those opportunities that march only at +a snail's pace—one is not allowed to make use of them, they are +snatched from one. They arrive, only to take wings again. And in those +posts of daily combat, one has not only against one the enemies who +attack one openly, which would be but a slight matter, a touch with a +goad or a prick of the spur, at most—but one has to contend with +friends who compromise, and servants who serve one badly.</i></p> + +<p><i>Every man who occupies an office, whatever it may be, has for his +adversaries those who covet it, those who regret it, those who have once +filled it, and those who desire to fill it. What assaults too! Against a +successful rival, there is no infamy too base, no mine too deep, no +villainy too cruel, no lie too poisoned to be made use of—and the +minister, his Excellency, is like a hostage to Power.</i></p> + +<p><i>And yet one more point, it is not in his enemies or his calumniators +that his danger lies. The real, absolute evil is in the system of +routine and ill-will which attack the statesmen of probity. It will be +seen from these pages that there is a warning bell destined, alas! to +keep away from those in power the messengers who would bring them the +truth from outside, the unwelcome and much dreaded truth.</i></p> + +<p><i>The novel may sometimes be this stroke of the bell,—a stroke honest +and useful,—a disinterested </i>warner,<i> and I have striven to make +</i>Monsieur le Ministre<i> precisely that, in a small degree, for the +political world. I have essayed to paint this hell paved with some of +the good intentions. <a name="Page_xvii" id="Page_xvii"></a>The success which greeted the appearance of this +book, might justify me in believing that I have succeeded in my task. I +trust that it will enjoy under its new form—so flattering to an author, +that an editor-artist is pleased to give it,—the success achieved under +its first form.</i></p> + +<p><i></i>Monsieur le Ministre<i> is connected with more than one recollection of my +life. I was called upon one day to follow to his last resting-place—and +it is on an occasion like this that one discovers more readily and +perceives more clearly life's ironies—one of those men "who do nothing +but create other men," a journalist. It was bitterly cold and we stood +before the open grave, just in front of a railway embankment, in an out +of the way cemetery of Saint-Ouen,—the cemetery called </i>Cayenne,<i> +because the dead are "deported" thither. We were but four faithful +ones. Yes, four, but amongst these four must be included a young man, +bare-headed and wearing the uniform of an officer, who stood by the +deceased man's son.</i></p> + +<p><i>Whilst one of us bade the last farewell to the departed on the brink of +the grave, the scream of the railway engine cut short his words, and +seemed to hiss for the last time the fate of the vanquished man lying +there. As we were quitting the cemetery, a worthy man, a song-writer, +observed to me: "Well, if all those whom Léon Plée helped during his +lifetime had remembered him when he was dead, this little </i>Campo Santo<i> +of Saint-Ouen would not have been large enough to hold them all!"</i></p> + +<p><i>Doubtless. But they did not remember him.</i></p> + +<p><i>And from the contrast between the shabby obsequies of the old +journalist and the solemn pomp of that of the funeral service of the +four days' minister came the idea of my book. It seemed to me that here +was an appropri<a name="Page_xviii" id="Page_xviii"></a>ate idea and a useful reparation. Art has nothing to +lose—rather the contrary, when it devotes itself to militant tasks.</i></p> + +<p><i>Ah! I forgot—When one mentions to-day the name of this illustrious +minister whose funeral convoy was in its day one of the great spectacles +of Paris, and one of the great surprises to those who know how difficult +it is for a minister to die in office—like the Spartan still grasping +his shield—those best informed, shaking their heads solemnly will say:</i></p> + +<p><i>"Ricard?—Oh! he had great talent, Ricard—I saw lately a portrait of +Paul de Musset by him—It is superb!"</i></p> + +<p><i>They confound him with the painter to whom no statue has been erected, +but whose works remain.</i></p> + +<p><i>Be, then, a Cabinet Minister!</i></p> + +<p><i>JULES CLARETIE.</i></p> + +<p><i>Viroflay, September 1, 1886.</i><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1"></a><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2"></a><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3"></a><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4"></a><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="HIS_EXCELLENCY_THE_MINISTER" id="HIS_EXCELLENCY_THE_MINISTER"></a><a name="PART_FIRST" id="PART_FIRST"></a><a name="I" id="I"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h1>HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER</h1> + +<h2>PART FIRST</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + + +<p>The third act of L'Africaine had just come to a close.</p> + +<p>The minister, on leaving the manager's box, said smilingly, like a man +glad to be rid of the cares of State: "Let us go to the greenroom, +Granet, shall we?"</p> + +<p>"Let us go to the greenroom, as your Excellency proposes!"</p> + +<p>They were obliged to cross the immense stage where the stage carpenters +were busy with the stage accessories as sailors with the equipment of a +vessel; and men in evening dress, with white ties, looked natty without +their greatcoats, and with opera hats on their heads were going to and +fro, picking their way amongst the ropes and other impedimenta which +littered the stage, on their way to the greenroom of the ballet.<a name="Page_6" id="Page_6"></a></p> + +<p>They had come here from all parts of the house, from the stalls and +boxes; most of them humming as they went the air from Nélusko's ballad, +walking lightly as habitués through the species of antechamber which +separates the body of the house from the stage.</p> + +<p>A servant wearing a white cravat, was seated at a table writing down +upon a sheet of paper the names of those who came in. One side of this +sheet bore a headline reading: <i>Messieurs</i>, and the other <i>Médecin</i>, in +two columns. From time to time this man would get up from his chair to +bow respectfully to some official personage whom he recognized.</p> + +<p>"Have you seen Monsieur Vaudrey come in yet, Louis?" asked a still young +man with a monocle in his eye, who seemed quite at home behind the +scenes.</p> + +<p>"His Excellency is in the manager's box, monsieur!" answered the servant +civilly.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Louis!"</p> + +<p>And as the visitor turned to go up the narrow stairway leading to the +greenroom, the servant wrote down in the running-hand of a clerk, upon +the printed sheet: <i>Monsieur Guy de Lissac</i>.</p> + +<p>Upon the stage, Vaudrey, the Minister whom Lissac had been inquiring +for, stood arm in arm with his companion Granet, looking in astonishment +at the vast machinery of the opera, operated by this army of workmen, +whom he did not know. He was quite astonished at the sight, as he had +never beheld its like. His <a name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></a>astonishment was so evident and artless that +Granet, his friend and colleague in the Chamber of Deputies, could not +help smiling at it from under his carefully waxed moustaches.</p> + +<p>"I consider all this much more wonderful than the opera itself," +observed his Excellency. The floor and wings were like great yellow +spots, and the whole immense stage resembled a great, sandy desert. +Vaudrey raised his head to gaze at the symmetrical arrangement of the +chandeliers, as bright as rows of gas-jets, amongst the hangings of the +friezes. A huge canvas at the back represented a sunlit Indian +landscape, and in the enormous space between the lowered curtain and the +scenery, some black spots seemed as if dancing, strange silhouettes of +the visitors in their dress clothes, standing out clearly against the +yellow background like the shadows of Chinese figures.</p> + +<p>"It is very amusing; but let us see the greenroom," said the minister. +"You are familiar with the greenroom, Granet?"</p> + +<p>"I am a Parisian," returned the deputy, without too great an emphasis; +but the ironical smile which accompanied his words made Vaudrey +understand that his colleague looked upon his Excellency as fresh from +the province and still smacking of its manners.</p> + +<p>Sulpice hesitatingly crossed the stage in the midst of a hubbub like +that of a man-of-war getting ready for action, caused by the methodical +destruction and removal <a name="Page_8" id="Page_8"></a>of the scenery comprising the huge ship used in +<i>L'Africaine</i> by a swarm of workmen in blue vests, yelling and shoving +quickly before them, or carrying away sections of masts and parts of +ladders, hurrying out of sight by way of trap-doors and man-holes, this +carcass of a work of art; this spectacle of a great swarm of human ants, +running hither and thither, pulling and tugging at this immense piece of +stage decoration, in the vast frame capable of holding at one and the +same time, a cathedral and a factory, was rather awe-inspiring to the +statesman, who stopped short to look at it, while the tails of his coat +brushed against the fallen curtain.</p> + +<p>From both sides of the stage, from the stage-boxes, opera-glasses were +turned upon him here and there and a murmur like a breeze came wafted +towards him.</p> + +<p>"It is the new Minister of the Interior!"</p> + +<p>"Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur Vaudrey."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey proudly drew himself up under the battery of opera-glasses +levelled at him, while Granet, smiling, said to the master of the chorus +who, dressed in a black coat, stood near him:</p> + +<p>"It can be easily seen that this is his first visit here!"</p> + +<p>Oh! yes, truly, it was the first time that the new minister had set his +foot in the wings of the <a name="typo_13" id="typo_13"></a>Opéra! He relished it with all the curiosity of +a youth and the gusto of a collegian. How fortunate that he had not +brought Madame Vaudrey, who was slightly indisposed. This <a name="Page_9" id="Page_9"></a>rapid survey +of a world unknown to him, had the flavor of an escapade. There was a +little spice in this amusing adventure.</p> + +<p>Behind the canvas in the rear, some musicians, costumed as Brahmins, +with spectacles on their noses, the better to decipher their score, +fingered their brass instruments with a weary air, rocking them like +infants in swaddling clothes. Actors in the garb of Indians, with +painted cheeks, and legs encased in chocolate-colored bandages, were +yawning, weary and flabby, and stretching themselves while awaiting the +time for them to present themselves upon the stage. Others, dressed like +soldiers, were sleeping on the wooden benches against the walls, their +mouths open, their helmets drawn down over their noses like visors. +Others, their pikes serving them for canes, had taken off their headgear +and placed it at their feet, the better to rest their heads against the +wall, where they leaned with their eyes shut.</p> + +<p>Little girls, all of them thin, and in short skirts, were already +pirouetting, and humming airs. Older girls stood about with their legs +crossed, or, half-stooping, displayed their bosoms while retying the +laces of their pink shoes. Others, wearing a kind of Siamese headdress +with ornaments of gold, were laughing and clashing together their little +silver cymbals. Awkward fellows with false beards, dressed like high +priests in robes of yellow, striped with red, elbowed past and jostled +against the girls quite unceremoniously.<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10"></a> An usher, dressed à la +Française, and wearing a chain around his neck, paced, grave and +melancholy, amongst these shameless young girls.</p> + +<p>The greenroom at the end of the stage was entered through a large +vestibule hung with curtains of grayish velvet shot with violet, and at +the top of the steps where some men in dress-clothes were talking to +ballet-girls, Vaudrey could see in the great salon beyond, blazing with +light, groups of half-nude women surrounded by men, resembling, in their +black clothes, beetles crawling about roses, the whole company reflected +in a flood of light, in an immense mirror that covered one end of the +room. Little by little, Vaudrey could make out above the paintings +representing ancient dances, and the portraits by Camargo or Noverre, a +confusion of gaudy skirts, pink legs, white shoulders, with the +ubiquitous black coats sprinkled about here and there amongst these +bright colors like large blots of ink upon ball-dresses.</p> + +<p>Sulpice had often heard the greenroom of the ballet spoken about, and he +was at once completely disillusioned. The glaring, brutal light +ruthlessly exposed the worn and faded hangings; and the pretty girls in +their full, short, gauzy petticoats, with their bare arms, smiling and +twisting about, their satin-shod feet resting upon gray velvet +footstools, seemed to him, as they occupied the slanting floor, to move +in a cloud of dust, and to be robbed of all naturalness and freshness.<a name="Page_11" id="Page_11"></a></p> + +<p>"And is this all?" the minister exclaimed almost involuntarily.</p> + +<p>"What!" answered Granet, "you seem hard to please!"</p> + +<p>Amongst all these girls, there had been manifested an expression of +mingled curiosity, coquetry and banter on Vaudrey's appearance in their +midst. His presence in the manager's box had been noticed and his coming +to the greenroom expected. Every one had hurried thither. Sulpice was +pointed out. He was the cynosure of all eyes. On the divans beneath the +mirror, some young, well-dressed, bald men, surrounded—perhaps by +chance—by laughing ballet-girls, now half-concealed themselves behind +the voluminous skirts of the girls about them, and bent their heads, +thus rendering their baldness more visible, just as a woman buries her +nose in her bouquet to avoid recognizing an acquaintance.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey, observing this ruse, smiled a slight, sarcastic smile. He +recognized behind the shielding petticoats, some of his prefects, those +from the environs of Paris, come from Versailles and Chartres, or from +some sub-prefectures, and gallantly administering the affairs of France +from the heart of the greenroom. Amiable functionaries of the Ministry +of Fine Arts also came here to study æstheticism between the acts.</p> + +<p>All members of the different régimes seemed to be fraternizing in +ironical promiscuousness here, and Vaudrey in a whisper drew Granet's +attention to this. Old <a name="Page_12" id="Page_12"></a>beaux of the time of the Empire, with dyed and +waxed moustaches, with dyed or grizzled hair flattened on their temples, +their flabby cheeks cut across by stiff collars as jelly is cut by a +knife, were hobnobbing, fat and lean, with young fops of the Republic, +who with their sharp eyes, wide-open nostrils, their cheeks covered with +brown or flaxen down, their hair carefully brushed, or already bald, +seemed quite surprised to find themselves in such a place, and chattered +and cackled among themselves like beardless conscripts, perverted and +immoral but with some scruples still remaining and less cunning than +these well-dressed old roués standing firmly at their posts like +veterans.</p> + +<p>"The licentiates and the pensioners," whispered Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"You have a quickness of sight quite Parisian, your Excellency," +returned Granet.</p> + +<p>"There are Parisians in the Provinces, my dear Granet," replied Sulpice +with a heightened complexion, his blood flowing more rapidly than usual, +due to emotions at once novel and gay.</p> + +<p>"Ah! your Excellency," exclaimed a fat, animated man with hair and +whiskers of quite snowy whiteness, and smiling as he spoke, "what in the +world brought you here?"</p> + +<p>He approached Vaudrey, bowing but not at all obsequiously, with the air +of good humor due to a combination of wealth and embonpoint. Fat and +rich, in perfect <a name="Page_13" id="Page_13"></a>health, and carrying his sixty years with the +lightness of forty, Molina—Molina the "Tumbler" as he was +nicknamed—spent his afternoons on the Bourse and his evenings in the +greenroom of the ballet.</p> + +<p>He had a small interest in the theatre, but a large one in the +coryphées, in a paternal way, his white hair giving him the right to be +respected and his crowns the right to respect nothing. Beginning life +very low down, and now enjoying a lofty position, the fat Molina haunted +the Bourse and the greenroom of the Opéra. He glutted himself with all +the earliest delicacies of the season, like a man who when young, has +not always had enough to satisfy hunger.</p> + +<p>Pictures that were famous, women of fashion, statues of marble and fair +flesh, he must have them all. He collected, without any taste whatever, +costly paintings, rare objects; he bought without love, girls who were +not wholly mercenary. At a pinch he found them, taking pleasure in +parading in his coupé, around the lake or at the races, some recruit in +vice, and in watching the crowd that at once eagerly surrounded her, +simply because she had been the mistress of the fat Molina. He had in +his youth at Marseilles, in the Jewish quarter of the town, sold old +clothes to the Piedmontese and sailors in port. Now it was his delight +to behold the Parisians of the Boulevard or the clubs buy as sentimental +rags the cast-off garments of his passion.</p> + +<p>"You in the greenroom of the ballet, your Excel<a name="Page_14" id="Page_14"></a>lency?" continued the +financier. "Ah! upon my word, I shall tell Madame Vaudrey."</p> + +<p>Sulpice smiled, the mere name of his wife sounded strange to his ears in +a place like this. It seemed to him that in speaking of her, she was +being dragged into a strange circle, and one which did not belong to +her. He had felt the same only a few days before upon his entrance into +the cabinet, on seeing a report of his marriage, his dwelling minutely +described, and a pen portrait of that Adrienne, who was the passion of +his life.</p> + +<p>"After all," continued Molina, "Madame Vaudrey must get used to it. The +Opéra! Why, it is a part of politics! The key of many a situation is to +be found in the greenroom!"</p> + +<p>The financier laughed merrily, a laugh that had the ring of the +Turcarets' jingling crowns.</p> + +<p>He went on to explain to his Excellency all the little mysteries of the +greenroom, as a man quite at home in this little Parisian province, and +lightly, by a word, a gesture even, he gave the minister a rapid +biography of the young girls who were laughing, jesting, romping there +before them; flitting hither and thither lightly across the boards, +barely touching them with the tips of their pink satin-shod feet.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was surprised at everything he saw. He did not even take the +pains to conceal his surprise. Evidently it was his first visit behind +the scenes.</p> + +<p>"Ah! your Excellency," said Molina, delighted with <a name="Page_15" id="Page_15"></a>his rôle of +cicerone, "it is necessary to be at home here! You should come here +often! Nothing in the world can be more amusing. Here behind the scenes +is a world by itself. One can see pretty little lasses springing up like +asparagus. One sees running hither and thither a tall, thin child who +nods to you saucily and crunches nuts like a squirrel. One takes a three +months' journey, and passes a season at Vichy or at Dieppe, and when one +returns, presto! see the transformation. The butterfly has burst forth +from its cocoon. No longer a little girl, but a woman. Those saucy eyes +of old now look at you with an expression which disturbs your heart. One +might have offered, six months before, two sous' worth of chestnuts to +the child; now, however, nothing less than a coupé will satisfy the +woman. It used to jump on your knee at that time, now every one is +throwing his arms around its pretty neck. Thus from generation to +generation, one assists at the mobilization of a whole army of recruits, +who first try their weapons here, pass from here into the regiment of +veterans, build themselves a hospital in cut-stone out of their savings, +and some of them mount very high through the tips of their toes if they +are not suddenly attacked by <i>the malady of the knee</i>."</p> + +<p>"Malady of the knee?" inquired Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"A phrase not to be found in the <i>Dictionary of Political Economy</i> by +Maurice Block. It is a way of saying that ill-luck has overtaken one. A +very interesting con<a name="Page_16" id="Page_16"></a>dition, this malady of the knee! It often not only +shortens the leg but the career!"</p> + +<p>"Is this malady a frequent one at the Opéra?"</p> + +<p>"Ah! your Excellency, how can it be helped? There are so many slips in +this pirouetting business! It is as risky as politics!"</p> + +<p>Fat Molina shouted with laughter at this clumsy jest, and placing a +binocle upon his huge nose, which was cleft down the middle like that of +a hunting-hound, he exclaimed suddenly, turning towards the door as he +spoke:</p> + +<p>"Eh! Marie Launay? What is she holding in her hand?"</p> + +<p>Light, nimble and graceful in her costume of a Hindoo dancing girl, a +young girl of sixteen or seventeen summers, already betraying her +womanhood in the ardent glances half-hidden in the depths of her large, +deep-blue eyes, tripped into the greenroom, humming an air and holding +in her hand a long sheet of paper.</p> + +<p>She shook, as if embarrassed by it, the broad necklace of large +imitation pearls that danced on her fine neck and fell on her +undeveloped bosom; and looking in search of some one among the crowd of +girls, cried out from a distance to a plump little brunette who was +talking and laughing within a circle of dress-coats at the other end of +the room:</p> + +<p>"Eh! Anna, you have not subscribed yet!"</p> + +<p>The brunette, freeing herself unceremoniously enough <a name="Page_17" id="Page_17"></a>from her living +madrigals, came running lightly up to Marie Launay, who held out towards +her an aluminum pencil-case and the sheet of paper.</p> + +<p>"What the devil is that?" asked Molina.</p> + +<p>"Let us go and see," said Granet.</p> + +<p>"Would it not be an indiscretion on our part?" asked Vaudrey, half +seriously.</p> + +<p>The financier, however, was by this time at the side of the two pretty +girls, and asked the blonde what the paper contained, the names on which +her companion was spelling out.</p> + +<p>Marie Launay, a lovely girl with little ringlets of fair hair curling +low down upon her forehead, smiled like a pretty, innocent and still +timid child, under the luring glances of the fat man, and glancing with +an expression of virgin innocence at Sulpice and Granet, who were +standing beside him, replied:</p> + +<p>"That—Oh! that is the subscription we are getting up for Mademoiselle +Legrand."</p> + +<p>"Oh! that is so," said Molina. "You mean to make her a present of a +statuette?"</p> + +<p>"On her taking her leave of us. Yes, every one has subscribed to +it—even the boxholders. Do you see?"</p> + +<p>Marie Launay quickly snatched the paper from her friend; on it were +several names, some written in ink, others in pencil, the whole +presenting the peculiar appearance of schoolboys' pot-hooks or the +graceful lines traced by crawling flies, while the fantastic spelling +<a name="Page_18" id="Page_18"></a>offered a strange medley. Molina burst out laughing, his ever-present +laugh that sounded like the shaking of a money-bag,—when he ran his eye +over the list and found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and +members of the chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitués.</p> + +<p>"Look! your Excellency—It is stupendous! Here: <i>Amélie Dunois</i>, 2 +francs. <i>Jeanne Garnot</i>, 5 francs. <i>Bel-Enfant</i>—<i>Charles</i>—, 1 fr., 50 +centimes. <i>Warnier I.</i>, 2 francs. <i>Warnier II.</i>, 2 francs. <i>Gigonnet</i>, 4 +francs. <i>Baron Humann</i>, 100 francs. <i>The baron</i>!—the former prefect! +Humann writing his name down here with <i>Bel-Enfant</i> and <i>Gigonnet</i>. +Humann inscribing above his signature—<i>I vill supscribe von +hundertfranc</i>! If one were to see it in a newspaper, one would not +believe it! If only a reporter were here now! For a choice <i>Paris echo</i> +what a rare one it would be!"</p> + +<p>Granet examined little Marie Launay with sly glances, toying with his +black moustache the while, and the other young girl Anna, very much +confused at the coarse laughter of Molina the "Tumbler," kept turning +around in her slender fingers the aluminum pencil-case and looking at +Marie as much as to say:</p> + +<p>"You know I can never muster up courage to write down my name before all +these people!"</p> + +<p>"Lend me your pencil, my child," Molina said to her.</p> + +<p>She held it out towards him timidly.<a name="Page_19" id="Page_19"></a></p> + +<p>"Where the baron has led the way, Molina the Tumbler may certainly +follow!" said the financier.</p> + +<p>He turned the screw of the pencil-case to extend the lead, and placing +one of his huge feet upon a divan to steady himself, wrote rapidly with +the paper on his knee, as a man used to scribbling notes at the Bourse:</p> + +<p>"Solomon Molina, 500 francs."</p> + +<p>"Ah! monsieur," exclaimed Marie Launay upon reading it, "that is +handsome, that is! It is kind, very kind! If everybody were as generous +as you, we could give a statue of Terpsichore in gold to Mademoiselle +Legrand."</p> + +<p>"If you should ever want one of Carpeaux's groups for yourself, my +child," said Molina, "you may go to the studio in a cab to look at it, +and fetch it away with you in—your own coupé."</p> + +<p>The girl grew as red as a cherry under her powder, even her graceful, +childish shoulders turned pink, enhancing her blonde and childlike +beauty.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was conscious of a strange and subtle charm in this intoxicating +circle,—a charm full of temptations which made him secretly uneasy. +There passed before his eyes visions of other days, he beheld the +phantoms of gay dresses, the apparitions of spring landscapes, he felt +the breezes of youth, laden with the scents of the upspringing grass, +the lilacs at Meudon, the violets of Ville-d'Avray, the souvenirs of the +escapades of his student days. Their short, full skirts reminded him of +white <a name="Page_20" id="Page_20"></a>frocks that whisked gayly around the hazel-trees long ago, those +ballet-girls bore a striking resemblance to the pink and white grisettes +that he had flirted with when he was twenty.</p> + +<p>He extended his hand in turn towards the sheet of paper to which Molina +had just signed his name, saying to Marie Launay as he did so:</p> + +<p>"Let me have it, if you please, mademoiselle."</p> + +<p>Granet began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Ah! ah!" he cried, "you are really going to write down under Monsieur +Gigonnet's signature the name of the Minister of the Interior?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! bless me!" said Vaudrey, laughing, "that is true! You will believe +it or not as you please, but I quite forgot that I was a minister."</p> + +<p>"It was the same with me when I was decorated," said Molina. "I would +not receive my great-coat from box-openers because I saw the morsel of +red ribbon hanging on it, and I was sure the garment was not mine. But +one grows used to it after a while! Now," and his laugh with the +hundred-sou piece ring grew louder than ever, "I am really quite +surprised not to find the rosette of red ribbon sticking to my flannel +waistcoats."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey left Marie Launay, greatly to her surprise, and listened to +Molina's chronicles of the ballet.</p> + +<p>Ah! if his Excellency had but the time, he would have seen the funniest +things. For instance, there was amongst the dancers a marble cutter, who +during the day <a name="Page_21" id="Page_21"></a>sold and cut his gravestones and came here at night to +grin and caper in the ballet. He was on the scent of every funeral from +the Opéra; he would get orders for tombstones between two dances at the +rehearsals. One day Molina had been present at one of these. It seems +incredible, but there was a bank clerk in a gray coat, a three-cornered +hat upon his head and a brass buckler on his arm, who sacrificed to +Venus in the interval between his two occupations, dancing with the +coryphées; a dancer by night and a receiver of money by day. A girl was +rehearsing beside him, in black bands and skirt. Then Molina, +astonished, inquired who she might be. He was told that it was a girl in +mourning, whose mother had just died. The Opéra is a fine stage upon +which to behold the ironies and contrasts of life.</p> + +<p>The financier might have related to Sulpice Vaudrey a description of a +journey to Timbuctoo and have found him less amused and less interested +than now. It was a world new and strange to him, attractive, and as +exciting as acid to this man, still young, whose success had been +achieved by unstinted labors, and who knew Paris only by what he had +learned of it years ago, when a law student: the pit of the Comédie +Française, the Luxembourg galleries and those of the Louvre, the Public +Libraries, the Hall of Archives, the balls in the Latin Quarter, the +holidays and the foyer of the Opéra once or twice on the occasion of a +masked ball. And, besides that?—Nothing. That was all.<a name="Page_22" id="Page_22"></a></p> + +<p>The great man from Grenoble arrived in Paris with his appetite whetted +for the life of the city, and now he was here, suddenly plunged into the +greenroom of the ballet, and all eyes were turned towards him, almost +frightened as he was, on catching a glimpse of his own image reflected +in the huge mirror glittering under the numerous lights, in the heart of +this strange salon and surrounded by half-clad dancing girls. Then, too, +everybody was looking at him, quizzing him, shrinking from him through +timidity or running after him through interest. The new Minister of +State! The chief of all the personnel of prefects, under-prefects, and +secretaries-general represented there, lolling on these velvet divans in +this vulgar greenroom.</p> + +<p>All the glances, all the whisperings of the women, the frowns of his +enemies, the cringing attitudes of dandified hangers-on, were making +Vaudrey feel very uncomfortable, when to his great relief he suddenly +observed coming towards him, peering hither and thither through his +monocle, evidently in search of some one, Guy de Lissac, who immediately +on catching sight of Vaudrey came towards him, greeting him with evident +cordiality, tinged, however, with a proper reserve.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was not long in breaking through this reserve. He hurried up to +Guy, and seizing him by the hand, cried gayly:</p> + +<p>"Do you know that I have been expecting this visit!<a name="Page_23" id="Page_23"></a> You are the only +one of my friends who has not yet congratulated me!"</p> + +<p>"You know, my dear Minister," returned Guy in the same tone, "that it is +really not such a great piece of luck to be made Minister that every one +of your friends should be expected to fall upon your neck, crying bravo! +You have mounted up to the capitol, but after all, the capitol is not +such a very cheerful place, that I should illuminate <i>à giorno</i>. I am +happy, however, if you are. I congratulate you, if you wash your hands +of it, and that is all."</p> + +<p>"You and my old friend Ramel," answered Sulpice, "are the two most +original men that I know."</p> + +<p>"With this difference however, Ramel is a Puritan, an ancient, a man of +marble, and I am a <i>boulevardier</i> and a skeptic. He is a man of +bronze—your Ramel! And your friend Lissac of <i>simili-bronze</i>! The proof +of it is that I have been seeking you for half the evening to ask you to +do me a favor."</p> + +<p>"What favor, my dear fellow?" cried Vaudrey, his face lighting up with +joy. "Anything in the world to please you."</p> + +<p>"I was in Madame Marsy's box,—you do not know Madame Marsy? She is a +great admirer of yours and makes a point to applaud you in the Chamber. +She has prayed for your advent. She saw you in the manager's box a while +ago, and she has asked me to present you to her, or rather, to present +her to you, <a name="Page_24" id="Page_24"></a>for I presume for your Excellency the ceremony is +modified."</p> + +<p>"Madame Marsy!" said Vaudrey. "Is she not an artist's widow? Her salon +is a political centre, is it not?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. A recent salon opened in opposition to that of Madame Evan. An +Athenian Republic! You do not object to that?"</p> + +<p>"On the contrary! A republic cannot be founded without the aid of +women."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" cried Lissac, laughing. "Politics and honors have not changed you, +I see."</p> + +<p>"Changed me? With the exception that I have twenty years over my head, +and alas! not so much hair as I had then upon it, I am the same as I was +in 1860."</p> + +<p>"<i>Hôtel Racine! Rue Racine!</i>" said Lissac. "In those days, I dreamed of +being Musset, I a gourmand, and what have I become? A spectator, a +trifler, a Parisian, a rolling stone.—Nothing. And you who dreamed of +being a second Barnave, Vergniaud or Barbaroux, your dream is realized."</p> + +<p>"Realized!" said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>He made an effort to shake his head deprecatingly as if his vanity were +not flattered by those honeyed words of his friend; but his glance +displayed such sincere delight and so strong a desire to be effusive and +in evidence, that he could not repress a smile upon hearing from the +companion of his youth, such a confirmation of <a name="Page_25" id="Page_25"></a>his triumph. They are +our most severe critics, these friends of our youth, they who have +listened to the stammering of our hopes and dreams of the future. And +when at length we have conquered the future, these are often the very +ones to rob us of it! Lissac, however, was not one of these envious +ones.</p> + +<p>"Let us go to Madame Marsy's box, my dear Guy," said Sulpice. "The more +so because if she at all resembles her portrait at the last Salon, she +must be lovely indeed."</p> + +<p>He left the greenroom, leaning on the arm of Lissac, after throwing a +glance backward, however, at the girls whirling about there, and where +in the presence of their stiff, ancient superiors, the young +sub-prefects still hid their faces behind their opera hats. Granet with +Molina went to take leave of Vaudrey, leaving little Marie Launay +smiling artlessly because the financier, the <i>Tumbler</i>, had said to her, +in drawing down her eyelids with his coarse finger: "Will you close your +periwinkles—you <i>kid</i>?"</p> + +<p>"Your Excellency," the banker had said, cajoling his Excellency with his +meaning glance, "I am always at your orders you know."</p> + +<p>"To-morrow, at the Prisons' Commission, Monsieur le Ministre," said +Granet. And amid salutations on every side Vaudrey withdrew, smiling and +good-humored as usual.</p> + +<p>In order to reach the box, Vaudrey had to cross the stage. The new scene +was set. Buddhist temples with <a name="Page_26" id="Page_26"></a>their grotesque shapes and huge statues +stood out against a background of vivid blue sky, and on the canvas +beyond, great pink flowers glowed amid refreshing verdure. Over all fell +a soft fairy-like light from an electric lamp, casting on the floor a +fantastic gleam, soft and clear as the rays of the moon. Sulpice smiled +as he passed beneath this flood of light and saw his shadow projected +before him as upon the glassy waters of a lake. It seemed to him that +this sudden illumination, a sort of fantastic apotheosis as it were, was +like the fairy-like aureole that attended his progress.</p> + +<p>At the very moment of leaving the greenroom, Sulpice had jostled +accidentally against a man of very grave aspect wearing a black coat +closely buttoned. He was almost bald save for some long, thin, gray +locks that hung about his huge ears, his cheeks had a hectic color and +his skull was yellow. He entered this salon in a hesitating, inquisitive +way, with wide-open eyes and a gourmand's movement of the nostrils, and +gazed about the room, warm with lights and heavy with perfume.</p> + +<p>Sulpice glanced at him carelessly and recognized him as the man whom he +himself had superseded on Place Beauvau—a Puritan, a Huguenot, a +widower, the father of five or six daughters, and as solemn and proper +in his ordinary demeanor as a Sunday-school tract. Sulpice could not +refrain from crying out merrily: "Bless me! Monsieur Pichereau!"</p> + +<p>The other shook his butter-colored skull as if he had <a name="Page_27" id="Page_27"></a>suddenly received +a stinging blow on it with a switch, and his red face became +crimson-hued at the sight of Sulpice, his successor in office, standing +before him, politely holding out to him his two gloved hands.</p> + +<p>Guy de Lissac was no longer laughing.</p> + +<p>Their two Excellencies found themselves face to face at the foot of the +greenroom staircase, in the midst of a crowd of brahmins, dancers, +negresses, and female supernumeraries; two Excellencies meeting there; +one smiling, the other grimacing beneath the glance of this curious, +shrewd little world.</p> + +<p>"Ah! I have caught you, my dear colleague," cried Sulpice, very much +amused at Pichereau's embarrassed air, his coat buttoned close like a +Quaker's and his little eyes blinking behind his spectacles, and looking +as sheepish as a sacristan caught napping.</p> + +<p>"Me?" stammered Pichereau. "Me? But my dear Minister, it's you—yes, you +whom I came expressly to seek!"</p> + +<p>"Here?" said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Yes, here!"</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>"I had something to say to you—I—yes, I wanted—"</p> + +<p>The unlucky Pichereau mechanically pulled and jerked at his waistcoat, +then assuming a dignified, grave air, he whistled and hesitated, and +finally stammered:</p> + +<p>"I wished to speak with you—yes—to consult with <a name="Page_28" id="Page_28"></a>you upon a matter of +grave importance—concerning Protestant communities."</p> + +<p>Sulpice could not restrain his laughter.</p> + +<p>Pichereau, with his look of a Calvinistic preacher, was throwing from +behind his spectacles glowing looks in the direction where Marie Launay +stood listening to and laughing at the badinage of Molina. Some +newspaper reporters, scenting a handy paragraph, came sauntering up to +overhear some fragment of the conversation between the minister of +yesterday and him of to-day.</p> + +<p>Guy de Lissac stood carelessly by, secretly very much amused at +Pichereau, who did not move, but rubbing his hands nervously together +was trying to appear at ease, yet by his sour smile at his successor +allowing it to be plainly seen how gladly he would have strangled +Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"My dear colleague," said Sulpice, gayly, "we will talk elsewhere about +your communities. This is hardly the place. <i>Non est hic locus!</i> +Good-bye!"</p> + +<p>"Good-bye, your Excellency," replied Pichereau with forced politeness.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey drew Lissac away, saying with a suppressed laugh:</p> + +<p>"Oh! oh! the Quaker! He has laid down his portfolio, but he has kept the +key to the greenroom, it seems."</p> + +<p>"It would appear," replied Guy, "that the door leading into the +greenroom may open to scenes of consola<a name="Page_29" id="Page_29"></a>tion for fallen greatness. The +blue eyes of Marie Launay always serve as a sparadrap to a fallen +minister!"</p> + +<p>"Was the fat Molina right? To lose the votes of the majority is perhaps +the malady of the knee of ministers," said Vaudrey merrily.</p> + +<p>He laughed again, very much amused at the irritable, peevish yet +cringing attitude of Pichereau, the Genevan doctrinaire, who sought +consolation in the greenroom of the ballet, whilst his five or six +daughters sat at home, probably reading some chaste English romance, or +practising sacred music within the range of the green spectacles of +their governess.</p> + +<p>"But!" said he gayly, "to fall from power is nothing, provided one falls +into the arms of ballet-girls."</p> + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<p class="frmatter"><a name="ill_fronts" id="ill_fronts"></a><b>Part First Chapter I</b></p> + +<p class="center"><i>Molina burst out laughing ... when he ran his eye over the list and +found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and members of the +chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitués.</i></p> + +<p class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/frontispiece.jpg" width="435" height="618" alt="[Illustration: IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA]" title="IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA" /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II" id="II"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>II</h3> + + +<p>Madame Marsy was awaiting Guy de Lissac's return from the greenroom. +From the moment she caught sight of Vaudrey standing within the range of +her opera-glasses, she was seized with the eager desire to make him an +habitué of her salon, the new salon that had just been launched. Madame +Marsy was bitten by that tarantula whose bite makes modern society move +as if afflicted with Saint Vitus's dance. A widow, rich and <a name="Page_30" id="Page_30"></a>still +young, very much admired, she had set herself to play the rôle of a +leader in society to pass away the time. She was one of those women +forever passing before the reporters' note-book, as others pass in front +of a photographic apparatus. Of her inner life, however, very little was +known to the public. But the exact shade of her hair, the color of her +eyes, the cut of her gowns, the address of her tradesmen, the <i>menu</i> of +her dinners, the programme of her concerts, the names of her guests, the +visitors to her salon, the address of her mansion, were all familiar to +every one, and Madame Marsy was daily reported by the chroniclers to the +letter, painted, dressed and undressed.</p> + +<p>There was some romantic gossip whispered about her. It was said that she +had formerly led Philippe Marsy, the artist, a <i>hard life</i>. This artist +was the painter of <i>Charity</i>, the picture so much admired at the +Luxembourg, where it hangs between a Nymph by Henner and a Portrait of a +Lady by Carolus Duran. She was pretty, free, and sufficiently rich since +the sale of the contents of Philippe Marsy's studio. His slightest +sketches had fetched enormous sums under Monsieur Pillet's hammer at the +Hôtel Drouot, and Sabine after an appropriate interval of mourning, +opened her salon.</p> + +<p>Solitary, though surrounded by friends, she created no jealousy among +her admirers, whose homage she received with perfect equanimity, as if +become weary and desirous of a court but not of a favorite. She had a +son at <a name="Page_31" id="Page_31"></a>college who was growing up; he, however, was rarely to be met +with in his mother's little hôtel in the Boulevard Malesherbes. This +pale, slender youth in his student's uniform would sometimes steal +furtively up the staircase to pay his mother a visit as a stranger might +have done, never staying long, however, but hurrying off again to rejoin +an old woman who waited at the corner of the street and who would take +him by the arm and walk away with him—Madame Marsy, his grandmother.</p> + +<p>It was the grandmother who was bringing up the boy. She and a +kind-hearted fellow, François Charrière, a sculptor, who as he said +himself, was nothing of a genius, but who, however, designed models and +advantageously sold them to the manufacturers of lamps in the Rue +Saint-Louis au Marais. It was Charrière who, in fulfilment of a vow made +to his friend Marsy, acted as guardian to the boy.</p> + +<p>Nobody in Paris now remembered anything about Philippe Marsy. In the +course of time, all the little rumors are hushed in the roar and rattle +of Parisian life. Only some semi-flattering rumors were connected with +Sabine's name, together with some mysterious reminiscences. Moreover, +she had the special attraction of a hostess who imparts to her salon the +peculiar charm and flavor of unceremonious hospitality. One was only +obliged to wear a white cravat about his throat, he did not have to +starch his wits.</p> + +<p>Only very recently had Sabine Marsy's salon acquired <a name="Page_32" id="Page_32"></a>the reputation of +being an easy-going one, where one was sure of a welcome, a sort of +rendezvous where every one could be found as in the corridor of a +theatre on the night of a first appearance, or on the sidewalk of a +boulevard; a salon well-filled, that could rank with the semi-official +and very distinguished one presided over by Madame Evan, and those +others quieter, more sober—if a little Calvinistic—of the select +Alsatian colony.</p> + +<p>Sabine Marsy must have had a great deal of tact, force of character and +perseverance in carrying out her plans, to have reached this point, more +difficult to her, moreover, than it would have been to any other, as she +had no political backing whatever. Her connection with society was +entirely through the world of artists. Many of these, however, had +brought to her salon some of the Athenians of the political world, +connoisseurs, good conversationalists, handsome men, who freely declared +with Vaudrey, that a republic could not exist without the assistance of +women, that to women Orleanism was due, and those charming fellows had +made Madame Marsy's hospitable salon the fashion.</p> + +<p>Besides it is easy enough in Paris to have a salon if one knows how to +give dinners. Some squares of Bristol board engraved by Stern and posted +to good addresses, will attract with an almost disconcerting facility, a +crowd of visitors who will swarm around a festive board like bees around +a honeycomb.</p> + +<p>Paris is a town of guests.<a name="Page_33" id="Page_33"></a></p> + +<p>Then too, Madame Marsy was herself so captivating. She was always on the +watch for some new celebrity, as a game-keeper watches for a hare that +he means to shoot presently. One of her daily tasks was to read the +<i>Journal Officiel</i> in order to discover in the orator of to-day the +Minister of State of to-morrow. She was always well informed beforehand +which artist or sculptor would be likely to win the medal of honor at +the Salon, and was the first to invite such a one and to let him know +that it was she who had discovered him. In literature, she encouraged +the new school, liking it for the attention it attracted. It was also +her aim to give to her salon a literary as well as a political color. +Artists and statesmen elbowed one another there.</p> + +<p>For some days now, she had thought of giving a reception which was to be +a surprise to her friends. She had heard of Japanese exhibitions being +given at other houses. She herself was determined to give a <i>soirée +exotique</i>. It happened just then that a friend of Guy de Lissac, +Monsieur José de Rosas, a great lounger, had returned from a journey +around the world. What a piece of good fortune! She too had known De +Rosas formerly, and if she could only get him to consent, she could +announce a most attractive soirée: the travels of such a man as Monsieur +de Rosas: a rare treat!</p> + +<p>"The Comtesse d'Horville gives literary matinées," said Sabine, quite on +fire with the idea; "Madame Evan has poems and tragedies read at her +receptions,<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34"></a> I shall have lecturers and savants, since that is +fashionable."</p> + +<p>And what a woman wishes, a grandee of Spain willed, it appeared. +Monsieur de Rosas decided, egged on a little by Guy de Lissac, to come +and relate to Madame Marsy's friends his adventures in strange lands. +The invitations to the soirée were already out.</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy had also obtained a promise from three Ministers of State +that they would be present. She had spread the news far and wide. A +little more and she would have had their names printed on the programmes +for the evening. She had had a success quite unlooked for—a promise +from Monsieur Pichereau to be present—from Pichereau, that starched +Puritan, and all the newspapers had announced his intention. When +suddenly—stupidly—a cabinet crisis had arisen at the most unexpected +moment, a useless crisis. Granet had interpellated Pichereau with a view +to succeed him, and Pichereau fell without Granet succeeding him. A +Ministry had been hastily formed, with Collard at its head, and Sulpice +Vaudrey as Minister of the Interior in place of Pichereau! And all those +Ministers of State who had promised to be present to hear Monsieur de +Rosas at Madame Marsy's, fell from power with Pichereau.</p> + +<p>"Such a Cabinet!" Sabine had exclaimed in a rage. "A Cabinet of +pasteboard capuchins."</p> + +<p>"A Ministry of pasteboard, certainly," Guy had answered.<a name="Page_35" id="Page_35"></a></p> + +<p>Madame Marsy was quite beside herself. Granet indeed! Why could he not +have waited a day or two longer before upsetting the whole +administration. It would have been quite as easy to have overthrown +Pichereau a day after her soirée as a few days before. Was Granet then, +in a great hurry to be made minister? Oh! her opinion of him had always +been a correct one! An ambitious schemer. He had triumphed, or at least +he had expected to triumph. And the consequence was that Sabine found +herself without a Minister to introduce to her guests. It was as if +Granet had purposely designed this.</p> + +<p>No, she did not know a single member of the new Cabinet. She had spoken +once to the President of the council, Collard, a former advocate of +Nantes, at a reception at the Élysée. Collard had even, in passing by +her, torn off a morsel of the lace of her flounce. How charmingly, too, +he had excused himself! But this acquaintanceship with him would hardly +justify her in asking him brusquely to honor her with his presence at +this soirée upon which her social success depended.</p> + +<p>Her intimate friend, pretty Madame Gerson, who assisted her in doing the +honors of her salon until the time when she herself would have a rival +salon and take Sabine's guests away from her, sought in vain to comfort +her by assuring her that Pichereau would be sure to come. He had +promised to do so. He was a sincere man, and his word could be relied +on. He <a name="Page_36" id="Page_36"></a>would, moreover, bring his former colleagues from the +Departments of Public Instruction, and Post and Telegraph. He had +promised. Oh! yes, Pichereau! Pichereau, however, mattered very little +to Sabine now! <i>Ex</i>-ministers, indeed! she could always have enough of +them. It was not that kind that she wanted. She did not care about her +salon being called the <i>Invalides</i> as that of a rival was called the +<i>Salon des Refuseès</i>. No, certainly not, that was something she would +never consent to.</p> + +<p>Granet's impatience had upset all her plans.</p> + +<p>So Madame Marsy, side by side in her box with Madame Gerson, whose dark, +brilliant beauty set off her own fair beauty, had listened with a bored +and sulky manner to the first act of <i>L'Africaine</i>, while Monsieur +Gerson conversed timidly, half under his breath, with Guy de Lissac, who +made the fourth occupant of the box.</p> + +<p>At the end of the second act, however, Lissac suddenly caught sight of +Vaudrey's smiling countenance beside Granet's waxed moustaches in the +manager's box.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he exclaimed, "there is Vaudrey!"</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy, however, had already caught sight of him. She turned her +opera-glass upon the new Cabinet Minister, whose carefully arranged +blonde beard was parted in the middle and spread out in two light tufts +over his white necktie, his silky moustaches turned jauntily upwards +against his fleshy cheeks. Sabine, continuing to look at the newcomer +through her glass, saw <a name="Page_37" id="Page_37"></a>as he moved within the shadow of the box, this +man of forty, with a very agreeable and still youthful face, and as he +leaned over the edge of the box to look at the audience, she noted that +he had a slight bald spot on the top of his skull between the fair tufts +that adorned the sides of his head.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, "I thought that he was a dark man."</p> + +<p>"No, no," answered Lissac, "on the contrary, he was a fair, handsome +youth when we both studied law here in Paris together."</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy, as if she had been touched by an electric spark, turned +quickly round on her chair to look at Guy, displaying to him as she did +so, a lovely face, surmounting the most beautiful shoulders imaginable.</p> + +<p>"What! you know the minister so intimately?"</p> + +<p>"Very intimately."</p> + +<p>"Then, my dear Lissac, you can do me the greatest favor. No, I do not +ask you to do it, I insist on it."</p> + +<p>Over the pretty Andalusian features of Madame Gerson, a mocking smile +played.</p> + +<p>"I have guessed it," she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>"And so have I," said Lissac. "You wish me to present the new Minister +of the Interior to you? You have a friend you want appointed to a +prefecture."</p> + +<p>"Not at all. I only want him to take Pichereau's place at my reception. +My dear Lissac, my kind Lis<a name="Page_38" id="Page_38"></a>sac," she continued in dulcet tones, and +clasping her little gloved hands entreatingly, like a child begging for +a toy, "persuade Monsieur Vaudrey to accept this invitation of mine and +you will be a love, you understand, Lissac, a love!"</p> + +<p>But Guy had already risen and with a touch of his thumb snapping out his +crush hat, he opened the door of the box, saying to Sabine as he did so:</p> + +<p>"Take notice that I ask nothing in return for this favor!"</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" she cried, "that is discreet, but I am willing to subscribe to any +condition!"</p> + +<p>"Selika is cold beside you," said Lissac as he disappeared through the +open doorway, "I will bring you your minister in ten minutes."</p> + +<p>Sabine waited nervously. The curtain had just fallen on the third act. +The manager's box was empty. Guy would doubtless be obliged to rejoin +Vaudrey, and neither the minister nor his friend would be seen again. +Just then some one knocked at the door of the box. Monsieur Gerson, +overcome by fatigue, and weary as only a man can be who is dragged +against his will night after night to some place of amusement, was +dozing in the rear of the box. At a word from his wife he got up and +hastened to open the door. It proved to be an artist, an old friend of +Philippe Marsy, who came to invite Sabine to his studio to "admire" <i>his +Envoy</i> that he <a name="Page_39" id="Page_39"></a>had just finished for the Salon. Sabine received him +graciously, and promised him somewhat stiffly that she would do so. She +tapped impatiently with her fan upon her fingers as the orchestra began +to play the prelude to the fourth act. It was quite certain that Lissac +had failed in his mission.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, in the luminous space made by the open door, Guy's elegant +figure appeared for a moment, disappearing immediately to allow a man to +pass who entered, smiling pleasantly, and at whom a group of people, +standing in the lobby behind, were gazing. He bowed as Lissac said to +Sabine:</p> + +<p>"Allow me, madame, to present to you His Excellency the Minister of the +Interior."</p> + +<p>Sabine, suddenly beaming with joy, saw no one but Sulpice Vaudrey +amongst the group of men in dress-clothes who gave way to allow the +dignitary to pass. She had eyes only for him!</p> + +<p>She arose, pushing back her chair instinctively, as the Minister +entered, Monsieur and Madame Gerson standing at one side and Sabine on +the other and bowing to him,—Sabine triumphant, Madame Gerson curious, +Monsieur Gerson flattered though sleepy.</p> + +<p>Sulpice seated himself at Madame Marsy's side, with the amiable +condescension of a great man charmed to play the agreeable, and to +visit, at the solicitation of a friend, a fair woman whom all the world +delighted to honor. It seemed to him to put the finishing touch to <a name="Page_40" id="Page_40"></a>that +success and power which had been his only a few days.</p> + +<p>He went quite artlessly and by instinct wherever he might have the +chance to inhale admiring incense. It seemed to him as if he were +swimming in refreshing waters. Everything delighted him. He wished to be +obliging to every one. It seemed to him but natural that a woman of +fashion like Sabine should wish to meet him and offer him her +congratulations, as he himself, without knowing her, should desire to +listen to her felicitations. To speak in complimentary terms was as +natural to him as to listen to the compliments of others.</p> + +<p>He delighted in the atmosphere of adulation which surrounded him, these +two pretty women who smiled upon him with a gratitude so impressive, +pleased him. Sabine appeared especially charming to him when, speaking +with the captivating grace of a Parisian, she said:</p> + +<p>"I hardly know how to thank my friend Monsieur de Lissac for inducing +you to listen to the entreaties of one who solicits—"</p> + +<p>"Solicits, madame?" said the minister with an eagerness which seemed +already to answer her prayer affirmatively.</p> + +<p>"I hope your Excellency will consent to honor with your presence a +reunion of friends at my house—a reunion somewhat trivial, for this +occasion, but clever enough."</p> + +<p>"<a name="Page_41" id="Page_41"></a>A reunion?" replied Vaudrey, still smiling.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Lissac has not told you then, what my hopes are?"</p> + +<p>"We are too old friends, Lissac and I, for him not to allow me the +pleasure of hearing from your own lips, madame, in what way I may be of +service to you, or to any of your friends."</p> + +<p>Sabine smiled at this well-turned phrase uttered in the most gallant +tone.</p> + +<p>Who then, could have told her that Vaudrey was a provincial? An intimate +enemy or an intimate friend. But he was not at all provincial. On the +contrary, Vaudrey was quite charming.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas has had the kindness, your Excellency, to promise to +come to my house next Saturday and give a chatty account of his travels. +He will be, I am quite sure, most proud to know that in his audience—"</p> + +<p>Sulpice neatly and half modestly turned aside the compliment that was +approaching.</p> + +<p>He knew Monsieur de Rosas. He had read and greatly admired some +translations of the Persian poets by that lettered nobleman, which had +been printed for circulation only amongst the author's most intimate +friends. Vaudrey had first met Monsieur de Rosas at a meeting of a +scientific society. Rosas was an eminent man as well as a poet, and one +whom he would be greatly pleased to meet again. A hero of romance as +erudite as a Benedictine. Charming, too, and clever! Something like a<a name="Page_42" id="Page_42"></a> +Cid who has become a boulevard lounger on returning from Central Asia.</p> + +<p>This portrait of Rosas was a clever one indeed, and Sabine nodded +acquiescence again and again as each point was hit off by Vaudrey. He, +in his turn, basked comfortably in the light of her smiles, and listened +with pleasure to the sound of his own voice. He could catch glimpses +through the box curtains from between these two charming profiles—one a +brunette, the other a blonde—of the vast auditorium all crimson and +gold, blazing with lights and crowded with faces. From this well-dressed +crowd, from these boxes where one caught sight of white gleaming +shoulders, half-gloved arms, flower-decked heads, sparkling necklaces, +flashing glances, it seemed to Vaudrey as if a strange, subtle perfume +arose—the perfume of women, an intoxicating odor, in the midst of this +radiancy that rivaled the brilliant sun at its rising.</p> + +<p>Upon the stage, amid the dazzling splendor of the ballet, in the milky +ray of the electric light, the swelling skirts whirled, the pink +slippers that he had seen but a moment before near by, and the gleaming, +silver helmets, the tinfoil and the spangles shone in the dance. A fairy +light enveloped all these stage splendors; and this luxurious ensemble, +as seen from the depths of the box, seemed to him to be the glory of an +unending apotheosis, a sort of fête given to celebrate his entrance on +his public career.</p> + +<p>Then, in the unconcealed effusion of his delight, with<a name="Page_43" id="Page_43"></a>out any effort at +effect, speaking frankly to this woman, to Guy, and to Gerson, as if he +were communing with himself to the mocking accompaniment of this Hindoo +music, he revealed his joys, his prospects, and his dreams. He replied +to Sabine's congratulations by avowing his intention to devote himself +entirely to his country.</p> + +<p>"In short, your Excellency," she said, "you are really going to do great +things?"</p> + +<p>He gazed dreamily around the theatre, smiling as if he beheld some lucky +vision, and answered:</p> + +<p>"Really, madame, I accepted office only because I felt it was my duty +and as a means of doing good. I intend to be just—to be honest. I +should like to discover some unappreciated genius and raise him from the +obscurity in which an unjust fate has shrouded him, to the height where +he belongs. If we are to do no better than those we have succeeded, it +was useless to turn them out!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! <i>pardieu</i>," said Lissac, while Madame Marsy smiled and nodded +approval of Vaudrey's words, "you and your colleagues are just now in +the honeymoon of your power."</p> + +<p>"We will endeavor to make this honeymoon of as long duration as +possible," laughingly replied Sulpice. "I believe in the case of power, +as in marriage, that the coming of the April moon is the fault of the +parties connected with it."</p> + +<p>"It takes a shrewd person indeed to know why April <a name="Page_44" id="Page_44"></a>moons rise at all!" +said Guy. Vaudrey's thoughts turned involuntarily toward Adrienne, his +own pretty wife, who was waiting for him in the great lonely apartments +at the Ministry which they had just taken possession of as they might +occupy rooms at a hotel.</p> + +<p>He felt a sudden desire to return to her, to tell her of the incidents +of this evening. Yes, to tell her everything, even to his visit behind +the scenes—but he remained where he was, not knowing how to take leave +of Madame Marsy just yet, and she, in her turn, divined from the +slackened conversation that he was anxious to be off.</p> + +<p>"I was waiting for that strain," said Madame Marsy to Guy, "now that it +is over, I will go."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey did not reply, awaiting Sabine's departure, so as to conduct her +to her carriage.</p> + +<p>People hurried out into the lobbies to see him pass by. Upon the +staircases, attendants and strangers saluted him. It seemed to Vaudrey +that he moved among those who were in sympathy with him. Lissac followed +him with Madame Gerson on his arm; her jaded husband sighed for a few +hours' sleep.</p> + +<p>In the sharp, frosty air of a night in January, Sulpice, enveloped in +otter fur, stood with Madame Marsy on his arm, waiting for the +appearance of that lady's carriage, which was emerging from the luminous +depths of the Place, accompanied by another carriage without a monogram +or crest; it was that of the minister.<a name="Page_45" id="Page_45"></a></p> + +<p>Sulpice gazed before him down the Avenue de l'Opéra, brilliant with +light, and the bluish tints of the Jablockoff electric apparatus flooded +him with its bright rays; it seemed to him as if all this brilliancy +blazed for him, like the flattering apotheosis which had just before +fallen upon him as he crossed the stage of the Opéra. It seemed like an +aureole lighted up especially to encircle him!</p> + +<p>Sabine asked Vaudrey as he escorted her to her carriage:</p> + +<p>"Madame Vaudrey will, I trust, do me the honor to accompany your +Excellency to my house? I will take the liberty to-morrow of calling on +her to invite her."</p> + +<p>The Minister bowed a gracious acquiescence.</p> + +<p>Sabine finally thanked him by a gracious smile: her small gloved hand +raised the window of the coupé, and the carriage was driven off rapidly, +amid the din of horses' hoofs.</p> + +<p>"Good-bye," said Lissac to Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Cannot I offer you a seat in my carriage?"</p> + +<p>"Thank you, but I am not two steps away from the Rue d'Aumale."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey turned towards Madame Gerson; she and her husband bowed low.</p> + +<p>"May I not set you down at your house, madame?"</p> + +<p>"Your Excellency is very kind, but we have our own carriage!"<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46"></a></p> + +<p>"Au revoir," said Vaudrey to Lissac, "come and breakfast with me +to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"With pleasure!"</p> + +<p>"To the ministry!" said Vaudrey to the coachman as he stepped into his +carriage.</p> + +<p>He sank back upon the cushions with a feeling of delight as if glad to +be alone. All the scenes of that evening floated again before his eyes. +He felt once more in his nostrils the subtle, penetrating perfume of the +greenroom, he saw again the blue eyes of the little danseuse. The +admiring looks, the respectful salutes, the smiles of the women, the +soft, caressing tones of Sabine, and Madame Gerson's pearly teeth, he +saw or heard all these again, and above all, this word clear as a +clarion, triumphant as a trumpet's blast: <i>Success!</i> All this came back +again to him.</p> + +<p>"You have succeeded!"</p> + +<p>He heard Guy's voice again speaking this to him in joyous tones. +Succeeded! It was certainly true.</p> + +<p>Minister! Was it possible! He had at his beck and call a whole host of +functionaries and servitors! He it was who had the power to make the +whole machine of government move—he, the lawyer from Grenoble—who ten +years ago would have thought it a great honor to have been appointed to +a place in the department of Isère!</p> + +<p>All those people whom he could see in the shadow of the lighted +boulevards buying the newspapers at the <a name="Page_47" id="Page_47"></a>kiosks, would read therein his +name and least gesture and action.</p> + +<p><i>"Monsieur le Ministre has taken up his residence on the Place Beauvau. +Monsieur Vaudrey this morning received the heads of the Bureaus and the +personnel of the Department of the Ministry of the Interior. Monsieur +Vaudrey, with the assistance of Monsieur Henri Jacquier of Oise, +undersecretary of State, is actively engaged in examining the reports of +prefects and under-prefects. Monsieur will doubtless make some needed +reforms in the administration of the prefectures."</i> Everywhere, in all +the newspapers, Monsieur Vaudrey! The Minister of the Interior! He, his +name, his words, his projects, his deeds!</p> + +<p>Success! Yes, it was his, it had come!</p> + +<p>Never in his wildest visions had he dreamed of the success that he had +attained. Never had he expected to catch sight of such bright rays as +those which now shone down upon him from that star, which with the +superstition of an ambitious man, he had singled out. Success! Success!</p> + +<p>And now all the world should see what he would do. Already in his own +little town, in his speeches, during the war, at the elections of 1871, +and especially at Versailles, during the years of struggle and political +intrigue, in the tribune, or as a commissioner or sub-commissioner, he +had given proofs of his qualifications as a statesman, but the +touchstone of man is power. Emerging from his <a name="Page_48" id="Page_48"></a>semi-obscurity into the +sunshine of success, he would at last show the world what he was and +what he could do. Power! To command! To create! To impress his ideas +upon a whole nation! To have succeeded! succeeded! succeeded! Sulpice's +dreams were realized at last.</p> + +<p>And whilst the ministerial carriage was driving at a gallop towards the +Place Beauvau, Sabine, muffled up in her furs, her fine skin caressed by +the blue-fox border of her pelisse, said to herself, quite indifferent +to the man himself, but delighted to have a minister's name to enroll +upon her list of guests:</p> + +<p>"He is a simpleton—Vaudrey—but a very charming simpleton, +nevertheless."</p> + +<p>The iron gates of the Place Beauvau were thrown back for his +Excellency's carriage to enter. The gravel creaked under the wheels, as +the coupé turning off to the left, stopped under the awning over the +door.</p> + +<p>Sulpice alighted. The great door opened to admit him. Two +white-cravatted servants occupied a bench while awaiting the minister's +return.</p> + +<p>Sulpice ran lightly up the great marble staircase leading to his private +apartments. Handing his hat and coat to a servant in the antechamber, he +gayly entered the little salon, where he found his wife sitting by a +table reading <i>La Revue</i> by the light of a shaded lamp. At the sight of +her pretty, fresh young face extended to greet him, with her blue eyes +and smiling air, at the sound of her clear, sweet, but rather timid +voice asking a <a name="Page_49" id="Page_49"></a>little anxiously: "Well?" Sulpice took the fair face in +both his hands and his burning lips imprinted a long kiss on the white +forehead, over which a few curls of golden hair strayed.</p> + +<p>"Well, my dear Adrienne, I have been greatly interested. All the +kindness with which I was received, the evident delight with which the +new cabinet has been welcomed by the people, even the grimaces of +Pichereau whom I met,—if you only knew where—all gave me pleasure, +delighted me, and yet made me fear. Minister! Do you know what I have +been thinking of since I was made a minister?"</p> + +<p>"Of what have you been thinking?" asked the young wife, who, with her +hands folded, gazed trustingly and sweetly into Sulpice's feverish eyes.</p> + +<p>"I?—I have been telling myself that it is not enough to be a minister. +One must be a great minister! You understand, Adrienne, a great +minister!"</p> + +<p>As he spoke he took Adrienne's hands in his, and the young wife glanced +up admiringly at this young man burning with hope, who stood there +before her, declaring: "I will be great!"</p> + +<p>She had never dreamed of his reaching such heights as these on that day +when she felt the fingers of her fiancé trembling in her hand, the day +that Sulpice had whispered the words in her ear which made her heart +leap with joy: "I love you, Adrienne, I shall always love you—Always!"<a name="Page_50" id="Page_50"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="III" id="III"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>III</h3> + + +<p>Sulpice Vaudrey had married Adrienne for love. She brought to him from +the convent at Grenoble where she had been educated, the charming +innocence of a young girl and the innate devotion of a woman. She was an +orphan with a considerable fortune, but although Sulpice had only +moderate resources, he had scarcely thought of her wealth, not even +inquiring of her guardian, Doctor Reboux, on the occasion of his formal +demand for her hand, about the dowry of Mademoiselle Gérard.</p> + +<p>He had met her at more than one soirée at Grenoble, where she appeared +timid, dazzled and retiring, and quietly interrogating everything by her +sweet glance. Some few words exchanged carelessly, music which they had +listened to side by side, the ordinary everyday intercourse in society, +had made Sulpice acquainted with his wife; but the sight of the pretty +blonde—so sweet and gentle—the childlike timidity of this young girl, +something rather pensive in the confiding smile of this blooming +creature of eighteen summers, had won him completely. He was free, and +alone, for he had lost, but a short time before, the only creature he +loved in <a name="Page_51" id="Page_51"></a>the world, his mother, of whom he was the son in the double +sense of flesh and spirit, by the nourishment of her breast and by the +patient teaching that she had implanted in his mind.</p> + +<p>He remembered only his father's dreamy and refined face in the portrait +of a young, sad-looking man in a lawyer's black gown, before which he +had stood when quite small, and spelled out as he might have lisped a +prayer, the four letters: <i>papa</i>. Alone in this little town of Grenoble, +for which he had left his native village of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, he +had, just before meeting Adrienne, fallen a victim to a profound +melancholy and realized the necessity of deciding upon his career.</p> + +<p>He was then thirty-four. Except the years spent in the study of law at +Paris amid the turmoil of the left bank of the Seine, he had always +lived in the province—his own province of Dauphiné. He had grown up in +the old house at Saint-Laurent, where every nook and corner kept for him +its own sweet memory of his childhood and youth. The great white +drawing-room with its wainscotings of the time of Louis XVI., which +opened out upon a flight of steps leading down into a terraced garden; +the portraits of obscure ancestors: lawyers in powdered wigs and wearing +the robes of the members of the Third estate, fat and rosy with double +chins resting upon their broad cravats, amiable old ladies with oddly +arranged hair and flowered gowns, coquettish still <a name="Page_52" id="Page_52"></a>as they smiled in +their oval, wooden frames, and then the old books in their old-fashioned +bindings slumbering in a great bookcase with glass doors, or piled up on +shelves below the fowling-pieces, the game-bags and the powder-horns.</p> + +<p>With this dwelling of which he thought so often now, his whole past was +linked, about it still clung something of its past poetry, and it was +sacred through the memories it preserved, and as the scene of the +unforgotten joys of childhood. He could see again, the great +stone-flagged kitchen, where they sat up at nights telling stories, the +chamber above it, the bed with its heavy serge curtains, where he +lay—sometimes shaking with terror—all alone, adjoining the room once +occupied by his father, and the moonlight shining through the tall old +trees in the courtyard outside, that entering by the half-open blinds +cast shadows like trembling lace on the wall opposite to him. It seemed +to Sulpice then that he could hear the sounds of the weird demon's chase +as told by old Catherine, the cook, in bated tones during their vigils.</p> + +<p>It was there that he went every year to pass his holidays with his +mother, who had had the courage to send him away,—just as during winter +she had plunged him into cold water—to the Lyceum at Grenoble, whence +he would return to Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, "so thin, poor child!" as his +mother said.</p> + +<p>And how fat she would send him back again to school,—to make the +masters ashamed of their stinginess.<a name="Page_53" id="Page_53"></a></p> + +<p>How pleasant were the reminiscences of those sunny days amongst the +mountains, the excursions to Grande Chartreuse, where the murmuring +brook trickled among the rocks, the halts at Guiers-Mort or under the +trees in the stillness of a drowsy day in summer; how delightful to +stretch one's self out at the foot of the cliffs or on a grassy slope +with a book, pausing now and then to indulge in day-dreams or glance up +at the fleecy clouds floating in the blue sky above his head and watch +them gathering, then vanishing and melting away like smoke wreaths! Ah! +how sweet were those long, idle days full of dreams, when the noise of +the waterfall dashing over the rocks lulled the senses like some merry +song, or a nurse's tender, crooning lullaby.</p> + +<p>In those days Sulpice made no plans for his future, where he would go, +what he would do, or what would become of him; but he felt within +himself unbounded hope, a hope as limitless and bright as the azure sky +above him, the inspiration of devotion, love and poetry. He asked +himself whether he should be a missionary or a representative of the +people. It seemed to him that his heart was large enough to contain a +world, and as he grew up he began to ask himself the terrible question: +"Will a woman ever love me?"</p> + +<p>To be loved! What a dream! One day he put this question to one of his +comrades at college, Guy de Lissac, the son of a country gentleman in +the neighborhood, who answered:<a name="Page_54" id="Page_54"></a></p> + +<p>"Booby! every one is loved some day or other, and there are some who are +loved even too much!"</p> + +<p>Sulpice had received a patriarchal and half-puritanical training, but +softened materially by his mother's almost excessive care, it had left, +as it were, a kind of poetic perfume that clung about him and never left +him.</p> + +<p>Even during the days of his struggle in crowded Paris, in the heat of +political strife, his thoughts would fly back to the old home at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, recalling to mind the old armchair where his +father used to sit, the father whose kiss he had never known, hearing +again his mother's voice from the great oak staircase with its heavy +balusters, and he recalled at the same moment, the landscape with its +living figures, the spotted, steel-colored guinea-fowl screaming from +the branches of the elms, the vineyard hands returning from work, to +trample with bare feet the great clusters of grapes piled up in the +wine-vat in the cellar whose odor intoxicated! Even as a representative +or minister, musing over his past that seemed but yesterday, Sulpice +wandered again in thought to this quiet country spot, so loved by him, +so sweet, so still, reposing in the silence of provincial calm—far +away, removed from all the noise and bustle of Paris.</p> + +<p>The farmers of Dauphiné generally think of making their sons tillers of +the soil, sending them to school and to college, perhaps to begin later +the study of law or medicine, but welcoming them joyfully back again to +their native fields, to their farms, where the youths soon forget <a name="Page_55" id="Page_55"></a>all +they may have learned of the Code or the Codex and lead the healthy, +hardy life of the country. Good, well-built fellows, their chests +enlarged by their daily exercise, their thighs strengthened by +mountain-climbing, gay young men, liking to hunt and drink on the banks +of the Isère and caring more for good harvests than for the songs of the +wind amongst the branches of the poplars upon the river-banks.</p> + +<p>Sulpice had an old uncle on his father's side who proposed to his +sister-in-law to give up his broad acres—a fortune in themselves—to +Sulpice, if his nephew would consent to marry his daughter. Sulpice +refused. He would not marry for money.</p> + +<p>"Fiddle-faddle!" cried his uncle. "Sickly sentimentality! If he +cultivates that <i>grain</i>, my brother's son will not make much headway."</p> + +<p>"There is where you are mistaken, brother-in-law. What my poor Raymond +had not time to become, his child will be: a lawyer at once eloquent and +honest."</p> + +<p>"Well, well," replied the uncle, "but he shall not have my girl."</p> + +<p>Sulpice, after finishing his studies at Paris, returned to his mother at +Grenoble, took her away from the old house at Saint-Laurent and +installed her in the town with himself, where he began the practice of +law and attracted everybody's attention from the first. He made pleading +a sacred office and not a trade. Everyone was astonished that he had not +remained in Paris.<a name="Page_56" id="Page_56"></a></p> + +<p>Why? He loved his native province, the banks of the Isère, the healthy, +poetic atmosphere hanging over the desert of the Chartreuse and the +snows of the Grand-Som. A talented man could make his way +anywhere,—moreover, it was his pleasure to consider it a duty not to +leave this secluded corner of the earth where he would cause freedom of +speech to be known. Sulpice, whose heart was open to every ardent and +generous manifestation of human thought, had imbibed from his mother, as +well as from his father's writings and books, and from the +<i>Encyclopædia</i> that Raymond Vaudrey had interlined with notes and +reflections, not merely traditional information, but also, so to speak, +the baptism of liberty. He had lived in the feverish days of the past +eighty years, through his reading of the <i>Gazette Nationale</i> of those +stormy days. The speeches that he found in those pages—speeches that +still burned like uncooled lava—of Mirabeau, Barnave, and Condorcet, a +son of Grenoble, seemed to impart a glow to his fingers and fire to his +glance. Then, too, the magnificent dreams of freedom proclaimed from the +tribune inflamed his mind and made his heart beat fast. He saw as in a +vision applauding crowds, tricolors gleaming in the clear and golden +sunlight, processions moving, files marching past, and heard eternal +truths proclaimed and acclaimed.</p> + +<p>His mother smiled at all this enthusiasm. She did not however try to +repress it. It would vanish at the touch of years, just as the leaves of +the trees fly before <a name="Page_57" id="Page_57"></a>the winds of October. And besides, the dear woman +herself was in sympathy with his hopes, his dreams and visions, +remembering that her lost Raymond had loved what his son in his turn so +much adored.</p> + +<p>The termination of the war and the fall of the empire found Sulpice a +popular man at Grenoble; loved by all, by the populace who knew how +generous he was, and by the middle-class who regarded him as a prudent +man, hence the February elections saw him sent to Bordeaux, a member of +the National Assembly. He had just passed his thirty-fourth year.</p> + +<p>His mother lived long enough to see this event, and to be dazzled by +this brilliant launch on his career.</p> + +<p>With what deep emotion, even to-day, Vaudrey recalled that Sunday in +February, a foul, wet day, when he returned home in a closed carriage +with a friend, from an electioneering tour. The day before he had made a +speech in a wineshop to an audience of peasants, who listened, +open-mouthed, but withal suspicious, examining their candidate as they +would have handled a beast offered at the market, and who, step by step, +applauded his remarks, stretching out their rasp-like hands as he left +them, and crying out: "You are our man!"</p> + +<p>That very morning he returned to Grenoble in the rain, passing through +villages where the posters bearing his name and those of his friends, +half-demolished by the rain, flapped dismally in the wind. Before the +mayor's office, little groups were gathered, peaceful folk; <a name="Page_58" id="Page_58"></a>a gendarme +paced slowly to and fro, and bulletins littered the muddy thoroughfare. +But there was no excitement. Nothing more. Not even a quickened +pulse-beat was felt by those stolid men upon whose votes depended the +fate of the nation. Sulpice could not help marvelling at so much +indifference, but he reflected that it was thus throughout all France, +and that not only his name but the destiny of the nation was involved in +the struggle.</p> + +<p>Moreover, at night, with what feverish transport he watched the returns +of the election as they reached the Palais de Justice, black with the +crowd, and filled with uproar! With what a fearfully fast-beating heart +he saw the rapidly swelling number of ballots cast for him! Dispatches +came, and pedestrians hurried in from the country, waving their +bulletins above their heads, and Sulpice heard on every lip the same +cry: "Vaudrey leads!"</p> + +<p>Some cried bravo, while others clapped their hands. A crowd quickly +gathered about Vaudrey. It already seemed to him that he was lifted up +by a great wave and carried to a new world.</p> + +<p>A friend seized him by the arm and drew him into a corner of the hall, +away from the others, and hurriedly said: "You know I am not one to ask +much of you, to ask anything of you, in fact. I merely reckon on a +receivership. That is easily done, eh? A mere nothing?"</p> + +<p>Sulpice, whose feelings were overcome by this great <a name="Page_59" id="Page_59"></a>popular +consecration, felt a kind of anger stir his heart against this +solicitor, who, in the triumph of a great popular cause, saw only a +means of self-advancement, of securing an appointment. The deputy—for +he was a deputy now, each commune adding its total to the Vaudrey +vote—was moved by a feeling of disgust.</p> + +<p>The crowd followed him home that evening, shouting in triumph.</p> + +<p>Amid the joy of victory, Sulpice felt the burden of the anxiety caused +by duties to be done: a treaty of peace to be signed, and what a peace! +Must he, alas! append his signature to a document devoted to the +dismemberment of his country? Far into the night he stood in reverie in +his chamber, his brow resting against the cold window-pane.</p> + +<p>He retired to rest very late, and arose with the gray dawn of February, +but without having slept.</p> + +<p>He looked across the street to a convent garden, with its square and +lozenge-shaped beds regularly arranged, its bare trees and box-wood +borders, that he had often gazed upon. Some nuns in their black robes +passed slowly across this cold and calm horizon that for many years had +also been the range of his vision.</p> + +<p>Henceforth this familiar spot, this sad garden, whose cloistral +associations charmed him, would be lost to his view. It was Paris now +that awaited him, feverish Paris, burning with anger and odorous of +saltpetre. Its very <a name="Page_60" id="Page_60"></a>pavements must burn. Sulpice was in haste, however, +to see it once more, to pass with head aloft beneath the garrets where +he had once dreamed as a student, fagging and striving to get knowledge. +How often he would regret that convent garden, those familiar +flower-beds, the deep silence that enveloped him as he sat working by +the open window, the passage of a bird near him, as if to fan him with +its wing, and the vague murmur of the canticles of the sisters ascending +to his window like the echo of a prayer!</p> + +<p>In the recess during one of the years following his election to the +Assembly, he married Mademoiselle Gérard. Doctor Reboux, her guardian, +charmed to give his ward to a man with a future like Vaudrey's, had not +hesitated long about consenting to the marriage. Adrienne delighted +Sulpice, and the young girl herself was quite happy to be chosen by this +good-natured, distinguished young man whom everybody at Grenoble, not +excepting his political adversaries, admired and spoke well of. With +large, brilliant, black eyes lighting up a thin, fair face, a full +beard, a high forehead with a deep furrow between the eyebrows, giving +to his usually wandering, keen and restless glance a somewhat +contemplative expression, Sulpice was a decidedly attractive man. He was +not a handsome or a charming fellow, but a good-natured, agreeable, +refined man, a fine conversationalist, persuasive, enthusiastic and +alert; learned without being pedantic, a man who could inspire in a +young <a name="Page_61" id="Page_61"></a>girl a perfect passion. Adrienne joyfully married him, as he had +sought her from love.</p> + +<p>And now all the poetry and romance of his youth blossomed again in his +heart, in the thick of the political struggle in which he was engaged; +he forgot, amid the idyllic scenes of domestic life, the storms of +Versailles, the political troubles, forebodings as to the future, all +anxieties of the present, the routine life of the Assembly into which he +plunged with all his mind, and the excitement of his labors, his debates +and his duties.</p> + +<p>Sulpice thought again and again of the summer morning when he led his +wife to the altar, and compared it to a day's halt in the course of a +journey under the blaze of the sun; he recalled the old house full of +noisy stir, the crowd of relatives and friends in festive attire, the +stamping of the horses' feet before the great open gate, the neighbors +standing at the windows, and the little street-boys scuffling upon the +pavement, all the joyous bustle of that happy day. It seemed to Sulpice +that the sunlight came streaming in with Adrienne's entrance into the +vast salon, from the walls of which her pictured ancestresses in their +huge leg-of-mutton sleeves seemed to smile at her.</p> + +<p>Beneath the orange wreath sent from Paris, her face expressed the happy, +surprised, and sweetly anxious look of a young communicant wrapped in +her veil.</p> + +<p>Sulpice had never seen her look more beautiful. How prettily she came +towards him, blushing vividly, and hold<a name="Page_62" id="Page_62"></a>ing out her two little white +gloved hands! He, somewhat bored by the company that surrounded them, +cast an involuntary glance at a mirror hanging opposite and decided that +he looked awkward and formal with his hair too carefully arranged. How +they had laughed since then and always with new pleasure at these +recollections, so sweet even now.</p> + +<p>His happiness on that joyous day would have been complete had his mother +been present, when in the presence of the old priest who had instructed +Adrienne in her catechism, Sulpice stood forward and took by its velvet +shield the taper that seemed so light to him, and awkwardly held the +wafer that the priest extended to him. It was a great event in Grenoble +when the leader of the Liberal Party, who headed the list at the last +election, was seen being married like a believing bourgeois. The organ +pealed forth its tender vibrations, some Christmas anthem, mysterious +and tremulous, like an alleluia sounding through the aisles of +centuries; the light streamed through the windows in floods and rested +upon Adrienne, who was kneeling with her childlike head leaning on her +gloved hands, kissing her fair locks with sunlight and illumining the +gleaming satin of her dress with its long train spreading out over the +carpet.</p> + +<p>Sulpice took away from this ceremony in the presence of a crowded +congregation an impression at once perfumed and dazzling: the perfumes +of flowers, the play <a name="Page_63" id="Page_63"></a>of light, the greetings of the organ, and within +and about him, all the intoxication of love, singing a song of +happiness.</p> + +<p>All that was now far away! nearly six years had elapsed since that day, +six years of bitter struggle, during which Vaudrey fought the harder, +defended his ideas of liberty with fervid eloquence, disputed step by +step, and through intense work came to the front, living at Paris just +as he did in the province, having his books brought from there to his +apartment in the Rue de la Chaussée d'Antin, close to the railroad that +he took every morning when he regretfully left Adrienne, Adrienne to +whom he returned every evening that political meetings and protracted +sittings did not rob him of those happy evenings, which were in truth +the only evenings that he really lived.</p> + +<p>Adrienne seldom went out, not caring to display herself and shunning the +bustle, living at Paris, as at Grenoble, in peaceful seclusion, caring +only for the existence of her husband, his work, and his speeches that +he prepared with so much courageous labor. She sat up with him until +very late, glancing over the books, the summaries of the laws and the +old parliamentary reports.</p> + +<p>At times she was terrified at the ardor with which Sulpice devoted +himself to these occupations. She greatly desired to take her part and +was grieved at being unable to assist him by writing from his dictation, +or by examining these old books. She felt terribly anxious when Vaudrey +<a name="Page_64" id="Page_64"></a>had to make a speech from the tribune. She dared not go to hear him, +but knowing that he was to speak, she had not the courage to remain at +home. Anxiously she ascended to the public gallery. She shuddered and +was almost ready to faint, when she heard the voice of the president +break what seemed to her an icy silence, with the words: <i>Monsieur +Vaudrey has the ear of the Assembly</i>.</p> + +<p>The sound of Sulpice's voice seemed changed to her. Fearfully she asked +herself if fright was strangling him. She dared not look at him. It +seemed to her that the people were laughing, making a disturbance and +coughing, but not listening to him. Why had she come? She would never do +so again. An icy chill took possession of her. Then suddenly she heard a +storm of applause that seemed like an outburst of sympathy. Hands were +clapped, voices applauded. She half raised herself, and leaning upon the +rail of the gallery, saw Sulpice between the crowded heads, towering +above the immense audience, radiant and calm, standing with his arms +folded or his hands resting on the tribune, below the chair occupied by +a motionless, white-cravatted man, and throwing back his fair head, +hurling, as from a full heart, his words, his wishes and his faith. All +this she saw with supreme happiness and felt proud of the man whose name +she bore.</p> + +<p>At that moment, she would fain have cried out to every one that she was +his, that she adored him, that he <a name="Page_65" id="Page_65"></a>was her pride, even as she was his +joy! She would like to have folded him to her, to cling to his neck and +to repeat before all that crowd: <i>I love you!</i></p> + +<p>But she reserved all her tender effusions for the intimacy of their +home, in order to calm the enthusiasm, oftentimes desperate, of this +nervous man whom everything threw into a feverish excitement, this grand +man, as they called him at Grenoble, who was for her only a great child +whom she adored and kept in check by her girlish devotion combined with +her motherly, delicate attentions.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey, however, more ambitious to do good than to obtain power, and +spending his life in the conflicts of the Chamber, saw the years +slipping away without realizing that he was making any progress, not a +single step forward in the direction of his goal. Since the war, the +years had passed for him as well as for those of his generation, with +confusing rapidity, and suddenly, all at once, after having been in some +sense slumbering, flattering himself that a man of thirty has a future +before him, he was rudely awakened to the astonishing truth that he was +forty.</p> + +<p>Forty! Sulpice had experienced a certain melancholy in advancing the +figure by ten, and whatever position he had acquired within his party, +within the circle of his friends, his dream was to reach still higher, +he was tired of playing second-rate parts, and eager to stand before the +footlights in full blaze, in the first rôle.<a name="Page_66" id="Page_66"></a></p> + +<p>In the snug interior that Adrienne furnished, he enjoyed all material +happiness. She soothed him, brought his dreams back to the region of the +real, terrified at times by his discouragements, his anger, and still +more by his illusions concerning men and things.</p> + +<p>Sulpice often reproached her for having clipped the wings of his +ambition.</p> + +<p>"I!" she would say, "it is rather the fans of your windmills that I +break, you Don Quixote!"</p> + +<p>He would then smile at her, and look earnestly into the depths of the +timid creature's lovely blue eyes, causing her to blush as if ashamed of +having seemed to be witty.</p> + +<p>Her chief aim was to be the devoted, loving friend of this man whom she +thought so superior to herself, and although she was totally ignorant of +political intrigues, she was by virtue of the mere instinct of love, his +best and most perspicacious adviser and felt delighted only when +Vaudrey, by chance, listened to her counsel.</p> + +<p>"I love you so dearly!" she confessed with the unlimited candor of a +poor creature who has but a single affection, a single pretext for +loving.</p> + +<p>He saw in the life he led, only the penumbra: his neglected youth, his +hopes fled, his fears, the disgust which at times filled him as he +thought of the never-ending recommencements and trickeries of political +life. So dearly cherished, so beloved, it seemed to him, nevertheless, +that his life lacked something. He would have <a name="Page_67" id="Page_67"></a>liked a child, a son to +bring up, a domestic tie, since political conditions prevented him from +accomplishing a civic duty. Ah! yes, a son, a being to mould, a brow to +kiss, a soul to fashion after the image of his own, a child who would +not know all the sorrows of life that his own generation had laid on +him! Perhaps it was only a child that he needed. Something, however, he +evidently lacked.</p> + +<p>Still he smiled, always in love with that young woman of twenty-four +years, delicate, slender, and full of the fears and artlessness of a +child. Accustomed to the quiet solitude of the house of her guardian, +she, when at Paris, in her husband's study, arranging his books, his +papers, his legislative plans and reports, sought to surround her dear +Sulpice with the comforting felicity of bourgeois happiness that was +enjoyed calmly, like a cordial sipped at the fireside.</p> + +<p>Then suddenly one day, the news of a startling political change broke in +on this household.</p> + +<p>Sulpice reached home one evening at one and the same time nervous, +anxious, and happy.</p> + +<p>His name was on almost every lip, in connection with a ministerial +combination. His last speech on domestic policy had more than ever +brought him into prominence and he was considered to have boldly +contributed to the development of a fearful crisis.</p> + +<p>A minister! he might, before the morning, be a minister! His policy was +triumphant.<a name="Page_68" id="Page_68"></a></p> + +<p>The advocate Collard—of Nantes,—who was pointed out as the future head +of the Cabinet, was one of his intimate friends. It was +suggested—positively—that Sulpice should be intrusted with one of the +most <i>important portfolios</i>, that of the Interior or of Foreign Affairs, +the <i>lesser portfolios</i> being considered those of Public Instruction and +of Agriculture and Commerce, the former of which concerns itself with +the spiritual welfare of the people, and the latter with their food +supply.</p> + +<p>Sulpice told all this to Adrienne while eating his dinner mechanically +and without appetite.</p> + +<p>There was to be a meeting of his coterie at eight o'clock. It was +already seven. He hurried.</p> + +<p>Adrienne saw that he was very pale. She experienced a strange sensation, +evidently a joyful one although mingled with anxiety. Politics drew him +away from his wife so frequently, and for so long a time, that she was +already compelled to live in such solitude that the secluded creature +wondered if in future she would not be condemned to still greater +isolation. But all anxiety disappeared under the influence of Sulpice's +manifest joy. He was feverishly impatient. It seemed to him that never +had he known so decisive a moment in his life.</p> + +<p>The sound of the bell, suddenly ringing out its clear note in the +silence, caused him to start.</p> + +<p>The dining-room door was opened by a servant, who handed a letter to +Vaudrey, bearing on one corner of the envelope the word: <i>Urgent</i>.<a name="Page_69" id="Page_69"></a></p> + +<p>Sulpice recognized the writing.</p> + +<p>It was from Collard of Nantes.</p> + +<p>Adrienne saw her husband's cheek flush as he read this letter, which +Sulpice promptly handed her, while his eyes sparkled with delight.</p> + +<p>"It is done! Read!"</p> + +<p>Adrienne turned pale.</p> + +<p>Collard notified his "colleague" that the ministerial combination of +which he was the head had succeeded. The President awaited at the <a name="typo_2" id="typo_2"></a>Élysée +the arrival of the new ministers. He tendered Vaudrey the portfolio of +the Interior.</p> + +<p>"A minister!" said Adrienne, now overcome with delight.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had risen and, a little uneasy, was mechanically searching for +something, still holding his napkin in his hand.</p> + +<p>"My hat," he said. "My overcoat. A carriage."</p> + +<p>Adrienne, with her hands clasped in a sort of childish admiration, +looked at him as if he had become suddenly transformed. All his being, +in fact, expressed complete satisfaction. He embraced Adrienne almost +frantically, kissed her again and again, and left her, then descended +the staircase with the speed of a lover hastening to a rendezvous.</p> + +<p>This political honeymoon was still at its height at the moment when the +delighted Vaudrey, seeing everything rosy-hued, was satisfying his +astonished curiosity in the <a name="Page_70" id="Page_70"></a>greenroom of the ballet. He entered office, +animated by all the good purposes inspired by absolute faith. It seemed +to him that he was about to save the world, to regenerate the +government, and to destroy abuses.</p> + +<p>"It is very difficult to become a minister," he said, smiling, "but +nothing is easier than to be a great minister. It only demands a +determination to do good!"</p> + +<p>"And the power to do it," replied his friend Granet, somewhat +ironically.</p> + +<p>What! power? Nothing was more simple, since Vaudrey held the reins of +power!—If others wrecked the hopes of their friends, it was because +they had not dared, because they had not the will!</p> + +<p>They would now see what he would do himself! Not to-morrow either, nor +in a month—but at once.</p> + +<p>He entered the ministry boldly, like a good-natured despot, determined +to reform, study and rearrange everything; and a victim to the feverish +and glorious zeal of a neophyte, he was a little surprised to encounter, +at the very outset, the obstinate resistance of routine, ignorance, and +the unyielding mechanism of that vast machine, more eternal than +empires: Ad-min-is-tra-tion.</p> + +<p>Bah! he would have satisfaction! Patience would overcome all. After all, +time is on one's side.</p> + +<p>"Time? Already!" replied Granet, who was a perpetual scoffer.</p> + +<p>Adrienne, overwhelmed with surprise, enjoyed the reflections from the +golden aurora of power that so <a name="Page_71" id="Page_71"></a>sweetly tinted Sulpice's life. She +shared her husband's triumphs without haughtiness, and now, however she +might love her domestic life, it was incumbent upon her to pass more of +her time in society than formerly, <i>to show herself</i>, as Sulpice said, +and, surrounded by the success and flattery she enjoyed, she felt that +that obligation was only an added joy, whose contentment she reflected +on her husband.</p> + +<p>When she entered a salon, she was greeted with a flattering murmur of +admiration and good-natured curiosity. The women looked at her and the +men surrounded her.</p> + +<p>"Madame Vaudrey?"</p> + +<p>"The minister's wife!"</p> + +<p>"Charming!"</p> + +<p>"Quite young!"</p> + +<p>"Somewhat provincial!"</p> + +<p>"So much the more attractive!"</p> + +<p>"That is true, as fresh as a peach!"</p> + +<p>She endeavored to atone by a gracious, very sincere modesty, for the +enviable position in which chance had suddenly placed her. It was said +of her that she accepted a compliment as timidly as a boarding-school +miss receives a prize. They forgave her for retaining her rosy cheeks +because of her white and exquisitely shaped hands. She was not +considered to be "<i>trop de Grenoble</i>." Witty people called her the +pretty <i>Dauphinoise</i>, and the flatterers the little Dauphine.<a name="Page_72" id="Page_72"></a></p> + +<p>In short, her <i>success</i> was great! So said the chroniclers; the entrance +of a fashionable woman into a salon being daily compared with that of an +actress on the stage.</p> + +<p>It was especially because Vaudrey appeared to be so happy, that his +young wife was so contented. She felt none of the vainglory of power. +Generally alone in the vast, deserted apartments of the ministry, with +all their commonplace, luxurious appointments, she more than once +regretted the home in the Chaussée-d'Antin, where they enjoyed—but too +rarely—a renewal of the cherished solitude of the first months of their +union, the familiar chats of the Grenoble days, the prolonged +conversations, exchanges of thoughts, hopes and reminiscences—already! +only recollections,—and she sometimes said to Sulpice, who was +feverishly excited and glowed with delight at having reached the summit +of power:</p> + +<p>"Do you know what this place suggests to me? Why, living in a hotel!"</p> + +<p>"And you are right," Vaudrey gaily answered; "we are at a hotel, but it +is the hotel in which the will of France lodges!"</p> + +<p>"You understand, my dear, that if you are happy—"</p> + +<p>"Very happy! it is only now that I can show what I am made of. You shall +see, Adrienne, you shall see what I will do and become within a year."</p> + +<p>Within a year!<a name="Page_73" id="Page_73"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;"/> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="IV" id="IV"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>IV</h3> + + +<p>Guy de Lissac occupied a small summer-house forming a residence situated +at the end of a court on Rue D'Aumale. He had given carte-blanche for +the arrangement of this bachelor's nest,—a nest in which sitting-hens +without eggs succeeded each other rapidly,—to one of those upholsterers +who installed, in regulation style, the <a name="typo_14" id="typo_14"></a>knickknacks so much in vogue, +and who sell at very high prices to Bourse operators and courtesans the +spurious Clodions and imitation Boulles that they pick up by chance at +auction sales.</p> + +<p>Lissac, who had sufficient taste to discover artistic nuggets in the +gutters of Paris, had found it very convenient to wake up one fine +morning in a little mansion crowded with Japanese bric-à-brac, Chinese +satin draperies, tapestries, Renaissance chests and terra-cotta figures +writhing upon their sculptured bases. The upholsterer had taste, Lissac +had money. The knickknacks were genuine. There was a coquettish +attractiveness about the abode that made itself evident in every detail.</p> + +<p>This bachelor's suite lacked, however, something per<a name="Page_74" id="Page_74"></a>sonal, something +living, some cherished object, the mark of some particular taste, some +passion for a period, for a thing, or pictures or books. In this jumble +of ill-matched curiosities, where ivory <i>netzkés</i> on tables surrounded +Barye bronzes and Dresden figures, there lacked some evidence of an +individual character that would give a dominant tone, an original key, +to the collection. This worldly dwelling, with its white lacquered bed +and Louis XV. canopy and its heads of birds carved in wood like the +queen's bed at Trianon, vaguely resembled the apartments of a +fashionable woman.</p> + +<p>But Guy had hung around here and there a Samouraï sabre, Malay krises, +Oriental daggers in purple velvet sheaths, and upon the green tapestry +background of the antechamber a panoply on which keen-bladed swords with +steel guards were mingled with Scotch claymores with silver hilts, thus +giving a masculine character to this hôtel of a fashionable lounger, +steeped with the odor of ylang-ylang like the little house of a pretty +courtesan.</p> + +<p>This Guy enjoyed in Paris a free and easy life, leaving to Vaudrey, his +old college-comrade at Grenoble, the pursuit of the pleasures of +political life, and, as Lissac said in that bantering tone which is +peculiar to Parisian gossip, the relish of the "sweets of power"; for +himself, what kept him in Paris was Paris itself, just that and nothing +more:—its pleasures, its first nights, <a name="Page_75" id="Page_75"></a>its surprises, its women, that +flavor of scandal and perfume of refined immorality that seemed peculiar +to his time and surroundings.</p> + +<p>He had squandered two fortunes, one after the other, without feeling any +regret; he had made a brush at journalism, tried finance, won at the +Bourse, lost at the clubs, knew everybody and was known by all, had a +smiling lip, was sound of tooth, loved the girls, was dreaded by the +men, was of fine appearance, and was unquestionably noble, which +permitted him to enjoy all the frolics of Bohemian life without sullying +himself, having always discovered a forgotten uncle or met some +considerate friend to pay his gambling debts and adjust his differences +on the Bourse speculations at the very nick of time; just now he was +well in the saddle and decidedly attractive, with a sound heart and a +well-lined pocket, enjoying, not disliking life, which seemed to him a +term of imprisonment to be passed merrily—a Parisian to the finger-tips +and to the bottom of his soul, worse than a Parisian in fact, a +Parisianized provincial inoculated with <i>Parisine</i>, just as certain sick +persons are with morphine, judging men by their wit, actions by their +results, women by the size of their gloves; as sceptical as the devil, +wicked in speech and considerate in thought, still agile at forty, +claiming even that this is man's best time—the period of fortune and +gallantry—sliding along in life and taking things as he found them, +wisely considering that a day's snow or rain <a name="Page_76" id="Page_76"></a>lasts no longer than a +day's sunshine, and that, after all, a wretched night is soon over.</p> + +<p>On leaving Vaudrey the previous night, Lissac had passed part of the +night at his club on Place Vendôme. He had played and won. He had gone +to sleep over a fashionable novel, very faithfully written, but +wearisome in the extreme, and he had awakened late and somewhat +heavy-headed. There were fringes of snow upon the window-sills and upon +the house facing his little mansion. The roofs were hidden under a large +white sheet and half lost in the grayish-white background of the sky.</p> + +<p>"Detestable weather! So much the better," thought Lissac, "I shall have +no visitors."</p> + +<p>"I will see no one," he said to his servant. "In such weather no one but +borrowers will come."</p> + +<p>He had just finished his déjeuner, plunging a Russian enamelled silver +spoon into his egg, his tea smoking at his side in a burnished silver +teapot with Japanese designs, when, notwithstanding his orders, the +servant handed him a card written in pencil on a scrap of paper torn +from a note-book.</p> + +<p>"It is not a borrower, monsieur!"</p> + +<p>Guy seized the paper disdainfully, thinking, in spite of the servant's +opinion, that he would find the name of a beggar who had not even had +his name printed on a piece of Bristol-board, and, adjusting his glass, +he deciphered the fine writing on the paper; then after in<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77"></a>voluntarily +exclaiming: <i>Ah! bah</i>! and <i>well! well!</i> greatly astonished, he said as +he rose:</p> + +<p>"Show her in!"</p> + +<p>He had thrown on a chair his damask napkin of Muscovite pattern, and +instinctively glanced at himself in the mirror, just as a coquette might +do before a rendezvous, smoothing out his flannel vest and spreading out +his cravat that only half-fastened the blue foulard collar of his +dressing-gown.</p> + +<p>At the moment that he was examining the folds made on his red leather +slippers by his ample flannel trousers, a woman half-raised the satin +portière, and, standing within a frame formed by the folds of yellow +satin, looked at the young man, displaying her brilliant teeth as she +smilingly said:</p> + +<p>"Good-morning, Guy!"</p> + +<p>Lissac went straight toward her with outstretched hands.</p> + +<p>She allowed the large satin portière to fall behind her, and after +having permitted her little suède gloved hands to be raised for a +moment, she boldly abandoned them to Guy, laughing the while, as they +looked at each other face to face. He betrayed some little astonishment, +gazing at her as a person examines one whom one has not seen for a long +time, and the young woman raised her head unabashed, displaying her +features in full light, as if submitting to an inspection with +confidence.</p> + +<p>"You did not expect me, eh?"</p> + +<p>"I confess—"<a name="Page_78" id="Page_78"></a></p> + +<p>"Doubtless it is a considerable time since you thought of me."</p> + +<p>Guy was inclined to bow and, as his only reply, to kiss the tips of her +fingers; but he reflected that, since they last met, the parting of his +brown locks had been devilishly widened, and he remained standing, +answering with the conceit of a handsome man:</p> + +<p>"You are mistaken, I often think of you."</p> + +<p>She had, with, a sweeping glance around the room, examined the furniture +of the apartment, the framed pictures, the designs and the gilding, and, +on sitting down near the fire with her little feet crossed, she +expressed her opinion:</p> + +<p>"Very stylishly ensconced! You always had good taste, I know, my dear +Guy."</p> + +<p>"I have less now than formerly, my dear Marianne," he said, giving to +this airy remark the turn of a compliment.</p> + +<p>Marianne shrugged her shoulders and smiled.</p> + +<p>"Do you find me very much altered?" she asked abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, rejuvenated."</p> + +<p>"I don't believe a word of it."</p> + +<p>"Upon my honor. You look like a communicant."</p> + +<p>"Good heavens! what kind?" said Marianne, laughing in a clear, ringing, +but slightly convulsive tone.</p> + +<p>He was still looking at her curiously, seated thus near the fireplace.<a name="Page_79" id="Page_79"></a></p> + +<p>The bright and sparkling fire cast its reflections on the gold frames in +waving and rosy tints that brightened the somewhat pale complexion of +this young woman and imparted a warm tone to her small and brilliant +gray eyes. She half turned her fair face toward him, her retroussé nose +was tiny, spirituelle and mobile, her large sensuous mouth was provoking +and seductive, and suggested by its upturned corners, encouragement or a +challenge.</p> + +<p>She had allowed her cloak, whose fur trimming was well-worn, to slip +from her shoulders, exposing her form to the waist; she trembled +slightly in her tight-fitting dress, and golden tints played on her bare +neck, which was almost hidden under the waves of her copper-colored +hair.</p> + +<p>She had just taken off her suède gloves with a jerky movement and was +abstractedly twisting them between her fingers.</p> + +<p>In spite of the somewhat depressing effect of her worn garments, she +displayed a natural elegance, a perfect form and graceful movements, and +Guy, accustomed as he was to estimate at a glance the material condition +of people, divined that this woman felt some embarrassment. She whom he +had known four or five years previously so charming amid the din of a +life of folly, and the coruscation of an ephemeral luxury, was now +burned out like an exploded rocket.</p> + +<p>Marianne Kayser!<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80"></a></p> + +<p>Of all the women whom he had met, he had certainly loved her the most +sincerely, with an absolute love, unreflecting, passionate and half-mad. +She was not dissolute but merely turbulent, independent and impatient of +restraint. Too poor to be married, too proud to be a courtesan, too +rebellious to accept the humiliations of destiny.</p> + +<p>She was an orphan, and had been brought up by her uncle, Simon Kayser, a +serious painter, indifferent to all that did not concern his art,—its +morality, its dignity, its superiority—who had, under cover of his own +ignorance, allowed the ardent dreams of his niece and her wayward fits +to develop freely like poisonous plants; near this man, in the vicious +atmosphere of an old bachelor's disorderly household, Marianne had lived +the bitter life of a young woman out of her element, poor, but with +every instinct unswervingly leaning towards the enjoyments of luxury.</p> + +<p>She had grown up amid the incongruous society of models and artists and, +as it were, in the fumes of paradoxes and pipes. A little creature, she +served as a plaything for this painter without talent, and he allowed +her to romp, bound and leap on the divans like a kitten. Moreover, the +child lighted his stove and filled his pipe.</p> + +<p>The studio was littered with books. As chance offered, she read them all +eagerly and examined with curiosity the pictures drawn by an Eisen or a +Moreau, depicting passionate kisses exchanged under arbors, where +be<a name="Page_81" id="Page_81"></a>hind curtains, short silk skirts appeared in a rumpled state. She had +rapidly reached womanhood without Kayser's perceiving that she could +comprehend and judge for herself.</p> + +<p>This falsely inspired man, entirely devoted to mystical compositions, +vaguely painted—philosophical and critical, as he said—this thinker, +whose brush painted obscure subjects as it might have produced signs, +did not dream that the girl growing up beside him was also in love with +chimeras, and drawn toward the abyss, not however to learn the mysteries +hidden by the clouds, but the mystery of life, the secret of the visions +that haunted her, of the disquieting temptations that filled her with +such feverish excitement.</p> + +<p>If Uncle Kayser could for one moment have descended from the nebulous +regions, and touched the earth, he would have found an impatient ardor +in the depth of Marianne's glance, and something feverish and restless +in her movements. But this huge, ruddy, rotund man, speaking above his +rounded stomach, cared only for the morality of art, æsthetic dignity, +and the necessity of raising the standard of art, of creating a mission +for it, an end, an idea—<i>art the educator, art the moralizer</i>,—and +allowed this feverish, wearied, impulsive creature, moulded by vice, who +bore his name, to wander around his studio like a stray dog.</p> + +<p>Isolated, forgotten, the young girl sometimes passed whole days bending +over a book, her lips dry, her face <a name="Page_82" id="Page_82"></a>pale, but with a burning light in +her gray eyes, while her fingers were thrust through her hair, or she +rested upon a window-sill, following afar off, some imaginary picture in +the depths of the clouds.</p> + +<p>The studio overlooked a silent, gloomy street in which no sound was +heard save the slow footfalls of weary and exhausted pedestrians. It was +stifling behind this window and Marianne's gloomy horizon was this frame +of stones against which her wandering thoughts bruised themselves as a +bird might break its wings.</p> + +<p>Ah! to fly away, to escape from the solemn egotism and the theories of +Simon Kayser, and to live the passionate life of those who are free, +loved, rich and happy! Such was the dream upon which Marianne nourished +herself.</p> + +<p>She had perpetually before her eyes, as well as before her life, the +gray wall of that high house opposite the painter's studio, pierced with +its many eyes, and whether on summer's stifling evenings, the shutters +closed—the whole street being deserted, the neighbors having gone into +the country—or in winter, with its gray sky, the roofs covered with the +snow that was stained all too soon, when the brilliant lights behind the +curtains looked like red spots on the varnished paper, Marianne ever +felt in her inmost being the bitter void of Parisian melancholy, the +overwhelming sadness of black loneliness, of hollow dreams, gnawing like +incurable sorrows.</p> + +<p>She grew up thus, her mind and body poisoned by this <a name="Page_83" id="Page_83"></a>dwelling which she +never left except to drag her feet wearily through the galleries of the +Louvre, leaning on the arm of her uncle, who invariably repeated before +the same pictures, in the loud and bombastic tone of a <i>comediante</i>, the +same opinions, and grew enthusiastic and excited according as the +pictures of the masters agreed with his <i>style</i>, his <i>system</i>, his +<i>creed</i>. One should hear him run the gamut of all his great phrases: My +<i>sys-tem!</i> Marianne knew when the expression was coming. All these +Flemish painters! Painters of snuff-boxes, without any ideal, without +grasp! "And the Titian, look at this Titian! Where is <i>thought</i> +expressed in this Titian? And <i>mo-ral-i-ty?</i> Titian! A vendor of pink +flesh! Art should have a majesty, a dignity, a purity, an ideality very +different."</p> + +<p>Ah! these words in <i>ty</i>, solemn, bombastic, pedantic, with a false ring, +they entered Marianne's ears like burning injections.</p> + +<p>These visits to the museum impressed her with a gloom such as a ramble +in a cemetery would create, she returned to the house with depressing +headaches and muttering wrathful imprecations against destiny. She even +preferred that studio with its worn-out divans and its worm-eaten +tapestries that were slowly shredding away.</p> + +<p>There, at least, she was all alone, face to face with herself, consumed +by a cowardly fear—the fear of the future—this young girl who had read +everything, learned everything, understood everything, knew everything, +<a name="Page_84" id="Page_84"></a>sullied by all the jokes of the Kayser studio, which, in spite of the +exalted, sacrosanct, æsthetic discussions which took place therein, +sometimes shockingly resembled a smoking-room—this physical virgin +without any virginity of mind, could there take refuge in herself, and +there in the solitude to which she was condemned, she questioned herself +as to the end to which her present life would lead her.</p> + +<p>Of dowry she had none. Her father had left her nothing. Kayser was poor +and in debt. She had no occupation. To run about giving private lessons +on the piano, seemed to Marianne to degrade her almost to the level of +domestic service. Those who wished to pose for the Montyon prize might +do so! She never would!</p> + +<p>Ah! what sufferings! what would be the end of such a life? Marriage? But +who desired her? One of those talentless painters, who ventilated at +Kayser's house, not merely their contemptuous theories, but also their +down-at-the-heel shoes? To fall from one Bohemian condition to another, +from exigency to want, to be the wife of one of these greasy-haired +dreamers? Her whole nature shuddered in revolt at this idea. Through the +open window, the tepid breath of nature wafted toward her the odor of +the rising sap in gentle, warm whiffs that filled her with a feverish +astonishment. Stretched on the patched divan, her eyes closed and her +lovely form kissed by the tepid breeze, she dreamed, dreamed, dreamed—<a name="Page_85" id="Page_85"></a></p> + +<p>The awakening was folly, a rash act, an elopement.</p> + +<p>In the house on Rue de Navarin there happened to be one fellow more +daring than the rest, he was an artist who, in the jostling daily life, +kindled his love at the strange flame that burned in the lustful +virgin's eyes. A glance revealed all.</p> + +<p>The meeting with a rake determined the life of this girl. She fell, not +through ignorance or curiosity, but moved by anger and, as it were, out +of bravado. Since she was without social position, motherless and +isolated, having no family, without a prop and unloved, well, she threw +off the yoke absolutely. She broke through her shackles at one bound. +She rebelled!—</p> + +<p>She eloped with this man.</p> + +<p>He was a handsome fellow, who thirsted for pleasure, and took his prize +boldly about, plunging Marianne into the ranks of vulgar mistresses, and +had not the mad woman's superior intelligence, will, and even her +disgust, ruled at once over this first lover and the equivocal +surroundings into which he had thrust her, she would have become a mere +courtesan.</p> + +<p>Kayser had experienced only astonishment at the flight of his niece. How +was it that he had never suspected the cause that disturbed her +thoughts? "These diabolical women, nobody knows them, not even those who +made them. A father even would not have detected anything. The more +excuse therefore for an uncle!" So he resumed his musing on elevated +art, quieting his <a name="Page_86" id="Page_86"></a>displeasure—for his comrades jeered him—by the +fumes of his pipe.</p> + +<p>Moreover, all things considered, the painter added, Marianne had +followed the natural law. Full liberty for everybody, was still one of +Simon Kayser's pet theories. Marianne was of age and could dispose of +her lot without the necessity of submitting to a strict endorsement of +her conduct. When she had "sounded all the depths of the abyss,"—and +Kayser pronounced these words while puffing his tobacco—she would +return. Uncle Kayser would always keep a place for her at what he called +<i>his fireside</i>.</p> + +<p>"The fireside of your pipe," Marianne once remarked to him.</p> + +<p>So Kayser consoled himself for this escapade by the sacredness of art, +the only sacredness he recognized. On that indeed he yielded nothing. +What mattered it to the world, if a girl went astray, even if that girl +were his niece? Public morality was not hurt thereby. Ah! if he, Kayser, +had exhibited to the world a lewd picture, it would have been "a horse +of a different color"! The dignity, seriousness, purity of art, that was +right enough!—But a woman! Pshaw! a woman!—Nor was he heard once to +express any uneasiness as to what might become of Marianne.</p> + +<p>In the course of her perilous career, which, however, was not that of a +courtesan, but that of a freed woman avenging herself, Marianne had met +Guy de Lissac and <a name="Page_87" id="Page_87"></a>loved him as completely as her nature allowed her to +love. Guy entertained her. With him she talked over everything, she gave +herself up to him, and made plans for the future. Why should they ever +separate? They adored each other. Guy was rich, or at any rate he lived +sumptuously. Marianne was a lovely mistress, clever, in fact, ten women +in one. Guy became madly attached to her and he felt himself drawn +closer to her day by day. She often repeated with perfect sincerity that +she had never loved any one before.</p> + +<p>The first lover, then? She did not even know his name now!</p> + +<p>There was no reason why they should not live together for ever, a life +of mutual joy and happiness, led by the same fancies, stirred by the +same desires. Why ever leave each other, even once? But it was just this +that induced Guy to abandon this pretty girl. He was afraid. He saw no +end to such a union as theirs. The little love-affair that enticed him +assumed another name: <i>The Chain</i>. He sometimes debated with himself +seriously about marrying this Marianne, whose adventures he knew, but +who so intoxicated him that he forgot all the past.</p> + +<p>Uncle Kayser, entirely engrossed in the "dignity of art," and occupied +with the composition of an allegorical production entitled <i>The Modern +Family</i>,—a page of pure, mystic, social, regenerative art,—had +certainly forgotten his niece; nevertheless, Lissac at times felt +<a name="Page_88" id="Page_88"></a>somewhat tempted to restore her to him. He was grieved at the thought +of abandoning Marianne to another. His dread of marriage triumphed over +his jealousy. One fine day, Guy suddenly brought about a separation. +Feeling ill, he took to his bed, when one morning Marianne came to him +and said in passionate tones:</p> + +<p>"Now I will never leave you again! You are in danger, and I am here to +save you!"</p> + +<p>Guy now felt himself lost. His rapid perception, whose operation was as +sudden as a blow of the fist, warned him that if he allowed this woman +to install herself in his house, he might say good-by to liberty, and +probably also to his life. This Parisian had laid down as a principle, +that a man should always be <i>unfettered</i>. He held in horror this +shameful half-marriage that the language of slang had baptized, as with +a stain: <i>Collage</i>. He therefore decided to play his life against his +liberty, and during the temporary absence of this nurse established at +his bedside, he packed his clothes in his trunk at random, shivering as +he was with fever, threw himself into a hack, and, with chattering teeth +and a morbid shudder creeping over his entire body, had himself driven +to the railroad station and departed for Italy.</p> + +<p>Marianne was heartbroken anew at this unexpected departure. A hope had +vanished. She loved Guy very sincerely, and she vainly hoped that she +would hold <a name="Page_89" id="Page_89"></a>him. He fled from her! Whither had he gone? For a moment, +she was tempted to rejoin him when she received his letters. She +surmised, however, that Guy, desiring to avoid her, caused his brief +notes to be sent by some friend from towns that he had left. To play +there the absurd part of a woman chasing her lover would have been +ridiculous. She remained, therefore, disgusted, heartbroken for a moment +like a widow in despair, then she retraced her steps to the Rue de +Navarin, and returned to the fold, where she found Uncle Kayser still +quite unruffled, with the almost finished picture of <i>The Modern +Family</i>.</p> + +<p>"That is, I verily believe, the best I have done, the most moral," said +Kayser to her. "In art, morality before everything, my girl! Come, sit +down and tell me your little adventures."</p> + +<p>It was five years—five whole years—since Lissac had seen Marianne. +Their passion had subsided little by little into friendship,—expressed +though by letters. Marianne wrote, Guy replied. All the bitter reproofs +had been exchanged through the post, yet, in spite of this +correspondence, neither had sought the opportunity nor felt the desire +to meet. The fancy was dead! Nevertheless, they had loved each other +well!</p> + +<p>Suddenly, without overtures, on this bitingly cold morning, Marianne +arrived, half shivering, in the new apartment, warmed her tiny feet at +the fire and raised to him the rosy tip of her cold nose.<a name="Page_90" id="Page_90"></a></p> + +<p>Guy was somewhat surprised.</p> + +<p>He looked with a curiosity not unmixed with pain at that woman whom he +had loved truly enough to suffer love's pangs,—the innocents say to die +of it. He tried to find again in the depths of those gray eyes, +sparkling and malicious, the old burning passion, extinguished without +leaving even a fragment of its embers. To think that he had risked his +life for that woman; that he should have sacrificed his name; that he +should have torn himself from her with such harsh bravado; that he +should have cut deep into his own being in order to leave her; that he +had fled, leaving for Italy with a craving desire for solitude and +forgetfulness! Eh! yes, Marianne had been his true love, the true love +of this blasé Parisian sceptic and braggart, and he sought, while again +looking at the lovely girl, to recover some of the sensations that had +flown, to recall some of those reminiscences which more than once had +agreeably affected him.</p> + +<p>Marianne evidently understood what was passing in Guy's mind. She smiled +strangely. Buried in the armchair, whose back supported her own, and +half-bending her fair neck that reclined on the lace-covered head-rest, +she looked at Lissac fixedly with an odd expression, the sidelong glance +of a woman, that seems to be her keenest scrutiny.</p> + +<p>Through her half-closed lashes he seemed to feel that a malicious glance +embraced him. The mobile nostrils <a name="Page_91" id="Page_91"></a>of her delicate nose dilated with a +nervous trembling that intensified the mocking smile betrayed by her +curling lips. Her hands were resting upon her plump arms, and with a +trembling motion of the fingers beat a feverish little march as if she +were playing a scale on a keyboard.</p> + +<p>Guy sought to evoke from the well-set, gracefully reclining form, from +the half-sly and half-concealed glance, from the palpitating nostrils, +something that reminded him of his former ecstasies. Again he saw, +shadowed by the chin, that part of her neck where he loved to bury his +brow and to rest his lips, greedily, lingeringly, as when one sips a +liqueur. A strange emotion seized him. All that had not yet been +gratified of his shattered, but not wholly destroyed love, surged within +him.</p> + +<p>Were it fancy or reminiscence, beside this woman he still felt as of +old, a feeling that oppressed his heart and caused him that delightful +sensation of uneasiness to which he had been a stranger in connection +with his many later easy love adventures. A light, penetrating and sweet +odor floated around Marianne, reminding Lissac of the intoxicating +perfume of vanished days, an irritating odor as of new-mown hay.</p> + +<p>He said nothing, while she awaited his remarks with curiosity. Guy's +mute interrogation possibly embarrassed her, for she suddenly shook her +head and rose to her feet.<a name="Page_92" id="Page_92"></a></p> + +<p>"May one smoke here?" she said, as she opened a Russia leather +cigarette-case bearing her monogram.</p> + +<p>"What next?" said Guy, lighting a sponge steeped in alcohol that stood +in a silver holder and offering it to Marianne.</p> + +<p>She quickly closed her fine teeth on the end of the paper cigarette that +she had rolled between her fingers and lighted it at the flame. The +gleam of the alcohol brightened her eyes and slightly flushed her pale +cheeks, which Guy regarded with strange feelings.</p> + +<p>"Your invention is an odd one!" she said, as she returned him the little +sponge upon which a tongue of blue flame played.</p> + +<p>He extinguished it, and abandoning himself to the disturbing charm of +reminiscences, watched Marianne who was already half-enveloped in a +light cloud of smoke.</p> + +<p>"There is one thing you do not know," he said. "More than once—on my +honor—at the corner of the street, at some chance meeting, my old +Parisian heart has beaten wildly on seeing in some coquettish outline, +or in some fair hair falling loosely over an otter-skin cloak, or in +some fair, vanishing profile with a pearl set in the lobe of the ear, +something that resembled you. Those fur toques with little feathers that +everybody wears now, you wore before any one else, on your fair head. +Whenever I see one, I follow it. On my word, though, not for her. The +fair unknown trotted before me, making the side<a name="Page_93" id="Page_93"></a>walks echo to the touch +of the high heels of her little shoes, while I continued to follow her +under the sweet illusion that she would lead me at the end of the +journey to a spot where it seemed to me a little of paradise had been +scattered. It is thus that phantoms of loved ones course through the +streets of Paris in broad daylight, and I am not the only one, Marianne, +who has felt the anguish and heart-fluttering that I have experienced. +Often have I found my eyes moist after such an experience; but if it +were winter, I attributed my tears simply to a cold. Tell me, Marianne, +was it really the cold that moistened my eyes?"</p> + +<p>Marianne laughed.</p> + +<p>"Come, but you are idyllic, my dear Guy," said she, looking at Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Melancholy, nothing more."</p> + +<p>"Let us say elegiac. Those little fits have come upon you rather late in +the day, have they not? A little valerian and quinine, made up into +silver-coated pills, is a sovereign remedy."</p> + +<p>"You are making fun of me."</p> + +<p>"No," she said. "But it was so easy then, seeing that the recollection +of me could inspire you with so many poetic ideas and cause you to trot +along for such a distance behind plumed toques—it was so easy not to +take the train for Milan and not to fly away from me as one skips from a +creditor."</p> + +<p>Guy could not refrain from smiling.<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94"></a></p> + +<p>"Ah! it is because—I loved you too dearly!"</p> + +<p>"I know that!" exclaimed Marianne with a tone, in contrast with her +elegance, of an artist's model giving a pupil a retort. "A madrigal that +has not answered, no; does it rain?"</p> + +<p>"I have perhaps been stupid, how can it be helped?" said Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Do not doubt it, my dear friend. It is always stupid to deprive one's +self of the woman who adores one. Such rarities are not common."</p> + +<p>"You remember, dear Marianne," said Guy, "the day when you boldly wrote +upon the photographs to some one who loved you dearly: 'To him I love +more than every one else in the world?'"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Marianne, blowing a cloud of smoke upward. "Such things as +that are never forgotten when one writes them with the least sincerity."</p> + +<p>"And you were sincere?"</p> + +<p>"On the faith of an honest man," she answered laughingly.</p> + +<p>"And yet I have been assured since that time, that you adored another +before that one."</p> + +<p>"It is possible," said Marianne with sudden bitterness; "but, in the +life that I have led, I have been so often purchased that I have been +more than once able to mistake for love the pleasure that I have +derived."</p> + +<p>In those words, uttered sharply, and in a hissing tone <a name="Page_95" id="Page_95"></a>like the stroke +of a whip-lash in the air, she had expressed so much suffering and +hidden anger that Lissac was strangely affected.</p> + +<p>Guy, the Parisian, experienced a sentiment altogether curious and +unexpected, and this woman whose bare neck was resting on the back of +the armchair, allowing the smoke that issued from her lips in puffs to +enter her quivering nostrils, seemed to him a new creature, a stranger +who had come there to tempt him. In her languishing and, as it were, +abandoned pose, he followed the outline of her graceful body, blooming +in its youth, the fulness of her bust, the lines of her skirt closely +clinging to her exquisite hips, and the unlooked-for return of the lost +mistress, the forgotten one, assumed in his eyes the relish of a caprice +and an adventure. And then, that bitter remark, spoken in the course of +their light Parisian gossip, whetted his curiosity still further and +awoke, perhaps, all the latent force of a passion formerly suddenly +severed.</p> + +<p>He was seated on an ottoman beside Marianne, gazing into the young +woman's clear eyes, his hand endeavoring to seize a white hand that +nimbly eluded his grasp. The movement of his hands suggested the embrace +that his feelings prompted.</p> + +<p>Marianne suddenly looked him full in the face and curtly said, in a tone +of raillery, that suggested a past that refused to reopen an account for +the future:</p> + +<p>"Oh! oh! but is that making love, my friend?"<a name="Page_96" id="Page_96"></a></p> + +<p>Lissac smiled.</p> + +<p>"Come," she said, "nonsense! That is a romance whose pages you have +already often turned over."</p> + +<p>"The romance of my life," whispered Lissac in Marianne's ear.</p> + +<p>"The more reason that it should not be read again. It is true there are +books one never reads but once. And for that reason, probably, one never +forgets them."</p> + +<p>She rose abruptly, threw the stump of her cigarette into the fire and +looked with a bright, penetrating glance, into Lissac's surprised eyes.</p> + +<p>"Ah! it is a long while, you see, since you spoke laughingly—we have +both heartily laughed at it—of the 'caprices of Marianne.' Do you know +what I am, my dear Guy? Yes, where is the mad creature who was formerly +your mistress? Abandoned to dark, profound and incurable <i>ennui</i>, I yawn +my life away, as some one said, I yawn it away even to the point of +dislocating my jaw. The days seem dull to me, people stupid, books +insipid, while fools seem idiots and witty people fools. It is to have +the blues, if you will, or rather to have the grays, to hate colorless +objects, to be weary of the commonplace, to thirst for the impossible. A +thirst that cannot be allayed, let me add. The pure, fresh spring that +should slake my thirst has not yet gushed."</p> + +<p>She talked in a dry, bitter tone, with a smile that frequently gave way +to slight outbreaks of convulsive laughter almost as if she were +attacked with a fit of coughing.<a name="Page_97" id="Page_97"></a> From time to time, she blew away a +cloud of smoke that escaped from her lips, for she had resumed her +cigarette, or with the tip of her nail struck her papelito, knocking the +ashes on the carpet.</p> + +<p>Moved and greatly puzzled, but no longer thinking of the temptation of a +moment before, Guy looked at her and nodded his head gravely, like a +physician who finds a patient's illness more serious than the latter is +willing to acknowledge.</p> + +<p>"You are very unhappy, Marianne!" he remarked.</p> + +<p>"I? Nonsense! Weary, disgusted, bored, yes; but not unhappy. There is +still something great in misery. That can be battled against. It is like +thunder. But the rain, the eternal rain, incessantly falling, with its +liquid mud, that—ah! that, ugh! that is crushing. And in my life it +rains, it rains with terrible constancy."</p> + +<p>As she uttered these words, she stretched her arms out with a movement +that expressed boundless weariness and disclosed to Guy the dull +dejection that followed a great deception and a hopeless fall.</p> + +<p>"Life? My life? A mere millstone mechanically revolving. A perpetual +round of joyless love-episodes and intoxication without thirst. Do you +understand? The life of a courtesan endured by a true woman. My soul is +mine, my spirit and my intellect, but these are chained to a body that I +abandon to others—whom I have abandoned, thank God! for I am satiated +at length <a name="Page_98" id="Page_98"></a>and have now no lover, nor do I desire one. I desire to be my +own mistress, in short, and not the mistress of any person. I have but +one desire, hear—"</p> + +<p>"What?" asked Guy, who was deeply moved by this outburst of anger and +suffering, this cry of pain that declared itself involuntarily, his +feelings vacillating between doubt and pity.</p> + +<p>"My pleasure," Marianne replied, "is to shut myself up alone in a little +room that I have rented at the end of an unfrequented lane near the +Jardin des Plantes, whither I have had transported all the wreckage +saved from my past life: books, knickknacks, portraits, and I know not +what. My intention is that I shall remain there unknown to all, my name, +whence I come, where I go, my thoughts, my hatred, my past loves, +everything, in fact, a secret. I shall cloister myself. I shall stretch +myself out on a reclining-chair and think that if, by chance,—as +happens sometimes—an aneurism, a congestion, or I don't know what, +should strike me down in that solitude, no one would know who I am, +nobody, nobody, and my body would be taken to the Morgue, or to the +grave, it matters little to me, that body of which the little +otter-trimmed toques recall to you the graceful, serpentine line. Ah! +those plans are not very lively, are they? Well, my dear, such are my +good moments. Judge of the others, then."</p> + +<p>Lissac was profoundly stirred and very greatly puzzled. To call on him: +that implied a need of him. But there <a name="Page_99" id="Page_99"></a>was no attempt to find the marker +at the place where the romance had been interrupted: therefore the visit +was not to renew the relations that had been severed, yet not broken.</p> + +<p>What, then, brought this creature, still charming and giddy, whose heart +was gnawed and wrung with grief? And was she the woman—Guy knew her so +well!—to return thus, only to conjure up the vanished recollections, to +communicate the secret of her present sorrows and to permit Lissac to +inhale the odor of a departed perfume, more airy than the blue +smoke-wreaths that escaped from her cigarette?</p> + +<p>After entrusting Guy with the secret of her yearning for solitude, she +again indulged in her sickly smile, and still looking at Guy:</p> + +<p>"You are, I am told, a constant guest at Sabine Marsy's receptions?" she +said abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied Lissac. "But I have no great liking for political +salons."</p> + +<p>"It is a political centre, and yet not, seemingly. It is about to become +a scientific one, if one may believe the reporters—Monsieur de Rosas is +announced.—By the way, my dear Guy, you still see Monsieur de Rosas!"</p> + +<p>While Marianne uttered this name with an indifferent tone, she slightly +bent her head in order to scrutinize Guy.</p> + +<p>He did not reply at once, seeking first to discover <a name="Page_100" id="Page_100"></a>what object +Marianne had in speaking to him about De Rosas. In a vague way he +surmised that the great Castilian noble counted for something in +Marianne's visit.</p> + +<p>"I always see him when he is in Paris," he said after a moment's pause.</p> + +<p>"Then you will see him very soon, for he will arrive to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"Who told you that?"</p> + +<p>"The newspapers. You don't read the newspapers, then?—He is returning +from the East. Madame Marsy is bent on his narrating his travels, on the +occasion of a special soirée. A lecture! Our Rosas must have altered +immensely. He was wild enough of old."</p> + +<p>"A shy fellow, which is quite different. But," asked Lissac after a +moment, "what about Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Tell me, in the first place, that you know perfectly well that he will +arrive to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"I know it through the reporters, as you say. To-day, it is through the +reporters that one learns news of one's friends."</p> + +<p>"The important fact is that you know him, and it is because I am +particularly anxious to hear Monsieur de Rosas that I come to ask you to +present me at Madame Marsy's."</p> + +<p>"Oh! that is it?" Guy began.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that is it. I am weary. I am crazy over the Orient. You remember +Félicien David's <i>Desert</i> that I <a name="Page_101" id="Page_101"></a>used to play for you on the piano? I +would like to hear this story of travel. It would make me forget Paris."</p> + +<p>"You shall hear it, my dear Marianne. Madame Marsy asked me to introduce +Vaudrey to her the other evening. You ask me to present you to Madame +Marsy. I am both crimp and introducer; but I am delighted to introduce +you to a salon that you will, I trust, find less gloomy than your little +room of the Jardin des Plantes. In fact, I thought you were one of +Sabine Marsy's friends. Did I dream so?"</p> + +<p>"I have occasionally met her, and have found her very agreeable. She +invited me to call on her, but I have not dared—my hunger for +solitude—my den yonder—"</p> + +<p>"Is the little room forbidden ground, is one absolutely prohibited from +seeing it?" said Guy with a smile.</p> + +<p>"It is not forbidden, but it is difficult. Moreover, I have nothing +hidden from my friends," said Marianne, "on one condition, which is, +that they are my friends—"</p> + +<p>She emphasized the words: "Nothing but my friends."</p> + +<p>"Friendship," said Guy, "is all very well, it is very good, very +agreeable, but—"</p> + +<p>"But—?"</p> + +<p>"Love—"</p> + +<p>"Do not mention that to me! That takes wings, <a name="Page_102" id="Page_102"></a>b-r-r! Like swallows. It +flits. It leaves for Italy. But friendship—"</p> + +<p>She extended her small firm hand as rigid as steel.</p> + +<p>"When you desire to visit me over there, I shall be at home. I will give +you the address. But it is not Guy who will come, but Monsieur de +Lissac, remember. Is that understood?"</p> + +<p>"I should be very silly if I answered <i>yes</i>."</p> + +<p>Marianne shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Compliments! How foolish you are! Keep that sort of talk for others. It +is a long time since they were addressed to me."</p> + +<p>She took that man's face between her hands and kissed his cheeks in a +frank, friendly way. Guy became somewhat pale.</p> + +<p>"I have loved you, and truly, that is enough. Do not complain or ask +aught besides."</p> + +<p>Ah! what an eager desire now prompted him to possess her again, to find +in her his mistress once more, to restrain her from leaving until she +had become his, as of old.</p> + +<p>She had already thrown her cloak over her shoulders, and said, as she +gently pushed open the door:</p> + +<p>"So it is agreed? I am to go to Madame Marsy's?"</p> + +<p>"To Madame Marsy's. I will have an invitation sent you."</p> + +<p>"And I will call for you and take you. Yes, I, here, <a name="Page_103" id="Page_103"></a>like a jolly +companion. Or I'll go with my uncle. You will present me to Rosas. We +shall see if he recognizes me."</p> + +<p>She burst out laughing. "You will also introduce me—since that is your +occupation—" and here her smile disclosed her pretty, almost +mischievous-looking teeth—"to Monsieur Vaudrey, your comrade. A +minister! Such people are always useful for something. <i>Addio, caro!</i>"</p> + +<p>Guy de Lissac had hardly taken two steps toward Marianne before she had +vanished behind the heavy folds of the Japanese portière that fell in +its place behind her. He opened the door. Mademoiselle Kayser was +already in the hall, with her hand on the handle of the door.</p> + +<p>"At nine o'clock I shall be with you," she said to Lissac as she +disappeared.</p> + +<p>She waved a salutation, the valet de chambre hastened to open the door, +and her outline, that for a moment stood out in the light of the +staircase, vanished. Guy was almost angry, and returned to his room.</p> + +<p>Now that she had left, he opened his window quickly. It seemed to him +that a little blue smoke escaped from the room, the cloud emitted by +Marianne's cigarette. And with this bluish vapor also disappeared the +odor of new-mown hay, bearing with it the passing intoxication that for +a moment threatened to ensnare this disabused man.<a name="Page_104" id="Page_104"></a></p> + +<p>The cold outside air, the bright sunshine, entered in quivering rays. +Without, the snow-covered roofs stood out clearly against a soft blue +sky, limpid and springlike. Light wreaths of smoke floated upward in the +bracing atmosphere.</p> + +<p>Guy freely inhaled this buoyant atmosphere that chased away the blended +odor of tobacco and that exhaled from the woman. It seemed to him that a +sort of band had been torn from his brow which, but a moment ago, felt +compressed. The fresh breeze bore away all trace of Marianne's kisses.</p> + +<p>"Must I always be a child?" he thought. "It is not on my account that +she came here, but on Rosas's. Our friends' friends are our lovers. +Egad! on my word, I was almost taken in again, nevertheless! Compelled, +in order to cut adrift again, to make another journey to Italy,—at my +age."</p> + +<p>Then, feeling chilly, he closed the window, laughing as he did so.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="V" id="V"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>V</h3> + + +<p>On the pavement of the Boulevard Malesherbes, two policemen, wrapped in +their hooded coats, restrained the crowd that gathered in front of the +huge double-door of the house occupied by Madame Marsy. A double row of +curious idlers stood motionless, braving benumbed <a name="Page_105" id="Page_105"></a>fingers while +watching the carriages that rolled under the archway, which, after +quickly depositing at the foot of the brilliantly lighted perron women +enveloped in burnooses and men in white gloves, their faces half-hidden +by fur collars, turned and crossed the row of approaching coupés.</p> + +<p>For an hour past there had been a double file of carriages, and a +continuous stream of guests arriving on foot, who threw their cigars at +the foot of the perron, chatting as they ascended the steps, which were +protected by a covering of glass. The curious pointed out the faces of +well-known persons. It was said in the neighborhood that the greater +part of the ministers had accepted invitations.</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy's salons were brilliant under the blazing lights. Guests +jostled each other in the lobbies. Overcoats and mantles were thrown in +heaps or strung up in haste, the gloved hands reaching out as in the +lobby of a theatre to receive the piece of numbered pasteboard.</p> + +<p>"You have No. 113," said Monsieur de Lissac to Marianne, who had just +entered, wearing a pale blue cloak, and leaning on his arm.</p> + +<p>She smiled as she slipped the tiny card into her pocket.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I am not superstitious!"</p> + +<p>She beamed with satisfaction.</p> + +<p>People in the hall stood aside in order to allow this <a name="Page_106" id="Page_106"></a>pretty creature +to pass by; her fair hair fell over her plump, though slender, white +shoulders, and the folds of her satin skirt, falling over her +magnificent hips, rustled as she walked.</p> + +<p>Lissac, with his eyeglass fixed, and ceremoniously carrying his +flattened opera-hat, advanced toward the salon, amid the greedy +curiosity of the guests who contemplated the exquisite grace of the +lovely girl as if they were inhaling its charm.</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy stood at the entrance of the salon, looking attractive in a +toilet of black silk which heightened her fair beauty, and, with +extended hands, smilingly greeted all her guests, while the charming +Madame Gerson, refined and tactful, aided her in receiving.</p> + +<p>Sabine appeared perfectly charmed on perceiving Marianne. She had felt +the influence formerly of this ready, keen and daring intelligence. She +troubled herself but little about Marianne's past. Kayser's niece was +received everywhere, and had not Kayser decided to accompany her? He +followed in the rear of the young girl. People had not observed him. He +chatted with a man about sixty years old, with a white beard and very +gentle eyes who listened to him good-naturedly while thinking perhaps of +something else.</p> + +<p>"Ah! my old Ramel, how glad I am to see you!" he said with theatrical +effusion.</p> + +<p>"It is a fact that we rarely see each other. What has become of you, +Kayser?"<a name="Page_107" id="Page_107"></a></p> + +<p>"I? I work. I protest, you know, I have never compromised—Never—The +dignity of art—"</p> + +<p>Their voices were drowned by the hubbub of the first salon, already +filled with guests; Sabine meanwhile took Marianne, whom Lissac +surrendered, and led her toward a larger salon with red decorations, +wherein the chairs were drawn up in lines before an empty space, +forming, thanks to the voluminous folds of the curtains, a sort of stage +on which, doubtless, some looked-for actor was about to appear.</p> + +<p>Nearly all these chairs were already occupied. The lovely faces of the +women were illuminated by the dazzling light. Everybody turned toward +Marianne as she entered the room, under the guidance of Sabine, who led +her quickly toward one of the unoccupied seats, close to the improvised +stage on which, evidently, Monsieur de Rosas was going to speak.</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson had taken her seat near Marianne, who searched her black, +bright eyes with a penetrating glance in order to interrogate the +thoughts of this friend of the family. Madame Gerson was delighted. +Sabine, dear Sabine, had achieved a success, yes, a success! Monsieur +Vaudrey was there! And Madame Vaudrey, too! And Monsieur Collard—of +Nantes—the President of the Council! And Monsieur Pichereau, who, after +all, had been a minister!</p> + +<p>"That makes almost three ministers, one of whom is President of the +Council! Sabine is overcome with joy, <a name="Page_108" id="Page_108"></a>yes, absolutely crazy! Think of +it: Madame Hertzfield, Sabine's rival, never had more than two ministers +at a time in her salon."</p> + +<p>She added, prattling in soft, linnet-like tones, that Madame +Hertzfield's salon was losing its prestige. Only sub-prefects were +created there. But Sabine's salon was the antechamber to the +prefectures!</p> + +<p>"And if you knew how charming Monsieur Vaudrey is—a delightful +conversationalist—he has dined excellently—he was twice served with +an entrée!"</p> + +<p>Marianne listened, but her mind was wandering far away. She was debating +with herself as to when Monsieur de Rosas would appear on that narrow +strip of waxed floor before her.</p> + +<p>Guy had correctly surmised: it was Rosas and Rosas only whom this woman +was seeking in Sabine's salon. She wished to see him again, to talk to +him, to tempt destiny. A fancy.—A final caprice. Why not?</p> + +<p>Marianne thought that she played a leading part there. She remembered +this José very well, having met him more than once in former days with +Guy. A Parisian Castilian, more Parisian than Spanish, he spoke with +exquisite finish the classic tongue, and with the free-and-easy manner +of a frequenter of the boulevards, chatted in the slang of the pavement +or of the greenroom; he was an eminent virtuoso and collector, an author +when the desire seized him, but only in his own <a name="Page_109" id="Page_109"></a>interest, liberal in +his opinions, lavish in his disposition, attractive in his manners; an +eager traveller, he had, at thirty years of age, seen all that was to be +seen, he had visited India and Japan, drunk camel's milk under the tents +of the Kirgheez, and eaten dates with the Kabyles, and narrated with a +sort of appetizing irony, love adventures which might have seemed +romantic brag, if it were not that he lessened their improbability by +his raillery. He was a kind of belated Byron, who might have been cured +of his romantic tastes by the wounds and contact of reality.</p> + +<p>She especially recalled a visit in Guy's company to José at an apartment +that the duke had furnished in Rue de Laval. He occupied a painter's +large studio, draping it with Oriental tapestry, crowding it with +knickknacks and panoplies of weapons: an extravagant luxury,—something +like the embarrassment of riches in a plundered caravansary. It was +there that José had regaled Marianne and Guy with coffee served in +Turkish fashion, and while they chatted, they had smoked that pale +Oriental tobacco, that the Spaniard, quoting some Persian poets, +gallantly compared to the perfumed locks of Mademoiselle Kayser.</p> + +<p>During her years of hardship, she had many a time recalled that +auburn-haired, handsome fellow, with his blue eye, pensive and +searching, and lower lip curled disdainfully over his tawny beard +trimmed in Charles V. style, as he reclined there, stretched on Hindoo +rugs, <a name="Page_110" id="Page_110"></a>chanting some monotonous song as slow as the movement of a +caravan.</p> + +<p>"Isn't my friend Rosas a delightful fellow?" Guy had asked her.</p> + +<p>"Delightful!"</p> + +<p>"And clever! and learned! and entertaining! and, what is not amiss, a +multi-millionaire!"</p> + +<p>Marianne thought of the absolute power, satisfied desires, whims and +possible dreams that were linked with that man. He was a mass of +perambulating gold. How many times she had dreamed, in the mists of her +recollection, of that somewhat haughty smile that curled his delicate +mustache, and those keen-edged teeth gleaming though his reddish beard, +as if greedy to bury themselves deep in flesh!</p> + +<p>But where was the duke now? Among the Kabyles or the Mormons? At Tahiti, +Greenland, or gone to the devil? The papers had once announced that he +was organizing an expedition to the North Pole. Perhaps he was lost +among the icebergs in the Arctic Seas! She smiled at that, sighing +involuntarily with sincere emotion, but prompted by selfish regret.</p> + +<p>It had seemed to her that José had more than once permitted himself to +express his affection for her. Politely, correctly, of course, as a +gallant man addresses a friend's mistress, but manifesting in his +reserve a host of understood sentiments and tender restraint that +suggested hidden or implied declarations. Marianne had <a name="Page_111" id="Page_111"></a>pretended not to +understand him. At that time, she loved Guy or thought that she loved +him, which amounts to the same thing. She contented herself with smiling +at the flirtation of Monsieur de Rosas.</p> + +<p>"I have perhaps been very stupid," she said to herself. "Pshaw! he might +have been as silly as I, if occasion demanded. The obligations of +friendship! The phantom of Guy!"</p> + +<p>She suddenly stopped and this name escaped her lips: <i>José</i>—<i>Joseph!</i></p> + +<p>Nevertheless, this was one of the vexations of this girl: she was angry +because she had acted rightly. Others suffer remorse for their ill +deeds, but she suffered for her virtue. She often thought of the Duc de +Rosas, as her mother Eve must have thought of Paradise lost. She would +have stirred, astonished, conquered, crushed Paris, if she had been the +mistress of Rosas.</p> + +<p>"What then! Whose fault was it? How foolish of one not to dare +everything!"</p> + +<p>Now see how suddenly and unexpectedly, just as an adversary might offer +an opportunity for revenge, chance, at the turning-point of her life, +had brought back to Paris this José whom she had never forgotten, and +who perhaps remembered her, and by whom she would be recognized most +assuredly, in any case. It was an unhoped, unlooked-for opportunity that +restored Marianne's faith in herself, superstitious as she was, like all +successful gamblers.<a name="Page_112" id="Page_112"></a></p> + +<p>She had fallen, but how she could raise herself by the arms of the duke! +One must be determined.</p> + +<p>Guy and Sabine were met on the way, like two helpers. She profited by +this circumstance, using the one to reach the other and to gain Rosas +from the latter. She bore a grudge, nevertheless, against Guy de Lissac, +the insolent and silly fellow who had formerly left her. Bah! before +taking vengeance on him, it was most important to make use of him, and, +after all, revenge is so wearisome and useless.</p> + +<p>Now Kayser's niece, Guy's mistress, a woman who had given herself or who +had been taken, who had sold herself or who had been purchased, a young +girl who remained so in features, gracefulness and the virgin charms +that clothed her courtesan's body—her smile a virgin's, her glance full +of frolic—Marianne was now within a few feet of him whom she expected, +wishing for him as a seducer desires a woman.</p> + +<p>"If he has loved me one moment, one single moment, Rosas will love me," +she thought.</p> + +<p>The salon was stiflingly hot, but Marianne was determined to keep +herself in the first row, to be directly under the eye of the duke.</p> + +<p>She felt the waves of over-heated air rise to her temples, and at times +she feared that she would faint, half-stifled as she was and +unaccustomed now to attend soirées. She remained, however, looking +anxiously toward the door, watching for the appearance of the trav<a name="Page_113" id="Page_113"></a>eller +and wondering when the pale face of the Spaniard would show itself.</p> + +<p>At a short distance from her there was a young woman of twenty-three or +twenty-four, courted like a queen and somewhat confused by the many +questions addressed to her; robed in a white gown, she was extremely +pretty, fair, and wore natural roses in her ash-colored hair, her eyes +had a wondering expression, her cheeks were flushed, and in her amiable, +gracious manner, she disclosed a touch of provincialism, modesty and +hesitation—Marianne heard Madame Gerson say to her neighbors:</p> + +<p>"It is the minister's wife."</p> + +<p>"Madame Vaudrey?"</p> + +<p>"Yes! Very charming, isn't she?"</p> + +<p>"Ravishingly pretty! Fresh-looking!"</p> + +<p>Then in lowered tone:</p> + +<p>"Too fresh!"</p> + +<p>"Rather provincial!"</p> + +<p>And one voice replied, in an ironical, apologetic tone:</p> + +<p>"Bless me, my dear, nothing dashing! Hair and complexion peculiarly her +own! So much the better."</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding the low tone of this conversation, Marianne heard it +all. One by one, every one looked at this young woman who borrowed her +golden tints from the rising sun. She bore the popular name of the new +minister. She entered into prominence with him, accepting gracefully and +unaffectedly the weight of his <a name="Page_114" id="Page_114"></a>fame. Her timid, almost restless, +uncertain smile, seemed to crave from the other women pardon for her own +success, and there, surrounded by a group of men seated near the window, +were two persons for whom chairs had just been placed, one of whom was a +young, happy man, who exhaled an atmosphere of joy, and looked from time +to time toward Adrienne and Marianne as if to see if the young wife were +annoyed.</p> + +<p>"Where is Monsieur Vaudrey then?" Marianne asked Madame Gerson.</p> + +<p>"Why, he is just opposite to you! There on your right, beside Monsieur +Collard, and he is devouring you with his glances."</p> + +<p>"Ah, bah!" said Marianne with an indifferent smile.</p> + +<p>And she looked in her turn.</p> + +<p>She had, in fact, already noticed this very elegant man who had been +watching her for some time.</p> + +<p>But how could she know that he was Monsieur Vaudrey? He was delightful, +moreover, sprightly in manner and of keen intelligence. A few moments +before, she had heard him, as she passed by him under Sabine's guidance, +utter some flattering remarks which had charmed her and made her smile.</p> + +<p>Ah! that was Vaudrey?</p> + +<p>She had often heard him spoken of. She had read of his speeches. She had +even frequently seen his photograph in the stationers' windows.</p> + +<p>The determined air of this young man, whom she knew <a name="Page_115" id="Page_115"></a>to be eloquent, had +pleased her. She ought then to have recognized him. He was exactly as +his photographs represented him.</p> + +<p>Of all the glances bestowed on the minister, Marianne's especially +attracted Sulpice. A moment previously he had felt a singular charm at +the appearance of this woman, threading her way directly between the +rows of men by whom she was so crowded as to be in danger of having her +garments pulled from her body. In his love of definitions and analyses, +Vaudrey had never pictured the Parisian woman otherwise, with her +piquant and instantaneous seductiveness, as penetrating as a subtle +essence.</p> + +<p>Marianne, smiling restlessly, looked at him and allowed him to look at +her.</p> + +<p>Her cheeks, which were extremely pale, suddenly became flushed as if +their color were heightened by some feverish attack, when, amid the stir +caused by the curiosity of the guests, and a greeting manifested by the +shuffling of feet and the murmuring of voices, Monsieur de Rosas +appeared; his air was somewhat embarrassed, he offered his arm to Madame +Marsy, who conducted him to the narrow stage as if to present him.</p> + +<p>"At last! ah! it is he!"</p> + +<p>"It is really the Duc de Rosas, is it not?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, it is he!"</p> + +<p>"He is charming!"</p> + +<p>The name of Rosas, although only repeated in an under<a name="Page_116" id="Page_116"></a>tone by the lips +of these women, rung in Marianne's ears, sounding like a quickstep +played on a clarion. It seemed to her that a decisive moment in her life +was announced fantastically in those utterances. Even now, while burning +with the very fever of her eagerness, she felt the gambler's +superstition. As soon as she saw José, she said to herself at once that +if he saw her and recognized her first glance, then he had not forgotten +her and she could hope for everything. Everything! "Men happily forget +less quickly than women," she thought. "Through egotism, or from regret, +some abandon themselves to their reminiscences with complacency, like +this Guy, and recognize on our countenances the lines of their own +youth. Others, perhaps, mourn over the lost opportunity, and the duke is +sentimental enough to be of that class."</p> + +<p>She thought that Rosas must look at her, yes, at any cost; and with body +inclined, her chin resting on her gloved right hand, while the other +handled her fan with the skill peculiar to the Spanish women, she darted +at the duke a rapid glance, a glance burning with desire and in which +she expressed her whole will. The human eye has within it all the power +of attraction possessed by a magnetic needle. As if he had experienced +the actual effect of that glance fixed on his countenance, the duke +raised his head after a polite but somewhat curtly elegant bow, to look +at the audience of lovely women whom Sabine had gathered to greet him, +and, as if only Marianne had been <a name="Page_117" id="Page_117"></a>present, he at once saw the +motionless young woman silently contemplating him.</p> + +<p>Rosas, as he appeared within the frame formed by the red curtains, his +thin, regular and ruddy face looking pale against the white of his +cravat and the bosom of his shirt, looked like a portrait of a Castilian +of the time of Philip II., clothed in modern costume, his fashionable +black clothes relieved only by a touch of vermilion, a red rosette. But +however fashionable the cut of his clothes might be, on this man with +the vague blue eyes, and looking contemplative and sad with his upturned +moustache, the black coat assumed the appearance of a <i>doublet</i> of old, +on which the red ribbon of the Legion of Honor looked like a diminutive +cross of Calatrava upon a velvet cloak.</p> + +<p>In fixing, to some extent, his wandering glance on the fervent look of +Marianne, this melancholy Spanish face was instinctively lighted up with +a fleeting smile that immediately passed and was followed by a slight, +respectful bow, quite sufficient, however, to surround the young woman +with an atmosphere that seemed to glow.</p> + +<p>"He has recognized me! at once! come!—I am not forgotten."</p> + +<p>As in the glorious moment of victory, her bloodless face was overspread +with a dazzling expression of joy. Boldly raising her head and inviting +his glances as she had braved them, she listened, with glowing eyes, +drinking each word that flowed from his lips, her nostrils distended as +if to scent the approach of an Oriental perfume, <a name="Page_118" id="Page_118"></a>to the recital of the +narrative commenced by the duke in a measured, cajoling tone, which grew +animated and louder.</p> + +<p>Everybody listened to Rosas. Only the slight fluttering of fans was +heard like a beating of wings. Without changing the tone of his +discourse, and recounting his travels to his audience as if he were +addressing only Marianne, he told in a voice more Italian than Spanish, +in musical, non-guttural cadences, of his experiences on the borders of +the Nile, of the weariness of the caravans, of the nights passed under +star-strewn skies, of the songs of the camel-driver, slowly intoned like +prayers, of the gloom of solitary wastes and of the poetic associations +of the ruins slumbering amid the red sands of the desert. At times he +recited a translation of an Arabian song or remarked in passing, on some +mournful ballad, refined as a Sennett, deep as the infinite, in which +the eternal words of love, tender and affecting in all languages, +assumed an intensely poetic character under the influence of their +Semitic nature; songs in which passers-by, strangers, lovers dead for +centuries, who had strewed, as it were, their joys and their sobs over +the sands of the desert, told the color of the hair and of the eyes of +their dear ones, pleaded with their betrothed dead for the alms of love, +and promised to spectres of women rose-colored garments and flowers that +time would never wither.</p> + +<p>These songs of Arabs dying for Nazarenes, of sons of<a name="Page_119" id="Page_119"></a> Mohammed +sacrificing themselves for the daughters of Aïssa were so translated by +this Castilian that the exquisite charm of the original, filtered +through his rendering, lost none,—even in French,—of the special +characteristics of his own nation, a half-daughter of the Orient. And +inevitably, with its melancholy repetition, the poetry he spoke of dwelt +on wounded, suffering love, on the anguish of timid hearts, and the sobs +of unknown despairing Arabs, buried for ages under the sands of the +desert.</p> + +<p>The duke seemed to take pleasure in dwelling on these poetic quotations +rather than on the reminiscences of his travels. His individuality, his +own impressions vanished before this passionate legacy bequeathed by one +human race to another. Marianne trembled, believing that she could see +even in Rosas's thoughts a desire to speak especially for her and to +her. Was it not thus that he spoke in his own house in the presence of +Lissac, squatting on his divan like an Arab story-teller?</p> + +<p>She felt her youth renewed by the memory of all those past years. She +thought herself back once more in the studio on Rue de Laval. Sabine +Marsy's salon disappeared, Rosas was whispering in her ear, looking at +her, and allowing the love that he felt to be perceived, in spite of +Guy.</p> + +<p>Guy! who was Guy? Marianne troubled herself about no one but De Rosas. +Only the duke existed now. Had Guy been blended with her life but for a +<a name="Page_120" id="Page_120"></a>single moment? She embraced Rosas with her burning glance.</p> + +<p>She no longer saw Sulpice, but he never looked away from Mademoiselle +Kayser. He thought her a most charming woman. A magnetic fluid, as it +were, flowed from her to this man, and he, with wandering mind, did not +hear one word of Monsieur de Rosas's narrative, but concentrated his +thoughts upon that pretty, enticing woman, whom he could not refrain +from comparing with his wife, sitting so near her at this moment.</p> + +<p>Adrienne was very pretty, her beauty was more regular than the other's. +Her smooth, blond hair was in contrast with the tumbled, auburn locks of +Marianne, and yet, extraordinary as it was—Adrienne had never seemed to +be so cold as on that evening, as she sat there motionless, watching, +while a timid habitual smile played over her lips.</p> + +<p>Sulpice suffered somewhat in consequence of this awkwardness on +Adrienne's part, contrasted as it was with the clever freedom of manner, +graceful attitude, and flowing outlines of that disturbing neighbor, +with her dull white countenance, half-closed mouth, strange curl of her +lips, which seemed turned up as if in challenge. She was decidedly a +Parisian, with all her intoxicating charms, that alluring, if vicious +attraction that flows from the eyes of even modest girls. Some words +spoken by Monsieur de Rosas reaching Vaudrey's ears—a description of +the somewhat fantastical <a name="Page_121" id="Page_121"></a>preparation of poison by the Indians, +explained by the duke by way of parenthesis—suggested to Sulpice that +the most subtle, the gentlest and most certainly deadly poison was, +after all, the filtering of a woman's glance through the very flesh of a +man, and he thirsted for that longed-for poison, intoxicating and +delicious—</p> + +<p>He was anxious for the duke to finish his remarks. What interest had he +in all those travels, those Arabic translations, that Oriental poetry, +or that poison from America? He was seized with the desire to know what +such a charming creature as Marianne thought. Ah! what a pretty girl! He +had already inquired her name; he happened to know Uncle Kayser; the +painter had formerly sent him a printed memoir <i>On the Method of +Moralizing Art through the Mind</i>.</p> + +<p>The minister experienced on hearing Rosas the feeling of enervation that +attacked him in the Chamber when, near the dinner-hour, an orator became +too long-winded in his speech. He was unable to resist remarking in a +whisper to the President of the Council, who was near him:</p> + +<p>"Suppose we call for the clôture?"</p> + +<p>Monsieur Collard in a diplomatic way expressed his approval of Rosas by +a look that at the same time rebuked his colleague Vaudrey for his lack +of sufficient gravity.</p> + +<p>The duke did not tire any one except Sulpice. He was listened to with +delight. The sentimental exterior <a name="Page_122" id="Page_122"></a>of this man concealed a jester's +nature, and the sober appearance of this Castilian wore all the +characteristics of a polished lounger. The least smile that animated his +passive countenance became at once attractive. Marianne thought him most +delightful, or rather, she found him just what she had formerly believed +him to be, a refined, delicate and very simple man in spite of his +graciously haughty manner. When he concluded, the room echoed with the +thunder of the applause. Even in the adjoining rooms the people +applauded, for silence had been secured so as to hear his remarks. With +a wave of his gloved hand, Rosas seemed to disclaim that his discourse +merited the applause, and he received the greetings as a man of the +world receives a salutation, not as a tenor acknowledging the homage +paid to him. He strove to make his way through the group of young men +who were stationed behind him.</p> + +<p>"At last!" said Vaudrey, in a half-whisper.</p> + +<p>It was the moment for which he had been waiting. He would be able now to +address himself to Mademoiselle Kayser!</p> + +<p>He hastened to offer his arm to Marianne.</p> + +<p>Madame Marsy, eagerly and quickly, had already appropriated Monsieur de +Rosas, who was moreover surrounded and escorted by a crowd who +congratulated him noisily. Except for that, Marianne would have gone +direct to him in obedience to her desires.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey's arm, however, was not to be despised. The <a name="Page_123" id="Page_123"></a>new minister was +the leading figure in the assembly. She looked at Sulpice full in the +face as if to inquire the cause of his eagerness in placing himself at +her side, and observing that this somewhat mocking interrogation +disconcerted him, she smiled at him graciously.</p> + +<p>She passed on smiling, amid the double row of guests who bowed as she +passed. She suddenly felt a sort of bewilderment, it seemed to her that +all these salutations were for her benefit. She believed herself created +for adoration. Inwardly she felt well-disposed towards Sulpice now, +because he had so gallantly chosen and distinguished her among all these +women.</p> + +<p>After all, she would easily find Rosas again. And who knows? It would +perhaps be better that the duke should seek her. Meanwhile, she crossed +the salons, leaning on the arm of the minister. It was a kind of +triumph.</p> + +<p>Good-naturedly and politely, but without pride, the minister received +all these attentions, becoming as they were to him in his official +capacity, and as he moved on he uttered from time to time some +commonplace compliment to Marianne, reserving his more intimate remarks +for the immediate future.</p> + +<p>Before the buffet, brilliant with light and the gleaming of crystal, the +golden-tinted champagne sparkling in the goblets, the ruddy tone of the +punch, the many fruits, the bright-colored <i>granite</i> and the ices, +Vaudrey stopped, releasing the arm of the young girl but remaining +beside <a name="Page_124" id="Page_124"></a>her and passing her the sherbet which a lackey handed him over +the piled-up plates.</p> + +<p>Groups were always encircling him; searching, half-anxious glances +greeted his. An eager hunt after smiles and greetings accompanied the +hunt for <i>tutti frutti</i>. But the minister confined his attentions to +Marianne, chafing under the eagerness of his desires, though bearing +them with good grace, as if he were really the lover of the pretty girl.</p> + +<p>Marianne stood stirring the sherbet with the point of a silver-plated +spoon, examining this statesman, as seductive as a fashionable man, with +that womanly curiosity that divines a silent declaration. A gold weigher +does not balance more keenly in his scales an unfamiliar coin than a +woman estimates and gauges <i>the value</i> of a stranger.</p> + +<p>Marianne readily understood that she had fascinated Vaudrey. This +Vaudrey! Notwithstanding that he possessed a charming wife, he still +permitted himself to recognize beauty in other women, and to tell them +so, for he so informed Marianne! He declared it by his smile, his +sparkling eyes, and the protecting bearing that he instinctively +manifested in the presence of this creature who glanced at him with +perfect composure.</p> + +<p>In the confusion attending the attack on the buffet and in the presence +of the crowd that formed a half-circle round the minister, it was not +possible for him to commit himself too much; and the conversation, +half-drowned by <a name="Page_125" id="Page_125"></a>the noise of voices, was carried on by fits and starts; +but in order to make themselves understood, Vaudrey and Marianne drew +nearer each other and found themselves occasionally almost pressed +against each other, so that the light breath of this woman and the scent +of new-mown hay that she exhaled, wafted over Sulpice's face. He looked +at her so admiringly that it was noticeable. She was laced in a light +blue satin gown that showed her rosy arms to the elbows, and her +shoulders gleamed with a rosy tint that suggested the rays of a winter +sun lighting up the pure snow. A singular animation, half-feverish, +beamed in her small, piercing, restless eyes, and her delicate ears with +their well-marked rims were quite red. The light that fell from the wax +candles imparted to her hair a Titian red tint as if she had bound her +locks with henna during the night. She was visibly assured of her power +and smiled with a strange and provoking air.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt really much disturbed, he was attracted and half-angered by +this pretty girl with dilating nostrils who calmly swallowed her glass +of sherbet. He thought her at once exquisite and lovely, doubly charming +with her Parisian grace and in her ball costume, her bare flesh as +lustrous as mother-of-pearl under the brilliant light.</p> + +<p>Her corsage was ornamented on the left side by an embroidered black +butterfly, with outstretched wings of a brownish, brilliant tint, and +Vaudrey, with a smile, asked her, without quite understanding what he +said, if it were an emblematic crest.<a name="Page_126" id="Page_126"></a></p> + +<p>She smiled.</p> + +<p>"Precisely," she replied. "What I wear in my corsage I have in my mind. +Black butterflies—or <i>blue devils</i>, as you choose."</p> + +<p>"You are not exceptional," said Sulpice. "All women are such."</p> + +<p>"All women in your opinion then, are a little—what is it called? a +little out of the perpendicular—or to speak more to the point, a little +queer, Monsieur le Ministre?"</p> + +<p>The minister smiled in his turn, and looked at Marianne, whose eyes, +seen between the blinking lids, gleamed as the electric eyes of a cat +shine between its long lashes.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, "no, but I blame them somewhat for loving the blue only +in the butterflies of which you speak, the <i>blue devils</i> that penetrate +their brain! They are born for blue, however, for that which the +provincial poets style 'the azure', and they shun it as if blue were +detestable. <i>Blue!</i> Nonsense! Good for men, those simpletons, who in the +present age, are the only partisans of <i>blue</i> in passion and in life."</p> + +<p>Whether he desired it or not, he had drawn still closer to this creature +who studied him like a strategist while he fawned on her with his +glances, losing himself in that "blue" of which he spoke with a certain +elegance, in which he desired to express mockery, but which was +nevertheless sincere. In the same jesting tone, pointing to the light +blue of her gown, she said:<a name="Page_127" id="Page_127"></a></p> + +<p>"You see, your Excellency, that all women do not dislike blue."</p> + +<p>"If it is fashionable, <i>parbleu!</i> And if it becomes their beauty as well +as this stuff of yours, they would adore it, most assuredly."</p> + +<p>"They love it otherwise, too—In passion and in life. That depends on +the women—and on men," she added, showing her white teeth while smiling +graciously.</p> + +<p>She dropped her spoon in the saucer and handed the sherbet to a servant. +With an involuntary movement—or perhaps, after all, it was a shrewdly +calculated one—she almost grazed Sulpice's cheek and lips when she +extended her round and firm arm, and Sulpice, who was somewhat +bewildered, was severely tempted, like some collegian, to kiss it in +passage.</p> + +<p>He closed his eyes and a moment after, on reopening them, the disturbing +element having passed, he saw Marianne before him with her fan in her +hand, and as if the image of which he spoke only now recurred to his +memory, he said:</p> + +<p>"Mademoiselle, it seems to me that in this very costume and as charming +as you are at this moment, I have seen your portrait at the Salon; is it +not so?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she said. "It is the very best painting that my uncle has +produced."</p> + +<p>"I thought it excellent before seeing you," said Sulpice, "but now—"</p> + +<p>She did not feel satisfied with the smile that accom<a name="Page_128" id="Page_128"></a>panied the +compliment. She wished to hear the entire phrase.</p> + +<p>"Now—?" said she, as a most seductive smile played on her lips.</p> + +<p>"Now, I find it inferior to the original!"</p> + +<p>"One always says so, your Excellency, except perhaps to the artist; but +I was greatly afraid that you would not think me so, arrayed in +this—this famous blue—this sky-blue that you love so much."</p> + +<p>"And that I love a hundred times more from this evening forward," said +he, in a changed and genuinely affected tone.</p> + +<p>She did not reply, but looked at him full in the face as if to inform +him that she understood him. He was quite pale.</p> + +<p>"Would you not like to be one of the bright ornaments of my salon, as +you are of that of Madame Marsy?" said he, in a whisper.</p> + +<p>"With the greatest happiness, your Excellency."</p> + +<p>What Sulpice said was not heard by the others; but Marianne felt that +she was observed, envied already, and manifested her complete +satisfaction with a toss of her head. In this atmosphere of flattery, +oppressive as with the heavy odor of incense, she experienced a +sensation of omnipotence, the intoxication of that power with which +Vaudrey was invested, whose envied reflection was cast on her by that +simple aside spoken in the midst of the crowd.<a name="Page_129" id="Page_129"></a></p> + +<p>She was delighted and exceedingly proud. She almost forgot that her +visit had been made on Rosas's account.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was about to add something, when Madame Marsy in passing to +greet her guests, noticed Marianne and grasping her hand:</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, your Excellency," she said, "but I must take her +away from you. I have been asked for her."</p> + +<p>"By whom?" said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey looked at Marianne. He observed distinctly a flash of joy +illuminate her pale face and he felt a sudden and singular discontent, +amounting almost to physical anguish. And why, great heavens?</p> + +<p>Marianne smiled a salutation; he half-bowed and watched her as she went +away, with a sort of angry regret, as if he had something further to say +to this woman who was almost a stranger to him, and who, guided by +Sabine, now disappeared amid the crowd of black coats and bright +toilets. And then, almost immediately and suddenly, he was surrounded +and besieged by his colleagues of the Chamber, men either indifferent or +seeking favors, who only awaited the conclusion of the conversation with +Mademoiselle Kayser, which they would certainly have precipitated, +except for the fear of acting indiscreetly, in order to precipitate +themselves on him. Amid all those unknown persons who approached <a name="Page_130" id="Page_130"></a>him, +Vaudrey sought a friend as he felt himself lost and taken by assault by +this rabble.</p> + +<p>The sight of the face of a friend, older than himself, a spare man with +a white beard very carefully trimmed, caused him a feeling of pleasure, +and he joyfully exclaimed:</p> + +<p>"Eh! <i>pardieu!</i> why, here is Ramel!"</p> + +<p>He immediately extended both hands in warm greeting to this man of sixty +years, wearing a white cravat twisted round his neck, like a neckerchief +in the old-fashioned style, and whose black waistcoat with its standing +collar of ancient pattern was conspicuous amid the open waistcoats of +the fashionably-dressed young men who had been very eagerly surrounding +the minister for the last few moments.</p> + +<p>"Good day, Ramel!—How delighted I am to see you!"—</p> + +<p>"And I also," said Ramel in a friendly and affectionate tone, while his +face, that seemed severe, but was only good-natured and masculine, +suddenly beamed. "It is not a little on your account that I came here."</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>"Really. I was anxious to shake hands with you. It is so long since I +saw you. How much has happened since then!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! Ramel, who the devil would have said that I should be minister when +I took you my first article for the <i>Nation Française</i>!" said Vaudrey.<a name="Page_131" id="Page_131"></a> +"Bah! who is not a minister?" said Ramel. "You are. Remember what +Napoléon said to Bourrienne as he entered the Tuileries: 'Here we are, +Bourrienne! now we must stay here!'"</p> + +<p>"That is exactly what Granet said to me when he told me of the new +combination."</p> + +<p>"Granet expressed in that more of an after-thought than your old Ramel."</p> + +<p>"My best friend," said Sulpice with emotion, grasping this man's hands +in his.</p> + +<p>"It is so much more meritorious on your part to tell me that," said +Ramel, "seeing that now you do not lack friendships."</p> + +<p>"You are still a pessimist, Ramel?"</p> + +<p>"I—A wild optimist, seeing that I believe everything and everybody! But +I must necessarily believe in the stupidity of my fellows, and upon this +point I am hardly mistaken."</p> + +<p>"But what brings you to Madame Marsy's, you who are a perfect savage?"</p> + +<p>"Tamed!—Because, I repeat to you, I knew that you were coming and that +Monsieur de Rosas was to speak on the subject of savages, and these +please me. If I had been rich or if I only had enough to live on, I +should have passed my life in travelling. And in the end, I shall have +lived between Montmartre and Batignolles: a tortoise dreaming that he is +a swallow—"</p> + +<p>"Ramel, my dear fellow," said the minister, "would <a name="Page_132" id="Page_132"></a>you wish me to give +you a mission where you could go and study whatever seemed good to you?"</p> + +<p>"With my rheumatism? Thanks, your Excellency!" said Ramel, smiling. "No, +I am too old, and never having asked any one for anything, I am not +going to begin at my age."</p> + +<p>"You do not ask, it is offered you."</p> + +<p>"Well, I have no desire for that. I am at the hour of the <i>far niente</i> +that precedes the final slumber. It is a pleasant condition. One has +seen so many things and persons that one has no further desires."</p> + +<p>"The fact is," said the minister, "that if all the people you have +obligated in your life had solicited an invitation from Madame Marsy, +these salons would not be large enough to contain them."</p> + +<p>"Bah! they have all forgotten as I have, myself," said Ramel, with a +shake of his head and smiling pleasantly.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt intense pleasure in meeting, in the midst of this crowd of +indifferent or admiring persons, the man who had formerly seen him +arrive in Paris, and with whom he had corresponded from the heart of his +province, as with a kinsman. There was, in fact, between them, a +relationship of mind and soul that united this veteran of the press with +this young statesman.</p> + +<p>The ideal sought was the same, but the temperaments were different. +Ramel, although he had known them, had for a long time avoided those +excitements of struggle and power that inflamed Vaudrey's blood.<a name="Page_133" id="Page_133"></a></p> + +<p>"It was a glorious day when my pulse became regulated," he said. +"Experience brought me the needed tonic."</p> + +<p>Denis Ramel was a wise man. He took life as he found it, without +enthusiasm as without bitterness. He was not wealthy. More than sixty +years old, he found himself, after a life of hard, rough and continuous +struggle, as badly off as when he started out on his career, full of +burning hopes. He had passed his life honorably as a journalist—a +journalist of the good old times, of the school of thought, not of +news-tellers,—he had loyally and conscientiously exercised a profession +in which he took pleasure; he had read much, written much, consumed much +midnight oil, touched upon everything; put his fingers into every kind +of pie without soiling them, and after having valiantly turned the heavy +millstone of daily labor incessantly renewed for forty years, he had +reached the end of his journey, the brink of the grave, almost +penniless, after having skirted Fortune and seen Opportunity float +toward him her perfumed and intoxicating locks more than a hundred +times. Bent, weary, almost forgotten, and unknown and misunderstood by +the new generation, that styled this enthusiasm, more eager, moreover, +than that of juvenile faith, "old"—he saw the newcomers rise as he +might have beheld the descent of La Courtille.</p> + +<p>"It amuses me."</p> + +<p>Ramel had, in the course of his career as a publicist, <a name="Page_134" id="Page_134"></a>as a dealer in +fame, assisted without taking part therein, in the formation of +syndicates, allotments of shares and financial intrigues; and putting +his shoulder to the wheel of enterprises that appeared to him to be +solid, while seeking to strike out those which appeared to be doubtful, +he had created millionaires without asking a cent from them, just as he +had made ministers without accepting even a thread of ribbon at their +hands.</p> + +<p>This infatuating craft of a maker of men pleased him. All those pioneers +in the great human comedy, he had seen on their entrance, hesitating and +crying to him for assistance. This statesman, swelling out with his +importance in the tribune, had received the benefit of his correction of +his earlier harangues. He had encouraged, during his competition for the +Prix de Rome, this member of the Institute who to-day represented +national art at the Villa Médicis; he had seen this composer, now a +millionaire, beg for a private rehearsal as he might ask alms, and slip +into one's hands concert tickets for the Herz hall. He was the first to +point out the verses of the poet who now wore <i>l'habit vert</i>. He had +first heralded the fame of the actor now in vogue, of the tenor who +to-day had his villas at Nice, yes, Ramel was the first to say: "He is +one of the chosen few!"</p> + +<p>Old, weary and knowing, very gentle and refined in his banter, and +refusing to be blinded or irritated by the trickeries of destiny, Denis +Ramel, when asked why, at his age and with his talents, he was neither a +deputy, nor <a name="Page_135" id="Page_135"></a>a millionaire, nor a member of the Institute, but only a +Warwick living like a poor devil, smiled and said, with the tone of a +man who has probed to the bottom the affairs of life:</p> + +<p>"Bah! what is the use? All that is not so very desirable. Ministers, +academicians, millionaires, prefects, men of power, I know all about +them. I have made them all my life. The majority of those who strut +about at this very time, well! well! it is I who made them!"</p> + +<p>And, like a philosopher allowing the rabble to pass him, who might have +been their chief, but preferred to be their judge, he locked himself in +his apartments with his books, his pictures, his engravings, his little +collection slowly gathered year by year, article by article, smoking his +pipe tranquilly, and at times reviewing the pages of his life, just as +he might have fingered the leaves of a portfolio of engravings, thinking +when he chanced to meet some notable person of the day who shunned him +or merely saluted him curtly and stiffly:</p> + +<p>"You were not so proud when you came to ask me to certify your pay-slip +for the cashier of the journal."</p> + +<p>Ramel had always greatly esteemed Sulpice Vaudrey. This man seemed to +him to be more refined and less forgetful than others. Vaudrey had never +"posed." As a minister, he recalled with deep emotion the period of his +struggles. Ramel, the former manager of the <i>Nation Française</i>, was one +of the objects of his affection and admiration. He would have been +delighted to <a name="Page_136" id="Page_136"></a>snatch this man from his seclusion and place him in the +first rank, to make this sexagenarian who had created and moulded so +many others, noteworthy by a sudden stroke.</p> + +<p>Amid the tumultuous throng, and feeling overjoyed to find once more one +whom he could trust, to whom he could abandon himself entirely, he +repeated to him in all sincerity:</p> + +<p>"Come, Ramel! Would you consent to be my secretary general?"</p> + +<p>"No! your Excellency," Ramel answered, as a kindly smile played beneath +his white moustaches.</p> + +<p>"To oblige me?—To help me?"</p> + +<p>"No—Why, I am an egotist, my dear Vaudrey. Truly, that would make me +too jealous. Take Navarrot," he added, as he pointed to a fashionable +man, elegantly cravatted, carrying his head high, who had just greeted +Vaudrey, using the same phrase eight times: "My dear minister—your +Excellency—my minister—"</p> + +<p>"Navarrot?"</p> + +<p>"He appears to be very much attached to you!"</p> + +<p>"You are very wicked, Ramel. He holds to the office and not to the man. +He is not the friend of the minister, but of ministers. He is one of the +ordinary touters of the ministry. He applauds everything that their +Excellencies choose to say."</p> + +<p>"Oh! I know those touters," said the old journalist. "When a minister is +in power, they cheer him to the echo; when he is down, they belabor +him."</p> + +<p><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137"></a>Vaudrey looked at him and laughingly said: "Begone, journalist!"</p> + +<p>"But at any rate,"—and here he extended his hand to Ramel,—"you will +see me this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>"And you still live at—?"</p> + +<p>"Rue Boursault, Boulevard des Batignolles."</p> + +<p>"Till then, my dear Ramel! If occasion require, you will not refuse to +give me your advice?"</p> + +<p>"Nor my devotion. But without office, remember without office," said +Ramel, still smiling.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey took great delight in chatting with his old friend, but for a +moment he had been seized with an eager desire to find amid the +increasing crowd that thronged the salons, the pretty girl who had +appeared to him like a statue of Desire, whetted desire, but even in her +charms somewhat unwholesome, yet disturbing and appetizing.</p> + +<p>He had come to Sabine Marsy's only by chance and as if to display in +public the joy of his triumph, just as a newly decorated man willingly +accepts invitations in order to show off his new ribbon, but he now felt +happy for having done so. He had promised himself only to put himself in +evidence and then disappear with Adrienne to the enjoyment of their +usual chats, to taste that intimacy that was so dear to him, but which, +since his establishment on Place Beauvau, had vanished.</p> + +<p>He habitually disliked such receptions as that in which <a name="Page_138" id="Page_138"></a>he now took +part, those soirées as fatiguing as those crowds where one packs six +hundred persons in salons capable of holding only sixty: commonplace +receptions, where the master of the house is as happy when he refuses +invitations as a theatre-manager when his play is the rage; where one is +stifled, crushed, and where one can only reach the salon after a +pugilistic encounter, and where the capture of a glass of syrup entails +an assault, and the securing of an overcoat demands a battle. He held in +horror those salons where there is no conversation, where no one is +acquainted, where, because of the hubbub of the crowd or the stifling +silence attending a concert, one cannot exchange either ideas or +phrases, not even a furtive handshake, because of the packing and +crushing of the guests. It was a miracle that he had just been able to +exchange a few words with Mademoiselle Kayser and Ramel. The vulgarity +of the place had at once impressed him,—the more so because he was the +object of attraction for all those crowded faces.</p> + +<p>All that gathering of insignificant, grave and pretentious young men, +who, while they crowded, made their progress in the ranks of the +sub-prefects, councillors of prefectures, picking up nominations under +the feet of the influential guests as they would cigar stumps, disgusted +him; men of twenty years, born, as it were, with white cravats, +pretentious and pensive, creatures of office and not of work, haunting +the Chambers and the antechambers, mere collectors of ideas, repeaters +of serious <a name="Page_139" id="Page_139"></a>commonplaces, salon democrats who would not offer their +ungloved hand to a workman on the street; staff-majors ambitious of +honors and not of devotion, whom he felt crowding around him, with +smiles on their lips and applications in their pockets. How he preferred +the quiet pleasure of reading at the fireside, a chat with a friend, or +listening to one of Beethoven's sonatas, or a selection from Mendelssohn +played by Adrienne, whose companionship made the unmarked flight of the +hours pass more sweetly.</p> + +<p>It was for that that he was created. At least he thought so and believed +it. And now this salon that he had simply desired to traverse, at once +seemed altogether delightful to him. And all this was due to his meeting +a divine creature in the midst of this crowd. He was eager to find +Marianne, to see her again. She aroused his curiosity as some enigma +might.</p> + +<p>What, then, was this woman, was she virtuous or of questionable status? +Ah! she was a woman, or rather ten women in one, at the very least! A +woman from head to foot! A woman to her finger tips, a refined, Parisian +woman, perverse even in her virginity, and a virgin perhaps in her +perversity. A problem in fair flesh.</p> + +<p>As Vaudrey hurriedly left the buffet, every one made way for him, and he +crossed the salons, eagerly looking out for Marianne. As he passed +along, he saw Guy de Lissac sitting on a chair upholstered in garnet +satin, his <a name="Page_140" id="Page_140"></a>right hand resting on the gilded back and chatting with +Adrienne who was fanning herself leisurely. On noticing Sulpice, the +young woman smiled at him even at a distance, the happy smile of a +loving woman, and she embraced him with a pure glance, asking a question +without uttering a word, knowing well that he habitually left in great +haste.</p> + +<p>"Do you wish to return?" was the meaning of her questioning glance.</p> + +<p>He passed before her, replying with a smile, but without appearing to +have understood her, and disappeared in another salon, while Lissac said +to Adrienne:</p> + +<p>"What about the ministry, madame?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! don't speak to me of it!—it frightens me. In those rooms, it seems +to me that I am not at home. Do you know just what I feel? I fancy +myself travelling, never, however, leaving the house. Ministers +certainly should be bachelors. Men have all the honor, but their wives +endure all the weariness."</p> + +<p>"There must, however, be at the bottom of this weariness, some pleasure, +since they so bitterly regret to take leave of it."</p> + +<p>"Ah! <i>Dieu!</i>" said Adrienne. "Already I believe that I should regret +nothing. No, I assure you, nothing whatever."</p> + +<p>She, too, might have desired,—as Vaudrey did formerly—to leave the +soirée, to be with her husband again, and she thought that Sulpice found +it necessary <a name="Page_141" id="Page_141"></a>to remain longer, since he had not definitely decided on +going away.</p> + +<p>The new salon that he entered, communicated with a smaller, circular +one, hung with Japanese silk draperies, and lighted by a Venetian +chandelier that cast a subdued light over the divans upon which some of +the guests sat chatting. Sulpice immediately divined, as if by instinct, +that Marianne was there. He went straight in that direction, and as he +entered the doorway, through the opening framed by two pale blue +portières, he saw in front of him, sitting side by side, the pretty girl +and the Duc de Rosas to whom she had listened so attentively, almost +devotedly, a little earlier; he recalled this now.</p> + +<p>The light fell directly on Mademoiselle Kayser's shoulders and played +over her fair hair. The duke was looking at her.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey took but a single step forward.</p> + +<p>He experienced an altogether curious and inexplicable sensation. This +tête-à-tête displeased him.</p> + +<p>At that moment, on half-turning round,—perhaps by chance—she perceived +the minister and greeting him with a sweet smile, she rose and beckoned +to him to approach her.</p> + +<p>The sky-blue satin hangings, on which the light fell, seemed like a +natural framework for the beautiful blonde creature.</p> + +<p>"Your Excellency," she said, "permit me to introduce my friend, the Duc +de Rosas, he is too accom<a name="Page_142" id="Page_142"></a>plished not to appreciate eloquence and he +entertains the greatest admiration for you."</p> + +<p>Rosas had risen in his turn, and greeted the minister with a very +peculiar half-inclination, not as a suitor in the presence of a powerful +man, but as a nobleman greeting a man of talent.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey sought to discover an agreeable word in the remarks of this man +but he failed to do so. He had, nevertheless, just before applauded +Rosas's remarks, either out of condescension or from politeness. But it +seemed to him that here the duke was no longer the same man. He gave him +the impression of an intruder who had thrust himself in the way that led +to some possible opportunity. He nevertheless concealed all trace of the +ill-humor that he himself could not define or explain, and ended by +uttering a commonplace phrase in praise of the duke, but which really +meant nothing.</p> + +<p>As he was about to move away, Marianne detained him by a gesture:</p> + +<p>"Well, your Excellency," she remarked, with a charming play of her lips +as she smiled, "you see,"—and she pointed to the blue draperies of the +little salon, as dainty as a boudoir—"you see that there are some women +who like blue."</p> + +<p>"Yes, Madame Marsy!—" Vaudrey answered, with an entirely misplaced +irony that naturally occurred to him, as a reproach.</p> + +<p>"So do I," said Marianne. "We have only chatted <a name="Page_143" id="Page_143"></a>together five minutes, +but I have found that time enough to discover that you and I have many +tastes in common. I am greatly flattered thereby."</p> + +<p>"And I am very happy," replied Vaudrey, who was disturbed by her direct +glances that pierced him like a blade.</p> + +<p>She had resumed her place on the divan, but Vaudrey had already forgiven +her tête-à-tête with Rosas—and in truth, what had he to forgive?—This +burning glance had effaced everything. He bore it away like a bright ray +and still shuddered at the sensation he experienced.</p> + +<p>He was in a hurry to leave. He now felt a sudden attack of nervousness. +He was at the same moment charmed and bored. Again he resumed—amid the +throng that made way for him, humbly performing its duty as a crowd—his +rôle of minister, raising his head, and greeting with his official +smile, but, at the bottom of his heart, really consumed by an entirely +different thought. His brain was full of blue, of floating clouds, and +he still heard Marianne's voice ringing in his ears with an insinuating +tone, whispering: "We have many tastes in common," together with all +kinds of mutual understandings which, as it were, burned like a fire in +his heart.</p> + +<p>He saw Adrienne still seated in the same place and smiling sweetly at +him,—a smile of ardent devotion, but which seemed to him to be +lukewarm. He leaned toward her, reached his hands out and said to De +Lissac, hurriedly, as he grasped his hand: "We meet later, do we not, +Guy?" Then he disappeared in the ante<a name="Page_144" id="Page_144"></a>chamber, while the servants +hurried toward Madame Vaudrey, bearing her cloak, and as Vaudrey put on +his overcoat, a voice called out:</p> + +<p>"His Excellency's carriage."</p> + +<p>"I am exhausted," said Adrienne, when she had taken her place in the +carriage. "What about yourself?"</p> + +<p>"I? not at all! I am not at all tired. It was very entertaining! One +must show one's self now—"</p> + +<p>"I know that very well," the young wife replied.</p> + +<p>Like a child who is anxious to go to sleep, she gently rested her +hood-covered head on Sulpice's shoulder. Her tiny hands sought her +husband's hand, to press it beneath her cloak, as warm as a nest; and +after she had closed her eyes, overcome as she was by weariness, her +breathing seemed to become gradually almost as regular as in slumber, +and Sulpice Vaudrey recalled once more, beneath the light of the +chandeliers, that pretty blonde, with her half-bare arms and shoulders, +and strange eyes, who moistened her dry lips and smiled as she swallowed +her sherbet.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="VI" id="VI"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VI</h3> + + +<p>In the pretty little Japanese salon, with its panels of sky-blue satin, +framed with gilded bamboo, Marianne was seated on the divan, half-facing +the duke as if to penetrate his inward thoughts, and she seemed to the +Castilian as she did to Vaudrey, to be a most charming creature <a name="Page_145" id="Page_145"></a>amid +all those surroundings that might have been made expressly to match her +fair beauty. Moreover, with Rosas, her freedom of manner was entirely +different from that which she manifested to Sulpice, and she embraced +the young man with a passionate, fervent glance.</p> + +<p>José felt himself grow pale in the presence of this exquisite creature +whose image, treasured in the depths of his heart, he had borne with him +wherever his fancy had led him to travel. He gazed at her as a man looks +at a woman whom he has long desired, but whom some urgent necessity has +kept out of his way, and who by chance is suddenly brought near him, +fate putting within our reach the dream—</p> + +<p>She was prettier than ever, graceful and blooming, "more matured," like +a fruit whose color is more tempting to the appetite. Sabine had just +before very naturally brought these two together and instinctively, as +if they had to exchange many confidences, they had immediately sought a +retired spot away from that crowd and were seated there in that salon +where Vaudrey, already half-jealous, guessed that Marianne would be.</p> + +<p>Yes, indeed, she had many confidences to impart to that man who had +suddenly entered the sphere of her life and had suddenly disappeared, +remaining during several years as if dead to her. It seemed to her as +they sat face to face that this flight of wasted time had made her still +younger, and Rosas, notwithstanding his cold demeanor, allowed his +former passion to be divined:<a name="Page_146" id="Page_146"></a> the women one loves unmask one's secret +before a man can himself explain what he feels.</p> + +<p>She felt a profound, sincere joy. She recalled a similar conversation +with José in his studio, that Oriental corner hidden in the Rue de +Laval. The Japanese satin enhanced the illusion.</p> + +<p>"Do you know that it seems to me," she said, "that I have been dreaming, +and that I am not a whit older?"</p> + +<p>"You are not altered, in fact," said Rosas. "I am mistaken—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know. I have grown lovelier. That is a compliment that I am used +to—Lissac has told me that already, only the other morning."</p> + +<p>She bit her lips almost imperceptibly, as if to blame herself for her +imprudence, but had she mentioned Guy's name designedly, she could not +have been better satisfied with the result. Monsieur de Rosas, usually +very pale, became pallid, and a slight curl of his lip, although +immediately suppressed, gave an upward turn to his reddish moustache.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he said, "You still see Guy."</p> + +<p>"I!—I had not spoken a single word to him until I asked him to have an +invitation sent me for this soirée, and then it was merely because I +knew you would be here."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said José again, without adding a word.</p> + +<p>Marianne was satisfied. She knew now that the duke still loved her, +since the mention of Lissac's name had <a name="Page_147" id="Page_147"></a>made him tremble. Well! she had +shrewdly understood her Rosas.</p> + +<p>"And what have you been doing, my dear duke, for such an age?" she said.</p> + +<p>She looked at him as she had looked at Vaudrey, with her sweet and +shrewd smile, which moved him profoundly, and her glance penetrated to +the inmost depths of his being.</p> + +<p>"You know the old saying: 'I have lived.' It is great folly, perhaps, +but it is the truth."</p> + +<p>"And I wager," boldly said Marianne, "that you have never thought of +me."</p> + +<p>"Of you?"</p> + +<p>"Of me. Of that mad Marianne, who is the maddest creature of all those +you have met in your travels from the North Pole to Cambodia, but who +has by no means a wicked heart, although a sufficiently unhappy one, and +that has never ceased to beat a little too rapidly at certain +reminiscences which you do not recall, perhaps—who knows?"</p> + +<p>"I remember everything," replied the duke in a grave voice.</p> + +<p>Marianne looked at him and commenced to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Oh! how you say that, <i>mon Dieu!</i> Do you remember I used to call you +Don Carlos? Well, you have just reminded me of Philip II. 'I remember +everything!' B-r-r! what a funereal tone. Our reminiscences are not, +however, very dramatic."<a name="Page_148" id="Page_148"></a></p> + +<p>"That depends on the good or ill effects that they cause," said Rosas +very seriously.</p> + +<p>"Ah! God forgive me if I have ever willingly done you the least harm, my +dear Rosas. Give me your hand. I have always loved you dearly, my +friend."</p> + +<p>She drew him gently toward her, half bending her face under the cold +glance of the young man:</p> + +<p>"Look at me closely and see if I lie."</p> + +<p>The duke actually endeavored to read the gray-blue eyes of Marianne; but +so strange a flash darted from them, that he recoiled, withdrawing his +hands from the pressure of those fingers.</p> + +<p>"Come, come!" she said, "I see that my cat-like eyes still make you +afraid. Are they, then, very dreadful?"</p> + +<p>She changed their expression to one of sweetness, humility, timidity and +winsomeness.</p> + +<p>"After all, that is something to be proud of, my dear duke. It is very +flattering to make a man tremble who has killed tigers as our sportsmen +kill partridges."</p> + +<p>"You know very well why I am still sufficiently a child to tremble +before you, Marianne," murmured José. "At my age, it is folly; but I am +as superstitious as gamblers—or sailors, those other gamblers, who +stake their lives, and I have never met you without feeling that I was +about to suffer."</p> + +<p>"To suffer from what?"</p> + +<p>"To suffer through you," said the duke. "Do you <a name="Page_149" id="Page_149"></a>know that if I had +never met you, it is probable that I should never have seen all those +countries of which I spoke just now, and that I should have been married +long ago, at Madrid or at Toledo?"</p> + +<p>"And I prevented you?—"</p> + +<p>Rosas interrupted Marianne, saying abruptly, and smiling almost sadly:</p> + +<p>"Ah! my dear one, if you only knew—you have prevented many things."</p> + +<p>"If I have prevented you from being unhappy, I am delighted. Besides, it +is evident that you have never had a very determined inclination for +marriage, seeing that you have preferred to trot around the world."</p> + +<p>"Like Don Quixote, eh? Do you know, moreover, since we are talking of +all these things, that you have saved me from dying in the corner like +an abandoned dog?"</p> + +<p>"I?" said Marianne.</p> + +<p>"You or your songs, as you please. Yes, in Egypt I suffered from fever +something like typhus. They left me for dead, as after a battle, in the +most wretched and frightful of native villages. No doctors, who might, +perhaps, have cured me, not a bed, not even a mattress. My servants, +believing me past hope, abandoned me—or rather, for I prefer your +Parisian word—cast me adrift—there is no other expression. There I +was, stretched out on a heap of damp straw—in short, on a dunghill—"<a name="Page_150" id="Page_150"></a></p> + +<p>"You, Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"In all conscience, I correctly portrayed Job there; lean, with a three +months' old beard, and with the death-rattle in my throat; in the open +air—don't alarm yourself, the nights were warm. In the evening the +fellah-women gathered round me, while I watched the sun that tinted +their cheeks with bronze—there were some pretty ones among them, I have +painted them in water-colors from memory—they poured out their insults +upon me in guttural tones, which I unfortunately understood, as I am an +Orientalist,"—he smiled—"and in addition to those insults they threw +mud at me, a fetid mass of filth. The women were charming, although they +took part in it. These people did not like the <i>roumi</i>, the shivering +Christian. Besides, women do not like men who have fallen. They do not +like feeble creatures.—"</p> + +<p>"Bah!—and where were the hospitals, the Sisters of Charity?"</p> + +<p>"Are you quite sure that the Sisters of Charity are women, my dear +Marianne?—In a word, I swear that I asked only one thing, as I lay on +that devilish, poisonous dunghill, and that was, to end the matter in +the quickest possible way, that I might be no longer thought of, +when—don't know why, or, rather, I know very well—in my fever, a +certain voice reached me—whence?—from far away it commenced +humming,—I should proclaim it yours among a thousand—a ridiculously +absurd refrain that we heard together one evening at the Variétés, at +<a name="Page_151" id="Page_151"></a>an anniversary celebration. And this Boulevard chant recurred to me +there in the heart of that desert, and transported me at a single bound +to Paris, and I saw you again and these fair locks that I now look at, I +saw them, too, casting upon your forehead the light shadow that they do +now. I heard your laugh. I actually felt that I had you beside me in one +of the stage-boxes at the theatre, listening to the now forgotten singer +humming the refrain that had so highly amused you, Guy and myself—"</p> + +<p>It seemed to Marianne that the duke hesitated for a moment before +pronouncing Guy's name. It was an almost imperceptible hesitation, +rather felt than seen.</p> + +<p>Rosas quickly recovered:</p> + +<p>"On my word, you will see directly that the Boulevard lounger was hidden +under your gloomy Castilian,—that refrain took such a hold on my poor +wandering brain, such an entire possession, that I clung to it when the +fever was at its height—I hummed it again and again, and on my honor, +it banished the fever, perhaps by some homeopathic process, for at any +other time, this deuced refrain would have aroused a fever in me."</p> + +<p>"Why?—Because it was I who formerly hummed it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Rosas in a lowered tone. "Well! yes, just for that +reason!—"</p> + +<p>He drew closer to her on the divan, and she said to him, laughingly:</p> + +<p>"How fortunate it is that Faure is singing yonder!<a name="Page_152" id="Page_152"></a> He attracts +everybody and so leaves us quite alone in this salon. It is very +pleasant. Would you like to go and applaud Faure? It is some years since +I heard him."</p> + +<p>"You are very malicious, Marianne," said the duke. "Let me steal this +happy, fleeting hour. I am very happy."</p> + +<p>"You are happy?"</p> + +<p>"Profoundly happy, and simply because I am near you, listening to you +and looking at you—"</p> + +<p>"My poor Job," she said, still laughing, "would you like me to sing you +the refrain that we heard at the Variétés?"</p> + +<p>De Rosas did not reply, but simply looked at her.</p> + +<p>He felt as if he were surrounded with all the perfume of youth. On a +console beside Marianne, stood a vase of inlaid enamel containing sprigs +of white lilacs which as she leaned forward, surrounded her fair head as +with an aureole of spring. Her locks were encircled with milk-white +flowers and bright green leaves, transparent and clear, like the limpid +green of water; and at times these sprigs were gently shaken, dropping a +white bud on Marianne's hair, that looked like a drop of milk amid a +heap of ruddy gold.</p> + +<p>Ah! how at this moment, all the poetry, all the past with its +unacknowledged love swelled Rosas's heart and rushed to his lips. In +this brilliantly-lighted salon, under the blaze of the lights, amid the +shimmering re<a name="Page_153" id="Page_153"></a>flections of the satin draperies, he forgot everything in +his rapture at the presence of this woman, lovely to adoration, whose +glance penetrated his very veins and filled him with restless thoughts.</p> + +<p>The distant music, gentle, penetrating and languishing, some soothing +air from Gounod, reached them like a gentle breeze wafted into the room.</p> + +<p>José believed himself to be in a dream.</p> + +<p>"Ah! if you only knew, madame," he said, becoming more passionate with +each word that he spoke, as if he had been gulping down some liqueur, +"if you only knew how you have travelled with me everywhere, in thought, +there, carried with me like a scapular—"</p> + +<p>"My portrait?" said Marianne. "I remember it. I was very slender then, +prettier, a young girl, in fact."</p> + +<p>"No! no! not your portrait. I tore that up in a fit of frenzy."</p> + +<p>"Tore it up?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, as I thought that those eyes, those lips and that brow belonged to +another."</p> + +<p>Marianne's cheeks became pallid.</p> + +<p>"But I have taken with me something better than that portrait: I +preserved you, you were always present, and pretty, so pretty—as you +are now, Marianne—Look at yourself! No one could be lovelier!"</p> + +<p>"And why," she said slowly, speaking in a deep, endearing tone, "why did +you not speak to me thus, of old?"<a name="Page_154" id="Page_154"></a></p> + +<p>"Ah! of old!" said the duke angrily.</p> + +<p>She allowed her head to fall on the back of the divan; looking at this +man as she well knew how, and insensibly creeping closer to him, she +breathed in his ears these burning words:</p> + +<p>"Formerly, one who was your friend was beside me, is that not so?"</p> + +<p>"Do not speak to me of him," José said abruptly.</p> + +<p>"On the contrary, I am determined to tell you that even if I had loved +him, I should not have hesitated for a moment to leave him and follow +you. But I did not love him."</p> + +<p>"Marianne!"</p> + +<p>"You won't believe me? I never loved him. I have never been his +mistress."</p> + +<p>"I do not ask your secret. I do not speak of him," said the duke, who +had now become deadly pale.</p> + +<p>"And I am determined to speak to you of him. Never, you understand, +never was Guy de Lissac my lover. No, in spite of appearances; he has +never even kissed my lips. I thought I loved him, but before yielding, I +had time to discover that I did not love him! And I waited, I swear to +you, expecting that you would say to me: 'I love you!'"</p> + +<p>"I?"</p> + +<p>"You," said Marianne, in a feeble tone. "You never guessed then?"</p> + +<p>And she crept with an exquisitely undulating move<a name="Page_155" id="Page_155"></a>ment still closer to +Rosas, who, as if drawn by some magnetic fluid, surrendered his face to +this woman with the wandering eyes, half-open lips, from which a gentle +sigh escaped and died away in the duke's hair.</p> + +<p>He said nothing, but hastily seizing Marianne's hand, he drew her face +close to his lips, her pink nostrils dilated as if the better to breathe +the incense of love; and wild, distracted, intoxicated, he pressed his +feverish, burning lips upon that fresh mouth that he felt exhaled the +perfume of a flower that opens to the morning dew.</p> + +<p>"I love you now, I loved you then!—" Marianne said to him, after that +kiss that paled his cheeks.</p> + +<p>Rosas had risen: a thunder of applause greeted the termination of a song +in the other salon and the throng was pouring into the smaller salon. +Marianne saw Uncle Kayser, who was arguing with Ramel, whose kindly, +lean face wore an expression of weariness. She also rose, grasped the +duke's hands with a nervous pressure and said as she still gazed at him:</p> + +<p>"There is my uncle. We shall see each other again, shall we not?"</p> + +<p>She crushed Rosas with her electric glance.</p> + +<p>Preceding the duke, she went straight to Kayser and took his arm, +leaning on it as if to show that she was not alone, that she had a +natural protector, and was not, as Rosas might have supposed, a girl +without any position.<a name="Page_156" id="Page_156"></a></p> + +<p>Kayser was almost astonished at the eagerness of his niece.</p> + +<p>"Let us go!" she said to him.</p> + +<p>"What! leave? Why, there is to be a supper."</p> + +<p>"Well! we will sup at the studio," she replied nervously. "We will +discuss the morality of art."</p> + +<p>She had now attained her end. She realized that anything she might add +would cool the impression already made on the duke. She wished to leave +him under the intoxication of that kiss.</p> + +<p>"Let us go!" said Kayser, drawing himself up in an ill-humored way. +"Since you wish it—what a funny idea!—Ramel," he said, extending his +hand to the old journalist, "if your feelings prompt you, I should like +to show you some canvases."</p> + +<p>"I go out so rarely," said Ramel.</p> + +<p>"Huron!" said the painter.</p> + +<p>"Puritan!" said Marianne, also offering her hand to Denis Ramel.</p> + +<p>Rosas looked after her and saw her disappear amongst the guests in the +other salon, under the bright flood of light shed by the chandeliers; +and when she was gone, it seemed to him that the little Japanese salon +was positively empty and that night had fallen on it. Profound ennui at +once overcame him, while Marianne, in a happy frame of mind, on +returning to Kayser's studio, reviewed the incidents of that evening, +recalling Vaudrey's restless smile, and seeming again to hear<a name="Page_157" id="Page_157"></a> Rosas's +confidences, while she thought: "He spoke to me of the past almost in +the same terms as Lissac. Is human nature at the bottom merely +commonplace, that two men of entirely different characters make almost +identical confessions?" While she was recalling that passionate moment, +the duke was experiencing a feeling of disappointment because of their +interrupted conversation, and he reproached himself for not having +followed Marianne, for having allowed her to escape without telling +her—</p> + +<p>But what had he to tell her?</p> + +<p>He had said everything. He had entirely surrendered, had opened his +soul, as transparent as crystal. And this notwithstanding that he had +vowed in past days that he would keep his secret locked within him. He +had smothered his love under his frigid Castilian demeanor. And now, +suddenly, like a child, on the first chance meeting with that woman, he +had allowed himself to be drawn into a confession that he had been +rigidly withholding!</p> + +<p>Ah! it was because he loved her, and had always loved her. There was +only one woman in the whole world for him,—this one. He did not lie. +Marianne's smile haunted him, wherever he was. In her glance was a +poison that he had drunk, which set his blood on fire. He was hers. +Except for the image of Lissac, he would most certainly have returned +long since to Paris to seek Mademoiselle Kayser.<a name="Page_158" id="Page_158"></a></p> + +<p>But Lissac was there. He recalled how much Guy had loved her. He had +more than once made the third in their company. He had often accompanied +Lissac to Marianne's door. How then had she dared to say just now that +she had never been his mistress?</p> + +<p>But how was he to believe her?</p> + +<p>And why, after all, should she have lied? What interest had she?—</p> + +<p>In proportion as Rosas considered the matter, he grew more angry with +himself, and in the very midst of the crowd, he was seized with a +violent attack of frenzy, such as at times suddenly determined him to +seek absolute solitude. He was eager to escape.</p> + +<p>In order to avoid Madame Marsy, who was perhaps seeking him, he slipped +through the groups of people and reached the door without being seen, +leaving without formal salutation, as the English do.</p> + +<p>He was in the hall, putting on his overcoat, while a servant turned up +its otter-fur collar, when he heard Guy say:</p> + +<p>"You are going, my dear duke? Shall we bear each other company?"</p> + +<p>The idea was not distasteful to Rosas. Involuntarily, perhaps, he +thought that a conversation with Lissac was, in some way, a <i>chat</i> with +Marianne. These two beings were coupled in his recollections and +preoccupations; besides, he really liked Guy. The Parisian was the +com<a name="Page_159" id="Page_159"></a>plement of the Castilian. They had so many reminiscences in common: +fêtes, suppers, sorrows, Parisian sadnesses, girls who sobbed to the +measure of a waltz. Then they had not seen each other for so long.</p> + +<p>Rosas experienced a certain degree of pleasure in finding himself once +more on the boulevard with Guy. It made him feel young again. Every +whiff of smoke that ascended from his cigar in the fresh air, seemed to +breathe so many exhalations of youth. They had formerly ground out so +many paradoxes as they strolled thus arm in arm, taking their recreation +through Paris.</p> + +<p>In a very little time, and after the exchange of a few words, they had +bridged the long gap of years, of travel and separation. They expressed +so much in so few words. Rosas, as if invincibly attracted by the name +of Marianne, was the first to pronounce it, while Guy listened with an +impassive air to the duke's interrogations.</p> + +<p>In this way they went toward the boulevard, along which the rows of +gas-jets flamed like some grand illumination.</p> + +<p>"Paris!" said Rosas, "has a singular effect on one. It resumes its +dominion over one at once on seeing it again, and it seems as if one had +never left it. I have hardly unpacked my trunks, and here I am again +transformed into a Parisian."</p> + +<p>"Paris is like absinthe!" said Guy. "As soon as <a name="Page_160" id="Page_160"></a>one uncorks the bottle, +one commences to drink it again."</p> + +<p>"Absinthe! there you are indeed, you Frenchmen, who everlastingly +calumniate your country. What an idea, comparing Paris with absinthe!"</p> + +<p>"A Parisian's idea, <i>parbleu!</i> You have not been here two days and you +are already intoxicated with <i>Parisine</i>, you said so yourself. The +hasheesh of the boulevard."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it is not <i>Parisine</i> only that has, in fact, affected my +brain," said Rosas.</p> + +<p>"No doubt, it is also the <i>Parisienne</i>. Madame Marsy is very pretty."</p> + +<p>"Charming," said Rosas coldly.</p> + +<p>"Less charming than Mademoiselle Kayser!"</p> + +<p>Guy sent a whiff of smoke from his cigar floating on the night breeze, +while awaiting the duke's reply; but José pursued his way beside his +friend, without uttering a word, as if he were suddenly absorbed, and +Lissac, who had allowed the conversation to lapse, sought to reopen it: +"Then," he said suddenly,—dropping the name of Mademoiselle +Kayser:—"You will be in Paris for some time, Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"I do not in the least know."</p> + +<p>"You will not, I hope, set out again for the East?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! you know what a strange fellow I am. It won't do to challenge me +to!"</p> + +<p>Lissac laughed.<a name="Page_161" id="Page_161"></a></p> + +<p>"I don't challenge you at all, I only ask you not to leave the +fortifications hereafter. We shall gain everything. You are not a +Spaniard, you are a born Parisian, as I have already told you a hundred +times. If I were in your place, I would set myself up here and stick to +Paris. Since it is the best place in the world, why look for another?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Guy," interrupted the duke, who had not listened, "will you +promise to answer me, with all frankness, a delicate, an absurd +question, if you will, one of those questions that is not generally put, +but which I am going to ask you, nevertheless, without preface, +point-blank?"</p> + +<p>"To it and to any others that you put me, my dear duke, I will answer as +an honest man and a friend should."</p> + +<p>"Have you been much in love with Mademoiselle Kayser?"</p> + +<p>"Very much."</p> + +<p>"And has she loved you—a little?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all."</p> + +<p>"That is not what she has just told me."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Lissac, as he threw away his cigar. "You spoke of me, then?"</p> + +<p>"She told me that she believed she loved you sincerely."</p> + +<p>"That is just what I had the pleasure of telling you."</p> + +<p>"And—Marianne?—"<a name="Page_162" id="Page_162"></a></p> + +<p>"Marianne?" repeated Lissac, who perfectly understood the question from +De Rosas's hesitation.</p> + +<p>"My dear friend, when a man feels sufficiently anxious, or sufficiently +weak, or sufficiently smitten, whichever you please, to stake his life +on the throw of the dice, he is permitted to put one of those misplaced +questions to which I have just referred. Well! you can tell me what, +perhaps, none other than I would dare to ask you: Have you been +Marianne's lover?"</p> + +<p>Before replying, Guy took the arm of the duke in a friendly way, and, +leaning upon it, felt that it trembled nervously. Then, touching his +hand by chance, he observed that Rosas was in a burning fever.</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, it is the everlasting question of honor between men and +of duty to a woman that you put before me. Had I been Marianne's lover, +I should be bound to tell you that Marianne had never been my mistress. +These falsehoods are necessary. No; I have not been Marianne's lover, +but I advise you, if you do not wish to be perfectly miserable, not to +seek to become so. You are one of those men who throw their hearts open +as wide as a gateway. She is a calculating creature, who pursues, madly +enough I admit, without consistency or constancy in her ideas, any plan +that she may have in view. She might be flattered to have you as a +suitor, as I was, or as a lover, as I have been assured others were. I +do not affirm this, remember; but she will never be moved by your +affection. She is a pure<a name="Page_163" id="Page_163"></a> Parisian, and is incapable of loving you as +you deserve, but you could not deceive her, as they say she has been."</p> + +<p>"Deceived?" asked Rosas, in a tone of pity that struck Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Deceived! yes! deceit is the complementary school of love."</p> + +<p>"Then—if I loved Marianne?" asked Rosas.</p> + +<p>"I would advise you to tell it to her at first, and prove it afterward, +and finally to catalogue it in that album whose ashes are sprinkled at +the bottom of the marriage gifts."</p> + +<p>"You speak of Mademoiselle Kayser as you would speak of a courtesan," +said the duke, in a choking voice.</p> + +<p>"Ah! I give you my word," said Lissac, "that I should speak very +differently of Mademoiselle Alice Aubry, or of Mademoiselle Cora +Touchard. I would say to you quite frankly: They are pretty creatures; +there is no danger."</p> + +<p>"And Marianne, on the contrary, is dangerous."</p> + +<p>"Oh! perfectly, for you."</p> + +<p>"And why is she not dangerous for you?"</p> + +<p>"Why, simply, my dear duke, because I am satisfied to love her as you +have hitherto done and because I had, as I told you, the good fortune +not to be her lover."</p> + +<p>"But you brought her to Madame Marsy's this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! her uncle accompanied us, but I was there."<a name="Page_164" id="Page_164"></a></p> + +<p>"You offer your arm then to a woman whom, as you have just told me, you +consider dangerous?"</p> + +<p>"Not for Sabine!—and then, that is a drop of the absinthe, a little of +the hasheesh of which I spoke to you. One sees only concessions in +Paris, and even when one is dead, one needs a further concession, but in +perpetuity. One only becomes one's self"—and Guy's jesting tone became +serious,—"when a worthy fellow like you puts one a question that seems +terribly like asking advice. Then one answers him, as I have just +answered you, and cries out to him: 'Beware!'"</p> + +<p>"I thank you," said Rosas, suddenly stopping short on the pavement. "You +treat me like a true friend."</p> + +<p>"And if I seem to you to be too severe," added Lissac, smiling, "charge +that to the account of bitterness. A man that has loved a woman is never +altogether just toward her. If he has ceased to love her, he slights +her, if he still loves her, he slanders her. I have perhaps, traduced +Marianne, but I have not slighted you, that is certain. Now, take +advantage of this gossip. But when?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," replied the duke. "I will write you. I shall perhaps +leave Paris!"</p> + +<p>"What is that?"</p> + +<p>"Just what I say."</p> + +<p>"The deuce!" said Lissac. "Do you know that if you were to fly from the +danger in question, I should be very uneasy? It would be very serious."<a name="Page_165" id="Page_165"></a></p> + +<p>"That would not be a flight. At the most, a caprice," the duke replied.</p> + +<p>They separated, less pleased with each other than they were at the +commencement of their interview. Lissac felt that in some fashion or +other, he had wounded Rosas even in adopting the flippant tone of the +lounger, without any malice, and the Spaniard with his somewhat morose +nature, retired within himself, almost gloomy, and reproached Guy for +the first time for smiling or jesting on so serious a matter.</p> + +<p>Discontented with himself, he entered his house. His servant was waiting +for him. He brought him a blue envelope on a card-tray.</p> + +<p>"A telegram for monsieur le duc."</p> + +<p>Rosas tore it open in a mechanical way. It was from one of his London +friends, Lord Lindsay, who having learned of Rosas's return, sent him a +pressing invitation. If he did not hasten to Paris to welcome him, it +was simply because grave political affairs demanded his presence in +London.</p> + +<p>The duke, while taking off his gloves, looked at the crumpled despatch +lying under the lamp. He was, like most travellers, superstitious. +Perhaps this despatch had arrived in the nick of time to prevent him +from committing some act of folly.</p> + +<p>But what folly?</p> + +<p>He still felt Marianne's kiss on his lips, burning like ice. +To-morrow,—in a few hours,—his first thought, <a name="Page_166" id="Page_166"></a>his only thought would +be to find that woman again, to experience that voluptuous impression, +that dream that had penetrated his heart. A danger, Lissac had said. The +feline eyes of Marianne had a dangerous ardor; but it was their charm, +their strength and their adorable seductiveness, that filtered like a +flame through her long, fair lashes.</p> + +<p>He closed his eyes to picture Mademoiselle Kayser, to inhale the +atmosphere, to enjoy something of the perfume surrounding her.</p> + +<p>A danger!</p> + +<p>Guy was perhaps right. The best love is that which is never gathered, +which remains immature, like a blossom in spring that never becomes a +fruit. Lord Lindsay's despatch arrived seasonably. It was a chance or a +warning.</p> + +<p>In any case, what would Rosas risk by passing a few days in London, and +losing the burning of that kiss? The sea-breezes would perhaps efface +it.</p> + +<p>"I am certainly feverish," the duke thought. "It was assuredly necessary +to speak to Lissac. It was also necessary to speak to her," he added, in +a dissatisfied, anxious, almost angry tone.</p> + +<p>A danger!</p> + +<p>Lissac had acted imprudently in uttering that word, which addressed to +such a man as Rosas, had something alluring about it. What irritated the +duke was Guy's reply, asserting that he had not been Marianne's lover, +<a name="Page_167" id="Page_167"></a>but that Marianne had had other lovers. Others? What did Lissac know of +this? A species of jealous frenzy was blended with the feverish desire +that Marianne's kiss had injected into Rosas's veins. He would have +liked to know the truth, to see Marianne again, to urge Guy to further +confidences. And, then, he felt that he would rather not have come, not +have seen her again, not have gone to Sabine's.</p> + +<p>"Well, so be it! Lord Lindsay is right, I will go."</p> + +<p>The following morning, Guy de Lissac found in his mail a brief note, +sealed with the arms of the duke, with the motto: <i>Hasta la muerte</i>.</p> + +<p>José wrote to him as he was leaving Paris:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"You are perhaps right. I am a little intoxicated with + <i>Parisine</i>. I am going to London to visit a friend and if I + ever recount my voyages there, it will only be to the + serious-minded members of the Geographical Society. There, at + least, there is no 'danger.' With many thanks and until we meet + again.</p> + <p> + "Your friend,<br /> + "J. DE R——"</p></div> + + +<p>"Plague on it," said Lissac, who read the letter three times, "but our +dear duke is badly bitten! <i>Ohimé!</i> Marianne Kayser has had a firm and +sure tooth this time!—We shall see!—" he added, as he broke the seal +of another letter, containing a request for a loan on the part of +someone richer than himself.<a name="Page_168" id="Page_168"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="VII" id="VII"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VII</h3> + + +<p>The soirée at Sabine Marsy's had caused Vaudrey to feel something like +the enervation that follows intoxication. The next morning he awoke with +his head heavy, after a night of feverish sleep, interrupted by sudden +starts, wherein he saw that pretty, fair girl standing before him +devouring sherbet and smiling gayly.</p> + +<p>Every morning since he had been at the ministry, Sulpice had experienced +a joyous sensation at finding himself again on his feet and rejoicing in +life. He paced about his apartments, feeling a sort of physical delight, +opening his window and looking out on the commonplace garden through +which so many ministers had passed and which he called, as so many +before him had done: <i>My garden</i>. His thoughts took him back then to +that little convent garden at Grenoble. What a distance he had travelled +since then! and how good it was to live!</p> + +<p>That morning, on the contrary, the black and bare trees in the garden +appeared to him to be very gloomy. He felt morose. He had been awakened +early so that the despatches from the provinces might be laid before +him. The information in them was quite insignificant. But then his +spirit was not present. Once again he was <a name="Page_169" id="Page_169"></a>at Sabine's, beside Marianne, +so lovely in her sky-blue gown, and with her wavy locks.</p> + +<p>If he had been free, he would have gladly sought the opportunity to see +that woman again as soon as the morning commenced. He felt a kind of +infantile joy in being thus perturbed and haunted. It seemed to him that +this emotion made him feel younger. Formerly, on awakening, the dream of +the night had followed him like some intoxication.</p> + +<p>Formerly! but "formerly" he was not the important man, the distinguished +personage of to-day.—He had not the charge of power as some others have +the charge of souls. A minister has something else to do than to be +under the sway of a vision. Sulpice dressed hurriedly, went down to his +office, where a huge log-fire flamed behind an antique screen. He sat +down in front of his large mahogany bureau, covered with papers, and on +which was lying a huge black portfolio stuffed with documents bearing +this title in stamped letters: <i>Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur</i>. In +the centre of the bureau had been placed a leather portfolio filled with +sheets of paper bearing the title: <i>Documents to be signed by Monsieur +le Ministre</i>. Beside this were spread out various reports, bearing upon +one corner of the sheet a printed headline: <i>Office of the Prefect of +Police</i> and <i>Director-General of the Press</i>.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey settled down in his chair with the profound satisfaction of a +man who has not grown weary of an <a name="Page_170" id="Page_170"></a>acquired possession. This huge salon +with its blackened pictures, cold marbles, and large, severe-looking +bookcases, presented a sober bourgeois harmony that pleased him. It was +like the salon of a well-to-do notary, with its tall windows overlooking +the courtyard, already full of the shadows of importunate callers and +favor seekers whom the secretary-general received in a room adjoining +the ministerial cabinet. The minister inhaled once more the atmosphere +of his new domicile before settling down to work. Every morning it was +his custom to read the reports of the Director of the Press and of the +Prefect of Police before all else.</p> + +<p>He took up the report of the Prefect. Nothing serious. A slight accident +on the Vincennes line near the fortifications of Paris. A train +derailed. A few injured. In the Passage de l'Opéra, the previous +evening, the early speech of the Minister of the Interior upon general +policy, and that of the Finance Minister, who was to reply to the rumor, +falsely or prematurely announcing the conversion of the five per cents, +had caused an upward movement in value. All was satisfactory, all was +quiet. The new minister enjoyed public confidence. Perfect.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was delighted and passed on to the report of the Director of the +Press. Except a small number of disgruntled and irreconcilable party +journals, all the French and foreign papers warmly praised and supported +the newly-created ministry. The <i>Times</i> declared that the coalition +perfectly met the requirements of the <a name="Page_171" id="Page_171"></a>existing situation. The Berlin +papers did not take umbrage at it, although Monsieur Vaudrey had more +than once declared his militant patriotism from the tribune. "In short," +the daily report concluded, "there is a concert of praise, and public +opinion is delighted to have finally secured a legitimate satisfaction +through the choice of a homogeneous ministry, such as has long been +desired."</p> + +<p>"What strange literature," muttered Sulpice, almost audibly, as he threw +the report with the other documents.</p> + +<p>He recalled how, on that morning when Sulpice Vaudrey sat there for the +first time, the morning following Pichereau's sudden dismissal from +office, the editor of this daily press bulletin, like an automaton, +mechanically and indifferently laid on the table of the minister a +report wherein he said in full:</p> + +<p>"Public opinion, by the mouth of the accepted journals, has for too long +a time reposed confidence in the Pichereau administration, for the +ministry to be troubled about the approaching and useless interpellation +announced some days ago by Monsieur Vaudrey—of Isère—."</p> + +<p>And it was to Vaudrey, the elected successor of Pichereau, that the +report was handed naturally and as was due.</p> + +<p>"The compilers of these little chronicles are very optimistic," thought +Sulpice. "After all, probably, it is the office that is responsible for +this, as, doubtless, min<a name="Page_172" id="Page_172"></a>isters do not like to know the truth. I will +see, however, that I get it."</p> + +<p>He had, this time, a burdensome morning. Prefects were arriving by the +main entrance to the ministry, the vast antechambers on the left; and +friends, more intimate suitors, waited on the right, elbowing the +ushers, in order to have their cards handed to the secretary-general or +to the minister. There were some who, in an airy sort of way, said: +"Monsieur Vaudrey," in order to appear to be on familiar terms.</p> + +<p>Sulpice felt himself attacked on both sides at once; blockaded in his +office; and he despatched the petitioners with all haste, extending his +hand to them, smiling, cheerfully making them promises, happy to promise +them, but grieved in principle to see humbug depicted on the human face. +From time to time, in the midst of his ministerial preoccupations and +conversations, the disturbing smile of Marianne suddenly appeared like a +flash of lightning in a storm; and though shaking his head, to give the +appearance of listening and understanding, the minister was in reality +far away, near a brilliant buffet and watching a silver spoon glide +between two rosy lips.</p> + +<p>In that procession, which was to be a daily one, of petitioners, of +deputies urging appointments in favor of their constituents, asking the +removal of mayors, the decoration of election agents, harassing the +minister with recommendations and petitions which, although couched <a name="Page_173" id="Page_173"></a>in +a humble tone, always veiled a threat, Vaudrey did not often have to do +with his friends. It was a wearisome succession of lukewarm friends or +recognized enemies, who rallied around a successful man. This man, +although a minister for so short a time, had already a vague, +disquieting impression that the administration was the property of a +great number of clients, always the same, frequenters of these +corridors, guests in these antechambers, well known to the ushers, and +who, whoever the minister might be, had the same access and the same +influence with the ministry.</p> + +<p>There were some whom the clerks saluted in a familiar way, as if they +were old acquaintances: intrepid office-seekers, unmoved by any changes +in ministerial combinations. Such entered Vaudrey's cabinet in a +deliberate, familiar manner, and as if feeling at home. Sulpice had once +heard one of them greet an usher by his first name: "Good-morning, +Gustave."</p> + +<p>The minister asked Gustave: "Who is that gentleman?" The usher replied, +with a tinge of respect in his tone: "It is one of our visitors, +Monsieur le Ministre, Monsieur Eugène Renaudin. We call him only +Monsieur <i>Eugène</i>. We have known him a long time."</p> + +<p>This "Monsieur Eugène" had already petitioned for a prefecture, or a +sub-prefecture, or—it mattered little—whatever place the minister +might choose to give him.</p> + +<p>His claims? None: he was an office-seeker.<a name="Page_174" id="Page_174"></a></p> + +<p>The minister was already overwhelmed by this vulgar procession of +petitioners and intermediaries, when an usher brought him a card bearing +this name: <i>Lucien Granet</i>.</p> + +<p>In the Chamber it was thought that Granet did not like Vaudrey too well, +and Sulpice vaguely scented in him a candidate for his office. The more +reason, then, that he should make himself agreeable.</p> + +<p>"What does he want?" the minister thought.</p> + +<p>This Granet was, moreover, a typical politician; by the side of the +minister of to-day, he was the inevitable minister of to-morrow, the +positive reformer, the man appointed to cleanse the Augean stables, +whose coming, it was said, would immediately mark the end of all abuses, +great and small.</p> + +<p>"Ah! when Granet is minister!"</p> + +<p>The artist without a commission consoled himself with the prospect of +the Granet ministry. He would decorate the monuments when Granet became +minister. The actress who looked with longing eyes toward the Comédie +Française, and dreamed of playing in Molière, had her hopes centered in +Granet. Granet promised to every actress an engagement at the Rue de +Richelieu. <i>I am waiting for the Granet ministry!</i> was the consolatory +reflection, interrupted by sighs, of the licentiates in law. Meanwhile +those office-seekers danced attendance on Granet, and their smile was +worth to the future Excellency all the sweets of office.<a name="Page_175" id="Page_175"></a></p> + +<p>Granet had thus everywhere a host of clients, women and men, sighing for +his success, working to bring about his ministry, intriguing in advance +for his advent, and working together for his glory.</p> + +<p>"Ah! if Granet were in power!"</p> + +<p>"Such abuses would not exist under a Granet ministry!"</p> + +<p>"All will be changed when Granet becomes minister!"</p> + +<p>"That dear Granet! that good Granet! Long live Granet!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was not ignorant of the fact that for some time past, Lucien +Granet had been manoeuvring for his appointment to any office whatever, +the most important obtainable. He was within an ace of becoming a member +of the last Ministerial Coalition. He might have been Vaudrey's +colleague instead of his rival. Sulpice was as glad to have him as an +opponent in the Chamber as a colleague in the ministerial council. He +was, however, not an adversary to be trifled with. Granet was a power in +himself.</p> + +<p>"Well!" said the minister to Granet, who entered smiling, and with a +very polite greeting, "you come then to inspect your future office? +Already!—"</p> + +<p>"I?" said Granet, who did his best to be agreeable, "God prevent me from +thinking of this department. It is too well filled."</p> + +<p>"That is very gallant, my dear Granet."</p> + +<p>"Far from disputing your portfolio, I come, on the <a name="Page_176" id="Page_176"></a>contrary, to give +you some advice as to strengthening your already excellent position."</p> + +<p>"Advice from you, my dear colleague, should be excellent. Let us hear +it."</p> + +<p>"My dear minister, it is about the appointment of an Under Secretary of +State for the Interior. Well! I have come to urge the claims of my +friend, our colleague Warcolier."</p> + +<p>While speaking, Granet, who was seated near the bureau of the minister, +with his hat on his knee, was watching Vaudrey through his eyeglass; he +saw that his lips twitched slightly as he hesitated before replying.</p> + +<p>"But I am bound to Jacquier—of l'Oise," Vaudrey said abruptly.</p> + +<p>Granet smiled. Certainly Jacquier would be a most excellent choice. He +was a cool, solid and remarkable man. But he had little influence with +the Chamber, frequented society rarely, was morose and exclusive, while +Warcolier was a most amiable man, an excellent speaker and one who was +well-known in the Chamber. He was a fine orator. He was highly esteemed +by the Granet group.</p> + +<p>"My personal friend, too, my dear minister. You would, I assure you, +displease me if you did not support Warcolier this morning at the +Ministerial Council, at which the nomination of under secretaries should +take place. It is this morning, isn't it?"<a name="Page_177" id="Page_177"></a></p> + +<p>"Certainly, in an hour's time."</p> + +<p>Granet left the minister, repeating with considerable emphasis, which +Vaudrey could not fail to remark, that the nomination of Warcolier would +be favorably viewed by the majority of the deputies. A hundred times +more so than that of Jacquier—of l'Oise.</p> + +<p>"Jacquier is a bear. They don't like bears," said Granet, tapping his +thumb lightly with his eyeglass.</p> + +<p>He left Vaudrey out of humor, and very much disgusted at finding that +Warcolier had already exploited the field.</p> + +<p>In truth, Vaudrey liked Warcolier as little as he did Granet. Warcolier +took life easily. He was naturally of a contented disposition. He liked +people who were easily pleased. An Imperialist under the Empire, he was +now a Republican under the Republic. Epicurean in his tastes, he was +agreeable, clever and fond of enjoyment, and he approved of everything +that went the way he desired. He sniffed the breeze light-heartedly and +allowed it to swell his sail and his self-love. He did not like +ill-tempered people, people who frowned or were discontented or gloomy. +Having a good digestion, he could not understand the possibility of +disordered stomachs. A free-liver, he could not realize that hungry +people should ever think of better food. Everything was good; everything +was right; everything was beautiful. Of an admirably tranquil +disposition, he felt neither anger nor envy. Thinking himself superior +to every one <a name="Page_178" id="Page_178"></a>else, Warcolier never made comparisons, he did not even +prefer himself: he worshipped himself. The world belonged to him, he +trod the ground with a firm step, swinging his arms, his paunch smooth, +his head erect and his shoulders thrown forward. He seemed to inhale, at +every step, the odor of triumph. He was not the man to compromise with a +defeated adversary.</p> + +<p>Of Warcolier's literary efforts, people were familiar with his <i>History +of Work and Workers</i> that he had formerly dedicated to His Majesty +Napoléon III. in these flattering terms: "To you, sire, who have +substituted for the nobility of birth, that of work, and for the pride +of ancestry, that of shedding blood for one's country."</p> + +<p>Later, in 1875, Warcolier had re-issued his <i>History of Work</i> and his +dedication was anxiously awaited. It did not take him long to get over +the difficulty. He dedicated his work to another sovereign: "To the +People, who have substituted the nobility of work for that of birth, and +that of blood shed for the country for that of blood shed by ancestors."</p> + +<p>And that very name which was formerly read at the foot of professions of +faith:—<i>Appeal to Honest People. The Revolution overwhelms us!</i> is now +found at the foot of proclamations wherein this devil of a Warcolier +exclaims:—<i>Appeal to Good Citizens. Reaction now threatens us!</i></p> + +<p>This was the man whom Granet and his friends had <a name="Page_179" id="Page_179"></a>worked so hard to +thrust into the position of Undersecretary of State of the Interior. +Vaudrey reserved his opinion on this subject to be communicated to the +President by and by.</p> + +<p>The hour for the meeting of the Council drew near. Sulpice saw, through +the white curtains of the window, his horses harnessed to his coupé and +prancing in the courtyard, although it was but a short distance from +Place Beauvau to the Élysée. He slipped the reports of the Prefect of +Police and the Director of the Press into his portfolio and was about to +leave, when the usher brought him another card.</p> + +<p>"It is useless, I cannot see any one else."</p> + +<p>"But the gentleman said that if the minister saw his name, he would most +assuredly see him."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey took the card that was extended to him on the tray:</p> + +<p>"Jéliotte! He is right. Show him in."</p> + +<p>He removed his hat and went straight toward the door, that was then +opened to admit a pale-faced, lean man with long black whiskers that +formed a sort of horsetail fringe to his face. Jéliotte was a former +comrade in the law courts, an advocate in the Court of Appeal, and he +entered, bowing ceremoniously to Sulpice, who with a pleased face and +outstretched hands, went to welcome the old companion of his youth.</p> + +<p>Jéliotte bowed with a certain affectation of respect, and smiled +nervously.<a name="Page_180" id="Page_180"></a></p> + +<p>"How happy I am to see you," Vaudrey said.</p> + +<p>"You still address me in the old familiar way," Jéliotte answered, +showing his slightly broken and yellow teeth.</p> + +<p>"What an idea! Have I forfeited your good opinion, that I should abandon +our familiar form of address?"</p> + +<p>"Honors, then, have not changed you; well! so much the better," said +Jéliotte. "You ask me how I am? Oh! always the same!—I work hard—I am +out of your sight—but I applaud all your successes."</p> + +<p>While Jéliotte was speaking of Vaudrey's successes, he sat on the edge +of a chair, staring at his hat, and wagging his jaw as if he were +cracking a nut between his frail teeth.</p> + +<p>"I have been delighted at your getting into the cabinet. Delighted for +your sake—"</p> + +<p>"You ought also to be delighted on your own account, my good Jéliotte. +Whatever I may hereafter be able to do—"</p> + +<p>Jéliotte cut the minister short and said in a tone as dry as tinder:</p> + +<p>"Oh! my dear Sulpice, believe one thing,—that I ask you nothing."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because—no, nothing. And I repeat, nothing."</p> + +<p>"And you would be wrong if I could be friendly to you or useful."<a name="Page_181" id="Page_181"></a></p> + +<p>"I have said <i>nothing</i>, and I stick to <i>nothing</i>. You will meet quite +enough office-seekers in your career—"</p> + +<p>"Evidently!"</p> + +<p>"Petitioners also!"</p> + +<p>"Most assuredly!"</p> + +<p>"Well! I am neither a petitioner nor an office-seeker nor a sycophant. I +am your friend."</p> + +<p>"And you are right, for I have great affection for you."</p> + +<p>"I am your friend and your devoted friend. I should consider it a +rascally thing to ask you for anything. A rascally thing, I say! You are +in office, you are a minister, so much the better, yes, so much the +better! But, at least, don't let your friends pester you, like vermin +crawling before you, because you are all-powerful. I will never crawl +before you, I warn you. I shall remain just what I am. You will take me +just as I am or not at all. That will depend altogether upon the change +of humor that the acquisition of honors may produce in you—"</p> + +<p>"Jéliotte! we shall see, Jéliotte!"</p> + +<p>"Well! You can take me or leave me. And as I do not wish to be +confounded with the cringing valets who crowd your antechambers—"</p> + +<p>"You crowd nothing, you will not dance attendance. Have I asked you to +dance attendance?"</p> + +<p>"No, not yet—I called simply to see if I should be received. Yes, it is +merely in the nature of an experi<a name="Page_182" id="Page_182"></a>ment—it is made. It is to your honor, +I admit, but I will not repeat it—I shall disappear. It is more simple. +Yes, I have told you and I was determined to tell you that you will +never see me, so long as you are a minister."</p> + +<p>"Ah! Jéliotte! Jéliotte!"</p> + +<p>"Never—not until you have fallen—For one always falls—"</p> + +<p>"Fortunately," said Sulpice, with a laugh.</p> + +<p>"Fortunately or unfortunately, that depends. I say: when you have +fallen—then, oh! then, don't fear, I will not be the one to turn my +back on you—"</p> + +<p>"You are very kind."</p> + +<p>"Whatever you may have said or done, you understand, while you are in +power—and power intoxicates men!—I will always offer you my hand. Yes, +this hand shall always be extended to you. You will find plenty of +people who will turn their backs on you at that moment. Not I! I am a +friend in dark days—"</p> + +<p>"That is understood."</p> + +<p>"I will leave you to your glory, Vaudrey. I crave pardon for not styling +you: Monsieur le Ministre; I could not. It is not familiar to me. I +cannot help it. I am not the friend for the hour of success, but for +that of misfortune."</p> + +<p>"And you will return?"</p> + +<p>"When you are overthrown!—"</p> + +<p>"Thank you!"<a name="Page_183" id="Page_183"></a></p> + +<p>"That is like me! I love my friends."</p> + +<p>"When they are down!" said Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"That is so!" exclaimed Jéliotte.</p> + +<p>"And is that all you had to say to me?" the minister asked.</p> + +<p>"Is not that enough?"</p> + +<p>"Yes! yes! <i>Au revoir</i>, Jéliotte."</p> + +<p>"<i>Au revoir!</i> Till—you know when."</p> + +<p>"Yes. When I feel my position threatened, I will call upon you. Don't be +afraid. That time will come."</p> + +<p>"The idiot!" said Sulpice, angrily shrugging his shoulders, when the +advocate was gone.</p> + +<p>He snatched his hat and went out hurriedly to his carriage, the +messengers rising to bow to him as he passed through the antechamber.</p> + +<p>It was hardly necessary for him to order his coachman to drive to the +Élysée. The duties of each day were so well ordered in advance, and +besides, the attendants at the department knew quite as well as the +minister if a Council was to be held at the Élysée.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was somewhat upset. Jéliotte's visit, following that of Granet, +presented the human species in an evil aspect. He had never felt envious +of any one, and it seemed to him that the whole world should be +gratified at his modest bearing under success.</p> + +<p>"For, after all, I triumph, that is certain!—That animal of a Jéliotte +is not such a simpleton!—There are many who, if they were in my place, +would swagger!"<a name="Page_184" id="Page_184"></a></p> + +<p>So he complacently awarded himself a patent of modesty.</p> + +<p>The carriage stopped at the foot of the steps of the Élysée. Sulpice +always felt an exquisite joy in alighting from his carriage, his +portfolio pressed to his side, and leaping over the carpet-covered steps +of the stone staircase leading to the Council Chambers. He passed +through them, as he did everywhere, between rows of spectators who +respectfully bowed to him. Devoted friends extended their hands +respectfully toward his overcoat. Certainly, he only knew the men by +their heads, bald or crowned with locks, as the case might be. His +colleagues were gathered together, awaiting him, and chatting in the +salon, decorated in white and gold, the invariable salon of official +apartments with the inevitable Sèvres vases with deep-blue, light-green +or buff color grounds, placed upon consoles or pedestals. The portfolios +appeared stuffed or empty, limp or bursting with paper bundles, under +the arms of their Excellencies. Suddenly a door was opened, the ushers +fell back and the President approached, looking very serious and taking +his accustomed place opposite to the President of the Council with the +formality of an orderly, the Minister of the Interior on the left of the +President of the Republic, with the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the +right.</p> + +<p>Then, in turn, each minister, beginning at the right, reported the +business of his department, sometimes debated in private council. Each +having completed his <a name="Page_185" id="Page_185"></a>information, bowed to his neighbor on the right, +and said:</p> + +<p>"I have finished. It is your turn, my dear colleague."</p> + +<p>The President listened. Sulpice sometimes allowed himself to muse while +seated at this green-covered table, forgetting altogether the affairs +under consideration. Sometimes he recalled those green-covered tables of +the Council Chambers of the Grenoble Prefecture, finding that this +Ministerial Council recalled the mean impression invoked by his +provincial recollections, at other times, a vein of poesy would flit +across his mind, or an eloquent word would reach his ear, suggesting to +him the thought that, after all, these men seated there before their +open portfolios, turning over or scattering about the papers, +nevertheless represented cherished France and held in their leather +pouches the secrets, the destinies, aye, even the very fate of the +fatherland.</p> + +<p>And this Sulpice, overjoyed to expand at his ease in the delights of +power, sitting there in his accustomed chair,—a chair which now seemed +to be really his own—enjoying a sort of physical satisfaction ever new, +inhaling power like the fumes of a nargileh, forgot himself, however, +and suddenly felt himself recalled to the urgent reality when his +colleague, the Minister of War, a spare man with a grizzled moustache, +dropped an infrequent remark in which, in the laconic speech of a +soldier, could be comprehended some cause of anxiety or of hope. Sulpice +listened then, more moved than he was willing <a name="Page_186" id="Page_186"></a>to have it appear, +trying, in his turn, to hide all his artistic and patriotic anxieties +under that firm exterior which his colleague of the Department of +Foreign Affairs wore, a dull-eyed, listless face, and cheeks that might +be made of pasteboard.</p> + +<p>The business of the Council was of little importance that morning. The +Keeper of the Seals, Monsieur Collard—of Nantes—a fat, puffing, +apoplectic man with somewhat glassy, round eyes, proposed to the +President, who listened attentively but without replying, some reform to +which Vaudrey was perfectly indifferent. He did not even hear his +colleague's dull speech, the latter lost himself in useless +considerations, while the Minister of War looked at him, as if his eyes, +loaded with grapeshot said, in military fashion: "<i>Sacrebleu!</i> get +done!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey looked out of the window at the dark horizon of the winter sky +and the gray tints of the leafless trees, and watched the little birds +that chased one another among the branches. His thoughts were far, very +far away from the table where the sober silence was broken by the +interminable phrases of the Minister of Justice, whose words suggested +the constant flow of an open spigot.</p> + +<p>The vision of a female form at the end of the garden appeared to him, a +form that, notwithstanding the cold, was clothed in the soft blue gown +that Marianne wore yesterday at Sabine's. He seemed to catch that +fleeting smile, the exact expression of which he sought to recall, <a name="Page_187" id="Page_187"></a>that +peculiar glance, cunning and enticing, that exquisite outline of a +perfect Parisian woman. How charming she was! And how sweet that name, +Marianne!</p> + +<p>Let us see indeed, what in reality could such a woman be! Terrible, +perhaps, but certainly irresistible!</p> + +<p>Not for years had Vaudrey felt such an anxiety or allowed himself to be, +as it were, carried away by such a dominating influence. Waking, he +found Marianne the basis of all his thoughts, as she was during his +slumber.</p> + +<p>And so charming!</p> + +<p>"Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur is the next to address the +Council."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had not noticed that Monsieur Collard—of Nantes—had finished +his harangue, and that after the Minister of Justice, the Minister of +Foreign Affairs had just concluded his remarks. Vaudrey, therefore, +needed a moment's reflection, a hasty self-examination to recognize his +own personality: <i>Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur!</i> This title only +called up his <i>ego</i> after a momentary reflection, a sort of simulated +astonishment under the cloak of a pensive attitude. Vaudrey's colleagues +did not perceive that this man seated beside them was, as it were, lost +in meditation.</p> + +<p>Sulpice, moreover, had little to say. Nothing serious. The confirmation +of the favorable reports that had been made to him. Within a week he +would finish his plan of prefectorial changes. He simply required the +Coun<a name="Page_188" id="Page_188"></a>cil to deal at once with the nomination of the Undersecretaries of +State.</p> + +<p>It was then that Vaudrey realized the extraordinary influence that +Lucien Granet must possess. From the very opening of the discussion, the +minister felt that his candidate, Jacquier—of l'Oise—was defeated in +advance by Warcolier. Granet must have laid siege to the ministers one +by one. The President was entirely in Warcolier's favor. Warcolier's +amiability, tact, the extraordinary facility with which he threw +overboard previous opinions, were so many claims in his favor. It was +necessary to give pledges to new converts, to prove that the government +was not closed against penitents.</p> + +<p>"That is a very Christian theory," said Vaudrey, "and truly, I am +neither in favor of jacobinism nor suspicion, but there is something +ironical in granting this amnesty to turncoats."</p> + +<p>"But it is decidedly politic," said Monsieur Collard—of Nantes.</p> + +<p>"It is a premium offered to the new converts."</p> + +<p>"Eh! eh! that is not so badly done!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey knew perfectly well that it was useless to insist, he must put +up with Warcolier. It was his task to manage matters so that this man +should not have unlimited power in the ministry.</p> + +<p>Warcolier was elected and the President signed his appointment at the +earliest possible moment.<a name="Page_189" id="Page_189"></a></p> + +<p>"A nomination discounted in advance," thought Vaudrey, who again +recalled Granet's polite but threatening smile.</p> + +<p>He felt somewhat nervous and annoyed at this result. But what could be +done? To divert his thoughts, he listened to his colleagues' +communications. The Minister of War commenced to speak, and in a tone of +irritated surprise, instead of the lofty, patriotic considerations that +Vaudrey expected of him, Vaudrey heard him muttering behind his +moustache about soldiers' cap-straps, shakos, gaiter-buttons, +shoulder-straps, cloth and overcoats. That was all. It was the vulgar +report of a shoemaker or a tailor, or of a contractor detailing the +items of his account.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was anxious for the Council to be over. The President, before +the close of the session, repeated, with all the seriousness of a judge +of the Court of Appeal: "Above all, messieurs, no innovations, don't try +to do too well, let things alone. Don't let us trouble about business! +Let us be content to live! The session is ended."</p> + +<p>"Not about business?" said Vaudrey to himself.</p> + +<p>He understood power in quite a different way. Longing for improvements, +he did not understand how to let himself be dragged on like a cork upon +a stream, by the wave of daily events. He was determined to put his +ideas into force, to give life and durability to his ministry. There was +no use in being a minister if he must <a name="Page_190" id="Page_190"></a>continue the habitual +go-as-you-please of current politics. In that case, the first chief of +bureau one might meet would make as good a minister as he.</p> + +<p>At the moment of leaving the Council Chamber, the Minister of War said +to him, in a jocose, brusque way: "Well! my dear colleague, Warcolier's +election does not seem to have pleased you? Bah! if he has changed +shoulders with his gun, that only proves that he knows how to drill."</p> + +<p>And the soldier laughed heartily behind his closely buttoned frock coat.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey got into his carriage and returned to the ministry to breakfast.</p> + +<p>Formerly the breakfast hour was generally the time of joyous freedom for +Sulpice. He felt soothed beside Adrienne and forgot his daily struggles.</p> + +<p>In their home on Chaussée d'Antin, he usually abandoned himself freely +to lively and cheerful conversation, to allow his wife to find in him, +the man of forty years, the fiancé, the young husband of former days. +But here, before these exclusive domestics, the familiars of the +ministry, planted around the table like so many inspectors, rather than +servants, he dared not manifest himself. He scarcely spoke. He felt that +he was watched and listened to. The valet who passed him the dishes +watched over Monsieur le Ministre. He imagined that <i>his attendants</i> in +their silent reflections compared the present minister with those that +had gone <a name="Page_191" id="Page_191"></a>before him. On one occasion, one of the domestics replied to a +remark made by Adrienne: "Monsieur Pichereau, who preceded Monsieur le +Ministre, and Monsieur le Comte d'Harville, who preceded Monsieur +Pichereau, considered my service very proper, madame."</p> + +<p>Adrienne accepted as well as she could the necessities of her new +position. Since that was power, let power rule! She was resigned to +those wastes whose luxury was apparent, since the political fortunes of +her husband cast her there, like a prisoner, in that huge, commonplace, +ministerial mansion, wherein none of the joys of home or of that +Parisian apartment that she had furnished with such refined taste were +left her. She felt half lost in those vast, cold salons of that ancient +Hôtel Beauvau,—cold in spite of their stoves, and which partook at one +and the same time of the provisional domicile and the furnished +apartment,—with its defaced gilded panels, and here and there a crack +in the ceiling, and those vulgar ornaments, those wearisome imitation +Chardins with their cracked colors and those old-fashioned pictures of +Roqueplan, giving to everything at once <i>one date</i>, a bygone style. With +what a truly melancholy smile Adrienne greeted the friends who came to +see her on her reception day, when they remarked to her: "Why, you are +in a palace!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I much prefer my accustomed furniture and my own house."<a name="Page_192" id="Page_192"></a></p> + +<p>Sulpice, free at last from that Council and the morning receptions, as +he alighted from his carriage, caused <i>Madame</i> to be informed that he +had returned.</p> + +<p>Adrienne, who was looking pretty in a tight-fitting, black velvet gown, +approached him with a smile and was suddenly overcome with sadness on +seeing him absorbed in thought. She dared not question him, but being +somewhat anxious, she, nevertheless, inquired the cause of his frowning +expression.</p> + +<p>"You have your bad look, my good Sulpice," she smilingly said.</p> + +<p>He then quickly explained the Warcolier business.</p> + +<p>"Is that all? Bah!" she said, "you will have many other such +annoyances."</p> + +<p>She was smiling graciously.</p> + +<p>"That is politics!—And then you like it—At least, confine your likes +to that, Sulpice," she said, drawing near to Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>She was about to present her forehead for his kiss, as formerly, but she +drew back abruptly. A valet entered with a dignified air and +ceremoniously announced that breakfast was served.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey ate without appetite. Adrienne watched him tenderly, her eyes +were kind and gentle. How nervous he was and quickly disturbed! Truly, +Warcolier's appointment was not worth his giving himself the least +anxiety about.<a name="Page_193" id="Page_193"></a></p> + +<p>She was going to speak to him about it. Vaudrey imposed silence by a +sign. The motionless domestics were listening.</p> + +<p>Like Sulpice, Adrienne suffered the annoyance of a constant +surveillance. She was hungry when she sat down to table, but her +appetite had vanished. The viands were served cold, brought on plates +decorated with various designs and marked with the initials of Louis +Philippe, L.P., intertwined, or with the monogram of the Empire, N.; the +gilt was worn off, the fillets of gold half obliterated: a service of +Sèvres that had been used everywhere, in imperial dwellings, national +palaces, and was at last sent to the various ministries as the remnant +of the tables of banished sovereigns.</p> + +<p>Instead of eating, Adrienne musingly looked at the decorations. It +seemed to her that she was in a gloomy restaurant where the badly served +dishes banished her appetite. Sulpice, sad himself, scarcely spoke and +in mute preoccupation, in turn confused the shrewd, sly Granet, the +intriguing Warcolier, and Marianne Kayser, whose image never left him. +He was discontented with himself and excited by the persistency with +which the image of this woman haunted him.</p> + +<p>In vain did Adrienne smile and seek to divert him from the thoughts that +besieged him—she was herself in a melancholy mood, without knowing why, +and her endeavors were but wasted; if he abandoned the train of his +reflections, it was merely to express a thought in <a name="Page_194" id="Page_194"></a>rapid tones, and he +seemed momentarily to shake off his torpor; he replied to his wife's +forced smile by a mechanical grimace, and immediately relapsed into his +nervously silent state.</p> + +<p>In the hours of anxious struggle, she had often seen him thus, hence she +was not alarmed. If she had been in her own home, instead of occupying +this strange mansion, she would have rushed to him, and seated on his +knees, taken his burning head between her little hands and said: "Come +now! what ails you? what is the matter? Tell me everything so that, +child as I may be, I may comfort my big boy."</p> + +<p>But there, still in the presence of those people, always in full view, +she dared not. She carefully and anxiously watched Sulpice's mortified +countenance. Since his entry on his ministerial functions, this was the +first occasion, probably, that he had been so preoccupied.</p> + +<p>"There is something the matter with you, is there not, my dear?"</p> + +<p>"No—nothing—Besides—"</p> + +<p>The minister's glance was a sufficient conclusion to his remark. +Moreover, how could he, even if he had some trouble to confide, make it +known before the ever watchful lackeys? Before these impassive +attendants, who, though apparently obsequious, might in reality be +hostile, and who looked at them with cold glances? What a distance +separated them from the old-time intimacies, the cherished interchange +of thought inter<a name="Page_195" id="Page_195"></a>rupted by piquant kisses and laughter, just like a +young husband and wife!</p> + +<p>In truth, Adrienne had not thought of it: Sulpice could not talk.</p> + +<p>"You will serve the coffee at once," she said.</p> + +<p>She made haste in order that she might take refuge in her own apartment +to be alone with her husband. He, however, as if he shunned this +tête-à-tête, eager as he was for solitude, quickly attributed his +unpleasant humor to neuralgia or headache. Too much work or too close +application of mind.</p> + +<p>"At the Ministerial Council perhaps?" remarked Adrienne inquiringly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, at the Council,—I must take a little fresh air—I will take a +round in the Bois—The day is dry—That will do me good!"</p> + +<p>"Will you take me?" she said gayly.</p> + +<p>"If you wish," he replied. Then, in an almost embarrassed tone, he +added:</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it will be better for me to go alone—I have to think—to +work—There is no sitting at the Chamber to-day; and the day is entirely +at my own disposal."</p> + +<p>"Just as you please," Adrienne replied, looking at Sulpice with a tender +and submissive glance. "It would, however, have been so delightful and +beneficial to have gone to the Bois together on such a bright day! But +you and your affairs before everything, you are right; <a name="Page_196" id="Page_196"></a>take an airing, +be off, come, breathe—I shall be glad to see you return smiling +cheerfully as in the sweet days."</p> + +<p>Sulpice looked at his young wife with a fondness that almost inspired +him with remorse. In her look there was so complete an expression of her +love. Then her affection was so deep, and her calm like the face of a +motionless lake was so manifest, and she loved him so deeply, so +intelligently. And how trustful, too!</p> + +<p>He was impelled now to beg her don her cloak and to have a fur robe put +into the coupé and set out now, when the sun was gradually showing +itself, like two lovers bound for a country party. At the same time he +felt a desperate longing to be alone, to abandon himself to his new idea +and to the image that beset him. He felt that he was leaving Adrienne +for Marianne.</p> + +<p>He did not hold to the suggestion, in fact, he repeated that it would be +better if he were alone. As there would be no session of the Chamber for +a whole week, he would go out with Adrienne the next day. The coachman +could drive them a long distance, even to Saint-Cloud or Ville-d'Avray. +They would breakfast together all alone, unknown, in the woods.</p> + +<p>"Truly?" said Adrienne.</p> + +<p>"Truly! I feel the necessity of avoiding so many demonstrations in my +honor."</p> + +<p>Sulpice laughed.</p> + +<p>"I am stifled by them," he said, as he kissed Adri<a name="Page_197" id="Page_197"></a>enne, whose face was +pink with delight at the thought of that unrestrained escapade.</p> + +<p>"How you blush!" said Sulpice, ingenuously. "What is the matter with +you?"</p> + +<p>"With me? Nothing."</p> + +<p>She looked at him anxiously.</p> + +<p>"You think my complexion too ruddy! I have not the Parisian tint. Only +remain a minister for some time, and that will vanish. There is no +dispraise in that."</p> + +<p>She again offered her brow to him.</p> + +<p>He left her, happy to feel himself free.</p> + +<p>At last! For an entire day he was released from the ordinary routine of +his life; from the wrangling of the assembly, the hubbub of the +corridors, the gossip of the lobbies, interruptions, interrupted +conversations, from all that excitement that he delighted in, but which +at times left him crushed and feverish at the close of the day. He +became once more master of his thoughts, of his meditation. He belonged +to himself. It was almost impossible to recover his self-mastery in the +stormy arena into which he was thrust, happy to be there, and where his +distended nostrils inhaled, as it were, the fumes of sulphur.</p> + +<p>At times, amid the whirlwind of politics, he suffered from a yearning +for rest, a sick longing for home quiet, a desire to be free, to go +between the acts, as it were, to vegetate in some corner of the earth +and to resume in <a name="Page_198" id="Page_198"></a>very truth an altogether different life from the +exasperating, irritating life that he led in Paris, always, so to speak, +under the lash; or, still better, to change the form of his activity, to +travel, to feed his eyes on new images, the fresh verdure, or the varied +scenes of unknown cities.</p> + +<p>But the years had rolled by amid the excitement and nervous strain of +political life. He lived with Adrienne in an artificial and overheated +atmosphere. Happy because he was loved, that his ambitions were +realized, that he charmed an assembly of men by the same power that had +obtained him the adoration of this woman, yes, he was happy, very happy: +to bless life, to excite envy, to arouse jealousy, to appear simply +ridiculous if he complained of destiny; and nevertheless, at the bottom +of his soul, discontented without knowing why, consumed by intangible, +feverish instincts, ill-defined desires for Parisian curiosities, having +dreamed in his youth of results very inferior to those he had realized, +yet finding when he analyzed the realities that he enjoyed, that the +promises of his dreams were more intoxicating than the best +realizations.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was an ambitious man, but he was ambitious to perform valiant +feats. Life had formerly seemed to him to be made up of glory, triumphal +entries into cities, accompanied by the fluttering of flags and the +flourish of trumpets. He pictured conquests, victories, exaltations! +Theatrical magnificence! But now, more <a name="Page_199" id="Page_199"></a>ironical, he was contented with +quasi-triumphs, if his restless, anxious nature could be satisfied with +what he obtained.</p> + +<p>Adrienne loved him. He loved her profoundly.</p> + +<p>Why had the meeting with Marianne troubled him so profoundly, then? +Manifestly, Mademoiselle Kayser realized the picture of his vanished +dreams, and the desires of a particular love that the passion for +Adrienne, although absolute, could not satisfy. This man had a nature of +peculiar ardor—or rather, curious desires, a greedy desire to know, an +itching need to approach and peep into abysses.</p> + +<p>Sometimes it seemed to Vaudrey that he had not lived at all, and this +was the fear and desire of his life: to live that Parisian life which +flattered all his instincts and awoke and reanimated all his dreams. But +yesterday it had appeared to him when he met this young woman who raised +her eyes to him, half-veiled by her long eyelashes, that a stage-curtain +had been raised, disclosing dazzling fairy scenery, and since then that +scenery had been always before him. It banished, during his drive, all +peace, and while the coupé threaded its way along the Faubourg +Saint-Honoré toward the Arc-de-Triomphe, the minister who, but two hours +before, had been plunged in state affairs, settled himself down in a +corner of the carriage, his legs swaddled in a robe and his feet resting +on a foot-warmer, looking at, but without observing the cold figures +that walked rapidly <a name="Page_200" id="Page_200"></a>past him, the houses lighted up by the sun's rays, +and the dry pavements, and he thought of those strange eyes and those +black butterflies, which seemed to him to flutter over that fair hair +like swallows over a field of ripe wheat.</p> + +<p>It pleased him to think of that woman. It was an entirely changed +preoccupation, a relaxation. A curious, strangely agreeable sensation: +his imagination thus playing truant, and wandering toward that vision, +renewed his youth. He experienced therein the perplexities that troubled +him at twenty. Love in the heart means fewer white hairs on the brow. +And then, indeed, he would never, perhaps, see Mademoiselle Kayser +again! He would, however, do everything to see her again at the coming +soirée at the ministry, an invitation—Suddenly his thoughts abruptly +turned to Ramel, whom he also wished to invite and meet again. He loved +him so dearly. It was he who formerly, in the journalistic days, and at +the time of the battles fought in the <i>Nation Française</i>, had called +Denis "a conscience in a dress-coat."</p> + +<p>Therefore, since he had an afternoon to spare, he would call on Ramel. +He was determined to show him that he would never preserve the dignity +of a minister with him.</p> + +<p>"Rue Boursault, Batignolles," he said to the coachman, lowering one of +the windows; "after that, only to the Bois!"<a name="Page_201" id="Page_201"></a></p> + +<p>The coachman drove the coupé toward the right, reaching the outer +boulevards by way of Monceau Park.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was delighted. He was going to talk open-heartedly to an old +friend. Ah, Ramel! he was bent on remaining in the background, on being +nothing and loving his friends only when they were in defeat, as +Jéliotte had said. Well, Vaudrey would take him as his adviser. This +devil of a Ramel, this savage fellow should govern the state in spite of +himself.</p> + +<p>The minister did not know Ramel's present lodging which he had occupied +only a short time. He expected to find dignified poverty and a cold +apartment. As soon as Denis opened the door to him, he found himself in +a workman's dwelling that had been transformed by artistic taste into +the small museum of a virtuoso. After having passed through a narrow +corridor, and climbed a small, winding staircase, Vaudrey rang at the +third floor of a little house in Rue Boursault and entered a well-kept +apartment full of sunlight.</p> + +<p>Hanging on the walls were engravings and crayons in old-fashioned +frames. A very plain mahogany bookcase contained some select volumes, +which, though few, were frequently perused and were swollen with markers +covered with notes. The apartment was small and humble: a narrow bedroom +with an iron bedstead, a dressing room, a tiny dining-room furnished +with cane-seated chairs, and the well-lighted study with his portraits +and his frames of the old days. But with this simplicity, as <a name="Page_202" id="Page_202"></a>neat as a +newly-shaved old man, all was orderly, and arranged and cared for with +scrupulous attention.</p> + +<p>This modest establishment, the few books, the deep peace, the oblivion +found in this Batignolles lodging, in this home of clerks, poor, petty +tradesmen and workmen, sufficed for Ramel. He rarely went out and then +only to take a walk from which he soon returned exhausted. He had +formerly worked so assiduously and had given, in and out of season, all +his energy, his nerves and his body, improvising and scattering to the +winds his appeals, his protests, his heart, his life, through the +columns of the press. What an accumulation of pages, now destroyed or +buried beneath the dust of neglected collections! How much ink spilled! +And how much life-blood had been mingled with that ink!</p> + +<p>Ramel willingly passed long hours every day at his study window, looking +out on the green trees or at the high walls of a School of Design +opposite, or at the end of a tricolored flag that waved from the frontal +of a Primary Normal School that he took delight in watching; then at the +right, in the distance, throbbing like an incessant fever, he saw the +bustling life of the Saint-Lazare Station, where with every shrill +whistle of the engines, he saw white columns of smoke mount skyward and +vanish like breaths.</p> + +<p>"Smoke against smoke," thought Ramel, with his pipe between his teeth. +"And it would be just as well for one to struggle—a lost unity—against +folly, as for a <a name="Page_203" id="Page_203"></a>single person to desire to create as much smoke as all +these locomotives together!"</p> + +<p>Ramel appeared to be delighted to see Vaudrey, whose name the +housekeeper murdered by announcing him as <i>Monsieur Vaugrey</i>. He placed +a chair for him, and asked him smilingly, what he wanted "with an +antediluvian journalist."</p> + +<p>"A mastodon of the press," he said.</p> + +<p>What had Vaudrey come for?</p> + +<p>His visit had no other object than to enjoy again a former faithful +affection, the advice he used to obtain, and also to try to drag the +headstrong Ramel into the ministry. Would not the directorship of the +press tempt him?</p> + +<p>"With it, the directing of the press!" said Denis. "It is much better to +have an opposition press than one that you have under your thumb. +Friendly sheets advise only foolishly."</p> + +<p>"Why, Vaudrey, do you know," suddenly exclaimed the veteran journalist, +"that you are the first among my friends who have come into power—I say +the first—who has ever thought of me?"</p> + +<p>"You cannot do me a greater pleasure than tell me so, my dear Ramel. I +know nothing more contemptible than ingrates. In my opinion, to remember +what one owes to people, is to be scrupulously exact; it is simply +knowing orthography."</p> + +<p>"Well! mercy! there are a devilish lot of people who <a name="Page_204" id="Page_204"></a>don't know if the +word gratitude is spelled with an <i>e</i> or an <i>a</i>. No, people are not so +well skilled as that in orthography. There are not a few good little +creatures to be sent back to school. All the more reason to be thankful +for having learned by heart—by heart, that is the way to put it, my +dear Vaudrey—your participles."</p> + +<p>Sulpice was well acquainted with Ramel's singular wit, a little sly, but +tinged with humor, like pure water into which a drop of gin has been +poured, more perfumed than bitter. He knew no man more indulgent and +keen-sighted than him.</p> + +<p>"For what should I bear a grudge against people?" said the veteran. "For +their stupidity? I pity them, I haven't time to dislike them; one can't +do everything."</p> + +<p>Besides, the minister felt altogether happy to be with this man no +longer in vogue, but who might be likened to coins that have ceased to +be current and have acquired a higher value as commemorative medals. He +could unbosom himself to him: treachery was impossible. He longed to +have such a stay beside him, and still urged him, but Ramel was +inflexible.</p> + +<p>"But as I have already said—if I have need of you?"</p> + +<p>"Of me? I am too old."</p> + +<p>"Of your advice?"</p> + +<p>"Well! it is not necessary for me to give you my address, since you find +yourself here now, or to tell you that you can depend on me, seeing you +know me."<a name="Page_205" id="Page_205"></a></p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt that it was useless to pursue the matter further. He was +not talking with a misanthrope or a scorner, but with a learned man. He +would find at hand whenever he needed it, the old, ever faithful +devotedness of this white-haired man, who, with skull-cap on his head, +was smoking his pipe near the window when the minister entered.</p> + +<p>"Then, you are happy, Ramel?" said Sulpice, a little astonished, +perhaps.</p> + +<p>"Perfectly so."</p> + +<p>"You have no ambition for anything whatever?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, I await philosophically the hour for the monument."</p> + +<p>He smiled when he saw that his own familiar remark was puzzling Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"The monument, there, on one side: Villa Montmartre!—Oh! I am not +anxious to have done with life. It is amusing enough at times. But, +after all, it is necessary to admit that the comedy ends when it is +finished. One fine day, I shall be found sleeping somewhere, here in my +armchair, or in my bed, suddenly, or perhaps after a long illness—this +would weary me, as a lingering illness is repugnant to me—and you will +read in one or two journals a short paragraph announcing that the +obsequies of Monsieur Denis Ramel, one-time editor of a host of +democratic newspapers, a celebrated man in his day, but little known +recently, will take place on such a day at such an hour. Few will +attend, <a name="Page_206" id="Page_206"></a>but I ask you to be present—that is, if there is no important +sitting at the Chamber."</p> + +<p>Old Ramel twirled his moustache with his long, lean fingers as he spoke +these last words into which he infused a dash of irony. He nullified it, +however, as he extended his frankly opened hand and said to Sulpice +Vaudrey:</p> + +<p>"What I have said to you is very cheerful! A thousand pardons. The more +so that I do not think of doubting you for a single moment—You have +always been credulous. That is your defect, and it is a capital one. In +the world of business men and politicians, who are for the most part +egotists, of mediocrities, or to speak plainly—I know no more +picturesque term—of <i>dodgers</i>,—you move about with all the illusions +and tastes of an artist. You are like the brave fellows of our army, +poets of war, as it were, who hurled themselves to their destruction +against regiments of engineers. Certainly, my dear minister, I shall +always be delighted to give you my counsel, you whom I used to call my +dear child, and if the observations of a living waif can serve you in +anything, count on me. Dispose of me, and if by chance I can be useful +to you, I shall feel myself amply repaid."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" cried Sulpice, "if you only knew how much good it does me to hear +the sincere thoughts of a man one can rely on! How different is their +ring from that of others!"<a name="Page_207" id="Page_207"></a></p> + +<p>He then allowed himself to pass by an easy transition to the confessions +of his first deceptions or annoyances.</p> + +<p>The selection that very morning, of Warcolier as Under Secretary of +State in a Republican administration, a man who had played charades at +Compiègne, had thrown him into a state of angry excitement.</p> + +<p>Ramel, however, burst into laughter.</p> + +<p>"Ah, nonsense! You will see many other such! Why, governments always do +favors to their enemies when their opponents pretend to lower their +colors! What good is it to serve friends? They love you."</p> + +<p>"This does not vex you, then, old Republican?"</p> + +<p>"I, an old soldier grown white in harness," said Ramel, whose moustache +still played under his smile, "that doesn't disturb my peace in the +least. I comfort myself with the thought that my dream, my <i>ideal</i>, to +use a trite expression, is not touched by such absurdities, and I am +persuaded that progress does not lag and that the cause of liberty gains +ground, in spite of so much injustice and folly. I confess, however, +that I sometimes feel the strange emotion that a man might experience on +seeing, after the lapse of years, the lovely woman whom he loved to +distraction at twenty, in the arms of a person whom he did not +particularly respect."</p> + +<p>Ramel had lighted his pipe, and half-hidden by the bluish wreaths of +smoke, chatted away, quite happy on his side to give himself up to the +revelation of the secret of his heart without the least bitterness, and +like <a name="Page_208" id="Page_208"></a>an elder brother, advised this man, who was still young and whom +he had compared formerly to one of those too fine pieces of porcelain +that the least shock would crack.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he said abruptly, "above all, my dear Vaudrey, <a name="typo_3" id="typo_3"></a>do not fear to +appear in the tribune more uncouth and assertive than you really are. In +times when the word <i>sympathetic</i> becomes an insult, it is wiser to have +the manners of a boor. Tact is a good thing."</p> + +<p>"I shall never succeed in that," said Sulpice, smiling as usual.</p> + +<p>"So much the worse! What has been wanting in my case is not to have been +able to secure the title of <i>our antipathetic confrère</i>. The modest and +refined people are dupes. By virtue of swelling their necks, turkeys +succeed in resembling peacocks. Believe me, my dear friend, it is +dangerous to have too refined a taste, even in office, even in the rank +in which you are placed. One hesitates to proclaim the excessively +stupid things that stir the crowd, and the blockhead who is bold enough +to declare his folly creates a hellish noise with his nonsense, while a +man of refinement, who is not always a squeamish man, remains in his +corner unseen. Remember that more moths are caught at night with a +greasy candle than with a diamond of the first water."</p> + +<p>"You speak in paradox—" Sulpice began.</p> + +<p>"And you think I am making paradoxes? Not in the least, I will give +you—not at cost, for it has cost me dearly, but in block,—my stock of +experience. Do with <a name="Page_209" id="Page_209"></a>it what you please, and, above all, beware of <i>alle +donne!</i>"</p> + +<p>"Women?" asked the minister, with involuntary disquiet.</p> + +<p>"Women, exactly. Encircling every minister there is a squadron of +seductive women, who though perhaps more fully clothed than the flying +squadron of the Medicis, is certainly not less dangerous. Women who +complain that they are denied political rights, have in reality all, +since they are able to rule administrations and knock ministers off, as +the Du Barry did her oranges! When I speak of women, you will observe +well that I do not speak of your admirable wife," said Ramel, with a +respect that was most touching, coming from this honest veteran.</p> + +<p>"While we are gossiping," he resumed, "I am going to tell you frankly +what strikes me most clearly in the present conjuncture. You will gather +from it what you choose. In these days, my dear Vaudrey, what is most +remarkable is the facility men have for destroying their credit and +wearing themselves out. Politics, especially, entails a formidable +consumption. It seems that the modern being is not cut out to wear long. +This, perhaps, is due to the fact that public business, whichever party +wins, is always committed to men who are ill-prepared for their good +fortune. I do not say this of you, who, intellectually speaking, are an +exception. But men are no longer bathed in the Styx, or perhaps they +<a name="Page_210" id="Page_210"></a>show the heel too quickly. For some years, moreover, the strange +phenomenon has presented itself of the provincial towns being the prey +of Parisian manufacturers, who reconstruct them and demolish their +picturesque antiquity, in order to garnish their boulevards and fine +mansions, while Paris, on the contrary, is directed and governed by +provincials, who provincialize it just as the Parisian companies +parisianize the provinces. Our provincials, astonished to find +themselves at the head of Parisian movement, lose their heads somewhat +and rush with immoderate appetites at the delicate feast. They have the +gluttony of famished children, and on the most perilous question they +are simply gourmands. It is <i>woman</i> again to whom I refer. The country +squires and gentlemen riders, who have grown old in their province with +the love of farm-wenches, or small tradesmen professing medicine or law +within their sub-prefectures, after having made verses for the female +tax-gatherer, all, you understand, all are hungry to know that unknown +creature: <i>woman</i>. And speedily enough the woman has drained their +Excellencies. Oh! yes, even to the marrow! She robs the Opposition of +its energy; the faithful to liberty, of the virility of their faith. +Energetic ministers or ministers with ideas are not long before woman +destroys both their strength and their ideas. Eh! <i>parbleu!</i> it is just +because they do not rule Paris as one pleads a civil suit in a +provincial court."</p> + +<p>The minister listened with a somewhat anxious, sober <a name="Page_211" id="Page_211"></a>air to these +truisms, clear-cut as with a knife, expressed by the old journalist +without passion, without exasperation, without anger. He was, in fact, +pleased that Ramel should speak to him so candidly.</p> + +<p>Yes, indeed, what the old "veteran,"—as Denis sometimes called +himself—said, were Vaudrey's own sentiments. These sufficiently +saddening observations he had himself made more than once. It was +precisely to put an end to such abuses, folly, and provincialism, this +hobbling spirit inculcated in a great nation, that he had assumed power, +and was about to increase his efforts.</p> + +<p>He thanked Ramel profusely and sincerely. This visit would not be his +last, he would often return to this Rue Boursault where he knew that a +true friend would be waiting.</p> + +<p>"And you will be right," said Denis. "Nowhere will you find a love more +profound, or hear truths more frankly spoken. You see, Vaudrey, the +walls of the ministerial apartments are too thick. There, neither the +noise of carriages nor the sound of street-cries is heard. I have passed +a few days in a palace—in '48,—at the Tuileries, as a national guard: +at the end of two hours, I heard nothing. The carpets, the curtains, +stifled everything, and, believe me, a cannon might have been fired +without my hearing anything more than an echo, much less could I hear +the truth! Besides, people do not like to pronounce truth too loudly. +They are afraid."<a name="Page_212" id="Page_212"></a></p> + +<p>"I swear to you that I will listen to everything," replied Sulpice, "and +I will strive to understand everything. And since I have the power—"</p> + +<p>Denis Ramel shook his head:</p> + +<p>"Power? Ah! you will see if that is ever taken in any but homoeopathic +doses! Why, you will have against you the <i>bureaux</i>, those sacrosanct +<i>bureaux</i> that have governed this country since bureaucracy has existed, +and they will cram more than one Warcolier down your throat, I warn +you."</p> + +<p>"Yes, if I allow it," said Vaudrey haughtily.</p> + +<p>"Eh! my poor friend, you have already allowed it," said the veteran.</p> + +<p>He had risen, Vaudrey had taken his hat, and he said to the minister, +leaning on his arm, with gentle familiarity, as he led him to the door:</p> + +<p>"Power is like a kite, but there is always some rascal who holds the +thread."</p> + +<p>"Come, come," said Vaudrey, "you are a pessimist!"</p> + +<p>"I confess that Schopenhauer is not unpleasant to me—sometimes."</p> + +<p>Thereupon they separated, after a cordial grasp of the hand, and Denis +Ramel resumed his pipe and his seat at the window corner, while the +minister carried away from this interview, as if he had not already been +in the habit of a frank interchange of opinions, an agreeable though +perhaps anxious impression.</p> + +<p>He felt the need of <i>mentally digesting</i> this conversation:<a name="Page_213" id="Page_213"></a> the idea of +going back, on this beautiful February day, to his official apartments +did not enter his mind. He was overcome by a springtime hunger.</p> + +<p>"To the Bois! Around the Lake!" he said to the coachman, as he +re-entered his carriage.</p> + +<p>The air was as balmy as on an afternoon in May. Vaudrey lowered the +carriage window to breathe freely. This exterior boulevard that he +rolled along was full of merry pedestrians. One would have thought it +was a Sunday afternoon. Old people, sitting on benches, were enjoying +the early sun.</p> + +<p>Sulpice looked at them, his brain busy with Ramel's warnings. He had +just called him a pessimist, but inwardly he acknowledged that the old +stager, who had remained a philosopher, spoke the truth. Woman! Why had +Ramel spoken to him of woman?</p> + +<p>This half-disquieting thought speedily left Sulpice, attracted as he was +by the joyous movement, the delight of the eyes which presented itself +to his view.</p> + +<p>In thus journeying to the Bois, he felt a delightful emotion of solitude +and forgetfulness. He gradually recovered his self-possession and became +himself once more. He drew his breath more freely in that long avenue +where, at this hour of the day, few persons passed. There was no +petition to listen to, no salutation to acknowledge.</p> + +<p>Ah! how easy it would be to be happy, to sweetly enjoy the Paris that +fascinated him instead of burning <a name="Page_214" id="Page_214"></a>away his life! Just now, at the foot +of the Arc de Triomphe, he had seen people dressed in blouses, sleeping +like Andalusian beggars before the walls of the Alhambra. Little they +cared for the fever of success! Perhaps they were wise.</p> + +<p>An almost complete solitude reigned over the Bois. Vaudrey saw, as he +glanced between the copsewood, now growing green, only a few isolated +pedestrians, some English governesses in charge of scampering children, +the dark green uniform of a guard or the blue blouse of a man who +trimmed the trees.</p> + +<p>The coachman drove slowly and Sulpice, enjoying the intoxication of this +early sun, lowered the shade and breathed the keen air while he repeated +to himself that peaceful joy was within the reach of everybody at Paris.</p> + +<p>"But why is this wood so deserted? It is so pleasant here."</p> + +<p>He almost reproached himself for not having brought Adrienne. She would +have been so happy for this advanced spring day. She required so little +to make her smile: mere crumbs of joy. She was better than he.</p> + +<p>He excused himself by reflecting that he would not have been able to +talk to Ramel.</p> + +<p>And then it would have been necessary to talk to Adrienne, whereas the +joy of the present moment was this solitary silence, the bath of warm +air taken in the complete forgetfulness of the habitual existence.</p> + +<p>The sight of the blue, gleaming lake before him, en<a name="Page_215" id="Page_215"></a>circled with pines, +like an artificial Swiss lake, compelled him to look out of the window.</p> + +<p>The coachman slowly drove the carriage to the left in order to make the +tour of the Lake.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey looked at the sheet of water upon which the light played, and on +which two or three skiffs glided noiselessly, even the sound of their +oars not reaching his ears.</p> + +<p>At the extremity of the alley, a carriage was standing, a hackney coach +whose driver was peacefully sleeping in the sunshine, with his head +leaning on his right shoulder, his broad-brimmed hat, bathed in the +sunshine, serving him as a shade.</p> + +<p>It was the only carriage there, and a few paces from the border of the +water, standing out in dark relief against the violet-blue of the lake, +a woman stood surrounded by a group of ducks of all shades, running +after morsels of brown bread while uttering their hoarse cries.</p> + +<p>Two white swans had remained in the water and looked at her with a +dignified air, at a distance.</p> + +<p>At the first glance at this woman, Sulpice felt a strange emotion. His +legs trembled and his heart was agitated.</p> + +<p>He could not be mistaken, he certainly recognized her. Either there was +an extraordinary resemblance between them, or it was Mademoiselle Kayser +herself.</p> + +<p>Marianne? Marianne on the edge of this Lake at an <a name="Page_216" id="Page_216"></a>hour when there was +no one at the Bois? Vaudrey believed neither in superstitions nor in +predestination. Nevertheless, he considered the meeting extraordinary, +but there is in this fantastic life a reality that brings in our path +the being about whom one has just been thinking. He had frequently +observed this fact. He had already descended from his carriage to go to +her, taking a little pathway under the furze in order to reach the +water's edge. There was no longer any doubt, it was she. Evidently he +was to meet Mademoiselle Kayser some day. But how could chance will that +he should desire to take that promenade to the Lake at the very hour +that the young woman had driven there?</p> + +<p>As he advanced, he thought how surprised Marianne would be. As he walked +along, he looked at her.</p> + +<p>She stood near a kind of wooden landing jutting out over the water. Over +her black dress she had flung a short cloak of satin, embroidered with +jet which sparkled in the sunlight. The light wind gently waved a black +feather that hung from her hat, in which other feathers were entwined +with a fringe of old gold bullion. Vaudrey noted every detail of this +living statuette of a Parisian woman: between a little veil knotted +behind her head and the lace ruching of her cloak, light, golden curls +fell on her neck, and in that frame of light, this elegant woman, this +silhouette standing out in full relief against the sky and the horizon +line of the water, with a pencil of rays gilding her fair locks, seemed +more ex<a name="Page_217" id="Page_217"></a><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218"></a><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219"></a>quisite and more the "woman" to Sulpice than in the décolleté +of a ball costume.</p> + +<p>When she heard the crushing of the sand by Sulpice's footsteps as he +approached her with timid haste, she turned abruptly. Under her small +black veil, drawn tightly over her face, and whose dots looked like so +many patches on her face, Vaudrey at first observed Marianne's almost +sickly paleness, then her suddenly joyous glance. A furtive blush +mounted even to the young girl's cheek.</p> + +<p>"You here?" she said—"you, Monsieur le Ministre?"</p> + +<p>She had already imparted an entirely different tone to these questions. +There was more abandon in the first, which seemed more like a cry, but +the second betrayed a sudden politeness, perhaps a little affected.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey replied by some commonplace remark. It was a fine day; he was +tired; he wished to warm himself in this early sunshine. But she?—</p> + +<p>"Oh! I—really I don't know why I am here. Ask the—my coachman. He has +driven me where he pleased."</p> + +<p>She spoke in a curt, irritated tone, under which either deception or +grief was hidden.</p> + +<p>She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, which +were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks, white or gray, +black, spotted, striped like tulips, marbled like Cordovan leather, with +iridescent green or blue necks, whose tone suggested Venetian +<a name="Page_220" id="Page_220"></a>glassware, all of them hurrying, stretching their necks, opening their +bills, or casting themselves at Marianne's feet, fighting, then almost +choking themselves to swallow the enormous pieces of bread that were +sold by a dealer close at hand.</p> + +<p>"Ah! bless me! I did not think I should have the honor of meeting you +here," she said.</p> + +<p>"The honor?" said Vaudrey. "I, I should say the joy."</p> + +<p>She looked straight into his eyes, frankly.</p> + +<p>"I do not know what joy is, to-day," she said. "I come from the +Continental Hotel, where I hoped to see—"</p> + +<p>"What is that?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing—"</p> + +<p>"If it were nothing, you would not have frowned so."</p> + +<p>"Oh! well! a friend—a friend whom I have again found—and who has +disappeared. Just so,—abruptly—No matter, perhaps, after all! What +happens, must happen. In short—and to continue my riddle, behold me +feeding these ducks. God knows why! I detest the creatures. The state +feeds them badly, Monsieur le Ministre, I tell you: they are famished. +Well? well?" she said to a species of Indian duck, bolder than the +others, who snapped at the hem of her skirt to attract attention and to +demand fresh mouthfuls.</p> + +<p>She commenced to laugh nervously, and said:</p> + +<p>"That one isn't afraid."<a name="Page_221" id="Page_221"></a></p> + +<p>She threw him a morsel that he swallowed with a greedy gulp.</p> + +<p>"Do you know, Monsieur le Ministre, that the story of these ducks is +that of the human species? There are some that have got nothing of all +the bread that I have thrown them, and there are others who have gorged +enough to kill them with indigestion. How would you classify that? Poor +political economy."</p> + +<p>"Oh, oh!" said Vaudrey. "You are wandering into the realms of lofty +philosophy!—"</p> + +<p>"Apropos of that, yes," said Marianne, as she pointed to the line of +birds that hurried on all sides, left the water, waddled about, uttering +their noisy cries. "You know that when one is sad, one philosophizes +anent everything."</p> + +<p>"And you are sad?" asked Sulpice, in a voice that certainly quivered +slightly.</p> + +<p>She threw away, without breaking it, the piece of bread that was left, +brushed her gloved fingers, and, turning toward the minister, said with +a smile that would make the flesh creep:</p> + +<p>"Very sad. Oh! what would you have? The black butterflies, you know, the +blue devils."</p> + +<p>He saw her again, just as she had appeared before him yesterday, with +arms and shoulders bare, lovely and seductive, and now, with her +shoulders hidden under her cloak, her face half-veiled and quite pale, +he thought her still more disquietingly charming. Moreover, the +strangeness of the situation, the chance meeting, imparted <a name="Page_222" id="Page_222"></a>something of +mystery to their conversation and the attraction of an assignation.</p> + +<p>Ah! how happy he felt at having desired to breathe the air of the Bois! +It now seemed to him that he had only come there for her sake. Once more +it appeared to him that some magnetic thought led to this deserted spot +these two beings, who but yesterday had only exchanged commonplace +remarks and who, in this sunbathed solitude, under these trees, in the +fresh breeze of the departing winter, met again, impelled toward each +other, drawn on by the same sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Do you know what I was thinking of?" she said, smiling graciously. +"Yes, of what I was thinking as I cast the brown bread to those ducks? +An idyll, is it not? Well! I was thinking that if one dared—a quick +plunge into such a sheet of water—very pure—quite tempting—Eh! well! +it would end all."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey did not reply. He looked at her stupidly, his glance betraying +the utmost anxiety.</p> + +<p>"Oh! fear nothing," she said. "A whim! and besides, I can swim better +than the swans, there is no danger."</p> + +<p>He had seized her hands instinctively and he experienced a singular +delight in feeling the flesh of Marianne's wrists under his fingers.</p> + +<p>"You are feverish," he said.</p> + +<p>"I should be, at any rate."</p> + +<p>Her voice was still harsh, as if she were distressed.<a name="Page_223" id="Page_223"></a></p> + +<p>"The departure of—of that friend—has, then, caused you much +suffering?"</p> + +<p>"Suffering? No. Vexation, yes—You have built many castles of cards in +your life—Come! how stupid I am!" she said bitterly. "You still build +many of them. Well! there it is, you see!"</p> + +<p>She had withdrawn her hands from Sulpice, and walked away slowly from +the border of the lake, going toward the end of the path where her +coachman awaited her, his eyes closed and his mouth open.</p> + +<p>"Where are you going on leaving the Bois?" asked Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"I? I don't know."</p> + +<p>He had made a movement.</p> + +<p>"Oh! once more I tell you, don't be afraid," she said. "I want to live. +Fear nothing, I will go home, <i>parbleu</i>."</p> + +<p>"Home?"</p> + +<p>"Or to my uncle's."</p> + +<p>"But, really, Monsieur le Ministre," she said, "you are taking upon +yourself the affairs of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police. I +know him well, and certainly he asks fewer questions than Your +Excellency."</p> + +<p>"That, perhaps," said Vaudrey, with a smile, "is because he has less +anxiety about you than I have."</p> + +<p>"Ah! bah!" said Marianne.</p> + +<p>She had by this time got close to her hackney coach and looked at the +coachman for a moment. "Don't you <a name="Page_224" id="Page_224"></a>think it would be very wrong to waken +him?" she said. "Will you accompany me for a moment, Monsieur le +Ministre?"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey paled slightly, divining under this question a seductive +prospect.</p> + +<p>Marianne's gray eyes were never turned from him.</p> + +<p>They walked along slowly, followed by the coupé whose lengthened shadow +was projected in front of them along the yellow pathway, moving beside +the lake where the swans floated with their pure white wings extended +and striking the water with their feet, raising all around them a white +foam, like snow falling in flakes. The blue heavens were reflected in +the water. The grass, of a burnt-green, almost gray color, looked like +worn velvet here and there, showing the weft and spotted with earth.</p> + +<p>Side by side they walked, Vaudrey earnestly watching Marianne, while she +gazed about her and pointed out to him the gray, winter-worn rocks, the +smooth ivy, and on the horizon some hinds browsing, in the far distance, +as in a desert, the bare grass as yellow as ripe wheat, around a pond, +in a gloomy landscape, russet horizons against a pale sky, presenting a +forlorn, mysterious and fleeting aspect.</p> + +<p>"One would think one's self at the end of the world," said Sulpice, with +lowered voice and troubled heart.</p> + +<p>A slight laugh from Marianne was her only reply, as she pointed with the +tip of her finger to an inscription on a sign:<a name="Page_225" id="Page_225"></a></p> + +<p>"<i>To Croix-Catelan!</i>" she said. "That end of the world is decidedly +Parisian!"</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, see how isolated we are to-day."</p> + +<p>It seemed as if she had divined his thought, for she took a path that +skirted a road and there, in the narrowest strip of soft, fresh soil, on +which the tiny heels of her boots made imprints like kisses upon a +cheek, she walked in front of him, the shadows of the small branches +dappling her black dress, while Vaudrey, deeply moved, still looked at +her, framed as she was by trees with moss-covered trunks and surrounded +with brambles, a medley of twisted branches.</p> + +<p>And Sulpice felt, at each step that he took, a more profound emotion. +Along this russet-tinted wood, stood out here and there the bright +trunks of birch-trees, and far above it, the pale blue sky; the abyss of +heaven, strewn with milky clouds and throughout the course of this +pathway arose like a Cybelean incense, a healthful and fresh odor that +filled the lungs and infused a desire to live.</p> + +<p>To live! and, thought Sulpice, but a moment ago this lovely, slender +girl spoke of dying. He approached her gently, walking by her side, at +first not speaking, then little by little returning to that thought and +almost whispering in her ear—that rosy ear that stood out against the +paleness of her cheek:</p> + +<p>"Is it possible to think of anything besides the opening spring, in this +wood where everything is awakening <a name="Page_226" id="Page_226"></a>to life? Is it really true, +Marianne, that you really wished to die?"</p> + +<p>He did not feel astonished at having dared to call her by name. It +seemed as if he had known her for years. He forgot everything, as if the +world was nothing but a dream and that this dream presented this woman's +face.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she replied. "Upon my honor, I was weary of life, but I see that +most frequently at the very moment when one despairs—"</p> + +<p>She stopped suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Well?" he asked, as he waited for her to continue.</p> + +<p>"Nothing. No, nothing!"</p> + +<p>She commenced to laugh, calling his attention to the end of the path, to +a broader alley which brought them back to the edge of the lake, whose +blue line they saw in the distance.</p> + +<p>"Blue on blue," she said, pointing to the sky and the water. "You +reproach me for not liking blue, Monsieur le Ministre, see! I am taking +an azure bath. This horizon is superb, is it not?"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey debated with himself if she were jesting. Why should she give +him that title which here and at such a moment, had such an out-of-place +ring?</p> + +<p>She glanced at him sidelong with a little droll expression, her pretty +mouth yielding to a smile that enticed a kiss.</p> + +<p>"We shall soon have returned to my carriage," she said. "Already!"<a name="Page_227" id="Page_227"></a></p> + +<p>"That <i>already</i> pleases me," said Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"It is true. This short promenade is nothing, but it suffices to make +one forget many things."</p> + +<p>"Does it not?" exclaimed Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>The shadow of his coupé was still projected between them along the +ochre-colored road.</p> + +<p>"Do you come to the Bois often?" asked the minister.</p> + +<p>"No. Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because I shall frequently return here," he said in a trembling voice.</p> + +<p>"Really!—Then, oh! why then, it would be love-making?" said Marianne, +who pierced him with her warm, tender glances.</p> + +<p>He wished to seize this woman's hand and print a kiss thereon, or to +press his lips upon her bare neck upon which the golden honey-colored +ringlets danced in the bright sunlight.</p> + +<p>"On these clear, fine days," she said in an odd tone, emphasizing every +word, "it is very likely that I shall return frequently to visit this +pathway. Eh! what is that?" she said, turning around.</p> + +<p>She was dragging a dry bramble that had fastened its thorns to the folds +of her satin skirt and she stopped to shake it off.</p> + +<p>"Stop," said Sulpice.</p> + +<p>He desired to tread on the russet-colored bramble.</p> + +<p>"You will tear my gown," said Marianne. "The bramble clings too +tightly."<a name="Page_228" id="Page_228"></a></p> + +<p>Then he stooped, gently removed the thorn, and Marianne, her bosom +turned toward him and half-stooping, looked at that man—a +minister—almost kneeling before her in this wood.</p> + +<p>He cast the bramble away from him.</p> + +<p>"There," he said.</p> + +<p>"Thanks."</p> + +<p>As he rose, he felt Marianne's fresh breath on his forehead. It fell on +his face, as sweet as new-mown hay. He became very pale and looked at +her with so penetrating an expression that she blushed slightly—from +pleasure, perhaps,—and until they reached the carriage where her +coachman was still sleeping, they said nothing further, fearing that +they had both said too much.</p> + +<p>At the moment when she entered her carriage, Sulpice, suddenly, with an +effort at boldness, said to her, as he leaned over the door:</p> + +<p>"I must see you again, Marianne."</p> + +<p>"What is the use?" she said, keeping her eyes fixed on his.</p> + +<p>"Where shall I see you?" he asked, without replying to her question.</p> + +<p>"I do not know—at my house—"</p> + +<p>"At your house?"</p> + +<p>"Wait," she added abruptly, "I will write to you."</p> + +<p>"You promise me?"</p> + +<p>"On my word of honor. At the ministry, <i>Personal</i>, isn't that so?"<a name="Page_229" id="Page_229"></a></p> + +<p>"Yes!—Ah! you are very good!" he cried, without knowing what he was +saying, while Marianne's coachman whipped his horses and the carriage +disappeared in the direction of Paris.</p> + +<p>It seemed to Vaudrey, who remained standing, that little gloved fingers +appeared behind the window and that he caught glimpses of a face hidden +under a black, dotted veil.</p> + +<p>The carriage disappeared in the distance.</p> + +<p>"To the ministry!" said the minister, as he got into his carriage.</p> + +<p>He stretched himself out as if intoxicated. He looked at all the +carriages along the drive of the Bois de Boulogne, the high life was +already moving toward the Lake. In calèches, old ladies in mourning +appeared with pale nuns, and old men with red decorations stretched out +under lap-robes. Pretty girls with pale countenances pierced with bright +eyes, like fragments of coal in flour, showed themselves at the doors of +the coupés, close to the muzzles of pink-nosed, well-combed, +white-haired little dogs. Vaudrey strove to find Marianne amid that +throng, to see her again. She was far away.</p> + +<p>He thought only of her, while his coupé went down the Avenue des +Champs-Élysées, bustling with noise and movement and flooded with light. +The coachman took a side street and the carriage disappeared through an +open gateway between two high posts surmounted by two lamps, in a +passage leading to a huge white mansion <a name="Page_230" id="Page_230"></a>whose slate roof was ablaze +with sunlight. An infantry soldier in red trousers, with a shako on his +head, mounted guard and stood motionless beside a brown-painted +sentry-box that stood at the right. Above the gateways a new tricolor +flag, in honor of the new ministry, waved in the sunshine.</p> + +<p>Against the ministerial edifice were two gas fixtures bearing two huge +capital letters: R.F., ready to be illuminated on important reception +nights.</p> + +<p>Two lackeys hastily opening the door, rushed up to the halted carriage +and stood at its door.</p> + +<p>"Adieu! Marianne," thought Sulpice, as he placed his foot in the +antechamber of this vast mansion as cold as a tomb.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<p class="frmatter"><a name="ill_216" id="ill_216"></a><b>Part First Chapter VII</b></p> +<p class="center"><i>She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, +which were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks</i> ...</p> + +<p class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/page216.png" width="434" height="612" alt="[Illustration: VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS]" title="VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS" /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VIII</h3> + + +<p>Marianne Kayser was superstitious. She believed that in the case of +compromised affairs, salvation appeared at the supreme moment of playing +the very last stake. She had always rebounded, for her part,—like a +rubber-ball, she said—at the moment that she found herself overthrown, +and more than half conquered. Fate had given some cause for her +superstitious ideas. She thought herself lost, and was weary of +searching, of living, in fact, when suddenly Monsieur de Rosas reached +Paris from the other end of the world. That was salvation.<a name="Page_231" id="Page_231"></a></p> + +<p>The duke did not prove very difficult to ensnare. He had yielded like a +child in Sabine's boudoir. Marianne left that soirée with unbounded +delight. She had recovered all her hopes and regained her <i>luck</i>. The +next day she would again see Rosas. She passed the night in dreams. +Light and gold reigned upon her life. She was radiant on awaking.</p> + +<p>Her uncle, on seeing her, found her looking younger and superb.</p> + +<p>"You are as beautiful as a Correggio, who though a voluptuous painter, +must have been talented. You ought to pose to me for a Saint Cecilia. It +would be magnificent, with a nimbus—"</p> + +<p>"Oh! let your saint come later," said Marianne, "I haven't time."</p> + +<p>Simon Kayser did not ask the young woman, moreover, why "she had not +time." Marianne was perfectly free. Each managed his affairs in his own +way. Such, in fact, was one of the favorite axioms of this painter, a +man of principle.</p> + +<p>Marianne breakfasted quickly and early, and after dressing herself, +during which she studied coquettish effects while standing before her +mirror, she left the house, jumped into a cab and drove to the Hôtel +Continental. With proud mien and tossing her head, she asked for the +duke as if he belonged to her. She was almost inclined to exclaim before +all the people: "I am his mistress!"<a name="Page_232" id="Page_232"></a></p> + +<p>But she suddenly turned pale upon hearing that Monsieur de Rosas had +left.</p> + +<p>"What! gone?"</p> + +<p>Gone thus, suddenly, unceremoniously, without notice, without a word? It +was not possible.</p> + +<p>They were obliged to confirm this news to her several times at the hotel +office. Monsieur le duc had that very morning ordered a coupé to take +him to catch a train for Calais. It was true that he had left some +baggage behind, but at the same time he notified them that they would +perhaps have to forward it to him in England later.</p> + +<p>Marianne listened in stupid astonishment. She became livid under her +little veil.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas did not receive a telegram?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, madame."</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>Something serious had, perhaps, suddenly intervened in the duke's life. +Nevertheless, this abrupt departure without notification, following the +exciting soirée of the previous day, greatly astonished this woman who +but now believed herself securely possessed of José.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" she thought. "He was afraid of me—Yes, that's it!—Of +course, he was afraid of me. He loves me much, too much, and distrusts +himself. He has gone away."</p> + +<p>She commenced to laugh uneasily as she got into her carriage again.<a name="Page_233" id="Page_233"></a></p> + +<p>"Assuredly, that is part of my fate. That stupid Guy leaves for Italy. +Rosas leaves for England. Steam was invented to admit of escape from +dangerous women. I did not follow Lissac. What if I followed the duke?"</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders, and gnawed her cambric handkerchief under +her veil, her head resting on the back of the coach, while the driver +waited, standing on the sidewalk in front of the hotel, ignorant of the +direction in which the young woman wished to go.</p> + +<p>Marianne felt herself beaten. She was like a gambler who loses a +decisive game. Evidently, Rosas only showed more clearly by the action +he had taken, how much he was smitten; she measured his love by her own +dismay; but what was the good of that love, if the duke escaped in a +cowardly fashion?—But where could she find him? Where follow him? Where +write to him?—A man who runs about as he does! A madman! Perhaps on +arriving at Dover he had already re-embarked for Japan or Australia.</p> + +<p>"Ah! the unexpected happens, it seems," thought Marianne, laughing +maliciously, as she considered the ludicrousness of her failure.</p> + +<p>"Madame, we are going—?" indifferently asked the coachman, who was +tired of waiting.</p> + +<p>"Where you please—to the Bois!"</p> + +<p>"Very good, madame."</p> + +<p>He looked at his huge aluminum watch, coolly remarking:<a name="Page_234" id="Page_234"></a></p> + +<p>"It was a quarter of twelve when I took Madame—"</p> + +<p>"Good! good!—to the Bois!"</p> + +<p>The movement of the carriage, the sight of the passers-by, the sunlight +playing on the fountains and the paving-stones of the Place de la +Concorde fully occupied Marianne's mind, although irritating her at the +same time. All the cheerfulness attending the awakening spring, +delightful as it is in Paris, seemed irony to her. She felt again, but +with increased bitterness, all the sentiments she experienced a few +mornings previously when she called on Guy and told him of her +burdensome weariness and distaste of life. Of what use was she now? She +had just built so many fond dreams on hope! And all her edifices had +crumbled.</p> + +<p>"All has to be recommenced. To lead the stupid life of a needy, lost, +harassed woman; no, that is too ridiculous, too sad! What then—" she +said to herself, as with fixed eyes she gazed into the infinite and +discovered no solution.</p> + +<p>She was savagely annoyed at Rosas. She would have liked to tear him in +pieces like the handkerchief that she shredded. Ah! if he should ever +return to her after this flight!</p> + +<p>But perhaps it was not a flight—who knows? The duke would write, would +perhaps reappear.</p> + +<p>"No," a secret voice whispered to Marianne. "The truth is that he is +afraid of you! It is you, you, whom he flees from."<a name="Page_235" id="Page_235"></a></p> + +<p>To renounce everything was enough to banish all patience. Yesterday, on +leaving Rosas, she believed herself to be withdrawn forever from the +wretched Bohemian life she had so painfully endured. To-day, she felt +herself sunk deeper in its mire. Too much mire and misery at last! +However, if she only had courage!</p> + +<p>It was while looking at the great blue lake, the snowy swans, the +gleaming barks, that she dreamed, as she had just told Vaudrey, of +making an end of all. Madness, worse than that, stupidity! One does not +kill one's self at her age; one does not make of beauty a valueless +draft. In order to occupy herself, she had bought some brown bread, +which she mechanically threw to the ducks, in order to draw her out of +herself. It was then that Sulpice saw her.</p> + +<p>"Assuredly," she thought, as she left the minister, "those who despair +are idiots!"</p> + +<p>In fact, it seemed that chance, as her fingers had cast mouthfuls of +bread to the hungry bills, had thrown Vaudrey to her in place of Rosas.</p> + +<p>A minister! that young man who smiled on her just now in the alleys of +the Bois and drew near her with trembling breath was a minister. A +minister as popular as Vaudrey was a power, and since Marianne, weary of +seeking love, was pursuing an actuality quite as difficult to +obtain—riches, Sulpice unquestionably was not to be despised.<a name="Page_236" id="Page_236"></a></p> + +<p>"As a last resource, one might find worse," thought Marianne, as she +entered her home.</p> + +<p>She had not, moreover, hesitated long. She was not in the mood for +prolonged anger. She was at an age when prompt decisions must be made on +every occasion that life, with its harsh spurs, proposed a problem or +furnished an opportunity. On the way between the Lake and Rue de +Navarin, Marianne had formed her plan. Since she had to reply to +Vaudrey, she would write him. She felt an ardent desire to avenge +herself for Rosas's treatment, as if he ought to suffer therefor, as if +he were about to know that Sulpice loved her.</p> + +<p>Had she found the duke awaiting her, as she entered the house, she would +have been quite capable of lashing his face with a whip, while making +the lying confession:</p> + +<p>"Ah! you here? It is too late! I love Monsieur Vaudrey."</p> + +<p>She would, moreover, never know any but gloomy feelings arising from her +poverty in that house. The thought suggested itself to her of at once +inviting Vaudrey to call on her. But surrounded by the vulgar +appointments of that poor, almost bare, studio, concealing her poverty +under worn-out hangings, indifferent studies, old, yellowed casts +covered with dust—to receive Vaudrey there would be to confess her +terribly straitened condition, her necessities, her eagerness, all that +repels and freezes love. In glancing around her uncle's studio, she +scrutinized everything with an expression of hatred.<a name="Page_237" id="Page_237"></a></p> + +<p>It smacked of dirty poverty, bourgeois ugliness. She would never dare to +ask Vaudrey to sit upon that divan, which was littered with old, torn +books and tobacco grains, and which, when one sat upon it, discharged a +cloud of dust whose atoms danced in the sunlight.</p> + +<p>"What are you looking at?" asked Kayser, as he followed his niece's +glances about the room. "You seem to be making an inspection."</p> + +<p>"Precisely. And I am thinking that your studio would not fetch a very +high figure at Drouot's auction mart."</p> + +<p>"Lofty and moral creations don't sell in times like these," gravely +replied the old dauber. "For myself, I am not a painter of obscene +subjects and lewd photography."</p> + +<p>Marianne shrugged her shoulders and went out, coughing involuntarily. +Old Kayser passed his time steeped in the odors of nicotine.</p> + +<p>"I am lost, if Vaudrey comes here," she said to herself.</p> + +<p>She knew well enough that caprice, the love of those who do not love, +lives on luxury, intoxicating perfumes, shimmering silk, and all the +mysterious surroundings of draperies which are the accompaniment of the +adventure. Vaudrey would recoil before this Bohemian studio. The famous +"nimbus," of which Kayser spoke, was the creature of his tobacco smoke. +What was to be done, then? Receive the minister yonder in that remote +apartment where, all alone,—it was true—she went to <a name="Page_238" id="Page_238"></a>dream, dream with +all the strange joys attending isolation? Draw this man to a distant +corner of Paris, in the midst of the ruins of former luxury, as mean as +the wretch's studio?—Eh! that was to acknowledge to Vaudrey that she +was intriguing for a liaison with the single object of quitting the +prison-walls of want. She realized that this man, full of illusions, +believing that he had to do with perhaps a virtuous girl, or, at least, +one who was not moving in her own circle, who was giving herself, but +not selling herself, would shrink at the reality on finding himself face +to face with an adventuress.</p> + +<p>"Illusion is everything! He must be deceived! They are all stupid!" she +mused.</p> + +<p>But how was she to deceive this man as to her condition, how cloak her +want, how cause herself to pass for what she was not? With Rosas it +would have been a simple matter. Poor, she presented herself to him in +her poverty. He loved her so. She could the better mislead him. But with +Vaudrey, on the contrary, she must dazzle.</p> + +<p>"Two innocents," Marianne said to herself, "the one thirsts for virtue, +the other for vice."</p> + +<p>Should she confess everything to Sulpice as she had done to Rosas? Yes, +perhaps, if she discovered no better way, but a better plan had to be +found, sought, or invented. Find what? Borrow? Ask? Whom? Guy? She would +not dare to do so, even supposing that Lissac was sufficiently well off. +Then she wished to <a name="Page_239" id="Page_239"></a>keep up appearances, even in Guy's eyes. Further, +she had never forgiven him for running off to Italy. She never would +forget it. No, no, she would ask nothing from Guy.</p> + +<p>To whom, then, should she apply? She again found herself in the +frightful extremity of those who, in that almost limitless Paris, +involved in the terrible intricacies of that madly-directed machine, +seek money, a loan, some help, an outstretched hand, but who find +nothing, not an effort to help them in all its crowd. She was overcome +with rage and hatred. Nothing! she had nothing! She would have sold +herself to any person whatsoever, to have speedily obtained a few of the +luxuries she required. Yes; sold herself now, to sell herself more +dearly to-morrow.</p> + +<p>Sold! Suddenly from the depths of her memory she recalled a form, +confused at first, but quickly remembered vividly, of an old woman +against whom she had formerly jostled, in the chance life she had led, +and who, once beautiful, and still clever and rich, it was said, had +been seized with a friendly desire to protect Marianne. It was a long +time since the young woman had thought of Claire Dujarrier. She met her +occasionally, her white locks hidden under a copious layer of golden +powder, looking as yellow as sawdust. The old woman had said to her:</p> + +<p>"Whenever you need advice or assistance, do not forget my address: Rue +La Fontaine, Auteuil."<a name="Page_240" id="Page_240"></a></p> + +<p>Marianne had thanked her at the time, and had forgotten all about it +till now, when in the anguish of her pursuit she recalled the name and +features of Claire Dujarrier as from the memories of yesterday. Claire +Dujarrier, a former danseuse, whose black eyes, diamonds, wild +extravagance, and love adventures were notorious formerly, had for the +last two or three years buried herself in a little house, fearing that +she would be assassinated; she kept her diamonds in iron-lined safes +built in the wall, and had a young lover, a clerk in a novelty store, +who was stronger than a market-house porter, and who from time to time +assumed a high tone and before whom she stood in awe.</p> + +<p>"Claire Dujarrier! The very thing!—Why not?" thought Marianne.</p> + +<p>She had been introduced to the ex-danseuse by Guy de Lissac. He was +considered as one of Claire's old lovers. They quarrelled when the old +dame had heard one of Guy's bons mots that had become familiar at the +Club:</p> + +<p>"When I see her, I always feel a slight emotion: she recalls my youth to +me!—But alas! not hers!"</p> + +<p>Claire was well-off and perhaps miserly. Marianne instinctively felt, +however, that she would get help at her hands.</p> + +<p>Money!</p> + +<p>"I will return her all! It is usury. Her pledge is here!"<a name="Page_241" id="Page_241"></a></p> + +<p>With brazen front, Kayser's niece struck her bosom, looking at the same +time at the reflection of her fine bust and pale face in the mirror.</p> + +<p>The next day she went straight to the former danseuse's.</p> + +<p>Claire Dujarrier lived in that long Rue La Fontaine at Auteuil which +partook of the characteristics of a suburban main street and a +provincial faubourg, with its summer villas, its little cottages +enclosed within gloomy little gardens, railed-off flower-beds, +boarding-schools for young people, and elbowing each other as in some +village passage, the butcher's store, the pharmacy, the wine-dealer's +shop, the baker's establishment,—a kind of little summer resort with a +forlorn look in February, the kiosks and cottages half decayed, the +gardens full of faded, dreary-looking leaves. Marianne looked about, +seeking the little Claire house. She had visited it formerly. A +policeman wandered along sadly,—as if to remind one of the town,—and +on one side, a gardener passed scuffling his wooden shoes, as if to +recall the village.</p> + +<p>However, here it was that the formerly celebrated girl, who awoke storms +of applause when she danced beside Cerrito at the Opéra, now lived +buried in silence,—a cab going to the Villa Montmorency seemed an event +in her eyes,—forgotten, her windows shut, and as a diversion looking +through the shutters at the high chimneys of some factory in the +neighboring Rue Gras that <a name="Page_242" id="Page_242"></a>belched forth their ruddy or bluish fumes, or +yellow like sulphuric acid, or again red like the reflection of fire.</p> + +<p>Marianne rang several times when she arrived at the garden railing of +the little house. The bells sounded as if they were coated with rust. An +ancient maid-servant, astonished and morose, came to open the door.</p> + +<p>She conducted the young woman into the salon where Claire Dujarrier sat +alone, eating cakes, with her terrier on her lap.</p> + +<p>The dog almost leaped at Marianne's throat while Claire, rising, threw +herself on her neck.</p> + +<p>"Ah! dear little one!—How pleased I am! What chance brings you?"</p> + +<p>Marianne looked at the Dujarrier. She might still be called almost +lovely, although she was a little painted and her eyes were swollen, and +her cheeks withered; but she knew so perfectly well all the secrets for +rejuvenating, the eyebrow preparation, the labial wash, that she was a +walking pharmaceutical painting done on finely sculptured features. The +statue, although burdened with fat, was still superb.</p> + +<p>She listened to Marianne, smiled, frowned and, love-broker and advisory +courtesan that she was, ended by saying to the "little one" that she had +a devilish good chance and that she had arrived like March in Lent.</p> + +<p>"It is true, it has purposely happened. Vanda, you know her well?"</p> + +<p>"No!" answered Marianne.<a name="Page_243" id="Page_243"></a></p> + +<p>"What! Vanda, whom that big viper Guy called the Walking Rain?"</p> + +<p>"I do not remember—"</p> + +<p>"Well! Vanda has gone to Russia, she left a month ago. She will be there +all the winter and summer, and part of next winter. Her <i>general</i> +requires her. He is appointed to keep an eye on the Nihilists. So she +wishes to rent her house in Rue Prony. That is very natural. A charming +house. Very <i>chic</i>. In admirable taste. You have the chance. And not +dear."</p> + +<p>"Too dear for me, who have nothing!"</p> + +<p>"Little silly! You have yourself," said Claire Dujarrier. "Then you have +me, I have always liked you. I will lend you the ready cash to set +yourself up, you can give me bills of exchange, little documents that +your minister—pest! you are going on well, you are, ministers!—that +His Excellency will endorse. Vanda will not expect anything after the +first quarter. Provided that her house is well-rented to someone who +does not spoil it, she will be satisfied. If she should claim all, why, +at a pinch I can make up the amount. But, my dear,"—and the old woman +lowered her voice,—"on no account say anything to Adolphe."</p> + +<p>"Adolphe?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my <i>husband</i>. You do not know him?"</p> + +<p>She took from the table a photograph enclosed in a photograph-case of +sky-blue plush, in which Marianne recognized a swaggering fellow with +flat face, large <a name="Page_244" id="Page_244"></a>hands, fierce, bushy moustache, who leaned on a cane, +swelling out his huge chest in outline against a mean, gray-tinted +garden ornamented with Medicis vases.</p> + +<p>"A handsome fellow, isn't he? Quite young!—and he loves me—I adore +him, too!"</p> + +<p>The tumid eyes of Claire Dujarrier resembled lighted coals. She pressed +kiss after kiss of her painted lips on the photograph and reverently +laid it on the table.</p> + +<p>Marianne almost pitied this half-senile love, the courtesan's +terrifying, last love.</p> + +<p>She was, however, too content either to trouble herself, or even to +reflect upon it. She was wild with joy. It seemed to her that a sudden +rift had opened before her and a gloriously sunny future pictured itself +to her mind. What an inspiration it was to think of Claire Dujarrier!</p> + +<p>She would sign everything she wished, acknowledge the sums lent, with +any interest that might be demanded. Much she cared about that, +indeed!—She was sure now to free herself and to <i>succeed</i>.</p> + +<p>"You are jolly right," said the ancient danseuse. "The nest is entirely +at the birds' disposal. Your minister—I don't ask his name, but I shall +learn it by the bills of exchange—would treat you as a grisette if he +found you at your uncle's. Whereas at Vanda's—ah! at Vanda's! you will +have news to tell me. So, see this is all that is necessary. I will +write to Vanda that her house is rented, and well rented. Kiss me and +skip! I hear Adolphe coming.<a name="Page_245" id="Page_245"></a> He does not care to see new faces. And +then, yours is too pretty!" she added, with a peculiar significance.</p> + +<p>She got the old servant to show Marianne out promptly, as if she felt +fearful lest her <i>husband</i> should see the pretty creature. Claire +Dujarrier was certainly jealous.</p> + +<p>"It is not I that would rob her of her porter!" Marianne thought, as she +walked away from Rue La Fontaine.</p> + +<p>Evening was now darkening the gray streets. A faint bluish mist was +rising over the river and spreading like breath over the quays. Marianne +saw Paris in the distance, and her visit seemed like a dream to her; she +closed her eyes, and a voice within her whispered confusedly the names +of Rosas, Vaudrey, Vanda, Rue Prony; she pictured herself stretched at +length on a reclining chair in the luxurious house of a courtesan, and +she saw at her feet that man—a minister—who supplicatingly besought +her favor, while in the distance a man who resembled Rosas was +travelling, moving away, disappearing—</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" the superstitious creature said to herself, "it was one or +the other! The duke or the minister! I have not made the choice."</p> + +<p>Then looking at the confused image of herself thrown on the window of +the cab, she threw a kiss at her own pale reflection, happy with the +unbounded joy of a child, and cried aloud while laughing heartily:</p> + +<p>"Bonjour, Vanda! I greet you, Mademoiselle Vanda."<a name="Page_246" id="Page_246"></a><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247"></a></p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248"></a><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249"></a><a name="PART_SECOND" id="PART_SECOND"></a><a name="II_I" id="II_I"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h2>PART SECOND</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + + +<p>The Monceau plain is the quarter of changed fortunes and dice-throwing. +An entire town given over to luxury, born in a single night, suddenly +sprung into existence. The unpremeditated offspring of the aggregation +of millions. Instead of the cobbler's stall, the red-bedaubed shop of +the dealer in wines, the nakedness of an outer boulevard, here in this +spot of earth all styles flourish: the contrast of fancy, the château +throwing the English cottage in the shade; the Louis XIII. dwelling +hobnobbing with the Flemish house; the salamander of Francis I. hugging +the bourgeois tenement; the Gothic gateway opening for the entry of the +carriages of the courtesan. A town within a town. Something novel, +white, extravagant, overdone: the colossal in proximity to the +attractive, the vastness of a grand American hotel casting its shadow +over an Italian loggia. It partook at once of the Parisian and the +Yankee. The<a name="Page_250" id="Page_250"></a> Château de Chambord sheltering a chocolate maker, and the +studio of an artist now become the salon of a rich curbstone broker.</p> + +<p>The little Hôtel de Vanda,—<i>one of our charming fugitives</i>, as those of +the chroniclers who still remember Vanda, say of her in their articles +sometimes—is an elegant establishment, severe in external appearance, +but of entirely modern interior arrangements, with a wealth of choice +knickknacks, and is regarded as one of the most attractive houses in Rue +Prony. Since the flight of the pretty courtesan, it bears the sad +notice: <i>Residence to let</i>. Its fast closed shutters give it the gloomy +appearance of a deserted boudoir. Complete silence succeeds feverish +bustle! Vanda was a boisterous, madcap spendthrift. Through the old +windows with their old-fashioned panes there often used to escape +snatches of song, airs of waltzes, fragments of quadrilles. Vanda's +horses pawed the ground spiritedly as they started at the fashionable +hour for the Bois, through the great gateway leading to the stables. And +now, for months, a corner of Rue Prony had been silent and drowsy, and +weighted with the melancholy that surrounds forsaken objects.</p> + +<p>It was here that Marianne, in carrying out her determination, entered +with a high head, resolved to cast off her sombre misery or to sink, her +plans defeated. The Dujarrier had greatly assisted her in taking up her +abode, building her hopes on Mademoiselle Kayser's beauty as on some +temporary profitable investment. As the old <a name="Page_251" id="Page_251"></a>woman looked at her, she +shook her head. Marianne had to be quick. She was pale, already weary, +and her beauty, heightened by this weariness, was "in full blast," as +the former bungling artiste said in her capacity of a connoisseur.</p> + +<p>"After all," Dujarrier said to herself, "it is the favorable moment for +success. One does not become a <i>general</i> except through seniority."</p> + +<p>Marianne also experienced the same feelings as the Dujarrier. She +realized that she had reached the turning-point of her life, it was like +a game of baccarat that she was playing with fate. She might come out of +it rich and preserved from the possibility of dying in a hospital or a +hovel after having dragged her tattered skirts through the streets, or +overwhelmed with debts, ruined forever, strangled by liabilities. This +commercial term made her smile ironically when she thought of it. +Against her she had her past, her adventurous life, almost the life of a +courtesan, carried away by the current of her amorous whims; it now +needed only the burden of liabilities for her to become not only +completely disclassed, but ruined by Parisian life. She had given the +Dujarrier receipts for all that that quasi-silent-partner had advanced +her, the old lady excusing herself for the precaution she took by saying +precisely:</p> + +<p>"In that way one can hold people. Grateful acknowledgments are good; +written acknowledgments are better!"<a name="Page_252" id="Page_252"></a></p> + +<p>The Dujarrier considered herself witty.</p> + +<p>Marianne had signed, moreover, all that the other had asked. She still +needed, indeed, to make further outlay. And what mattered it if she +plunged deeper while she was <i>taking a dive</i>, as she expressed it in her +language, which was a mixture of street slang and the elegant +phraseology of the salon.</p> + +<p>"Bah! I know how to swim."</p> + +<p>She suddenly straightened herself under this anxiety, reassured, +moreover, and spurred on as she was by the Dujarrier herself, who said +as she shrugged her shoulders:</p> + +<p>"When a woman like you has a man like Vaudrey,—a minister,—she has her +nest lined."</p> + +<p>Sulpice was not the man long to resist so refined a Parisienne as +Marianne. In him, the repressed ardors, the poetic ideas of a man of +twenty, had become the appetites of a man of forty. This provincial, +hungry for Parisianism,—very young in feelings and soul,—felt, as soon +as he found himself in Marianne's company, mad with desire for a new +life. The dazzling honors attending his entry into the ministry found +their culmination in the burning glance of Marianne, as their eyes met.</p> + +<p>Hardly was she installed in Rue Prony than she reminded him of his +promise to call on her. He hastened to her with strange eagerness and he +left her more disturbed, as if he had just taken a peep at an unknown +world. The feminine elegance of the Hôtel de Vanda had suddenly +intoxicated him. Marianne played her <a name="Page_253" id="Page_253"></a>part very calmly in producing the +daily ravage that passion was making on Sulpice. She studied its rapid +progress with all the sang-froid of a physician. She regulated the doses +of her toxicant, the poison of her glance instilled into the veins of +this man. Determined to become his mistress, she desired to fall in the +guise of a woman madly in love, and not as an ordinary courtesan. With +any other man than Vaudrey, she would, perhaps, have yielded more +quickly. But she acted with Vaudrey as formerly she had done with Rosas. +Seeing that these idealists caressed their dreams, she coquetted with +platonic love, besides, she preferred to remain free for a short time, +without the burden of those pleasures of which she had grown tired, and +which had always caused her more disgust than delight.</p> + +<p>Moreover, she said to herself that it was necessary in Sulpice's case to +have the appearance of playing frankly, of loving truly, as in the case +of Rosas. But, this time, she would not let Vaudrey escape her by +flight, as the duke did. She would yield at the desired moment, certain +that Sulpice would not leave her the next day.</p> + +<p>"Rosas would be here," she said to herself self-confidently, "if he had +been my lover."</p> + +<p>After a moment of regretful preoccupation, she shrugged her shoulders +and said quickly:</p> + +<p>"Bah! <i>what is written is written</i>, as he said. If I haven't him, I have +the other."</p> + +<p>The "other" grew day by day more deeply enamored.<a name="Page_254" id="Page_254"></a> He rushed off in hot +haste to visit Marianne; his hired hack, in which he sometimes left his +minister's portfolio peacefully at rest, pending his return, stood +before the little door in the Avenue Prony. He was happier when he +thought he had made a forward step in Marianne's affections than when he +had acquired new votes from the minority in the Chamber. Ambitious +projects yielded to the consuming desire that he felt toward this woman. +At the ministry, during the familiar conversations at table with +Adrienne and even during the hurly-burly attendant on private receptions +and morning interviews, he sometimes remained silent, lost in thought, +his mind wandering and, in reality, with Marianne.</p> + +<p>Adrienne, at such times, with a sweet smile which made Sulpice shudder +with remorse, would beseech him to work less, to take some recreation, +and not allow himself to be so absorbed in politics.</p> + +<p>"You are extremely pale, I assure you. You look worn out. You work too +hard."</p> + +<p>"It is due to administrative changes. There are so many documents to +examine."</p> + +<p>"I know that very well, but isn't Monsieur Warcolier there? In what way +does he help you?"</p> + +<p>"In no way," replied the minister sharply, speaking with truth.</p> + +<p>Public affairs, in fact, absorbed him, and he found it necessary to +steal the precious time to make a hasty trip to Rue Prony. A vacation, +it is true, was near. In less <a name="Page_255" id="Page_255"></a>than a month, Vaudrey would have more +time at his disposal. But for more than three weeks yet, the minister +would have everything to modify and change,—everything to put into a +healthy shape, as Warcolier said—in the Hôtel Beauvau.</p> + +<p>What matter! He found the time to fly incognito to the Maison de Vanda, +leaving his coupé at the ministry. Marianne was always there for him +when he arrived. The male domestic or the femme de chambre received him +with all the deference that "domestics" show when they suspect that the +visitor brings any kind of subsidy to the house. To Vaudrey, there was a +sort of mystery in Mademoiselle Kayser's life. Ramel, who knew her uncle +Kayser, had told him of the poverty of the painter. How then, seeing +that her uncle was so shabby, could the niece be so sumptuously +established?</p> + +<p>Kayser, whom he had once met at Marianne's, had answered such a question +by remarking that his niece was a <i>sly puss</i> who understood life +thoroughly and would be sure to make headway. But that was all.</p> + +<p>"I have suspected for a long time that that little head was not capable +of much," the painter had added. "I considered her a light-headed +creature, nothing more. Fool that I was! she is a shrewd woman, a clever +woman, a true woman. I only find fault with her for one thing."</p> + +<p>"What?" asked Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Do you ask what, Monsieur le Ministre? The style <a name="Page_256" id="Page_256"></a>of her establishment. +It is flashy, tawdry, noisy, it is boudoir art. It lacks seriousness! It +lacks morality! I would have in it figures that have style, character. I +don't ask for saintly pictures, but moral allegories, austere art. I +understand only the severe in art. I am a puritan in the matter of the +brush. For that reason, I shall attain nothing in these days of <i>genre</i> +and water-color painting."</p> + +<p>And Kayser went on painting allegories, to digest his dinner, the pâté +de foie gras washed down with kummel, of which he had just partaken at +his niece's.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey himself viewed those Japanese trifles, those screens, those +carpets, those pedestals surmounted by terra-cotta figures presenting in +their nudity the flesh tints of woman, those clock-cases above the +doors, that profusion of knickknacks, of furniture, of ottomans, that +soft upholstery that seemed to be made only to excuse a fall—nay, even +urged to sudden temptations, to chance love, to violent caprices; and on +leaving the house, where he had spoken to Marianne only in compliments a +hundred times repeated, and where she had but re-echoed sarcasms full of +tender, double meanings, as a woman who would undoubtedly yield, but +would not offer herself, he bore away with him in his nostrils and, as +it were, in his clothes, a permeating, feminine odor, which would now +follow him everywhere, and everywhere float about him in whiffs, urging +him to return to that house in which a new world seemed to be opening to +him.<a name="Page_257" id="Page_257"></a></p> + +<p>He would not long persist in enquiring how Marianne Kayser had procured +all those baubles that so highly incensed the puritan instincts of her +honest uncle. He found himself urged forward with profound delight in +this adventure whose mysterious features pleased him. Bah! the very fact +that he found so much inexplicable in the life of this woman enticed him +all the more. It seemed to him that not only had he entered upon a +romantic course, but that he was himself the hero of the romance. Never, +in the days when he rolled about, an unknown student, on the Parisian +wave, and had lifted his thoughts toward some pale patrician girl, +toward some pretty creature he had caught a glimpse of, leaning back in +a dark-blue coupé, or framed in by the red velvet hangings of a +proscenium box, had he more perfectly incarnated the ideal of his desire +than in so charming a creature. Dreams of power, visions of love of his +twentieth year, had now become tangible to him and at forty he stretched +out his feverish hand toward them all.</p> + +<p>"Could Ramel have been right?" he said to himself, "and I, only a +provincial, athirst for Parisine? But what matter? Let Mademoiselle +Kayser be what she will and I what I may be, it seems to me that I have +never loved any one as I love this woman."</p> + +<p>"Not even Adrienne," added a faint, trembling voice from within. But +Sulpice had a ready answer to stifle it: Adrienne could not be compared +with any creature in the world. Adrienne was the charm, the daily +com<a name="Page_258" id="Page_258"></a>fort of the domestic hearth. She was the wife, not the "woman." She +was the darling, not the love. Vaudrey would have severed one of his +arms to spare her any heavy sorrow, but he was not anxious about +Adrienne. She knew nothing, she would know nothing. And what fault, +moreover, had he committed hitherto? In that word <i>hitherto</i>, a host of +mental reservations were involved that Sulpice would gladly have +obliterated with his nails, he was ready to cry out with the same good +faith,—that of the husband who deceives the wife whom he loves:</p> + +<p>"What wrong have I done?"</p> + +<p>One afternoon,—there was no session of the Chamber that day,—Marianne +was seated in her little salon. She was warming the tips of her +slippers, that furtively peeped from beneath the lace of her skirt as a +little bird might protrude its beak from a nest, her right leg crossed +over the other, and she appeared to be musing, her chin resting on her +delicate hand.</p> + +<p>She was weary. Justine, her recently engaged femme de chambre, who, like +the silverware, was provided by the Dujarrier, came to announce with the +discreet, bantering little smile of servants, that Monsieur Dachet, the +upholsterer, had called twice.</p> + +<p>"The upholsterer!"</p> + +<p>Marianne frowned slightly.</p> + +<p>"What did he say?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, that he would return to-morrow."<a name="Page_259" id="Page_259"></a></p> + +<p>"You call that nothing?" said Marianne, with a short laugh.</p> + +<p>When Justine had left the room, she went straight to a small, black, +Italian cabinet inlaid with ivory, of which one drawer was locked. In +opening it, the sound of gold coins rattling on the wood caused her to +smile; then, with the tips of her white fingers, she spread out the +louis at the bottom of the drawer, which she abruptly closed, making a +wry face, and folding her arms, she returned to her seat in front of the +fire, beating her right foot nervously upon the wrought-iron fender.</p> + +<p>"The Dujarrier's money will not go much further," she thought. "It is +finished."</p> + +<p>She thought of striking a decisive blow. Up to the present time, her +relations with Sulpice had floated in the regions of the +sentimentalities of the novel, or of romance. The minister believed +himself loved for love's sake. He saw in Marianne only an eccentric girl +free from all prejudices and every duty, who disposed of her life as +seemed best to her, without being under the necessity of accounting to +either husband or lover. Free, she made of her liberty pleasure or +passion according to her fancy. The frightful, practical questions, the +daily necessities, were lost sight of by this man who was burdened with +the governmental question of France. Again, he never asked himself the +source of Marianne's luxury. He delighted in it without thinking of +analyzing anything or of knowing anything, and this ingenuously.<a name="Page_260" id="Page_260"></a> +Mademoiselle Kayser's first word must necessarily awaken him to the +situation.</p> + +<p>She knew that Vaudrey was to come, and suddenly leaving the fire, she +arrayed herself for him in a black satin peignoir lined with red surah, +with lapels of velvet thrown widely apart and allowing the whiteness of +her neck and chest to be seen under folds of old lace. Her fair hair +fell upon her velvet collar, and surmounting this strange costume, her +pale face against the background of the red-draped salon assumed the +disturbing charm of an apparition.</p> + +<p>On seeing her, Sulpice could not refrain from stopping short and looking +at her in admiration. Seated there, in the centre of her salon, she was +awaiting him and arranging bundles of papers in a basket with gilded +feet and lined with pink satin. She extended her hand to him. It was a +pale hand, as inanimate as the hand of a dead person, and she languidly +asked him why he remained there stupefied without approaching her.</p> + +<p>"I am looking," said the minister.</p> + +<p>"You are always the most gallant of men," said Marianne, and she added:</p> + +<p>"You are not already tired then of looking at me? Usually, caprices do +not last so long."</p> + +<p>"The affection that I have for you is not a caprice."</p> + +<p>"What is it, then? I am curious—"</p> + +<p>"It is a passion, Marianne, an absolute, deep, mad passion—"<a name="Page_261" id="Page_261"></a></p> + +<p>"Oh! nonsense! nonsense!" said Marianne. "I know that you speak +wonderfully well, I have heard you in the tribune. A declaration of love +costs you no more than a ministerial declaration. But to-day, my dear +minister, I am not disposed to listen to it even from you."</p> + +<p>In these last words, there was a certain tenderness that in a measure +modified the expression of weariness or sulkiness which Marianne +suggested. Sulpice inferred therefrom an implied acceptance of his +proffered love.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said she abruptly; "I am very sad, frightfully sad."</p> + +<p>"Without a cause?" asked Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I am not of those who allow their nerves to control them. When I am +out of sorts, there is invariably a cause. Let that be understood once +for all."</p> + +<p>"And the cause?—I should be delighted to learn it, Marianne, for I +swear to you that I would always bear a half of your troubles and +pains."</p> + +<p>"Thanks!—But in life there are troubles so commonplace that one could +only acknowledge them to the most intimate friends."</p> + +<p>"You have no more devoted friend than I am," replied Vaudrey, in a tone +that conveyed unmistakable conviction.<a name="Page_262" id="Page_262"></a></p> + +<p>She knew it positively. She could read that heart like an open page.</p> + +<p>"When one meets friends like you, one is the more solicitous to keep +them and to avoid saddening them with stupid affairs."</p> + +<p>"But why?" asked Vaudrey, drawing close to Marianne. "What troubles you? +I beseech you to tell me!"</p> + +<p>He gazed earnestly at her eyes, seeking in the depths of their blue +pupils a secret or a confession that evaded him, and with an instinctive +movement he seized Marianne's hands which she abandoned to him; they +were quite cold. As he bent toward her to plead with her to speak, he +felt her gentle breath, inhaled the perfume of her delicate, fair skin, +and saw the exquisite curves of her body outlined beneath the black +folds of her satin peignoir. Marianne's knee gently pressed his own +while her heavy eyelids fell like veils over the young woman's eyes, in +which Vaudrey thought he observed tears.</p> + +<p>"Marianne, I entreat you, if you have any sorrow whatever, that I can +assuage, I pray you, tell me of it!"</p> + +<p>"Eh! if it were a sorrow!—" she said, quickly withdrawing her left hand +from Sulpice's warm grasp. "But it is worse: it is a financial worry, +yes, financial," she said brusquely, on observing that Vaudrey's face +depicted astonishment.</p> + +<p>She seized the handful of papers that she had thrown <a name="Page_263" id="Page_263"></a>into the +work-basket, and said in a tone that was expressive of mingled wrath and +disgust:</p> + +<p>"There now, you see that? They are bills for this house: the accounts of +clamorous creditors, upholsterers, locksmiths, builders and I don't know +what besides!"</p> + +<p>"What! your house?"</p> + +<p>"You thought that I had paid for it? It is a rented one and nothing in +it is paid for. I owe for all, and to a hungry pack."</p> + +<p>She began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Do you imagine then that old Kayser's niece could lead this life in +which you see her? Without a sou, should I possess all that you see +here?—No!—I have perpetrated the folly of ordering all these things +for which I am now indebted and which must be paid for at once, and now +I am about to be sued. There! you were determined to urge me to confess +all that—Such are my worries and they are not yours, so I ask your +pardon, my dear Vaudrey: so let us talk of something else. Well! how did +the Fraynais interpellation turn out?—What has taken place in the +Chamber?"</p> + +<p>"Let us speak only of you, Marianne," said the minister, who looked at +the young woman with a sort of frank compassion as a friendly physician +looks at a sick person.</p> + +<p>She nervously snapped her fingers and with her feet crossed, beat the +little feverish march that she had previously done.<a name="Page_264" id="Page_264"></a></p> + +<p>He drew still closer to her, trying to calm her and to obtain some +explanation, some information from her; and Marianne, as if she had +already yielded in at once confiding her secret unreflectingly, refused +at present to accord him the full measure of her confidence. She +repeated that nothing that could be a source of annoyance or sordid, +ought to sadden her friends. Besides, one ought to draw the line at +one's life-secret. She was entitled, in fact, to maintain silence. That +Vaudrey should question her so, caused her horrible suffering.</p> + +<p>"And you, Marianne," he said, "you torture me much more by not replying +to me, to whom the least detail of your life is interesting. To me who +see you preoccupied and distressed, when I wish, I swear to you, to +banish all your sadness."</p> + +<p>She turned toward him with an abrupt movement and with her gray, +gold-speckled eyes flashing, she seemed to yield to a violent, sudden +and almost involuntary decision and said to Sulpice:</p> + +<p>"Then you wish to know even the wretchedness of my life? So be it! But I +warn you that it is not very cheerful. For," said she, after a moment's +silence,—Sulpice shuddered under her glance,—"it is better to be +frank, and if you love me as you say you do, you should know me +thoroughly; you can then decide what course to take. For myself, I am +accustomed to deception."</p> + +<p>Ah! although this woman were ready to tell him every<a name="Page_265" id="Page_265"></a>thing, Vaudrey felt +sure that her confidence could only intensify the love that he felt. She +had risen, her arms were crossed over her black gown whose red velvet +trimming suggested open wounds, her ardent eyes were in strong contrast +with her pale face, her lips of unusually heightened color expressed a +strange sensuality that invited a kiss, while her nostrils dilated under +the impulse of bitter anger—standing thus, she began to narrate her +life to Vaudrey who was seated in front of her, looking up to her—as if +at her knees. Her story was a sad one of a wicked childhood, ignorant +youth, wasted early years, melancholy, sins, outbursts of faith, falls, +returns of love, pride, virtue, restitution through repentance, scourged +hopes, dead confidences, the entire heartrending existence of a woman +who had left more of her heart than of the flesh of her body clinging to +the nails of her calvaries:—all, though ordinary and commonplace, was +so cruel in its truth that it appealed at once to Sulpice's heart, a +heart bursting with pity, to that credulous man who was attracted by all +that seemed to him so exquisitely painful and new about this woman.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps I am worrying you?" she asked abruptly.</p> + +<p>"You!" said he.</p> + +<p>He looked at her with a tear in his eye.</p> + +<p>Marianne's eyes gleamed with a sudden light.</p> + +<p>"Well!" she said, "such is my life! I have loved, I have been betrayed. +I have had faith in some one and I awakened one fine morning with this +prospect before <a name="Page_266" id="Page_266"></a>me: to sink in the deep mud or to do like so many +others,—to take a lover and save myself through luxury, since I could +not recover myself through passion. Bah! the world shows more leniency +toward those who succeed than toward those who repent. All that is +necessary is to succeed, and on my word—you know Monsieur de Rosas +well?"</p> + +<p>"No," stammered Vaudrey, before whose mind the duke's blond face +appeared.</p> + +<p>"You heard him the other evening!"</p> + +<p>"I mean that I have never spoken to him. Well! what of Monsieur de +Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas loved me. Oh!" she said, interrupting a gesture made +by Vaudrey, "wait. He said that he loved me. He is rich. Why should I +not have been Rosas's mistress? Deal for deal, that was a good bargain, +at least! I accept Rosas! It was to receive him that I was foolish +enough to make my purchases without reckoning, without knowing. What's +that for a Rosas?" she said, as she crushed the bundle of bills between +her fingers.</p> + +<p>"And—Monsieur de Rosas?" asked Vaudrey, who was quite pale.</p> + +<p>"He?"</p> + +<p>Marianne laughed.</p> + +<p>"Well, he has gone—I have told you as much. He has, moreover, perhaps, +done wisely. I regretted him momentarily—but, bah! I should have sent +him away—<a name="Page_267" id="Page_267"></a>yes, very quickly, just so! without even allowing him to +touch the tips of my fingers."</p> + +<p>"Rosas?" repeated the minister, looking keenly into Marianne's eyes.</p> + +<p>"Rosas!" she again said, lowering her voice. "And do you know why I +would have done that?"</p> + +<p>"No—" answered Sulpice trembling.</p> + +<p>"Simply because I no longer loved him, and that I loved another."</p> + +<p>She had spoken these last words slowly and in such passionate, vibrating +tones that Sulpice felt himself shudder with delight.</p> + +<p>"Ah," he said, as he went toward her, "is that the reason? Truly, +Marianne, is that the reason?"</p> + +<p>She had not confessed whom she loved, she had spoken only by her looks. +But Sulpice felt that he belonged to her, he was burning with passion, +transported, insane from this avowal; his hands sought hers and drew her +to him. He clasped her to his bosom, intoxicated by the pressure of this +body against his own, and added in a very low tone while his fingers +alternately wandered over her satiny neck and her silky hair:</p> + +<p>"How can I help loving you, Marianne? Is it true, really true? You love +me?—Ah! what the great nobleman has not done, do you think I cannot do? +You are in your own home, you understand, Marianne.—Then, as he touched +the young woman's exquisite ears with his lips, he added:<a name="Page_268" id="Page_268"></a></p> + +<p>"Our home—will you have it so?—Our home!—"</p> + +<p>He felt, as she remained in his embrace with her body leaning against +his, that she quivered throughout her frame; his lips wandered from her +ear to her cheek and then to her lips, there they rested long in a +ravishing kiss that filled him with the languishing sensation of +swooning, he holding her so tightly that, with a smile, she disengaged +herself, pink with her blushes, and bright-eyed, said, with an +expression of peculiar delight:</p> + +<p>"It is sealed now!"</p> + +<p>Sulpice, even in his youthful days, had never felt so intoxicating a +sensation as that which he enjoyed to-day. It was a complete abandonment +of himself, a forgetfulness of everything in the presence of his +absolute intoxication. All the realities of life that were ready to take +possession of him on leaving this place melted before this dream: the +possession of that woman. He forgot the assembly, the foyer, that human +crowd that he ruled from the height of the tribune, and Adrienne, who +was seated yonder at the window, awaiting him. He forgot everything. +Like those who possess the singular faculty of easily receiving and +losing impressions, he fancied that his horizon was limited to these +walls with their silken hangings, these carpets, this feminine salon, +opening on a boudoir, a retreat whence escaped the odors of flowers and +perfume bottles.</p> + +<p>Then, too, a special feeling of pride entered his heart. He felt his joy +increased tenfold at the thought that he, <a name="Page_269" id="Page_269"></a>the petty bourgeois from +Grenoble, had snatched this woman from a duke and, like a great +nobleman, had paid the debts that she had contracted. He raised his head +proudly from an instinctive impulse of vanity. Rosas! He, the son of +honest Dauphiny folks, would crush him with his liberality.</p> + +<p>"What shall I do to silence those creditors?" he said to +Marianne,—whose hands he held and whose face grazed his in a way that +almost made him frantic.</p> + +<p>"Nothing," she replied. "What you have promised me is enough. Now I feel +that I am saved. Our house, you said so, we are in our own house here. +If the creditors will not believe me when I tell them to have +patience—"</p> + +<p>"They will believe you," said Vaudrey. "Come, we will find the means—On +my signature, any one will lend me money."</p> + +<p>It seemed that Marianne was expecting this word <i>money</i>, coarse but +eloquent, in order to tell Vaudrey that an old friend, Claire Dujarrier, +was on intimate terms with a certain Adolphe Gochard, who upon the +endorsement of a responsible person, would certainly advance a hundred +thousand francs that he had at this moment lying idle. Gochard only +needed a bill of exchange in his favor for one hundred thousand francs +at three months' date, plus interest at five per cent. This Gochard was +a very straightforward capitalist, who did not make it a business to +lend money, but merely to oblige.<a name="Page_270" id="Page_270"></a> It was Madame Dujarrier who had +introduced him and Marianne would have already availed herself of his +courtesy, if she had believed herself able to repay it at the appointed +date.</p> + +<p>"And where does this Monsieur Gochard live?" Vaudrey promptly asked.</p> + +<p>"Oh! it would not be necessary for you to go to see him," replied +Marianne. "On receipt of a bill of exchange from me, Madame Dujarrier +would undertake to let me have a hundred thousand francs from hand to +hand."</p> + +<p>"A hundred thousand francs!—In three months," said Vaudrey to himself, +"in a vast placer like Paris, one can find many veins of gold."</p> + +<p>He had, besides, his personal property and land in Dauphiny. If need be, +without Adrienne's even knowing it, he could mortgage his farms at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont!</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas would not have hesitated. But in his case there would +have been no merit," said Mademoiselle Kayser.</p> + +<p>At the name of that man, coupled with the recollection of him, Sulpice +felt himself spurred to a decision. Clearly the great millionaire noble +would not have delayed before snatching this woman from the claws of her +creditors. A hundred thousand francs, a mere trifle for the count! Well, +Vaudrey would give it as the Spaniard would have done. He would find it. +Within three <a name="Page_271" id="Page_271"></a>months, he would have put everything right; he did not +know how, but that mattered little.</p> + +<p>"Have you a pen, Marianne?"</p> + +<p>The minister had not noticed the sheet of white paper that was lying on +the blotting pad of Russia leather, among the satin finished envelopes +and the ivory paper-cutters.</p> + +<p>"What are you going to do, my friend?"</p> + +<p>She pretended to put away the green, sharkskin penholder lying near the +inkstand, but drew it imperceptibly nearer to Sulpice, who with a quick +movement had already seated himself in front of the secrétaire.</p> + +<p>"A minister's signature is sufficient, I suppose?" he said with a smile.</p> + +<p>He commenced to write.</p> + +<p>"What did you say?—Gochard?—"</p> + +<p>She was quite pale as she looked over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him +rapidly write several lines on the paper, then she spelled:</p> + +<p>"Adolphe Gochard—Go-go-c-h-ar-d."</p> + +<p>"There it is!" he said, as he handed her the sheet of paper.</p> + +<p>"I wish to know what is thereon, or I would never consent."</p> + +<p>She took the paper between her fingers as if to tear it to pieces. +Sulpice prevented her.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, "I request you to keep it; it is the best reply you can +give to those people.—Rely on me!"<a name="Page_272" id="Page_272"></a></p> + +<p>"Do you wish it?" asked Marianne, with a toss of her head, speaking in a +very sweet voice.</p> + +<p>"Decidedly. It is selfish, but I wish to feel myself not a little at +home here," Sulpice replied.</p> + +<p>He seized her hands, her plump, soft, coaxing hands, and as he clasped +them within his own, he carried them to his lips and kissed them, as +well as her face, neck, ear and mouth, which he covered with kisses; and +Marianne, still holding the satin paper that the minister had just +signed, said with a laugh as she feebly defended herself:</p> + +<p>"Come—come—have done with it! Oh! the big boy!—You will leave nothing +for another time!"</p> + +<p>He left the house, his head was swimming, and he was permeated with +strong odors. He flung to the coachman an address half-way to the +ministry.</p> + +<p>"Place de la Madeleine."</p> + +<p><a name="typo_4" id="typo_4"></a>He shut his eyes to picture Marianne.</p> + +<p>As soon as she was alone, her lips curled as a smile of satisfied vanity +played over them. She began by reading the lines that he had so hastily +written: <i>I guarantee to Monsieur Adolphe Gochard a bill of exchange at +three months, if he agrees to advance that amount to Mademoiselle +Dujarrier who will hand it to Mademoiselle Marianne Kayser</i>.</p> + +<p>"Well! the Dujarrier was right," she said; "a woman's scheming works +easier than a sinapism."</p> + +<p>Then, after a slight toss of the head and still smiling, she opened one +of the drawers of the small Inaltia <a name="Page_273" id="Page_273"></a>cabinet and slipped into it the +satin paper to which the minister had affixed his signature and which +she had carefully folded four times. She considered that autograph worth +a thousand times more gold than the few pieces that remained scattered +about the drawer, like so many waifs of luxury. Then, slowly returning +to her armchair, she sank into it, clasping her two hands behind her +head and gazing at the ceiling, her thoughts wandered in dreams—a crowd +of little ambitious thoughts passed through her brain like drifting +clouds across the sky—and while with the top of her foot she again beat +her nervous march on the hem of her petticoat, her lips, the lips whose +fever had been taken away by Vaudrey, still preserved the strange turn +of the corners that indicated the unsatiated person who sees, however, +his opportunity arrive.</p> + +<p>She was as fully mistress of herself as Vaudrey was embarrassed and +unbalanced. He seemed to hear voices laughing and singing within him and +his brain was inflamed with joy. Before him opened the immense prospects +of his dreams. Glorious as it was to be all-powerful, it was better to +be loved. Everything whirled about within his brain, he thought he still +heard Denis Ramel talking to him, and in a twinkling, Marianne's smiling +face appeared, and with a kiss she interrupted the old journalist's +sallies, and Sulpice saw her, too, as it were half-fainting, through the +window of her fiacre, like a pastel half-hidden beneath the glass.<a name="Page_274" id="Page_274"></a></p> + +<p>He was delighted to walk about for a moment when the carriage had set +him down on the asphalted space that surrounds the Madeleine. The walk +was beneficial. He raised his head instinctively, expanded his lungs +with the air, and threw out his chest. He thought that people looked at +him attentively. Some passers-by turned round to see him. He would have +felt prouder to have heard them say: "That is Mademoiselle Kayser's +lover!" than: "That is Monsieur Vaudrey, the minister!"</p> + +<p>He felt a kind of annoyance on returning to Place Beauvau. He was still +with Marianne. He recalled her attitudes, her smile, the tone of her +voice. Public matters now fastened their collar on him, there were +signatures to be subscribed, reports to be read, telegrams, routine +work; in a word, vulgar professional duties were to be resumed. He did +not at once go to his cabinet. Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State, +received and despatched ordinary matters.</p> + +<p>Through some strange caprice, he felt a desire to see Adrienne very soon +after leaving Marianne, perhaps to know how he would feel and if "<i>cela +se voyait</i>" as they say. There was also a feeling of remorse involved in +this eagerness. He wished to satisfy himself that Adrienne was not +suffering, and as formerly, to smile on her as if redoubled affection +would, in his own eyes, obliterate his fault.</p> + +<p>Adrienne was in her salon. Sulpice heard the sound of voices beyond the +door. Some one was talking.<a name="Page_275" id="Page_275"></a><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276"></a><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277"></a></p> + +<p>"Madame has a visitor?" he inquired of the domestic.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Monsieur le Ministre—Monsieur de Lissac."</p> + +<p>"What! Guy! what chance brings him here!" Sulpice thought.</p> + +<p>He opened the door and entered, extending his hand to his friend.</p> + +<p>"How lucky! it is very kind of you to come."</p> + +<p>Guy stood, hat in hand, while Vaudrey stooped toward Adrienne to kiss +her brow unceremoniously in the presence of his friend.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Lissac, "I have not come to greet Your Excellency. It is your +charming wife that I have called on."</p> + +<p>"I thank you for it," said Sulpice, "my poor Adrienne does not receive +many visits outside the circle of official relations."</p> + +<p>"And she does not get very much entertainment! So I promise myself to +come and pay court to her—or such court as you would wish—from time to +time. Madame," said Lissac jocosely, "it is a fact that this devilish +minister deserves that you should receive declarations from morning to +night while he is over yonder ogling his portfolio. Such a husband as he +is, is not to be found again—"</p> + +<p>Adrienne, blushing a little, looked at Vaudrey with her usual expression +of tender devotion as profound as her soul. Sulpice made an effort to +smile at Lissac's pleasantries.<a name="Page_278" id="Page_278"></a></p> + +<p>"No, take care, you know!" added Guy. "As Madame Vaudrey is so often +alone, I shall allow myself to come here sometimes to keep her company, +and I won't guarantee to you that I won't fall in love with her."</p> + +<p>He turned respectfully toward Adrienne and added, with the correct +bearing of a gentleman:</p> + +<p>"Madame, all this is only to make him comprehend that nothing in the +world, not even a rag of morocco,—is his portfolio a morocco one?—is +worth the happiness of having such a wife as you. And the miserable +fellow doesn't suspect it. You see, I speak of you as the Opposition +journals do."</p> + +<p>Sulpice tried to smile but he divined under Guy's jesting, a serious and +truthful purpose. Perhaps Adrienne had just been allowing herself to +complain of the sadness and dreariness of her life. He was hurt by it. +After all, he did all that he could to gratify his wife. But a man like +him was not, in fact, born to remain forever tied down. The wife of a +minister must bear her part of the burden, since there must be a burden.</p> + +<p>As if Adrienne had divined Sulpice's very thoughts, she quickly added, +interrupting the jester who had somewhat confused the minister:</p> + +<p>"Don't pay any attention to Monsieur de Lissac. I am very happy just as +I am."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had taken her hand to clasp it between his fingers with a +slightly nervous grasp. The trustful, good-natured, pure smile that +Adrienne gave him, re<a name="Page_279" id="Page_279"></a>called the anxious, distracted expression on +Marianne's lip.</p> + +<p>"Dear wife!"</p> + +<p>He sought to find a word, a cry, some consolation, a sort of caress, +proceeding from one heart and penetrating the other. He could find none.</p> + +<p>"Come!" said Guy. "I am going to leave you, and if you will allow me, +madame, I will occasionally come here and tell you all the outside +tittle-tattle."</p> + +<p>"You will always be welcome, Monsieur de Lissac," Adrienne said, as she +extended her hand to him.</p> + +<p>Guy bowed to Madame Vaudrey in a most profoundly respectful way.</p> + +<p>Sulpice accompanied him through the salons as far as the hall.</p> + +<p>"Do you want me to tell you?" said Lissac. "Your wife is very weary, +take care! This big mansion is not very cheerful. One must inevitably +catch colds in it, and then a woman to be all alone here! A form of +imprisonment! Do not neglect to wheedle the majority, my dear minister, +but don't forget your wife. Come! I will not act traitorously toward +you, but I warn you that if I often find your wife melancholy, as she is +to-day, I will tell her that I adore her. Yes! yes! your wife is +charming. I would give all the orders in the world for a lock of her +hair. Adieu, Monsieur le Ministre."</p> + +<p>"Great idiot," said Vaudrey, giving him a little friendly, gentle tap on +the neck.<a name="Page_280" id="Page_280"></a></p> + +<p>"Be it so, but if you do not love her well enough, I shall fall in love +with her, and I forewarn you that it is much better that I should than +any other. Au revoir."</p> + +<p>"Au revoir!" Sulpice repeated.</p> + +<p>He tried now to force a smile and went down to his cabinet, where he +found heaped-up reports awaiting his attention and he turned the pages +over nervously and read them in a very bad humor.</p> + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<p class="frmatter"><a name="ill_272" id="ill_272"></a><b>Part Second Chapter I</b></p> + +<p class="center"><i>She was quite pale as she looked +over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him rapidly write several lines on the +paper, then she spelled:</i></p> + +<p class="center"><i>"Adolphe Gochard—Go-go-ch-a-r-d."</i></p> + +<p class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/page272.png" width="433" height="619" alt="[Illustration: SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE]" title="SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE" /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_II" id="II_II"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>II</h3> + + +<p>Madame Vaudrey drew no real pleasure from the commonplace receptions at +the ministry, or at her Wednesday <i>at homes</i>, except when by chance, +Denis Ramel permitted himself to abandon the Batignolles to call at +Place Beauvau, or when Guy enlivened this dull spot by recounting the +happenings of the outside world.</p> + +<p>Adrienne felt herself terribly isolated; she knew hardly any one in +Paris. Since Vaudrey had installed himself in Rue de la +Chaussée-d'Antin, she had not had time to form acquaintances among the +wives of the deputies to the Assembly, the majority of whom lived in the +provinces or dwelt at Versailles for economical reasons.</p> + +<p>Evidently the residence at the ministry had only brought her ready-made +relations, depressingly inevitable visitors who resembled office-seekers +or clients. These <a name="Page_281" id="Page_281"></a>official receptions filled her with sadness. The +conversation always took the same hackneyed tone, disgusting in its +flattery or disquieting by reason of its allusions. People discussed +coming interpellations of ministers; government majorities, projected +legislation; the same phrases, as dreary as showers, fell with all the +regularity of drops of rain. Even young girls, brought up in this centre +of infuriated politicians, spoke of the breaking up of the majority, +reports or ballots, in the same manner as shopkeepers talk of their +trade.</p> + +<p>Poor Adrienne exerted herself to acquire an interest in these matters. +Since her husband's very existence was involved therein, hers should +also be. She had, however, formerly dreamed of an entirely different +youth and on bright, sunshiny days she reflected that yonder on the +banks of the Isère, it was delightful in her sweet, little, provincial +house.</p> + +<p>Besides, she carefully concealed her melancholy. She knew that she was +already reproached for being somewhat sad. A minister's wife should know +how to smile. This was what Madame Marsy never failed to repeat to her +as often as possible when she visited her at Place Beauvau. This woman +who hardly concerned herself at all about her son, allowing him to grow +up badly enough and committing all her maternal duties to the +grandmother, was perpetually cheerful, notwithstanding that her life had +been chequered by chance and her widowhood of sufficiently dramatic +character, as was said.<a name="Page_282" id="Page_282"></a> She endeavored to play the part of an adviser, +an intimate friend to Adrienne. She frequently said to Madame Gerson, +who rarely left her, that Madame Vaudrey would be altogether charming if +she had <i>chic</i>.</p> + +<p>"Unfortunately, she is provincial; not in her element. She still smacks +of Dauphiny. And then—what is the funniest thing: she knows nothing of +politics."</p> + +<p>"She does not even concern herself about it," said the pretty Madame +Gerson, laughing heartily.</p> + +<p>According to these ladies she did not take the trouble to fulfil the +rôle of a minister's wife faultlessly. Ah! if only Sabine or Blanche +Gerson occupied the position filled by this <i>petite bourgeoise</i> of +Grenoble! Well! Paris would have seen what an Athenian Republic was.</p> + +<p>Sabine Marsy was decidedly clever. She politely advised Adrienne, +without appearing to do so, as to many matters, in such a way as to +convey reproof under the guise of kindness. Madame Vaudrey would have +done well, as Madame Gerson also observed, to have studied the <i>Code du +Cérémonial</i> on reaching Place Beauvau.</p> + +<p>Like Madame Marsy, Madame Gerson had gradually gained Adrienne's +friendship. From an ostentatious desire to be able to tell of what +happened at the ministry; to be on the first list of guests, when the +minister received or gave a ball, Sabine Marsy, who had suffered from +the mania of aspiring to become an artist, patronized the +<i>intransigeant</i> painters and exhibited at the salon, now set her mind on +playing the rôle of a <a name="Page_283" id="Page_283"></a>political figure in Paris. Madame Gerson, +<i>Blanche</i>, as Sabine called her, had a similar ambition, but simply from +a desire to be in fashion.</p> + +<p>She wished to bring herself into notice. Everything attracted her, +tempted her. She belonged, body and soul, to that machine with its +manifold gearing, brilliant, noisy, active, puffing like a locomotive, +that is called <i>chic</i>. <i>Chic</i>, that indefinite, indefinable word, +changeable and subtle like a capillary hygrometer, is a Parisian tyranny +that grinds out more fashionable lives than the King of Dahomey offers +as victims on his great feast days. For Blanche, everything in this most +stimulated, over-excited, feverishly deranged life, was reduced to these +two inevitable conclusions: what was <i>chic</i> and what was not <i>chic</i>. Not +only was this the inevitable guide in reference to style, clothing, hat, +gloves, costume, material, jewelry, the dress that she should wear, but +also the book that should be read, the play that should be heard, the +operatic score that should be strummed on the piano, the bonbon that +should be presented, the opinion that one should hold, the picture one +should comment upon, all was hopelessly a question of <i>chic</i>.</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson would have preferred to be compromised in the matter of +her honor rather than to be ridiculed as to her opinions or to express +an idea that was not chic. The necessary result was that all this +woman's conversation—and she often came to see Madame Vaudrey,—was on +well-known topics; so that Adrienne knew <a name="Page_284" id="Page_284"></a>in advance what Blanche's +opinion was upon such and such a matter, and that ideas could only pass +muster with Madame Gerson when they bore the stamp of chic, just as a +coin, to escape suspicion of being counterfeit, must bear the stamp of +the mint.</p> + +<p>Blanche would have been heartbroken if she had not been seen in the +President's salon on the occasion of a great reception at the Élysée; at +the ministry, on the evening of a comedy; if she had not been in the +front rank of the ladies' gallery on the day of interpellation at the +Assembly; if she had not been greeted from the top of the grand stand by +some minister, on Grand Prix day; if she had not been the first at the +varnishing; the first at the general rehearsals, a little <i>chic</i>,—the +first everywhere. Slender, delicate, but hardy as a Parisian, she +dragged her exhausted husband, with her hand of fine steel, through +receptions, balls, soirées, salons, talking loudly, judging everything, +chattering, cackling and haranguing, delighted to mount, with head +erect, the grand staircase of a minister and feel the joy of plunging +her little feet into the official moquettes as if her heels had been +made for state carpets; swelling with pride when she heard the usher, +amid the hubbub of the reception, call loudly the name which meant the +fashionable couple, a couple found at every fête:</p> + +<p>"Monsieur and Madame Gerson!"</p> + +<p>While the husband, fatigued, weary, left his office heavy-headed, after +having eaten a hasty meal, put on his <a name="Page_285" id="Page_285"></a>dress coat and white tie in +haste, got into his carriage in haste, hurriedly accompanied his wife, +left her in order to take a doze on an armchair during the height of the +ball, woke in haste, returned home in haste, slept hurriedly, rose the +same, dragging this indefatigable creature about with him like a +convict's chain, she smiled at others, enticed others, waltzed with +others, adorned herself for others, keeping for him only her weariness, +her yawns, her pallor and her sick-headaches.</p> + +<p>For these two galley-slaves of <i>chic</i>, the winter passed in this manner, +as fatiguing as months of penal servitude, and they went none too soon, +when the summer arrived, to breathe the sea air or enjoy the sunshine of +the country, in order to restore their frames, wan, worn-out, seedy and +"gruelled," as Sabine Marsy said, when she recalled her connection with +the artists.</p> + +<p>"Ah! how much better I like my home!" thought Madame Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>Sabine and Madame Gerson, with the wives of the ministers, those of the +chiefs of departments, and the regular visitors, were the most assiduous +in their attentions to Adrienne, whom they considered decidedly +provincial. She, stupefied, was alarmed by these Parisian bustlers, that +resembled machines in running order, jabbering away as music-boxes play.</p> + +<p>"Do they tire you?" said Guy de Lissac to her bluntly one evening, +succumbing to a feeling of pity for this pensive young woman,—who was a +hundred times <a name="Page_286" id="Page_286"></a>prettier than Madame Gerson, whose beauty was so highly +extolled in the journals,—this minister's wife, who voluntarily kept +herself in the background with a timidity that betrayed no awkwardness, +but was in every way attractive, especially to a man about town like +Guy.</p> + +<p>"They do not tire me, they upset me," Adrienne replied.</p> + +<p>"Ah! they are in full <i>go</i>, as it is called. An express train. But they +amuse themselves so much that they have not even time to smile. When the +locomotive spins along too rapidly, try to distinguish the scenery!"</p> + +<p>Adrienne instinctively felt that under his irony this sceptic disguised +a sort of sincerity. Lissac's wit pleased her. He surprised her somewhat +at times, but the probably assumed raillery of the young man compensated +for the insipid nonsense of the conversation to which she listened +daily.</p> + +<p>At first from mere curiosity and after from a sentiment of respectful +devotion, Guy was impelled to study that delicate and sensitive nature, +entirely swayed by love of Sulpice, that suffered at times a vague +pressure as of some indefinable anguish at the throat, as if a vacuum—a +choking vacuum—had been created about her by some air-pump.</p> + +<p>This huge mansion seemed to her to be entirely innocent of all memories, +and though peopled with phantoms, was as commonplace and vulgar as an +apartment house. There were no associations save dust and cracks. These +<a name="Page_287" id="Page_287"></a>salons, built for the Maréchal de Beauvau, these walls that had +listened to the sobs of Madame d'Houdetot at the death-bed of +Saint-Lambert, appeared to Adrienne to exude ennui, strangling and +inevitable ennui, solemn, official, absolute ennui, nothing but ennui in +the very decorum of the place, and isolation in the midst of power.</p> + +<p>She cursed her loneliness, she felt lost amid the salons of this +furnished ministerial mansion, whose cold, gloomy apartments, with the +chairs symmetrically arranged along the walls, she wandered through, but +evidently without expecting any one: state chairs lacking +occupants,—ordinary chairs, domestic chairs seem to have tongues—that +never exchanged conversation. Vast, deserted rooms where the green +curtains behind the glass doors of the bookcases were eternally drawn, +bookcases without books, forever open, mournful as empty sepulchres.</p> + +<p>Yes, this immense gilded dwelling with its Gobelins tapestries stifled +her with its terrifying gloom, where nothing, not a single article, +recalled her charming provincial home, her Grenoble house with its +garden filled with lilacs where she was often wont to read while Sulpice +worked upstairs, bent over his table crowded with papers, before his +open window. Ah! those cherished rooms, in the humble corner of the +provincial home, their happy crouching in the peaceful nest; aye, even +the happy first days in Paris, in the Chaussée-d'Antin apartments, in +which Adrienne at least felt herself in her <a name="Page_288" id="Page_288"></a>own home, free in her +actions and thoughts, and where she could talk aloud without feeling +that an eye was constantly watching her, and ears were always strained, +in fact, a perpetual espionage upon all her actions and a criticism of +all her words.</p> + +<p>She had reached a point when she asked herself if, even for Sulpice, +happiness was not far removed from this life of slavery, of feverish +politics, which for some time past had been visibly paling his cheeks +and rendering him nervous and altogether different from of old.</p> + +<p>"If you did not love me so much," she said with a sweet smile, "I could +believe that you loved me no longer."</p> + +<p>"What folly! you have only one rival, Adrienne."</p> + +<p>"Ah! I know that very well, but that robs me of everything. It is +politics. Come! be great, and I shall be happy or resigned, as you wish. +I adore you so much! I would give you my life, so I would gladly give +you my days of weariness!"</p> + +<p>Although she was rich, she strove to introduce into her official +surroundings the bourgeois and provincial orderly methods that she had +been so virtuously taught. She found that her desserts vanished with +frightful rapidity, that dishes scarcely touched and bottles whose +contents had only been tasted, were removed to the kitchen. She +commented thereon, but the somewhat contemptuous smile of her domestics +was her only reply and it made her feel ashamed.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289"></a>Vaudrey's predecessor, Monsieur Pichereau, was exacting, +<i>close-fisted</i>. His table was meagre but there was nothing astonishing +in that, Monsieur Pichereau had a delicate stomach. Well and good, but +the predecessors of Monsieur Pichereau, they had given fêtes, they had! +It is true that one was a count and the other a marquis. One can always +tell a gentleman anywhere.</p> + +<p>One evening, they heard one of the domestics of the ministry say to +another:</p> + +<p>"As if it were not our money that the ministers spend! It is the +electors' money. They give us wages: we give them salaries. There it +is!"</p> + +<p>The domestic was discharged immediately, but these remarks, however, +recurred to Adrienne's memory and filled her with dislike for the +flunkeyism that surrounded her, waiting on her with cold civility, but +without any attachment, like hotel waiters or girls at an inn that one +will leave the next day, giving them a gratuity.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey saw much less of these daily little wounds. He lived in an +atmosphere of constant flattery, favor-begging cloaked under +complimentary phrases. Had he leisure, he would have been able to +calculate with mathematical exactitude how many angles the human form +would describe in the process of bowing and scraping. In his department, +everybody asked for something or got someone else to ask. <i>Promotion</i>, +that insatiable hunger, was the greedy dream of all that little world of +intriguing, underhand, begging employés, who opened <a name="Page_290" id="Page_290"></a>up around the new +minister so many approaches, like military lines around a redoubt.</p> + +<p>Sulpice felt himself besieged and the target for a crowd of greedy +ambitions. The sub-heads of departments cast bitterly envious glances at +the offices of chiefs, like hungry beggars hypnotized by the display at +Chevet's. Commendatory letters rained on him. This shower of +begging-missives nauseated the minister to such an extent that he +endeavored to arrest the stream, ordering Warcolier, the Under Secretary +of State, to be called and requesting him to reply to the deputies, to +the senators, to everybody, in fact: that he had no influence to use, +that the era of favoritism was over; that he, Vaudrey, understood that +only merit would receive official gifts. "Merit only. You understand, +Monsieur Warcolier?"</p> + +<p>Warcolier rolled his huge eyes in astonishment; then, with the +self-satisfied smile of an expressionless beau, after passing his fat +hand through his long whiskers, yellow and streaked with gray, that +decorated his rosy cheeks, he remarked doctorally, that Monsieur le +Ministre was entering on a path that, in all conscience, he could +qualify as being only dangerous. Eh! <i>bon Dieu!</i> one must do something +for one's friends!—Vaudrey's accession to the Department of the +Interior had given birth to many new hopes; on all grounds they must be +satisfied. Vaudrey would never be forgiven for such deception.<a name="Page_291" id="Page_291"></a></p> + +<p>"What deception?" asked Sulpice. "I promised reforms and I am going to +carry them out, but people laugh at my reforms and ask what?—Places."</p> + +<p>"Bless me!" replied Warcolier, "entirely logical."</p> + +<p>"Be it so! but there are places and places. I cannot, however, retire a +whole staff of employés to give place to a new one. That's precisely +what they want. There is not a deputy who has not one candidate to +recommend to me."</p> + +<p>"That's very natural, Monsieur le Ministre, seeing that there is not a +deputy who may not himself be a candidate."</p> + +<p>"Still, he should be independent of his electors, but in truth, it is +not the rights of those who have elected them that my colleagues defend, +it is their own interests."</p> + +<p>"Every man for himself, Monsieur le Ministre. Yesterday, even yesterday, +one of my electors whose wife has just given birth to a child, wrote me, +asking for a good nurse. That is like one of our colleagues, Perraud—of +the Vosges.—One of his electors commissioned him to take back an +umbrella with him upon his early return. The electors regard their +deputies in the light of commission merchants."</p> + +<p>"And as tobacco bureaus! Well, I wish to have more morality than that in +State affairs. I like giving, but I know how to refuse," said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"That will be easy enough so long as you are popular and solid in +Parliament; but on the day that it is clearly <a name="Page_292" id="Page_292"></a>proved that such and such +a future minister can make himself more useful than you to the personal +interests of everybody—and there are such ministers in sight—"</p> + +<p>"Granet, yes, I know! He promises more butter than bread, to cry quits +later in giving more dry crusts than fresh butter. But I don't care to +deceive any one."</p> + +<p>"As you please, Monsieur le Ministre, as you please," answered +Warcolier, in a mocking and gentle tone.</p> + +<p>Sulpice did not like this man. He was a phrase-maker. He had a vague +feeling that this Warcolier who in public affected strictly severe +principles was privately undermining him and that he yielded to favors +in order to win support. It was enough for the minister to discourage +coarse, greedy ambitions, provided that the Under Secretary of State +encouraged unsavory, eager hopes by shrewd smiles and silence that +assented to all that was desired. This little underhand work going on in +his office was unknown to Vaudrey; he did not know that out of every +refusal he gave, Warcolier secured friends; but he maintained a watchful +distrust for this republican who had become so stanch a supporter of the +Republic only since that form of government had triumphed. Besides, what +had he to fear? The President of the Council, Monsieur Collard, of +Nantes, had the unbounded confidence of the head of the State and of the +Chamber; and he was Collard's intimate friend. The majority of the +cabinet was compact. The perfect <a name="Page_293" id="Page_293"></a>calm of the horizon was undisturbed by +a cloud. Vaudrey could rule without fear, without excitement and give +all his spare time to that woman whose piercing glance, wandering smile, +palpitating nostrils, dishevelled, fair hair, kisses, fondness, cries, +and tones pursued him everywhere.</p> + +<p>Marianne, how he loved her! From day to day, how his love of her +increased like a madman's! It seemed to him that he suddenly found +himself in the presence of the only woman who could possibly understand +him, and in the only world in which he could live; his petty bourgeois, +sensual inexperience flourished in the little hôtel of the courtesan.</p> + +<p>He had doubtless loved; often enough he had thought himself once more in +love; the poor grisettes, to whom he had written in verse, as he might +have sung songs to them, were gone from his thoughts, though they had +occupied his heart for a short time. He had profoundly loved her who +bore his name, perhaps he loved her still as warmly, as sincerely—the +unfortunate man!—as of old. He sometimes recalled with tearful eye, how +his whole frame trembled with love in the presence of that young girl +who had given herself entirely to him, in all her trust and sincerity, +in all her candor, and all her chastely-timid innocent modesty. But +Adrienne's love was insipid compared with the intoxicating and +appetizing voluptuousness of this woman, so adorable in her exquisite +luxury, the refinements of her charm, the singular <a name="Page_294" id="Page_294"></a>grace of her +attitudes, of her mind, of her disjointed conversation which dared +everything, mocked, caressed, beginning with a pout and ending with some +drollery, and challenged passion by exasperating it with refusals and +mockery that changed into distracting lasciviousness.</p> + +<p>When she extended to Vaudrey her little hand, covered with rings, and +indolent and soft, he felt as if he had received an electric shock and +that his marrow had been touched. This man of forty felt all the +enthusiasm and distraction of a youth. It seemed to him that this was +the only woman that he possibly could love, and in truth she was the +only one that he could have loved as he did, with his forgetfulness of +self, his outbursts of madness, the distracted sentiment of a love for +which he would have braved and risked everything.</p> + +<p>When he confessed it frankly, she had a way of answering with a +questioning manner full of doubt, which conveyed the delicacy of the +woman's self-love and the intentionally refined doubt of the coquette, a +questioning <i>yes</i>:</p> + +<p>"Yes?"</p> + +<p>Simply that.</p> + +<p>And in this <i>yes</i>, there was a world of tenderness, excitement and +burning promises for Sulpice.</p> + +<p>Then he drew her to him:</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, yes, yes!" he repeated in burning tones, as he thrust his +head between her shoulders that emerged <a name="Page_295" id="Page_295"></a>from her embroidered chemise, +and her neck perfumed and satiny, that he covered with eager kisses.</p> + +<p>Yes! And he would have uttered this <i>yes</i> before every one like a +bravado. <i>Yes!</i> It was his delight to give himself wholly to Marianne +and to tell her again and again that nothing in the whole world could +take the place of this mistress who made him forget everything: +politics, the home, the ambition that had been his life, and his +affection for Adrienne that had been his joy.</p> + +<p>Thanks to the Dujarrier, Marianne had paid the rent of the house, the +servants and the pressing debts. Claire Dujarrier advanced the hundred +thousand francs demanded by Mademoiselle Kayser, and which she had +apparently—in reality she took them from her own funds—borrowed from +Adolphe Gochard, her lover, who had not a sou, and in whose favor +Vaudrey signed in regular legal form, a bill of exchange at three +months' date <i>value received in cash</i>. The Dujarrier merely retained +twenty thousand francs as her commission and handed only eighty thousand +to Marianne.</p> + +<p>"But Vaudrey's acceptance to Gochard is for one hundred thousand!"</p> + +<p>"You are silly, my girl! What if I lose the balance? If your minister +should not pay?"</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Stranger things have happened, my little one."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey having paid, given his name, signed this bill of exchange, felt +the extreme joy arising from the base <a name="Page_296" id="Page_296"></a>self-love of the man who pays a +lovely creature and who, nevertheless, believes himself loved.</p> + +<p>In the early days, Sulpice went to Rue Prony only during the day or at +night after dinner, or on leaving a reception or the theatre. Marianne +awaited him. He came stealthily, distracted with joy. There, in the +closed chamber he remained with Marianne, who was full of pride at the +complete subjugation of the will of this man in her embrace. She amused +herself occasionally by calling him <i>Your Excellency</i>, in reading to him +from some book which spun out the ceremonial necessary in applying for +an interview with a minister:</p> + +<p>"If ever I ask you for an audience, do you know how I must address +myself to the secretary? Listen to this book, it is funny: 'Ordinary +toilet. The etiquette for the toilet is not very strict, but it is, +however, in good taste to appear dressed as for a ceremonious call. For +women, the toilet should be simple and the gloves new.'"</p> + +<p>She laughed as she rested almost naked in Sulpice's arms, and repeated, +looking into his eyes:</p> + +<p>"A simple toilet!"</p> + +<p>"And again, listen!" she said, as she resumed the book. "'In speaking to +a minister as in writing to him, one should address him as <i>Monseigneur</i> +or <i>Your Excellency</i>. On reaching the door as you leave the salon, you +should again bow respectfully.' That is amusing, ah! how amusing it +is!—Then they respect you as much as that? Your Excellency! +Monseigneur! Shall I be <a name="Page_297" id="Page_297"></a>obliged to courtesy to you?—Your lips, give me +your lips, Monseigneur! I adore you!—You are my own minister; my +finance minister, my lover, my all! I do not respect you, but I love +you, I love you!"</p> + +<p>He trembled to the very roots of his hair when she spoke to him thus. He +felt transports of joy in clasping her in his arms and genuine despair +when he left her. Leave her! leave her there under that lamp alone, in +that low bed where he had just forgotten that there existed anything +else in the world besides that apartment, warm with perfumes. He would +have liked to pass the whole night beside her, separating only when +satiated and overwhelmed with caresses. But how could he leave Adrienne +alone over there in the ministerial mansion? However trustful this young +wife might be, and innocent, credulous and incapable of suspicion, if he +had passed a night absent from her, she would have been terrified and +warned.</p> + +<p>He easily invented prolonged receptions and night sessions that detained +him until an advanced hour.</p> + +<p>"One would say that the evening sessions grow more frequent than +formerly," Adrienne remarked gently at breakfast.</p> + +<p>"Don't talk to me about it," replied Sulpice. "In order to reach the +vacation sooner, the deputies talk twice as long."</p> + +<p>Adrienne never opened the <i>Officiel</i>, which Vaudrey received in his +private office, pretending that the sight <a name="Page_298" id="Page_298"></a>of a newspaper too vividly +recalled the fatiguing political life that absorbed him. One day, +however, he allowed the journals to be brought into the salon and to lie +about in Madame's room. He informed Adrienne that he was going to pass +the day in Picardy, at Guise or at Vervins, where an important deputy +had invited him to visit his factory. He would leave in the morning and +could not return until the following day toward noon.</p> + +<p>"What a long time!" said Adrienne.</p> + +<p>"It is still longer for me than for you, since you remain here, in our +home."</p> + +<p>"Oh! our home! we have only one home: in Chaussée-d'Antin, or the house +at Grenoble, you know."</p> + +<p>"Dear wife!" cried Vaudrey, as he embraced her tenderly,—sincerely, +perhaps.</p> + +<p>And he left. He set out for Guise, returned in the evening and ordered +the Director of the Press to send to all the journals by the Havas +agency, a message which ran: <i>The Minister of the Interior passed the +entire day yesterday at Guise, at Monsieur Delair's, the deputy from +L'Aisne. He dined and slept at the house of his host. Monsieur Vaudrey +is to return to Paris this morning, at eleven o'clock.</i></p> + +<p>Then he showed the news to Adrienne, and laughed as he said:</p> + +<p>"It is surprising! one cannot take a single step without it appears in +print and the entire population is informed at once!"<a name="Page_299" id="Page_299"></a></p> + +<p>"Tell me everything," Adrienne replied, as she embraced him with her +glance. "Are you tired? You look pale. How did you spend the day? You +made a speech? Were you applauded?"</p> + +<p>It was mainly by kisses that Vaudrey answered. What could he say to +Adrienne? She knew perfectly well how similar all these gatherings were, +with their official routine. Monsieur Delair had been very agreeable, +but the minister had necessarily had to endure much talk, much +importunity.</p> + +<p>"The day seemed very long to me!"</p> + +<p>"And to me also," she said.</p> + +<p>Sulpice indeed returned from Guise, but the last train on the previous +night had taken him to Rue Prony, at Marianne's. He had then found out +the secret of remaining at her side undisturbed for a long time, and the +telegraph, managed by the Director of the Press, enabled him to prove an +alibi to Adrienne from time to time. He had taken to Marianne a huge +bouquet of fresh flowers gathered in the park at Guise for Madame +Vaudrey by Monsieur Delair's two daughters. That appeared to him to be +quite natural.</p> + +<p>Marianne, who was waiting for him, put the flowers in the Japanese vases +and said to him as she threw her bare arms around him:</p> + +<p>"Very good! You thought of me!—--"</p> + +<p>The next morning Vaudrey left, more than ever enchained by the delight +of her embraces. He sometimes <a name="Page_300" id="Page_300"></a>returned on foot, to breathe the +vivifying freshness of the roseate dawn, or taking a cab, he stretched +himself out wearily therein, as he drove to the ministry, musing over +the hours so recently passed and striving to arrest them in their +flight, to enjoy again their seductive joy and to squeeze as from a +delicious fruit, all their intoxicating poetry, delight and fascination.</p> + +<p>He closed his eyes. He saw Marianne again with her eyes veiled as he +kissed her, he drank in the odor of her hair that fell like a sort of +fair cover over the lace pillow. It seemed that he was permeated with +her perfume. He breathed the air with wide-open nostrils to inhale it +again, to recover its scent and preserve it. His whole frame trembled +with emotion at the recollection of that lovely form that he had left +whiter than the sheet of the bed, in the dim light that filtered through +the opal-shaded lamp.</p> + +<p>Then he thought that he must forget, and invent some tale for Adrienne. +Again he opened his eyes and trembled in spite of himself, as he saw, on +both sides of the cab, workmen slowly trudging along the sidewalks with +their hands in their pockets, their noses red, a wretched worn-out silk +scarf about their necks and swinging on their arms the supply of food +for the day, or again with their fingers numb with the cold, holding +some journal in their hands in which they read as they marched along, +the speech of "Monsieur le Ministre de l'Intérieur," that magnificent +speech not made during <a name="Page_301" id="Page_301"></a>the night session as Sulpice had told Adrienne, +but the day before yesterday, in broad day, when the majority, +faithfully grouped about him, had applauded this phrase: <i>I, whose hours +are consecrated to the amelioration of the lot of the poor and who can +say with the poet,—I shall be pardoned for this feeling of vanity:</i></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"What I steal from my nights, I add to my days!"</p></div> + +<p>Sulpice heard again the applause that he received. He saw those devoted +hands reached out to him as he descended from the tribune; he again +experienced a feeling of pride, and yet he felt dissatisfied with +himself now that he saw the other hands, the servile hands of the +applauders, hidden by the red, cold hands of a mason who held this +speech between his horny fingers.</p> + +<p>Sulpice returned to the ministry, shaking himself as if to induce +forgetfulness, busy, weary, and still,—eternally,—as if immovably +fixed in an antechamber of Place Beauvau, he found the inevitable +place-hunters, the hornets of ministries.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey caused these urgent people, as well as some others, to be +received by Warcolier, who asked nothing better than to make tools, to +sow the seed of his clientage. Guy de Lissac and Ramel had +simultaneously called Vaudrey's attention to the eagerness which +Warcolier manifested in toying with popularity.</p> + +<p>"He is not wholly devoted to you, is this gentleman who prefers every +government!" said Guy.<a name="Page_302" id="Page_302"></a></p> + +<p>"He will undermine you quietly!" added Ramel.</p> + +<p>"I am satisfied of that. But I am not disturbed: I have the majority. +Oh! faithful and compact."</p> + +<p>"Woman often changes," muttered Ramel.</p> + +<p>Guy was troubled about Vaudrey for another reason. He vaguely suspected +that Sulpice was neglecting Adrienne. Political business, doubtless. +Vaudrey unquestionably loved his wife, who adored him and was herself +adorable. But he manifestly neglected her.</p> + +<p>Lissac found them one day smilingly discussing a question that was +greatly occupying the journalists: divorce. Apropos of a trifle, of a +suit for separation that Adrienne had just read in the <i>Gazette +Tribunaux</i>. It referred to an adulterous husband, a pottery dealer in +Rue Paradis, Monsieur Vauthier, the lover of a singer at a rather +notorious <i>café-concert</i>, named Léa Thibault. The wife had demanded a +separation. Adrienne had just read the pleadings.</p> + +<p>"Poor woman!" she said. "She must have suffered, indeed."</p> + +<p>Sulpice did not reply.</p> + +<p>"Do you know that if that were my case, I could never forgive you?"</p> + +<p>"You are mad! What are you thinking of?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! it is true, the idea that you could touch another woman, that you +could kiss her as you kiss me, that would make me more than angry, +horrified and disgusted. I tell you, I would never forgive you."<a name="Page_303" id="Page_303"></a></p> + +<p>"Who puts all this stuff in your head? Come, I will do as I used to do," +said Vaudrey. "Not another paper shall enter your house! What an idea, +to read the <i>Gazette des Tribunaux</i>!"</p> + +<p>"It is because this name: <i>Vauthier</i>, somewhat resembles your own that I +was induced to read it. And then this very mournful title: <i>Separation +de corps</i>. I would prefer divorce myself. A complete divorce that severs +the past like a knife-cut."</p> + +<p>"But what an idea!" repeated Sulpice, who was somewhat uneasy.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was delighted to hear Guy announced in the midst of this +discussion. They would then change the topic. But Adrienne, who was much +affected by her reading, returned to the same subject in an obstinate +sort of way and Lissac commenced to laugh.</p> + +<p>"What a joke! To speak of divorce between you two! Never fear, madame, +your husband will never present to the Chamber a law in favor of +divorce."</p> + +<p>"Who knows?" Sulpice answered. "I am in favor of divorce myself, yes, +absolutely."</p> + +<p>"And I cannot understand, for my part, how a woman can belong to two +living men," said Adrienne.</p> + +<p>"You reason for yourself. But the unhappy women who suffer—and the +unhappy men—The existing law, in fact, seeing that it admits +separation, permits divorce, but more cruel, heartrending, and unjust. +Divorce without freedom. Divorce that continues the chain."<a name="Page_304" id="Page_304"></a></p> + +<p>"Sulpice is right, madame, and sooner or later, we shall certainly +arrive at that frightful divorce."</p> + +<p>"After all, what does it matter to me?" Adrienne replied.</p> + +<p>She threw the accursed <i>Gazette des Tribunaux</i> into the waste basket +with its <i>Suit of Vauthier vs. Vauthier</i>. "We are not interested, +neither my husband nor I; he loves me and I love him. I am as sure of +him as he is sure of me. He may demand all the laws that are possible: +it would not be for selfish interest, for he would not profit by them."</p> + +<p>"Never!" said Sulpice with a laugh, delighted to be released from the +magnetic influence of Adrienne's strange excitement.</p> + +<p>There was, however, a somewhat false ring in this laugh. Face to face +with the avowed trustfulness of his wife, Sulpice experienced a slight +pricking of conscience. He thought of Marianne. His passion increased +tenfold, but this very increase of affection made him afraid. He +hastened to find himself again at Rue Prony. The Hôtel Beauvau depressed +him. It became more than ever a prison. How gladly he escaped from it!</p> + +<p>Yes, it was a prison for him as it was for Adrienne; a prison that he +fled from to seek Marianne's boudoir, to enjoy her kisses and mirth, +while, at the same moment, his wife, the dear abandoned, disdained +creature, sad without being cognizant of the cause of her melancholy, +terrified by the emptiness of that grand ministerial man<a name="Page_305" id="Page_305"></a>sion, that +"sounded hollow," as she said, quietly and stealthily took the official +carriage that Vaudrey sent back to her from the Chamber, and had herself +driven—where?—only she knew!</p> + +<p>"You ought to make a great many calls," the minister had frequently +said. "It would divert your mind and it is well to appear to know a +great many persons."</p> + +<p>But she only found pleasure in making one visit, she gave the coachman +the address of the apartments on Chaussée-d'Antin, where she had lived +long, happy years with Sulpice, sweet and peaceful under the clear light +of the lamp. She entered this deserted apartment, now as cold as a tomb, +and had the shutters opened by the concierge in order that she might see +the sunlight penetrate the room and set all the motes dancing in its +cheerful rays. She shut herself in and remained there happy, consoled; +sitting in the armchair formerly occupied by Sulpice, she pictured him +at the table at which he used to work, his inkstand before him and +surrounded by his books, his cherished books! She lived again the +vanished life. "Return!" she said to the dream, the humble dream she had +at last recovered. She rambled about those deserted rooms that on every +side reminded her of some sweet delight, here it was a kiss of chaste +and eternal love, there a smile. Ah! how easy life would have been there +all alone, happy for ever!</p> + +<p>The Ministry! Power! Popularity! Fame! Authority! What were they worth?<a name="Page_306" id="Page_306"></a></p> + +<p>Is all that worth one of the blessed hours in this little dwelling, +where the cup of bliss would have been full if the wife could have heard +the clear laugh or the faint cry of a child?</p> + +<p>Poor Sulpice! how he was exhausting himself now in an overwhelming task! +He was giving his health and life to politics, while here he only +experienced peace, consoling caresses and the quieting of every +excitement. On the study-table there still remained some pens and some +books that were formerly in constant use.</p> + +<p>Adrienne went away with reddened eyes from these pilgrimages, as it +were, to her former happiness. She returned to her carriage and +moistened her cambric pocket handkerchief with her warm breath, in order +to wipe her eyes so that Sulpice might not see that she had been +weeping. Then when her well-known carriage passed before the shops in +the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, the wives of mercers or booksellers, +dressmakers, young girls, all of whom enviously shook their heads, said +to each other:</p> + +<p>"The minister's wife!—Ah! she has had a glorious dream!—She is +happy!"<a name="Page_307" id="Page_307"></a></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_III" id="II_III"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>III</h3> + + +<p>Marianne was contented. Not that her ambition was completely satisfied, +but after all, Sulpice in place of Rosas was worth having. Though a +minister was only a passing celebrity, he was a personage. From the +depths of the bog in which she lately rolled, she would never have dared +to hope for so speedy a revenge.</p> + +<p>Speedy, assuredly, but perhaps not sufficient. Her eager hunger +increased with her success. Since Vaudrey was hers, she sought some +means of bringing about some adventure that would give her fortune. What +could be asked or exacted from Sulpice? She recalled the traditions of +fantastic bargains, of extensive furnishings. She would find them. She +had but to desire, since he had abandoned himself, bound hand and foot, +like a child.</p> + +<p>She knew him now, all his candor, all his weakness, for, in the presence +of this blasé woman, weary of love, Vaudrey permitted himself to confide +his thoughts with unreserved freedom, opening his heart and disclosing +himself with a clean breast in this duel with a woman:—a duel of +self-interest which he mistook for passion.</p> + +<p>She had studied him at first and speedily ranked him, calling him:</p> + +<p>"An innocent!"<a name="Page_308" id="Page_308"></a></p> + +<p>She felt that in this house in Rue Prony, where she was really not in +her own home but was installed as in a conquered territory, Sulpice was +dazzled. Like a provincial, as Granet described him so often, he entered +there into a new world.</p> + +<p>Uncle Kayser frequently called to see his niece. Severe in taste, he +cast long, disdainful looks at the tapestries and the artistic trifles +that adorned the house. In his opinion, it was rubbish and the luxury of +a decaying age. He never changed his tune, always riding the hobby-horse +of an æsthetic moralist.</p> + +<p>"It lacks severity, all this furnishing of yours," was his constantly +repeated criticism to Marianne, as he sat smoking his pipe on a divan, +as was his custom in his own, wretched studio.</p> + +<p>Then, in an abrupt way, with his eye wandering over the ceiling as if he +were following the flight of a chimera, he would say:</p> + +<p>"Why! your minister must do a great deal, if all this comes from the +ministry!"</p> + +<p>Marianne interrupted him. It was no business of his to mix himself up +with matters that did not concern him. Above all, he must hold his +tongue. Did he forget that Vaudrey was married? The least indiscretion—</p> + +<p>"Oh! don't alarm yourself," the painter broke in, "I am as dumb as a +carp, the more so since your escapade is not very praiseworthy!—For you +have, in fact, deserted the domestic hearth—yes, you have deserted <a name="Page_309" id="Page_309"></a>the +hearth.—It is pretty here, a little like a courtesan's, perhaps, but +pretty, all the same.—But you must acknowledge that it is a case of +interloping. It is not the genuine home with its dignity, its virtuous +severity, its—What time does your minister come? I would like to speak +to him—"</p> + +<p>"To preach morality to him?" asked Marianne, glancing at her uncle with +an ironical expression.</p> + +<p>"Not at all. I am considered to be ignorant—No, I have a plan to +decorate in a uniform way, all the mayors' offices in Paris and I want +to propose it to him—<i>The Modern Marriage</i>, an allegorical +treatment!—<i>Law Imposing Duty on Love</i>. Something noble, full of +expression, moralizing. Art that will set people thinking, for the +contemplation of lofty works can alone improve the morals and the +masses—You understand?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly. You want a commission!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! that's a contemptible word, hold! A commission! Is a true artist +commissioned? He obeys his inspiration, he follows his ideal—A +commission! a commission! Ugh!—On my word, you would break the wings of +faith! Little one, have you any of that double zero Kummel left, that +you had the other day?"</p> + +<p>Marianne sought to spare Sulpice the importunities of her uncle. She +wished to keep the minister's entire influence for herself.</p> + +<p>She had nothing to fear, moreover. Sulpice was hers as fully as she +believed. Like so many others who have <a name="Page_310" id="Page_310"></a>lived without living, Sulpice +did not know <i>woman</i>, and Marianne was ten times a woman, woman-child, +woman-lover, woman-courtesan, woman-girl, and every day and every night +she appeared to her lover renewed and surprising, freshly created for +passion and pleasure. Everything about her, even the frame that +surrounded her beauty, the dwelling, perfumed with passionate love, +distractedly captivated Sulpice. Behind the dense curtains in the +dressing-room upholstered like a boudoir, with its carpet intended only +for naked feet, as the reclining chair with its extra covering of +Oriental silk was adapted to moments of languishing repose, Sulpice saw +and contemplated the vast wardrobe with its three mirrors reflecting the +huge marble washstand with its silver spigots, its silver bowl, wherein +the scented water gleamed opal-like with its perfumes, the gas +illuminating the brushes decorated with monograms, standing out against +the white marble, the manicure sets of fine steel, the dark-veined +tortoise-shell combs, the coquettish superfluity of scissors and files +scattered about amongst knickknacks, inlaid enamels, and Japanese ivory +ornaments, and there, stretched out and watching Marianne, who came and +went before him with a smile on her face, her hair unfastened, sometimes +with bare shoulders, Sulpice saw, through a half-open door in the middle +of a bathroom floored with blue Delft tiles, the bath that steamed with +a perfumed vapor, odorous of thyme, and the water which was about to +envelop in its warm embrace that <a name="Page_311" id="Page_311"></a>rosy form that displayed beneath the +lights and under the full blaze of the gas, the nudity of her flesh +beneath a transparent Surah chemise, silky upon the living silk.</p> + +<p>Milk-white reflections seemed to play on her shoulders and Sulpice never +forgot those ardent visions that followed him, clung to him, thrust +themselves before his gaze and into his recollections, never leaving +him, either at the Chamber, the Council Board or even when he was with +Adrienne.—The young woman, seeing his absorption, hesitated to disturb +his thoughts, political as they were, no doubt, while he mused upon his +hours of voluptuous enjoyment, forever recalling the youthful roundness +of her shoulders, and the inflections of her body, the ivory-like curve +of her neck, whose white nape rested upon him, and her curls escaped +from the superb arrangement of her hair, held in its place at the top by +a comb thrust into this fair mass like a claw plunged into flesh.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey must have had an active and prompt intelligence at times to +forget suddenly these passionate images, when he unexpectedly found +himself compelled to ascend the tribune during a discussion or to +express his opinion clearly at the Ministerial Council. He increased his +power, finding, perhaps, a new excitement, a new spur in the love that +renewed his youth. He had never been seen more active and more stirring +in the Chamber, though he was somewhat nervous. He determined to put +himself in evidence at the Ministry and to prove to the phrase-monger +Warcolier that he knew how <a name="Page_312" id="Page_312"></a>to act. The President of the Council, +Monsieur Collard—of Nantes—said several times to Sulpice:</p> + +<p>"Too much zeal, my dear minister. A politician ought to be cooler."</p> + +<p>"I shall be cooler with age!" Sulpice replied with a laugh.</p> + +<p>From time to time he went to seek advice from Ramel, as he had promised. +The little shopkeepers and laundresses of Rue Boursault hardly suspected +when they saw a coupé stop at the door of the old journalist, that a +minister alighted from it.</p> + +<p>Sulpice felt amid the bustle of his life, amid the spurring and +over-excited events of his existence, the need of talking with his old +friend. Besides, Rue Boursault was on the way to Rue Prony. As Marianne +was frequently not at home, Sulpice would spend the time before her +return in chatting with Ramel.</p> + +<p>"Well! Ramel, are you satisfied with me?"</p> + +<p>"How could I be otherwise? You are an honest man and faithful and +devoted to your ideas. I am not afraid of you, but I am of those by whom +you are surrounded."</p> + +<p>"Warcolier?"</p> + +<p>"Warcolier and many others, of those important fellows who ask me—when +they deign to speak to me—with an insignificant air of superiority and +almost of pity, the idiots: 'Well! you are no longer doing anything! +When will you do something?' As if I had not done too much already, +seeing that I have made them!"<a name="Page_313" id="Page_313"></a></p> + +<p>Denis Ramel smiled superciliously and the minister looked with a sort of +respect at this vanguard warrior, this laborer of the early morn who had +never received his recompense or even claimed it.</p> + +<p>"I should like you to resume your journal in order to announce all these +truths," Vaudrey said to him.</p> + +<p>"Do you think so? Why, a journal that would proclaim the truth to +everybody would not last six months, since no one would buy it."</p> + +<p>As Sulpice was about to go, there was a ring at Ramel's door.</p> + +<p>"Ah! who can it be? A visit. I beg you will excuse me, my dear Vaudrey."</p> + +<p>Denis went to open the door.</p> + +<p>It was a man of about fifty, dressed in the garb of a poor workman, +wearing a threadbare greatcoat and trousers that were well polished at +the knees, who as he entered held his round, felt hat in his hand. He +was thin, pale and tired-looking, with a dark, dull complexion and a +voice weak rather than hoarse. He bowed timidly, repeating twice: "I +earnestly ask your pardon;" and then he remained standing on the +threshold, without advancing or retiring, in an embarrassed attitude, +while a timid smile played beneath his black beard, already sprinkled +with gray.</p> + +<p>"Pardon—I disturb you—I will return—"</p> + +<p>"Come in, Garnier," said Ramel.</p> + +<p>The man entered, saluting Vaudrey, who was not <a name="Page_314" id="Page_314"></a>known to him, and at a +gesture from Denis, he took a seat on the edge of a chair, scarcely +sitting down and constantly twirling his round-shaped hat between his +lean fingers. From time to time, he raised his left hand to his mouth to +check the sound of a dry cough which rose in his muscular throat, that +might be supposed to be a prey to laryngitis.</p> + +<p>"You ask for the truth—Listen a moment, a single moment," Ramel +whispered in the ear of the minister.</p> + +<p>Without mentioning Sulpice's name, he began to question Garnier, who +grew bolder and talked and gossiped, his cheek-bones now and then +heightened in color by small, pink spots.</p> + +<p>"Well! Garnier, about the work?—Oh! you may speak before monsieur, it +interests him."</p> + +<p>The man shrugged his shoulders with a sad, somewhat bitter smile, but +resigned at least. He very quietly, but without any complaint, +acknowledged all that he was enduring. Work was in a bad way. It +appeared that it was just the same everywhere in Europe, in fact, but +indeed that doesn't provide work at the shop. The master, a kind man, in +faith, had grown old, and was anxious to sell his business of an art +metal worker. He had not found a purchaser, then he had simply closed +his shop, being too ill to continue hard work, and the four or five +workmen whom he employed found themselves thrown into the street. There +it is! Happily for Garnier, he had neither wife nor child, nothing but +his own <a name="Page_315" id="Page_315"></a>carcass. One can always get one's self out of a difficulty, but +the others who had households and brats! Rousselet had five. Matters +were not going to be very cheerful at home. He must rely on charity or +credit, he did not know what, but something to stave off that distress, +real and sad distress, since it was not merited.</p> + +<p>"Do you interest yourself in politics?" asked Vaudrey curiously, +surmising that this man was possessed of strong and quick intelligence, +although he looked so worn and crushed and his cough frequently +interrupted his remarks.</p> + +<p>Garnier looked at Ramel before replying, then answered in a quiet tone:</p> + +<p>"Oh! not now! That is all over. I vote like everybody else, but I let +the rest alone. I have had my reckoning."</p> + +<p>He had said all this in a low tone without any bitterness and as if +burdened with painful memories.</p> + +<p>"It is, however, strange, all the same," added the workman, "to observe +that the more things change, the more alike they are. Instead of +occupying themselves over there with interpellations and seeking to +overthrow or to strengthen administrations, would it not be better if +they thought a little of those who are dying of hunger? for there are +some, it is necessary to admit that such are not wanting! What is it to +me whether Pichereau or Vaudrey be minister, when I do not know at the +moment where I shall sleep when I have spent my savings, and <a name="Page_316" id="Page_316"></a>whether +the baker will give me credit now that I am without a shop?"</p> + +<p>At the mention of Vaudrey's name, Ramel wished to make a sign to this +man, but Sulpice had just seized the hand of his old friend and pressed +it as if to entreat him not to interrupt the conversation. The voice +that he heard, interrupted by a cough, was the voice of a workman and he +did not hear such every day.</p> + +<p>"Note well that I am not a blusterer or a disturber, isn't that so, +Monsieur Ramel? I have always been content with my lot, myself—One +receives and executes orders and one is satisfied. Everything goes on +all right—My politics at present is my work; when I shall have broken +my back to bring journalists into power—I beg your pardon, Monsieur +Ramel, you know very well that it is not of you that I speak thus—I +shall be no fatter for it, I presume. I only want just to keep life and +soul together, if it can be done. I suppose you could not find me a +place, Monsieur Ramel? I would do anything, heavy work if need be, or +bookkeeping, if it is desired. I would like bookkeeping better, although +it is not my line, because the forge fire, the coal and heat, as you +see, affect me there now—he touched his neck—it strangles me and +hastens the end too quickly. It is true for that I am in the world."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt himself stirred even to his bones by the mournful, musical +voice of the consumptive, by this true misery, this poverty expressed +without phrases and this <a name="Page_317" id="Page_317"></a>claim of labor. All the questions <i>yonder</i>, as +Garnier said, in the committees and sub-committees, in the tribune and +in the lobbies, discussions, disputes, personal questions cloaked under +the guise of the general welfare, suddenly appeared to him as petty and +vain, narrow and egotistical beside the formidable question of bread +which was propounded to him so quietly by this man of the people, who +was not a rebel of the violent days, but the unfortunate brother, the +eternal Lazarus crying, without threat, but simply, sadly: "And I?"</p> + +<p>He would have liked, without making himself known, to give something to +this sufferer, to promise him a position. He did not dare to offer it or +to mention his name. The man would have refused charity and the +minister, in all the personnel of bustling employés, often useless, that +fill the ministry, had not a single place to give to this workman whose +chest was on fire and whose throat was choking.</p> + +<p>"I will return and we will talk about him," he said to Ramel, as he +arose, indicating Garnier by a nod. "Do not tell him who I am. On my +word, I should be ashamed—Poor devil!"</p> + +<p>"Multiply him by three or four hundred thousand, and be a statesman," +said Ramel.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey bowed to the workman, who rose quickly and returned his salute +with timid eagerness, and the minister went rapidly down the stairs of +the little house and jumped into his carriage, making haste to get +away.<a name="Page_318" id="Page_318"></a></p> + +<p>He bore with him a feeling akin to remorse, and in all sincerity, for he +still heard ringing in his ears, the poor consumptive's voice saying:</p> + +<p>"What is it to me, who am suffering, whether Vaudrey or Pichereau be +minister?"</p> + +<p>On reaching Place Beauvau, he found a despatch requesting his immediate +presence at the Élysée. At the Palace he received information that +surprised him like a thunderbolt. Monsieur Collard—of Nantes—had just +been struck down by apoplexy in the corridors of the ministry. The +President of the Council was dead and the Chief of the State had turned +to Vaudrey to fill the high position which, but two hours before, had +been held by Monsieur Collard.</p> + +<p>President of the Council! He, Vaudrey! Head of the Ministry! The first +in his country after the supreme head? The joyful surprise that such a +proposition caused him, so occupied his mind that he was unable to feel +very much moved by the loss of Monsieur Collard—of Nantes—. Sulpice, +moreover, had never profoundly cared for this austere advocate, although +he had been much associated with him. His liking for this man who +brought to the Council old-time opinions and preconceived ideas was a +merely political affection. The President's offer proved to him that his +own popularity, as well as his influence over parliament, had only +increased since his recent entry on public life. He was then about to be +in a position to assert his individuality still better. What a glorious +<a name="Page_319" id="Page_319"></a>time for Grenoble and what wry faces Granet would make!</p> + +<p>Sulpice hastened to announce this news to Adrienne, although it would +not become official until after Collard's funeral obsequies. He returned +almost triumphantly to the Hôtel Beauvau. Only one thought, a sombre +image, clouded his joy: it was not the memory of Collard, but the sad +image of the man whom he had met at Ramel's, and who, when the +<i>Officiel</i> should speak, should make the announcement, would shrug his +shoulders and say ironically:</p> + +<p>"Well! and what then?"</p> + +<p>He had scarcely whispered these words to Adrienne: "President of the +Council! I am President of the Council!" when, without being astonished +at the faint, almost indifferent smile that escaped the young wife, he +suddenly thought that he was under obligation to make a personal visit +to the Ministry of Justice where Collard was lying dead.</p> + +<p>He ordered himself to be driven quickly to Place Vendôme.</p> + +<p>At every moment, carriages brought to the ministry men of grave mien, +decorated with the red ribbon, who entered wearing expressions suitable +to the occasion and inscribed their names in silence on the register, +passing the pen from one to another just as the aspergillus is passed +along in church. Everybody stood aside on noticing Vaudrey. It seemed to +him that they instinctively <a name="Page_320" id="Page_320"></a>divined that Collard being out of the way +it was he who must be the man of the hour, the necessary man, the +President of the Council marked out in advance, the chief of the coming +<i>ministry</i>.</p> + +<p>"Poor Collard!" thought Sulpice, as he inscribed his name on the +register. "One will never be able to say: the <i>Collard Administration</i>. +But it would be glorious if one day history said: the <i>Vaudrey +Administration</i>."</p> + +<p>He re-entered the Hôtel Beauvau, inflated with the idea. In the +antechamber, there were more office-seekers than were usually in +attendance. One of them, on seeing Vaudrey, rose and ran to him and said +quickly to Sulpice, who did not stop:</p> + +<p>"Ah! Monsieur le Ministre—What a misfortune—Monsieur Collard—If there +were no eminent men like Your Excellency to replace him!—"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey bowed without replying.</p> + +<p>"What is the name of that gentleman?" said he as soon as he entered his +cabinet, to the usher who followed him. "I always find him, but I cannot +recognize him."</p> + +<p>"He! Monsieur le Ministre? Why, that is, <i>Monsieur Eugène</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! very good! That is right! The eternal Monsieur Eugène!"</p> + +<p>Just then Warcolier opened the door, looking more morose than sad, and +holding a letter that he crushed in his hand, while at the same time he +greeted Vaudrey <a name="Page_321" id="Page_321"></a>with a number of long phrases concerning the dreadful, +unexpected, sudden, unlooked-for, crushing death—he did not select his +epithets, but allowed them to flow as from an overrunning cask—the +dramatic decease of Collard—of Nantes—. From time to time, Warcolier, +while speaking, cast an involuntary, angry glance at the paper that he +twisted in his fingers, so much so that Vaudrey, feeling puzzled, at +last asked him what the letter was.</p> + +<p>"Don't speak to me about it—" said the fat man. "An imbecile!"</p> + +<p>"What imbecile?"</p> + +<p>"An imbecile whom I received with some little courtesy the other +morning—I who, nevertheless, go to so much trouble to make myself +agreeable."</p> + +<p>"And that is no sinecure!—Well, the imbecile in question?"</p> + +<p>"Left furious, no doubt, because of the reception accorded him—and to +me, me, the Under-Secretary of State, this is the letter that he writes, +that he dares to write! Here, Monsieur le Ministre, listen! Was ever +such stupidity seen? '<i>Monsieur le Secrétaire d'Etat, you have under +your orders a very badly trained Undersecretary of State, who will make +you many enemies, I warn you. As you are his direct superior, I permit +myself to notify you of his conduct</i>,' etc., etc. You laugh?" said +Warcolier, seeing that a smile was spreading over Vaudrey's +blond-bearded face.<a name="Page_322" id="Page_322"></a></p> + +<p>"Yes, it is so odd!—Your correspondent is evidently ignorant that there +are only Under-Secretaries of State in the administration!—unless this +innocent is but simply an insolent fellow."</p> + +<p>"If I thought that!" said Warcolier, enraged. "No, but it is true," he +said with astonishing candor, a complete overflowing of his satisfied +egotism, "there are a lot of people who ask for everything and are good +for nothing!—Malcontents!—I should like to know why they are +malcontents!—What are they dreaming about, then? What do they want? I +am asking myself ever since I came into office: What is it they want? +Doesn't the present government carry out the will of the majority?—It +is just like those journalists with their nagging articles!—They squall +and mock! What they print is disgusting! Granted that we have demanded +liberty, but that does not mean license!"</p> + +<p>While Warcolier, entirely concerned about himself, with erect head and +oratorical gesture, spoke as if in the presence of two thousand hearers, +Sulpice Vaudrey again recalled, still sad and sick, the dark and sunken +cheeks and the colorless ears, the poor projecting ears of the +consumptive Garnier with whom he had come in contact at Ramel's.</p> + +<p>He was anxious to be with Adrienne again, and above all, with Marianne. +What would his mistress say to him when she knew of his reaching the +presidency of the Council?<a name="Page_323" id="Page_323"></a></p> + +<p>Adrienne had certainly received the news with little pleasure.</p> + +<p>"If you are happy!"—was all she said, with a sigh.</p> + +<p>It was the very expression she had used at the moment when, on the +formation of the "Collard Cabinet," he had gone to her and cried out: "I +am a minister!"</p> + +<p>Adrienne was impassive.</p> + +<p>In truth, Sulpice was beginning to think that she was too indifferent to +the serious affairs of life. The delightful joys of intimacy, now, +moreover, discounted, ought not to make a woman forget the public +successes of her husband. Instinctively comparing this gentle, slender +blonde, resigned and pensive, with Marianne, with her tawny locks and +passionate nature, whom he adored more intensely each day, Vaudrey +thought that a man in his position, with his ambition and merit, would +have been more powerfully aided, aye, even doubled in power and success +by a creature as strongly intelligent, as energetic and as fertile in +resource as Mademoiselle Kayser.</p> + +<p>He still had before him a peculiar smile of indefinable superiority +expressed by his mistress when Adrienne and Marianne chanced to meet one +evening at the theatre, which made him feel that his mistress was +watching and analyzing his wife. The next day, Marianne with exquisite +grace, but keen as a poisoned dart, said to him:</p> + +<p>"Do you know, my dear, Madame Vaudrey is charming?"<a name="Page_324" id="Page_324"></a></p> + +<p>He felt himself blush at these words hurled at him point-blank, then his +cheeks grew cold. Never, till that moment, had Mademoiselle Kayser +mentioned Adrienne's name.</p> + +<p>"You like blondes, I see!" said Marianne. "I am almost inclined to be +jealous!"</p> + +<p>"Will you do me a great favor?" then interrupted Sulpice. "Never let us +speak of her. Let us speak of ourselves."</p> + +<p>"Yes," continued the perfidious Marianne in a patronizing tone, as if +she had not heard him, "she is certainly charming! A trifle—just a +trifle—bourgeoise—But charming! Decidedly charming!"</p> + +<p>Knowing Vaudrey well, she understood what a keen weapon she was plunging +straight into him. A little <i>bourgeoise</i>! This conclusion rendered by +the Parisienne with a smile now haunted Sulpice, who was annoyed at +himself and he sought to discover in his wife, the dear creature whom he +had so tenderly loved, whom he still loved, some self-satisfying excuse +for his passion and adultery.</p> + +<p>"Bah!" he thought. "Is it adultery? There is no adultery save for the +wife. The husband's faithlessness is called a caprice, an adventure, a +craving or madness of the senses. Only the wife is adulterous."</p> + +<p>In all candor, what sin had he committed? Was Adrienne less loved? He +would have sacrificed his life for her. He overwhelmed her with +presents, created sur<a name="Page_325" id="Page_325"></a>prises for her that she received without emotion, +and simply said in a doleful tone:</p> + +<p>"How good you are, my dear!"</p> + +<p>He was ruining neither her nor his children! Ah! if he but had children! +Why had not Adrienne had children? A woman should be a mother. It is +maternity that in the marriage estate justifies a man in abandoning his +freedom and a woman her shame.</p> + +<p>A mother! And was Marianne a mother?</p> + +<p>No, but Marianne was Marianne. Marianne was not created for the domestic +fireside and the cradle. Her statuesque and seductively lovely limbs +only craved for the writhings of pleasure, not the pangs of maternity. +Adrienne, on the contrary, was the wife, and the childless wife soon +took another name: the friend. No, he robbed her of nothing, Adrienne +lost none of his affection, none of his fortune. The money squandered at +Rue Prony, Vaudrey had acquired; it was the savings of the honest people +of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, the parents, the <i>old folks</i>, that he +threw—as in smelting—into the crucible of the girl's mansion.</p> + +<p>Adrienne expressed no desire that was not fulfilled, and Sulpice who +was, moreover, confident and lulled by her quietude, felt no remorse. He +did not enquire if his passion for Marianne would endure. He flung +himself upon this love as upon some prey; nor was desire the only +influence that now attached him to this woman, he was drawn to her also +by the admiration that he felt <a name="Page_326" id="Page_326"></a>for her boldness of thought, her +singular opinions, her careless expressions, her devilish spirit; her +appetizing and voluptuous attractions surprised and ensnared him—</p> + +<p>What a counselor and ally such a woman would be!</p> + +<p>Well and good! When Vaudrey informed her that he was about to become +first minister, to preside over the Council, to show his power—this was +his eternal watchword—Marianne immediately comprehended the new +situation and what increase of influence in the country such a fortunate +event would give him.</p> + +<p>He observed with pleasure that something like a joyful beam gleamed in +Mademoiselle Kayser's gray eyes.</p> + +<p>She also doubtless thought that it was desirable to take advantage of +the occasion, to seize and cling to the opportunity.</p> + +<p>"Then it is official?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Not yet. But it is certain."</p> + +<p>What could Marianne hope for? Again, she had no well-defined object; but +she watched her opportunity, and since Vaudrey's power was enlarged, +well, she was to profit by it. Claire Dujarrier, who had already served +her so well, could be useful to her again and advise her advantageously. +That will be seen.</p> + +<p>"Are you desirous of attending Collard's funeral?" Vaudrey asked +Marianne.</p> + +<p>She laughed as she asked:</p> + +<p>"Why! what do you think that would be to me?"</p> + +<p>"It will be very fine. All the authorities, the mag<a name="Page_327" id="Page_327"></a>istrates, the +Institute, the garrison of Paris will be present."</p> + +<p>"Then you think it is amusing to see soldiers file past? I am not at all +curious! You will describe it all to me and that will be quite +sufficient for me."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey walked at the head of the cortége that accompanied through Place +Vendôme and Rue de la Paix, black with the crowd, the funeral procession +of Collard—of Nantes—to the Madeleine. Troops of the line in parade +uniforms lined the route. From time to time was heard the muffled roll +of drums shrouded in crêpe. The funeral car was immense and was crowded +with wreaths. As with bowed head he accompanied the funeral procession +of his colleague, almost his friend,—but, bah! friendship of committees +and sub-committees!—Sulpice was sufficiently an artist to be somewhat +impressed with the contrast afforded by the display of official pomp +crowning the rather obscure life of the Nantes advocate. He had ever +obtrusively before him, as if haunted by the spectre of the Poor Man +before Don Juan, the lean face of Garnier and the white moustache of +Ramel. Which of the two had better served his cause, Ramel vanquished or +Collard—of Nantes—dying in the full blaze of success?</p> + +<p>He pondered over this during the whole of the ceremony. He thought of it +while the notes of the organ swelled forth, while the blue flames of the +burning incense danced, and while the butts of the soldiers' muskets +<a name="Page_328" id="Page_328"></a>sounded from time to time on the flagstones, as the men stood around +the bier and followed the orders of the officer who commanded them.</p> + +<p>On leaving the ceremony, Granet approached Sulpice while gently stroking +his waxed moustache, and said in an ironical tone:</p> + +<p>"Do you know that it is suggested that a statue be raised in Collard's +honor?"</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, because he is considered to have shown a great example."</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"He is one of those rare cases of ministers dying in office. Imitate +him, my dear minister,—to the latest possible moment."</p> + +<p>Sulpice made an effort to smile at Granet's pleasantry. This cunning +fellow decidedly displeased him; but there was nothing to take offence +at, it was mere diplomatic pleasantry expressed politely.</p> + +<p>Before returning to the ministry, Vaudrey had himself driven to Rue +Prony. Jean, the domestic, told him that Madame had gone out; she had +been under the necessity of going to her uncle's. After all, Sulpice +thought this was a very simple matter; but he was determined to see +Marianne, so he ordered his carriage to be driven to the artist's +studio. Uncle Kayser opened the door, bewildered at receiving a call +from the minister and, at the same time, showing that he was somewhat +uneasy, <a name="Page_329" id="Page_329"></a>coughing very violently, as if choked with emotion, or perhaps +as a signal to some one.</p> + +<p>"Is Mademoiselle Kayser here?" asked Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"Yes—Ah! how odd it is—Chance wills that just now one of our +friends—a connoisseur of pictures—"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had already thrust open the door of the studio and he perceived, +sitting near Marianne and holding his hat in his hand, a young man with +pale complexion and reddish beard, whom Mademoiselle Kayser, rising +quickly and without any appearance of surprise, eagerly presented to +him:</p> + +<p>"Monsieur José de Rosas!"</p> + +<p>In the simple manner in which she had pronounced this name, she had +infused so triumphant an expression, such manifest ostentation, that +Vaudrey felt himself suddenly wounded, struck to the heart.</p> + +<p>He recalled everything that Marianne had said to him about this man.</p> + +<p>He greeted Rosas with somewhat frigid politeness and from the tone in +which Marianne began to speak to him, he at once realized that she had +some interest in allowing the Spaniard to surmise nothing. She unduly +emphasized the title by which she addressed him, repeating a little too +frequently: "Monsieur le Ministre."—Whenever Vaudrey sought to catch +her glance she looked away in a strange fashion and managed to avoid +carrying on any formal conversation with Sulpice. On the contrary, she +addressed Rosas affably, asking what he had done in<a name="Page_330" id="Page_330"></a> London, what he had +become and what he brought back new.</p> + +<p>"Nothing," José answered with a peculiar expression that displeased +Vaudrey. "Nothing but the conviction that one lives only in Paris +surrounded by persons whom one vainly seeks to avoid and toward whom one +always returns—in spite of one's self, at times."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey observed the almost proud, triumphant expression that flashed in +Marianne's eyes. He vaguely realized an indirect confession expressed in +that trite remark made by Rosas. The Spaniard's voice trembled slightly +as he spoke.</p> + +<p>Marianne smiled as she listened.</p> + +<p>"You have taken a new journey, monsieur?" asked Sulpice, uncertain what +bearing to assume.</p> + +<p>"Oh! just a temporary absence! A trip to London—"</p> + +<p>"Have you returned long?"</p> + +<p>"Only this morning."</p> + +<p>His first call was at Simon Kayser's house, where perhaps, he expected +to see Marianne. And the proof—</p> + +<p>Vaudrey instinctively thought that it was a very hasty matter to call so +soon on Uncle Kayser. This man's first visit was not to the painter's +studio, but in reality to the woman who—Sulpice still heard Marianne +declare that—who would not become his mistress. There was something +strange in that. Eh! <i>parbleu!</i> it was perhaps Monsieur de Rosas who had +sent for Marianne.<a name="Page_331" id="Page_331"></a></p> + +<p>She endeavored to make it clear that only chance was responsible for +bringing them together here, but Sulpice doubted, he was uneasy and +angry.</p> + +<p>He felt almost determined to declare, if it were only by a word, the +prize of possession, the conquest of this woman, whom he felt that Rosas +was about to contend with him for.</p> + +<p>She surmised everything and interrupted Sulpice even before he could +have spoken and, with a sort of false respect, displayed before Rosas +the friendship which Monsieur le Ministre desired to show her and of +which she was proud.</p> + +<p>"By the way, my dear minister, as to your appointment as President of +the Council?"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey knit his brows.</p> + +<p>"That is so! I ask your pardon. I am betraying a state secret. Monsieur +de Rosas will not abuse it. Isn't that so, Monsieur le Duc?"</p> + +<p>Rosas bowed; Vaudrey was growing impatient.</p> + +<p>"Madame Vaudrey will, of course, be delighted at this appointment, +Monsieur le Ministre?" continued Marianne.</p> + +<p>She smiled at Sulpice who was greatly astonished to hear Adrienne's name +mentioned there; then, turning to Rosas, she charmingly depicted a +quasi-idyllic sketch of the affection of Monsieur le Ministre for Madame +Vaudrey. A model household. There was nothing surprising in that, +moreover. "Monsieur le Ministre" was so <a name="Page_332" id="Page_332"></a>amiable—yes, truly amiable, +without any flattery,—and Madame Vaudrey so charming!</p> + +<p>Sulpice, who was very nervous and had become slightly pale, endeavored +to discover the meaning of this riddle. He asked himself what Marianne +was thinking about, what she meant to say or dissimulate.</p> + +<p>Monsieur de Rosas sat motionless on his chair, very cool, looking calmly +on without speaking a word.</p> + +<p>He seemed to await an opportunity to leave the studio, and since Vaudrey +had arrived he had only spoken a few brief phrases in strict propriety.</p> + +<p>Marianne, all smiles and happy, with beaming eyes, interrogated Vaudrey +and sought to provide a subject of conversation for the unexpected +interview of these two men. Was there a great crowd at Collard's +funeral? Who had sung at the ceremony? Vaudrey answered these questions +rapidly, like a man absorbed in other thoughts.</p> + +<p>After a moment's interval, Monsieur de Rosas arose and bowed to Marianne +with gentlemanly formality.</p> + +<p>"Are you going, my dear duke?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I have seen you again. You are getting along well. I am +satisfied."</p> + +<p>"You will come again, at any rate? My uncle has some new compositions to +show you."</p> + +<p>"Oh! great ideas," began Kayser. "Things that will make famous +frescoes!—For a palace—or the Pantheon!—either one!"<a name="Page_333" id="Page_333"></a></p> + +<p>He had looked alternately at the duke and Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>Rosas bowed to the minister and withdrew without replying, followed by +Kayser and Marianne who, on reaching the threshold of the salon, seized +his hand and pressed it nervously within her own soft one and said +quickly:</p> + +<p>"You will return, oh! I beg you! Ah! it is too bad to have run away! You +will come back!"</p> + +<p>She was at once entreating and commanding him. Rosas did not reply, but +she felt in the trembling of his hand, as he pressed her own, in his +brilliant glance, that she would see him again. And since he had +returned to Paris alone, weary of being absent from her, perhaps, seeing +that he had hastened back after having desired to free himself from her, +did it not seem this time that he was wholly captivated?</p> + +<p>All this was expressed by a pressure of the fingers, a glance, a sigh.</p> + +<p>Rosas went rapidly away, like one distracted. Marianne, who motioned to +Uncle Kayser to disappear, reappeared in the studio, entirely +self-possessed.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had risen from the divan on which he had been sitting and he was +standing, waiting.</p> + +<p>"I believed that I understood that you had dismissed Monsieur de Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"I might have told you that I did so, since it is true."</p> + +<p>"You smiled at him, nevertheless, just now."<a name="Page_334" id="Page_334"></a></p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"A man who begged you to be his mistress!"</p> + +<p>"And whom I rejected, yes!"</p> + +<p>She looked at Sulpice with her winsome, sidelong glance, curling her +lovely pink lips that he had kissed so many times.</p> + +<p>"Then you love that man?"</p> + +<p>"I! not at all, only it is flattering to me to have him return like +that, just like some penitent little boy."</p> + +<p>"I do not understand—"</p> + +<p>"<i>Parbleu!</i> you are not a woman, that is all that that proves!—It is +irritating to our self-love to see people too promptly accept the +dismissal one gives them. What! Don't they suffer? Don't they say +anything? Don't they complain? Monsieur de Rosas comes back to me, that +proves that he was hurt, and I triumph. Now, do you understand?"</p> + +<p>"And—that joy that I observed is—?"</p> + +<p>"It is because Monsieur de Rosas is in Paris."</p> + +<p>"And you don't love him? You don't love him?" asked Vaudrey, clasping +Marianne's hands in his.</p> + +<p>She laughed and said:</p> + +<p>"I do not love him in the least."</p> + +<p>"And you love me?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you, I love you!"</p> + +<p>"Marianne, you know that it would be very wicked and wrong to lie! It is +not necessary to love me at all if you must cease to love me!"<a name="Page_335" id="Page_335"></a></p> + +<p>"In other words, one should never lend money unless one is obliged to +lend one's whole fortune."</p> + +<p>He felt extremely dissatisfied with Marianne's ironical remark. She +looked at him with an odd expression which was all the more disquieting +and intoxicating.</p> + +<p>"Let us speak no more about that, shall we?" she said. "I repeat to you +that I am satisfied at having seen Monsieur de Rosas again, because it +affords my self-love its revenge. Now, whether he comes back or not, it +matters little to me. He has made the <i>amende honorable</i>. That is the +principal thing, and you, my dear, must not be jealous; I find Othello's +rôle tiresome; oh! yes, tiresome!—The more so, because you have no +right to treat me as a Desdemona. The Code does not permit it."</p> + +<p>"You want to remind me again, then, that I am married? A moment ago, you +stabbed me by pin-thrusts."</p> + +<p>"In speaking of your household? Say then with knife-thrusts."</p> + +<p>"Why did you mention my wife before Monsieur de Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Why," said Marianne, "you do not understand anything. It was for your +sake, for you alone, in order to explain the presence in Marianne's +house, of a minister who is considered to lead a puritan life. Nothing +could be more simple!—Would you have me tell him that you neglect your +wife and that you are my lover? Perhaps you would have liked that +better!"<a name="Page_336" id="Page_336"></a></p> + +<p>"Yes, perhaps," said Vaudrey passionately.</p> + +<p>"Vain fellow!" the pretty girl said as she placed upon his mouth her +little hand which he kept upon his lips. "Then you would like me to +parade our secrets everywhere and to publicly announce our happiness?"</p> + +<p>"I should like," he said, as he removed his lips from the soft palm of +her hand, "that all the world should know that you are mine, mine +only—only mine, are you not?—That man?"</p> + +<p>His eyes entreated her and lost their fire.</p> + +<p>Marianne shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Let Monsieur de Rosas alone in tranquillity and let us return to my +house, <i>our house</i>," she said, with a tender expression in her eyes.</p> + +<p>"You do not love him?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"And you love me?"</p> + +<p>"I have told you so."</p> + +<p>"You love me? You love me?"</p> + +<p>"I love you!—Ah!" she said, "how unhappy you would be, nevertheless, if +I told you aloud some day in one of the lobbies of the Assembly what you +ask me to repeat here in a whisper."</p> + +<p>"I should prefer that to losing you and to knowing that you did not love +me."</p> + +<p>"He is telling the truth, however, the great fool!" cried Marianne, +laughing.</p> + +<p>"The real, sincere, profound truth!"<a name="Page_337" id="Page_337"></a></p> + +<p>He drew her to him, seated on the vulgar divan where Simon Kayser was +wont to display his paradoxes, and encircling her waist with both arms +he felt her yielding form beneath her satin gown, and wished her to bend +her fair face to his lips that were craving a kiss.</p> + +<p>Marianne took his face between her soft hands, and looking at him with +an odd smile, tender and ironical at once, at this big simpleton who was +completely dominated by her mocking tenderness, she said:</p> + +<p>"You are just the same Sulpice!"—as she spoke, she bent over him +engagingly, and laughed merrily while he kissed her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_IV" id="II_IV"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>IV</h3> + + +<p>José de Rosas thought himself much more the master of himself than he +actually was.</p> + +<p>This energetic man, firm as a very fine steel blade, had hoped to find +that in living at a distance from Marianne, he might forget her or at +least strengthen himself against her influence. He found on his return +that he was, however, more seduced by her than before, his heart was +wholly filled and gnawed by the distracting image of the pretty girl. He +had borne away with him to London, as everywhere in fact, the puzzling +smile, the sparkling glance of this woman's gray eyes that ceaselessly +appeared to him at his bedside, and beside him, like some phantom.<a name="Page_338" id="Page_338"></a></p> + +<p>The phantom of a living creature whose kiss still burned his lips like a +live coal. A phantom that he could clasp in his arms, carry away and +possess. All the virgin sentiments of this man whose life had been the +half-savage one of a trapper, a savant or a wanderer, turned toward +Marianne as to an incarnated hope, a living, palpitating chimera.</p> + +<p>José felt certain that if he returned to Paris it was all over with him, +and that he was giving his life to that woman. But he returned. His +fight against himself over, the first visit he made, once again, was to +the den where he knew well that he could discover Marianne's +whereabouts. He went to her as he might walk to a gulf. Under his cold +demeanor of a Castilian of former days, he was intensely passionate and +would neither reflect nor resist. He had experienced that delightful +sensation of impulse when, upon the rapids at the other end of the +globe, the river carried into a whirlpool his almost engulfed boat. He +would doubtless have been stupefied had he found Marianne installed in a +fashionable little mansion. She promised herself to explain that to him +when she next saw him while informing him, there and then, that she had +taken up her abode there. A mere whim: Mademoiselle Vanda having gone +away, the idea had attracted her of sleeping within a courtesan's +curtains. "I will tell him that this transient luxury recalls my former +follies when I made him believe that I was spending an inheritance from +my grandmother."<a name="Page_339" id="Page_339"></a></p> + +<p>She had, indeed, already lied to him, for the money she had formerly +squandered had been provided by De Lissac, but even then it was +necessary—for the duke was in expectancy—to conceal its source from +Rosas, hence the story of the inheritance that never existed. But she at +once thoroughly realized that the surroundings which were favorable to +the progress of the duke's love were not the bedroom and the +dressing-room of Mademoiselle Vanda. What difference would Rosas have +found between her and the fashionable courtesans whom he had loved, or +rather, enriched, in passing? He would not believe this new lie this +time.</p> + +<p>All that luxury might seduce Sulpice Vaudrey; it would have disgusted +José. What satisfied the appetite of the little, successful bourgeois +would nauseate the gentleman.</p> + +<p>As soon as Rosas returned to her, happy and stupefied at the same time, +extravagantly happy in his joy, her plan of campaign was at once +arranged. She did not wish to receive him in the vulgar hôtel, where the +clubmen had wiped their feet upon the carpets. She entreated him, since +he wished to see her again, to see her at her "own house," yes, really, +at her own house, in that little, unknown room, in Rue Cuvier, far from +the noise of Paris and near the Botanical Garden, a kind of hidden cell +into which no one entered.</p> + +<p>"No one but me," she said.</p> + +<p>The order had been given to Uncle Kayser in advance:<a name="Page_340" id="Page_340"></a> in case Rosas +should reappear, Simon was to at once inform his niece and prevent the +duke from discovering Marianne's new address. And this had been done.</p> + +<p>The duke was then going to see Mademoiselle Kayser only at Rue Cuvier, +after having rediscovered her at Uncle Simon's.</p> + +<p>He felt in advance a kind of gratitude to this woman who thus abandoned +the secret of her soul to him; giving him to understand that it was +there that she passed her days, buried in her recollections, dreaming of +her departed years, of that which had been, of that which might be, a +living death.</p> + +<p>Marianne had shrewdly divined the case. For this great soul, mystery +added a new sentiment to the feelings that Rosas experienced. The first +time that he found himself in that little abode where Simon Kayser's +niece awaited him, he was deeply moved, as if he had penetrated into the +pure chamber of a young girl. There, yonder, in that distant quarter, he +found a peaceful retreat for one wounded by life, thirsting for solitude +and passing there secret hours in the midst of loved books; in fact, the +discreet dwelling of a poor teacher who had collected some choice +<i>bibelots</i> that she had found by chance. Rosas there felt himself +surrounded by perfect virtue, amid the salvage of a happier past. +Marianne thus became what he imagined her to be, superior to her lot, +living an intellectual life, consoling herself for the mortification of +existence and the hideous experiences of life <a name="Page_341" id="Page_341"></a>by poet's dreams, in +building for herself in Paris itself a sort of Thebais, where she was +finally free and mistress of herself and where, when she was sad, she +was not compelled to wear a mask or a false smile, and was free from all +pretended gaiety. And she was so often sad!</p> + +<p>She had occasionally mentioned to Rosas the assumed name under which she +lived at that place.</p> + +<p>"Mademoiselle Robert!"</p> + +<p>He had manifested surprise thereat.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I do not wish them to know anything of me, not even my name. You +should understand the necessity that certain minds have for repose and +forgetfulness. Did not one of your sovereigns take his repose lying in +his coffin? Well! I envy him and when I have pushed the bolt of my +little room in Rue Cuvier, I tremble with delight, just as if I felt my +heart beating in a coffin. Do not tell any one. They would desire to +know and see. People are so curious and so stupid!"</p> + +<p>Marianne now seemed to be still more strange and seductive to Rosas. All +this romantic conduct, commonplace as it was, with which she surrounded +herself, exalted her in the estimation of the duke. She became in that +little chamber where she was simply Mademoiselle Robert, a hundred times +more charming and attractive to him than any problem: a veritable +Parisian sphinx.</p> + +<p>She was not his mistress. He loved her too deeply, with a holy, +respectful passion, to take her hastily, as by chance, and Marianne was +too skilful to risk any <a name="Page_342" id="Page_342"></a>imprudent act, well-knowing that if she yielded +too quickly, it would not be a woman who would fall into the duke's +arms, but an idol that descended from its pedestal.</p> + +<p>In the silence of the old house in the deserted quarter, they held +conversations in the course of which Rosas freely abandoned himself, and +through which she gained every day a more intimate knowledge of the +character of that man who was so different from those who hitherto had +sought her for pleasure.</p> + +<p>Thus, the very respect that he instinctively felt for her, impelled her +to love him.</p> + +<p>She had not been accustomed to such treatment. Every masculine look that +since her puberty she had felt riveted upon her, clearly expressed even +before the lips spoke: "You are beautiful. You please me. Will you?" +Rosas, at least, said: "I love you," before: "I desire you."</p> + +<p>Tainted in the body which she had given, offered, abandoned, sold, she +felt that she was respected by him even in that body, and although she +considered him silly, she thought him superior to all others, or at +least different, and that was a sufficient motive for loving him.</p> + +<p>One day she said to him in a peculiar tone and with her distracting +smile:</p> + +<p>"Do you know, my dear José, there is one thing I should not have +believed? You are bashful!"<a name="Page_343" id="Page_343"></a></p> + +<p>He turned slightly pale.</p> + +<p>"Sincere love is always bashful and clumsy. By that it may be known."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps!" said Marianne.</p> + +<p>Their conversations, however, only concerned love, so that Rosas might +speak of his passion or of his reminiscences.</p> + +<p>She once asked him if he would despise a woman if she became his +mistress.</p> + +<p>"No!" he said, with a smile, "it is only a Frenchman who would despise +the woman who surrendered herself. Other nations treat love more +seriously. They do not consider the gift of one's self in the light of a +fall."</p> + +<p>Marianne looked at him full in the face with a strange expression.</p> + +<p>"What, then, if I love you well enough to become your mistress?"</p> + +<p>"I should still esteem you enough to become your husband!"</p> + +<p>She felt her color change.</p> + +<p>Was it a sport on the part of Monsieur de Rosas? Why had he spoken to +her thus? Had he reflected upon what he had just said?</p> + +<p>José added in a very gentle tone:</p> + +<p>"Will you permit me to ask you a question, Marianne?"</p> + +<p>"You may ask me anything. I will frankly answer all your questions."<a name="Page_344" id="Page_344"></a></p> + +<p>"What was Monsieur Sulpice Vaudrey doing at your uncle's the other day? +Was he there to see you?"</p> + +<p>Marianne smiled.</p> + +<p>"Why, the minister simply came to talk of business matters. I hardly see +him except for Uncle Kayser, who is soliciting an official +commission,—you heard him—"</p> + +<p>"Does Monsieur Vaudrey pay his addresses to you?"</p> + +<p>"Necessarily. Oh! but only out of pure French gallantry. Mere +politeness. He loves his wife and he knows very well that I don't love +any one."</p> + +<p>"No one?" asked Rosas.</p> + +<p>"I do not love any one yet," repeated Marianne, opening her gray eyes +with a wide stare under the Spaniard's anxious glance.</p> + +<p>From that day, her mind was possessed of a new idea that imperiously +directed it. When Rosas had returned to her, she had only regarded him +as a possible lover, rich and agreeable. The mistress of a minister, she +would become the mistress of a duke. A millionaire duke. The change +would be profitable, assuming that she could not retain both. Her +calculations were speedily made. She would only make Rosas pay more +dearly for the resistance he had offered before surrendering himself.</p> + +<p>But now, abruptly and without her having thought of it, he had, with the +incautiousness of a soldier who discloses his attack and lays himself +open to a bully who <a name="Page_345" id="Page_345"></a>tries to provoke him, the duke showed her the +extent of his violent passion by a single phrase that feverishly +agitated her.</p> + +<p>His mistress! Why his mistress, since he had shown her that perhaps?—</p> + +<p>"Idiot that I am!" thought Marianne. "Suppose I play my cards for +marriage?"</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>"It will cost no more!"</p> + +<p>Married! Duchess! and Duchesse de Rosas! At first she laughed. Duchess! +I am asking a little from you! The mistress of Pierre Méran, the +artist's drudge, the wretch who abducted her and debauched her, adding +his depravity to hers, and who died of consumption while quite young, +after having plunged this girl into vice, this Marianne Kayser, born and +moulded for vice: she a duchess!</p> + +<p>"It would be too funny, my dear!" she thought.</p> + +<p>Never had Vaudrey, whom she saw that evening at Rue Prony, seemed so +provincial, or, as she said, so <i>Sulpice</i>. Besides, he was gloomy and +unable to express himself clearly at first, but finally he brought +himself to acknowledge that he was embarrassed about providing for the +bill of exchange—she understood—</p> + +<p>"No, I do not know!"</p> + +<p>"The bill of exchange in favor of Monsieur Gochard!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! that is so. Well! if you cannot pay it, my dear, I will advise—I +will seek—"<a name="Page_346" id="Page_346"></a></p> + +<p>There was nothing to seek. Vaudrey would evidently get himself out of +the affair—but the document matured at an unfortunate time. He did not +dare to mortgage La Saulière, his farm at Saint-Laurent-du-Pont. He had +reflected that Adrienne might learn all about it. And then—</p> + +<p>Marianne broke in upon his confidences.</p> + +<p>"Don't speak to me about these money matters, my friend, you know that +sort of thing disgusts me!—"</p> + +<p>"I understand you and ask your pardon."</p> + +<p>They were to see each other again the next day, as parliament was to +take a rest.</p> + +<p>"What joy! Not to be away from you for the whole of the day!" remarked +Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Well then, till to-morrow!"</p> + +<p>She felt intense pleasure in being alone again, wrapped in her sheets, +with the light of the lamp that ordinarily shone upon her hours of love +with Sulpice, still burning, and to be free to dream of her Spanish +grandee who had said, plainly, with the trembling of passion on his +lips: "I should esteem you enough to become your husband!"</p> + +<p>She passed the night in reverie.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey, in spite of the joy of the morrow,—a long tête-à-tête with his +mistress,—thought with increasing vexation of the approaching maturity +of his bill of exchange; within two months he would have to pay the +hundred thousand francs which he had undertaken to pay Marianne's +creditor.<a name="Page_347" id="Page_347"></a></p> + +<p>"It is astonishing how quickly time passes!"</p> + +<p>At breakfast the following day, Adrienne saw that her husband was more +than usually preoccupied.</p> + +<p>"Are political affairs going badly?"</p> + +<p>"No—on the contrary—"</p> + +<p>"Then why are you melancholy?"</p> + +<p>"I am a little fatigued."</p> + +<p>"Then," said Madame Vaudrey, "you will scold me."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"I have led Madame Gerson to hope—You know whom I mean, Madame Marsy's +friend,—I have almost promised her that you would accept an invitation +to dine at her house."</p> + +<p>For a moment Vaudrey was put out.</p> + +<p>Another evening taken! Hours of delight stolen from Marianne!</p> + +<p>"I have done wrong?" asked Adrienne, as she rested her pretty but +somewhat sad face on her husband's bosom. "I did it because it is so +great a pleasure to me to spend an entire evening with you, even at +another's house. Remember you have so many official dinners, banquets +and invitations that you attend alone. When the minister's wife is +invited with him, it is a fête-day for the poor, little forsaken thing. +I do not have much of you, it is true, but I see you, I hear you talking +and I am happy. Do not chide me for having said that we would go to +Madame Gerson's. The more so, because she is a charming woman. Ah! when +she <a name="Page_348" id="Page_348"></a>speaks of you! 'So great a minister!' Don't you know what she calls +you?—'A Colbert!'"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey could not restrain a smile.</p> + +<p>"Come, after that, one cannot refuse her invitation. It is the +<i>Monseigneur</i> of the beggar," said he, kissing Adrienne's brow. "And +when do we dine at Madame Gerson's?"</p> + +<p>"On Monday next; I shall have at least one delightful evening to see +you," said the young wife sweetly.</p> + +<p>The minister entered his cabinet. Almost immediately after, a messenger +handed him a card: <i>Molina, Banker</i>.</p> + +<p>"How strange it is!" thought Sulpice. "I had him in mind."</p> + +<p>In the course of his troublesome reflections concerning the Gochard +paper, Vaudrey persistently thought of that fat, powerful man who +laughed and harangued in a loud voice in the greenroom of the ballet, as +he patted with his fat fingers the delicate chin of Marie Launay.</p> + +<p>Why! if he were willing, this Molina—Molina the Tumbler!—for him it is +a mere bagatelle, a hundred thousand francs!</p> + +<p>Salomon Molina entered the minister's cabinet just as he made his way +into the foyer of the Opéra, with swelling chest, tilted chin and +stomach thrust forward.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur le Ministre," he said in a clear voice, as he spread himself +out in the armchair that Vaudrey pointed out to him, "I notify you that +you have my maiden <a name="Page_349" id="Page_349"></a>visit!—I am still in a state of innocency! On my +honor, this is the first time I have set my foot within a minister's +office!"</p> + +<p>He manifested his independence—born of his colossal influence—by his +satisfied and successful air. The former Marseillaise clothes-dealer, in +his youth pouncing upon the sailors of the port and Maltese and +Levantine seamen, to palm off on them a second-hand coat or trousers, as +the wardrobe dealers of the Temple hook the passer-by, Salomon Molina, +who had paraded his rags and his hopes on the Canebière, dreaming at the +back of his dark shop of the triumphs, the pleasures, the revels and the +indigestions that money affords, had, moreover, always preserved the +bitterness of those wretched days and his red, Jewish lip expressed the +gall of his painful experiences.</p> + +<p>His first word as he entered Vaudrey's cabinet, <a name="typo_5" id="typo_5"></a>asserting the virginity +of his efforts at solicitation, betrayed his bitterness.</p> + +<p>Now, triumphant, powerful, delighted, feasted and fat, his massive form, +his gross flesh and his money were in evidence all over Paris. His huge +paunch, shaking with laughter, filled the stage-boxes at the theatres. +He expanded his broad shoulders as he reclined in the calèche that +deposited him on race-days at the entrance of the weighing-enclosure. He +held by the neck, as it were, everything of the Parisian quarry that +yelps and bounds about money, issues of stock, and <a name="Page_350" id="Page_350"></a>the food of public +fortune: bankers, stock-brokers, and jobbers, financial, political and +exchange editors, wretches running after a hundred sous, statesmen in a +fair way to fortune; and he distributed to this little crowd, just as he +would throw food into a kennel, the discounts and clippings of his +ventures, taking malicious pleasure, the insolent delight of a fortunate +upstart, in feigning at the moment when loans were issued, sickness that +had no existence, in order to have the right of keeping his chamber, of +hearing persons of exalted names ringing at his door and dancing +attendance upon him,—powerful, influential and illustrious +persons,—him, the second-hand dealer and chafferer from Marseilles.</p> + +<p>It was then that he tasted the joy of supreme power, that delight which +titillated even his marrow, and after having rested all day, the prey of +a convenient neuralgia, he experienced the unlimited pleasure of force +overcoming mind, the blow of a fist crushing a weakling, as with a white +cravat he appeared in some salon, in the greenroom of the ballet, or in +the dressing-room of a <i>première</i>, saying with the mocking smile of +triumph and the assurance attending a gorged appetite:</p> + +<p>"I was sick to-day, I suffered from neuralgia! The Minister of Finance +called on me!—Baron Nathan came to get information from me!"</p> + +<p>Among all the pleasures experienced by this man, he valued feminine +virtue occasionally purchased with gold as little in comparison with the +virgin souls, honor <a name="Page_351" id="Page_351"></a>and virtue that he often succeeded in humiliating, +in bending before him like a reed, and snuffing out with his irony, +whenever necessity placed at his mercy any of those puritanical beings +who had passed sometimes with haughty brow before the millions of this +man of money. It was then that the clothes-dealer took his revenge in +all its hideousness. There was no pity to be expected from this fat, +smiling and easy-going man. His fat fingers strangled more certainly +than the lean hands of a usurer. Molina never pardoned.</p> + +<p>Ah! if this fellow went to see the minister, most assuredly he wanted a +favor from him.</p> + +<p>But what?</p> + +<p>It was extraordinary, but before Vaudrey, Molina who could hold his own +among rascals, found himself ill at ease. There was in the frank look of +this <i>ninny</i>, as Molina the <i>Tumbler</i> had one evening called him while +talking politics, such direct honesty that the banker, accustomed as he +was to dealings with sharks and intriguers, did not quite know how to +open the question, nevertheless a very important matter was in hand.</p> + +<p>"A rich plum," thought Molina.</p> + +<p>A matter of railways, a concession to be gained. A matter of private +interest, disguised under the swelling terms of the public welfare, the +national needs. Millions were to be gained. Molina was charged with the +duty of sounding the President of the Council and the Minister of Public +Works. Two honest men. The<a name="Page_352" id="Page_352"></a> <i>dodge</i>, as the <i>Tumbler</i> said, was to make +them swallow the affair under the guise of patriotism. A strategical +railroad. The means of rapid locomotion in case of mobilization. With +such high-sounding words, <i>strategy</i>, <i>frontier</i>, <i>safety</i>, they could +carry a good many points.</p> + +<p>Unfortunately, Vaudrey was rather skittish on these particular +questions, besides he was informed on the matter. He felt his flesh +creep while Molina was speaking. Just before, on seeing the banker's +card, the idea of the money of which the fat man was one of the +incarnations, had suddenly dawned upon him as a hope. Who knows? By +Molina's aid, he might, perhaps, free himself from anxiety about the +Gochard bill of exchange!—But from the minister's first words, although +the banker could not get to the point, intimidated as he was by +Sulpice's honest look, it was clear that Vaudrey surmised some repugnant +suggestions in the hesitating words of this man.</p> + +<p>What! Molina hesitating? He did not go straight to the point, squarely, +according to his custom, Molina the illustrious <i>Tumbler</i>? Eh! no! the +intentionally cold bearing of the minister decidedly discomposed him. +Vaudrey's glance never wandered from his for a moment. When the promoter +pronounced the word Bourse, a disdainful curl played upon Sulpice's +lips, but not a word escaped him. Molina heard his own voice break the +silence of the ministerial cabinet and he felt himself entangled. He +came to propose a combination, a bonus, <a name="Page_353" id="Page_353"></a>and he did not suspect that +Vaudrey would refuse to have a hand in it. And here, this devilish +minister appeared not to understand, did not understand, perhaps, or +else he understood too well. Molina was not accustomed to such +hard-of-hearing people. With his fat hand, he had dropped into the hands +of senators and ministers of the former régime, a sum for which the only +receipt given was a smile. He was accustomed to the style of +conversation carried on by hints and ended between intelligent people by +a <i>shake of the hand</i>, that in which some bits of paper rested: +bank-notes or paid-up shares. And this Vaudrey knew nothing! So he felt +himself obliged to explain himself clearly, to stoop to dotting every +<i>i</i>, at the risk of being shown out of doors.</p> + +<p>Molina was too shrewd to run this risk. He would return at another time, +seeing that the minister turned a deaf ear, but <i>pécaïre</i>! he sweat huge +drops in seeking roundabout phrases, this man who never minced his words +and habitually called things by their proper names. Was the like ever +seen! A pettifogger from Grenoble to <i>floor</i> Salomon Molina!</p> + +<p>"It made me warm," said the money-maker, on leaving the cabinet, "but, +deuce take it! I'll have my revenge. One is not a minister always. You +shall pay me dearly, my little fellow, for that uncomfortable little +time."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had thoroughly understood the matter, but he did not intend to +allow it to be seen that he did. That <a name="Page_354" id="Page_354"></a>was a simpler way. He had not had +to dismiss the buyer of consciences; he had enjoyed his embarrassment +and that was sufficient.</p> + +<p>"What, however, if I had spoken to him of money before he had shown his +hand! If I had accepted from him—!" he said to himself.</p> + +<p>He shuddered at the thought as he had previously done while Molina was +talking to him. A single imprudence, a single confidence might easily +have placed him under the hand of this fat man. He must, however, find +some solution. The days were rolling away and the bills signed for +Marianne would in a very short time reach maturity.</p> + +<p>"When I think that this Molina could in one day enable me to gain three +times this sum."</p> + +<p>Salomon had just told him: "To forestall the news on the Bourse is +sometimes worth gold ingots!" A <i>forestaller</i>! As well say the +revelation of a State secret, base speculation, almost treachery! And +yet on hearing these words that covered up an insult, he had not even +rung for the messenger to show Molina out, but had striven to comprehend +nothing!</p> + +<p>As the result of this conversation, he felt uncomfortable. The man had +left an odor of pollution, as it were, behind him.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey must needs be soon reassured respecting the Gochard paper. In +visiting Marianne, he observed that his mistress was a shrewd woman. She +informed him <a name="Page_355" id="Page_355"></a>immediately that Claire Dujarrier whom she had seen, would +secure a renewal from Gochard, who was unknown to Vaudrey, from three +months to three months until the expiration of six months in +consideration of an additional twenty thousand francs for each period of +ninety days.</p> + +<p>"I did not understand that at first," Marianne began by remarking.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Sulpice, "I understand perfectly, it is absolute usury. But +time is ready money, and in six months it will be easier for me to pay +one hundred and forty thousand francs than a hundred thousand to-day. I +have plans."</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"Very difficult to explain, but quite clear in my mind! The important +part is not to have the date of maturity on the first of June, but on +the first of December."</p> + +<p>"Then nothing is more simple. Madame Dujarrier will arrange it."</p> + +<p>"Is Madame Dujarrier a providence then?"</p> + +<p>"Almost," said Marianne coldly.</p> + +<p>Sulpice was intoxicated with joy, realizing that he had before him all +the necessary time in which to free himself from his embarrassment, when +Marianne should have returned him his first acceptance for one hundred +thousand francs against a new one for one hundred and forty thousand. He +breathed again. From the twenty-sixth of April to the first of December, +he had nearly seven <a name="Page_356" id="Page_356"></a>months in which to free himself. He repeated the +calculation that he had formerly made when he said: "I have ample time!"</p> + +<p>He reëntered the Hôtel Beauvau in a cheerful mood, Adrienne was +delighted. She feared to see him return nervous and dejected.</p> + +<p>"Then you will be brilliant presently at Madame Gerson's."</p> + +<p>"Stop! that's so. It is this evening in fact!—"</p> + +<p>He had forgotten it.</p> + +<p>Marianne, too, was not free. She was going, she said, to Auteuil for +that bill of exchange. Vaudrey did not therefore, regret the soirée. His +going to Madame Gerson's was now a matter of indifference to him.</p> + +<p>"As for me, I am so happy, oh! so happy!" said Adrienne, clapping her +little hands like a child.</p> + +<p>In undressing, Vaudrey fortunately found this document which he had +folded in four and left in his waistcoat pocket:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"On the first of June next, I will pay to the order of Monsieur + Adolphe Gochard of No. 9, Rue Albouy, the sum of One Hundred + Thousand Francs, value received in cash.</p> + <p> + "SULPICE VAUDREY,<br /> + "Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, 37."<br /> + </p></div> + + +<p>He turned pale on reading it. If Adrienne had seen it!—</p> + +<p>He burned the paper at a candle.<a name="Page_357" id="Page_357"></a></p> + +<p>"I am imprudent," he said to himself. "Poor Adrienne! I should not like +to cause her any distress."</p> + +<p>She was overjoyed as she made the journey in the ministerial carriage +from Place Beauvau to the Gersons' mansion. At last she had a rapid, +stolen moment in which she could recover the old-time joy of happy +solitude, full of the exquisite agitation of former days.</p> + +<p>"Do you recall the time when you took me away like this, on the evening +of our marriage?" she whispered to him, as the carriage was driven off +at a gallop.</p> + +<p>He took her hands and pressed them.</p> + +<p>"You still love me, don't you, Sulpice?—You believe too, that I love +you more than all the world?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I believe it!"</p> + +<p>"You would kill me if I deceived you?—I, ah, if you deceived me, I do +not know what I should do.—Although I think that you are here, that I +hold you, that I love you, you may still belong to another woman—"</p> + +<p>"Again! you have already said that. Are you mad?" said Sulpice. "See! we +have reached our destination."</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson had brilliantly illuminated her house in Rue de Boulogne +with lights, filled it with flowers, and spread carpets everywhere to +receive the President of the Council. The house was too small to +accommodate the guests, who were about to be stifled therein. She packed +them into her dining-room. For the soirée which was to follow, she had +sounded the roll-call of her <a name="Page_358" id="Page_358"></a>friends. She was bent on founding a new +salon, on showing Madame Marsy that she was not alone to be the rival of +Madame Evan.</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson was not on friendly terms with Sabine Marsy. People were +ignorant as to the cause. Adrienne, who was not familiar with the +history of such little broils, was very much surprised to learn of this +fact.</p> + +<p>"She claims that we take away all her <i>personnel</i>," said Madame Gerson. +"It is not my fault if people enjoy themselves at our house. I hope that +you will find pleasure here, Monsieur le Président."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey bowed. "Madame Gerson could not doubt it."</p> + +<p>The guests sat down to dinner. Madame Gerson beamed with joy beside the +minister. Guy de Lissac, Warcolier, some senators and some deputies were +of the dinner party. Monsieur and Madame Gerson never spoke of them by +their names but: <i>Monsieur le Sénateur, Monsieur le Député!</i> They +lubricated their throats with these titles, just as bourgeois who come +in contact with highnesses swell out in addressing a prince as +<i>Monseigneur</i>, absolutely as if they were addressing themselves.</p> + +<p>Sulpice felt in the midst of this circle in which everything was +sacrificed to <i>chic</i>, as he invariably did, the painful sensation of a +man who is continually on show. He never dined out without running +against the same menu, the same fanfare, and the same conversation.</p> + +<p>Monsieur Gerson endeavored to draw the President of <a name="Page_359" id="Page_359"></a>the Council into +political conversation. He wished to know Vaudrey's opinion as to the +one-man ballet. Sulpice smiled.</p> + +<p>"Thanks!" he said. "We have just been dealing with that. I prefer +truffles, they are more savory."</p> + +<p>Through the flowers, Adrienne could see her husband who was seated +opposite to her beside Madame Gerson. She conversed but little with Guy +de Lissac, who was sitting on her right, although the formalities of the +occasion would have suggested that Monsieur le Senator Crépeau and +Monsieur de Prangins, the deputy, should have been so placed. Madame +Gerson, however, had remarked with a smile, that Madame Vaudrey would +not feel annoyed at having Monsieur de Lissac for her neighbor. "I have +often met Monsieur de Lissac at the ministry; he is received noticeably +well there."</p> + +<p>Not knowing any one among the guests, Adrienne was, in fact, charmed to +have Guy next to her. He was decidedly pleasing to her with his sallies, +his skepticism which, as she thought, covered more belief than he wished +to disclose. For a long time, he had felt himself entirely captivated by +her cheerful modesty and the grace of her exquisite purity. She was so +vastly different from all the other women whom he had known. How the +devil could Vaudrey bring himself to neglect so perfect a creature, who +was more attractive in her fascinating virtue than all the damsels to be +met with in society, among the demi-monde, or those of a still lower +<a name="Page_360" id="Page_360"></a>grade? For Vaudrey remained indifferent to Adrienne; and this was a +further and manifest blow. A specialist in matters of observation like +Guy was not to be deceived therein. Madame Vaudrey had not yet +complained, but she was already suffering. Was it merely politics, or +was it some woman who was taking her husband from Adrienne? Guy did not +know, but he would know. The pretty Madame Vaudrey interested him.</p> + +<p>"If that idiot Sulpice were not my friend, I would make love to her. +Besides," he said to himself, as he looked at Adrienne's lovely, limpid +eyes, "I should fail; there are some lakes whose tranquillity cannot be +disturbed."</p> + +<p>Adrienne, pleased to have him beside her, enquired of him the names of +the guests. On the left of Madame Gerson sat a little, broad-backed man, +with black hair pasted over his temples, long leg-of-mutton whiskers +decorating his bright-colored cheeks, and a keen eye: he was Monsieur +Jouvenet, formerly an advocate; to-day Prefect of Police.</p> + +<p>Senator Crépeau sat further away. He was a fat manufacturer, who talked +about alimentary products and politics. In the <i>Analytical Table of the +Accounts of the Sittings of the Senate</i>, his name shone brilliantly, +with the following as his record: "CRÉPEAU, of L'Ain, Life +Senator—Apologizes for his absence—8 January—. Apologizes for his +absence—20 February—. Member of a commis<a name="Page_361" id="Page_361"></a>sion—<i>Journal Officiel</i>, p. +1441. Apologizes for not being able to take part in the labors of the +commission—4 March—. Apologizes for his absence—20 March—. Asks for +leave of absence—5 April—." Such were his services during the ordinary +work of that year. Monsieur Crépeau—of L'Ain—had earned the right to +take a rest.</p> + +<p>"He eats very heartily," said Lissac. "His appetite is better than his +eloquence."</p> + +<p>Next to Crépeau was another legislator, Henri de Prangins, a publicist, +an old, wrinkled, stooping, dissatisfied grumbler.</p> + +<p>"Ah! that is Monsieur de Prangins," said Adrienne, "I have heard much +about him."</p> + +<p>"He is a typical character," Lissac said, with a smile. "You know +Granet, <i>the gentleman who will become a minister</i>; well, Prangins is +the gentleman who would be a minister, but who never will be! Moreover, +he is five hundred times more remarkable than a hundred others who have +been in office ten times, for what reason cannot be said."</p> + +<p>For nearly half a century Prangins, the old political wheel-horse, had +plotted and jockeyed in politics, set up and overthrown ministries, +piled up review articles on newspaper articles, contradiction on +contradiction, page on page, spoiled cartloads of paper in his vocation +of daily or fortnightly howler, and withal he was applauded, rich and +popular, famous and surrounded by flatterers, knife-and-fork companions, +without friends but not want<a name="Page_362" id="Page_362"></a>ing clients, as he had made and spoiled +reputations, ministers, governments, and although he well knew the +vanity and nothingness of power, he aspired to secure that vain booty, +oft alleging, with bitter enviousness of authority and impatient of +tyranny, that to enjoy popularity uninterruptedly was not worth a +quarter of an hour of power, approaching with greedy eagerness the +desired lot, yet seeing it inevitably, eternally, relentlessly escape +and recede from him, plucked from his grasp as it were, like a shred of +flesh from the jaw of a Molossian. And now, in his unquenchable lust of +power, amid the monuments of combination and deception he had created, +this man was weary, disgusted and irritated,—believing himself +vanquished and smothering the anger of defeat in the luxurious isolation +of his wealth. He was neither officially influential nor liked. Feared +he was, probably, and envied because of his good fortune, recognized, +too, as a <i>force</i>, but only as acting in the whirlwind of his ideas and +struggling in the emptiness of his dreams. After having immolated +everything, youth, family, friendship, love, to this chimera: power, he +found himself old, worn-out, broken by his combats, face to face with +the folly of his hopes and the worthlessness of his will. Never had his +nervous hand been able to grasp in its transition, the fragment of +morocco of a portfolio and now that his parchment-like fingers were old +and feeble, they would never cling to that shred of power! And now this +Prangins avenged himself for the contempt <a name="Page_363" id="Page_363"></a>or the injustice of his +colleagues and the folly of circumstances, by criticism, defiance, +mockery, denial and by loudly expressing his opinion:</p> + +<p>"The defect of every government is that it will try to play new airs on +an old violin! Your violin is cracked, Monsieur Vaudrey! I do not +reproach you for that, you did not make it!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey laughed at the sally, but Warcolier felt that he was choking. +How could the minister allow his policy to be thus attacked at table? +Ah! how Warcolier would have clinched the argument of this Prangins.</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson was delighted. The dinner was served sumptuously and went +off without a hitch. The <i>maître d'hôtel</i> directed the service +admirably. The soirée that was to follow it would be magnificent. The +journals would most certainly report it. Gerson had invited one reporter +in spite of his dislike of journalists. Ah! those gossipers and foolish +fellows, they never forgot to describe the toilettes worn by "the pretty +Madame Gerson" at <i>first nights</i>, at the Élysée or at Charity Bazaars. +Occasionally, her husband pretended to be angered by the successes of +his wife:</p> + +<p>"Those journalists! Just imagine, those journalists! They speak about my +wife just as they would about an actress! 'The lovely Madame Gerson wore +a gown of <i>crêpe de Chine</i>!' The lovely Madame Gerson! What has my +wife's beauty or her toilette to do with them?"</p> + +<p>In truth, however, he felt flattered. He was only <a name="Page_364" id="Page_364"></a>sincerely annoyed +when people respected the devilish wall of private life, the cement of +which he would have stripped off himself, in order to show his wife's +beauty. To be quoted in the paper, why! that is <i>chic</i>.</p> + +<p>Adrienne felt a little stunned by the noise of the conversation which +increased in proportion as the dinner advanced. She was also very much +astonished and not a little grieved when Madame Gerson abruptly spoke in +a loud voice before all the guests concerning Madame Marsy, at whose +house it was, in fact, that she made the acquaintance of Vaudrey. Madame +Gerson showed her pretty teeth in a very charming manner as she tore her +old friend Sabine to pieces, as it were. In a tenderly indulgent tone +which was the more terrible, she repeated the tales that were formerly +current: the affecting death of Philippe Marsy, the painter of +<i>Charity</i>, and a particular escapade in which Sabine was involved with +Émile Cordier, one of the leaders of the <i>intransigeante</i> school of +painters.</p> + +<p>"What! you did not know that?" said the pretty Madame Gerson in +astonishment.</p> + +<p>Adrienne knew nothing. She was delighted moreover to know nothing. She +heard this former friend relate how Sabine had, at one time, exhibited +at the Salon. Oh! mere students' daubs, horrid things! Still-life +subjects that might have passed for buried ones, and yet, perhaps, +Cordier retouched them.</p> + +<p>"I thought that Madame Gerson was on the best of <a name="Page_365" id="Page_365"></a>terms with Madame +Marsy," whispered Adrienne to Lissac, who replied:</p> + +<p>"They have been on better! They perhaps will be so again. That is of +very little importance. Women revile each other and associate at the +same time."</p> + +<p>Adrienne decided that she would not listen. She knew Sabine Marsy only +slightly; she was not interested as a friend; but this little execution, +gracefully carried out here by a woman who recently did the honors at +the Salon of Boulevard Malesherbes seemed to her as cowardly as +treachery. This, then, was society! And how right was her choice in +preferring solitude!</p> + +<p>Then, in order that she might not hear the slander that was greeted with +applause by those very persons who but yesterday besieged Madame Marsy's +buffet, and who would run to-morrow to pay court to that woman, she +conversed with Lissac. She frankly told him what she suffered at Place +Beauvau. She spoke of Sulpice, as Sulpice was loved by her beyond all +else in the world.</p> + +<p>"Fancy! I do not see him, hardly ever! The other week he passed two days +at Laon, where an exposition was held at which he was present."</p> + +<p>"An exposition at Laon?" asked Lissac, astonished. "What exposition?"</p> + +<p>"I do not know. I know nothing myself. Perhaps it is wrong of me not to +keep myself informed of passing events, but all that wearies me. I +detest politics and journals—I am told quite enough about them.<a name="Page_366" id="Page_366"></a> +Politics! that which takes my husband from me! My uncle, Doctor Reboux, +often said to me: 'Never marry a doctor; he is only half a husband.' +Vaudrey is like a doctor. Always absent, with his everlasting +night-sessions."</p> + +<p>"Night-sessions?" asked Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Yes, at the Chamber—continually—"</p> + +<p>Guy determined to betray nothing of his astonishment; but he knew now as +surely as if he had learned everything, why Sulpice neglected Adrienne. +The fool! some girl from the Opéra! some office-seeker who was skilfully +entangling His Excellency! That appertained to his functions then? He +was exasperated at Vaudrey and alternately looked at him and at +Adrienne. So perfect a woman! Ravishing. What an exquisite profile, so +delicate and with such a straight nose and a delightful mouth! Was +Vaudrey mad then?</p> + +<p>The guests rose from the table, and, as usual, the men went into the +smoking-room, leaving the salon half-empty. Madame Gerson profited +thereby to continue distilling her little slanders about Sabine, which +she did while laughing heartily. In the smoking-room the men chatted +away beneath the cloud that rose from their <i>londrès</i>. The clarion tones +of Warcolier rung out above all the other voices.</p> + +<p>Guy, seated in a corner on a divan, was still thinking of Adrienne, of +those <i>night-sessions</i>, of those expositions, of those agricultural +competitions invented by Sulpice, <a name="Page_367" id="Page_367"></a>and caught but snatches of the +conversation, jests, and nonsensical stories which were made at the cost +of the colleagues of the Chamber and political friends:</p> + +<p>"You know how Badiche learned at the last election that he was not +elected?"</p> + +<p>"No, how?"</p> + +<p>"He returned to his house, anxious as to the result of the ballot. And +he heard, what do you think? His children, a little boy and a little +girl, who on receipt of the telegram that papa was waiting for and that +mamma in her feverish expectation had opened, had already composed a +song to the air of <i>The Young Man Poisoned</i>:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Résultat très négatif,<br /></span> +<span>Ballottage positif!<br /></span> +<span>Badiche est ballo—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bâté,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Est ballotté!<br /></span> +<span>Oui, Badiche est ballotté;<br /></span> +<span>C'est papa qu'est ballotté!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Happy precocity! genuine frightful gamins!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Du Gavarni</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Apropos, on what majority do you count, Monsieur le Président?"</p> + +<p>"One hundred and thirty-nine."</p> + +<p>"That is a large one."</p> + +<p>"I! my dear fellow,"—it was old Prangins speaking to Senator +Crépeau,—"I do not count myself as likely <a name="Page_368" id="Page_368"></a>to be included in the next +ministry, no! I do not delude myself, but I shall be in the second—or +rather in the third—no, in the fourth—yes, in the fourth +ministry—Assuredly!"</p> + +<p>An asthmatic cough, the cough of an old man, interrupted his remarks.</p> + +<p>Guy heard Warcolier, as he held a small glass of kirsch in his hand, say +with a laugh:</p> + +<p>"I have a way of holding my electors in leash. Not only when I visit +them do I address them as <i>my friend, my brave</i>, which flatters them, +but from time to time, I write them autograph letters. They look upon +that like ready money. Some of them, the good fellows, are flattered: +'He has written to me, he is not proud!' Others, the suspicious fellows, +are reassured: 'Now—I have his signature, I have him!' And there you +are!"</p> + +<p>They laughed heartily.</p> + +<p>"How they laugh <i>afterward</i>," thought Lissac, "at the electors whose +shoes they would blacken <i>beforehand</i>."</p> + +<p>"The course that I have followed is very simple," said another. "I +desired to become sub-prefect so as to become a prefect and a prefect to +become a deputy, and a deputy so as to reach a receiver-generalship. The +salaries assured, why, there's the crowning of a career."</p> + +<p>"Why, that fellow <i>plays the whole gamut</i>," again thought Guy, "but he +is frank!"<a name="Page_369" id="Page_369"></a></p> + +<p>"I read very little," now replied Crépeau to Warcolier—"I do not much +care for pure literature—we politicians, we need substantial reading +that will teach us to think."</p> + +<p>"I believe you!—" murmured this Parisian Guy, still smoking and +listening. "Go to school, my good man!"</p> + +<p>The conversation thus intermingled and confused, horrified and irritated +this <i>blasé</i> by its gravity and selfishness. He summed up an entire +character in a single phrase and shook his head as he very shrewdly +remarked: "Suppose <i>Universal Suffrage</i> were listening?"</p> + +<p>Lissac did not take any part in these conversations. It was his delight +to observe. He drew amusement from all these wearisome commonplaces, +according to his custom as a curious spectator.</p> + +<p>He was about, however, to rise and approach Vaudrey, who was +instinctively coming toward him, when the Prefect of Police, Monsieur +Jouvenet, without noticing it, placed himself between the minister and +his friend.</p> + +<p>Jouvenet spoke in a low tone to Vaudrey, smiling at the same time very +peculiarly and passing his fingers through his whiskers. Whatever +discretion the prefect employed, Guy was near enough to him to hear the +name of Marianne Kayser, which surprised him.</p> + +<p>Marianne! what question of Marianne could there be between these two +men?<a name="Page_370" id="Page_370"></a></p> + +<p>Lissac observed that Vaudrey suddenly became very pale.</p> + +<p>He drew still nearer, pretending to finish a cup of coffee while +standing. Then he heard these words very distinctly:</p> + +<p>"A reporter saw you leave her house the other evening!"</p> + +<p>Guy moved away very quickly. He felt a sort of sudden bewilderment, as +if the few words spoken by the Prefect of Police were the natural result +of his conversation with Adrienne, an immediate response thereto.</p> + +<p>"It would be astonishing if Marianne—" thought Lissac.</p> + +<p>Besides, he would know soon. He would merely question Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>As soon as Jouvenet, always polite, grave and impassive, had left +"Monsieur le Ministre" in a state of visible nervousness, almost of +anxiety, he entered upon his plan.</p> + +<p>"You know Mademoiselle Kayser intimately then?" he asked Vaudrey, who, +taken aback, looked at him for a moment without replying and endeavored +to grasp Lissac's purpose.</p> + +<p>"Am I imprudent?" further asked Guy.</p> + +<p>"No, but who has told you—?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, your Prefect of Police only spoke a little too loud. He seemed +to me to understand."<a name="Page_371" id="Page_371"></a></p> + +<p>Vaudrey's hand rapidly seized Lissac's wrist.</p> + +<p>"Hush! be silent!"</p> + +<p>"Very well! Good!" said Lissac to himself. "Poor little Adrienne."</p> + +<p>"I will tell you all about that later. Oh! nothing is more simple! It +isn't what you think!"</p> + +<p>"I am sure of that!" answered Lissac, with a smile.</p> + +<p>In a mechanical way, and as if to evade his friend, Sulpice left the +smoking-room for the salon, tritely observing:</p> + +<p>"We must rejoin the ladies—the cigar kills conversation—"</p> + +<p>He felt uncomfortable. It was the first time that Jouvenet had informed +him that there are agents for learning the movements of ministers. The +Prefect of Police, in a chance conversation at the Opéra with the +editor-in-chief of a very Parisian journal, had suppressed a rumor which +stated that a minister hailing from Grenoble set propriety at defiance +in his visits to Rue Prony. It would have been as well to print +Vaudrey's name.</p> + +<p>Hitherto he had been able to enjoy his passion for Marianne without +scandal and secretly. His mysterious intrigue was now known to the +police, to everybody, to a reporter who had stumbled against him on +leaving a supper-party at the house of a courtesan in the neighborhood.</p> + +<p>The minister was bitterly annoyed. The very flatter<a name="Page_372" id="Page_372"></a>ing applause that +the women bestowed upon him when he returned to the salon could not +dissipate his ill-humor. He tried to chat and respond to the affected +remarks of Madame Gerson and to the smiles of the women; but he was +embarrassed and nervous. Adrienne thought he looked ill.</p> + +<p>Everything was spoken of in the light but pretentious, easy tone of the +conversation of those second-rate salons where neither ideas nor men are +made, where, on the contrary, they are accepted, ready-made and <i>en +bloc</i>. On every question, the picture in vogue, the favorite book, the +man of the hour, they expressed themselves by the same stereotyped, +expected word, borrowed from the ceaseless repetition of current +polemics. Nothing was new. The conversation was as well worn as an old +farthing. Adrienne was pained to see a man of Vaudrey's intelligence +compelled to listen to these truisms and wondered if he would presently +reproach her for having brought him into the suffocating void of this +Parisian establishment where all was superficial, glittering and <i>chic</i>.</p> + +<p>She was in a hurry to get away. She saw that Sulpice was growing weary, +and took advantage of the first opportunity to whisper to him:</p> + +<p>"Would you like to go?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, let us go!" he said.</p> + +<p>He sought Lissac and repeated to him that he would have something to say +to him, and Guy bowed to the<a name="Page_373" id="Page_373"></a> Minister and Madame Vaudrey, who left too +early to please the Gersons.</p> + +<p>Adrienne, out of heart and discouraged by commonplace gossip and +slander, was eager to be again with her husband, to tell him that +nothing could compensate her for the deep joy of the tête-à-tête, their +evenings passed together as of old—he remembered them well,—when he +read to her from the works of much-loved poets.</p> + +<p>"Poetry!" said Vaudrey. "Will you be quiet! The Gersons would find me as +antiquated as Ramel. It is old-fashioned."</p> + +<p>"I am no longer surprised," added the young wife, "at being so little +fashionable. Morally speaking, those hot-houses of platitudes stifle +one. Never fear, Sulpice, I shall not be the one to ever again drag you +into salons. Are you tired? Are you weary?"</p> + +<p>"No, I was thinking of something else," replied Vaudrey, who really was +thinking of Marianne.</p> + +<p>Madame Vaudrey had not left Madame Gerson's salon before that pretty +little Parisian whispered imprudently enough in the ear of a female +friend:</p> + +<p>"Our ministers' wives are always from Carpentras, Pont-à-Mousson, or +Moulins; don't you think so?"</p> + +<p>"And what would you have!" said Lissac, who on this evening heard +everything that he ought not to hear, "it is as good as being from the +<i>Moulin-Rouge</i>!"</p> + +<p>Madame Gerson smiled, thought the expression charm<a name="Page_374" id="Page_374"></a>ing, very apt, very +happy, but again reflected that Lissac was exceedingly considerate +toward Adrienne and that Madame Vaudrey was a little too indulgent +toward Monsieur de Lissac.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_V" id="II_V"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>V</h3> + + +<p>Since the moment when it had entered her mind that she might find +something more than a lover in Monsieur de Rosas, Marianne had been +sorely puzzled. She was playing a strong hand. Between the minister and +the duke she must make a choice.</p> + +<p>She did not care seriously for Vaudrey. In fact she found that he was +ridiculously unreserved. "He is a simple fellow!" she said to Claire +Dujarrier. But she had sufficient <i>amour-propre</i> to retain him, and she +felt assured that Sulpice was weak enough to obey her in everything: +such an individual was not to be disdained. As to Rosas, she felt a +sentiment which certainly was not love, but rather a feeling of +astonishment, a peculiar affection. Rosas held her in respect, and she +was flattered by his timid bearing, as he had in his veins the blood of +heroes. He spoke almost entirely of his love, which, however, he never +proposed to her to test, and this platonic course, which in Vaudrey's +case she would have considered <i>simple</i>, appeared to her to be "good +form" in the great nobleman's case. The duke raised her in her own +eyes.<a name="Page_375" id="Page_375"></a></p> + +<p>He had never repeated that word, doubtless spoken by him at random: +marriage, and Marianne was too discreet and shrewd to appear to have +specially noticed it. She did not even allude to it. She waited +patiently. With the lapse of time, she thought, Rosas would be the more +surely in her grasp. Meantime it was necessary to live and as she was +bent on maintaining her household, she kept Vaudrey, whom she might need +at any moment.</p> + +<p>Her part was to carry on these two intrigues simultaneously, leading +Rosas to believe that the minister was her friend only, nothing more, +the patron of Uncle Kayser, and making Vaudrey think that since she had +dismissed the duke he had become resigned and would "suppress his +sighs." She could have sworn, in all sincerity, that José was not her +lover.</p> + +<p>To mislead Vaudrey was not a very difficult task. Sulpice was literally +blinded by this love.—For a moment, he had been aroused by Jouvenet's +intimation that his secret was known to others. For a while he seemed to +have kept himself away from Marianne; but after taking new precautions, +he returned trembling with ardent passion to Mademoiselle Vanda's hôtel, +where his mistress's kiss, a little languid, awaited him.</p> + +<p>Months passed thus, the entire summer, the vacation of the Chamber, the +dull season in Paris. Adrienne set out for Dauphiny, where Vaudrey was +to preside over the Conseil-Général, and she felt a childish delight <a name="Page_376" id="Page_376"></a>on +finding herself once more in the old house at Grenoble, where she had +formerly been so happy! Yet even beneath this roof, within these walls, +the mute witnesses of his virtuous love, especially when alone, Vaudrey +thought of Marianne, he had but one idea, that of seeing her again, of +clasping her in his arms, and he wrote her passionate letters each day, +which she hardly glanced over and with a shrug of her shoulders burned +as of no importance.</p> + +<p>In the depths of his province he grew weary of the continual bustle of +fêtes, receptions held in his honor, addresses delivered by him, +ceremonies over which he had to preside, deputations received, statues +inaugurated. Statues! always statues! In the lesser towns, at Allevard +or Marestel, he was dragged from the <i>mairie</i> to the <i>Grande Place</i>, +between rows of firemen, in noisy processions, whose accompanying brass +instruments split his ears, under pink-striped tents, draped with +tricolor flags, before interminable files of gymnastic societies, glee +clubs, corporate bodies, associations, Friends of Peace, or Friends of +War societies! Then wandering harangues; commonplace remarks, spun out; +addresses, sprinkled with Latin by professors of rhetoric; declarations +of political faith by eloquent municipal councillors, all delighted to +grab at a minister when the opportunity offered. How many such harangues +Vaudrey heard! More than in the Chamber. More thickly they came, more +compressed, more severe than in the Chamber.<a name="Page_377" id="Page_377"></a> What advice, political +considerations and remonstrances winding up with demands for offices! +What cantatas that begged for subsidies! Everywhere demands: demands for +subsidies, demands for grants, demands for help, demands for +decorations! Nothing but harass, enervation, lassitude, deafening +clamor. They wished to kill him with their shouts: <i>Vive Vaudrey!</i></p> + +<p>The Prefect and the Commandant General of the division were constantly +on guard about Vaudrey, who was dragged about in torture between these +two coat-embroidered officers. From the lips of the prefect, Vaudrey +heard the same commonplace utterances: progress, the future, the fusion +of parties and interests, the greatness of the department, the cotton +trade and the tanneries, the glory of the minister who—of the minister +whom—of the glorious child of the country—of the eagle of Dauphiny. +<i>Vive Vaudrey! Vive Vaudrey!</i> The general, at least, varied his effects. +He grumbled and wrung his hands, and on the day of the inauguration of +the statue of a certain Monsieur Valbonnans, a former deputy and +celebrated glove manufacturer,—also the glory of the country,—Vaudrey +heard the soldier murmur from morning till night, with a movement of his +jaw that made his imperial jerk: "<i>I love bronze! I love bronze!</i>" with +a persistency that stupefied the minister.</p> + +<p>This was, perhaps, the only recollection of a cheerful nature that +Vaudrey retained of his trips in Isère. This eternal murmuring of the +general: <i>I love bronze! I love <a name="Page_378" id="Page_378"></a>bronze!</i> had awakened him, and he gayly +asked himself what devilish sort of appetite that soldier had who +continually repeated his phrase in a ravenous tone. Seated beside him on +the platform, while the glee-club sung an elegy in honor of the late +Monsieur Valbonnans, which was composed for the occasion by an amateur +of the town:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Monsieur Valbonnans' praise let's chant, yes, chant!<br /></span> +<span>His gloves the best, as all must grant,<br /></span> +<span>The best extant!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>while the flourish of trumpets took up the refrain and the firemen +unveiled, amid loud acclamations, the statue of Monsieur Valbonnans, +which bore these words on the pedestal: <i>To the Inventor, the Patriot, +the Merchant</i>; while, too, the prefect still poured in Vaudrey's left +ear his inexhaustible observations: the glove trade, the glory of Isère; +the progress, the interest, the greatness of the department, the +minister who—the minister whom—(<i>Vive Vaudrey!</i>) Sulpice still heard, +even amid the acclamations, the mechanical rumbling of the general's +voice, repeating, reasserting, rehearsing: "<i>I love bronze! I love +bronze!</i>"</p> + +<p>On the evening of the banquet, the minister at length obtained an +explanation of this extraordinary affection. The general rose, grasping +his glass as if he would shiver it, and while the <i>parfait</i> overflowed +on to the plates, he cried in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head +of his division:<a name="Page_379" id="Page_379"></a></p> + +<p>"I love bronze—I love bronze—because it serves for the erection of +statues and the casting of cannon. I love bronze because its voice wins +battles, the artillery being to-day the superior branch, although the +cavalry is the most chivalrous! I love bronze because it is the image of +the heart of the soldier, and I should like to see in our country an +army of men of bronze who—whom—"</p> + +<p>He became confused and muddled, and rolled his white eyes about in his +purpled face and to close his observations brandished his glass as if it +had been his sword, and amid a frenzy of applause from the guests, he +valiantly howled: "I love bronze! I love bronze!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey could scarcely prevent himself from laughing hysterically, in +spite of his ministerial dignity, and when he returned to Grenoble, his +carriage full of the flowers that they had showered on him, he could +only answer to Adrienne, who asked him if he had spoken well, if it had +been a fine affair, by throwing his bouquets on the floor and saying:</p> + +<p>"I have laughed heartily, but I am crushed, stupefied! What a headache!"</p> + +<p>And Sulpice wrote all that to Marianne, and innocent that he was, told +her: "Ah! all those applauding voices are not worth a single word from +you! When shall I see you, Marianne, dear heart?"</p> + +<p>"At the latest possible date!" <i>the dear heart</i> said.<a name="Page_380" id="Page_380"></a></p> + +<p>She regarded the close of summer and the beginning of autumn with +extreme vexation, for it would bring with it the parliamentary session +and Vaudrey, and inflict on her the presence of her lover.</p> + +<p>Sulpice provided her liberally with all that her luxurious appetites +demanded, and it was for good reasons that she decided not to break with +him, although for a long time she had sacrificed this man in her +inclinations. "Ah! when I shall be able to bounce him!" she said, +expressing herself like a courtesan. She could not, she would not accept +anything from Rosas. On that side, the game was too fine to be +compromised. She could with impunity accept the position of mistress of +Vaudrey, but with José she must appear to preserve, as it were, an +aureole of modesty, of virginal charms, that she did not possess.</p> + +<p>In fact, the Spaniard's mind became singularly crystallized, and she +turned this result to good account: in proportion as he associated +himself with the real Marianne, he created a fictitious Marianne, ideal, +kind, <i>spirituelle</i>, perhaps ignorant, but subtile and corrupted in +mind, who amused and disconcerted him at one and the same time. He had +left the Continental Hotel, and rented a house on Avenue Montaigne, +Champs-Élysées, where he sometimes entertained Marianne as he might have +done a princess. At such times she gossiped while smoking Turkish +tobacco. Her Parisian grace, her champagne-like effervescent manner, +seduced and<a name="Page_381" id="Page_381"></a> <a name="Page_382" id="Page_382"></a><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383"></a>charmed this serious, pale traveller, whose very smile +was tinged with melancholy.</p> + +<p>He completely adored this woman and no longer made an effort to resist. +He entirely forgot that it was through Guy that he had known her. It +seemed to him that he had himself discovered her, and besides, she had +never loved Guy. No, certainly not. She was frank enough to acknowledge +everything. Then she denied that Lissac ever—Then what! If it should be +true? But no! no! Marianne denied it. He blindly believed in Marianne.</p> + +<p>All the conflicting, frantic arguments that men make when they are about +to commit some foolish action were at war in José's brain. The more so +as he did not attempt to analyze his feelings. He passed, near this +pretty woman whose finger-tips he hardly dared kiss, the most delicious +summer of his life. Once, however, on going out with Marianne in the +Champs-Élysées, he had met the old Dujarrier with the swollen eyelids +and the yellow hair that he had known formerly. One of his friends, the +Marquis Vergano, had committed suicide at twenty for this woman who was +old enough to be his mother. The Dujarrier had stopped and greeted +Marianne, but as she remarked herself, a thousand bows and scrapes were +thrown away, for Rosas had hardly noticed her with a glacial look.</p> + +<p>"Why do you return that woman's salutation?" he at once asked Marianne.<a name="Page_384" id="Page_384"></a></p> + +<p>"I need her. She has done me services."</p> + +<p>"That is surprising! I thought her incapable of doing anything but +harm."</p> + +<p>He did not dream of Mademoiselle Kayser's coming in contact with +courtesans. In the tiny, virtuous room in Rue Cuvier, Rosas thought that +Marianne was in her true surroundings. She would frequently sit at the +piano—one of the few pieces of furniture contained in this +apartment,—and play for Rosas Oriental melodies that would transport +him far away in thought, to the open desert, by the slow lulling of +David's <i>Caravane</i>, then abruptly change to that familiar air, that +rondeau of the Variétés that he hummed yonder, on his dunghill, +forsaken—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Voyez-vous, là-bas,<br /></span> +<span>Cette maison blanche—"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"I love that music-hall air!" she said.</p> + +<p>He now no longer meditated resuming travel, or quitting Paris. +Mademoiselle Kayser's hold on him grew more certain every day. The +suspicion of odd mystery that enveloped this girl intensified his +passion.</p> + +<p>He sometimes asked her what her uncle was doing.</p> + +<p>"He? Why, he has obtained, thanks to Monsieur Vaudrey, the decoration of +a hydropathic establishment, <i>Les Thermes des Batignolles</i>. He has +commenced the cartoon for a fresco: <i>Massage Moralizing the People</i>. We +shall see that in his studio."<a name="Page_385" id="Page_385"></a></p> + +<p>"Do you know," Marianne continued, "what I would like to see?"</p> + +<p>"What, then?"</p> + +<p>"Spain, your own country. Where were you born, Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"At Toledo. I own the family château there."</p> + +<p>"With portraits and armor?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, with portraits and armor."</p> + +<p>"Well, I would like to go to Toledo, to see that château. It must be +magnificent."</p> + +<p>"It is gloomy, simply gloomy. A fortress on a rock. Gray stone, a red +rock, scorched by the sun. Huge halls half Moorish in style. Walls as +thick as those of a prison. Steel knights, standing with lance in hand +as in <i>Eviradnus</i>! Old portraits of stern ancestors cramped in their +doublets, or Duchesses de Rosas, with pale faces, sad countenances, +buried in their collars whose <i>guipures</i> have been limned by Velasquez +or Claude Coëllo. Immense cold rooms where the visitors' footfalls echo +as over empty tombs. A splendor that savors of the vault. You would die +of ennui at the end of two hours and of cold at the end of eight days."</p> + +<p>"Die of cold in Spain?"</p> + +<p>"There is a cold of the soul," the duke replied with a significant +smile. "That I have travelled so much, is probably due to my desire to +escape from that place! But you at Toledo, at Fuentecarral,—that is the +name of my castle,—a Parisian like you! It would be cruel.<a name="Page_386" id="Page_386"></a> As well +shut up a humming-bird in a bear-pit. No! thank God, I have other nooks +in Spain that will shelter us, my dear sparrow of the boulevards! Under +the Andalusian jasmines, beneath the oleanders of Cordova or Seville, +under the fountains whose basins are decorated with azulejos, and in +which sultanas bathe, my jasmins could never sufficiently exhale their +perfume, my fountains could never murmur harmoniously enough to furnish +you a joyous welcome—when you go—if you go—But Toledo! My terrible +castle Fuentecarral! It is in vain that I am impenitently romantic, I +would not take you there for anything in the world. It would be as if +ice fell on your shoulders. Fuentecarral? Ugh!—that smacks of death."</p> + +<p>While he spoke, Marianne looked at him with kindling eyes and in thought +roamed through those sweet-scented gardens, and she craved to see +herself in that tomblike fortress Fuentecarral, passing in front of the +pale female ancestors of Rosas, aghast at the <i>froufrou</i> of the +<i>Parisian woman</i>.</p> + +<p>José thought Marianne's burning glance was an expression of her love. +Ah! how completely the last six months in Paris had riveted him to this +woman, who was the mistress of another! One day,—Vaudrey had just left +Marianne at the <i>rond-point</i> of the Champs-Élysées,—the duke seeing her +enter his house, said abruptly to her:</p> + +<p>"I was about to write you, Marianne."<a name="Page_387" id="Page_387"></a></p> + +<p>"Why, my dear duke?"</p> + +<p>"To ask an appointment."</p> + +<p>"You are always welcome, my friend, at our little retreat."</p> + +<p>He made her sit down, seized both her hands, and looked at her earnestly +as he said:</p> + +<p>"Swear to me that you have never been Lissac's mistress!"</p> + +<p>She did not even quiver, but was as calm as if she had long awaited this +question.</p> + +<p>She boldly met José's glance and said:</p> + +<p>"Does one ask such a question of the woman one loves?"</p> + +<p>"Suppose that I ask this question of the Duchesse de Rosas!" said the +Spaniard, with quivering lip.</p> + +<p>She became as pale as he.</p> + +<p>"I do not understand—" she said.</p> + +<p>The duke remained silent for a moment; then his entire soul passed into +his voice:</p> + +<p>"I have no family, Marianne. I am entirely my own master, and I love +you. If you swear to me that you have not been Guy's mistress—"</p> + +<p>"Nobody has the right to say that he has even touched my lips," replied +Marianne firmly. "Only one man, he who took me, an innocent girl, and +left me heart-broken, disgusted, believing I should never again love, +before I met you. He is dead."</p> + +<p>"I know," said Rosas, "you confided that to me for<a name="Page_388" id="Page_388"></a>merly.—A widow save +in name, I offer you, yes, I! my name, my love, my whole life—will you +take them?"</p> + +<p>"Eh! you know perfectly well that I love you!" she exclaimed, as she +frantically gave him the burning and penetrating kiss that had never +left his lips since the soirée at Sabine's.</p> + +<p>"Then, no one—no one?" José repeated.</p> + +<p>"No one!"</p> + +<p>"On honor?"</p> + +<p>"On honor!"</p> + +<p>"Oh! how I love you!" he said, distractedly, all his passion shattering +his coldness of manner, as the sun melts the snow. "If you but knew how +jealous and crazed I am about you!—I desire you, I adore you, and I +condemn myself to remain glacial before you, beneath your glance that +fires my blood—I love you, and the recollection of Guy hindered me from +telling you that all that is mine belongs to you—I am a ferocious +creature, you know, capable of mad outbursts, senseless anger, and +unreasoning flight—Yes, I have wished to escape from you again. Well! +no, I remain with you; I love you, I love you!—You shall be my wife, do +you hear? My wife!—Ah! what a moment of bliss! I have loved you for +years! Have you not seen it, Marianne?"</p> + +<p>"I have seen it and I loved you! I also have kept silence! I saw plainly +that you believed that I had given myself to another—No, no, I am +yours, nothing but <a name="Page_389" id="Page_389"></a>yours! All my love, all myself, take it; I have kept +it for you; for I hate the past, more than that, I do not know that it +exists—It is despised, obliterated, it is nothing! But you, ah! you, +you are my life!"</p> + +<p>She left José's, her youth renewed, haughty, intoxicated with delight. +She walked along alone, in the paths of the Champs-Élysées, the rusty +leaves falling in showers at the breath of the already cold wind, her +heels ringing on the damp asphalt. She marched straight ahead, her +thoughts afire from her intoxicating emotions. It seemed that Paris +belonged to her.</p> + +<p>That evening, she was to go to the theatre. It was arranged that Vaudrey +should wait for her at the entrance with a hired carriage and take her +to Rue Prony. She wrote to him that she could not leave the house. A +slight headache. Uncle Kayser undertook to have the letter taken by a +commissionaire.</p> + +<p>"Unless you would rather have me go to the ministry!"</p> + +<p>"Are you mad?" Marianne said.</p> + +<p>"That is true, it would be immoral."</p> + +<p>She wished to have the evening to herself, quite alone, so that she +could let her dreams take flight.</p> + +<p>Dreams? Nonsense! On the contrary, it was a dazzling reality: a fortune, +a title, a positive escape from want and the mire. What a revenge!</p> + +<p>"It is enough to drive one mad!"</p> + +<p>Sudden fears seized her; the terror of the too suc<a name="Page_390" id="Page_390"></a>cessful gambler. What +if everything crumbled like a house of cards! She wished that she were +several weeks older.</p> + +<p>"Time passes so quickly, and yet one has a desire to spur it on."</p> + +<p>Now in the solitude of her house she felt weary. She could neither read +nor think, and became feverish. She regretted that she had written to +Vaudrey. She wished to go to the theatre. A new operetta would be a +diversion, and why should she not go? She had the ticket for her box. +She could at once inform Vaudrey that her headache had vanished.</p> + +<p>"And then he bores me!—Especially now."</p> + +<p>Matters, however, must not be abruptly changed. Suppose Rosas should +take a sudden fancy to fly off again! Besides, she had mutual interests +with the minister, there was an account to be settled.</p> + +<p>"The Gochard paper?—Bah! he will pay it. More-ever, I am not involved +in that."</p> + +<p>Suddenly she thought that she would act foolishly if she did not go +where she pleased. Sulpice might think what he pleased. She got her maid +to dress her hair.</p> + +<p>"Madame is going to the theatre?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Justine. To the Renaissance!"</p> + +<p>She was greatly amused at the theatre, and was radiant with pleasure. +She was the object of many glances, and felt delighted at being alone. +One of the characters in the operetta was a duchess whose adven<a name="Page_391" id="Page_391"></a>tures +afforded the audience much diversion. She abandoned herself to her +dreams, her thoughts wandering far from the theatre, the footlights and +the actors, to the distant orange groves yonder.</p> + +<p>During an entr'acte some one knocked at the door of her box. She turned +around in surprise. It was Jouvenet, the Prefect of Police, who came to +greet her in a very gallant fashion. The prefect—he had gained at the +palais in former days, the title of <i>L'Avocat Pathelin</i>,—with +insinuating and wheedling manners, hastened to pay his meed of respect +to Marianne when he met her. There was no necessity to stand on ceremony +with him. He knew all her secrets. Such a man, more-ever, must be +treated prudently, as he can make himself useful. Never had Jouvenet +spoken to her of Vaudrey, he was too politic in matters of state. But as +a man who knows that everything in this world is transient, he skilfully +maintained his place in the ranks, considering that a Prefect of Police +might not be at all unlikely to succeed a President of the Council.</p> + +<p>Marianne permitted him to talk, accepted all his gallantries as she +might have done bonbons, and with a woman's wit kept him at a distance +without wounding his vanity.</p> + +<p>Jouvenet with the simple purpose of showing her that he was +well-informed, asked her, stroking his whiskers as he did so, if she +often saw the Duc de Rosas. What a charming man the duke was! And while +the young <a name="Page_392" id="Page_392"></a>woman watched him as if to guess his thoughts, he smiled at +her.</p> + +<p>The prefect, not wishing to appear too persistent, changed the +conversation with the remark:</p> + +<p>"Ah! there is one of our old friends ogling you!"</p> + +<p>"An old friend?"</p> + +<p>It was in fact Guy de Lissac who was standing at the balcony training +his glass upon the box.</p> + +<p>Marianne had only very occasionally met Lissac, but for some time she +had suspected him of being secretly hostile to her. Guy bore her a +grudge for having taken Sulpice away from Adrienne. He pitied Madame +Vaudrey and perhaps his deep compassion was blended with another +sentiment in which tenderness had taken the place of a more modified +interest. He was irritated against the blind husband because he could +not see the perfect charms of that delicate soul, so timid and at the +same time so devoted. Although he had not felt justified in showing his +annoyance to Vaudrey, he had manifested his dislike to Marianne under +cover of his jesting manner, and she had been exceedingly piqued +thereby. Wherefore did this man who could not understand her, interfere, +and why did he add to the injuries of old the mockery of to-day?</p> + +<p>"After all, perhaps it is through jealousy," she thought. "The dolt!"</p> + +<p>Guy did not cease to look at her through his glass.</p> + +<p>"Does that displease you?" Jouvenet asked.<a name="Page_393" id="Page_393"></a></p> + +<p>"Not at all. What is that to me?"</p> + +<p>"This Lissac was much in love with you!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! Monsieur le Préfet!" Marianne observed sharply. "I know that your +office inclines you to be somewhat inquisitive, but it would be polite +of you to allow my past to sleep in your dockets. They are famous +shrouds!"</p> + +<p>Jouvenet bit his lips and in turn brought his glass to bear on Lissac.</p> + +<p>"See," he said, "he makes a great deal of the cross of the Christ of +Portugal! It is in very bad taste! I thought he was a shrewder man!"</p> + +<p>"The order of Christ is then in bad odor?"</p> + +<p>"On the contrary; but as it is like the Legion of Honor in color, he is +prohibited from wearing it in his buttonhole without displaying the +small gold cross—And I see only the red there—"</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, Monsieur le Préfet, there is one."</p> + +<p>"Oh! my glass is a wretched one!—But even so, I do not believe Monsieur +de Lissac is authorized by the Grand Chancellor to wear his decoration. +That is easily ascertained!—I will nevertheless not fail to insert in +the <i>Officiel</i> to-morrow a note relative to the illegality of wearing +certain foreign decorations—"</p> + +<p>"Is this note directed against Lissac?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all. But he reminds me of a step that I have wished to take for +a long time: the enforcement of the law."<a name="Page_394" id="Page_394"></a></p> + +<p>The entr'acte was over. Jouvenet withdrew, repeating all kinds of +remarks with double meanings that veiled declarations of love; that if +the occasion arose, he would place himself entirely at her service, and +that some day she might be very glad to meet him—</p> + +<p>"I thank you, Monsieur le Préfet, and I will avail myself of your +kindness," replied Marianne, out of courtesy.</p> + +<p>Something suggested to her that Guy would pay his respects to her during +the next entr'acte, were it only to jest about Jouvenet's visit, seeing +that he was regarded as a compromising acquaintance, and she was not +wrong.</p> + +<p>Behind his monocle, his keen, mocking glance seemed like a taunting +smile.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said, in a somewhat abrupt tone, as he sat near Marianne, "I +congratulate you, my dear friend."</p> + +<p>"Why?" she answered with surprise.</p> + +<p>"On the great news, <i>parbleu!</i> Your marriage."</p> + +<p>She turned slightly pale.</p> + +<p>"How do you know?—"</p> + +<p>"I have seen the duke. He called on me."</p> + +<p>"On you? What for?"</p> + +<p>"Can't you make a little guess—a very little guess—"</p> + +<p>"To ask you if I had been your mistress? Lissac, you are very silly."</p> + +<p>"Yes, my dear Marianne, prepare yourself somewhat for the position of a +duchess. A gentleman, to whom <a name="Page_395" id="Page_395"></a>you have sworn that I have never been +your lover, could not doubt your word!—José asked me nothing. He simply +stated his determination to see what I would say, or gather from my +looks what I thought of it."</p> + +<p>"And you said?"</p> + +<p>"What I had to say to him: I congratulated him!"</p> + +<p>Marianne raised her gray eyes to Lissac's face.</p> + +<p>"Congratulate?" she said slowly.</p> + +<p>"The woman he marries is pretty enough, I think?"</p> + +<p>"Ah! my dear, a truce to insolent trifles!—what is it that has +possessed you for some time past?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, but something has possessed you—or some one."</p> + +<p>"Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"No, Vaudrey!"</p> + +<p>"I will restore him to you. Oh! oh! you are surprisingly interested in +Vaudrey. Vaudrey or his wife?" she remarked.</p> + +<p>She smiled with her wicked expression.</p> + +<p>"Duchess," said Lissac, "accustom yourself to respect virtuous women!"</p> + +<p>"Is it to talk of such pleasant trifles that you have gained access to +my box?"</p> + +<p>"No, it is to ask you for some special information."</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"Is it true, is it really true that you are about to wed Rosas?" he +asked in an almost cordial tone.</p> + +<p>"Why not?" she replied, as she raised her head.<a name="Page_396" id="Page_396"></a></p> + +<p>"Because—I am going to be frank—I have always regarded you as an +absolutely straightforward woman, a woman of honor—You once claimed so +to be. Mad, fantastic, you often are; charming, always; but dishonest, +never. To take Rosas's love, even his fortune, would be natural enough, +but to take his name would be a very questionable act and a skilful one, +but lacking in frankness."</p> + +<p>"That is to say that I may devour him like a courtesan, but not marry +him as a—"</p> + +<p>"As a young girl, no, you cannot do that. And you put me—I am bound to +tell you so and I take advantage of the intermission to do so—in a +delicate position. If I declared the truth to Rosas, I act toward you as +a rascal. If I keep silent to my friend, my true friend, I act almost +like a knave."</p> + +<p>"Did Rosas ask you to speak to me?"</p> + +<p>"No, but there is a voice within me that pricks me to speech and tells +me that if I allow you to marry the duke, I am committing myself to a +questionable affair—Do you know what he asked me?—To be his witness."</p> + +<p>If Marianne had been in a laughing mood, she would have laughed +heartily.</p> + +<p>"It is absurd," she said. "You did not consent?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed, I have consented. Because I really hoped that you would +relieve me from such an undesirable duty, a little too questionable."</p> + +<p>"You would like?—What would you like?"<a name="Page_397" id="Page_397"></a></p> + +<p>"I wish—no, I would have you not marry Monsieur de Rosas."</p> + +<p>Marianne shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>She clearly felt the threat conveyed in Lissac's words, but she desired +to show from the first that she disdained them. What right, after all, +had this casual acquaintance to mix himself up in her life affairs? +Because, one day, she had been charitable enough to give him her youth +and her body! The duty of friendship! The rights of friendship! To +protect Vaudrey! To defend Rosas! Words, tiresome words!</p> + +<p>"And what if I wish to marry him, myself?—Would you prevent it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, if I could!" he said firmly. "It is time that to the freemasonry +of women we should oppose the freemasonry of men."</p> + +<p>"You are cruelly cowardly enough when you are alone, what would you be +then when you are together?" said Marianne, with a malignant expression. +"In fact," said she, after a moment's pause, "what would you have? What? +Decide!—Will you send my letters to the duke?"</p> + +<p>"That is one way," said Lissac, calmly. "It is a <i>woman's</i> way, that!"</p> + +<p>"You have my letters still?"</p> + +<p>"Preciously preserved."</p> + +<p>He had not contemplated such a threat, but she quickly scented a danger +therein.<a name="Page_398" id="Page_398"></a></p> + +<p>"Suppose I should ask the return of those letters, perhaps you would +restore them to me?"</p> + +<p>"Probably," he said.</p> + +<p>"Suppose I asked you to bring them to me, you know, in that little out +of the way room of which I spoke to you one day?"</p> + +<p>She had leaned gently toward Lissac and her elbows grazed the knees of +her former lover.</p> + +<p>"I would wear, that day, one of those otter-trimmed toques that you have +not forgotten."</p> + +<p>She saw that he trembled, as if he were moved by some unsatisfied desire +for her. She felt reassured.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" she said with a smiling face. "You are not so bad as you +pretend to be."</p> + +<p>The manager tapped the customary three blows behind the curtain, and the +orchestra began the prelude to the third act.</p> + +<p>"Adieu for a brief period, my enemy!" said Marianne, extending her hand.</p> + +<p>He hesitated to take that hand. At length, taking it in his own, he +said:</p> + +<p>"Leave me Rosas!"</p> + +<p>"Fie! jealous one! Don't I leave Vaudrey to you?"</p> + +<p>She laughed, while Lissac went away dissatisfied.</p> + +<p>"I will have my letters, at all risks," thought Marianne when he had +disappeared. "It is more prudent."</p> + +<p>That night she slept badly, and the following morning <a name="Page_399" id="Page_399"></a>rose in a very +ill-humor. Her face expressed fatigue, her eyes were encircled with dark +rings and burned feverishly, but withal, her beauty was heightened. All +the morning she debated as to the course she should take, and finally +decided to write to Guy, when Sulpice Vaudrey arrived, and beaming with +delight, informed Marianne that he had the entire day to spend with her.</p> + +<p>"I learned through Jouvenet this morning that you were able to go to the +theatre. Naughty one, to steal an evening from me. But I have all +to-day, at least."</p> + +<p>And he sat down in the salon like a man spreading himself out in his own +house. Marianne was meditating some scheme to get rid of him when the +chamber-maid entered, presenting a note on a tray.</p> + +<p>"What is that?"</p> + +<p>"A messenger, madame, has brought this letter."</p> + +<p>Marianne read the paper hurriedly.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey observed that she blushed slightly.</p> + +<p>"Is the messenger still there, Justine?"</p> + +<p>"No, madame, he is gone. He said that there was no reply."</p> + +<p>Marianne quickly tore in small pieces the note she had just read.</p> + +<p>"Some annoyance?" asked Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>"Yes, exactly."</p> + +<p>"May I know?"</p> + +<p>"No, it does not interest you. A family affair."</p> + +<p>"Ah! your uncle?" asked Vaudrey, smiling.<a name="Page_400" id="Page_400"></a></p> + +<p>"My uncle, yes!"</p> + +<p>"He has asked that he be permitted to exhibit at the Trocadero the +cartoons that he has finished: <i>The Artist's Mission</i>, <i>Hydropathy the +Civilizer</i>, I don't know what in fact, a series of symbolical +compositions—"</p> + +<p>"With the <i>mirliton</i> device underneath?—Yes, I know," said Marianne.</p> + +<p>She snapped her fingers in her impatience.</p> + +<p>The letter that she had torn up had been written by Rosas, and received +by Uncle Kayser at his studio, whence he had forwarded it to his niece. +The duke informed Marianne that he would wait for her at five o'clock at +Avenue Montaigne. He had something to say to her. He had passed the +entire night reflecting and dreaming. She remembered her own wild +dreams. Had Rosas then caught her thought floating like an atom on the +night wind?</p> + +<p>At five o'clock! She would be punctual. But how escape Vaudrey? She +could not now feign sickness since she had received him! Moreover, he +would instal himself near her and bombard her with his attentions. Was +there any possible pretext, any way of getting out now? Her lover had +the devoted, radiant look of a loved man who relied on enjoying a long +interview with his mistress. He looked at her with a tender glance.</p> + +<p>"The fool—The sticker!" thought Marianne. "He will not leave!"<a name="Page_401" id="Page_401"></a></p> + +<p>The best course was to go out. She would lose him on the way.</p> + +<p>"What time have you, my dear minister?"</p> + +<p>"One o'clock!"</p> + +<p>"Then I have time!" she said.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey seemed surprised. Marianne unceremoniously informed him, in +fact, that she had some calls to make, to secure some purchases.</p> + +<p>"How disagreeable!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, for me!"</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon," said Sulpice, correcting himself.</p> + +<p>She sent for a coupé and damp and keen as the weather was, she +substituted for the glorious day of snug, intimate joy that Vaudrey had +promised himself, a succession of weary hours passed in the draught +caused by badly-fitting windows, while making a series of trips hither +and thither, Marianne meantime cudgelling her brains to find a way to +leave her lover on the way, or at least to notify Rosas.</p> + +<p>But above all to notify Lissac! It was Lissac whom she was determined to +see. Yes, absolutely, and at once. The more she considered the matter, +the more dangerous it appeared to her.</p> + +<p>Sulpice had not given her a moment of freedom at her house, in which to +write a few lines. He might have questioned her and that would be +imprudent.</p> + +<p>"I wish, however, to tell Guy to expect me!—Where?<a name="Page_402" id="Page_402"></a> Rue Cuvier? He +would not go there!—No, at his house!"</p> + +<p>On the way she found the means.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey evidently was at liberty for the day and, master of his time, he +would not leave her. This he repeated at every turn of the wheel. She +ordered the driver to take her to <i>The Louvre</i>.</p> + +<p>"I have purchases to make!"</p> + +<p>Sulpice could not accompany her, so he waited for her at the entrance on +Place du Palais-Royal, nestled in a corner of the carriage, the blinds +of which were lowered in order that he might not be seen. He felt very +cold.</p> + +<p>Marianne slowly crossed between the stalls on the ground floor, hardly +looking at the counters bearing the Japanese goods, the gloves and the +artificial flowers. She ascended a winding iron stairway draped with +tapestries, her tiny feet sinking into the moquette that covered the +steps, and entered a noiseless salon where men and women were silently +sitting before three tables, writing or reading, just as in the +<i>drawing-room</i> of a hotel. At a large round table, old ladies and young +girls sat looking at the pictures in <i>Illustration</i>, the caricatures in +the <i>Journal Amusant</i>, and the sketches in <i>La Vie Parisienne</i>. Others, +at the second table, were reading the daily papers, some of which were +rolled about their holders like a flag around its staff, or the <i>Revue +des Deux Mondes</i>. Further on, at a red-covered table furnished with +leather-bound blotters and round, glass inkstands in <a name="Page_403" id="Page_403"></a>which the ink +danced with a purple reflection, people were writing, seated on chairs +covered in worn, garnet-colored velvet, with mahogany frames. This +gloomy apartment was brightened by broad-leaved green plants, and was +lighted from the roof by means of a flat skylight.</p> + +<p>Marianne walked direct to the table on which the paper was symmetrically +arranged in a stationery rack, and quickly seating herself, she laid her +muff down, half-raised her little veil, and beat a tattoo with her tiny +hand on the little black leather blotter before her, then taking off her +gloves, she took at random some sheets of paper and some envelopes +bearing the address of the establishment on the corners. As she looked +around for a pen, Marianne could not refrain from smiling, she thought +of that poor Sulpice down there, waiting in the carriage and probably +shivering in the draughts issuing from the disjointed doors. And he a +minister!</p> + +<p>"Such is adultery in Paris!" she said to herself, happy to make him +suffer.</p> + +<p>She did not hurry. She was amused by her surroundings. A uniformed man +promenaded the salon, watching the stationery in the cases and replacing +it as it was used. If required, he sold stamps to any one present. A +letter-box was attached near the tall chimney, bearing the hours of +collection.</p> + +<p>Beside Marianne, elbow to elbow, and before her, were principally women, +some writing with feverish haste, <a name="Page_404" id="Page_404"></a>others hesitatingly, and amongst them +were two girls opposite her, who as they finished their letters chuckled +in a low tone and passed them one to the other, say-to each other, as +they chewed their plaid penholders:</p> + +<p>"It is somewhat cold, eh! He will say: <i>Eh, well, it is true then!</i>"</p> + +<p>The two pretty, cheerful girls before her were doubtless breaking in +this way some liaison, amusing themselves by sending an unexpected blow +to some poor fellow, and enjoying themselves by spoiling paper; the one +writing, the other reading over her companion's shoulder and giving vent +to merry laughter under her Hungarian toque, a huge Quaker-collar almost +covering her shoulders and her little jacket with its large steel +buttons.</p> + +<p>This feminine head-gear made Marianne think of Guy. Her eyes, catlike in +expression, gleamed maliciously.</p> + +<p>She took some paper and essayed to frame some tempting, tender phrases, +something nebulous and exciting, but she could not.</p> + +<p>"What I would like to write him is that he is a wretch and that I hate +him!" she thought.</p> + +<p>Then she stopped and looked about her, altogether forgetting Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>The contrast between that silent reading-room and the many-colored crowd +in that Oriental bazaar, whose murmurs reached her ears like the roaring +of a distant <a name="Page_405" id="Page_405"></a>sea, and of which she could see only the corner clearly +defined by the framework of the doors, amused Marianne, who with a smile +on her lips, enjoyed the mischievous delight of fooling a President of +the Council.</p> + +<p>"At least that avenges me for the cowardice that the <i>other</i> forced me +to commit!"</p> + +<p>Then mechanically regarding the crowd that flowed through these <i>docks</i>, +that contained everything that could please or disgust a whole world at +once, the crowd, the clerks, the carpets, the linen, the crowding, the +heaping,—all seemed strange and comic to her, novel and not Parisian, +but American and up-to-date.</p> + +<p>"Oh! decidedly up-to-date!—And so convenient!" she said, as she heard +the young girls laugh when they finished their love-letters.</p> + +<p>Then she began to write, having surely found the expressions she sought. +She sent Rosas a letter of apology: she would be at his house to-morrow +at the same hour. To-day, her uncle took up her day, compelling her to +go to see his paintings, to visit the Louvre, to buy draperies for an +Oriental scene that he intended to paint. If Rosas did not receive the +letter in time, it mattered little! To Lissac,—and this was the main +consideration,—she intimated that she would call on him the next +morning at ten o'clock.</p> + +<p>"Rendezvous box!" she said, as she slipped her two letters into the +letter-box. "This extreme comfort is very ironical."<a name="Page_406" id="Page_406"></a></p> + +<p>She smiled as she thought how long it would take to count the number of +the little hands, some trembling, some bold, that had slipped into the +rectilinear mouth of the letter-box some little missive that was either +the foretaste or the postscript of adultery.</p> + +<p>Then she went downstairs and rejoined Vaudrey, who was impatiently +tapping the floor of the carriage with his foot.</p> + +<p>"I was a long time there, I ask your pardon," said Marianne.</p> + +<p>"At any rate, I hope you have bought something that suited you?" asked +Vaudrey, who seemed to have caught a cold.</p> + +<p>"Nothing at all. There is nothing in that store!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was alarmed. Were they to visit one after the other all the +fancy goods stores?</p> + +<p>Marianne took pity on him.</p> + +<p>"Let us return, shall we?" she asked.</p> + +<p>She called to the coachman: "Rue Prony!" while Sulpice, whom she +unwillingly took with her, though he wearily yawned, seized her hand and +said as he sneezed:</p> + +<p>"Ah! how kind you are!"</p> + +<p>The next day, Marianne rang the bell of Lissac's house in Rue d'Aumale, +a little before the appointed hour.</p> + +<p>"Punctual as a creditor!" she thought.</p> + +<p>She reached Guy's, ready for anything. She was very pale and charming in +her light costume, and she entered <a name="Page_407" id="Page_407"></a>as one would go into a fray with +head high. She would not leave the place until she had recovered her +letters.</p> + +<p>It was only for those scraps of paper that she again, as it were, bound +and tied herself to her past; she wished to cut herself away from it and +to tear them to pieces with her teeth. But what if Guy should refuse to +give them up to her? That could not be possible, although he was +sincerely attached to Rosas. Still, between gratitude to a woman and +duty to a friend, a man might hesitate, when he is a corrupted Parisian +like Lissac.</p> + +<p>"His affection for José will not carry him to the length of forgetting +all that I have given him of myself!" Marianne thought.</p> + +<p>Then shrugging her shoulders:</p> + +<p>"After all, these men have such a freemasonry between them, as <i>he</i> +said!—And they speak of our fraternity, we women!—It is nothing +compared with theirs!"</p> + +<p>Guy did not show any displeasure on hearing Mademoiselle Kayser +announced. He was waiting for her. As Marianne could not feel free so +long as he held the proof of her imprudence, some day or other she must +inevitably seek him to supplicate or threaten him. The letter received +overnight had apprised him that that moment had arrived.</p> + +<p>He had just finished dressing when she entered. His <a name="Page_408" id="Page_408"></a>suède gloves were +laid out flat on a little table beside his hat, his stick and a small +antique cloisonné vase into which were thrown the many-colored rosettes +of his foreign decorations, some of them red, amid which a little gold +cross glistened like some brilliant beetle settled on a deep-hued rose.</p> + +<p>"I wager that you are going out!" Marianne remarked abruptly. "Clearly, +you did not expect me!—Haven't you received my letter?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Marianne," he replied, as he slowly finished adjusting the knot +of his cravat, "that is the very remark you made when you condescended +to reappear at my house after a lapse of some years. You have too modest +a way of announcing yourself; I assure you that, for my part, I always +expect you—and that with impatience. But to-day, more than on any other +occasion, because of your charming note."</p> + +<p>She knew Guy well enough to perceive that his exquisite politeness only +concealed a warlike irony. She did not reply, but stood smiling in front +of the fireplace and warmed her toes at the light flames that leapt +about the logs.</p> + +<p>"You are exceedingly polite," she said at last. "On honor, I like you +very much—you laugh? I say very much—Yes, in spite—In no case, have +you had aught to complain of me."</p> + +<p>She half turned, resting her left hand on the edge of the velvet-covered +mantel, and cast a furtive, gentle <a name="Page_409" id="Page_409"></a>glance at Lissac that recalled a +multitude of happy incidents.</p> + +<p>"I have never complained," said the young man, "and I have frequently +expressed my thanks!"</p> + +<p>Marianne laughed at the discreet manner so ceremoniously adopted by +Lissac.</p> + +<p>"You are silly, come!—We have a great liking for each other, and it is +in the name of that affection that I come to ask a service."</p> + +<p>"You have only to speak, my dear Marianne," Lissac answered, as if he +had not noticed the intimacy her words expressed.</p> + +<p>He affected a cold politeness; Marianne replied to him with apparent +renewed tenderness. She looked at him for some time as if she hesitated +and feared, her glance penetrating Lissac's, and begging with a tearful +petition that wished to kindle a flame in his eyes.</p> + +<p>"What I have to say to you will take some time. I am afraid—"</p> + +<p>"Of what?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"I don't know. You are in a hurry? I interfere with you, perhaps!"</p> + +<p>"Not the least in the world. I breakfast at the Club, take a turn in the +Bois, and drop in at the <i>Mirlitons</i> to see the opening. You see that I +should be entitled to very little merit in sacrificing to you a +perfectly wasted day."<a name="Page_410" id="Page_410"></a></p> + +<p>"Is the present Exposition of the <i>Mirlitons</i> well spoken of?" asked +Marianne, indifferently.</p> + +<p>"Very. It is a collection of things that are to be sold for the benefit +of a deceased artist. Would you like to go there at four o'clock?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks!—And I repeat, my dear Guy, that I will not hinder you, you +know, if I have been indiscreet in giving you an appointment!—"</p> + +<p>She seemed to be mechanically toying with the silk rosettes in the +little vase; she picked them up and let them drop from her fingers like +grains.</p> + +<p>"These are yours?" she asked.—"Come near that I may put them on!"</p> + +<p>She went to Guy, smilingly, and resting her body against his for its +entire length, she paused for a moment while she held the lapel of his +jacket, and from head to foot she gazed at him with a look that seemed +to impregnate him with odor and turned him pale.</p> + +<p>"What an idea, Marianne! I do not wear these ribbons now."</p> + +<p>"A childish one. I remember that I was the first to place in this +buttonhole some foreign decoration that Monsieur de Rosas brought you—"</p> + +<p>She pronounced this name boldly, as if she would bring on the battle.</p> + +<p>"That suits you well," she continued. "Orders on your coat are like +diamonds in our ears—they are of no use, but they are pretty."<a name="Page_411" id="Page_411"></a></p> + +<p>She had passed a red rosette through the buttonhole, and lowering his +head, Guy saw her fair brow, her blond locks within reach of his lips. +They exhaled a perfume—the odor of hay, that he liked so well—and +those woman's fingers on his breast, the fingers of the woman whom he +had mocked the previous night at the theatre, caused him a disturbing +sensation. He gently disengaged himself, while Marianne repeated: "That +suits you well—" Then her hand fell on his and she pressed his fingers +in her burning and soft palm and said, as she half lowered her head +toward him:</p> + +<p>"Do you know why I have come? You know that I am silly. Well, naughty +one, the other evening in that box when you punished me with your irony, +all my love for you returned!—Ah! how foolish we are, we women! Tell +me, Guy, do you recall the glorious days we have spent? Those +recollections retain their place in the heart! Has the idea of living +again as in the past never occurred to you? It was so sweet!"</p> + +<p>Lissac laughed a little nervously and trembled slightly, trying to joke +but feeling himself suddenly weakening in the presence of this woman +whose wrath or contemptuous smile he preferred.</p> + +<p>He recognized all the vanished perfumes. The sensation of trembling +delight that years had borne away now returned to him. The silent +pressure of the hands recalled nights of distraction. He half shut his +eyes, a sudden madness overcame him, although he was suffi<a name="Page_412" id="Page_412"></a>ciently calm +to say to himself that she had an end in view, this woman's coming to +him, loveless, to speak of love to him, herself unmoved by the senses, +to awaken vanished feelings, to offer herself with the irresistible +skill of desire: a dead passion born of caprice.</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, it is you who left me, satiated after taking from me all +that you were capable of loving," she said. "Do you know one thing, +however, Guy? There is more than one woman in a woman. There are as many +as she possesses of passions or joys, and the Marianne of to-day is so +different from the one who was your mistress formerly!—You would never +leave me, if you were my lover now!"</p> + +<p>She tempted this man whose curiosity was aroused, accustomed as he was +to casual and easy love adventures. He foresaw danger, but there within +reach of his lips were experienced kisses, an ardent supplicant, a +proffered delight, full of burning promise. In a sort of anger, he +seized the woman who recalled all the past joys, uttered the well-known +cries, and who suddenly, as in a nervous attack, deliriously plucked the +covering from her bosom, and bared with the boldness of beauty that +knows itself to be irresistible, her white arms, her brilliant, +untrammeled breasts, the sparkling splendor of her flesh, with her +golden hair unfastened, as she used to appear lying on a pillow of fair +silk, almost faint and between her kisses, that were as fierce as bites, +uttering: "I love you—you—I adore you—" And the lovely, <a name="Page_413" id="Page_413"></a>imperious +girl again became, almost without a word having been exchanged, the +submissive woman carried away by lascivious ardor; and Guy, confused and +speechless, no longer reasoning, was unable to say whether Marianne +belonged to him, or he to the mistress of former days, become the +mistress of to-day.</p> + +<p>He held her clasped to him, his hand raising her pale, languishing face +about which her fair hair fell loosely; to him she looked like one +asleep, her pink nostrils still dilating with a spasmodic movement, and +it seemed to him that he had just suffered from the perturbing contact +of a courtesan in the depths of some luxurious den.</p> + +<p>It was an immediate reawakening, enervating but furious. She had given +herself impulsively. He recovered himself similarly. The sudden contact +of two bodies resulted in the immediate recoil of two beings.</p> + +<p>With more bitter shame, he had had similar morose awakenings after a +dissipated night, his heart, his brave heart thumping against the +passionate form, often lean and sallow, of some satiated girl, fearfully +weary.</p> + +<p>What cowardice! Was it Vaudrey's mistress or the future wife of Rosas +who had clung to his lips?</p> + +<p>He felt disgusted at heart.</p> + +<p>Yet she was adorable, this still young and lovely Marianne.</p> + +<p>With cruel perspicacity, he already foresaw that he would be guilty of +cowardly conduct in yielding to this sudden weakness, and ashamed of +himself he disengaged <a name="Page_414" id="Page_414"></a>himself from her hysterical embrace, while +Marianne squatted on his bed, throwing back her hair from her face, +still smiling as she looked at him and asked:</p> + +<p>"Well—what? What is the matter with you, then?"</p> + +<p>She rose slowly, slipping upon the carpet while he went to the window to +look mechanically into the yard. Between these two creatures but a +moment before clasped together, a sudden icy coldness sprung up as if +each had divined that the hour was about to sound, terrible as a knell, +when their affairs must be settled. The kisses of love are to be paid +for.</p> + +<p>Standing before the mirror, half undressed, Marianne was arranging her +hair. Her white shoulders, her still heaving and oppressed bosom were +still exposed within the border of her fine chemisette. She felt her +wrists, instinctively examining her bracelets, and looked toward the bed +in an absent sort of way as if to see if some charm had not slipped from +them.</p> + +<p>"Guy," she said abruptly, but in a tone which she tried to make +endearing, "promise me that you will not refuse what I am about to ask +you."</p> + +<p>"I promise."</p> + +<p>They now quite naturally substituted for the "thou" of affectionate +address, the more formal "you," secretly realizing that after the +intertwining of their bodies, their real individualities independent of +all surprises or sensual appetite, would find themselves face to face.</p> + +<p>"I could wish that our affection—and it is profound, <a name="Page_415" id="Page_415"></a>is it not, +Guy?—dated only from the moment that we have just passed."</p> + +<p>"I do not regret the past," he said.</p> + +<p>"Nor I! Yet I would like to efface it—yes, by a single stroke!"</p> + +<p>She held between her white fingers some rebellious little locks of hair +that had come out, which she had rolled and twisted, and casting them +into the clear flame, she said:</p> + +<p>"See! to burn it like that!—<i>Pft!</i>—"</p> + +<p>"Burn it?" Lissac repeated.</p> + +<p>He had left the window, returned to Marianne and smiling in his turn, he +said:</p> + +<p>"Why burn it?—Because it is tiresome or because it is dangerous?"</p> + +<p>"Both!" she replied.</p> + +<p>She paused for a moment before continuing, drew up over her arms the +lace of her chemisette, then half bending her head, and looking at Guy +like a creditor of love she said:</p> + +<p>"You still have my letters, my dear?"</p> + +<p>"Your letters?"</p> + +<p>"Those of the old days?"</p> + +<p>"That is so," he said. "The past."</p> + +<p>He understood everything now.</p> + +<p>"You came to ask me to return them?"</p> + +<p>"I have been, you must admit, very considerate, not to have claimed +them—before!"<a name="Page_416" id="Page_416"></a></p> + +<p>"You have been—generous!" answered Lissac, with a gracious smile.</p> + +<p>He opened his secrétaire, one of the drawers of which contained little +packages folded and tied with bands of silk ribbon, that slept the sleep +of forgotten things.</p> + +<p>"There are your letters, my dear Marianne! But you have nothing to fear; +they have never left this spot."</p> + +<p>The eyes of the young woman sparkled with a joyous light. Slowly as if +afraid that Guy would not give them to her, she extended her bare arm +toward the packet of letters and snatched it suddenly.</p> + +<p>"My letters!"</p> + +<p>"It is an entire romance," said Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Less the epilogue!" she said, still enveloping him with her intense +look.</p> + +<p>She placed the packet on the velvet-covered mantelpiece and hastily +finished dressing. Then taking between her fingers those little letters +in their old-fashioned envelopes bearing her monogram, and that still +bore traces of a woman's perfume, she looked at them for a moment and +said to Lissac:</p> + +<p>"You have read them occasionally?"</p> + +<p>"I know them by heart!"</p> + +<p>"My poor letters!—I was quite sincere, you know, when I wrote you +them!—They must be very artless! Yours, that I have burned, were too +clever. I remember that one day you wrote me from Holland: 'I pass my +life among chefs-d'oeuvre, but my mind is far away from <a name="Page_417" id="Page_417"></a>them. I have +Rembrandt and Ruysdaël; but the smallest millet seed would be more to my +liking: millet is <i>fair!</i>' Well, that was very pretty, but much too +refined. True love has no wit.—All this is to convey to you that +literature will not lose much by the disappearance of my disconnected +scrawls."</p> + +<p>She suddenly threw the packet into the fire and watched the letters as +they lightly curled, at first spotted with fair patches, and enveloped +in light smoke, then bursting into flame that cast its rosy reflection +on Marianne's face. Little by little all disappeared save a patch of +black powder on the logs, that danced like a mourning veil fluttering in +the wind and immediately disappeared up the chimney:—the dust of dead +love, the ashes of oaths, all black like mourning crêpe.</p> + +<p>Marianne watched the burning of the letters, bending her forehead, while +a strange smile played on her lips, and an expression as of triumphant +joy gleamed in her eyes.</p> + +<p>When the work was done, she raised her head and turned toward Guy and in +a quivering voice, she said proudly and insolently:</p> + +<p>"<i>Requiescat!</i> See how everything ends! It is a long time since lovers +who have ceased to love invented cremation! Nothing is new under the +sun!"</p> + +<p>She was no longer the same woman. A moment before she manifested a sort +of endearing humility, but now she was ironically boastful, looking at +Lissac with the air <a name="Page_418" id="Page_418"></a>of one triumphing over a dupe. He bit his lips +slightly, rubbing his hands together, while examining her sidelong, +without affectation. Marianne's ironical smile told him all that she now +had to say.</p> + +<p>It was not the first time that he had been a witness to such a +transformation of the feminine countenance before and after the return +of letters. Guy for some time had ceased to be astonished at anything in +connection with women.</p> + +<p>"Now, my dear," said Marianne, "I hope that you will do me the kindness +of allowing me to go on in my own way in life, and that I shall not have +the annoyance of finding you again in the way of my purpose."</p> + +<p>"I confess," Lissac replied, "that I should be the worst of ingrates if +I did not forget many things in consideration of what I owe you, both in +the present and in the past. Your burned letters still shed their +fragrance!"</p> + + +<p>Marianne touched the half-consumed logs with the tip of her foot and the +débris of the paper fluttered around her shoe like little black +butterflies.</p> + +<p>"I wish I could have destroyed the past as I have made those letters +flame! It weighs on me, it chokes me! You do not imagine, perhaps," she +said, "that I have forgiven you for your flight and all that followed +it?—If, for a moment, I almost stumbled in the mire, the fault was +yours, for I loved you and you abandoned me, as a man forsakes a +strumpet.—So, you see, my <a name="Page_419" id="Page_419"></a>dear, a woman never forgets it, and I would +have cried out long before, if I had felt myself free, free as I am now +that those letters are burned, the poor letters of a stupid mistress, +confiding in her lover who is overcome with weariness, and who is only +thinking of deserting her, while she is still intoxicated in yielding to +him—and because I adored you—yes, truly—because I was your mistress, +do you arrogate to yourself the right of preventing me from marrying as +I wish, and of drawing myself out of the bog into which, perhaps, by +your selfishness, I have fallen? Ah, my dear fellow, really I am +somewhat surprised at you, I swear!—I said nothing because of those +scraps of paper, that you would have been cowardly enough, I assert, to +show Rosas and every line of which told how foolish I had been to love +you."</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas would never have seen them!" said Lissac severely.</p> + +<p>She did not seem to hear him.</p> + +<p>"But now, what? Thank God," she continued, "there is nothing, and you +have delivered those letters to me that you ought never to have +returned. And I have paid you for them, paid for them with new caresses +and a last prostitution! Well! that ends it, doesn't it? There is +nothing more between us, nothing, nothing, nothing!—And these two +beings, who exchanged here their loveless kisses, the kisses of a +debauchee and a courtesan, will never recognize each other again, I +hope—you hear, never recognize each other again—<a name="Page_420" id="Page_420"></a>when they meet in +life. Moreover, I will take care to avoid meetings!"</p> + +<p>Guy said nothing.</p> + +<p>He twirled his moustache slightly and continued to look at Marianne +sideways without replying.</p> + +<p>This indifference, though doubtless assumed, nevertheless annoyed the +young woman.</p> + +<p>"Go, find Monsieur de Rosas now!" she said. "Tell him that you have been +my lover, he will not believe you."</p> + +<p>"I am satisfied of that," Lissac replied very calmly.</p> + +<p>She realized a threat in his very calmness. But what had she to fear +now?</p> + +<p>She fastened her ironical glance on Lissac, the better to defy him, and +to enjoy his defeat.</p> + +<p>With extended hands, he noiselessly tapped his fingers together, the +gesture of a person who waits, sure of himself and displaying a mocking +silence.</p> + +<p>"Then adieu!" she said abruptly. "I hope that we shall never see each +other again!"</p> + +<p>"How can you help it?" said Lissac, smiling. "In Paris!"</p> + +<p>He sat down on a chair, while Marianne stood, putting on her gloves.</p> + +<p>"On my word, my dear Marianne, for a clever woman you are outrageously +sanguine."</p> + +<p>"I?"</p> + +<p>"And credulous! You credit me with the simplicity of the Age of Gold, +then?—Is it possible?—Do you <a name="Page_421" id="Page_421"></a>think a corrupted Parisian like myself +would allow himself to be trifled with like a schoolboy by a woman as +extremely seductive as I confess you are? But, my dear friend, the first +rule in such matters is only to completely disarm one's self when it is +duly proved that peace has been definitely signed and that a return to +offensive tactics is not to be feared. You have shown your little pink +claws too nimbly, Marianne. Too quickly and too soon. In one of those +drawers, there are still one or two letters left, I was about to say, +that belong to the series of letters that are slumbering: exquisite, +perfumed, eloquent, written in that pretty, fine and firm writing that +you have just thrown into the fire, and those letters I would only have +given you on your continuing to act fairly. They were my reserve. It is +an elementary rule never to use all one's powder at a single shot, and +one never burns <i>en bloc</i> such delicate autographs. They are too +valuable! Tell me, will you disdain to recognize me when you meet me, +Miss Marianne?"</p> + +<p>She remained motionless, pale and as if frozen.</p> + +<p>"Then you have kept?—" she said.</p> + +<p>"A postscriptum, if you like, yes."</p> + +<p>"Are you lying now, or did you lie in giving me the packet that has been +burned?"</p> + +<p>"I did not tell you that the packet was complete, and what I now tell +you is the simple truth! I regret it, but you have compelled me to keep +my batteries, in too quickly unmasking your own."<a name="Page_422" id="Page_422"></a></p> + +<p>Marianne pulled off her gloves in anger.</p> + +<p>"If you do not give me everything here that belongs to me, you are a +coward; you hear, a coward, Monsieur de Lissac!"</p> + +<p>"Oh! your insults are of as little importance as your kisses! but they +are less agreeable!"</p> + +<p>She clearly saw that she had thrown off the mask too soon, and that +Lissac would not now allow himself to be snared by her caresses or +disarmed by her threats. The game was lost.</p> + +<p>Lost, or merely compromised?</p> + +<p>She looked about her with an expression of powerless rage, like a very +graceful wild beast enclosed in a cage. Her letters, her last letters +must be here, in one of those pieces of furniture whose drawers she +might open with her nails. She threw her gloves on the floor and +mechanically tore into shreds—as she always did when in a rage—between +her nervous fingers, her fine cambric handkerchief reduced to rags.</p> + +<p>"Be very careful what you are doing, Guy," she said at last, casting a +malicious look at him, "I have purchased these letters from you, for I +hate you, I repeat it, and these letters you owe to me as you would owe +money promised to a wench. If you do not give them to me, I will have +them, notwithstanding."</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>"I promise you I will."</p> + +<p>"And suppose I have burned them?"<a name="Page_423" id="Page_423"></a></p> + +<p>"You lie, you have them here, you have kept them. You have behaved +toward me like a thief."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, Marianne," said Lissac coldly, "on my faith, I see I have +done well to preserve some weapon against you. You are certainly very +dangerous!"</p> + +<p>"More than you imagine," she replied.</p> + +<p>He moved slightly backward, seeing that she wished to pass him to reach +the door.</p> + +<p>"You will not give me back my letters?" she asked in a harsh and +menacing tone as she stood on the threshold of the room.</p> + +<p>Guy stooped without heeding her and picked up the gloves that were lying +on the carpet and handed them to the young woman:</p> + +<p>"This is your property, I think?"</p> + +<p>This was said with insolently refined politeness.</p> + +<p>Marianne took the gloves, and as a last insult, like a blow on the +cheek, she threw them at Guy's face, who turned aside and the gloves +fell on the bed where just before these two hatreds had come together in +kisses of passion.</p> + +<p>"Miserable coward!" said Marianne, surveying Lissac from head to foot +with an expression of scorn, while he stood still, his monocle dangling +at the end of a fine cord on his breast, near the buttonhole of his +jacket that bore the red rosette; his face was pale but wore a sly +expression.</p> + +<p>That silk rosette looked there like a vermilion note <a name="Page_424" id="Page_424"></a>stamped on a dark +ground, and it seemed to pierce like a luminous drill into Marianne's +eyes; and with her head erect, pallid face and trembling lip she passed +before the domestic who hastened to open the door and went downstairs, +repeating to herself with all the distracted fury of a fixed idea:</p> + +<p>"To be avenged! To be avenged! Oh! to be avenged!"</p> + +<p>She jumped into a cab.</p> + +<p>"Well?"—said the coachman, looking with blinking eyes at this +pale-faced, distraught-looking woman.</p> + +<p>She remained there as if seeking an idea, a purpose.</p> + +<p>"Where shall we go?" repeated the driver.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Marianne's face trembled with a joyous expression and she +abruptly said:</p> + +<p>"To the Prefecture of Police!"</p> + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<p class="frmatter" ><a name="ill_376" id="ill_376"></a><b>Part Second Chapter V</b></p> + +<p class="center"><i>The general rose, grasping his glass as if he would shiver it, +and while the </i>parfait<i> overflowed on to the plates, he cried +in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head of his division:</i></p> + +<p class="center"><i>"I love bronze—I love bronze—...."</i></p> + +<p class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/page376.png" width="433" height="611" alt="[Illustration: THE BANQUET]" title="THE BANQUET" /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_VI" id="II_VI"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VI</h3> + + +<p>There was a crowd at the <i>Mirlitons</i> Exposition.</p> + +<p>A file of waiting carriages lined the kerbstone the whole length of +Place Vendôme. Beneath the arch and within the portal, groups of +fashionable persons elbowed each other on entering or leaving, and +exchanged friendly polite greetings; the women quizzing the new hats, +little hoods of plush or large <i>Rembranesque</i> hats in which the +<a name="Page_425" id="Page_425"></a>delicate Parisian faces were lost as under the roof of a cabriolet. The +liveried lackeys perfunctorily glanced at the cards of admission that +the holders hardly took the trouble to present. One was seated at a +table mechanically handing out catalogues. Through the open door of the +Club's Theatre could be seen gold frames suspended from the walls, terra +cottas and marbles on their pedestals, and around the pictures and +sculptures a dense crowd, masses of black hats inclined toward the +paintings, side by side with pretty feminine heads crowned with +Gainsborough hats adorned with plumes. It was impossible to see at close +quarters the pieces offered for the sale that was for that day the +engrossing topic of conversation of <i>All Paris</i>.</p> + +<p>"A veritable salon in miniature!" said Guy aloud to an art critic who +was taking notes. "But to examine it comfortably one should be quite +alone. For an hour past I have been trying to get a look at the +Meissonier, but have not been able to do so. It is stifling here. I will +return another time."</p> + +<p>He quickly grasped the hand that held the pencil, and which was extended +to him, and tried to make a passage through the crowd to the exit. +Pushed and pushing, he smiled and apologized for his inability to +disengage his arms that were held by the crowd as if in a vise, in order +to salute the friends he recognized. At length he reached, giving vent +to a grunt of satisfaction, the hall where visitors were sitting on +divans, chatting, <a name="Page_426" id="Page_426"></a>either less eager to view the pictures or satisfied +in their desires. There, Guy instinctively looked at a mirror and +examined the knot of his cravat. He did not notice that a gentleman with +a closely buttoned frock-coat, on seeing him, quietly rose from the +divan on which he had been sitting, and approached him, mechanically +pulling the skirts of his coat meanwhile, so as to smooth the creases.</p> + +<p>He simply touched Monsieur de Lissac's shoulder with the tip of his +finger.</p> + +<p>Guy turned round, expecting to recognize a friend.</p> + +<p>"You are surely Monsieur de Lissac?" said the man in the frock-coat, +with the refined manners of a gentleman.</p> + +<p>"Yes!" said Lissac, somewhat astonished at the coldness of his manner.</p> + +<p>"Be good enough to accompany me, monsieur, I am a Commissioner of the +Judiciary Delegations!"</p> + +<p>Lissac thought he misunderstood him.</p> + +<p>"I confess that I don't quite understand you," he began, with a rather +significant smile.</p> + +<p>"I am a Commissioner of Police," the other replied, "and I am ordered to +arrest you."</p> + +<p>He suddenly exposed his insignia like the end of a sash, and by a very +polite gesture, with an amiable and engaging manner, pointed to the way +out by the side of the archway of the hôtel.</p> + +<p>"I have two of my men yonder, monsieur, but you will not place me under +the necessity of—"<a name="Page_427" id="Page_427"></a></p> + +<p>"What is this, monsieur?" said Lissac. "I frankly confess that I +understand nothing of this enigma. I hope you will explain it to me."</p> + +<p>All this was said in a conversational tone, <i>mezzo voce</i>, and +accompanied with smiles. No one could have guessed what these two men +were saying to each other. Only, Guy was very pale and his somewhat +haughty glance around him seemed to indicate that he was seeking some +support or witness.</p> + +<p>He uttered a slight exclamation of satisfaction on perceiving the +journalist to whom he had just before spoken a few words before a little +canvas by Meissonier.</p> + +<p>"My dear Brévans," he said in a loud voice, "here is an unpublished item +for your journal. This gentleman has laid his hand on my collar."</p> + +<p>With a sly look he indicated the Commissioner of Police, who did not +budge.</p> + +<p>"What! my dear fellow?"</p> + +<p>"They have arrested me, that is all," said Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur," the Commissioner quickly interrupted in a low voice, "no +commotion, please. For my sake—and for yours."</p> + +<p>He lightly touched Lissac's buttonhole with the end of his finger, as if +to intimate that there was the explanation of his arrest, and Guy +suddenly became very red and stamped his foot.</p> + +<p>"Idiot that I am!—I am at your orders, monsieur," he said, making a +sign to the Commissioner to pass out.<a name="Page_428" id="Page_428"></a></p> + +<p>He again saluted the stupefied journalist, and the Commissioner bowing +to him, out of politeness or prudence, Guy passed before him, angrily +twirling his mustache.</p> + +<p>Besides Brévans, nobody in all that crowd suspected that a man had just +been arrested in the midst of the Exposition. Unless the journalist had +hawked the news from group to group, it would not have been suspected.</p> + +<p>Lissac found at the door of the Club on Place Vendôme a hired carriage +which had come up as soon as the driver saw the Commissioner. Two +agents, having the appearance of good, peaceable bourgeois, were walking +about, chatting together on the sidewalk, as if on duty. The +Commissioner said to one of them:</p> + +<p>"I have no further need of you, Crabot will do."</p> + +<p>Crabot, a little man with the profile of a weasel, slowly mounted the +box beside the coachman, and the Commissioner of Police took his seat +next to Lissac, who had nervously plucked the rosette of the Portuguese +Order of Christ from his buttonhole.</p> + +<p>"What!" he said. "Really, then, it is for this? Because I wear this +ribbon without having paid five or six louis into the Chancellery?—I +have always intended to do so, but, believe me, I have not had the time. +But a fiscal question does not warrant publicly insulting—"</p> + +<p>"I do not know if it is for that," interrupted the Commissioner; "but it +is evident that a recent note in the <i>Officiel</i> points directly to the +illegal wearing of foreign <a name="Page_429" id="Page_429"></a>decorations. You do not read the <i>Officiel</i>, +Monsieur de Lissac."</p> + +<p>Guy shrugged his shoulders as if he considered the matter perfectly +ridiculous. It seemed to him that behind the alleged pretext there was +some secret cause, something like a feminine intrigue. He vaguely +recalled that he had seen Marianne one evening at Madame de Marsy's +smile at the Prefect of Police, that Jouvenet who flirted so agreeably +with that pretty girl in a corner of the salon. And then, too, at the +theatre, in Marianne's box, the prefect found his way. At the first +moment, the idea that Marianne had a hand in this arrest took possession +of his mind. He saw her standing before him at his house, posing her +little nervous, fidgety hand on his breast at the very spot occupied by +this rosette; again he saw her smiling mysteriously, accompanying it +with a caress which seemed to suggest the desire to end in a scratch.</p> + +<p>Was it really true that Marianne was sufficiently audacious to have +brought about this coup de théâtre? No, there was some error. The stupid +zeal of some subordinate officer was manifested in this outrage. Some +cowardly charge had perhaps been made against him at the prefecture. +Every man who crosses a street has so many enemies that look at him as +he passes as if they would spy on him! There are so many undeclared +hatreds crawling in the rotten depths of this Parisian bog! One fine +morning one feels one's self stung in the <a name="Page_430" id="Page_430"></a>heel. It is nothing: only +some anonymous gossip; some unknown person taking revenge!</p> + +<p>At the prefecture, they would doubtless inform Guy as to the cause of +the attack: in questioning him, he would himself certainly be permitted +to interrogate. He was stunned on arriving at the clerk's office to find +that they took his description, just as they would that of a common +offender, a night-walker or a rascal. He wished to enter a protest and +became annoyed. He flew into a rage for a moment, then he reflected that +there was nothing to be done but to submit to the bites of the iron +teeth of the police routine in which he was suddenly entangled. They +searched his pockets and he felt their vile hands graze his skin. He +experienced a strongly rebellious sentiment and notwithstanding his +present enforced calm, from time to time he demanded to see the Prefect +of Police, the Chief of the Municipal Police, the <i>Juge d'Instruction</i>, +he did not know whom, but at least some one who was responsible.</p> + +<p>"You have my card, send my card to Monsieur Jouvenet; he knows me!"</p> + +<p>They made no reply.</p> + +<p>The Commissioner who had arrested him was not there. Guy found himself +in the presence of what were as pieces of human machinery, working +silently, without noise of wheels, and caring for his protests no more +than they did for the wind that blew through the corridors.</p> + +<p>"See, on my honor, I am not a rascal!" he said.<a name="Page_431" id="Page_431"></a> "What have I done? I +have stupidly passed this bit of red ribbon into my buttonhole. Well! +that is an offence, it is not a crime! People are not arrested for that! +I will pay the fine, if fine there is! You are not going to keep me here +with thieves?"</p> + +<p>In that jail, he endeavored to preserve his appearance as a fashionable +elegant and an ironical man of the world, treating his misadventure in a +spirit of haughty disdain; but his overstrained nerves led him to act +with a sort of cold fury that gave him the desire to openly oppose, as +in a duel, his many adversaries.</p> + +<p>"I beg you to remain calm," one of these men repeated to him from time +to time in a passionless way.</p> + +<p>"Oh! that is easy enough for you to say," cried Lissac. "I ask you once +more, where is Monsieur Jouvenet?—I wish to see Monsieur Jouvenet!"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur le Prefect cannot be seen in this way," was the reply. +"Moreover, you haven't to see any one; you have only to wait."</p> + +<p>"Wait for what?"</p> + +<p>They led Guy de Lissac through the passages to the door of a new cell, +which they opened before him.</p> + +<p>"Then," he said, as he tried to force a troubled smile, "I am a +prisoner? Quite seriously? As in melodrama? This is high comedy!"</p> + +<p>He asked if he would soon be examined, at least. They didn't know. They +hardly replied to him. Could he write, at any rate? Notify any one? +Protest?<a name="Page_432" id="Page_432"></a> What should he do? He heard from the lips of a keeper who had +the appearance of a very honest man, the information, crushing as a +verdict: "You are in close confinement, as it is called!"</p> + +<p><i>In close confinement?</i> Were they mocking him? In secret, he, Lissac? +Evidently, they wanted to make fun; it was absurd, it was unlikely, such +things only happened in operettas. He would heartily relish it at the +Café Riche presently, when he went to dine. <i>In close confinement?</i> He +was no longer annoyed at the jest, so amusing had it become. For an old +Parisian like him, it was a facetious romance and almost amusing.</p> + +<p>"A climax!"</p> + +<p>Evening passed and night came. They brought Lissac a meal, and the +<i>jest</i>, as he called it, in no way came to an end. He did not close his +eyes for the whole night. He was stifled, and grew angry within the +narrow cage in which they had locked him. All sorts of wild projects of +revenge passed through his brain. He would send his seconds to Monsieur +Jouvenet, he would protest in the papers. He would have public opinion +in his favor.</p> + +<p>Then his scepticism came to his aid, and shrugging his shoulders, he +said:</p> + +<p>"Bah! public opinion! It will ridicule me, that's all! It will accuse me +of desiring to make a stir, to cut off my dog's tail. To-day, Alcibiades +would thus cut off his, but the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to +Animals would bring an action against him."<a name="Page_433" id="Page_433"></a></p> + +<p>He waited for the next morning with the feverish anxiety of those who +cannot sleep. Certainly he would be examined at the first moment. They +did so in the case of the vagabonds gathered in during the night and +dumped into the <i>lions' den</i>. The whole day passed without Lissac's +seeing any other faces than those of his turnkeys, and these men were +almost mutes. Then his irritation was renewed. He turned his useless +anger against himself, as he could not insult the walls.</p> + +<p>Night came round, and spite of himself, he slept for a short time on the +wretched prison pallet. He began to find the facetious affair too +prolonged and too gloomy. They took him just in time, the second day +after his arrest, before a kind of magistrate or police judge, who, +after having reminded him that the law was clear in respect of the +wearing of foreign orders, announced that the matter was settled by a +decree of <i>nolle prosequi</i>.</p> + +<p>"That is to say," said Lissac, in anger, "that two nights passed in +close confinement is regarded as ample punishment? If I am guilty of a +crime, I deserve much more than that. But, if only a mere peccadillo is +attributable to me, I consider it too much; and I swear to you that I +intend, in my turn, to summon to justice for illegal arrest—"</p> + +<p>"Keep quiet," curtly interrupted the magistrate. "That is the best thing +you can do!"</p> + +<p>Lissac, meantime, felt a sort of physical delight in leaving those cold +passages and that stone dwelling.<a name="Page_434" id="Page_434"></a></p> + +<p>The fresh breeze of a gray November day appeared to him to be as gentle +as in spring. It seemed that he had lived in that den for weeks. He +flung himself into a carriage, had himself driven home, and was received +by his concierge with stupefied amazement.</p> + +<p>"You, monsieur?" he said. "Already!"</p> + +<p>This <i>already</i> was pregnant with suggestiveness, and puzzled Lissac. The +rumor had, in fact, spread throughout the quarter, and probably the +porter had helped it along—that Guy had been arrested for complicity in +some political intrigue, though of what nature was unknown. +Nevertheless, the previous evening, the agents of police had come to the +apartments in Rue d'Aumale and had searched everything, moved, tried and +probed everything. Evidently they were in quest of papers.</p> + +<p>"Papers?" cried Lissac. "Her letter, <i>parbleu!</i>"</p> + +<p>He was no longer in doubt. The delicate, dreaded hand of Marianne was at +the bottom of all that. She had made some bargain with Monsieur +Jouvenet, as between a woman and a debauchee! The Prefect of Police was +not the loser: Marianne Kayser had the wherewithal to satisfy him.</p> + +<p>"The miserable wench!" Lissac repeated as he went up to his apartment.</p> + +<p>He rang and his servant appeared, looking as bewildered as the porter.</p> + +<p>The apartment was still topsy-turvy. The valet de chambre had not dared +to put the things in order, as if <a name="Page_435" id="Page_435"></a>there reigned, amid the scattered +packages and the yawning drawers, the majesty of the official seal.</p> + +<p>They had examined everything, forced locks and removed packets of +letters.</p> + +<p>The small Italian cabinet, that contained Marianne's letter, had had its +drawers turned over, like pockets turned inside out. Marianne's letter +to Lissac, the scrap of paper which the police hunted, without knowing +whose will they were obeying, that confession of a crazy mistress to a +lover who was smitten to his very bones, was no longer there.</p> + +<p>"Ah! I will see Vaudrey! I will see him and tell him!" said Lissac +aloud.</p> + +<p>"Will monsieur breakfast?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, as quickly as possible. Two eggs and tea, I am in a hurry."</p> + +<p>He was anxious to rush off to the ministry. Was the Chamber sitting +to-day? No. He would perhaps then find Sulpice at his first call. The +messengers knew him.</p> + +<p>He speedily hastened to Place Bréda, looking for a carriage. On the way, +he stumbled against a man who came down on the same side, smoking a +cigar.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Monsieur de Lissac!"</p> + +<p>Guy instinctively stepped back one pace; he recognized Uncle Kayser. +Then, suddenly, his anger, which up to that time he had been able to +restrain, burst forth, and in a few words energetic and rapid, he told +Simon, <a name="Page_436" id="Page_436"></a>who remained bewildered and somewhat pale, as if one had tried +to force a quarrel on him, what he thought of Marianne's infamy.</p> + +<p>The uncle said nothing, regretted that he had met Lissac, and contented +himself with stammering from time to time:</p> + +<p>"She has done that?—What! she has done that?—Ah! the rogue."</p> + +<p>"And what do you say about it, you, Simon Kayser?"</p> + +<p>"I?—What do I say about it?—Why—"</p> + +<p>Little by little he recovered his sang-froid, looking at matters from +the lofty heights of his artist's philosophy.</p> + +<p>"It is rather too strong. What do you want?—It is not even moral, but +it has <i>character!</i> And in art, after the moral idea comes <i>character!</i> +Ah! bless me! character, that is something!—Otherwise, I disapprove. It +is brutal, vulgar, that lack of ideal. I defy you to symbolize that. +<i>Love Avenging Itself Against Love</i>—<i>Jealousy Calling the Police to Its +Aid in Order to Triumph over Dead Love!</i> It is old, it lacks +originality, it smacks of Prud'hon!—The Correggio of the décolleté!—It +is like Tassaert, it is of the sprightly kind!—I would never paint so, +that is what I say about it!"</p> + +<p>Guy had no reply for this imperturbable moralist and he regretted that +he had lost time in speaking to him. But his uncontrollable rage choked +him. Enough remained however to show all his feelings to Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>The minister was not in his cabinet. A messenger <a name="Page_437" id="Page_437"></a>asked Lissac if he +would speak to Monsieur Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State.</p> + +<p>"I, I," then said a man who rose from the chair in which he had been +sitting in the <a name="typo_11" id="typo_11"></a>antechamber, "I should be glad to see Monsieur +Warcolier—Monsieur Eugène, you know."</p> + +<p>"Very well, Monsieur Eugène, I will announce you." Lissac explained that +his visit was not official, he called on a personal matter.</p> + +<p>"Is the minister in his apartments?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, monsieur, but to-day, you know—"</p> + +<p>What was going on to-day, then? Lissac had not noticed, in fact, that a +marquee with red stripes was being erected at the entrance to the hôtel, +and that upholsterers were bringing in wagons benches covered with red +velvet with which they were blocking the peristyle. There was a +reception at the ministry.</p> + +<p>"That will not prevent Monsieur Vaudrey from seeing me," he said.</p> + +<p>One of the messengers opened the doors in front of him and conducted him +to the floor above, where Monsieur le Ministre was then resting near the +fire and glancing over the papers after breakfast.</p> + +<p>He appeared pleased but a little astonished at seeing Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Eh! my dear Guy, what a good idea!—Have you arrived already for the +soirée? You received your invitation?"<a name="Page_438" id="Page_438"></a></p> + +<p>"No," answered Lissac, "I have received nothing, or if the invitation +arrived, the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet have taken it away with many +other things."</p> + +<p>"The agents! what agents?" asked the minister.</p> + +<p>He had risen to receive Guy and remained standing in front of the +fireplace looking at his friend, who questioned him with his glance to +discover if Vaudrey could really be in ignorance as to such a matter.</p> + +<p>"Ah, so! but," said Lissac with trembling voice and in a tone of angry +bitterness, "do you not know then, what takes place in Paris?"</p> + +<p>"What is happening?" asked Sulpice, who had turned slightly pale.</p> + +<p>"They arrest men for nothing, and keep them in close confinement for two +days in order to have time to search their correspondence for a document +that compromises certain persons. It is very proper, no doubt; but that +smacks too much of romanticism and the Bridge of Sighs. It is very +old-fashioned and worn-out. I would not answer for your long employing +such methods of government."</p> + +<p>"Come, are you mad? What does it all signify?" asked the minister, in +astonishment.</p> + +<p>He appeared as if he really did not understand. It was clear that he did +not know what Guy meant.</p> + +<p>"Don't you read the papers, then?" Lissac asked him.</p> + +<p>"I read the reports of the Director of the Press."<a name="Page_439" id="Page_439"></a></p> + +<p>"Well, if those reports have not informed you of my arrest in the heart +of the Exposition des Mirlitons, on Wednesday, they have told you +nothing!—"</p> + +<p>"Arrested! you?"</p> + +<p>"By the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police, to gratify +your mistress, Mademoiselle Kayser!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! my dear Guy!" said the minister, whose cheek became flushed in +spots. "I should be glad if you—"</p> + +<p>He paused for a phrase to express clearly and briefly that he required +Lissac to be silent, but could not frame one. He received, as it were, a +sudden and violent blow on the head. Beyond question, he did not know a +word of all that Lissac had informed him. And yet this was the gossip of +Paris for two days! Either naming in full, or in indicating him +sufficiently clearly, the newspapers had related the adventure on their +front page. Moreover, much attention had been attracted to an article in +a journal with which Lucien Granet was intimately connected, wherein, in +well-turned but perfidious phrases, a certain Alkibiades—Lissac had +guessed that this name was applied to him—had been arrested by the +orders of the archon Sulpicios at the instance of a certain Basilea, one +of the most charming hetaires of the republic of Perikles. Under this +Greco-Parisian disguise it was easy for everyone to discover the true +names and to see behind the masks the faces intended.</p> + +<p>At the very moment that Lissac called to ask the min<a name="Page_440" id="Page_440"></a>ister for an +explanation of the acts of the Prefect Jouvenet, Madame Vaudrey was +opening a copy of a journal in which these names travestied by some +Hellenist of the boulevard were underlined in red pencil. The article +entitled <i>The Mistress of an Archon</i>, had been specially sent to her +under a cover bearing the address in a woman's handwriting, Sabine Marsy +or Madame Gerson! Some friend. One always has such.</p> + +<p>It was of Adrienne that Vaudrey thought while Lissac was giving vent to +his ironical, blunt complaint. Was Guy mad to speak of Marianne aloud in +this way, and in this place, a few feet away from his wife, who could +hear everything? Yes, Lissac was over-excited, furious and apparently +crazy. He did not lower his tone, in spite of the sudden terror +expressed by Vaudrey, who seized his hand and said to him eagerly: "Why, +keep quiet! Suppose some one is listening?"</p> + +<p>He felt himself, moreover, impelled by a violent rage. If what Guy told +him were correct, Marianne had made use of him and of the title of +mistress that she ought to have concealed. She had played it in order to +compel Jouvenet to commit an outrage.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" said Lissac, sneeringly. "Are you innocent enough to believe +that she has seduced the Prefect of Police by simply telling him that +she was your mistress? You don't know her. She only did this in becoming +his!"</p> + +<p>Sulpice had become livid, and he looked at Lissac <a name="Page_441" id="Page_441"></a>with a sudden +expression of hatred, as if this man had been his enemy. Guy had +directly attacked his vanity and his heart with a knife-thrust, as it +were, without sparing either his self-love or his passion.</p> + +<p>"Ah! yes," said Lissac, "I know very well that that annoys you, but it +is so! I knew this young lady before you did. Let her commit all the +follies that she chooses with others and throw me overboard at a pinch, +as she did three days ago, all is for the best. She is playing her rôle. +I am only an imbecile and I am punished for it, and it is well; but, in +order to attack me, to secure a very tiny paper, which put her very +nicely at my mercy, that she should commit a foolish and brutal outrage +against you who answer for the personnel of your administration, I +cannot forgive. She thought then that I would make use of this note +against her? She takes me for a rascal? If I wished to commit an act of +treachery, could I not go this very moment, even without the weapon that +Jouvenet's agents have taken from me, straight to her Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Rosas?" asked Sulpice, whose countenance contorted, and who feverishly +twisted his blond beard.</p> + +<p>"Eh! <i>parbleu</i>, yes, Rosas! On my honor, one would take you for the +Minister of the Interior of the Moon! Rosas, who perhaps is her lover, +but will be her husband if she wishes it! and she does!"</p> + +<p>Poor Sulpice looked at Lissac with a terrified expression which might +have been comic, did it not in its <a name="Page_442" id="Page_442"></a>depth portray a genuine sorrow. He +was oblivious to everything now, where he was, if Guy spoke too loudly, +or if Adrienne could hear. He was only conscious of a terrible strain of +his mind. This sudden revelation lacerated him—as if his back received +the blows of a whip. He wished to know all. He questioned Lissac, +forcing him into a corner, and making him hesitate, for he now feared +that he would say too much, and limited himself to demanding Jouvenet's +punishment.</p> + +<p>"As to Marianne, one would see to that after," he said.</p> + +<p>Ah! yes, certainly, Jouvenet should be punished! How? Vaudrey could not +say, but from this moment the Prefect of Police was condemned. Guy's +arrest, which was an act of brutal aggression, was tantamount to a +dismissal signed by the Prefect himself. And Marianne! she then made a +sport of Sulpice and took him for a child or a ninny!</p> + +<p>"Not at all. For a man who loves, that is enough," replied Lissac.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had flung himself into an armchair, striking his fist upon the +little table, covered with the journals that he had scarcely opened, and +absent-mindedly pushing the chair back, the better to give way to his +excessively violent threats, after the manner of weak natures.</p> + +<p>"Do you want my advice?" Lissac abruptly asked him. "You have only what +you deserve, ah! yes, that <a name="Page_443" id="Page_443"></a>is just it! I tell you the sober truth. A +wife like yours should never be forsaken for a creature like Marianne!"</p> + +<p>"I love Adrienne sincerely!" replied Vaudrey eagerly.</p> + +<p>"And you deceive her entirely. That is foolish. You deserve that +Mademoiselle Kayser should have ridiculed, deceived and ruined you +irretrievably, and that your name should never be uttered again. When +one has the opportunity to possess a wife like yours, one adores her on +bended knees, you understand me, and one doesn't destroy her true +happiness to divert it in favor of the crowd. And what pleasure! +Jouvenet has had the same dose at a less cost!"</p> + +<p>"You abuse the rights of friendship, somewhat," said Sulpice, rising +suddenly. "I do what pleases me, as it pleases me, and I owe no account +to any one, I think!"</p> + +<p>He stopped suddenly. His feet were, as it were, nailed to the floor and +his mouth closed. He seized Guy's hand and felt his flesh creep, as he +saw Adrienne standing pale, and supporting herself against the doorpost, +as if she had not the strength to proceed, her eyes wide open, like +those of a sick person.</p> + +<p>Assuredly, beyond all possible doubt, she had heard everything.</p> + +<p>She was there! she heard!</p> + +<p>She said nothing, but moved a step forward, upheld by a terrible effort.</p> + +<p>Her look was that of a whipped child, of a poor crea<a name="Page_444" id="Page_444"></a>ture terrified and +in despair, and expressed not anger but entire collapse. She was so wan, +so sad-looking, that neither Lissac nor Vaudrey dared speak. A chill +silence fell upon these three persons.</p> + +<p>While Adrienne approached the table upon which the journals were piled, +Guy was the first to force a smile to throw her off the scent; Adrienne +stopped him with a gesture that was intended to express that to +undeceive her, that is to say, to deceive her afresh, would be a still +more cowardly act. She took from among the journals that which she had +just been reading without at first quite understanding it, the one that +had been sent to her, underlined as with a venomous nail, and showing to +Vaudrey the article that spoke of Sulpicios and Basilea, she said gently +in a feeble voice, crushed by this crumbling of her hopes:</p> + +<p>"That is known then, that affair!"</p> + +<p>Then she sunk exhausted into the armchair in which Sulpice had been +sitting, and her breast heaved with a violent sob that tore it as if it +would rend it.</p> + +<p>Sulpice looked at Lissac who was standing half-inclined, as in the +presence of a misfortune. He instinctively seized the minister by the +shoulder and gently forced him toward Adrienne, saying to him in a +whisper, in ill-assured tones:</p> + +<p>"Kiss her then! One pardons when one loves!"</p> + +<p>With a supplicating cry, Vaudrey threw himself on his knees before +Adrienne, while Lissac hastily opened <a name="Page_445" id="Page_445"></a>the door and left, feeling indeed +that he could not say a word and that Vaudrey only could obtain +Vaudrey's pardon.</p> + +<p>"I, in my anger," he said, "he, in his jealousy, have allowed ourselves +to get into a passion. It is stupid. One should speak lower."</p> + +<p>He went away, much dissatisfied with himself and but little less with +Vaudrey. Again he considered this man foolish, adored as he was by such +a wife, whom he deceived. He was not sure that at the bottom of his own +heart he did not feel a sentiment of love toward Adrienne. Ah! if he had +been loved by such a creature, he would have been capable of great +things!—He would have arranged and utilized his life instead of +spoiling it. In place of vulgar love, he would have kept this unique +love intact from the altar to the tomb!</p> + +<p>Pale and tottering, and a child once more under her sorrow, as he had +just seen her, she was so adorably lovely that he had received an +entirely new impression, one of almost jealousy against Sulpice, and +therefore, brusquely overcoming this strange, unseemly emotion, he had +himself thrust Vaudrey toward his wife and had departed hastily, as if +he felt that he must hurry away and never see them again. But as he +left, on the contrary, he saw her again with her sad, wretched, +suffering look and the young wife's sorrowful voice went with him, +repeating in a tone of broken-hearted grief:</p> + +<p>"That is known then!"<a name="Page_446" id="Page_446"></a></p> + +<p>"Ah! that miserable fellow, Vaudrey!" thought Guy.</p> + +<p>In going out, he had to wait a moment in the antechamber, to admit of +the passage of some vases of flowers, green shrubs and variegated +foliage plants that were being brought in to decorate the salons. A +fête! And this evening! In the arrival of those flowers for decoration, +at the moment when chance, clumsily or wickedly, so suddenly revealed +that crushing news, Guy saw so much irony that he could not forbear +looking at them for a moment, almost insulting in their beauty and their +hothouse bloom.</p> + +<p>Would Adrienne have the courage or strength to undertake the reception +of the evening, within a few hours? Guy was annoyed at having come.</p> + +<p>"I could well have waited and kept my anger to myself. The unhappy woman +would have known nothing."</p> + +<p>"Bah!" he added. "She is kind, she adores Sulpice, it is only a passing +storm. She will forgive!"</p> + +<p>He promised himself, moreover, to return in the evening, to excuse +himself to Adrienne, to comfort her if he could.</p> + +<p>"There is some merit, after all, in that," he thought again. "On my +word! I believe I love her and yet I am angry with that animal Vaudrey +for not loving her enough."</p> + +<p>She will forgive!—Lissac knew courtesans but he did not know this +woman, energetic as she was under her <a name="Page_447" id="Page_447"></a>frail appearance, a child, a +little provincial lost in the life of Paris, lost and, as it were, +absorbed in the hubbub of political circles, smitten with her husband, +who comprehended in her eyes every seduction and superiority, having +given herself entirely and wishing to wholly possess the elect being who +possessed her, in whom she trusted and to whom she gave herself, body +and soul, with all her confidence, her innocence and her modesty. He did +not know what such a sensitive, nervously frail nature could feel on the +first terrible impulses, full of enthusiasm under her exterior coldness, +of resolution concealed under her timid manners, capable of madness, +distracted in spite of her reason and calm; this candor of thought, of +education, and associations that made her, with all her irresistible +attractiveness, the virtuous woman with all her charm.</p> + +<p>Adrienne had at first read the journal that had been sent to her without +understanding anything about it. Alkibiades, Basilea, the mistress of +the Archon, what signified that to her? What did it mean? Then suddenly +her thought rested on the name of Sulpice, travestied in the Greek of +parody, Sulpicios. Was it of her husband that they intended to speak? +She immediately felt a bitter anguish at heart, but it was a matter only +of allowing one's self to be impressed by a journalistic pleasantry, as +contemptible as an anonymous letter! She would think no more about it. +She must concentrate her thoughts on the evening's reception. There <a name="Page_448" id="Page_448"></a>was +to be an official repast, followed by a soirée. She had nothing to +concern herself about in regard to the menu; Chevet undertook that. For +the ministerial dinners there was a fixed price as in restaurants. Hosts +and guests live <i>au cabaret</i>, they dine at so much a head. Adrienne +endeavored to occupy herself with the musical soirée, with the +programmes that they brought her, with the names of comedians and female +singers, printed on vellum, and with those bouquets with which the vases +of her little salon were decorated. Ah! well, yes, in spite of the +feverish activity, she could think only of that article in the journal, +that miserable article, every line of which flamed before her eyes just +as when one has looked too long at a fire. She had been seized with the +temptation there and then to openly ask Sulpice what these veiled +illusions meant.</p> + +<p>"I hope, indeed," she thought, with her contempt of all lying, "that he +will not charge me with suspecting him. No, certainly, I do not suspect +him."</p> + +<p>She went to the little cabinet where Sulpice sometimes read or worked +after breakfast, and there, as if she had thrown herself upon an open +knife, she suddenly heard those sinister words which pierced her very +flesh like pointed blades.</p> + +<p>They were speaking of another woman. Lissac said in a loud tone: Your +mistress! and Vaudrey allowed it to be said!—</p> + +<p>A mistress! what mistress? Marianne Kayser! Oh, <a name="Page_449" id="Page_449"></a>that woman of whom +Sulpice had so often spoken in an indifferent manner, that pretty +creature, so often seen, seductive, wonderfully beautiful, terrifyingly +beautiful, it was she! Your mistress! Sulpice had a mistress! He lied, +he deceived. He? She was betrayed! Was it possible? If it were possible? +But it was true! Eh! <i>parbleu</i>, yes, it was true—And this, then, was +why they had sent her this horrible article! She knew now.</p> + +<p>She had been tempted to enter the room suddenly, to throw herself +between these men and interrupt their conversation. She had not the +strength. And then, what Lissac said had the effect of consoling +her!—Guy's reproaches to Sulpice were such as she would have liked to +cast at him, if she could have found speech now. But not a word could +she frame. She was stunned, dumb and like a crushed being. She knew only +one thing, that she suffered horribly, as she had never before suffered.</p> + +<p>At first she allowed Vaudrey, who knelt at her feet, as Lissac had told +him on going away, to take her hand that hung listlessly down. Then she +gently withdrew it as if she felt herself seized by an instinctive sense +of outraged modesty.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey tried to speak. At first only confused words, silly excuses, +clumsy falsehoods, cruelly absurd phrases—<i>caprices</i>, <i>nothing serious</i>, +<i>whim</i>, <i>madness</i>—so many avowals, so many insults, came to his lips. But +then, before the silence of Adrienne, he could say nothing <a name="Page_450" id="Page_450"></a>more, he was +speechless, overwhelmed, and sought a hand that was refused.</p> + +<p>"Will you never forgive me?" he asked at last, not knowing too well what +he said.</p> + +<p>"Never!" she said coldly.</p> + +<p>She rose and with as much sudden energy as but a moment before she had +felt of weakness, she crossed the room.</p> + +<p>"Are you going away?" stammered Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I must be alone—Ah! quite alone," she said, with a sort of +gesture of disgust as she saw her husband approach her.</p> + +<p>He stopped and said, as if by chance:</p> + +<p>"You know that—this evening—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," she replied, "do not be anxious about anything! I am still +the minister's wife, if I am Madame Vaudrey no longer."</p> + +<p>He tried in vain to reply.</p> + +<p>Adrienne had already disappeared.</p> + +<p>"There is the end of my happiness!" Sulpice stammered as he suddenly +confronted an unknown situation dark as an abyss. "Ah! how wretched I +am! Very wretched! whose fault is it?"</p> + +<p>He plunged gladly into the work of examining the bundles of reports from +the prefects, feverishly inspecting them to deafen and blind his +conscience, and seized at every moment with a desire to make an appeal +to Adrienne or to go and insult Marianne. Oh! especially <a name="Page_451" id="Page_451"></a>to tell +Marianne that she had betrayed him, that she was a wretch, that she was +the mistress of Rosas, the mistress of Jouvenet, a strumpet like any +other strumpet, yes, a strumpet!</p> + +<p>Amid all the disturbance of that day of harsh misfortune, perhaps he +thought more of the Marianne that he had lost than of the Adrienne that +he had outraged; while the wife questioned with herself if it were +really she coming and going, automatically trying on her ball costume, +abandoning her head to the hair-dresser, feeling that in two hours she +would be condemned to smile on the minister's guests, the senators and +the deputies and play the part of a spectre, marching in the land of +dreams, in a nightmare that choked her, fastened on her throat and heart +and prompted her to cry and weep, all her poor nerves intensely strained +and sick, subdued by the energy of a tortured person, imposing on +herself the task of not appearing to suffer and—a still more atrocious +thing—of not even suffering in reality and waiting, yes, waiting to +sob.</p> + +<p>In the evening, everything blazed on the façade of the ministry. The +rows of gas-jets suggested that a public fête was being held in the +Hôtel Beauvau. The naming capital letters R.F. were boldly outlined +against the dark sky, the three colors of the flags looked bright in the +ruddy light of the gas. Carriages rolled over the sanded courtyard, +giving up at the carpeted entrance to the hôtel the invited guests +dressed in correct style, the <a name="Page_452" id="Page_452"></a>women wrapped in ample cloaks with gold +fringe or trimmed with fur, and all poured into the antechamber, +brushing against the <i>Gardes de Paris</i> in white breeches, with grounded +arms, forming a row and standing out like Caryatides against the +shining, large leaved green flowers on which their white helmets shone +by the light of the lustres. In the dressing-room, the clothing was +piled up, tied together in haste; the antechamber was quickly crossed, +the women in passing casting rapid glances at the immense mirrors; a +servant asked the names of the guests and repeated them to an usher, +whose loud voice penetrated these salons that for many years had heard +so many different names, of all parties, under all régimes, and +proclaimed them in the usual commonplace manner, while murdering the +most celebrated of them. Upon the threshold of the salon, filled with +fashionable people and flooded with intense light, stood the minister, +who had been receiving, greeting, bowing, ever since the opening of the +soirée, to those who arrived, some of whom he did not know; crowding +behind him, correctly dressed, stood his secretaries, the members of his +cabinet appropriating their shares of the greetings extended to the +Excellency, and at his side stood Madame Vaudrey, pale and smiling as +the creatures of the other world; she also bowed and from time to time +extended her gloved hand mechanically; pale she looked in her décolleté +gown of white satin, clasped at the shoulders with two pearl clasps, a +bouquet of natural <a name="Page_453" id="Page_453"></a>roses in her corsage, and standing there like a +melancholy spectre on the very threshold of the festive salons.</p> + +<p>When she perceived Guy enter, she greeted him with a sad smile, and +Vaudrey eagerly offered his hand to him as if he relied greatly on him +to arrange matters.</p> + +<p>Adrienne's repressed grief had pained Lissac. While to the other guests +she appeared to be only somewhat fatigued, to him the open wound and +sorrow were visible. He plunged into the crowd. Beneath the streaming +light the diamonds on the women's shoulders gleamed like the lustres' +crystals. Within a frame of gobelins and Beauvais tapestry taken from +the repository, was an improvised scene that looked like a green and +pink nest of camellias, dracænas and palms. The bright toilettes of the +women already seated before this scenic effect presented a wealth of +pale blue, white or pink silk, mother-of-pearl shoulders, diamonds, and +bows of pink or feather headdresses. Guy recognized Madame Marsy in the +front row, robed in a very low-cut, sea-green satin robe with a bouquet +of flowers at the tip of the shoulder, who while fanning herself looked +with haughty impertinence at the pretty Madame Gerson, her former +friend. Madame Evan was numerously surrounded, she was the most charming +of all the stylish set and the woman whom all the others tried to copy.</p> + +<p>Behind this species of female flower-bed the black coated ranks crowded, +their sombre hue relieved here and there by the uniform of some French +officer or <a name="Page_454" id="Page_454"></a>foreign military attaché. There was a profusion of orders, +crosses and strange old faces, with red ribbons at the neck, deputies +evidently in dress, youthful attachés of the ministry or embassy, +correct in bearing and officious, their crush-hats under their arms and +holding the satin programme of the <i>musicale soirée</i> in their hands, +some numbers of which were about to be rendered. Under the ceilings that +were dappled with painted clouds, surrounded by brilliant lights and a +wealth of flowers, this crowd presented at once an aspect of luxury and +oddity, with its living antitheses of old parliamentarians and tyros of +the Assembly.</p> + +<p>Intermingled with strains of music, were whisperings and the confused +noise of conversations.</p> + +<p>Guy watched with curiosity, as a man who has seen much and compares, all +this gathering of guests. From time to time he greeted some one of his +acquaintance, but this was a rare occurrence. He was delighted to see +Ramel whom he had often met at Adrienne's <i>Wednesdays</i>, and whom he +liked. He appeared to him to be fatigued and sick.</p> + +<p>"I am not very well, in fact," said Ramel. "I have only come because I +had something serious to say to Vaudrey."</p> + +<p>"What then?" asked Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Oh! nothing! some advice to give him as to the course to be followed. +There is decidedly much underhand work going on about the President."<a name="Page_455" id="Page_455"></a></p> + +<p>"Who is it?"</p> + +<p>"Most of them are here!"</p> + +<p>"His guests?"</p> + +<p>"You know very well that when one invites all one's friends, one finds +that three-quarters of one's enemies will be present."</p> + +<p>"At least," said Lissac.</p> + +<p>He continued to traverse the salons, always returning instinctively +toward the door at which Adrienne stood, with pale face and wandering +look, and scarcely hearing, poor woman, the unfamiliar names that the +usher uttered at equal intervals, like a speaking machine.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur Durosoi!—Monsieur and Madame Bréchet!—Monsieur the Minister +of Public Works!—Monsieur the Prefect of the Aube!—Monsieur the Count +de Grigny!—Monsieur Henri de Prangins!—Monsieur the General +d'Herbecourt!—Monsieur the Doctor Vilandry!—Monsieur and Madame +Tochard!"</p> + +<p>She had vowed that she would be strong, and allow nothing to be seen of +the despair that was wringing her heart. She compelled herself to smile. +In nightmares and hours of feverish unrest, she had suffered the same +vague, morbid feeling that she now experienced. All that passed about +her seemed to be unreal. These white-cravatted men, these gaily-dressed +women, the file of guests saluting her at the same spot in the salon, +with the same expression of assumed respect and trite politeness, +appeared to her but a succession of phantoms.<a name="Page_456" id="Page_456"></a> Neither a name nor an +association did she attach to those countenances that beamed on her with +an official smile or gravely assumed a correct seriousness. She felt +weary, overwhelmed and heavy-headed at the sight of this continued +procession of strangers on whom it was incumbent that she should smile +and to whom she must bow out of politeness, in virtue of that duty of +state which she wished to fulfil to the last degree, poor soul!</p> + +<p>The distant music of Fahrbach's polkas or Strauss's waltzes seemed like +an added accompaniment that mocked the sadness of her unwholesome dream.</p> + +<p>"And yet, in all that crowd of women who salute her, there are some who +are jealous of her! Many envy her!" thought Guy, who was looking on.</p> + +<p>Adrienne did not look at Vaudrey. She was afraid that if her eyes met +her husband's fixed on her own, she would lose her sang-froid and +suddenly burst into sobs, there before the guests. That would have been +ridiculous. This blonde, so feebly gentle, isolated herself, therefore, +with surprising determination and seemed to see nothing save her own +thought, the unique thought: "Be strong. You shall weep at your ease +when you are alone, far away from these people, far away from this +crowd, alone with yourself, entirely alone, entirely alone!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was very pale, but carried away, in spite of himself, by the joy +which he felt in receiving all the illustrious and powerful men of the +state, foreign ambassadors, the Presidents of the Senate and the +Chamber, <a name="Page_457" id="Page_457"></a>the ministers, his colleagues, deputies, wealthy financiers, +renowned publicists, in fact, everything that counts and has a name in +Paris,—this minister, happy to see the crowd running to him, at his +house, bowing, paying homage to him, for a moment forgot the crushing +events of that day, the sudden thunderbolt falling on him and perhaps, +as he had said, crushing his hearthstone.</p> + +<p>He no longer thought of anything but what he saw: salutations, bowed +heads, inclinations that succeeded each other with the regularity of a +clock, that succession of homages to the little Grenoble advocate, now +become Prime Minister.</p> + +<p>Oblivious of everything else, he had lost the recollection of his +mistress, and he suddenly grew pale and looked instinctively with terror +at Adrienne, who was as pale as a corpse.—A visitor had just been +announced by the usher, in his metallic voice, and the name that he +cried mechanically, as he had uttered all the others, echoed there like +an insult.</p> + +<p>Guy de Lissac shook through his entire frame, as he too heard it.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur Simon Kayser and Mademoiselle Kayser!"—cried the usher.</p> + +<p>Still another name rang out from that clarion voice:</p> + +<p>"Monsieur le Duc de Rosas!"</p> + +<p>Neither Vaudrey nor Adrienne heard this name. Sulpice felt urged to rush +toward Marianne to entreat her to leave. It is true, he had invited her. +In spite <a name="Page_458" id="Page_458"></a>of Jouvenet who knew all, and in spite of so many others who +suspected the truth, she desired to be present at that fête at the +ministry and to show herself to all. Vaudrey had warned her, however. He +had written to her a few hours before, entreating her, nay, almost +commanding, her, not to come, and she was there. She entered, advancing +with head erect, leaning on the arm of her uncle, his white cravat +hidden by his artist's beard and on his lips a disdainful smile.</p> + +<p>Adrienne asked herself whether she was really dreaming now. Approaching +her, she saw, crossing the salon with a queenly step, that lovely, +insolent creature, trailing a long black satin skirt, her superb bosom +imprisoned in a corsage trimmed with jet, and crossed, as it were, with +a blood-red stripe formed by a cordon of roses. Marianne's fawn-colored +head seemed to imperiously defy from afar the pale woman who stood with +her two hands falling at her side as if overwhelmed.</p> + +<p>The vision, for vision it was, approached like one of the nightmares +that haunt people's dreams. Adrienne's first glance encountered the +direct gaze of Marianne's gray eyes. Behind Mademoiselle Kayser came De +Rosas, his ruddy Castilian face that was ordinarily pensive beamed +to-day, but Madame Vaudrey did not perceive him. She saw only this +woman, the woman who was approaching her, in her own house, insolently, +impudently, to defy her after having outraged her, to insult her after +having deceived her!<a name="Page_459" id="Page_459"></a></p> + +<p>Adrienne felt a violent wrath rising within her and suddenly her entire +being seemed longing to bound toward Marianne, to drive her out after +casting her name in her teeth.</p> + +<p>Instinctively she looked around her with the wild glance of a wretched +woman who no longer knows what to do, as if seeking for some assistance +or advice.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey's wan pallor and Lissac's supplicating gesture appealed to her +and at once restored her to herself. It was true! she had no right to +cause a scandal. She was within the walls of the ministry, in a common +salon into which this girl had almost a right to enter, just like so +many others lost in the crowd of guests. For Adrienne, it was not merely +a question of personal vanity or honor that was at stake, but also +Vaudrey's reputation. She felt herself <i>in view</i>, ah! what a word:—in +view, that it to say, she was like an actress to whom neither a false +step nor a false note is permitted; compelled to smile while death was +at her heart, to parade while her entrails were torn with grief, forced +to feign and to wear a mask in the presence of all who were there, and +to lie to all the invited guests, indifferent and inimical, as Ramel +said, and who were looking about ready at any moment to sneer and to +hiss.</p> + +<p>She recovered, by an effort that swelled her heart, strength to show +nothing of the feeling of indignant rebellion that was stifling her.<a name="Page_460" id="Page_460"></a></p> + +<p>She closed her eyes.</p> + +<p>Marianne Kayser passed onward, losing herself with Simon and De Rosas in +the human furrow that opened before her and immediately closed upon her, +and followed by a murmur of admiration.</p> + +<p>Adrienne had not however seen the pale, insolent countenance of the +young woman so closely approach her suffering and disconsolate face. +Above all, she had not seen the jealous, rapid glance that flashed +unconsciously in Vaudrey's eyes when he saw José de Rosas triumphantly +following the imperious Marianne. Ah! that look of sorrowful anger would +have penetrated like a red-hot iron into Adrienne's soul. That glance +that Guy caught a glimpse of told eloquently of wounded love and bruised +vanity on the part of that man who, placed here between these two women, +his mistress and the other, suffered less from the sorrow caused to +Adrienne than from Marianne's treason in deserting him for this +Spaniard.</p> + +<p>Lissac was exasperated. He felt prompted to rush between Marianne and +Rosas and say to him:</p> + +<p>"You are mad to accompany this woman! Mad and ridiculous! She is +deceiving you as she has deceived Vaudrey, as she has deceived me, and +as she will deceive everybody."</p> + +<p>He purposely placed himself in Mademoiselle Kayser's way. She had +appeared scarcely to recognize him and had brushed against him without +apparent emotion, but <a name="Page_461" id="Page_461"></a>with a disdainful pout. Her arm had sought that +of Rosas, as if she now were sure of her duke.</p> + +<p>Guy too, felt that he could not cause a scene at the ball, for this +would have brought a scandal on Vaudrey. He had just before repeated to +Adrienne: "Courage." This was now his own watchword, and yet he sought +out Jouvenet to whisper to the Prefect of Police what he thought of his +conduct. Jouvenet had come and gone. Granet, as if he had divined +Lissac's preoccupation, looked at him sneeringly as he whispered to the +fat Molina who was seated near him:</p> + +<p>"Alkibiades!"</p> + +<p>The soirée, moreover, was terribly wearisome to Lissac. He wandered from +group to group to find some one with whom to exchange ideas but he +hardly found anyone besides Denis Ramel. The same political commonplaces +retailed everywhere, at Madame Gerson's or at Madame Marsy's, as in the +corridors of the Chamber, were re-decocted and reproduced in the corners +of the salon of the Ministry, and around the besieged buffet attacked by +the most ferocious gluttony. <i>Interpellation</i>, <i>Majority</i>, <i>New +Cabinet</i>, <i>Homogeneous</i>, <i>Ministry of the Elections</i>, <i>Ballot</i>, <i>One Man +Ballot</i>. Guy went, weary of the conflict, to the room in which the +concert was given and listened to some operatic piece, or watched +between the heads, the hidden profile of some female singer or an actor +and heard the bursts of laughter that greeted the new monologue <i>The +Telephone</i>, rendered in a clear <a name="Page_462" id="Page_462"></a>voice with the coolness of an English +clown, by a gentleman in a dress coat: <i>See! I am Monsieur Durand—you +know, Durand—of Meaux?—Exactly—A woman deceives me—How did I learn +it?—By the telephone. My friend Durand—Durand—of Etampes—We are not +related—Emile Durand said to me: Durand, why haven't you a +telephone?—It is true, I hadn't one—Durand—the other +Durand—Durand—of Etampes—has one—Then—</i>And Lissac, somewhat +listless, left this corner of the salon and stumbled against a group of +men who surrounded an old gentleman much decorated, wearing the <i>grand +cordon rouge</i> crosswise, a yellow ribbon at his neck, who, with the +gravity of an English statesman, said, thrusting his tongue slightly +forward to secure his false teeth from falling:</p> + +<p>"I like monologues less than chansonnettes!—I, who address you, have +taken lessons from Levassor."</p> + +<p>"Levassor, Your Excellency?" answered in chorus a lot of little +bald-headed young men—diplomats.</p> + +<p>"Levassor," replied the old gentleman who was the very celebrated +ambassador of a great foreign power. "Oh! I was famous in the song: <i>The +Englishman Who Was Seasick</i>!"</p> + +<p>While the little young men smiled, approved and loudly applauded, the +old ambassador to whom the interests of a people were entrusted, hummed +in a low tone, amid the noise of the reception:<a name="Page_463" id="Page_463"></a></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Aoh! aoh! Je suis <i>mélède</i>,<br /></span> +<span>Bien <i>mélède</i>! Très <i>mélède</i>!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Guy de Lissac shrugged his shoulders. He had heard a great deal of this +man. This diplomat of the chansonnette evoked his pity. Where was he +then? At Paris or at Brives-la-Gaillarde? At a ball at the Hôtel Beauvau +or in some provincial sub-prefecture?</p> + +<p>Just before, he had heard Warcolier utter this epic expression:</p> + +<p>"If I were minister, I would give fireworks. They are warlike and +inoffensive at the same time!"</p> + +<p>The voice of a young man with a Russian accent who talked politics in a +corner, pleased him:</p> + +<p>"I am," he said aloud, "from a singular country: the Baltic provinces, +where society is governed by deputies who, by birth, have the right to +make laws, and I consider politics so tiresome, fatiguing and full of +disgust and weariness as an occupation, that one ought to consider one's +self most fortunate that there are people condemned to take hold of this +rancid pie, while others pass their lives in thinking, reading, talking +and loving."</p> + +<p>"That is good," thought Lissac. "There is one, at least, who is not so +stupid. It is true, perhaps because I think just the same."</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, he went and listened, mixing with the crowd, haphazard. +His preoccupation was not there. In reality, he thought only of +Adrienne. How the poor woman must suffer!<a name="Page_464" id="Page_464"></a></p> + +<p>With a feeling of physical and moral overthrow, she had left the +threshold of the salon, where she had been standing since the +commencement of the soirée. She was mixing with the crowd in her desire +to forget her sorrows amid the deafening of the music, the songs, the +laughter, and the murmur of the human billows that filled her salons. +She had taken her place in front of the little improvised theatre, +beside all those ladies who dissected her toilette, scanned her pallid +face, analyzed and examined her piece by piece, body and soul. But +there, seated near the stage, exactly in front of her, exposing, as in a +stall, her blonde beauty, and radiant as a Titian, was that Marianne +whose gleaming white shoulders appeared above her black satin corsage. +Again she saw her, as but a little while before, unavoidable, haughty +and bold, smiling with insolence.</p> + +<p>At every minute she was attracted by a movement of a head, or fan, or a +laugh from this pretty creature, who leaned toward Sabine Marsy, then +raised her brow and showed, in all the brilliancy of fatal beauty, her +black corsage, striped with those fine red roses. And now Adrienne's +anger, the grief that she had trampled under for some hours, increased +from moment to moment, heightened and stung by the sight of this +creature, by all kinds of bitter thoughts and by visions of treason and +baffled love. She felt that she was becoming literally mad at the +thought that, upon those red and painted lips, Sulpice had rested his, +that his hands had stroked those shoul<a name="Page_465" id="Page_465"></a>ders, unwound that hair, that +this woman's body had been folded in his arms. Ah! it was enough to make +her rise and cry out to that creature: "You are a wretch. Get you gone! +Get you gone, I say!"</p> + +<p>And if she did so?</p> + +<p>Why not? Had they the right to scorn her thus in public because she +owned an official title and position? Was not this vulgar salon of a +furnished mansion <i>her</i> salon then?</p> + +<p>Now it seemed to her that they were whispering about her; that they were +sneering behind their fans, and that all these women knew her secret and +her history.</p> + +<p>Why should they not know them? All Paris must have read that mocking, +offensive and singular article: <i>The Mistress of an Archon</i>! All these +people had, perhaps, learned it by heart. There were people here who +frequented the salons and who probably kept the article in their +pockets.</p> + +<p>Yes, that would be to commit a folly, to brave everything and to destroy +all!</p> + +<p>Sulpice, then, did not know her; he believed her to be insignificant +because she was gentle, resigned to everything because she was devoted +to his love and his glory?—Ah! devoted even to the point of killing +herself, devoted to the extent of dying, or living poor, working with +her own hands, if only he loved her, if only he never lied to her!</p> + +<p>"And here was his mistress!"<a name="Page_466" id="Page_466"></a></p> + +<p>His mistress! His mistress!</p> + +<p>She repeated this name with increasing rage, reiterating it, inwardly +digesting it, as if it were something terribly bitter. His mistress, +that lovely, insolent creature! Yes, very lovely, but manifestly +terrible and capable of driving a feeble being like Vaudrey to commit +every folly, nay, worse, infamy.</p> + +<p>"And it is such women that are loved! Ah! Idiots! idiots that we are!"</p> + +<p>The first part of the concert was terminating. Happily, too, for +Adrienne was choking. The minister must, as a matter of politeness, +express his thanks to the cantatrices from the Opéra, and to the +actresses from the Comédie Française, the artistes whose names appeared +on the programme. Vaudrey was obliged to pass the rows of chairs in +order to reach the little salon behind the stage, which served as a +foyer. Adrienne saw him coming to her side, and looking very pale, +though he made an effort to smile. He was uncomfortable and anxious. In +passing before Marianne, he tried to look aside, but Mademoiselle Kayser +stopped him in spite of himself, by slightly extending her foot and +smiling at him, when he turned toward her, with a prolonged, interested +and strange expression.</p> + +<p>Adrienne felt that she was about to faint. She took a few tottering +steps out of the salon, then she stopped as if her head were swimming. +Some one was on hand to support her. She felt that a hand was hold<a name="Page_467" id="Page_467"></a>ing +her arm, she heard some one whisper in her ear:</p> + +<p>"It is too much, is it not?"</p> + +<p>She recognized Lissac's voice.</p> + +<p>Guy looked at her for a moment, quite prepared for this great increase +of suffering.</p> + +<p>"Take me away," she murmured. "I can bear no more!—I can bear no more!"</p> + +<p>She was longing to escape from all that noise, that atmosphere that +lacked air, and from Marianne's look and smile that pierced her. She +went, as if by chance, instinctively guiding Lissac, led by him to a +little, salon far from the reception rooms, and which was reserved for +her and protected by a door guarded by an usher. It might have been +thought that she expected this solitude would be necessary to her as an +escape from the fright of that reception, to which her overstrained and +sick nerves made her a prey.</p> + +<p>In passing, Lissac had whispered to Ramel, who was at his elbow:</p> + +<p>"Tell Sulpice that Madame Vaudrey is ill!"</p> + +<p>"Ill?"</p> + +<p>"You see that she is!"</p> + +<p>When Adrienne was within the little salon hung with garnet silk +draperies, in which the candelabras and sconces were lighted, she sank +into an armchair, entirely exhausted and overwhelmed by the fearful +resistance she had made to her feelings. She remained there <a name="Page_468" id="Page_468"></a>motionless, +her eye fixed, her face pale, and both hands resting on the arms of her +chair, abstractedly looking at the pattern of the carpet.</p> + +<p>Guy stood near, biting his lips as he thought of the madman Vaudrey and +that wretched Marianne.</p> + +<p>"She at least obeys her instincts! But he!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! it is too much; yes, it is too much!" repeated Adrienne, as if +Lissac were again repeating that phrase.</p> + +<p>It seemed to her that she had been thrust into some cowardly situation; +that she had been subjected to a shower of filth! It was hideous, +repugnant. She now saw, in the depths of her life, events that she had +never before seen; her vision had suddenly become clear. Dark details +she could now explain. Vaudrey's falsehoods were suddenly manifested.</p> + +<p>"He lied! Ah! how he had lied!"</p> + +<p>She recalled his anxiety to hide the journals from her, his oft-repeated +suggestions, his precautions, the increasing number of his +night-sessions that made him pale. Pale from debauchery! And she pitied +him! She begged him not to kill himself for the politics that was eating +his life. Again she saw on the lips of her <i>Wednesday's</i> guests the +furtive smiles that were hidden behind muffs when she spoke of those +nocturnal sessions of the Chamber, which were only nights passed in +Marianne's bed! How those Parisians must have laughed at her and +ridiculed the credulity of the woman who believes herself loved, but who +is deceived and mocked at! Ma<a name="Page_469" id="Page_469"></a>dame Gerson, Sabine! How overjoyed they +must have been when, in their salons, they referred to the little, +stupid Provincial who was ignorant of these tricks!</p> + +<p>She felt ridiculed and tortured, more tortured than baffled, for her +vanity was nothing in comparison with her love, her poor, artless and +trusting love!</p> + +<p>"Sulpice, I should never have believed—Never!—"</p> + +<p>Why had they left Grenoble, their little house on the banks of the +Isère? They loved each other there, it was Paris that had snatched him +away! Paris! She hated it now. She hated that reputation that had +carried Vaudrey into office, the politics that had robbed her of a kind +and loving husband,—for he had loved her, she was sure of that,—and +which had made him the lover of a courtesan, the liar and coward that he +was!</p> + +<p>"Do you see?" she said to Lissac suddenly. "I detest these walls!"</p> + +<p>She pointed to the gilded ceilings with an angry gesture.</p> + +<p>"Since I entered here, my life has come to a close!—It is that, that +which has taken him from me!—Ah! this society, this politics, these +meannesses, this life exposed to every one and everything, to temptation +and to fall, I am entirely sick of, I am disgusted with. Let me be +snatched from it, let me be taken away! Everywhere here, one might say, +there is an atmosphere of lying!"</p> + +<p>"Do you hear? She laughs, she is happy! She! And I, ah! I!"<a name="Page_470" id="Page_470"></a></p> + +<p>She had risen to her feet, suddenly recovering all her energy, as if +stirred by the air of a Hungarian dance, whose strains dimly reached +them from the distant, warm salons, where Marianne was disporting her +beauty—</p> + +<p>"Ah! I hate this hôtel, the noise and the women!" said Adrienne. "This +horde ranged about the buffet, this salon turned into a restaurant, the +false salutations, the commonplace protestations,—this society, all +this society, I detest it!—I will have no more of it!—It seems to me +that it all is mocking me, and that its smiles are only for that +courtesan!—But if I had driven her out?—Who brought her?"</p> + +<p>"Her uncle and Monsieur de Rosas!"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur de Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Who marries her!"</p> + +<p>Adrienne nervously uttered a loud, harsh laugh, as painful as if it were +caused by a spasm.</p> + +<p>"Who marries her! Then these creatures are married?—Ah! they are +married—They are honored, too, are they not? And because they are more +easy of approach, they are thought more beautiful and more agreeable +than those who are merely honest wives? Ah! it is too silly!—Rosas! I +took him for a man of sense!—If I were to tell him myself that she is +my husband's mistress, what would the duke answer?"</p> + +<p>"He would not believe you, and you would not do that, madame!" said +Lissac.</p> + +<p>"Why?"<a name="Page_471" id="Page_471"></a></p> + +<p>"Because it would be an act of cowardice, and because you are the best, +the noblest of women!"</p> + +<p>Instinctively he drew near her, lowering his voice, embracing with his +glance that fine, charming beauty, that grief heightened by a burning +brilliancy.</p> + +<p>She raised her fine, clear eyes to Lissac, whose look troubled her, and +said:</p> + +<p>"And how have these served me?—Kindness, trickery!—Trickery, +chastity!—Ask all these men! All of them will go to Mademoiselle Kayser +and not to me!"</p> + +<p>"To you, madame," murmured Guy, "all that there is of devotion and +earnestness, yes, all of the tenderest and the truest will go to you as +respectful homage."</p> + +<p>"Respect?—Yes, respect to us!—And with it goes the home! But to her! +Ah! to her, love! And what if I wish to be loved myself?"</p> + +<p>"Loved by him!" said Lissac in a low tone, as if he did not know what he +said; and his hands instinctively sought Adrienne's. They trembled.</p> + +<p>A woman's perfume and something like the keen odor of flowers assailed +his nostrils. He had never felt the impulse of burning compassion which +at a sign from this saint, would have driven him to attempt the +impossible, to affront the noisy throng yonder.</p> + +<p>"Loved by him, yes, by him!" answered Adrienne, with the mournful shake +of the head of one who sees her joy vanish in the distance like a +sinking bark.<a name="Page_472" id="Page_472"></a></p> + +<p>She had been so happy! She had thought herself so dearly loved! Ah! +those many cowardly lies uttered by Sulpice!</p> + +<p>"Do not speak to me of him!" she suddenly said. "I hate him, too!—I do +more than that! I despise him! I never wish to see him again!—never. +You hear! never!"</p> + +<p>"What will you do?" Lissac asked.</p> + +<p>"I know nothing about it!—I wish to leave! Now, I have no more parading +to make in this ball, I think, I have no longer to receive the guests +whose insulting smiles were like blows! I will go, go!"</p> + +<p>"Adrienne!"</p> + +<p>"Will go at once!"</p> + +<p>She felt no astonishment at hearing the name Adrienne spoken suddenly +and unreflectingly by Guy de Lissac.</p> + +<p>She looked at him with a glance that reached his soul, not knowing what +she said:</p> + +<p>"Leave now! While the ball is in progress. To leave solitude to him, +suddenly—here! And that woman, if he wishes her, and if the other who +is marrying her will yield her to him!"</p> + +<p>She was carried away, her mind wandered, as if unbalanced by her grief, +all her efforts at self-control ending in a relaxation of her strained +nerves.</p> + +<p>"I will leave!—I do not wish to see him again!"</p> + +<p>"Leave to-night?"</p> + +<p>"For Grenoble—I don't know where!—But to fly <a name="Page_473" id="Page_473"></a>from him; ah! yes; to +escape from him! Take me away, Monsieur de Lissac!" she said +distractedly, as she seized his hand. "I should go mad here!"</p> + +<p>She had unconsciously taken refuge, as it were, in the arms of the man +who loved her, and Lissac felt the exquisite grace of the body abandoned +to him, without the woman's reflecting upon it, without loving him, +lost—</p> + +<p>It is quite certain that in her nervous, heart-broken condition, +Adrienne was not considering whether his affection for her sprung from +friendship or from love.</p> + +<p>For a moment this master skeptic, Guy, felt that he was committing the +greatest folly of his life.</p> + +<p>The young woman did not understand; nevertheless, even without love, he +clearly felt that this chasteness and grace, all that there was +exquisitely seductive about her, belonged to him—if he dared—</p> + +<p>"You are feverish, Adrienne," he said, as he took her hands as he would +a child's.</p> + +<p>"I am choking here!—I wish to leave!—take me away!"</p> + +<p>"Nonsense," said Lissac. "What are you thinking about? They are calling +for you, yonder."</p> + +<p>"It is because they call for me that I wish to escape. Don't you see +that I abhor all those people; that I detest them as much as I despise +them? Take me away!"</p> + +<p>Lissac had become very pale. He tried to smile at Adrienne—the heroic +smile of a wounded man undergoing amputation—and he whispered:<a name="Page_474" id="Page_474"></a></p> + +<p>"Don't you know very well, madame, that you would not have taken two +steps in the street, on my arm, before you would become a lost woman?"</p> + +<p>"Well," she said, "what of that, since it is they who are loved!—"</p> + +<p>"No, madame," Guy replied, "I love you. I may say so, because you are a +virtuous woman, and I have no right to take you away, do you understand? +because I love you."</p> + +<p>He, too, had summoned all his strength to impart to his confession, +which he would have expressed with ardor, the cold tone of a phrase.</p> + +<p>But that was enough. Adrienne recoiled before this avowal.</p> + +<p>He loved her. He told her so!</p> + +<p>It is true, she could not leave the mansion on his arm.</p> + +<p>She rested her glance on Lissac and extended her hand to him, saying, as +she felt suddenly recalled to herself:</p> + +<p>"You are an honest man!"</p> + +<p>"According to my moods," said Guy, with a sad smile.</p> + +<p>The door of the little salon opened, and Ramel entered.</p> + +<p>"I have called in a doctor," he said.</p> + +<p>"For me?" asked Adrienne. "Thanks! I am quite strong!"</p> + +<p>Then boldly going to Ramel:<a name="Page_475" id="Page_475"></a></p> + +<p>"Will you have the goodness to take me to Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin, +Monsieur Ramel?"</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because I will not remain one hour longer in a house where my husband +has the right to receive his mistress!—Monsieur de Lissac refuses to +accompany me. Your arm, Ramel!"</p> + +<p>"Madame," Ramel answered gently, "I knew that Monsieur de Lissac was a +man of intelligence. It seems to me that he is a man of heart. You +should remain here for your own sake, for your name's sake, for your +husband's. It is your duty. As to Mademoiselle Kayser, you can return to +the salons, for she has just left with Monsieur de Rosas."</p> + +<p>Adrienne remained for a moment with her sad eyes fixed on Ramel; then +shaking her head:</p> + +<p>"You knew it also? Everybody knew it then, except me?"</p> + +<p>"Well!" said Ramel, a good-natured smile playing in his white mustache, +"now it is necessary to forget."</p> + +<p>"Never!" replied Adrienne.</p> + +<p>Then proudly drawing herself up, she took Denis's arm and without even +glancing in her mirror, she went off toward the salons.</p> + +<p>"Your bouquet, madame," said Lissac, who was still pale and his voice +trembled.</p> + +<p>"True!" said Adrienne.</p> + +<p>She fastened her bouquet of drooping roses to her <a name="Page_476" id="Page_476"></a>corsage and without +daring to look at Lissac again, she re-entered, leaning on Ramel's arm.</p> + +<p>Left alone in the salon, Guy remained a moment to shake his head.</p> + +<p>"Poor, dear creature!" he said. "If I had been young enough not to +understand the position in which her madness placed me, or base enough +to profit by it, what a pretty little preface to a great folly she was +about to commit this evening! Well! this attack of morality will perhaps +count in my favor some day."</p> + +<p>He stooped down and picked up a rose that had fallen from Adrienne's +bouquet to the carpet.</p> + +<p>He smiled as he took up the flower and looked at it.</p> + +<p>"One learns at any age!" he thought, as he put the flower in his coat. +"That, at least, is a love souvenir that they will not send the police +to rob me of."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_VII" id="II_VII"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VII</h3> + + +<p>On rising the following morning, after a feverish night, Sulpice +realized a feeling of absolute moral destruction. It seemed to him that +he had lost a dear being. In that huge, silent hôtel one would have +thought that a corpse was lying. He did not dare to present himself to +Adrienne. He could not tell what to say to her. He went downstairs +slowly, crossing the salons that were still decorated with the now +fading flowers, to reach his <a name="Page_477" id="Page_477"></a>cabinet. The carpet was littered with the +broken leaves of dracænas and petals that had fallen from the azaleas, +and presented the gloomy, forsaken aspect peculiar to the morrow of a +fête. The furniture, stripped of its coverings, offered the faded tint +of old maids at their rising. With heavy head, he sat at his desk and +looked at the piled-up documents with a vague expression. Always the +eternal pile of despatches, optimistic reports, and banal summaries of +the daily press. Nothing new, nothing interesting, all was going well. +This tired world had no history.</p> + +<p>The minister still remained there, absorbed as after an unhealthy +insomnia, when Warcolier entered, ever serious, with his splendid, +redundant phrases and his usual attitude of a pedantic rhetor. He came +to inform the minister that a matter of importance, perhaps of a +troublesome nature, loomed on the horizon. Granet was preparing an +interpellation. Oh! upon a matter without any real importance. An affair +of a procession that had taken place at Tarbes, accompanied by some +little disturbance. It was only a pretext, but it was sufficient, +perhaps, to rally a majority around the <i>minister of to-morrow</i>. Old +Henri de Prangins, with his eye on a portfolio, and always thirsting for +power, was keeping Granet company: the man who would never be a minister +with the man who was sure to be.</p> + +<p>"Well, what has this to do with me?" asked Vaudrey indifferently.<a name="Page_478" id="Page_478"></a></p> + +<p>Granet! Prangins! He was thinking of a very different matter. Adrienne +knew all and Marianne deceived him. She was to marry Rosas.</p> + +<p>The very serious Warcolier manifested much surprise at the little energy +displayed by Monsieur le Ministre. He expected to see him bound, in +order to rebound, as he said, believing himself witty. Was Vaudrey +himself giving up the game? Was Granet then sure of the game? He +surmised it and had already taken the necessary measures in that +direction. But surely if Granet were the rising sun, Vaudrey was himself +abandoning his character of the setting sun. He was not setting, he was +falling. A sovereign contempt for this man entered Warcolier's lofty +soul, Warcolier the friend of success.</p> + +<p>"Then you do not understand, Monsieur le Président?"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey drew himself up with a sudden movement that was frequent with +him. He struck the table on which his open portfolio rested, and said:</p> + +<p>"I understand that Granet wants that portfolio! Well, be it so! I set +little store by it, but he does not have it yet!"</p> + +<p>"That is something like it! It is worthy of a brave man to show a +resolute front to his enemies! It is in battle that talent is +retempered, as formerly in the Styx were tempered—"</p> + +<p>"I know," said Sulpice.<a name="Page_479" id="Page_479"></a></p> + +<p>Warcolier's intelligent smile was not understood by the minister.</p> + +<p>Sulpice, who was in despair over his shattered domestic joys, had no +wish to enter on a struggle except to bring about a reaction on himself. +To hold his own against Granet, was to divert his own present sadness.</p> + +<p>"All right," he said to Warcolier. "Let Granet interpellate us when he +pleases—In eight days, to-morrow, yes, to-day even, I am ready!"</p> + +<p>"Interpellate <i>us</i>!" thought Warcolier. "You should say, interpellate +<i>you</i>."</p> + +<p>He had already got out of the scrape himself.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey debated with himself as to whether he would try to see Adrienne. +No? What should he say to her? It would be better to let a little time +shed its balm upon the wound. Then, too, if he wished to bar the way to +Granet, he had not too much time before him. The shrewd person should +act promptly.</p> + +<p>"I shall see him on the Budget Committee!" thought Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>He found it necessary now to force an interest in the struggle which a +few months before would have found him eagerly panting to enter on. The +honeymoon of his love of power had passed. He had too keenly felt, one +after another, the discouragements of the office that he sought in order +to <i>do good</i>, to reform, to act, in the pursuit of which he found +himself, from the first moment, <a name="Page_480" id="Page_480"></a>clashing with routine, old-fashioned +ideas, petty ambitions, the general welfare, all the brood of selfish +interests. It had been his to dream a sort of Chimera bearing the +country toward Progress on outstretched wings: he found himself +entangled in the musty mechanism of a worn-out and rancid-smelling +engine, that dragged the State as a broken-winded horse might have done. +Then, little by little, weariness and disgust had penetrated the heart +of this visionary who desired to live, to assert himself in putting an +end to so many abuses, and whom his colleagues, his chiefs of division, +his chief of service, the chief of the State himself cautiously advised: +"Make no innovations! Let things go! That has gone on so for so long! +What is the use of changing? It will still do very well!"</p> + +<p>Ah! it was to throw off the shackles and to try the impossible! Vaudrey +found himself hemmed in between his dearest hopes and the most +disheartening realities. He was asked for offices, not reforms. The men +charged with the fate of the country were not straggling after progress, +they were looking after their own interests, their landed and +shopkeeping interests. He felt nauseated by all this. He held those +deputies in contempt who besieged his cabinet and filled his antechamber +in order to beg, claim and demand. All of them sought something, and +they were almost strangled by the solicitations of their own +constituents. They appeared to Sulpice to be rather the commissionaires +of universal suffrage <a name="Page_481" id="Page_481"></a>than the servants. This abasement before the +manipulators of the votes made Vaudrey indignant. He felt that France +was becoming by degrees a vast market for favors, a nation in which +everyone asked office from those who to keep their own promised +everything, and the thought filled him with terror. The ministers, +wedded to their positions, became the mere servants of the deputies, +while the latter obeyed the orders of their constituents. All was kept +within a vast network of office-seeking and trafficking. And with it +all, a hatred of genuine talent, bitter selfishness and the crushing +narrowness of ideas!</p> + +<p>Vaudrey recalled a story that had been told him, how during the Empire, +the Emperor, terrified, feeling himself isolated, asked and searched for +a man, and how a certain little bell in the Tuileries was especially +provided to warn the chamberlains of the entry into the château of a new +face, of the visit of a stranger, in order that the camarilla, warned by +the particular ring, would have time to place themselves on their guard, +and to send the newcomer to the right about if he might become an aid to +the master and a danger to the servants. Well! Sulpice did not hear that +invisible and secret bell, but he guessed its presence, he divined its +presence around him, warning the interested, always ready to chase away +the stranger; he felt that its secret thread was everywhere thrown +around the powerful, the mighty of four days or a quarter of a century +and that, so long as influence <a name="Page_482" id="Page_482"></a>existed in the world, there would be +courtiers and that these courtiers, eager for a crumb, would prevent the +stranger, that is to say, truth, from reaching the light, fearing that +this stranger might play the part of the lion and chase the flies away +from the honeycomb.</p> + +<p>Thus, how much nausea and contempt he felt for that transient power +which in spite of himself was rendered useless! A power that placed him +at the mercy of the bawling of a colleague or an enemy, and even at the +mercy of that all-powerful master so readily dissatisfied: everybody. He +had seen, at too close quarters, the vile intrigues, the depressing +chafferings, the grinding of that political kitchen in which so many +people,—this Warcolier with his voluble rhetoric, this Granet with his +conceited smile of superiority,—were hungering to hold the handle of +the saucepan. He recalled a remark that Denis Ramel had often repeated +to him: "What is the use of putting one's self out in order to bask in +the sunshine? The best are in the shade."</p> + +<p>He was seized with lawful indignation against his own ambitions, against +the lack of energy that prevented him from sweeping away all +obstacles,—men, and routine,—and he recalled with afflicting +bitterness his entry on public life, in the blaze of divine light, and +his dreams, his poor noble dreams! "A great minister! I will be a great +minister!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! yes, indeed! one is a minister, that is all! And that is enough! It +is often too much! We shall <a name="Page_483" id="Page_483"></a>see indeed what he will do, that Granet who +ought to do so much!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey laughed nervously.</p> + +<p>"What he will do? Nothing! Nothing! Still nothing! That is very easy! To +do anything, one should be a great man and not a politician captivated +with the idea of reaching the summit of power. Ah! <i>parbleu!</i> to be a +great man! 'That is the question.'"</p> + +<p>He grew very excited over the proud rebellion of his old faith and +shattered hopes against the negative success he had obtained. Besides, +there was no reason for giving up the struggle. There was a council to +be held at the <a name="typo_6" id="typo_6"></a>Élysée. He went there, but at this moment of disgust, +disgust of everything and himself, this palace like all the rest, seemed +to him to be gloomy and mean. An usher in black coat and white cravat, +wearing a chain around his neck, wandered up and down the antechamber, +according to custom, his shoes covered with the dust from the carpet +trodden upon by so many people, either applicants or functionaries. The +gaslight burning in broad day as in the offices in London was reflected +on the cold walls that shone like marble. Doors ornamented with gilt +nails and round, ivory knobs and without locks, were noiselessly +swinging to and fro. Wearied office-seekers with tired countenances were +spread out upon the garnet-colored velvet chairs, which were like those +of a middle-class, furnished house.</p> + +<p>From time to time, the tiresome silence was broken <a name="Page_484" id="Page_484"></a>by the sound of near +or distant electric bells. Vaudrey, who arrived before his colleagues, +studiously contemplated the surroundings ironically. An estafette, a +gendarme, arrived with a telegram; the usher signed a receipt for it. +That was all the life that animated this silent palace. A man with a +military air, tall, handsome and in tightly-buttoned frock-coat, passed +and saluted the President of the Council; then, Jouvenet, the Prefect of +Police, looking like a notary's senior clerk, his abundant black hair +plastered on his head, a large, black portfolio under his arm, +approached the minister and bowed. Vaudrey, having Lissac in mind, +returned his salutation coldly.</p> + +<p>"I will speak to you presently, Monsieur le Préfet."</p> + +<p>"Good! Monsieur le Ministre!"</p> + +<p>In spite of the foot-soldier and the Parisian guard on duty at the door +of the palace, all that now seemed to Vaudrey to lack official +solemnity, and resembled rather a temporary and melancholy occupation.</p> + +<p>"Bah! And if I should never set my foot in this place again," he +thought, as he remembered Granet's interpellation, "what would it matter +to me?"</p> + +<p>He was informed first at the Council and then at the Chamber, that +Granet would not introduce his question until the next day. Vaudrey had +the desired time to prepare himself. In the Budget Committee, where he +met Granet, the <i>minister of to-morrow</i> asked him an inopportune +question concerning the expenses of the ad<a name="Page_485" id="Page_485"></a>ministration. Vaudrey was +angered and felt inclined to treat it as a personal question. It now +only remained for his adversaries to begin to suspect him! To appear so +was even now too much. Sulpice took Granet up promptly, the latter +assured him that "his colleague and friend, the President of the +Council," had entirely misconstrued the meaning of his words.</p> + +<p>"Well and good!" said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>He was not sorry that the interpellation was not to take place at once. +Before to-morrow, he would have placed his batteries. And then he would +think of quieting Adrienne, of regaining her, perhaps. On returning to +the ministry, he caused some inquiries to be made as to whether Madame +were not sick. Madame had gone out. She had gone out as if she were +making a pilgrimage to a cemetery, to the apartment in Rue de la +Chaussée-d'Antin, whereon might have been written: <i>Here lies</i>. It was +like the tomb of her happiness.</p> + +<p>She would not see Sulpice again. In the evening, however, she consented +to speak to him.</p> + +<p>Her poor, gentle face was extremely pale, and as if distorted by some +violent pain.</p> + +<p>"You will find some excuse," she said, "for announcing that I am ill. I +am leaving for Grenoble. I have written to my uncle, the Doctor expects +me, and all that now remains to me is a place in his house."</p> + +<p>"Adrienne!" murmured Sulpice.</p> + +<p>She closed her eyes, for this suppliant voice doubtless <a name="Page_486" id="Page_486"></a>caused her a +new grief, but neither gesture nor word escaped her. She was like a +walking automaton. Even her eyes expressed neither reproach nor anger, +they seemed dim.</p> + +<p>There was something of death in her aspect.</p> + +<p>After a few moments, she said: "I hope that my resolve will not work any +prejudice to your political position. In that direction I will still do +my duty to the full extent of my strength. But people will not trouble +themselves to inquire whether I am at Grenoble or Paris. They trouble +themselves very little about me."</p> + +<p>By a gesture, he sought to retain her. She had already entered her room, +and Vaudrey felt that between this woman and him there stood something +like a wall. He had now only to love Marianne.</p> + +<p>To love Marianne, ah! yes, the unhappy man, he still loved her. When he +thought of Marianne, it was more in wrath, when he thought of Adrienne, +it was more in pity; but, certainly, his wife's determination to leave +Paris caused him less emotion than the thought that his mistress was to +wed Rosas.</p> + +<p>That very evening he went to Marianne's.</p> + +<p>They told him that Madame was at the theatre. Where? With whom? Neither +Jean nor Justine knew.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey despised himself for jealously questioning the servants who, +when together, would burst with laughter in speaking of him.</p> + +<p>"Oh! miserable fool!" he said to himself. "There was only one woman who +loved you:—Adrienne!"<a name="Page_487" id="Page_487"></a></p> + +<p>Nevertheless, he recalled Marianne in the hours of past love, and the +recollection of her kisses and sobs still made his flesh creep. The +tawny tints that played in her hair as it strayed unfastened over the +pillow, the endearing caresses of her bare arms, he wished to see and +feel again. He calculated in his ferocious egotism that Adrienne's wrath +would afford him more complete liberty for a time, and that he would +have Marianne more to himself, if she were willing.</p> + +<p>He had written to Mademoiselle Kayser, but his letter had remained +unanswered. He thought that he would go to Mademoiselle Vanda's house +the next day, after the Chamber was up. Very late, he added, since the +sitting would be prolonged. Long and decisive, as the fate of his +ministry was at stake.</p> + +<p>Granet's interpellation did not make him unusually uneasy. He had +acquainted himself in the morning with a résumé of the journals. Public +opinion seemed favorable to the Vaudrey ministry, <i>except in the case of +some insufferable radical organs, and with which he need not in anyway +concern himself</i>, read the report. Vaudrey did not remember that it was +in almost these very terms that the daily résumé of the press expressed +itself on the eve of Pichereau's fall, to the Minister of the Interior, +in speaking of Pichereau's cabinet.</p> + +<p>"I shall have a majority of sixty votes," he said to himself. +"Everything will be carried—save honor!"<a name="Page_488" id="Page_488"></a></p> + +<p>He thought of Adrienne as he thus wished.</p> + +<p>The session of the Chamber was to furnish him the most cruel deception. +Granet had most skilfully prepared his plan of attack. Vaudrey's +ministry was threatened on all sides by lines of approach laid out +without Sulpice's knowledge. Granet had promised, here and there, new +situations, or had undertaken to confirm the old. He came to the assault +of the ministry with a compact battalion of clients entirely devoted to +his fortunes, which were their own. They did not reproach Vaudrey too +strongly with anything, unless it was that these impatient ones +considered that he had given away all that he had to give, prefectures, +sub-prefectures, councillors' appointments, crosses of the Legion of +Honor, and especially for having lasted too long. Vaudrey would fall +less because he had forfeited esteem than because others were impatient +to succeed him. Granet was tired of being only the <i>minister of +to-morrow</i>, he wished to have his day. He had just affirmed his policy, +he asserted that the whole country, weary of Vaudrey's compromises, +demanded a more homogeneous ministry. Homogeneity! Nothing could be said +against such a word. Granet favored the policy of homogeneity. This +vocable comprehended his entire programme. The Vaudrey Cabinet lacked +homogeneity! The President of the Republic decidedly ought to form a +homogeneous cabinet.</p> + +<p>"Granet is then homogeneous?" said Sulpice, with a <a name="Page_489" id="Page_489"></a>forced laugh, as he +sat on the ministerial bench while Lucien Granet was speaking from the +tribune, his right hand thrust into his frock-coat.</p> + +<p>The <i>bon mot</i> uttered by the President of the Council, although spoken +loudly enough, did not enliven any one, neither his colleagues who felt +themselves threatened nor his usual <i>claqueurs</i> who felt themselves +vanquished. Navarrot, the ministerial claqueur, was already applauding +Granet most enthusiastically. <i>Monsieur le Ministre</i> felt himself about +to become an ex-minister. He vaguely felt as if he were in the vacuum of +an air-pump.</p> + +<p>The order of the day of distrust, smoothed over by Granet with the +formulas of perfidious politeness—castor-oil in orange-juice, as +Sulpice himself called it, trying to pluck up courage and wit in the +face of misfortune,—that order of the day that the Vaudrey Cabinet +would not accept, was adopted by a considerable majority: one hundred +and twenty-two votes.</p> + +<p>For Sulpice, it was a crushing defeat.</p> + +<p>"One hundred and twenty-two deputies," he said, still speaking in a loud +voice in the corridors, "to whom I have refused the appointment of some +mayor or the removal of some rural guard!"</p> + +<p>Warcolier, ever dignified, remarked in his usual style, that this manner +of defending himself probably lacked some of that nobility which becomes +a defeat bravely endured.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had only one course open, to send in his <a name="Page_490" id="Page_490"></a>resignation. He was +beaten, thoroughly beaten. He returned to the Hôtel Beauvau and after +preparing his letter he took it himself to the President at the <a name="typo_7" id="typo_7"></a>Élysée.</p> + +<p>The President accepted it without betraying any feeling, as an employé +at the registry office receives any deed of declaration. Two or three +commonplace expressions of regret, a diplomatic shake of the hand, +expressive of official sympathy, that was all. Vaudrey returned to the +ministry and ordered his servants to prepare everything for leaving the +ministerial mansion.</p> + +<p>"When is that to be, Monsieur le Ministre?"</p> + +<p>"To-morrow," answered Vaudrey, to whom the title seemed ironical and +grated on his nerves.</p> + +<p>He caused himself to be announced to Adrienne.</p> + +<p>Adrienne, weary looking, was seated before a small desk writing, and +beneath her fair hair, her face still looked as white as that of a +corpse.</p> + +<p>"There is some news," Vaudrey said to her abruptly. "I am no longer +minister!"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" she said.</p> + +<p>Not a tremor, not a word of consolation. Three days previously, she +would have leaped to his neck and said: "How happy we shall be! I have +you back; I have found you again! What joy!"</p> + +<p>Again, she would have tried to console him had he been suffering.</p> + +<p>Now, she remained passive, frozen, indifferent to that news.<a name="Page_491" id="Page_491"></a></p> + +<p>"We shall leave the Hôtel Beauvau!" said Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"I am already preparing to leave," she replied. "My trunks are packed."</p> + +<p>"Will you do me the kindness of leaving here with me and of going back +to Rue de la Chaussée-d'Antin with me?—After that, you can set out at +once for Grenoble. But let us have no sign of scandal. The world must be +considered."</p> + +<p>She had listened to him coldly, unmoved by his trembling voice.</p> + +<p>"That is proper," she said ironically. "The world must be thought of. I +will wait then before leaving."</p> + +<p>He was stupefied to find so much coldness and so unswerving a +determination in this woman, as gentle as a child—my <i>wife-child</i>, he +so frequently said to her of old. In her presence he felt ill at ease, +discontented, hesitating whether he should throw himself at her feet and +wring pardon from her, or fly from her and be with Marianne, perhaps +forever. But no, it was Adrienne, his poor, his dear Adrienne that he +would keep and love! Ah! if she pardoned him! If he had dared to kneel +at her feet, to plead and to weep! But this living corpse froze him, he +was afraid of her, of that gentle and devoted creature.</p> + +<p>He went downstairs again, saying to himself that he would take a hurried +dinner and then go to Rue Prony.</p> + +<p>He was, however, obliged to occupy himself in despatching the last +current business. He must hand <a name="Page_492" id="Page_492"></a>over his official duties to his +successor. There was a mocking expression in these words: <i>his +successor!</i></p> + +<p>"After all, he will have one also!"</p> + +<p>He still had unexpected heartbreakings to experience. People to whom he +had promised appointments and decorations came, almost breathless, +suddenly stirred by the news, to entreat him to sign the nominations and +to prepare the decrees while he was <i>still</i> minister. The ravens were +about the corpse. <i>Monsieur Eugène</i>, still bowing low, although not +quite so low as heretofore, endeavored to dismember Vaudrey the +Minister. He wanted a little piece, only one piece! A sub-prefecture of +the third class!</p> + +<p>He had already been informed at the <a name="typo_8" id="typo_8"></a>Élysée that Granet was to be his +successor. <i>Parbleu!</i> he expected it! But the realization of his fears +annoyed him. And who would Granet keep for his Secretary of State? +Warcolier, yes Warcolier, with the promise of giving him the first +vacant portfolio.</p> + +<p>"How correct was Ramel's judgment?" thought Sulpice.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey, with a sort of rage urging him, immediately set himself about a +task as mournful as a funeral: packing up. It now seemed to him that he +had just suffered a total overthrow. Books and papers were being packed +in baskets. Before he was certain of his fall, he thought it was +delightful to escape from so much daily bother, but now he felt as if he +were being discrowned and <a name="Page_493" id="Page_493"></a>ruined. Ruin! It truly threatened him indeed +and held him by the throat. He had realized on many pieces of property +within the past year for Marianne!</p> + +<p>Adrienne, on the contrary, left this great cold hôtel of Place Beauvau, +as if she were leaving a prison, with a comforting sense of deliverance. +A bad dream was ended. She could lay down her official mask, weep at +ease, complain at will, fly to that Dauphiny where her youth was left. +She would leave to-morrow. Doctor Reboux awaited her in ignorance.</p> + +<p>After having given his first orders and arranged his most important +documents, Sulpice went out to walk to Marianne's. At first he wandered +along mechanically without realizing that he was going toward the quays, +almost fearing the interview with his mistress, now that he was only a +defeated man. He had nearly reached the Seine before he was aware of it. +He looked at his watch.</p> + +<p>Eleven o'clock.</p> + +<p>Marianne had been awaiting him for some time.</p> + +<p>He now followed, with the slow march of persons oppressed with a sense +of weariness, these deserted quays, that terrace on the bank of the +river, whose balustrades permitted glimpses of the silhouettes of +slender trees. He met no one. Upon the Place de la Concorde, still wet +with the scarce dried rain of this November night, as mild as an evening +in spring, permeated by a warm mist, he looked for a moment at the +Palace of the Corps<a name="Page_494" id="Page_494"></a> Législatif, gloomy-looking and outlining its roofs +against the misty sky, whose gleams fell on the horizon with a bluish +tint, while upon the broad sidewalks, the jets of gas magnified the +reddened reflections with their own ruddy hues. Along the grand avenue +of the <a name="typo_9" id="typo_9"></a>Champs-Élysées there were only two immense parallel rows of +gas-lamps and here and there, moving, luminous points that looked like +glow-worms. Vaudrey mechanically stopped a moment to contemplate the +scene.</p> + +<p>That did not interest him, but something within him controlled him. He +continued to walk unwittingly in the direction of Parc Monceau. The +solitude of the <a name="typo_10" id="typo_10"></a>Champs-Élysées pleased him. While passing before an +important club with its windows lighted, he instinctively shuddered. +Through the lace-like branches of the trees, he looked at the green +shades, the lustres, the unpolished sconces, with the backgrounds of red +and gold hangings, and the great, gold frames, and he imagined that they +were discussing the causes of his defeat and the success of Granet.</p> + +<p>"They are speaking of me, in there! They are talking about my fall! He +is fallen! Fallen! Beaten!—They are laughing, they are making jokes! +There are some there who yesterday were asking me for places."</p> + +<p>He continued on his way without quickening his pace; the deserted café +concerts, as melancholy-looking as empty stages, the wreaths of +suspended pearl-like lamps <a name="Page_495" id="Page_495"></a>illuminated during the summer months but now +colorless, seemed ironical amid the clumps of bare trees as gloomy as +cemetery yews, exhaling a sinister, forsaken spirit as if this solitude +were full of extinct songs, defunct graces, phantoms, and last year's +mirth. And Vaudrey felt a strangely delicious sensation even in his +bitterness at this impression of solitude, as if he might have been +lost, forgotten forever, in the very emptiness of this silent corner.</p> + +<p>Going on, he passed before the Élysée.</p> + +<p>A <i>sergent de ville</i> who was slowly pacing up and down in front of an +empty sentry-box, his two hands ensconced in the sleeves of his coat, +the hood of which he had turned up, cast a sidelong glance at him, +almost suspiciously, as if wondering what a prowler could want to do +there, at such an hour.</p> + +<p>"He does not know whom he has looked at," he said. "And yesterday, only +yesterday, he would have saluted me subserviently!"</p> + +<p>The windows of the Élysée facing the street were still lighted up and +Vaudrey thought that shadows were moving behind the white curtains.</p> + +<p>"The President has not yet retired! He has probably received Granet! And +Warcolier!—Warcolier!"</p> + +<p>Before the large door opening on Faubourg Saint-Honoré, four lamps were +burning over the head of a Parisian guard on duty, with his musket on +his shoulder, the light shining on the leather of his shako. Some +<a name="Page_496" id="Page_496"></a>weary-looking guardians of the peace were chatting together. At the end +of the court before the perron, a small, red carpet was laid upon the +steps and in front of the marquee faint lights gleamed. Vaudrey recalled +that joyous morning when he entered there, arriving and descending from +his carriage with his portfolio under his arm.</p> + +<p>He hurried his steps and found himself on Place Beauvau. His glance was +attracted by the grille, the hôtel, the grand court at the end of the +avenue. Sulpice experienced a feeling of sudden anger as he passed in +front of the Ministry of the Interior whose high grille, now closed, he +had many times passed through, leaning back in his coupé. He pictured +himself entering there, where he would never again return except as a +place-seeker like those eternal beggars who blocked its antechambers. He +still heard the cry of the lackey when the coachman crushed the sand of +the courtyard under the wheels of the carriage: "Monsieur le Ministre's +carriage!"—He went upstairs, the lackeys saluted him, the coupé rolled +off toward the Bois.</p> + +<p>Now, here in that vulgar mansion another was displaying himself, seated +on the same seats, eating at the same table, sleeping in the same bed +and giving his orders to the same servants. He experienced a strange +sensation, as of a theft, of some undue influence, of suffering an +ejectment by a stranger from some personal property, and this Granet, +the man sent there as he had <a name="Page_497" id="Page_497"></a>been, by a vote, seemed to him to be a +smart fellow, a filibuster and an intruder.</p> + +<p>"How one becomes accustomed to thinking one's self at home everywhere!" +thought Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>He partially forgot the keen wound given to his self-love by the time +that he found himself close to Parc Monceau approaching Rue Prony. In +Marianne's windows the lights were shining. To see that woman and hold +her again in his arms, overjoyed, that happiness would console him for +all his mortifications. Marianne's love was worth a hundred times more +than the delights of power.</p> + +<p>Marianne Kayser was evidently waiting for Sulpice. She received him in +her little, brilliantly-lighted salon, superb amid these lights, in a +red satin robe de chambre that lent a strange seductiveness to her bare +arms and neck which shone with a pale and pearly lustre beneath the +light.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt infinitely moved, almost painfully though deliciously +stirred, as he always did when in the presence of this lovely creature.</p> + +<p>She extended her hand to him, saying in a singular tone that astonished +him:</p> + +<p>"<i>Bonjour, vous!</i>"</p> + +<p>"Well!" she said at once, pointing to a journal which was lying on the +carpet, "is there anything new?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said. "But what is that to me? I don't think of that when I am +near you!"<a name="Page_498" id="Page_498"></a></p> + +<p>"Oh! besides, my dear," Marianne continued, "your darling sin has not +been to think of two things at one time! I don't understand anything of +politics, it bothers me. I have been advised, however, that you have +been thrashed by that Granet!"</p> + +<p>"Thrashed, yes," said Sulpice, laughing, "you use peculiar phrases!—"</p> + +<p>"Topical ones. I am of the times! But it appears that one must read the +journals to learn about you. I am going to tell you some news however, +before it appears in print."</p> + +<p>"That interests me?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps, but it most assuredly interests me!"</p> + +<p>"Important news?" asked Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"Important or great, as you will!"</p> + +<p>He nibbled his blond moustache nervously.</p> + +<p>Guy had not deceived him.</p> + +<p>"Then I think I know your news, my dear Marianne!"</p> + +<p>"Tell me!" she said, as she stretched herself on a divan, her arms +crossed, looking ravishingly lovely in her red gown.</p> + +<p>He sought some forcible phrase that would crush her, but he could find +none. His only desire was to take that fair face in his hands and to +fasten his lips thereon.</p> + +<p>Marianne smiled maliciously.</p> + +<p>"It is true then," Vaudrey exclaimed, "that you love Monsieur de +Rosas?"<a name="Page_499" id="Page_499"></a></p> + +<p>"There, you are well-informed! It is strange! Perhaps that is because +you are no longer a minister!"</p> + +<p>"You love Rosas?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I am marrying him. I have the honor to announce to you my +marriage to Monsieur le Duc José de Rosas, Marquis de Fuentecarral. It +surprises me, but it is so!—I have known days when I have not had six +sous to take the omnibus, and now I am to be a duchess! This does not +seem to please you? Are you selfish, then?"</p> + +<p>Stretched on her divan, her neck and arms sparkling under the light of +the sconces, she appeared to make sport of Vaudrey's stupefaction as he +looked at her almost with fright.</p> + +<p>"Now, my dear," she said curtly, but politely, as she toyed with a ring +on her finger, "this is why I desired to see you to-day. It is to tell +you that if you care to remain friendly on terms that forbid sensual +enjoyment, which is not objectionable in putting a lock on the past, you +may visit the Duchesse de Rosas just as you have Mademoiselle Kayser. +But if you are bent on finding in the Duchesse de Rosas the good-natured +girl that I have been toward you, and you are quite capable of it, for +you are a sentimental fellow, then it will be useless to even appear to +have ever known each other. I am turning the key on my life. <i>Crac! +Bonsoir</i>, Sulpice!"</p> + +<p>The unhappy man! He had cherished the thought of still visiting his +mistress, but he found there an unlooked-<a name="Page_500" id="Page_500"></a>for being, a new creature, who +was unmistakably determined, in spite of her cunning charm, and she +spoke to him in stupefying, ironical language.</p> + +<p>"You would have me go mad, Marianne?"</p> + +<p>"Why! what an idea! The phrase is decidedly romantic.—You should +dispense with the blue in love as well as the exaggeration in politics."</p> + +<p>"Marianne," Vaudrey said abruptly, "do you know that for your sake I +have destroyed my home and mortally wounded my wife?"</p> + +<p>"Well," she replied, "did I ask you to do so? I pleased you, you pleased +me; that was quite enough. I desire no one's death and if you have +allowed everything to be known, it is because you have acted +indiscreetly or stupidly! But I who do not wish to mortally wound," she +emphasized these words with a smile—"my husband, I expect him to +suspect nothing, know nothing, and as you are incapable of possessing +enough intelligence not to play Antony with him, let us stop here. +Adieu, then, my dear Vaudrey!"</p> + +<p>She extended her hand to him, that soft hand that imparted an electrical +influence when he touched it.</p> + +<p>"Well, what!—You are pouting?"</p> + +<p>"I love you," he replied distractedly. "I love you, you hear, and I wish +to keep you!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! no, no! no roughness," she said with a laugh, as he, taking a seat +near her, tried to draw her to him in his arms.<a name="Page_501" id="Page_501"></a></p> + +<p>"To keep you, although belonging to another," whispered Vaudrey slowly.</p> + +<p>"For whom do you take me?" said Marianne, proudly drawing herself up. +"If I have a husband, I require that he be respected. A man who gives +his name to a woman is clearly entitled to be dealt with truthfully!"</p> + +<p>"Then," stammered Sulpice, "what?—Must we never see each other again?"</p> + +<p>"We shall recognize each other."</p> + +<p>"You drive me away?"</p> + +<p>"As a lover!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! stay," said Vaudrey, as, pale with anger, he walked across the +room, "you are a miserable woman, a courtesan, you understand, a +courtesan!—Guy has told me everything! You gave yourself to Jouvenet to +avenge yourself on Lissac, you made a tool of me and you are making a +sport of Rosas who is marrying you!—What have I not done for you!—I +have ruined myself! yes, ruined myself!"</p> + +<p>"My dear," interrupted Marianne, "see the difference between a gentleman +like Monsieur de Rosas and a little bourgeois like yourself. The duke +might have ruined himself for me but he would never have reproached me. +One never speaks of money to a woman. You are a very honest, domestic +man and you were born to worship your wife! You should stick to her! You +are not made of the stuff of a true-born lover. What you have just told +me is the remark of a loon!"<a name="Page_502" id="Page_502"></a></p> + +<p>"Ah! if I had only known you!"</p> + +<p>"Or anything! But I am better than you, you see. I was better advised +than you. The bill of exchange that you owe to the Dujarrier or to +Gochard,—whichever you like—it inconveniences you, I know!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Vaudrey, "but—"</p> + +<p>"You would not, I think, desire me to pay it with the duke's money, that +Monsieur de Rosas should pay your debts?"</p> + +<p>"Marianne," cried Sulpice, livid with rage.</p> + +<p>"Bless me! you speak to me of money? You chant your ruin to me! The <i>De +Profundis</i> of your money-box, should I know that? I question with myself +as to what it means!—However, knowing you to be financially +embarrassed, I have myself found you help—Yes, I told someone who +understands how to extricate business men, that you were embarrassed!"</p> + +<p>"I?"</p> + +<p>"There is nothing to blush about. I told Molina the <i>Tumbler</i>—You know +him?"</p> + +<p>Did he know him! At that very moment he saw the ruddy gold moon that +represented the banker's face amid all the expanse of his shining flesh. +He trembled as if in the face of temptation.</p> + +<p>"Molina is a man of means," said Marianne. "If you need money, you can +have it there! And now, once more, leave me to my new life! The past is +as if it had <a name="Page_503" id="Page_503"></a>never been!—<i>Bonjour, Bonsoir!</i>—and adieu, go!—Give me +your hand!"</p> + +<p>She smiled so strangely, half lying on the divan, and stretched out her +white hand, which he covered with kisses, murmuring:</p> + +<p>"Well, yes, adieu! Yes, adieu!—But once more—once!—this evening—I +love you so dearly!—Will you?"</p> + +<p>She quietly reached out her bare arm toward a silk bell-rope that she +jerked suddenly and Vaudrey rose enraged and humiliated.</p> + +<p>"Show Monsieur Vaudrey out," Marianne said to Justine, as she appeared +at the door. "Then you may go to bed, my girl!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey left this woman's house in a fit of frenzy. She had just treated +him who had paid for the divan on which she was reclining as a genuine +duchess might have treated a man who had been insolently disrespectful +toward her. He was almost inclined to laugh at it.</p> + +<p>"It is well done! well done for you! Ah! the dolt! To trust a wanton! To +trust Warcolier! To trust everybody! To trust everybody except +Adrienne!—"</p> + +<p>He, mechanically and without thought, resumed the way to Place Beauvau, +forgetting that the ministerial home was no longer his. The porter—who +knows? might not have opened the gate to him. The lackeys would have +driven him off as the girl had done whom he had paid, yes, paid, paid! +For she was a harlot, nothing more!<a name="Page_504" id="Page_504"></a></p> + +<p>Gradually, the thought of that debt swelled by successive bills of +exchange, and almost forgotten during the recent days of feverish +excitement, took possession of his mind, he remembered that it must be +discharged on the first day of December, in five days, and the thought +troubled him like an impending danger. The prospect had often, during +the last few weeks, made him anxious. He saw the months pass, the days +flit with extraordinary rapidity, and the maturity, the inevitable due +date draw near with the mathematical regularity of a clock. So long as +months were ahead he felt no anxiety. Like gamblers he counted on +chance. Besides, he still had some farms in Dauphiny. In short, a word +to his notary and he could speedily get out of danger. Then, too, the +date of payment was far away. He calculated that by economy as to his +personal income and his official salary he could meet the bill to +Gochard, whose very name sometimes made him laugh. But Marianne's +exactions, unforeseen outlays, the eternal <i>leakage</i> of Parisian life +had quite prevented saving, and had dissipated in a thousand little +streams the money that he wished to pay out in a lump in December. He +soon grew alarmed by degrees at the approach of the maturity of the +debt. He had written to his notary at Grenoble, and this old friend had +replied that the farms of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, mortgaged and cut up +one after another, now represented only a ridiculous value, but that +after all, Vaudrey had nothing to be <a name="Page_505" id="Page_505"></a>concerned about, seeing that +Madame Vaudrey's fortune was intact.</p> + +<p>Adrienne's fortune! That then was all that remained to Vaudrey, and that +might be his salvation. A fortune that was not very considerable, but +still solid and creditable. But even if he were strangled by debt, +dunned and driven into a corner, could he pay the debts he had +contracted for his mistress by means of his wife's fortune? He was +disgusted at the thought. It was impossible.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt his head turn under the humiliation of his double defeat, +the loss of parliamentary confidence, and Marianne's insulting laugh, +and urged by the anxiety he felt about the obligation to be met in eight +days, in his bewilderment he thought of writing to Gochard of Rue des +Marais, to ask for time. This Gochard must be a half-usurer. Certain of +being paid, some day, he would perhaps be delighted to renew the bill of +exchange in inordinately swelling the amount. The letter was written and +Vaudrey mailed it himself the following morning.</p> + +<p>That very evening Adrienne was to leave. He endeavored to dissuade her +from her plan. She did not even reply to him. She stood looking at a +crystal vase on the chimney-piece in which were some winter roses, +Christmas roses, fresh and milk-white, that had been sent as a souvenir +from yonder Dauphiny. Her glance rested fixedly on that fair bouquet +that seemed like a bursting cloud of whiteness.<a name="Page_506" id="Page_506"></a></p> + +<p>"Then," said Vaudrey, "it is settled—quite settled—you are going?"</p> + +<p>"I am."</p> + +<p>"In three hours?"</p> + +<p>"In three hours!"</p> + +<p>"I know where those roses were gathered," said Sulpice tenderly. "It was +at the foot of the window where we leaned elbow to elbow and dreamed."</p> + +<p>"Yes," Adrienne answered, in a broken voice whose sound was like that +which might have been given out by the vase had it been struck and +shattered. "We had lovely dreams! The reality has indeed belied them!"</p> + +<p>"Adrienne!" he murmured.</p> + +<p>She made no reply.</p> + +<p>He tried to approach her, feeling ashamed as he thought that he had +similarly wished to approach Marianne.</p> + +<p>She instinctively drew back.</p> + +<p>"You remember," she said coldly, "that one day when we were speaking +about divorce, I told you that there was a very simple way of divorce? +It was never to see each other again, never, to be nothing more to each +other from the day on which confidence should die?—You have deceived +me, it is done. I am a stranger to you! If I were a mother, I should +have duties to fulfil. I would not have failed therein. I would have +endured everything for a son!—Nothing is left to me. I have not even +the joy of caressing a <a name="Page_507" id="Page_507"></a>child that would have consoled me. I am your +widow while you yet live. Well, be it so. You have willed it, there, +then, is divorce!"</p> + +<p>For the third time since Adrienne had learned everything, he tried to +stammer the word <i>pardon</i>. He felt it was useless. This sensitive being +had withdrawn within herself and wrapped herself, as with a cloak, in +all her outraged chastity. He could only humiliate himself without +softening her. All Adrienne's deceived trustfulness and insulted love +strengthened her in her determination never to forgive.</p> + +<p>She would go.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey in despair returned to his study, where the books that had been +sent from the ministry were piled upon the carpet in all the confusion +attending an entry into occupation. The servant at once brought him his +lamp and handed him a package of cards in envelopes,—cards of +condolence as for a death—and a large card, saying: "That gentleman is +here!"</p> + +<p>"Molina!" said Vaudrey, becoming very pale. "Show him in!"</p> + +<p>The fat Salomon entered puffing and smiling, and spread himself out on +an armchair as he said to the former minister:</p> + +<p>"Well, how goes it?—Not too badly crushed, eh?—Bah! what is it after +all to quit office?—Only a means for returning to it, sometimes!"</p> + +<p>"All the same," he said with his cackling laugh <a name="Page_508" id="Page_508"></a>that sounded like the +jingling of a money-bag, "there are too many changes of ministers! They +change them like shirts! It puts me out. I get used to one Excellency +and he is put aside! So it is settled, henceforth I will not say +Excellency save to the usher or an office-boy!"</p> + +<p>He accompanied his clumsy jests with a loud laugh, then, changing his +tone:</p> + +<p>"Come, that is not all. I came to speak of business to you."</p> + +<p>He looked Vaudrey full in the face with his piercing glance, took from +his pocketbook a printed sheet and said in a precise tone:</p> + +<p>"Here is an opportunity where your title of former minister will serve +you better than that of minister. So much is being said of Algeria, its +mines and its fibre. Well, read that!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey took the paper. It was the prospectus, very skilfully drawn, of +a company established to introduce gas into Algeria, almost as far as +the Sahara. They promised the subscribers wonders and miracles: acres +upon acres of land as a bonus. There was a fortune to be made. Meantime, +they would issue six thousand shares of five hundred francs. It was +three millions they were asking from the public. A mere trifle.</p> + +<p>"They might ask ten," said Molina, smiling. "They would give it!"</p> + +<p>"And you wish me to subscribe to your Algerian gas?" asked Vaudrey.<a name="Page_509" id="Page_509"></a></p> + +<p>The fat Molina burst out into loud laughter this time.</p> + +<p>"I? I simply wish to give you the opportunity to make a fortune!"</p> + +<p>"How?"</p> + +<p>"That is one scheme. I will bring you four, five, ten of them! I have +another, the Luxemburg coal. A deposit equal to that of Charleroi. You +have only to allow me to print in the list of directors: Monsieur +Sulpice Vaudrey, former President of the Council."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey looked the fat man squarely in the face.</p> + +<p>"Besides you will be in good company!" said the banker as he read over +the names of deputies, senators, statesmen, coupled with those of +financiers.</p> + +<p>Sulpice knew most of them.</p> + +<p>He despised nearly all of them. It was such that Molina styled <i>good +company!</i></p> + +<p>"And those mines, are you certain they will produce what you promise?"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Salomon, "that is the engineers' matter! Here is the report +of a mining engineer who is perhaps straining after effect and doing a +little puffing up! But one must go with the times! He who ventures +nothing, has nothing. In war, one risks one's skin; in business, one +risks one's money. That is war."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey debated with himself whether he should tear the prospectus in +pieces and throw them in the face of the fat man.</p> + +<p>"My dear Vaudrey," said the <i>Tumbler</i>, "you have a <a name="Page_510" id="Page_510"></a>vein that is +entirely your own. A former minister remains always a former minister. +Well, such a title as that is turned to account. It is quoted, like any +other commodity. You are not rich, that fact proves your honesty, +although in America, and we are Americanizing ourselves devilishly much, +that would only be the measure of your stupidity. You can become rich, I +have the means of making myself agreeable to you and you have the +opportunity of becoming useful to us."</p> + +<p>"In a word, you buy my name?"</p> + +<p>"I hire it from you! Very dearly," said Molina, still laughing.</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Vaudrey, "you did not understand me on the first +occasion that you called on me to speak about money, and when I +questioned with myself whether I should ask you not to call again."</p> + +<p>Molina interrupted him abruptly by rising. He felt that an insult was +about to be uttered. He parried it by anticipating it.</p> + +<p>"Stupidity!" he said. "Here is the prospectus. There are the names of +the directors. You will consider. It has never injured any one to take +advantage of his position. The puritans, in an age of trickery, are +idiots; I say so. What I propose to you surprises you. To place your +name beside that of Monsieur Pichereau or Monsieur Numa de Baranville! +It is as simple as saying good-day. Perhaps you think then that you will +be the only one? They all do it, all those who are ex<a name="Page_511" id="Page_511"></a>travagant and +shrewd. It is a matter of coquetting in these days over a hundred-sou +piece! Come, I will wager that Monsieur Montyon would not mince +matters—especially if he had transferable paper in circulation!"</p> + +<p>"You know that?" said Vaudrey, turning pale.</p> + +<p>"Ah! I know many others in like condition! Come, no false modesty! It is +a matter of business only! I tell you again, I have many other cases. +All this is in order to have the pleasure of offering you certificates +for attendance fees. I will open a credit for you of two hundred +thousand francs, if you wish. We will arrange matters afterwards."</p> + +<p>"I will leave you these declarations of faith!" added Molina, showing +the prospectus of the gas undertaking. "Fear nothing! It is not more +untruthful than the others! It is unnecessary to show me out. <i>A la +revista!</i>"</p> + +<p>He disappeared abruptly, Vaudrey hearing the floor of the hall creak +under this man's hippopotamus feet, and the unhappy Sulpice who had spun +so many, such glorious and grand dreams, dreams of liberty, freedom and +virtue, civic regeneration, reconstructed national morals and character, +the sacredness of the hearth and the education of the conscience; this +Vaudrey, bruised by life, overthrown by his vices, was there under the +soft light of his lamp, looking with staring eye, as a being who wishes +to die contemplates the edge of an <a name="Page_512" id="Page_512"></a>abyss, looking at that printed paper +soliciting subscriptions, beating the big drum of the <i>promoter</i> in +order to entrap the vast and ever-credulous horde.</p> + +<p>His name! To put his name there! The name of Vaudrey that he had dreamed +of reading at the foot of so many noble, eternal and reforming laws, to +inscribe it upon that paper beneath so many cunning names, jugglers, +habitual drainers of the public cash-box. To fall to that! To do that!</p> + +<p>To lend himself?</p> + +<p>To sell himself!</p> + +<p>And why not sell himself? Who would discharge this bill of exchange? The +Gochard paper! The debt of the past! The price of the nights spent with +Marianne! The hundred thousand francs for that girl's kisses!</p> + +<p>Sulpice felt in the weakness increased by a growing fever, that his +self-possession was leaving him. All his ideas clashed confusedly. Amid +the chaos, only one clear idea remained; a hundred and sixty thousand +francs had to be found. Where were they to be found? Yes, where? Through +Molina, who offered him two hundred thousand! This open credit seemed to +him like an opened-up placer in which he had only to dig with his nails. +The cunning and thick voice of the Hebrew banker echoed in Sulpice's +ears: "They all do it!" It was not so difficult to give his name, or to +<i>hire</i> it, as Salomon said. Who the devil would notice it at a time when +indifference passes over scandals as the sea <a name="Page_513" id="Page_513"></a>covers the putrid +substances on the shore and washes them with its very scum?</p> + +<p>"They all do it!"</p> + +<p>No, despite the irony of the handler of money, there are some +consciences that refuse to yield: and then, what then?—Vaudrey had +desired virtue of a different kind and other morals! Ah! how he had +suffered the poison to penetrate him; even to his bones! How Marianne +had deformed and moulded him at her fancy, and he still thought of her +only with unsatisfied longings for her kisses and ardor! Ah! women! +Woman! Yes, indeed, yes, woman was the great source of moral weakness +and inactivity. She used politics in her own way, in destroying +politicians. If he had only left office with head erect and not dragging +the chain-shot of debt! But that bill of exchange! Who would pay that?</p> + +<p>"Eh! Molina, <i>parbleu!</i> Molina! Molina!"</p> + +<p>He was right, too, that triumphant Jew with his insolent good humor. It +is an absurd thing, after all, to be prudish and to thrust away the dish +that is offered you. To be rich is, in fact, quite as good as to be +powerful! Money remains! That is the only real thing in the world! It +would be a fine sight to see a man refuse the opportunity to make a +fortune, and to refuse it—why? For a silly, conscientious scruple. And +after all, business was the very life of modern society. This Molina, +circulating his money, was as useful as many others who circulate +ideas.<a name="Page_514" id="Page_514"></a></p> + +<p>"His Algerian gas is a work of civilization just like any other!"</p> + +<p>Urged by the necessity of escaping from that debt that strangled him +like a running noose, Sulpice gradually arrived at argumentative +sophistries, which were but capitulations to his own probity, cowardly +arrangements with his own conscience. His name? Well, he would turn it +into money since it was worth a gold ingot! The journalist who sells his +thought, the artist who sells his marble, the writer who sells his +experiences and his recollections, equally sell their names and for +money, the flesh of their flesh. Like a living answer and a remorse, he +saw the lean face and white moustache of Ramel, who was seated at the +window, breathing the warm rays of the sun, in the little room on Rue +Boursault, but he answered, speaking aloud:</p> + +<p>"Well, what?—Ramel is a saint, a hero!—But I am no saint. I am a man +and I will live!"</p> + +<p>Somewhat angered, he took the prospectus that Molina had left him and +rereading it again and again, he relapsed into a sitting posture and +with haggard eyes scanned the loud-swelling lines of that commercial +announcement, seeking therein some pretext for accepting. For he would +accept, that was done. Nothing more was to be said, his conscience +yielded. He was inclined to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Still another victim caught and floored by Molina the <i>Tumbler!</i>"<a name="Page_515" id="Page_515"></a></p> + +<p>He remained there, terrified at the prospect of the quasi-association he +had determined on and by his complicity with a jobber of questionable +business.</p> + +<p>With his eye fixed upon this solicitation for capital, wherein were the +words which would formerly have repelled him: <i>joint stock company</i>, +<i>capital stock</i>, <i>public subscription</i>, <i>subscription certificate</i>, and at +the head of which he was about to inscribe his name as one of the +directors, at the foot of a capitulation, as it were, Sulpice had not +seen, standing in the doorway of his half-lighted study, a woman in +travelling costume, who stopped for a moment to look at the unfortunate, +dejected man within the shade of the lamp which made him look more bald +than he was, then advanced gently toward him, coughing slightly—for she +did not dare to call him by his name or touch him with her gloved +hand—to warn him that she was there.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey turned round abruptly, instinctively pushing aside Molina's +prospectus, as if he already felt some shame in holding it in his hands.</p> + +<p>He flushed as he recognized Adrienne.</p> + +<p>The young woman's reserved attitude showed absolute firmness. She came +to say adieu, she was about to leave.</p> + +<p>He had not even the energy to keep her. He was afraid of an unbending +reply that would have been an outrage.</p> + +<p>"Do you intend to become associated with Molina?"<a name="Page_516" id="Page_516"></a> Adrienne asked in a +clear voice, as she looked at Sulpice, who had risen.</p> + +<p>"What! Molina?" he stammered.</p> + +<p>"Yes, oh! he understands business. On leaving, he called on me. He +thought that I had still sufficient influence over you to urge you, as +he says, to make your fortune. He told me that you were in want of +money, and after having been sharp enough to try the husband, he offered +me, as you might give a commission to a courtesan, I do not know what +emerald ornament, if I would advise you to accept his proposals!—That +gentleman does not know the people with whom he is dealing!"</p> + +<p>"Wretch!" said Vaudrey. "He did that?"</p> + +<p>"And I thanked him," Adrienne replied calmly. "I did not know that you +had debts and that, in order to pay them, you had come so near accepting +the patronage of such a man. He told me so and he rendered me and you a +service."</p> + +<p>"Me?"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey snatched up the prospectus of the Algerian gas and angrily tore +it in pieces.</p> + +<p>"We shall probably not see each other again," said Adrienne, in a firm +voice that contrasted strangely with her gentle grace; "but I shall +never forget that I bear your name and that being mine, I will ever +honor it."</p> + +<p>She handed Sulpice a document.</p> + +<p>"Here is a power of attorney to Monsieur Beauvais, <a name="Page_517" id="Page_517"></a>my notary. All that +you need of my dowry to free yourself from liabilities is yours. I do +not wish to know why you have incurred debts, I am anxious only to know +that you have paid them, and my signature provides you with the means to +do so."</p> + +<p>Dejected, his heart burning, and his sobs rising, Sulpice uttered a loud +cry as he rushed toward her:</p> + +<p>"Adrienne!"</p> + +<p>She withdrew her hand slowly while he was trying to seize it.</p> + +<p>"You have nothing to thank me for," she said. "I am a partner, saving, +as I best can, the honor of the house. That association is better than +Molina's."</p> + +<p>"Adieu," she added bitterly.</p> + +<p>"Are you going—? Going away?" asked Sulpice, trying to give to his +entreaty something like an echo of the love of the former days.</p> + +<p>"Whose fault is it?" replied the young woman, in a voice as chilly as +steel.</p> + +<p>She was no longer the Adrienne of old, the little timid provincial with +blushing cheek and trembling gesture. Sorrow, the most terrible of +disillusions, had hardened and, as it were, petrified her. Vaudrey felt +that to ask forgiveness would be in vain. Time only could soften that +poor woman, obstinately unbending in her grief. He needed but to observe +her attitude and cutting tones to fully realize that.</p> + +<p>"It is quite understood," she continued, treating this <a name="Page_518" id="Page_518"></a>question of her +happiness as if she were cutting deep into her flesh and severing the +tenderest fibres of her being, but without trembling,—"it is quite +understood, is it not, that we shall make no scene or scandal? We are +separated neither judicially nor even in appearance. We live apart by +mutual consent, far from each other, without anything being known by +outsiders of this definitive rupture."</p> + +<p>"Adrienne!" Sulpice repeated, "it is impossible, you will not leave!"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she said. "I gave myself and I have taken myself back. Your +entreaties will not now alter my determination. I am eager to leave +Paris. It seems to me that I have regained myself and that I escape from +falsity, lies, and infamy, and from a swarm of insects that crawl over +my body!—I bid you farewell, and farewell it is!"</p> + +<p>"Well, let it be so!" exclaimed Vaudrey. "Go! But if it is a stranger +who leaves me, I will accept nothing from her. Here is the authority. +Will you take it back?"</p> + +<p>"I? No, I will not take it back! If you desire me to be worthy of the +name that you have given me, keep it honored, at least, in the sight of +the world, since to betray a woman, to mock and insult her, is not +dishonoring. I alone have the right to save you from shame. Do not deny +me the privilege that I claim. I do not desire that the man who has been +my husband should <a name="Page_519" id="Page_519"></a>descend to the questionable intrigues of a Molina. +You have outraged me enough, do not impose this last insult on me!"</p> + +<p>"For the last time, adieu!"</p> + +<p>She went out, and he allowed her to disappear, overwhelmed by this +living mourning of a faith. She fled and he allowed her to descend the +stairway, followed by her femme de chambre. She entered the carriage +that was waiting for her below, in Rue Chaussée-d'Antin, but he had not +the courage, hopeless as he was, to follow the carriage whose rumbling +he heard above the noise of the street as it rolled away more quickly +and more heavily than the others, and it seemed to him that its wheels +had crushed his bosom.</p> + +<p>"Ah! what a wretch I have been!" he said as he struck his knee with his +closed fist. "How unhappy I am! Adrienne!"</p> + +<p>He rose abruptly, as if moved by a spring, and bounded toward a window +which he threw wide open to admit the cold wind of this November +evening, and tried to distinguish among the many carriages that rolled +through the brownish mud, with their lighted lamps shining like so many +eyes, to discover, to imagine the carriage that was bearing Adrienne +away. He believed that he recognized it in a vehicle that was threading +its way, loaded with trunks, almost out of sight yonder.</p> + +<p>He leaned upon the window-sill, and like a shipwrecked sailor who sees a +receding ship, he called out, <a name="Page_520" id="Page_520"></a>with a loud cry lost in the tempest of +that bustling and busy street:</p> + +<p>"Adrienne! Adrienne!"</p> + +<p>No reply! The carriage had disappeared in the distance, in the fog.</p> + +<p>For a moment, Sulpice remained there crushed but drawn by the noise of +the street, as if by some whirlpool in the deep sea. Had he been thrown +out and been dashed upon the pavements, he would have been happy. Only a +void seemed about him, and before him that black hollow in which moved +confusedly only strangers who in no way formed part of his life.</p> + +<p>This isolation terrified him. At last, he went downstairs in haste, +threw himself into a carriage and had himself driven to the railway, +intending to see Adrienne again.</p> + +<p>"Quickly! quickly! at your best speed!"</p> + +<p>The driver whipped up his horses and the carriage-windows clattered with +the noise of old iron.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey arrived too late. The train had left twenty minutes before. He +had reflected too long at his window.</p> + +<p>"Besides," he said to himself sadly, "she would not have forgiven me! +She will never forget!"</p> + +<p>Buried in the corner of the coach that took her away, and closing her +eyes, recalling all her past life, so cruelly ironical to-day, Adrienne, +disturbed by the noise and rolling of the train that increased her +feverish condition, <a name="Page_521" id="Page_521"></a>felt her heart swell, and poor, broken creature +that she was, called all her strength to her aid to refrain from +weeping, from crying out in her grief. She was taking away, back to the +country, the half-withered Christmas roses received from Grenoble, and +in the morbid confusion of the ideas that clashed in her poor brain, she +saw once more Lissac's blanched face and heard Guy tell her again: "It +is because you are a virtuous woman that I love you!"</p> + +<p>"A virtuous woman! Does he know how to love as well as the others?" she +murmured, as she thought of Vaudrey whom she would never see again, and +whom she no longer loved.</p> + +<p>"See! I am a widow now, and a widow who will never love anyone, and who +will never marry again."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_VIII" id="II_VIII"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>VIII</h3> + + +<p>Alone in Paris now, a body without a soul, distracted, and the prey of +ennui, with sad and bitter regret for his wasted life, repeating to +himself that Adrienne, far away from him, would never forgive, and was +doubtless, at this moment, saying and saying again to herself in her +solitude at Grenoble, that these politicians, at least, owed her +divorce, Vaudrey, not knowing what to do after a weary day of troubled +rest, mechanically entered the Opéra House to distract his eyes if not +his mind.<a name="Page_522" id="Page_522"></a></p> + +<p>They were rendering <i>Aida</i> that evening, and a débutante had been +announced as a star.</p> + +<p>Sulpice Vaudrey, since Adrienne's departure,—already two weeks!—had +wandered about Paris like a damned soul when he did not attend the +Chamber, where he experienced the discomforts and the weakness of a +fallen man. Weary, disgusted and melancholy, Vaudrey took his seat in +the theatre to kill an evening.</p> + +<p>There was what was called in the language of a Paris editor, a <i>swell +house</i>. In front of the stage there was literally a shower of diamonds +and the boxes were gaily adorned. The <i>fauteuils</i> were occupied by +Parisian glories and foreign celebrities. Not a stall in the +amphitheatre without its <i>celebrity</i>. Chance had placed in this +All-Paris gathering, Madame Sabine Marsy and Madame Gerson, the two +friends who detested each other. The pretty little Madame Gerson +occupied and filled with her prattle, the box of the Prefect of +Police—No. 30, in which Monsieur Jouvenet showed his churchwarden's +profile. She was talking aloud about her salon, her receptions, her +acquaintances. She was eclipsing Madame Marsy with her triumphs. At the +back of the box, Monsieur Gerson was sleeping, overcome by fatigue. +Madame Gerson laughed on observing Sulpice in the orchestra-stalls.</p> + +<p>"See! there is Monsieur Vaudrey! He still looks a little <i>beaten!</i>" she +said.</p> + +<p>And she told her friends, crowded in the box, leaning <a name="Page_523" id="Page_523"></a>over her and +looking at the pretty, plump bosom of this little, well-made brunette, +how Vaudrey was to dine at her house on the very evening when he fell +from power.</p> + +<p>"Of course, he did not come!" she said. "I remember what Madame Marsy +advised me, one day,—she has passed through that in her time: one +should think of the invitations to dinner before dismissing a ministry! +Oh! it is tiresome; think of it!—One invites the Secretary of the +President of the Council to dinner. He is named on the card. He comes. +It is all over; he is no longer Secretary of the President, the +President of the Council is no longer President, there is no longer a +President, perhaps not even a Council; one should be certain of one's +titles and rank before accepting an invitation to dinner!"</p> + +<p>She laughed heartily and loud, and Madame Marsy, who was half dethroned, +fanned herself nervously in her box, or levelled her glass at some one +in the audience, affecting a little disdainful manner toward her fair +neighbor. A friendship turned to acid.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey, looking fatigued and abstracted, sat in his stall during the +entr'acte. He looked unconsciously about the theatre and still felt +surprised at not receiving salutations and bows, as formerly. He felt +that he was becoming a waif. Bah! he consoled himself with the thought +that the human race is thus constructed: everything is in success, he +gets most who offers most. Why then trouble about it?<a name="Page_524" id="Page_524"></a></p> + +<p>His eyes followed the movement of his glass and one after another he saw +Madame Marsy, Jouvenet, Madame Gerson, so many living and exceedingly +taunting recollections, when suddenly Sulpice trembled, shaken by a +keener and almost angry feeling as his glance was directed to a box +against the dark-red of which two faces were boldly outlined: those of +Rosas and Marianne.</p> + +<p>He was excited and unpleasantly piqued.</p> + +<p>There before him he saw, between two large pillars, bearing gigantic, +gilded masts that seemed to mock at him, the woman whom he had adored +and the sight of whom still tore his heart. Pale and dressed in a white +gown, she was leaning toward Rosas in a most adorable attitude, with her +fair hair half-falling on her white shoulders—those shoulders that he +still saw trembling under his kisses, those shoulders on which he might +have pressed his burning lips and his teeth.</p> + +<p>That livid beauty, strangely adorable, with her hair and ears dazzling +with jewels, stood clearly out against the background of the box in +which, like an enormous Cyclopean eye, appeared the round, ground glass +let into the door, forming a nimbus of light around Marianne's brow. +Paler than her, with a sickly but smiling countenance, Rosas showed his +bloodless, pale, Spanish face beside that of Marianne, as tragic looking +as a portrait by Coello. His tired-looking, pensive, thin face was +resting on his hand, which through the opera-glass looked a transparent +hand of wax, on which an enormous <a name="Page_525" id="Page_525"></a>emerald ring flashed under the +gaslight. Monsieur de Rosas did not move.</p> + +<p>She, on the contrary, at times inclined toward him, bringing her mouth +close to the Castilian's ear, standing out against his reddish beard as +if detached therefrom, and she whispered to Rosas words that Vaudrey +surmised, and which caused a spark of feverish delight to lighten up +José's sad eyes. As she leaned back tilting her chair, her satin corsage +below the bust was hidden from Sulpice by the edge of the box and he saw +only her face, neck and white shoulders, and she seemed to him to be +quite naked, the lines of her serpentine body sharply marked by the red +line of the velvet border. And with his greedy glance he continued to +trace the curves of that exquisite torso, the back that he had pressed, +all the being moulded by voluptuousness, that had been his.</p> + +<p>This was the vanishing of his last dream! This love gone, this deception +driven into his heart like a knife, his last faith mocked at, insulted, +and branded with its true name, <i>folly</i>, he felt as if a yawning chasm +had been opened in him. Life was over! He was old now and he had wasted, +yes, wasted his happiness in playing at youth. He had believed himself +loved! Loved! Imbecile that he was!</p> + +<p>He felt himself urged by a strong temptation to go to that box and open +its door and cry out to that man who had not yet given his name to that +woman:<a name="Page_526" id="Page_526"></a></p> + +<p>"You do not know her! She is debauchery and falsehood itself!"</p> + +<p>It seemed to Vaudrey that at times a bearded face, surmounting a white +cravat, appeared behind Rosas and Marianne: the haughty face of Uncle +Simon.</p> + +<p>While the throng of Egyptians filed on the stage, Sulpice endeavored to +turn away his thoughts and remove his glances from that group that +attracted him. He still, however, looked at it, in spite of himself, and +voluntarily wounded his own heart.</p> + +<p>Marianne did not seem to have even noticed him.</p> + +<p>The curtain fell and he wandered into the wings, less to be there than +to escape that irritating sight. In breathing that atmosphere of a +theatre, he experienced a strange sensation that pained and consoled him +at the same time. The scene-shifters were rolling back the illuminating +apparatus pierced with light, and dragged to the rear the huge white +sphinxes and the immense canvas on which the palm-trees were outlined +upon a blue sky. Sulpice felt the cruelly ironical sensation of finding +himself, disheartened and defeated, once more on the very boards where +he had entered the first time, smiling, swelling with joy, saluting and +saluted and hearing on every side the same murmur, sweet as a May +zephyr:</p> + +<p>"Monsieur le Ministre."</p> + +<p>It was the same scene, the same dress-coats upon the same luminous +boards, the same electric rays that fell <a name="Page_527" id="Page_527"></a>around him in the hour of his +accession, creating the same vulgar aureole. Some firemen crossed the +stage slowly and with a wearied expression made their examinations; some +water-carriers were sprinkling the parquet, while others were brushing +away the dust. And as if these common duties interested Sulpice, he +looked on with a vacant expression, as if his thoughts had taken wing.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, in the centre of a group, with his hat on, escorted by bending +men, whose lips expressed flattery, Sulpice recognized Lucien Granet, +who in the dazzling triumph of his new kingdom, crossed and recrossed +the stage, distributing here and there patronizing bows.</p> + +<p>The coarse Molina accompanied the new minister, laughing in a loud tone +like the sound of a well-filled cash-box suddenly shaken.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt just as if he had received a blow full in the chest.</p> + +<p>He recalled his own meeting as a successful man with Pichereau the +beaten one, on these very boards and almost in the same place, and in +order to avoid having to endure the friendly ironical hand-shake that +Pichereau was approaching him to give—the hand-shake formerly given to +Pichereau—he quickly hid himself behind a wing, receiving as he did so, +a blow, accompanied with a: <i>Pardon, monsieur</i>, from a workman who was +pushing along a piece of scenery, and a: <i>What a clumsy fellow!</i> from a +little danseuse, the tip of whose pink slipper he had unwittingly grazed +with his heel.<a name="Page_528" id="Page_528"></a></p> + +<p>He turned to the danseuse to apologize, when he perceived a young girl, +all in pink, whose blue eyes looked frightened and her cheeks reddened +when she recognized Vaudrey. It was Marie Launay, whom he had seen in +the greenroom the previous year, who had not yet scored a <i>success</i>, +while he was <i>retired</i>.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I did not recognize you," she said. "I beg your pardon, Monsieur le +Ministre!"</p> + +<p>He wished to make some reply; but this title used by the young girl, +ignorant of the political change, grated on his heart like the +scratching of a nail and he saw on the other side of the stage, reaching +the house by the communicating door, Lucien Granet, surrounded by his +staff, and followed by the eternal cortége of powerful ones, among whom +Warcolier was talking loudly, and Molina the Tumbler was recognizable by +his enormous paunch and loud laugh.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps Madame Marsy has asked that this Granet be presented to her," +thought Vaudrey as he mockingly recalled how Guy de Lissac ran after him +there in order to conduct him to the fashionable woman's box.</p> + +<p>How long it was since then!</p> + +<p>Sabine Marsy was dethroned. And he!—</p> + +<p>He felt a friendly tap on the shoulder as he was moving away, and +turning around he saw Warcolier who, having seen him in the distance, +doubtless came to him to enjoy the simple pleasure of treating him +patronizingly, he who had so long called him <i>Monsieur le Ministre</i>.<a name="Page_529" id="Page_529"></a></p> + +<p>"Well, my dear Vaudrey, what is the news?" said Warcolier, bearing his +head high and smiling with a silly, but an aggressively benign +expression, with the superior tone of satisfied fools.</p> + +<p>"Nothing!" said Sulpice. "I think Verdi's music is superb!"</p> + +<p>"Oh! a little Wagnerian," Warcolier replied, repeating what he had +heard. "But what of politics?"</p> + +<p>"Ah! politics concerns you now!"</p> + +<p>"Well! why," Warcolier replied, "that goes on well. There is a little +relaxation! a ministry more—more—"</p> + +<p>"More homogeneous!" said Vaudrey, in a slightly mocking tone.</p> + +<p>"Exactly. And, after all, the duty of every good citizen is to defend +the government under which we live."</p> + +<p>Ah! assuredly, Vaudrey considered that his former Secretary of State, +now become the vassal of Granet, displayed a rather ridiculous +assurance. He smiled as if he would have laughed in his face and turned +his back upon him.</p> + +<p>Warcolier was not annoyed, for he felt certain that he had angered the +former minister, and he was delighted. It was a kick from an ass. The +witticism of a fool.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey regained his place, much dissatisfied at having come and furious +at this pretentious imbecile, when, on leaving the wings, he ran against +Lissac who was entering a sort of hall where Louis sat writing the names +of the entrances on the sheet.<a name="Page_530" id="Page_530"></a></p> + +<p>Guy flushed slightly on seeing him.</p> + +<p>"In order to see you, one has to meet you here," said Sulpice. "Why have +you not called on me? Is it because I am no longer a minister?"</p> + +<p>"That would be a reason for seeing me more frequently," said Lissac. +"But it is not that. What do you want me to tell you? You know my +sentiments. I don't care to become a bore, as it is called, or a +ceaseless prater of morality, which is the same thing. Besides, morality +to me is something like the Montyon prize to a harlot! Then, too, I am +keeping in my corner and I shall stick to it hereafter closer than ever. +I have put the brake on. I am getting old, and I shall bury myself in +some suburb and look after my rheumatism."</p> + +<p>In Lissac's tone there was an unexpected melancholy.</p> + +<p>"Then you will not call on me again?"</p> + +<p>"What is the use of worrying you?—Reflect for yourself, my good man! +You don't need me to emphasize your blunders. By the way, you know, our +mad mistress?—She is in the theatre."</p> + +<p>"I have seen her!" said Vaudrey, turning very pale.</p> + +<p>"She is not yet a duchess, but that will be patched up in four days. If +one were only a rascal, how one could punish the hussy! But what is the +use? And this devilish Rosas, who is mad enough over her to tie himself +to her and to overlook everything he ought to know, would be capable of +marrying her all the same! Much good may it do him!"<a name="Page_531" id="Page_531"></a></p> + +<p>"But, tell me," continued Lissac, whose cutting tone suddenly became +serious, "have you read the paper?"</p> + +<p>"No! What is there in it?"</p> + +<p>They were then in the corridor of the Opéra, and heard the prelude to +the curtain-raising. Guy took the <i>Soir</i> from his pocket and handed it +to Vaudrey:</p> + +<p>"Here, see!—That poor Ramel!—You were very fond of him, were you not?"</p> + +<p>"Ramel!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey had no need to read. He knew everything as soon as Guy showed +him the paper and mentioned Denis's name in a mournful tone.</p> + +<p>Dead!—He died peacefully in his armchair near the window, as if falling +asleep.—"The death is announced," so read the paragraph, "of one of the +oldest members of the Parisian press, Monsieur Denis Ramel, who was +formerly a celebrated man and for a long time directed the <i>Nation +Française</i>, once an important journal, now no longer in existence."—Not +a word beyond the brief details of his death. No word of praise or +regret, merely the commonplace statement of a fact. Vaudrey thought it +was a trifling notice for a man who had held so large a place in the +public eye.</p> + +<p>"What do you think of it?" he said to Lissac. "People are ungrateful."</p> + +<p>"Why, what would you have? Why didn't he write operettas?"</p> + +<p>They parted after exchanging almost an ordinary grasp <a name="Page_532" id="Page_532"></a>of the hand, +though, perhaps, somewhat sad. Sulpice wished to cast a last look at +Rosas's box. Marianne was standing, her outline clearly defined against +the brightly-lighted background of the box. She was holding a saucer in +her hand, eating an ice. He saw her once more as she stood near the +buffet at Madame Marsy's, stirring her sherbet, a silver-gilt spoon +smoothly gliding over her tongue. He closed his eyes, and with a nervous +start quickly descended the grand stairway, where he found himself +alone.</p> + +<p>In order to forget Marianne, he turned his thoughts to Ramel.</p> + +<p>Denis had been suffering for a long time. He smiled as he felt the hour +of his departure draw near. He wished to disappear without stir, and in +a civil way as he said, without attracting attention, <i>à l'Anglaise</i>. +Poor man! his wish was accomplished.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey threw himself into a carriage and was driven to Batignolles. On +the way he thought of the eternal antitheses of Parisian life: the news +of the death of a friend communicated to him at the Opéra while a +waltz-tune was being played!</p> + +<p>And thinking to himself:</p> + +<p>"<i>From the Opéra to the Opéra!</i> That, moreover, is the history of my +ministry—and that of the Granet administration, probably!"</p> + +<p>The portress at Rue Boursault led him to Denis Ramel's apartment. Lying +on his bed with a kindly <a name="Page_533" id="Page_533"></a>smile on his face, the old journalist seemed +as if asleep. The cold majesty of death gave a look of power to his +face. One might almost believe at times, from the scintillating light +placed near his bony brow, that its rigid muscles moved.</p> + +<p>Denis Ramel! the sure guide of his youth and his counsellor through +life! He recalled his entry on public life, his arrival in Paris, the +first articles brought into the old editorial rooms of the <i>Nation +Française</i>! If for a moment he had been one of the heads of the State, +it was due to the man stretched out before him now!</p> + +<p>He gently stooped over the corpse and pressed a farewell kiss on the +dead man's brow.</p> + +<p>As he turned round, he saw a man whom he had not at first seen and who +had risen.</p> + +<p>The man was very pale and greeted him with a timid air.</p> + +<p>Vaudrey recognized Garnier, the man whom he had seen previously at +Ramel's, a cough-racked, patient, dying man.</p> + +<p>The consumptive had nevertheless outlived the old man.</p> + +<p>"It is good of you to have come, monsieur," said the workman. "He loved +you dearly."</p> + +<p>"He died suddenly then?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and quite alone, while reading a book. He was found thus. They +thought he was sleeping. It is all over, he is to be buried to-morrow. +Will you come, <a name="Page_534" id="Page_534"></a>monsieur?—I did not know who you were when—you know—I +said—In fact, it is kind—let us say no more about it—I beg your +pardon—There will be a vast gathering at Denis Ramel's funeral, if +there are present only a quarter of those whom he has obliged."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey was heartbroken the next day. Behind Ramel's coffin, not a +person followed. Himself, Garnier, and one or two old women from the +house on Rue Boursault, who did not go all the way to the cemetery of +Saint-Ouen because it was too far, were all that were present. At the +grave Sulpice Vaudrey stood alone with the grave-digger and the workman +Garnier. They buried Ramel in a newly-opened part close to the foot of a +railway embankment.</p> + +<p>For years Ramel had been forgotten, had even forgotten himself, he had +let ambitious men pass beyond him, ingrates succeed and selfish men get +to the top! He no longer existed! And those very men who had entreated +him and called him <i>dear master</i> in the old days, soliciting and +flattering him, now no longer knew his name. Had he disappeared, or did +he still live, that forerunner, a sort of Japanese idol, an ancient, a +useless being who had known neither how to make his fortune nor his +position, while building up that of others? Nobody knew or cared. +Occasionally when circumstances called for it, they laughed at this +romantic figure in politics, living like a porter, poor, lost, and +buried under a mass of unknown individuals, after having made min<a name="Page_535" id="Page_535"></a>isters +and unmade governments. Yet, at the news of his death, not one of those +who were indebted to him for everything, not a single politician who was +well in the saddle, and for whom he had held the stirrup, not a comedian +of the Chambers or the theatre who had pleaded with him, urged and +flattered him, was to be found there to pay the most ordinary respects +of memory to the man who had disappeared. That fateful solitude, added +to a keen winter's wind, appeared to Sulpice to be a cruel abandonment +and an act of cowardice. Two men followed the cortége of that maker of +men!</p> + +<p>"Follow journalism and you make the fame of others," said Vaudrey, +shaking his head.</p> + +<p>"After all," answered Garnier, "there are dupes in every trade, and they +are necessarily the most honest."</p> + +<p>When this man, who had been a minister, left the grave above which the +whistling trains passed, a freezing rain was falling and he passed out +of the cemetery in the company of the poor devil who coughed so sadly +within the collar of his overcoat that was tightly drawn up over his +comforter.</p> + +<p>Before leaving him, Vaudrey, with a feeling of timidity, desired to ask +him if work was at least fairly good.</p> + +<p>"Thanks!" replied Garnier. "I have found a situation—And then—" he +shook his head as he pointed out behind the black trees and the white +graves, the spot where they had lowered Ramel—"One has always a <a name="Page_536" id="Page_536"></a>place +when all is over, and that perhaps is the best of all!"</p> + +<p>He bowed and Vaudrey left in a gloomy mood. It seemed to him that his +life was crumbling away, that he was sowing, shred by shred, his flesh +on the road. The black hangings of Ramel's coffin—and he smiled sadly +at this new irony—recalled to him the bills of the upholsterers that he +still owed for the furnishing of that fête at the ministry on the last +day of his power and his happiness. The official decorations of Belloir +and the Gobelins were not sufficient for him. He had desired more modern +decorations. He gave the coachman the upholsterer's address, Boulevard +des Capucins. He hardly dared to enter and say: "I have come to pay the +account of the furnishing supplied at the ministry!" It still seemed +like a funeral bill he was paying. This upholsterer's account, paid for +forgotten display, seemed to him a sort of mortuary transaction.</p> + +<p>When he paid the upholsterer, the latter seemed to wear a cunning smile.</p> + +<p>On finding himself again outside, he felt a sensation of relief; being +cold, he was inclined to walk with a view to warming his chill blood.</p> + +<p>On hearing his name spoken by some one, he turned round and perceived +before him his compatriot Jéliotte, the friend of his childhood, the +comrade, who, with a smile, cordially extended his hands toward him.</p> + +<p>"I told you that you would always find me when I <a name="Page_537" id="Page_537"></a>should not appear +before you as a courtier! Well, then, here I am," said Jéliotte. "Now +you may see me as much as you please!"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Vaudrey.</p> + +<p>Jéliotte took his arm.</p> + +<p>"Probably you are going to the Chamber?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, exactly."</p> + +<p>"Well, I will accompany you!—Ah, since you are no longer minister, my +dear friend, and that one does not appear to be a flatterer or a seeker +of patronage, one can speak to you—You have faults enough!—You are too +confident, too moderate—It is necessary to have a firm hand—And then +that could not last. Those situations are all very fine but they are too +easily destroyed!—They are like glass, my old friend!—A place is +wanted for everybody, is it not?—Bah! must I tell you?—Why, you are +happier! I like you better as it is!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey felt strongly inclined to shake off this pretentious ninny who +was clinging to his arm.</p> + +<p>"That is like me!" continued Jéliotte. "I like my friends better when +they are down! What would you have? It is my generous nature. By the +way, do you know that the reason I have not seen you before is because I +have not been in Paris! I have returned from Isère!"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Vaudrey, thinking of Adrienne.</p> + +<p>"Well, you know, I have still some good news for <a name="Page_538" id="Page_538"></a>you. If you have had +enough of politics, you can retire at the approaching election!"</p> + +<p>"How?" asked Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"Why, Thibaudier is stirring up Grenoble. He has got the whole city with +him. He is very much liked and is a model mayor. He is a very +<i>mère</i>—mother—that mayor!—Jéliotte laughed heartily, believing that +he was funny.—If there is a list balloted for, and there certainly will +be, Thibaudier will head the list. If they had maintained the <i>scrutin +d'arrondissement</i>, he would have been capable of passing muster, all the +same!"</p> + +<p>"Against me?"</p> + +<p>"Against you. Thibaudier is very popular!—And as firm as a rock!—He +thinks you moderate, too moderate, as everybody else does!"</p> + +<p>"He?—He was a member of the Plebiscite Committee under the Empire!"</p> + +<p>"Exactly! He is an extreme Republican, just as he was an extreme +Bonapartist. Oh! Thibaudier is a man, there is no concession with him. +Never! He is always the same. He will beat you. Moreover, in Isère, they +want a homogeneous representation—"</p> + +<p>"Again!" said Vaudrey, who felt that he was pursued by this word.</p> + +<p>After all, what did Thibaudier matter to him, or the deputation, the +election or politics? Denis Ramel had sounded its depths in his grave in +the cemetery of Saint-Ouen.<a name="Page_539" id="Page_539"></a></p> + +<p>"Let us drop Thibaudier. By the way," said Jéliotte, "I saw your wife at +Grenoble."</p> + +<p>Vaudrey grew pale.</p> + +<p>He again repeated: "Ah!"</p> + +<p>"She is greatly changed. She doesn't leave the house of her uncle, the +doctor, nor does she receive any one."</p> + +<p>"Is she sick, then?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, slightly."</p> + +<p>"And you are separated, then?"</p> + +<p>"No," replied Sulpice.</p> + +<p>Jéliotte smiled.</p> + +<p>"Ah! joker, I understand!—Your wife was too strict!—Bless me, a +provincial! Bah! that will come right! And if it doesn't, why, you will +be free, that's all! But, say, then, if you are not re-elected, you will +rejoin her at Grenoble. Oh! your clients will return to you. You are +highly esteemed as an advocate, but as a minister, I ought to say—"</p> + +<p>"I shall be re-elected," said Vaudrey, in a decisive tone, so as to cut +short Jéliotte's interminable phrases.</p> + +<p>He was exceedingly unnerved. This man's stupidity would exasperate him. +He would never come across any but subjects of irritation or +disheartenment. He felt inclined to seek a quarrel with some one. He +would have liked to wrench Marianne's wrist with his fingers.</p> + +<p>As he entered the hall leading to the assembly, he unwittingly stumbled +against a gentleman who was walking <a name="Page_540" id="Page_540"></a>rapidly and without saluting him, +although he thought that he recognized him.</p> + +<p>"Yet I know him!"</p> + +<p>He had not gone three steps before he perfectly recalled this eternal +lobbyist, always bending before him and clinging to the armchairs of the +antechambers, like an oyster to a rock, and whom the messengers, +accustomed to his soliciting, bowing and scraping for years past, called +<i>Monsieur Eugène</i>—out of courtesy.</p> + +<p>It was too much! And, in truth, this strange fellow's impoliteness was +ill-timed.</p> + +<p>Sulpice suddenly turned round, approached Renaudin, and said to him +sharply:</p> + +<p>"You bowed more obsequiously to me a short time since, monsieur! It +seems to me that you were in the ministerial antechambers every +morning!"</p> + +<p>He expected a haughty reply from Renaudin, and that this man would have +compensated him for the others.</p> + +<p><i>Monsieur Eugène</i> smiled as he answered:</p> + +<p>"Why, I am still there, monsieur!"</p> + +<p>Vaudrey looked at him with a stupefied air, then in an outburst of +anger, as if he conveyed in the reply that he hurled at this +contemptible fellow, all the projects of his future revenge upon the +fools, the knaves, the dull valets and the ungrateful horde, he said, +boldly:</p> + +<p>"Well, you will salute me again, for I shall return there."</p> + +<p>He turned on his heels away from this worthless fellow, and entered the +Chamber.<a name="Page_541" id="Page_541"></a></p> + +<p>He heard an outburst of bravos; a perfect tempest of enthusiasm reached +him. He looked on and bit his lips.</p> + +<p>Lucien Granet was in the tribune, and the majority were applauding him.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="II_IX" id="II_IX"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h3>IX</h3> + + +<p>Marianne Kayser had the good taste, and perhaps the good sense not to +desire a solemnized marriage. It mattered little to her if she entered +her duchy surreptitiously, provided she was sovereign there. She would +have time later to assume a lofty air under her ducal coronet; +meanwhile, she would act with humility while wearing the wreath of +orange blossoms. She had discharged Jean and Justine with considerable +presents, thinking it undesirable to keep any longer about her people +who knew Vaudrey. She had advised Justine to marry Jean.</p> + +<p>"Marriage is amusing!" she had said.</p> + +<p>"Madame is very kind," answered Justine, "but she sees, herself, that it +is better to wait sometimes. There is no hurry, one does not know what +may happen."</p> + +<p>The future duchess showed that she was but little flattered by the +girl's reflections. It was scarcely worth while not to put on airs even +with servants, to meet such fools who become over-familiar with you +immedi<a name="Page_542" id="Page_542"></a>ately. So, in future, she would strive to be not such a +kind-hearted girl. She would keep servants at a distance. They would +see. Meanwhile, she was delighted to have made a clean sweep in the +house, she could now lie to Rosas as much as she pleased.</p> + +<p>Besides, the duke, who was madly in love and whose desire was daily +whetted by Marianne, would have been capable, as Lissac said, of +accepting everything and forgetting all, so that he might clasp the +woman in his arms. She held him entirely in her grasp, under the +domination of her intoxicating seductiveness, skilfully granting by a +kiss that kindled the blood in José's veins the promise of more ardent +caresses. In this very exercise, she assumed a passionate tenderness +like a courtesan accustomed to easy defeat who resists her very +disposition so that she may not be too soon vanquished. She had +ungovernable impulses that carried her toward Rosas as to an unknown +pleasure.</p> + +<p>The ivory-like pallor of this red-haired man with sunken eyes and +trembling lips, almost cold when she sought them under his tawny +moustache, pleased her. She sometimes said to him that under his gentle +manner he had the appearance of a tiger. "Or of a cat, and that pleases +me, for I am myself of that nature. Ah! how I love you!" She felt +herself tremble with fear of that being whom she felt that she had +conquered and who was entirely hers, but she was strangely troubled in +divining some of his secret thoughts.<a name="Page_543" id="Page_543"></a></p> + +<p>She was in a hurry to have the marriage concluded. Secretly if it were +desired, but legally and positively. She dreaded José's reawakening, as +it were. She did not know how, perhaps an anonymous letter, a chance +meeting with Guy, an explanation, who knows?</p> + +<p>"Although, after all," she thought, "I have been foolish to trouble +myself about this Guy. Word threats, that's all!"</p> + +<p>The duke had treated her as a virtuous girl, requiring her to declare +that she had never loved any but him, or that, at least, no living +person had the right to say that he had possessed her. She had sworn all +that he desired, saying to Uncle Kayser: "Oaths like that are like +political promises, they bind one to nothing!"</p> + +<p>The uncle began to entertain an extravagant admiration for his "little +Marianne." There is a woman, sure enough! Wonderful elegance! She had +promised to have a studio built for him, in which he could, instead of +painting, take his ease, stretched on a divan, smoking his pipe, and +pass his days in floating to the ceiling his theories of high and moral +art! An ideal picture!</p> + +<p>He also was in favor of prompt action in respect to the marriage. As +little noise as possible. The least hitch and all was lost. What a pity!</p> + +<p>"Do you wish me to tell you? It seems to me that you are walking to the +mayor's office on eggs!"</p> + +<p>"Be easy," Marianne replied, laughing heartily, "there will be none +broken."<a name="Page_544" id="Page_544"></a></p> + +<p>The marriage was celebrated. At last! as Kayser said. It was a formality +rather than a ceremony. Marianne, ravishingly beautiful, was exultant at +realizing her dream. Her pale complexion took on tints of the bloom of +the azalea pierced by the rays of the sun. Never had Rosas seen her so +lovely. How stupidly he had acted formerly in yielding to appearances +and flying from her, instead of telling her that he loved her. He had +lost whole years of love that he would never recover, even in the +blissful fever of this union. Those joys, formerly disdained, were, +alas! never to be restored.</p> + +<p>Ah! how he would love her now, adore her and keep her with him as his +living delight! They would travel; in three days they would set out for +Italy. The baggage already filled the house in the Avenue Montaigne, +their nuptial mansion. Marianne would take away all the souvenirs that +she had preserved in the grisette's little room at Rue Cuvier, where +Rosas had so often seen her and where he had said to her: "I love you!"</p> + +<p>"People took their pénates," she said, "but I take my fetishes!"</p> + +<p>Rosas was wild with joy. The possession of this woman, sought after as +mistress, but more intensely ardent than a mistress, with her outbursts +of tears and kisses, threw him into ecstasies and possessed him with +distracting joy. Something within him whispered, as in the days of early +manhood, at the ecstatic hour of sunrise.<a name="Page_545" id="Page_545"></a> Already he wished to be on +the way to Italy with Marianne, far from the mire and mists of Paris.</p> + +<p>"These rain-soaked sidewalks on which the gaslight is reflected seem +gloomy to me," he said. "Let us seek the blue skies, Marianne, the +orange groves of Nice, the stars of Naples."</p> + +<p>She smiled.</p> + +<p>"The <i>blue</i> again!" she thought. "They all desire it, then?"</p> + +<p>She desired to remain a few days longer in Paris, delighted to proclaim +her new name in its streets, its Bois and its theatres, where she had +been known in her sadness, displaying her desperate melancholy. It +seemed to her that, in her present triumph, she crushed both men and +things. What was Naples to her? She had not miserably dragged her +disillusions and her angers along the Chiaja. Florence might take her +for a duchess, as well as any other, but Paris, every corner of which +was familiar to her, and where every scene had been, as it were, a frame +for her follies, her hopes, her failures, her heartbreaks, her +deceptions, all her sorrows of an ambitious woman, which had made her +the daring woman that she was,—those boulevards, those paths about the +Lake, those proscenium boxes at the theatre, she would see them in her +triumph, as she had seen them in her untrammelled follies or in the +moments of her ruin and abandonment.</p> + +<p>"Two days more! One day more," she said. "After <a name="Page_546" id="Page_546"></a>the first +representation at the Variétés, we will leave, are you willing?"</p> + +<p>"Ah! you Parisienne! Hungry Parisienne!" José replied.</p> + +<p>She looked at him with her gray eyes sparkling, and smiling.</p> + +<p>"The Variétés?—Don't you know the old rondel?—The one you hummed when +you were sick, you know?—It seems to me that I can hear it yet:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Do you see yonder<br /></span> +<span>That white house,<br /></span> +<span>Where every Sunday<br /></span> +<span>Under the sweet lilacs—"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Uncle Kayser, ever prudent, advised a speedy departure. He feared he +scarcely knew what. He feared everything, "like Abner, and feared only +that." Every morning he dreaded seeing some indiscreet articles in the +papers respecting the Duke and the Duchesse de Rosas.</p> + +<p>"These journalists disregard, without scruple, the wall of private life! +It is a moral wall, however!"</p> + +<p>At last, they would leave in two days, so it was determined. Rosas had +wished to see Guy again for the last time. At Rue d'Aumale they informed +him that Monsieur de Lissac was travelling. The shutters of the +apartment were not, however, closed. The duke had for a moment been +tempted to insist on entering; then he withdrew and returned home +without analyzing too <a name="Page_547" id="Page_547"></a>closely the feeling of annoyance that came over +him. The weather was splendid and dry. He returned on foot to Avenue +Montaigne, where he expected to find Marianne superintending her trunks.</p> + +<p>On entering the house, the doors of which were open, as at the hour of +packing and removing, giving the whole house the appearance of neglect +and flight, he was astonished to hear a man's voice, which was neither +that of Simon Kayser nor that of the valet, and evidently answering in a +violent tone the equally evident angry voice of Marianne.</p> + +<p>He did not know this voice, and the noise of a bell-rope hastily pulled, +in a fit of manifest anger, made him quicken his steps, as if he +instinctively felt that the duchess was in danger.</p> + +<p>In the shadow of a dull December evening, the house, with its disordered +appearance that resembled a sacking, assumed a sinister aspect. José +suddenly felt a sentiment of anguish.</p> + +<p>He quickly reached the salon, where Marianne was in a robe de chambre of +black satin, and was standing near the chimney with an expression of +anger in her eyes, holding the bell-rope, whose iron chain had struck +against the wall.</p> + +<p>Before her stood a young man with a heavy moustache, his hat tilted over +his ear, whom Monsieur de Rosas did not know.</p> + +<p>His manner was insolent and he looked thick-set in <a name="Page_548" id="Page_548"></a>his black, +close-buttoned frock-coat. His style was vulgar, and, with his hands in +his pockets, he appeared both low and threatening.</p> + +<p>Marianne rang for a servant. She was flushed with rage. She became livid +on seeing José.</p> + +<p>"What is the matter, then?" asked Rosas coldly, as he stepped between +the duchess and the man.</p> + +<p>The man looked at him, took off his hat, and in a loud voice that was +itself odoriferous, said:</p> + +<p>"You are Monsieur le Duc de Rosas, doubtless?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said José, "and may I know—?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing! it is nothing!" cried Marianne, running hastily to José and +taking his hands as if she desired to drag him away.</p> + +<p>"How, nothing?" the man then said, as he took a seat, holding his hat in +his hand and placing his fist on his left hip, in the attitude of a +fencing-master posing for an elegant effect. "To treat a gentleman as +you have just treated me; you call that nothing?"</p> + +<p>He turned to Rosas and said, as he saluted him with the airs of a <i>sub. +off.</i> on the stage:</p> + +<p>"Adolphe Gochard! You do not know me, Monsieur le duc?"</p> + +<p>"No," said José.</p> + +<p>"What do you want?—"</p> + +<p>"Ah! pardon me," said Gochard, as he interrupted Marianne. "You rang, +you wished to have the presence of the servants. You threatened to have +me pitched out <a name="Page_549" id="Page_549"></a>of the door by the shoulders. Since you have called, +they shall hear me."</p> + +<p>The servants, hurrying to the spot, now appeared in the indistinct +shadow of the doorway.</p> + +<p>"Be off!" cried Marianne.</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked the duke severely, and astonished.</p> + +<p>"Because madame prefers that I should only tell you what I have to say +to you," said Gochard. "Ah! you claimed that I wanted to extort +blackmail. I, an old brigadier, extort blackmail? Well, so let it be! +Let us sing our little song!"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur," said the duke, who had become pallid and whose clenched +teeth showed beneath his red beard, "I do not know what Madame la +Duchesse de Rosas has said to you, or what you have dared to say to her, +but you will leave this place instanter!"</p> + +<p>"Is that so?" said the man, as he shrugged his shoulders, which were +like those of a suburban bully.</p> + +<p>"Just so!"</p> + +<p>"That would surprise me!" said Gochard. "But, <i>saperlipopette</i>, you are +not very polite in your set!"</p> + +<p>"Not very polite with boors! You are in my house!"</p> + +<p>"Oh! you can't teach me where I am!" said the Dujarrier's lover, with a +wink of his eye. "But, madame has been perching at my cost for a long +time at Rue Prony and it is upon my signature, yes, my own signature, if +you please, that she has obtained the means of <a name="Page_550" id="Page_550"></a>renting the Hôtel Vanda. +She has not so much to be impudent about!"</p> + +<p>"Your signature?—The Hôtel Vanda?"</p> + +<p>The duke looked at Marianne, who, as white as a corpse, instead of +becoming indignant, entreated and tried to lead her husband away from +this man, as if they were in the presence of grave danger.</p> + +<p>"Ah! bless me!" cried José, "you will explain to me—!"</p> + +<p>"That is very easy!—I was in want of money. The Dujarrier furnished me +with a little for that affair. She is too niggardly. I ask madame for +some. She assumes a haughty tone, and, instead of comprehending that I +come as a friend, she threatens to have me put out of doors. Blackmail! +I?—I?—What nonsense!"</p> + +<p>A friend! This man dared to say before her who bore the name of Duchesse +de Rosas that he came to her as an intimate. This alcoholic braggart had +assisted Marianne in sub-renting, he knew not what hôtel, from a +wanton!—Rue Prony!—Vanda!—What was there in common between these +names and that of the duchess? And the Dujarrier, that Dujarrier whose +manner of living was known to the Castilian, how had she become +associated with Marianne's life?</p> + +<p>Ah! since he had commenced, this Gochard would make an end of it. He +would tell everything! Even if he did not wish it, he would speak now. +Rosas, frightened himself, and terrified at the prospect of some<a name="Page_551" id="Page_551"></a><a name="Page_552" id="Page_552"></a><a name="Page_553" id="Page_553"></a> +unknown baseness and doubtful transaction, felt Marianne's hand tremble +in his, and by degrees, as Gochard proceeded, the duke realized that +Marianne wished to get away and it was he who now retained her; holding +the young woman's wrist tightly within his fingers, he forcibly +prevented her from escaping, insisting that she should listen and hear +everything.</p> + +<p>"Ah! if you think that I am afraid of speaking," said Gochard, "you will +soon see!"</p> + +<p>And then with a sort of swaggering air like that of a fencing-master or +tippler, searching for some droll expressions, cowardly avenging himself +by jests ejected like so many streams of tobacco, against this woman who +had just insulted him, who spoke of blackmail and the police, and of +thrusting the miserable fellow out of doors, he told everything that he +knew; Marianne's neediness, her weariness, her loves, the Dujarrier +connection, the renting of the Hôtel Vanda, the Vaudrey paper and its +renewals, his own foolishness as a too artless and tender, good sort of +fellow, relying on Claire Dujarrier's word, and not reserving to himself +so much per cent in the affair!</p> + +<p>Rosas listened open-mouthed, his ears tingling and his blood rushing to +his temples, while he sunk his fingers into Marianne's arms, she, +meanwhile, glaring at Gochard.</p> + +<p>When he had finished, she disengaged herself from Rosas's clutch by an +extreme effort, and ran to the rascal and spat in his face.<a name="Page_554" id="Page_554"></a></p> + +<p>He lifted his hand to her and said:</p> + +<p>"Ah! but!—"</p> + +<p>"Begone!" said the duke. "You wish to be paid?"</p> + +<p>"The money is not all. I demand respect!" replied Gochard, as he wiped +his cheek.</p> + +<p>He placed his card on the mantelpiece.</p> + +<p>"Adolphe Gochard! there is my address. Besides, Madame knows it. With +the pistol, the sabre, or the espadon, as you please! I am afraid of no +one."</p> + +<p>"You will be paid, you have been told, you shall be paid!" cried +Marianne, absolutely crazy and ready to tear him with her nails. "Be +off! ruffian! begone, thief!"</p> + +<p>"Fiddle-faddle!" replied Adolphe, as he replaced his hat on the side of +his bald head. "I have said what I have to say. I do not like to be made +a fool of!"</p> + +<p>He disappeared, waddling away like a strolling player uncertain of his +exit.</p> + +<p>Rosas did not even see him go.</p> + +<p>He had seized Marianne by both hands and was dragging her toward the +window, through which the daylight still entered, and convulsed with +rage he penetrated her eyes with his glance, his face looking still more +pallid, in contrast with his red beard.</p> + +<p>She was terrified. She believed herself at the point of death. She felt +that he was going to kill her.</p> + +<p>She suddenly fell on her knees.<a name="Page_555" id="Page_555"></a></p> + +<p>He still looked at her, leaning over her with the appearance of a +madman.</p> + +<p>"Vaudrey?—Vaudrey? The man whom I saw at your uncle's?—The man whom I +have elbowed with you?—Vaudrey?—This man was your lover, then?"</p> + +<p>She was so alarmed that she did not reply.</p> + +<p>"You have lied to me, then? But, tell me, wretched woman, have you not +lied to me?"</p> + +<p>"I loved you and I desired you!" said Marianne.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" said Rosas, in a strident, deep-chested voice. "You wanted +what that rascal wanted: money! You should have asked me for it! I would +have given you everything, all my fortune, all! But not my name! Not my +name!"</p> + +<p>He roughly repelled her.</p> + +<p>She remained on her knees. Her hands hung down and rested on the carpet. +She looked at it stupefied, hardly distinguishing its rose pattern.</p> + +<p>She was certain that she was about to die. José's sudden anger had the +fitfulness of a wild beast's. He crushed her with a terrible glance from +his bloodshot eyes.</p> + +<p>Then he began to laugh hysterically, like a young girl.</p> + +<p>"Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!—In a wanton's house yonder in Rue Prony, at +Vanda's! Vanda's! At Vanda's, in a harlot's bed, she gave herself, sold +herself!—A Rosas, for she is a Rosas! A Duchesse de Rosas now! Idiot! +Idiot that I am!"<a name="Page_556" id="Page_556"></a></p> + +<p>Marianne would have spoken, entreated, but fear froze her, coming over +her flesh and through her veins. She realized that an implacable +resolution possessed this trusting man. She found a master this time.</p> + +<p>"José!" said Marianne softly, in a timid voice.</p> + +<p>He drew himself up as if the mention of this name were an insult.</p> + +<p>"Come!" he said calmly, "so let it be. What is done, is done. So much +the worse for the fools! But listen carefully."</p> + +<p>This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame.</p> + +<p>His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists.</p> + +<p>"You are called the Duchesse de Rosas?—You were ambitious for that +name, you eagerly desired and struggled hard for that title, did you +not? Well, I will not, at least, suffer you to drag it like so many +others into intruders' salons, under ironical glances, before mocking +smiles and lorgnettes, in view of the papers, and into the gossip of the +Paris whose gutter-odor tempts you so strongly that you have not yet +been able to leave it. <i>Parbleu!</i> you have another lover in it, I +wager!—Vaudrey!—Or Lissac and many others!—Is it as I say?"</p> + +<p>"I swear to you—"</p> + +<p>"Ah! you have lied to me, do not swear! We are about to leave. Not for +Italy. It is good for those who love each other. You do not know +Fuentecarral?—<a name="Page_557" id="Page_557"></a>You are about to make its acquaintance. It is your +château now. Yours, yours, since you are a Rosas!"</p> + +<p>He again broke into laughter, such as a judge might indulge in who +should mock at a condemned man.</p> + +<p>"We are about to leave for Toledo. You asked me, one day, about the +castle in which I was born. It is a prison, simply a prison. It is +habitable nevertheless. But when one enters it, one rarely leaves it. +The device that you will bear is not very cheerful, but it is eloquent, +you know it: <i>Hasta la muerte!</i>—"Until death!"—What do you say about +it?—We shall be at Toledo in three days. There are Duchesses de Rosas +who will look on you, as you pass, over their plaited collars, and as +there were neither adulteresses nor courtesans among them, they will +probably ask what the Parisian is doing among them. Well, I will answer +them myself, that she is there to live out her life, you understand, +there, face to face with me, as you have <i>desired</i>, as you said, and no +one will have the right to sneer before the Duc de Rosas, who will see +no one. Oh! yes, I know that I belong to another period! I am +ridiculous, romantic!—I am just that!—You have awakened the half-Arab +that lurks in the Castilian. So much the worse for you if you have made +me remember that I am a Rosas!"</p> + +<p>She remained there, thunderstruck, hearing the duke come and go, his +heels ringing in spite of the muffling of the carpet, like the heels of +an armed man.</p> + +<p>At times, when he passed quite close to her, his at<a name="Page_558" id="Page_558"></a>tenuated shadow was +cast at full length over her and she was filled with terror.</p> + +<p>She experienced a feeling of fear, as if she were before an open tomb, +or that a puff of damp air chilled her face, or that she was suddenly +enveloped by the odor of a cellar. She shuddered and wished to plead +with him, murmuring:</p> + +<p>"Pity!—Pardon!—"</p> + +<p>"Madame la duchesse," Rosas replied coldly, "I am one of those who may +be deceived, no one is beyond the reach of treason; but I am not one of +those who pardon. I have been extremely foolish, ridiculous, credulous! +So much the worse for me! So much the worse for you! Rosas you are, +Rosas you will be! I have been your victim, eh? Exactly, that is +admitted: you shall be mine! Nothing could be juster, I think! I wish no +scandal resulting from a lawsuit or the notoriety of one or more duels. +I should become ridiculous in the eyes of others. But in my own and your +eyes, I do not propose to be! I did not desire to be your lover, I have +hardly been your husband. Now I am your companion forever. <i>Hasta la +muerte!</i> For me, the cold of an Escurial has no terror. I am accustomed +to it. If it makes you quake, whose fault is it? You willed it. A double +suicide! We leave this evening!"</p> + +<p>"This evening!" repeated Rosas, terribly, while Marianne, terrified, +felt stifled under the crushing weight of that name: <i>Duchesse de +Rosas!</i><a name="Page_559" id="Page_559"></a></p> + +<p>Simon Kayser came to dine. He was deeply moved when he learned that the +housekeeping was upset.</p> + +<p>What! the devilish duke knew all then?</p> + +<p>And he has taken the matter up in a dramatic fashion?</p> + +<p>"Folly!"</p> + +<p>"It is a serious matter, all the same!" said the uncle, after debating +with himself as to where he should dine. "He will break her heart as he +said, immured yonder within his four walls!—Ah! it was hardly worth +while to handle her affairs so cleverly for a Gochard to come on the +scenes and spoil everything, the rascal! For myself, I pity the little +Marianne!—Her plan of battle was excellently arranged, well disposed +and admirably put together! It was superb! And it failed!—Come, it +amounts to this in everything: it is said that the pursuit of a great +art is to ply the trade of a dupe! Destiny lacks morality! We should +perhaps be happier, both, if she were simply a <i>cocotte</i> and I engaged +in photography!—But!" the brave fellow added: "one has lofty ideas, +as-pi-ra-tions, or one has not!—One cannot remake one's self when one +is an artist!"<a name="Page_560" id="Page_560"></a></p> +<p class="smcap">Paris, 1880-1881. +<a name="Page_561" id="Page_561"></a></p> + +<hr style="width: 40%;" /> +<p class="frmatter"><a name="ill_544" id="ill_544"></a><b>Part Second Chapter IX</b></p> + +<p class="center"><i>This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame.</i></p> + +<p class="center"><i>His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists.</i></p> + +<p class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/page544.png" width="437" height="620" alt="[Illustration: MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT]" title="MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT" /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="List_of_Illustrations" id="List_of_Illustrations"></a><a href="#TOC">TOC</a></span></div> +<h2>List of Illustrations</h2> + +<p class="center">HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER</p> +<hr style="width: 10%;" /> +<table cellpadding="2" border="0" frame="void" rules="none" summary="List of illustrations"> +<tr><td> </td><th class="smcap">Page</th></tr> +<tr><td class="smcap"><a href="#ill_fronts">In the greenroom of the opera</a></td><td style="text-align:right;"><a href="#Page_fronts"><i>Fronts.</i></a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="smcap"><a href="#ill_216">Vaudrey meets Marianne in the bois</a></td><td style="text-align:right;"><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="smcap"><a href="#ill_272">Sulpice becomes surety for Marianne</a></td><td style="text-align:right;"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="smcap"><a href="#ill_376">The banquet</a></td><td style="text-align:right;"><a href="#Page_376">376</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="smcap"><a href="#ill_544">Marianne hears her sentence of banishment</a></td><td style="text-align:right;"><a href="#Page_544">544</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<p class="center" style="font-size: smaller;">Transcriber's Note: Illustrations have been moved to appropriate +positions. These page numbers are the original locations.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center" style="font-size: smaller;">Transcriber's Note: The following apparent misprints have been +corrected for this electronic edition:</p> +<table cellpadding="2" border="1" frame="box" rules="none" style="font-size: smaller;" summary="List of typos and their corrections"> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_1">wrote Monsieur J.-J. Weiss in the Journal des Débats</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Debats</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_2">The President awaited at the Élysée</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Elysée</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_3">above all, my dear Vaudrey, do not fear to appear</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Vaudrey, "do not fear</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_4">He shut his eyes to picture Marianne.</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>"He shut his eyes</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_5">asserting the virginity of his efforts</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>assertting</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_6">There was a council to be held at the Élysée</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Elysée</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_7">he took it himself to the President at the Élysée.</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Elysée</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_8">He had already been informed at the Élysée</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Elysée</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_9">Along the grand avenue of the Champs-Élysées</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Champs-Elysées</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_10">The solitude of the Champs-Élysées pleased him.</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Champs-Elysées</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_11">he had been sitting in the antechamber</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>ante-chamber</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_12">the corridors of the Opéra house</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Opera</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_13">the wings of the Opéra!</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>Opera</td></tr> +<tr><td style="text-align: right;"><a href="#typo_14">the knickknacks so much in vogue</a></td><td> <i>from</i> </td><td>knick-knacks</td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's His Excellency the Minister, by Jules Claretie + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + +***** This file should be named 15934-h.htm or 15934-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/9/3/15934/ + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: His Excellency the Minister + +Author: Jules Claretie + +Translator: Henri Roberts + +Release Date: May 29, 2005 [EBook #15934] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + + + + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + + +THIS EDITION +DEDICATED TO THE HONOR OF THE +ACADEMIE FRANCAISE +IS LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND NUMBERED AND REGISTERED +SETS, OF WHICH THIS IS + +NUMBER 358 + + +THE ROMANCISTS +JULES CLARETIE +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER + + +BIBLIOTHEQUE +DES CHEFS-D'OEUVRE +DU ROMAN +CONTEMPORAIN + +_HIS EXCELLENCY +THE MINISTER_ + +JULES CLARETIE + +OF THE ACADEMIE FRANCAISE + + +PRINTED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY BY + +GEORGE BARRIE & SONS, PHILADELPHIA +COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY G.B. & SON + +THIS EDITION OF +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER +HAS BEEN COMPLETELY TRANSLATED +BY +HENRI ROBERTS + +THE ETCHINGS ARE BY +EUGENE WALLET +AND DRAWINGS BY +ADRIEN MARIE + + + + +TO ALPHONSE DAUDET + + +My dear friend, + +Ideas sometimes float about in the air like the pollen of flowers. For +years past I have been at work collecting notes for this book which I +have decided to dedicate to you. + +In one of your charming prefaces, you told us lately that you only +painted from nature. We are both of us, I imagine, in our day and +generation, quite captivated and carried away by that modern society +from which in your exquisite creations you have so well understood how +to extract the essence. + +What is it that I have desired to do this time? That which we have both +been trying to do at one and the same time: to seize, in passing, these +stirring times of ours, these modern manners, that society which +perpetuates the antediluvian uproar, that feverish, bustling world +always posing before the footlights, that market for the sale of +appetites, that kirmess of pleasure that saddens us a little and amuses +us a great deal, and allows us romance-writers, simple seekers after +truth, to smile in our sleeves at the constant seekers after portfolios. + +This book is true, I have seen the events narrated in it pass before my +own eyes, and I can say, as a spectator greatly interested in what I +see, that I am delighted, my old fellow-traveller, to write your great +and honored name on the first page of my book as a witness to the +sincere affection and true comradeship of + +Your devoted, + +JULES CLARETIE. + + + + +PREFACE + + +_There was once a Minister of State who presented to his native land the +astonishing spectacle of a Cabinet Minister dying whilst in office. This +action was so astounding to the nation at large that a statue has since +been erected to his memory._ + +_I saw his funeral procession defile past me, I think I even made one of +the Committee sent by the Society of Men of Letters to march in the +funeral convoy. It was superb. This lawyer from the Provinces, good +honest man, eloquent orator, honest politician that he was, who came to +Paris but to die there, was buried with the greatest magnificence._ + +_De Musset had eight persons to follow him to the grave; his Excellency +had one hundred thousand._ + +_I returned home from this gorgeous funeral in a thoughtful mood, +thinking how much emptiness there is in glory, and particularly in +political glory. This man had been "His Excellency the Minister" and not +only his own province, but the whole country had placed its hopes on +him. But what had he done? He had left his home to cast himself into the +great whirlpool of the metropolis. It was the romance of a great +provincial plunged in Paris into the reality of contemporary history, +and become as ordinary as the commonplace items of the Journals. "What a +subject for a study at once profoundly modern and perfectly lifelike!" +The funeral convoy had hardly left the church of the Madeleine when my +plot of this romance was thought out, and appeared clearly before me in +this title, very brief and simple: _His Excellency the Minister_._ + +_I have not drawn any one in particular, I have thought of no individual +person, I even forgot all about this departed Minister, whose face I +hardly caught even a glimpse of, and of whose life I was completely +ignorant; I had only in my mind's eye a hero or rather a heroine: +Politics with all its discouragements, its vexations, its treacheries, +its deceptions, its visions as fair as the blue sky of summer, suddenly +bursting like soap bubbles; and to the woes of Politics, I naturally +endeavored to add those of the pangs of love._ + +_And this is how my book came to see the light. I have been frequently +asked from what living person I borrowed the character of Vaudrey, with +its sufferings, its disappointments, its falterings. From whom? An +American translator, better informed, it appears, than myself, has, I +believe, brought out in New York a _key_ to the characters presented in +my book. I should have publicly protested against this _Key_ which +unlocks nothing, however, had it been published in France. Reader, do +not expect any masks to be raised here--there are no masks; it is only a +picture of living people, of passions of our time. No portraits, +however, only types. That, at least, is what I have tried to do. And if +I expected to find indulgent critics, I have certainly succeeded, and +the two special characters which I sought to portray in my romance--in +Parisian and political life--have been fortunate enough to win the +approval of two critics whose testimony to the truth of my portraitures +I have set down here._ + +_An author of rare merit and an authority on Statecraft, Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss, was kind enough one day to analyze and praise, apropos of the +comedy founded upon my book, the romance which I am to-day republishing. +It has been extremely pleasant for me to put myself under the +sponsorship of a man of letters willing to vouch for the truth of my +portrayals. I must beg pardon for repeating his commendations of my +work, so grateful are they to me, coming from the pen of a critic so +renowned, and which I take some pride in reading again._ + +_"I had already twice read _Monsieur le Ministre_," wrote Monsieur J.-J. +Weiss in the _Journal des Debats_ the day following the production at +the Gymnase, "before having seen the drama founded on the book, and I do +not regret having been obliged to read it for the third time. The +romance is both well conceived and admirably executed. To have written +it, a union of character and talent was necessary. A Republican tried +and proved, permitting his ideal to be tarnished and sullied; a patriot +wronged by the vices of the times in which he lived; an honest, +clean-handed man; the representative of a family of rigid morality; the +strict impartiality of the artist who cares for nothing but his ideas of +art, and who protects those ideas from being injured or influenced by +the pretensions of any group or coterie; a close and long +acquaintanceship with the ins and outs of Parisian life; an eye at once +inquiring, calm and critical, a courageous indifference, hatred for the +mighty ones of the hour, and a loftiness of soul which refuses to yield +to the unjust demands of timid friendship: such are the qualities that +make the value of this matchless book. Monsieur Claretie has been +accused of having gathered together and exposed to the public gaze two +or three more or less scandalous episodes of private life, and using +them as the foundation of his romance. The fictitious name of Vaudrey +has been held to cloak that of such and such a Minister of State. Those, +however, who search for vulgar gossip in this book, or who look for +private scandal are far astray. They are quite mistaken as regards the +tendency and moral of Monsieur Claretie's book. The Vaudrey of the +romance is no minister in particular, neither this statesman nor that. +He is the Minister whom we have had before our eyes for the last quarter +of a century. He is that one, at once potential and universal. In him +are united and portrayed all the traits by which the species may be +determined. He had been elected to office without knowing why, and to do +him this justice, at least without any fault of his; he was deposed from +power without knowing the reason, and we have no hesitation in saying, +without his having done anything either good or bad to deserve his fall. +There he is minister, however; Minister of the Interior, and who knows? +in a fair way, perhaps, to be swept by some favorable wind to the post +of President of the Council; while not so very long ago to have been +made sub-prefect of the first class, would have surpassed the wildest +visions of his youth. In Monsieur Claretie's romance it is the old +Member of Parliament, Collard--of Nantes--converted late in life to +Republicanism, who chose the provincial Vaudrey for his Minister of the +Interior; this may, with equal probability be Marshal MacMahon._ + +_"In Monsieur Claretie's romance, _Monsieur le Ministre_ is of the Left +Centre or the so-called Moderate Party, he is therefore on the side of +Law and Order. He enters into the Cabinet with the determination to +reform every abuse, to recast everything; to seek for honest men, to +make merit and not faction, the touchstone of advancement. In short, to +apply in his political life the glorious principles which--and the noble +maxims that--He is only, however, forty-eight hours in office when he +becomes quite demoralized, paralyzed and stultified for the rest of his +ministerial life. It is the phenomenon of crushing demoralization and of +complete enervation of which the public, from the situation in which it +is placed, sees only the results of which Monsieur Claretie, with a +skilful hand describes for us the mechanism and the cause. This Minister +of State, supposed to be omnipotent in office, has not even the power to +choose an undersecretary of State for himself. The Minister who only the +day before, from his seat upon one of the benches of the Opposition, sat +with his head held aloft, his long body erect, with rigid dignity, as if +made of triple brass, cannot now take the initiative in the appointment +of a '_garde champetre_.' His undersecretaries of State, his _gardes +champetres_, he himself, his whole environment, in fact, are only +painted dummies and the meek puppets that a director of the staff, a +chief of a division, or a chief of a bureau sets in motion, to the tune +he grinds out of his hand-organ, or moves them about at his will like +pawns upon a chess-board. The Minister will read with smiling confidence +the reports by which his subordinates who are his masters, inform +him--what no one until then had thought of--that he has been called by +the voice of the nation to his high office, and that he can in future +count upon the entire and complete confidence of the country. To please +these obliging persons, the hangers-on of governments that he has passed +a quarter of his life infighting against and whom he will call gravely, +and upon certain occasions, very drolly, the hierarchy, he will betray +without any scruples all those whose disinterested efforts and great +sacrifices have brought about the triumph of the cause which he +represents._ + +_"Monsieur le Ministre is from the Provinces! You understand. Solemn and +pedantic, if his youth has been passed upon the banks of the Isere, a +puppy with his muzzle held aloft and giddy, if Garonne has nourished +him, broad faced and vulgarly pedantic if his cradle has been rocked in +upper Limousin. But whether he comes from Correze, from Garonne or +Isere, it is always as a Provincial that he arrives in Paris, the air of +which intoxicates him. He is in the same situation and carries with him +the same sentiments as Monsieur Jourdain when invited to visit the +Countess Dorimene. For the first adventuress who comes along, a born +princess who has strayed into a house of ill fame, or one who frequents +such a house, who masquerades as a princess in her coquettish house in +Rue Bremontier, he will forsake father, mother, children, state +documents, cabinet, councils, Chamber of Deputies, everything in fact. +He will break away from his young wife who has grown up under his eyes +in the same town with him, among all the sweet domestic graces, moulded +amid all the fresh and sapid delicacies of the provinces, but pshaw! too +provincial for a noble of his importance, and he will go in pursuit of +some flower, no matter what, be it only redolent of Parisian patchouli. +He will break the heart of the one, while for the other, he will bring +before the councils of administration suspected schemes, blackmailings, +concessions, treachery and ruin. Monsieur Claretie had shown us the +Vaudrey of his romance involved in all these degradations, although he +has checked him as to some, and in his novel, at least, with due +submission to the exalted truth of art, he has not shrunk from punishing +this false, great man and pretended tribune of the people, by the very +vices he espoused._ + +_"I do not stop to inquire if even in the story, Monsieur Claretie's +'Marianne Kayser' is frequently self-contradictory, and if in some +features I clearly recognize his Guy de Lissac; two characters that play +an important part in the narrative! But after all, what does it matter? +It suffices for me that his Excellency the Minister and all his +Excellency's entourage are fully grasped and clearly described. Granet, +the low _intriguer_ of the lobbies; Molina, the stock-company cut-throat +and Bourse ruffian; Ramel, the melancholy and redoubtable publicist, who +has made emperors without himself desiring to become one, who will die +in the neighborhood of Montmartre and the Batignolles, forgotten but +proud, poor, and unsullied by money, true to his ideals, among the +ingrates enriched by his journal and who have reached the summit only by +the influence of his authority with the public; Denis Garnier, the +Parisian workman who has had an experience of the hulks as the result of +imbibing too freely of sentimental prose and of lending too ready an ear +to the golden speech of some tavern demagogue, who has now had enough of +politics and who scarcely troubles to think what former retailer of +treasonable language, what Gracchus of the sidewalk may be minister, +Vaudrey or Pichereau, or even Granet: all these types are separately +analyzed and vigorously generalized. Monsieur Claretie designated no one +in particular but we elbow the characters in his book every day of our +lives. He has, moreover, written a book of a robust and healthy novelty. +The picture of the greenroom of the Ballet with which the tale opens and +where we are introduced in the most natural way possible to nearly all +the characters that play a part in the story of Vaudrey is masterly in +execution and intention. It is Balzac, but Balzac toned down and more +limpid."_ + +_I will stop here at the greenroom of the Ballet commended by Monsieur +J.-J. Weiss, to give a slight sketch, clever as a drawing by Saint' Aubin +or a lithograph by Gavarni, which Monsieur Ludovic Halevy has +contributed to a journal and in which he also praises the romance that +the _feuilletoniste_ of the _Debats_ has criticized with an authority so +discriminating and a benevolence so profound._ + +_It was very agreeable for me to observe that such a thorough Parisian +as the shrewd and witty author of _Les Petites Cardinal_ should find +that the Opera--which certainly plays a role in our politics--had been +sufficiently well portrayed by the author of _Monsieur le Ministre_. And +upon this, the first chapter of my book, Monsieur Ludovic Halevy adds, +moreover, some special and piquant details which are well worth +quoting:_ + +_"That which gave me very great pleasure in this tale of a man of +politics is that politics really have little, very little place in the +novel; it is love that dominates it and in the most despotic and +pleasant way possible. This great man of Grenoble who arrives at Paris +in order to reform everything, repair everything, elevate everything, +falls at once under the sway of a most charming Parisian adventuress. +See Sulpice Vaudrey the slave of Marianne. Marianne's gray eyes never +leave him--But she in her turn meets her master--and Marianne's master +is Adolphe Gochard, a horrid Parisian blackguard--who is so much her +master that, after all, the real hero of the romance is Adolphe Gochard. +Such is the secret philosophy of this brilliant and ingenious romance._ + +_"I have, however, a little quarrel on my own account with Monsieur +Jules Claretie. Nothing can be more brilliantly original than the +introductory chapter of _Monsieur le Ministre_. Sulpice Vaudrey makes +his first appearance behind the scenes of the Opera, and from the sides +of the stage, in the stage boxes, opera-glasses are turned upon him, and +he hears whispered:_ + +_"'It is the new Minister of the Interior.'_ + +_"'Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?'_ + +_"'Yes, Monsieur Vaudrey--'_ + +_"In short, the appearance of his Excellency creates a sensation, and it +is against this statement that I protest. I go frequently to the Opera, +very frequently. During the last ten years I have seen defile before me +in the wings, at least fifty Ministers of State, all just freshly ground +out. Curiosity had brought them there and the desire to see the dancers +at close quarters, and also the vague hope that by exhibiting themselves +there in all their glory, they would create a sensation in this little +world._ + +_"Well, this hope of theirs was never realized. Nobody took the trouble +to look at them. A minister nowadays is nobody of importance. Formerly +to rise to such a position, to take in hand the reins of one of the +great departments, it was necessary to have a certain exterior, a +certain prominence, something of a past--to be a Monsieur Thiers, +Monsieur Guizot, Monsieur Mole, Monsieur de Remusat, Monsieur Villemain, +Monsieur Duchatel, Monsieur de Falloux or Monsieur de Broglie--that is +to say, an orator, an author, a historian, somebody in fact. But +nowadays, all that is necessary to be a minister is the votes of certain +little combinations of groups and subsidiary groups, who all expect a +share of the spoils. Therefore we are ruled by certain personages +illustrious perhaps at Gap or at Montelimar but who are quite unknown in +the genealogical records of the Boulevard Haussmann. Why should you +imagine that public attention would be attracted by news like this:_ + +_"'Look!--There is Monsieur X, or Monsieur Y, or Monsieur Z.'_ + +_"One person only during these last years ever succeeded in attracting +the attention of the songstresses and ballet-girls of the Opera. And +that was Gambetta. Ah! when he came to claim Monsieur Vaucorbeil's +hospitality, it was useless to crouch behind the cherry-colored silk +curtains of the manager's box, many glances were directed toward him, +and many prowling curiosities were awakened in the vicinity of the +manager's box. Little lassies of ten or twelve came and seized your +hand, saying:_ + +_"'Please, monsieur, point out Monsieur Gambetta to me--he is here--I +would so much like to see him.'_ + +_"And then Gambetta was pointed out to them during the entr'acte--after +which, delighted, they went off caracoling and pirouetting behind the +scenes:_ + +_"'You did not see Monsieur Gambetta, but I saw him!'_ + +_"This was popularity--and it must be confessed that only one man in +France to-day receives such marks of it. This man is Gambetta._ + +_"Meanwhile Claretie's minister continues his walk through the corridors +of the Opera house. He reaches the greenroom of the ballet at last and +exclaims:_ + +_"'And that is all!'_ + +_"Alas, yes, your Excellency, that is all!--"_ + +_And everything is only a _"that is all,"_ in this world. If one should +set himself carefully to weigh power or fame,--power, that force of +which Girardin said, however: "I would give fifty years of glory for one +hour of power,"--even if one tilted the scale, one would not find the +weight very considerable._ + +_It would be necessary to have the resounding renown of a personality +like that one who, if I am to believe Monsieur Halevy, alone enjoyed the +privilege of revolutionizing the foyer of the ballet, in order to boast +of having been someone, or of having accomplished something._ + +_A rather witty skeptic once said to a friend of his who had just been +appointed minister:_ + +_"My dear fellow, permit me as a practical man to ask you not to engage +in too many affairs. Events in this world are accomplished without much +meddling. If you attempt to do something to-day, everyone will cry out: +'What! he is going to demolish everything!' If you do nothing, they will +cry: 'What! he does not budge! If I were minister, which God forbid, I +would say nothing--and let others act--I would do nothing--and let +others talk.'"_ + +_Everybody, very fortunately--and all ministers do not reason like this +jester. But the truth is that it is very difficult for an honest man in +the midst of political entanglements as Vaudrey was, to realize his +dream. When opportunities arise--those opportunities that march only at +a snail's pace--one is not allowed to make use of them, they are +snatched from one. They arrive, only to take wings again. And in those +posts of daily combat, one has not only against one the enemies who +attack one openly, which would be but a slight matter, a touch with a +goad or a prick of the spur, at most--but one has to contend with +friends who compromise, and servants who serve one badly._ + +_Every man who occupies an office, whatever it may be, has for his +adversaries those who covet it, those who regret it, those who have once +filled it, and those who desire to fill it. What assaults too! Against a +successful rival, there is no infamy too base, no mine too deep, no +villainy too cruel, no lie too poisoned to be made use of--and the +minister, his Excellency, is like a hostage to Power._ + +_And yet one more point, it is not in his enemies or his calumniators +that his danger lies. The real, absolute evil is in the system of +routine and ill-will which attack the statesmen of probity. It will be +seen from these pages that there is a warning bell destined, alas! to +keep away from those in power the messengers who would bring them the +truth from outside, the unwelcome and much dreaded truth._ + +_The novel may sometimes be this stroke of the bell,--a stroke honest +and useful,--a disinterested _warner,_ and I have striven to make +_Monsieur le Ministre_ precisely that, in a small degree, for the +political world. I have essayed to paint this hell paved with some of +the good intentions. The success which greeted the appearance of this +book, might justify me in believing that I have succeeded in my task. I +trust that it will enjoy under its new form--so flattering to an author, +that an editor-artist is pleased to give it,--the success achieved under +its first form._ + +__Monsieur le Ministre_ is connected with more than one recollection of my +life. I was called upon one day to follow to his last resting-place--and +it is on an occasion like this that one discovers more readily and +perceives more clearly life's ironies--one of those men "who do nothing +but create other men," a journalist. It was bitterly cold and we stood +before the open grave, just in front of a railway embankment, in an out +of the way cemetery of Saint-Ouen,--the cemetery called _Cayenne,_ +because the dead are "deported" thither. We were but four faithful +ones. Yes, four, but amongst these four must be included a young man, +bare-headed and wearing the uniform of an officer, who stood by the +deceased man's son._ + +_Whilst one of us bade the last farewell to the departed on the brink of +the grave, the scream of the railway engine cut short his words, and +seemed to hiss for the last time the fate of the vanquished man lying +there. As we were quitting the cemetery, a worthy man, a song-writer, +observed to me: "Well, if all those whom Leon Plee helped during his +lifetime had remembered him when he was dead, this little _Campo Santo_ +of Saint-Ouen would not have been large enough to hold them all!"_ + +_Doubtless. But they did not remember him._ + +_And from the contrast between the shabby obsequies of the old +journalist and the solemn pomp of that of the funeral service of the +four days' minister came the idea of my book. It seemed to me that here +was an appropriate idea and a useful reparation. Art has nothing to +lose--rather the contrary, when it devotes itself to militant tasks._ + +_Ah! I forgot--When one mentions to-day the name of this illustrious +minister whose funeral convoy was in its day one of the great spectacles +of Paris, and one of the great surprises to those who know how difficult +it is for a minister to die in office--like the Spartan still grasping +his shield--those best informed, shaking their heads solemnly will say:_ + +_"Ricard?--Oh! he had great talent, Ricard--I saw lately a portrait of +Paul de Musset by him--It is superb!"_ + +_They confound him with the painter to whom no statue has been erected, +but whose works remain._ + +_Be, then, a Cabinet Minister!_ + +_JULES CLARETIE._ + +_Viroflay, September 1, 1886._ + + + + +HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER + +PART FIRST + +I + + +The third act of L'Africaine had just come to a close. + +The minister, on leaving the manager's box, said smilingly, like a man +glad to be rid of the cares of State: "Let us go to the greenroom, +Granet, shall we?" + +"Let us go to the greenroom, as your Excellency proposes!" + +They were obliged to cross the immense stage where the stage carpenters +were busy with the stage accessories as sailors with the equipment of a +vessel; and men in evening dress, with white ties, looked natty without +their greatcoats, and with opera hats on their heads were going to and +fro, picking their way amongst the ropes and other impedimenta which +littered the stage, on their way to the greenroom of the ballet. + +They had come here from all parts of the house, from the stalls and +boxes; most of them humming as they went the air from Nelusko's ballad, +walking lightly as habitues through the species of antechamber which +separates the body of the house from the stage. + +A servant wearing a white cravat, was seated at a table writing down +upon a sheet of paper the names of those who came in. One side of this +sheet bore a headline reading: _Messieurs_, and the other _Medecin_, in +two columns. From time to time this man would get up from his chair to +bow respectfully to some official personage whom he recognized. + +"Have you seen Monsieur Vaudrey come in yet, Louis?" asked a still young +man with a monocle in his eye, who seemed quite at home behind the +scenes. + +"His Excellency is in the manager's box, monsieur!" answered the servant +civilly. + +"Thank you, Louis!" + +And as the visitor turned to go up the narrow stairway leading to the +greenroom, the servant wrote down in the running-hand of a clerk, upon +the printed sheet: _Monsieur Guy de Lissac_. + +Upon the stage, Vaudrey, the Minister whom Lissac had been inquiring +for, stood arm in arm with his companion Granet, looking in astonishment +at the vast machinery of the opera, operated by this army of workmen, +whom he did not know. He was quite astonished at the sight, as he had +never beheld its like. His astonishment was so evident and artless that +Granet, his friend and colleague in the Chamber of Deputies, could not +help smiling at it from under his carefully waxed moustaches. + +"I consider all this much more wonderful than the opera itself," +observed his Excellency. The floor and wings were like great yellow +spots, and the whole immense stage resembled a great, sandy desert. +Vaudrey raised his head to gaze at the symmetrical arrangement of the +chandeliers, as bright as rows of gas-jets, amongst the hangings of the +friezes. A huge canvas at the back represented a sunlit Indian +landscape, and in the enormous space between the lowered curtain and the +scenery, some black spots seemed as if dancing, strange silhouettes of +the visitors in their dress clothes, standing out clearly against the +yellow background like the shadows of Chinese figures. + +"It is very amusing; but let us see the greenroom," said the minister. +"You are familiar with the greenroom, Granet?" + +"I am a Parisian," returned the deputy, without too great an emphasis; +but the ironical smile which accompanied his words made Vaudrey +understand that his colleague looked upon his Excellency as fresh from +the province and still smacking of its manners. + +Sulpice hesitatingly crossed the stage in the midst of a hubbub like +that of a man-of-war getting ready for action, caused by the methodical +destruction and removal of the scenery comprising the huge ship used in +_L'Africaine_ by a swarm of workmen in blue vests, yelling and shoving +quickly before them, or carrying away sections of masts and parts of +ladders, hurrying out of sight by way of trap-doors and man-holes, this +carcass of a work of art; this spectacle of a great swarm of human ants, +running hither and thither, pulling and tugging at this immense piece of +stage decoration, in the vast frame capable of holding at one and the +same time, a cathedral and a factory, was rather awe-inspiring to the +statesman, who stopped short to look at it, while the tails of his coat +brushed against the fallen curtain. + +From both sides of the stage, from the stage-boxes, opera-glasses were +turned upon him here and there and a murmur like a breeze came wafted +towards him. + +"It is the new Minister of the Interior!" + +"Nonsense! Monsieur Vaudrey?" + +"Monsieur Vaudrey." + +Vaudrey proudly drew himself up under the battery of opera-glasses +levelled at him, while Granet, smiling, said to the master of the chorus +who, dressed in a black coat, stood near him: + +"It can be easily seen that this is his first visit here!" + +Oh! yes, truly, it was the first time that the new minister had set his +foot in the wings of the Opera! He relished it with all the curiosity of +a youth and the gusto of a collegian. How fortunate that he had not +brought Madame Vaudrey, who was slightly indisposed. This rapid survey +of a world unknown to him, had the flavor of an escapade. There was a +little spice in this amusing adventure. + +Behind the canvas in the rear, some musicians, costumed as Brahmins, +with spectacles on their noses, the better to decipher their score, +fingered their brass instruments with a weary air, rocking them like +infants in swaddling clothes. Actors in the garb of Indians, with +painted cheeks, and legs encased in chocolate-colored bandages, were +yawning, weary and flabby, and stretching themselves while awaiting the +time for them to present themselves upon the stage. Others, dressed like +soldiers, were sleeping on the wooden benches against the walls, their +mouths open, their helmets drawn down over their noses like visors. +Others, their pikes serving them for canes, had taken off their headgear +and placed it at their feet, the better to rest their heads against the +wall, where they leaned with their eyes shut. + +Little girls, all of them thin, and in short skirts, were already +pirouetting, and humming airs. Older girls stood about with their legs +crossed, or, half-stooping, displayed their bosoms while retying the +laces of their pink shoes. Others, wearing a kind of Siamese headdress +with ornaments of gold, were laughing and clashing together their little +silver cymbals. Awkward fellows with false beards, dressed like high +priests in robes of yellow, striped with red, elbowed past and jostled +against the girls quite unceremoniously. An usher, dressed a la +Francaise, and wearing a chain around his neck, paced, grave and +melancholy, amongst these shameless young girls. + +The greenroom at the end of the stage was entered through a large +vestibule hung with curtains of grayish velvet shot with violet, and at +the top of the steps where some men in dress-clothes were talking to +ballet-girls, Vaudrey could see in the great salon beyond, blazing with +light, groups of half-nude women surrounded by men, resembling, in their +black clothes, beetles crawling about roses, the whole company reflected +in a flood of light, in an immense mirror that covered one end of the +room. Little by little, Vaudrey could make out above the paintings +representing ancient dances, and the portraits by Camargo or Noverre, a +confusion of gaudy skirts, pink legs, white shoulders, with the +ubiquitous black coats sprinkled about here and there amongst these +bright colors like large blots of ink upon ball-dresses. + +Sulpice had often heard the greenroom of the ballet spoken about, and he +was at once completely disillusioned. The glaring, brutal light +ruthlessly exposed the worn and faded hangings; and the pretty girls in +their full, short, gauzy petticoats, with their bare arms, smiling and +twisting about, their satin-shod feet resting upon gray velvet +footstools, seemed to him, as they occupied the slanting floor, to move +in a cloud of dust, and to be robbed of all naturalness and freshness. + +"And is this all?" the minister exclaimed almost involuntarily. + +"What!" answered Granet, "you seem hard to please!" + +Amongst all these girls, there had been manifested an expression of +mingled curiosity, coquetry and banter on Vaudrey's appearance in their +midst. His presence in the manager's box had been noticed and his coming +to the greenroom expected. Every one had hurried thither. Sulpice was +pointed out. He was the cynosure of all eyes. On the divans beneath the +mirror, some young, well-dressed, bald men, surrounded--perhaps by +chance--by laughing ballet-girls, now half-concealed themselves behind +the voluminous skirts of the girls about them, and bent their heads, +thus rendering their baldness more visible, just as a woman buries her +nose in her bouquet to avoid recognizing an acquaintance. + +Vaudrey, observing this ruse, smiled a slight, sarcastic smile. He +recognized behind the shielding petticoats, some of his prefects, those +from the environs of Paris, come from Versailles and Chartres, or from +some sub-prefectures, and gallantly administering the affairs of France +from the heart of the greenroom. Amiable functionaries of the Ministry +of Fine Arts also came here to study aestheticism between the acts. + +All members of the different regimes seemed to be fraternizing in +ironical promiscuousness here, and Vaudrey in a whisper drew Granet's +attention to this. Old beaux of the time of the Empire, with dyed and +waxed moustaches, with dyed or grizzled hair flattened on their temples, +their flabby cheeks cut across by stiff collars as jelly is cut by a +knife, were hobnobbing, fat and lean, with young fops of the Republic, +who with their sharp eyes, wide-open nostrils, their cheeks covered with +brown or flaxen down, their hair carefully brushed, or already bald, +seemed quite surprised to find themselves in such a place, and chattered +and cackled among themselves like beardless conscripts, perverted and +immoral but with some scruples still remaining and less cunning than +these well-dressed old roues standing firmly at their posts like +veterans. + +"The licentiates and the pensioners," whispered Vaudrey. + +"You have a quickness of sight quite Parisian, your Excellency," +returned Granet. + +"There are Parisians in the Provinces, my dear Granet," replied Sulpice +with a heightened complexion, his blood flowing more rapidly than usual, +due to emotions at once novel and gay. + +"Ah! your Excellency," exclaimed a fat, animated man with hair and +whiskers of quite snowy whiteness, and smiling as he spoke, "what in the +world brought you here?" + +He approached Vaudrey, bowing but not at all obsequiously, with the air +of good humor due to a combination of wealth and embonpoint. Fat and +rich, in perfect health, and carrying his sixty years with the +lightness of forty, Molina--Molina the "Tumbler" as he was +nicknamed--spent his afternoons on the Bourse and his evenings in the +greenroom of the ballet. + +He had a small interest in the theatre, but a large one in the +coryphees, in a paternal way, his white hair giving him the right to be +respected and his crowns the right to respect nothing. Beginning life +very low down, and now enjoying a lofty position, the fat Molina haunted +the Bourse and the greenroom of the Opera. He glutted himself with all +the earliest delicacies of the season, like a man who when young, has +not always had enough to satisfy hunger. + +Pictures that were famous, women of fashion, statues of marble and fair +flesh, he must have them all. He collected, without any taste whatever, +costly paintings, rare objects; he bought without love, girls who were +not wholly mercenary. At a pinch he found them, taking pleasure in +parading in his coupe, around the lake or at the races, some recruit in +vice, and in watching the crowd that at once eagerly surrounded her, +simply because she had been the mistress of the fat Molina. He had in +his youth at Marseilles, in the Jewish quarter of the town, sold old +clothes to the Piedmontese and sailors in port. Now it was his delight +to behold the Parisians of the Boulevard or the clubs buy as sentimental +rags the cast-off garments of his passion. + +"You in the greenroom of the ballet, your Excellency?" continued the +financier. "Ah! upon my word, I shall tell Madame Vaudrey." + +Sulpice smiled, the mere name of his wife sounded strange to his ears in +a place like this. It seemed to him that in speaking of her, she was +being dragged into a strange circle, and one which did not belong to +her. He had felt the same only a few days before upon his entrance into +the cabinet, on seeing a report of his marriage, his dwelling minutely +described, and a pen portrait of that Adrienne, who was the passion of +his life. + +"After all," continued Molina, "Madame Vaudrey must get used to it. The +Opera! Why, it is a part of politics! The key of many a situation is to +be found in the greenroom!" + +The financier laughed merrily, a laugh that had the ring of the +Turcarets' jingling crowns. + +He went on to explain to his Excellency all the little mysteries of the +greenroom, as a man quite at home in this little Parisian province, and +lightly, by a word, a gesture even, he gave the minister a rapid +biography of the young girls who were laughing, jesting, romping there +before them; flitting hither and thither lightly across the boards, +barely touching them with the tips of their pink satin-shod feet. + +Sulpice was surprised at everything he saw. He did not even take the +pains to conceal his surprise. Evidently it was his first visit behind +the scenes. + +"Ah! your Excellency," said Molina, delighted with his role of +cicerone, "it is necessary to be at home here! You should come here +often! Nothing in the world can be more amusing. Here behind the scenes +is a world by itself. One can see pretty little lasses springing up like +asparagus. One sees running hither and thither a tall, thin child who +nods to you saucily and crunches nuts like a squirrel. One takes a three +months' journey, and passes a season at Vichy or at Dieppe, and when one +returns, presto! see the transformation. The butterfly has burst forth +from its cocoon. No longer a little girl, but a woman. Those saucy eyes +of old now look at you with an expression which disturbs your heart. One +might have offered, six months before, two sous' worth of chestnuts to +the child; now, however, nothing less than a coupe will satisfy the +woman. It used to jump on your knee at that time, now every one is +throwing his arms around its pretty neck. Thus from generation to +generation, one assists at the mobilization of a whole army of recruits, +who first try their weapons here, pass from here into the regiment of +veterans, build themselves a hospital in cut-stone out of their savings, +and some of them mount very high through the tips of their toes if they +are not suddenly attacked by _the malady of the knee_." + +"Malady of the knee?" inquired Vaudrey. + +"A phrase not to be found in the _Dictionary of Political Economy_ by +Maurice Block. It is a way of saying that ill-luck has overtaken one. A +very interesting condition, this malady of the knee! It often not only +shortens the leg but the career!" + +"Is this malady a frequent one at the Opera?" + +"Ah! your Excellency, how can it be helped? There are so many slips in +this pirouetting business! It is as risky as politics!" + +Fat Molina shouted with laughter at this clumsy jest, and placing a +binocle upon his huge nose, which was cleft down the middle like that of +a hunting-hound, he exclaimed suddenly, turning towards the door as he +spoke: + +"Eh! Marie Launay? What is she holding in her hand?" + +Light, nimble and graceful in her costume of a Hindoo dancing girl, a +young girl of sixteen or seventeen summers, already betraying her +womanhood in the ardent glances half-hidden in the depths of her large, +deep-blue eyes, tripped into the greenroom, humming an air and holding +in her hand a long sheet of paper. + +She shook, as if embarrassed by it, the broad necklace of large +imitation pearls that danced on her fine neck and fell on her +undeveloped bosom; and looking in search of some one among the crowd of +girls, cried out from a distance to a plump little brunette who was +talking and laughing within a circle of dress-coats at the other end of +the room: + +"Eh! Anna, you have not subscribed yet!" + +The brunette, freeing herself unceremoniously enough from her living +madrigals, came running lightly up to Marie Launay, who held out towards +her an aluminum pencil-case and the sheet of paper. + +"What the devil is that?" asked Molina. + +"Let us go and see," said Granet. + +"Would it not be an indiscretion on our part?" asked Vaudrey, half +seriously. + +The financier, however, was by this time at the side of the two pretty +girls, and asked the blonde what the paper contained, the names on which +her companion was spelling out. + +Marie Launay, a lovely girl with little ringlets of fair hair curling +low down upon her forehead, smiled like a pretty, innocent and still +timid child, under the luring glances of the fat man, and glancing with +an expression of virgin innocence at Sulpice and Granet, who were +standing beside him, replied: + +"That--Oh! that is the subscription we are getting up for Mademoiselle +Legrand." + +"Oh! that is so," said Molina. "You mean to make her a present of a +statuette?" + +"On her taking her leave of us. Yes, every one has subscribed to +it--even the boxholders. Do you see?" + +Marie Launay quickly snatched the paper from her friend; on it were +several names, some written in ink, others in pencil, the whole +presenting the peculiar appearance of schoolboys' pot-hooks or the +graceful lines traced by crawling flies, while the fantastic spelling +offered a strange medley. Molina burst out laughing, his ever-present +laugh that sounded like the shaking of a money-bag,--when he ran his eye +over the list and found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and +members of the chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitues. + +"Look! your Excellency--It is stupendous! Here: _Amelie Dunois_, 2 +francs. _Jeanne Garnot_, 5 francs. _Bel-Enfant_--_Charles_--, 1 fr., 50 +centimes. _Warnier I._, 2 francs. _Warnier II._, 2 francs. _Gigonnet_, 4 +francs. _Baron Humann_, 100 francs. _The baron_!--the former prefect! +Humann writing his name down here with _Bel-Enfant_ and _Gigonnet_. +Humann inscribing above his signature--_I vill supscribe von +hundertfranc_! If one were to see it in a newspaper, one would not +believe it! If only a reporter were here now! For a choice _Paris echo_ +what a rare one it would be!" + +Granet examined little Marie Launay with sly glances, toying with his +black moustache the while, and the other young girl Anna, very much +confused at the coarse laughter of Molina the "Tumbler," kept turning +around in her slender fingers the aluminum pencil-case and looking at +Marie as much as to say: + +"You know I can never muster up courage to write down my name before all +these people!" + +"Lend me your pencil, my child," Molina said to her. + +She held it out towards him timidly. + +"Where the baron has led the way, Molina the Tumbler may certainly +follow!" said the financier. + +He turned the screw of the pencil-case to extend the lead, and placing +one of his huge feet upon a divan to steady himself, wrote rapidly with +the paper on his knee, as a man used to scribbling notes at the Bourse: + +"Solomon Molina, 500 francs." + +"Ah! monsieur," exclaimed Marie Launay upon reading it, "that is +handsome, that is! It is kind, very kind! If everybody were as generous +as you, we could give a statue of Terpsichore in gold to Mademoiselle +Legrand." + +"If you should ever want one of Carpeaux's groups for yourself, my +child," said Molina, "you may go to the studio in a cab to look at it, +and fetch it away with you in--your own coupe." + +The girl grew as red as a cherry under her powder, even her graceful, +childish shoulders turned pink, enhancing her blonde and childlike +beauty. + +Vaudrey was conscious of a strange and subtle charm in this intoxicating +circle,--a charm full of temptations which made him secretly uneasy. +There passed before his eyes visions of other days, he beheld the +phantoms of gay dresses, the apparitions of spring landscapes, he felt +the breezes of youth, laden with the scents of the upspringing grass, +the lilacs at Meudon, the violets of Ville-d'Avray, the souvenirs of the +escapades of his student days. Their short, full skirts reminded him of +white frocks that whisked gayly around the hazel-trees long ago, those +ballet-girls bore a striking resemblance to the pink and white grisettes +that he had flirted with when he was twenty. + +He extended his hand in turn towards the sheet of paper to which Molina +had just signed his name, saying to Marie Launay as he did so: + +"Let me have it, if you please, mademoiselle." + +Granet began to laugh. + +"Ah! ah!" he cried, "you are really going to write down under Monsieur +Gigonnet's signature the name of the Minister of the Interior?" + +"Oh! bless me!" said Vaudrey, laughing, "that is true! You will believe +it or not as you please, but I quite forgot that I was a minister." + +"It was the same with me when I was decorated," said Molina. "I would +not receive my great-coat from box-openers because I saw the morsel of +red ribbon hanging on it, and I was sure the garment was not mine. But +one grows used to it after a while! Now," and his laugh with the +hundred-sou piece ring grew louder than ever, "I am really quite +surprised not to find the rosette of red ribbon sticking to my flannel +waistcoats." + +Vaudrey left Marie Launay, greatly to her surprise, and listened to +Molina's chronicles of the ballet. + +Ah! if his Excellency had but the time, he would have seen the funniest +things. For instance, there was amongst the dancers a marble cutter, who +during the day sold and cut his gravestones and came here at night to +grin and caper in the ballet. He was on the scent of every funeral from +the Opera; he would get orders for tombstones between two dances at the +rehearsals. One day Molina had been present at one of these. It seems +incredible, but there was a bank clerk in a gray coat, a three-cornered +hat upon his head and a brass buckler on his arm, who sacrificed to +Venus in the interval between his two occupations, dancing with the +coryphees; a dancer by night and a receiver of money by day. A girl was +rehearsing beside him, in black bands and skirt. Then Molina, +astonished, inquired who she might be. He was told that it was a girl in +mourning, whose mother had just died. The Opera is a fine stage upon +which to behold the ironies and contrasts of life. + +The financier might have related to Sulpice Vaudrey a description of a +journey to Timbuctoo and have found him less amused and less interested +than now. It was a world new and strange to him, attractive, and as +exciting as acid to this man, still young, whose success had been +achieved by unstinted labors, and who knew Paris only by what he had +learned of it years ago, when a law student: the pit of the Comedie +Francaise, the Luxembourg galleries and those of the Louvre, the Public +Libraries, the Hall of Archives, the balls in the Latin Quarter, the +holidays and the foyer of the Opera once or twice on the occasion of a +masked ball. And, besides that?--Nothing. That was all. + +The great man from Grenoble arrived in Paris with his appetite whetted +for the life of the city, and now he was here, suddenly plunged into the +greenroom of the ballet, and all eyes were turned towards him, almost +frightened as he was, on catching a glimpse of his own image reflected +in the huge mirror glittering under the numerous lights, in the heart of +this strange salon and surrounded by half-clad dancing girls. Then, too, +everybody was looking at him, quizzing him, shrinking from him through +timidity or running after him through interest. The new Minister of +State! The chief of all the personnel of prefects, under-prefects, and +secretaries-general represented there, lolling on these velvet divans in +this vulgar greenroom. + +All the glances, all the whisperings of the women, the frowns of his +enemies, the cringing attitudes of dandified hangers-on, were making +Vaudrey feel very uncomfortable, when to his great relief he suddenly +observed coming towards him, peering hither and thither through his +monocle, evidently in search of some one, Guy de Lissac, who immediately +on catching sight of Vaudrey came towards him, greeting him with evident +cordiality, tinged, however, with a proper reserve. + +Sulpice was not long in breaking through this reserve. He hurried up to +Guy, and seizing him by the hand, cried gayly: + +"Do you know that I have been expecting this visit! You are the only +one of my friends who has not yet congratulated me!" + +"You know, my dear Minister," returned Guy in the same tone, "that it is +really not such a great piece of luck to be made Minister that every one +of your friends should be expected to fall upon your neck, crying bravo! +You have mounted up to the capitol, but after all, the capitol is not +such a very cheerful place, that I should illuminate _a giorno_. I am +happy, however, if you are. I congratulate you, if you wash your hands +of it, and that is all." + +"You and my old friend Ramel," answered Sulpice, "are the two most +original men that I know." + +"With this difference however, Ramel is a Puritan, an ancient, a man of +marble, and I am a _boulevardier_ and a skeptic. He is a man of +bronze--your Ramel! And your friend Lissac of _simili-bronze_! The proof +of it is that I have been seeking you for half the evening to ask you to +do me a favor." + +"What favor, my dear fellow?" cried Vaudrey, his face lighting up with +joy. "Anything in the world to please you." + +"I was in Madame Marsy's box,--you do not know Madame Marsy? She is a +great admirer of yours and makes a point to applaud you in the Chamber. +She has prayed for your advent. She saw you in the manager's box a while +ago, and she has asked me to present you to her, or rather, to present +her to you, for I presume for your Excellency the ceremony is +modified." + +"Madame Marsy!" said Vaudrey. "Is she not an artist's widow? Her salon +is a political centre, is it not?" + +"Exactly. A recent salon opened in opposition to that of Madame Evan. An +Athenian Republic! You do not object to that?" + +"On the contrary! A republic cannot be founded without the aid of +women." + +"Ah!" cried Lissac, laughing. "Politics and honors have not changed you, +I see." + +"Changed me? With the exception that I have twenty years over my head, +and alas! not so much hair as I had then upon it, I am the same as I was +in 1860." + +"_Hotel Racine! Rue Racine!_" said Lissac. "In those days, I dreamed of +being Musset, I a gourmand, and what have I become? A spectator, a +trifler, a Parisian, a rolling stone.--Nothing. And you who dreamed of +being a second Barnave, Vergniaud or Barbaroux, your dream is realized." + +"Realized!" said Vaudrey. + +He made an effort to shake his head deprecatingly as if his vanity were +not flattered by those honeyed words of his friend; but his glance +displayed such sincere delight and so strong a desire to be effusive and +in evidence, that he could not repress a smile upon hearing from the +companion of his youth, such a confirmation of his triumph. They are +our most severe critics, these friends of our youth, they who have +listened to the stammering of our hopes and dreams of the future. And +when at length we have conquered the future, these are often the very +ones to rob us of it! Lissac, however, was not one of these envious +ones. + +"Let us go to Madame Marsy's box, my dear Guy," said Sulpice. "The more +so because if she at all resembles her portrait at the last Salon, she +must be lovely indeed." + +He left the greenroom, leaning on the arm of Lissac, after throwing a +glance backward, however, at the girls whirling about there, and where +in the presence of their stiff, ancient superiors, the young +sub-prefects still hid their faces behind their opera hats. Granet with +Molina went to take leave of Vaudrey, leaving little Marie Launay +smiling artlessly because the financier, the _Tumbler_, had said to her, +in drawing down her eyelids with his coarse finger: "Will you close your +periwinkles--you _kid_?" + +"Your Excellency," the banker had said, cajoling his Excellency with his +meaning glance, "I am always at your orders you know." + +"To-morrow, at the Prisons' Commission, Monsieur le Ministre," said +Granet. And amid salutations on every side Vaudrey withdrew, smiling and +good-humored as usual. + +In order to reach the box, Vaudrey had to cross the stage. The new scene +was set. Buddhist temples with their grotesque shapes and huge statues +stood out against a background of vivid blue sky, and on the canvas +beyond, great pink flowers glowed amid refreshing verdure. Over all fell +a soft fairy-like light from an electric lamp, casting on the floor a +fantastic gleam, soft and clear as the rays of the moon. Sulpice smiled +as he passed beneath this flood of light and saw his shadow projected +before him as upon the glassy waters of a lake. It seemed to him that +this sudden illumination, a sort of fantastic apotheosis as it were, was +like the fairy-like aureole that attended his progress. + +At the very moment of leaving the greenroom, Sulpice had jostled +accidentally against a man of very grave aspect wearing a black coat +closely buttoned. He was almost bald save for some long, thin, gray +locks that hung about his huge ears, his cheeks had a hectic color and +his skull was yellow. He entered this salon in a hesitating, inquisitive +way, with wide-open eyes and a gourmand's movement of the nostrils, and +gazed about the room, warm with lights and heavy with perfume. + +Sulpice glanced at him carelessly and recognized him as the man whom he +himself had superseded on Place Beauvau--a Puritan, a Huguenot, a +widower, the father of five or six daughters, and as solemn and proper +in his ordinary demeanor as a Sunday-school tract. Sulpice could not +refrain from crying out merrily: "Bless me! Monsieur Pichereau!" + +The other shook his butter-colored skull as if he had suddenly received +a stinging blow on it with a switch, and his red face became +crimson-hued at the sight of Sulpice, his successor in office, standing +before him, politely holding out to him his two gloved hands. + +Guy de Lissac was no longer laughing. + +Their two Excellencies found themselves face to face at the foot of the +greenroom staircase, in the midst of a crowd of brahmins, dancers, +negresses, and female supernumeraries; two Excellencies meeting there; +one smiling, the other grimacing beneath the glance of this curious, +shrewd little world. + +"Ah! I have caught you, my dear colleague," cried Sulpice, very much +amused at Pichereau's embarrassed air, his coat buttoned close like a +Quaker's and his little eyes blinking behind his spectacles, and looking +as sheepish as a sacristan caught napping. + +"Me?" stammered Pichereau. "Me? But my dear Minister, it's you--yes, you +whom I came expressly to seek!" + +"Here?" said Vaudrey. + +"Yes, here!" + +"Really?" + +"I had something to say to you--I--yes, I wanted--" + +The unlucky Pichereau mechanically pulled and jerked at his waistcoat, +then assuming a dignified, grave air, he whistled and hesitated, and +finally stammered: + +"I wished to speak with you--yes--to consult with you upon a matter of +grave importance--concerning Protestant communities." + +Sulpice could not restrain his laughter. + +Pichereau, with his look of a Calvinistic preacher, was throwing from +behind his spectacles glowing looks in the direction where Marie Launay +stood listening to and laughing at the badinage of Molina. Some +newspaper reporters, scenting a handy paragraph, came sauntering up to +overhear some fragment of the conversation between the minister of +yesterday and him of to-day. + +Guy de Lissac stood carelessly by, secretly very much amused at +Pichereau, who did not move, but rubbing his hands nervously together +was trying to appear at ease, yet by his sour smile at his successor +allowing it to be plainly seen how gladly he would have strangled +Vaudrey. + +"My dear colleague," said Sulpice, gayly, "we will talk elsewhere about +your communities. This is hardly the place. _Non est hic locus!_ +Good-bye!" + +"Good-bye, your Excellency," replied Pichereau with forced politeness. + +Vaudrey drew Lissac away, saying with a suppressed laugh: + +"Oh! oh! the Quaker! He has laid down his portfolio, but he has kept the +key to the greenroom, it seems." + +"It would appear," replied Guy, "that the door leading into the +greenroom may open to scenes of consolation for fallen greatness. The +blue eyes of Marie Launay always serve as a sparadrap to a fallen +minister!" + +"Was the fat Molina right? To lose the votes of the majority is perhaps +the malady of the knee of ministers," said Vaudrey merrily. + +He laughed again, very much amused at the irritable, peevish yet +cringing attitude of Pichereau, the Genevan doctrinaire, who sought +consolation in the greenroom of the ballet, whilst his five or six +daughters sat at home, probably reading some chaste English romance, or +practising sacred music within the range of the green spectacles of +their governess. + +"But!" said he gayly, "to fall from power is nothing, provided one falls +into the arms of ballet-girls." + + + * * * * * + +_Molina burst out laughing ... when he ran his eye over the list and +found accompanying the names of ballet-dancers and members of the +chorus, the distinguished particles of some habitues._ + +[Illustration: IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA] + + + + +II + + +Madame Marsy was awaiting Guy de Lissac's return from the greenroom. +From the moment she caught sight of Vaudrey standing within the range of +her opera-glasses, she was seized with the eager desire to make him an +habitue of her salon, the new salon that had just been launched. Madame +Marsy was bitten by that tarantula whose bite makes modern society move +as if afflicted with Saint Vitus's dance. A widow, rich and still +young, very much admired, she had set herself to play the role of a +leader in society to pass away the time. She was one of those women +forever passing before the reporters' note-book, as others pass in front +of a photographic apparatus. Of her inner life, however, very little was +known to the public. But the exact shade of her hair, the color of her +eyes, the cut of her gowns, the address of her tradesmen, the _menu_ of +her dinners, the programme of her concerts, the names of her guests, the +visitors to her salon, the address of her mansion, were all familiar to +every one, and Madame Marsy was daily reported by the chroniclers to the +letter, painted, dressed and undressed. + +There was some romantic gossip whispered about her. It was said that she +had formerly led Philippe Marsy, the artist, a _hard life_. This artist +was the painter of _Charity_, the picture so much admired at the +Luxembourg, where it hangs between a Nymph by Henner and a Portrait of a +Lady by Carolus Duran. She was pretty, free, and sufficiently rich since +the sale of the contents of Philippe Marsy's studio. His slightest +sketches had fetched enormous sums under Monsieur Pillet's hammer at the +Hotel Drouot, and Sabine after an appropriate interval of mourning, +opened her salon. + +Solitary, though surrounded by friends, she created no jealousy among +her admirers, whose homage she received with perfect equanimity, as if +become weary and desirous of a court but not of a favorite. She had a +son at college who was growing up; he, however, was rarely to be met +with in his mother's little hotel in the Boulevard Malesherbes. This +pale, slender youth in his student's uniform would sometimes steal +furtively up the staircase to pay his mother a visit as a stranger might +have done, never staying long, however, but hurrying off again to rejoin +an old woman who waited at the corner of the street and who would take +him by the arm and walk away with him--Madame Marsy, his grandmother. + +It was the grandmother who was bringing up the boy. She and a +kind-hearted fellow, Francois Charriere, a sculptor, who as he said +himself, was nothing of a genius, but who, however, designed models and +advantageously sold them to the manufacturers of lamps in the Rue +Saint-Louis au Marais. It was Charriere who, in fulfilment of a vow made +to his friend Marsy, acted as guardian to the boy. + +Nobody in Paris now remembered anything about Philippe Marsy. In the +course of time, all the little rumors are hushed in the roar and rattle +of Parisian life. Only some semi-flattering rumors were connected with +Sabine's name, together with some mysterious reminiscences. Moreover, +she had the special attraction of a hostess who imparts to her salon the +peculiar charm and flavor of unceremonious hospitality. One was only +obliged to wear a white cravat about his throat, he did not have to +starch his wits. + +Only very recently had Sabine Marsy's salon acquired the reputation of +being an easy-going one, where one was sure of a welcome, a sort of +rendezvous where every one could be found as in the corridor of a +theatre on the night of a first appearance, or on the sidewalk of a +boulevard; a salon well-filled, that could rank with the semi-official +and very distinguished one presided over by Madame Evan, and those +others quieter, more sober--if a little Calvinistic--of the select +Alsatian colony. + +Sabine Marsy must have had a great deal of tact, force of character and +perseverance in carrying out her plans, to have reached this point, more +difficult to her, moreover, than it would have been to any other, as she +had no political backing whatever. Her connection with society was +entirely through the world of artists. Many of these, however, had +brought to her salon some of the Athenians of the political world, +connoisseurs, good conversationalists, handsome men, who freely declared +with Vaudrey, that a republic could not exist without the assistance of +women, that to women Orleanism was due, and those charming fellows had +made Madame Marsy's hospitable salon the fashion. + +Besides it is easy enough in Paris to have a salon if one knows how to +give dinners. Some squares of Bristol board engraved by Stern and posted +to good addresses, will attract with an almost disconcerting facility, a +crowd of visitors who will swarm around a festive board like bees around +a honeycomb. + +Paris is a town of guests. + +Then too, Madame Marsy was herself so captivating. She was always on the +watch for some new celebrity, as a game-keeper watches for a hare that +he means to shoot presently. One of her daily tasks was to read the +_Journal Officiel_ in order to discover in the orator of to-day the +Minister of State of to-morrow. She was always well informed beforehand +which artist or sculptor would be likely to win the medal of honor at +the Salon, and was the first to invite such a one and to let him know +that it was she who had discovered him. In literature, she encouraged +the new school, liking it for the attention it attracted. It was also +her aim to give to her salon a literary as well as a political color. +Artists and statesmen elbowed one another there. + +For some days now, she had thought of giving a reception which was to be +a surprise to her friends. She had heard of Japanese exhibitions being +given at other houses. She herself was determined to give a _soiree +exotique_. It happened just then that a friend of Guy de Lissac, +Monsieur Jose de Rosas, a great lounger, had returned from a journey +around the world. What a piece of good fortune! She too had known De +Rosas formerly, and if she could only get him to consent, she could +announce a most attractive soiree: the travels of such a man as Monsieur +de Rosas: a rare treat! + +"The Comtesse d'Horville gives literary matinees," said Sabine, quite on +fire with the idea; "Madame Evan has poems and tragedies read at her +receptions, I shall have lecturers and savants, since that is +fashionable." + +And what a woman wishes, a grandee of Spain willed, it appeared. +Monsieur de Rosas decided, egged on a little by Guy de Lissac, to come +and relate to Madame Marsy's friends his adventures in strange lands. +The invitations to the soiree were already out. + +Madame Marsy had also obtained a promise from three Ministers of State +that they would be present. She had spread the news far and wide. A +little more and she would have had their names printed on the programmes +for the evening. She had had a success quite unlooked for--a promise +from Monsieur Pichereau to be present--from Pichereau, that starched +Puritan, and all the newspapers had announced his intention. When +suddenly--stupidly--a cabinet crisis had arisen at the most unexpected +moment, a useless crisis. Granet had interpellated Pichereau with a view +to succeed him, and Pichereau fell without Granet succeeding him. A +Ministry had been hastily formed, with Collard at its head, and Sulpice +Vaudrey as Minister of the Interior in place of Pichereau! And all those +Ministers of State who had promised to be present to hear Monsieur de +Rosas at Madame Marsy's, fell from power with Pichereau. + +"Such a Cabinet!" Sabine had exclaimed in a rage. "A Cabinet of +pasteboard capuchins." + +"A Ministry of pasteboard, certainly," Guy had answered. + +Madame Marsy was quite beside herself. Granet indeed! Why could he not +have waited a day or two longer before upsetting the whole +administration. It would have been quite as easy to have overthrown +Pichereau a day after her soiree as a few days before. Was Granet then, +in a great hurry to be made minister? Oh! her opinion of him had always +been a correct one! An ambitious schemer. He had triumphed, or at least +he had expected to triumph. And the consequence was that Sabine found +herself without a Minister to introduce to her guests. It was as if +Granet had purposely designed this. + +No, she did not know a single member of the new Cabinet. She had spoken +once to the President of the council, Collard, a former advocate of +Nantes, at a reception at the Elysee. Collard had even, in passing by +her, torn off a morsel of the lace of her flounce. How charmingly, too, +he had excused himself! But this acquaintanceship with him would hardly +justify her in asking him brusquely to honor her with his presence at +this soiree upon which her social success depended. + +Her intimate friend, pretty Madame Gerson, who assisted her in doing the +honors of her salon until the time when she herself would have a rival +salon and take Sabine's guests away from her, sought in vain to comfort +her by assuring her that Pichereau would be sure to come. He had +promised to do so. He was a sincere man, and his word could be relied +on. He would, moreover, bring his former colleagues from the +Departments of Public Instruction, and Post and Telegraph. He had +promised. Oh! yes, Pichereau! Pichereau, however, mattered very little +to Sabine now! _Ex_-ministers, indeed! she could always have enough of +them. It was not that kind that she wanted. She did not care about her +salon being called the _Invalides_ as that of a rival was called the +_Salon des Refusees_. No, certainly not, that was something she would +never consent to. + +Granet's impatience had upset all her plans. + +So Madame Marsy, side by side in her box with Madame Gerson, whose dark, +brilliant beauty set off her own fair beauty, had listened with a bored +and sulky manner to the first act of _L'Africaine_, while Monsieur +Gerson conversed timidly, half under his breath, with Guy de Lissac, who +made the fourth occupant of the box. + +At the end of the second act, however, Lissac suddenly caught sight of +Vaudrey's smiling countenance beside Granet's waxed moustaches in the +manager's box. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed, "there is Vaudrey!" + +Madame Marsy, however, had already caught sight of him. She turned her +opera-glass upon the new Cabinet Minister, whose carefully arranged +blonde beard was parted in the middle and spread out in two light tufts +over his white necktie, his silky moustaches turned jauntily upwards +against his fleshy cheeks. Sabine, continuing to look at the newcomer +through her glass, saw as he moved within the shadow of the box, this +man of forty, with a very agreeable and still youthful face, and as he +leaned over the edge of the box to look at the audience, she noted that +he had a slight bald spot on the top of his skull between the fair tufts +that adorned the sides of his head. + +"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, "I thought that he was a dark man." + +"No, no," answered Lissac, "on the contrary, he was a fair, handsome +youth when we both studied law here in Paris together." + +Madame Marsy, as if she had been touched by an electric spark, turned +quickly round on her chair to look at Guy, displaying to him as she did +so, a lovely face, surmounting the most beautiful shoulders imaginable. + +"What! you know the minister so intimately?" + +"Very intimately." + +"Then, my dear Lissac, you can do me the greatest favor. No, I do not +ask you to do it, I insist on it." + +Over the pretty Andalusian features of Madame Gerson, a mocking smile +played. + +"I have guessed it," she exclaimed. + +"And so have I," said Lissac. "You wish me to present the new Minister +of the Interior to you? You have a friend you want appointed to a +prefecture." + +"Not at all. I only want him to take Pichereau's place at my reception. +My dear Lissac, my kind Lissac," she continued in dulcet tones, and +clasping her little gloved hands entreatingly, like a child begging for +a toy, "persuade Monsieur Vaudrey to accept this invitation of mine and +you will be a love, you understand, Lissac, a love!" + +But Guy had already risen and with a touch of his thumb snapping out his +crush hat, he opened the door of the box, saying to Sabine as he did so: + +"Take notice that I ask nothing in return for this favor!" + +Madame Marsy began to laugh. + +"Ah!" she cried, "that is discreet, but I am willing to subscribe to any +condition!" + +"Selika is cold beside you," said Lissac as he disappeared through the +open doorway, "I will bring you your minister in ten minutes." + +Sabine waited nervously. The curtain had just fallen on the third act. +The manager's box was empty. Guy would doubtless be obliged to rejoin +Vaudrey, and neither the minister nor his friend would be seen again. +Just then some one knocked at the door of the box. Monsieur Gerson, +overcome by fatigue, and weary as only a man can be who is dragged +against his will night after night to some place of amusement, was +dozing in the rear of the box. At a word from his wife he got up and +hastened to open the door. It proved to be an artist, an old friend of +Philippe Marsy, who came to invite Sabine to his studio to "admire" _his +Envoy_ that he had just finished for the Salon. Sabine received him +graciously, and promised him somewhat stiffly that she would do so. She +tapped impatiently with her fan upon her fingers as the orchestra began +to play the prelude to the fourth act. It was quite certain that Lissac +had failed in his mission. + +Suddenly, in the luminous space made by the open door, Guy's elegant +figure appeared for a moment, disappearing immediately to allow a man to +pass who entered, smiling pleasantly, and at whom a group of people, +standing in the lobby behind, were gazing. He bowed as Lissac said to +Sabine: + +"Allow me, madame, to present to you His Excellency the Minister of the +Interior." + +Sabine, suddenly beaming with joy, saw no one but Sulpice Vaudrey +amongst the group of men in dress-clothes who gave way to allow the +dignitary to pass. She had eyes only for him! + +She arose, pushing back her chair instinctively, as the Minister +entered, Monsieur and Madame Gerson standing at one side and Sabine on +the other and bowing to him,--Sabine triumphant, Madame Gerson curious, +Monsieur Gerson flattered though sleepy. + +Sulpice seated himself at Madame Marsy's side, with the amiable +condescension of a great man charmed to play the agreeable, and to +visit, at the solicitation of a friend, a fair woman whom all the world +delighted to honor. It seemed to him to put the finishing touch to that +success and power which had been his only a few days. + +He went quite artlessly and by instinct wherever he might have the +chance to inhale admiring incense. It seemed to him as if he were +swimming in refreshing waters. Everything delighted him. He wished to be +obliging to every one. It seemed to him but natural that a woman of +fashion like Sabine should wish to meet him and offer him her +congratulations, as he himself, without knowing her, should desire to +listen to her felicitations. To speak in complimentary terms was as +natural to him as to listen to the compliments of others. + +He delighted in the atmosphere of adulation which surrounded him, these +two pretty women who smiled upon him with a gratitude so impressive, +pleased him. Sabine appeared especially charming to him when, speaking +with the captivating grace of a Parisian, she said: + +"I hardly know how to thank my friend Monsieur de Lissac for inducing +you to listen to the entreaties of one who solicits--" + +"Solicits, madame?" said the minister with an eagerness which seemed +already to answer her prayer affirmatively. + +"I hope your Excellency will consent to honor with your presence a +reunion of friends at my house--a reunion somewhat trivial, for this +occasion, but clever enough." + +"A reunion?" replied Vaudrey, still smiling. + +"Monsieur de Lissac has not told you then, what my hopes are?" + +"We are too old friends, Lissac and I, for him not to allow me the +pleasure of hearing from your own lips, madame, in what way I may be of +service to you, or to any of your friends." + +Sabine smiled at this well-turned phrase uttered in the most gallant +tone. + +Who then, could have told her that Vaudrey was a provincial? An intimate +enemy or an intimate friend. But he was not at all provincial. On the +contrary, Vaudrey was quite charming. + +"Monsieur de Rosas has had the kindness, your Excellency, to promise to +come to my house next Saturday and give a chatty account of his travels. +He will be, I am quite sure, most proud to know that in his audience--" + +Sulpice neatly and half modestly turned aside the compliment that was +approaching. + +He knew Monsieur de Rosas. He had read and greatly admired some +translations of the Persian poets by that lettered nobleman, which had +been printed for circulation only amongst the author's most intimate +friends. Vaudrey had first met Monsieur de Rosas at a meeting of a +scientific society. Rosas was an eminent man as well as a poet, and one +whom he would be greatly pleased to meet again. A hero of romance as +erudite as a Benedictine. Charming, too, and clever! Something like a +Cid who has become a boulevard lounger on returning from Central Asia. + +This portrait of Rosas was a clever one indeed, and Sabine nodded +acquiescence again and again as each point was hit off by Vaudrey. He, +in his turn, basked comfortably in the light of her smiles, and listened +with pleasure to the sound of his own voice. He could catch glimpses +through the box curtains from between these two charming profiles--one a +brunette, the other a blonde--of the vast auditorium all crimson and +gold, blazing with lights and crowded with faces. From this well-dressed +crowd, from these boxes where one caught sight of white gleaming +shoulders, half-gloved arms, flower-decked heads, sparkling necklaces, +flashing glances, it seemed to Vaudrey as if a strange, subtle perfume +arose--the perfume of women, an intoxicating odor, in the midst of this +radiancy that rivaled the brilliant sun at its rising. + +Upon the stage, amid the dazzling splendor of the ballet, in the milky +ray of the electric light, the swelling skirts whirled, the pink +slippers that he had seen but a moment before near by, and the gleaming, +silver helmets, the tinfoil and the spangles shone in the dance. A fairy +light enveloped all these stage splendors; and this luxurious ensemble, +as seen from the depths of the box, seemed to him to be the glory of an +unending apotheosis, a sort of fete given to celebrate his entrance on +his public career. + +Then, in the unconcealed effusion of his delight, without any effort at +effect, speaking frankly to this woman, to Guy, and to Gerson, as if he +were communing with himself to the mocking accompaniment of this Hindoo +music, he revealed his joys, his prospects, and his dreams. He replied +to Sabine's congratulations by avowing his intention to devote himself +entirely to his country. + +"In short, your Excellency," she said, "you are really going to do great +things?" + +He gazed dreamily around the theatre, smiling as if he beheld some lucky +vision, and answered: + +"Really, madame, I accepted office only because I felt it was my duty +and as a means of doing good. I intend to be just--to be honest. I +should like to discover some unappreciated genius and raise him from the +obscurity in which an unjust fate has shrouded him, to the height where +he belongs. If we are to do no better than those we have succeeded, it +was useless to turn them out!" + +"Ah! _pardieu_," said Lissac, while Madame Marsy smiled and nodded +approval of Vaudrey's words, "you and your colleagues are just now in +the honeymoon of your power." + +"We will endeavor to make this honeymoon of as long duration as +possible," laughingly replied Sulpice. "I believe in the case of power, +as in marriage, that the coming of the April moon is the fault of the +parties connected with it." + +"It takes a shrewd person indeed to know why April moons rise at all!" +said Guy. Vaudrey's thoughts turned involuntarily toward Adrienne, his +own pretty wife, who was waiting for him in the great lonely apartments +at the Ministry which they had just taken possession of as they might +occupy rooms at a hotel. + +He felt a sudden desire to return to her, to tell her of the incidents +of this evening. Yes, to tell her everything, even to his visit behind +the scenes--but he remained where he was, not knowing how to take leave +of Madame Marsy just yet, and she, in her turn, divined from the +slackened conversation that he was anxious to be off. + +"I was waiting for that strain," said Madame Marsy to Guy, "now that it +is over, I will go." + +Vaudrey did not reply, awaiting Sabine's departure, so as to conduct her +to her carriage. + +People hurried out into the lobbies to see him pass by. Upon the +staircases, attendants and strangers saluted him. It seemed to Vaudrey +that he moved among those who were in sympathy with him. Lissac followed +him with Madame Gerson on his arm; her jaded husband sighed for a few +hours' sleep. + +In the sharp, frosty air of a night in January, Sulpice, enveloped in +otter fur, stood with Madame Marsy on his arm, waiting for the +appearance of that lady's carriage, which was emerging from the luminous +depths of the Place, accompanied by another carriage without a monogram +or crest; it was that of the minister. + +Sulpice gazed before him down the Avenue de l'Opera, brilliant with +light, and the bluish tints of the Jablockoff electric apparatus flooded +him with its bright rays; it seemed to him as if all this brilliancy +blazed for him, like the flattering apotheosis which had just before +fallen upon him as he crossed the stage of the Opera. It seemed like an +aureole lighted up especially to encircle him! + +Sabine asked Vaudrey as he escorted her to her carriage: + +"Madame Vaudrey will, I trust, do me the honor to accompany your +Excellency to my house? I will take the liberty to-morrow of calling on +her to invite her." + +The Minister bowed a gracious acquiescence. + +Sabine finally thanked him by a gracious smile: her small gloved hand +raised the window of the coupe, and the carriage was driven off rapidly, +amid the din of horses' hoofs. + +"Good-bye," said Lissac to Vaudrey. + +"Cannot I offer you a seat in my carriage?" + +"Thank you, but I am not two steps away from the Rue d'Aumale." + +Vaudrey turned towards Madame Gerson; she and her husband bowed low. + +"May I not set you down at your house, madame?" + +"Your Excellency is very kind, but we have our own carriage!" + +"Au revoir," said Vaudrey to Lissac, "come and breakfast with me +to-morrow." + +"With pleasure!" + +"To the ministry!" said Vaudrey to the coachman as he stepped into his +carriage. + +He sank back upon the cushions with a feeling of delight as if glad to +be alone. All the scenes of that evening floated again before his eyes. +He felt once more in his nostrils the subtle, penetrating perfume of the +greenroom, he saw again the blue eyes of the little danseuse. The +admiring looks, the respectful salutes, the smiles of the women, the +soft, caressing tones of Sabine, and Madame Gerson's pearly teeth, he +saw or heard all these again, and above all, this word clear as a +clarion, triumphant as a trumpet's blast: _Success!_ All this came back +again to him. + +"You have succeeded!" + +He heard Guy's voice again speaking this to him in joyous tones. +Succeeded! It was certainly true. + +Minister! Was it possible! He had at his beck and call a whole host of +functionaries and servitors! He it was who had the power to make the +whole machine of government move--he, the lawyer from Grenoble--who ten +years ago would have thought it a great honor to have been appointed to +a place in the department of Isere! + +All those people whom he could see in the shadow of the lighted +boulevards buying the newspapers at the kiosks, would read therein his +name and least gesture and action. + +_"Monsieur le Ministre has taken up his residence on the Place Beauvau. +Monsieur Vaudrey this morning received the heads of the Bureaus and the +personnel of the Department of the Ministry of the Interior. Monsieur +Vaudrey, with the assistance of Monsieur Henri Jacquier of Oise, +undersecretary of State, is actively engaged in examining the reports of +prefects and under-prefects. Monsieur will doubtless make some needed +reforms in the administration of the prefectures."_ Everywhere, in all +the newspapers, Monsieur Vaudrey! The Minister of the Interior! He, his +name, his words, his projects, his deeds! + +Success! Yes, it was his, it had come! + +Never in his wildest visions had he dreamed of the success that he had +attained. Never had he expected to catch sight of such bright rays as +those which now shone down upon him from that star, which with the +superstition of an ambitious man, he had singled out. Success! Success! + +And now all the world should see what he would do. Already in his own +little town, in his speeches, during the war, at the elections of 1871, +and especially at Versailles, during the years of struggle and political +intrigue, in the tribune, or as a commissioner or sub-commissioner, he +had given proofs of his qualifications as a statesman, but the +touchstone of man is power. Emerging from his semi-obscurity into the +sunshine of success, he would at last show the world what he was and +what he could do. Power! To command! To create! To impress his ideas +upon a whole nation! To have succeeded! succeeded! succeeded! Sulpice's +dreams were realized at last. + +And whilst the ministerial carriage was driving at a gallop towards the +Place Beauvau, Sabine, muffled up in her furs, her fine skin caressed by +the blue-fox border of her pelisse, said to herself, quite indifferent +to the man himself, but delighted to have a minister's name to enroll +upon her list of guests: + +"He is a simpleton--Vaudrey--but a very charming simpleton, +nevertheless." + +The iron gates of the Place Beauvau were thrown back for his +Excellency's carriage to enter. The gravel creaked under the wheels, as +the coupe turning off to the left, stopped under the awning over the +door. + +Sulpice alighted. The great door opened to admit him. Two +white-cravatted servants occupied a bench while awaiting the minister's +return. + +Sulpice ran lightly up the great marble staircase leading to his private +apartments. Handing his hat and coat to a servant in the antechamber, he +gayly entered the little salon, where he found his wife sitting by a +table reading _La Revue_ by the light of a shaded lamp. At the sight of +her pretty, fresh young face extended to greet him, with her blue eyes +and smiling air, at the sound of her clear, sweet, but rather timid +voice asking a little anxiously: "Well?" Sulpice took the fair face in +both his hands and his burning lips imprinted a long kiss on the white +forehead, over which a few curls of golden hair strayed. + +"Well, my dear Adrienne, I have been greatly interested. All the +kindness with which I was received, the evident delight with which the +new cabinet has been welcomed by the people, even the grimaces of +Pichereau whom I met,--if you only knew where--all gave me pleasure, +delighted me, and yet made me fear. Minister! Do you know what I have +been thinking of since I was made a minister?" + +"Of what have you been thinking?" asked the young wife, who, with her +hands folded, gazed trustingly and sweetly into Sulpice's feverish eyes. + +"I?--I have been telling myself that it is not enough to be a minister. +One must be a great minister! You understand, Adrienne, a great +minister!" + +As he spoke he took Adrienne's hands in his, and the young wife glanced +up admiringly at this young man burning with hope, who stood there +before her, declaring: "I will be great!" + +She had never dreamed of his reaching such heights as these on that day +when she felt the fingers of her fiance trembling in her hand, the day +that Sulpice had whispered the words in her ear which made her heart +leap with joy: "I love you, Adrienne, I shall always love you--Always!" + + + + +III + + +Sulpice Vaudrey had married Adrienne for love. She brought to him from +the convent at Grenoble where she had been educated, the charming +innocence of a young girl and the innate devotion of a woman. She was an +orphan with a considerable fortune, but although Sulpice had only +moderate resources, he had scarcely thought of her wealth, not even +inquiring of her guardian, Doctor Reboux, on the occasion of his formal +demand for her hand, about the dowry of Mademoiselle Gerard. + +He had met her at more than one soiree at Grenoble, where she appeared +timid, dazzled and retiring, and quietly interrogating everything by her +sweet glance. Some few words exchanged carelessly, music which they had +listened to side by side, the ordinary everyday intercourse in society, +had made Sulpice acquainted with his wife; but the sight of the pretty +blonde--so sweet and gentle--the childlike timidity of this young girl, +something rather pensive in the confiding smile of this blooming +creature of eighteen summers, had won him completely. He was free, and +alone, for he had lost, but a short time before, the only creature he +loved in the world, his mother, of whom he was the son in the double +sense of flesh and spirit, by the nourishment of her breast and by the +patient teaching that she had implanted in his mind. + +He remembered only his father's dreamy and refined face in the portrait +of a young, sad-looking man in a lawyer's black gown, before which he +had stood when quite small, and spelled out as he might have lisped a +prayer, the four letters: _papa_. Alone in this little town of Grenoble, +for which he had left his native village of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, he +had, just before meeting Adrienne, fallen a victim to a profound +melancholy and realized the necessity of deciding upon his career. + +He was then thirty-four. Except the years spent in the study of law at +Paris amid the turmoil of the left bank of the Seine, he had always +lived in the province--his own province of Dauphine. He had grown up in +the old house at Saint-Laurent, where every nook and corner kept for him +its own sweet memory of his childhood and youth. The great white +drawing-room with its wainscotings of the time of Louis XVI., which +opened out upon a flight of steps leading down into a terraced garden; +the portraits of obscure ancestors: lawyers in powdered wigs and wearing +the robes of the members of the Third estate, fat and rosy with double +chins resting upon their broad cravats, amiable old ladies with oddly +arranged hair and flowered gowns, coquettish still as they smiled in +their oval, wooden frames, and then the old books in their old-fashioned +bindings slumbering in a great bookcase with glass doors, or piled up on +shelves below the fowling-pieces, the game-bags and the powder-horns. + +With this dwelling of which he thought so often now, his whole past was +linked, about it still clung something of its past poetry, and it was +sacred through the memories it preserved, and as the scene of the +unforgotten joys of childhood. He could see again, the great +stone-flagged kitchen, where they sat up at nights telling stories, the +chamber above it, the bed with its heavy serge curtains, where he +lay--sometimes shaking with terror--all alone, adjoining the room once +occupied by his father, and the moonlight shining through the tall old +trees in the courtyard outside, that entering by the half-open blinds +cast shadows like trembling lace on the wall opposite to him. It seemed +to Sulpice then that he could hear the sounds of the weird demon's chase +as told by old Catherine, the cook, in bated tones during their vigils. + +It was there that he went every year to pass his holidays with his +mother, who had had the courage to send him away,--just as during winter +she had plunged him into cold water--to the Lyceum at Grenoble, whence +he would return to Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, "so thin, poor child!" as his +mother said. + +And how fat she would send him back again to school,--to make the +masters ashamed of their stinginess. + +How pleasant were the reminiscences of those sunny days amongst the +mountains, the excursions to Grande Chartreuse, where the murmuring +brook trickled among the rocks, the halts at Guiers-Mort or under the +trees in the stillness of a drowsy day in summer; how delightful to +stretch one's self out at the foot of the cliffs or on a grassy slope +with a book, pausing now and then to indulge in day-dreams or glance up +at the fleecy clouds floating in the blue sky above his head and watch +them gathering, then vanishing and melting away like smoke wreaths! Ah! +how sweet were those long, idle days full of dreams, when the noise of +the waterfall dashing over the rocks lulled the senses like some merry +song, or a nurse's tender, crooning lullaby. + +In those days Sulpice made no plans for his future, where he would go, +what he would do, or what would become of him; but he felt within +himself unbounded hope, a hope as limitless and bright as the azure sky +above him, the inspiration of devotion, love and poetry. He asked +himself whether he should be a missionary or a representative of the +people. It seemed to him that his heart was large enough to contain a +world, and as he grew up he began to ask himself the terrible question: +"Will a woman ever love me?" + +To be loved! What a dream! One day he put this question to one of his +comrades at college, Guy de Lissac, the son of a country gentleman in +the neighborhood, who answered: + +"Booby! every one is loved some day or other, and there are some who are +loved even too much!" + +Sulpice had received a patriarchal and half-puritanical training, but +softened materially by his mother's almost excessive care, it had left, +as it were, a kind of poetic perfume that clung about him and never left +him. + +Even during the days of his struggle in crowded Paris, in the heat of +political strife, his thoughts would fly back to the old home at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, recalling to mind the old armchair where his +father used to sit, the father whose kiss he had never known, hearing +again his mother's voice from the great oak staircase with its heavy +balusters, and he recalled at the same moment, the landscape with its +living figures, the spotted, steel-colored guinea-fowl screaming from +the branches of the elms, the vineyard hands returning from work, to +trample with bare feet the great clusters of grapes piled up in the +wine-vat in the cellar whose odor intoxicated! Even as a representative +or minister, musing over his past that seemed but yesterday, Sulpice +wandered again in thought to this quiet country spot, so loved by him, +so sweet, so still, reposing in the silence of provincial calm--far +away, removed from all the noise and bustle of Paris. + +The farmers of Dauphine generally think of making their sons tillers of +the soil, sending them to school and to college, perhaps to begin later +the study of law or medicine, but welcoming them joyfully back again to +their native fields, to their farms, where the youths soon forget all +they may have learned of the Code or the Codex and lead the healthy, +hardy life of the country. Good, well-built fellows, their chests +enlarged by their daily exercise, their thighs strengthened by +mountain-climbing, gay young men, liking to hunt and drink on the banks +of the Isere and caring more for good harvests than for the songs of the +wind amongst the branches of the poplars upon the river-banks. + +Sulpice had an old uncle on his father's side who proposed to his +sister-in-law to give up his broad acres--a fortune in themselves--to +Sulpice, if his nephew would consent to marry his daughter. Sulpice +refused. He would not marry for money. + +"Fiddle-faddle!" cried his uncle. "Sickly sentimentality! If he +cultivates that _grain_, my brother's son will not make much headway." + +"There is where you are mistaken, brother-in-law. What my poor Raymond +had not time to become, his child will be: a lawyer at once eloquent and +honest." + +"Well, well," replied the uncle, "but he shall not have my girl." + +Sulpice, after finishing his studies at Paris, returned to his mother at +Grenoble, took her away from the old house at Saint-Laurent and +installed her in the town with himself, where he began the practice of +law and attracted everybody's attention from the first. He made pleading +a sacred office and not a trade. Everyone was astonished that he had not +remained in Paris. + +Why? He loved his native province, the banks of the Isere, the healthy, +poetic atmosphere hanging over the desert of the Chartreuse and the +snows of the Grand-Som. A talented man could make his way +anywhere,--moreover, it was his pleasure to consider it a duty not to +leave this secluded corner of the earth where he would cause freedom of +speech to be known. Sulpice, whose heart was open to every ardent and +generous manifestation of human thought, had imbibed from his mother, as +well as from his father's writings and books, and from the +_Encyclopaedia_ that Raymond Vaudrey had interlined with notes and +reflections, not merely traditional information, but also, so to speak, +the baptism of liberty. He had lived in the feverish days of the past +eighty years, through his reading of the _Gazette Nationale_ of those +stormy days. The speeches that he found in those pages--speeches that +still burned like uncooled lava--of Mirabeau, Barnave, and Condorcet, a +son of Grenoble, seemed to impart a glow to his fingers and fire to his +glance. Then, too, the magnificent dreams of freedom proclaimed from the +tribune inflamed his mind and made his heart beat fast. He saw as in a +vision applauding crowds, tricolors gleaming in the clear and golden +sunlight, processions moving, files marching past, and heard eternal +truths proclaimed and acclaimed. + +His mother smiled at all this enthusiasm. She did not however try to +repress it. It would vanish at the touch of years, just as the leaves of +the trees fly before the winds of October. And besides, the dear woman +herself was in sympathy with his hopes, his dreams and visions, +remembering that her lost Raymond had loved what his son in his turn so +much adored. + +The termination of the war and the fall of the empire found Sulpice a +popular man at Grenoble; loved by all, by the populace who knew how +generous he was, and by the middle-class who regarded him as a prudent +man, hence the February elections saw him sent to Bordeaux, a member of +the National Assembly. He had just passed his thirty-fourth year. + +His mother lived long enough to see this event, and to be dazzled by +this brilliant launch on his career. + +With what deep emotion, even to-day, Vaudrey recalled that Sunday in +February, a foul, wet day, when he returned home in a closed carriage +with a friend, from an electioneering tour. The day before he had made a +speech in a wineshop to an audience of peasants, who listened, +open-mouthed, but withal suspicious, examining their candidate as they +would have handled a beast offered at the market, and who, step by step, +applauded his remarks, stretching out their rasp-like hands as he left +them, and crying out: "You are our man!" + +That very morning he returned to Grenoble in the rain, passing through +villages where the posters bearing his name and those of his friends, +half-demolished by the rain, flapped dismally in the wind. Before the +mayor's office, little groups were gathered, peaceful folk; a gendarme +paced slowly to and fro, and bulletins littered the muddy thoroughfare. +But there was no excitement. Nothing more. Not even a quickened +pulse-beat was felt by those stolid men upon whose votes depended the +fate of the nation. Sulpice could not help marvelling at so much +indifference, but he reflected that it was thus throughout all France, +and that not only his name but the destiny of the nation was involved in +the struggle. + +Moreover, at night, with what feverish transport he watched the returns +of the election as they reached the Palais de Justice, black with the +crowd, and filled with uproar! With what a fearfully fast-beating heart +he saw the rapidly swelling number of ballots cast for him! Dispatches +came, and pedestrians hurried in from the country, waving their +bulletins above their heads, and Sulpice heard on every lip the same +cry: "Vaudrey leads!" + +Some cried bravo, while others clapped their hands. A crowd quickly +gathered about Vaudrey. It already seemed to him that he was lifted up +by a great wave and carried to a new world. + +A friend seized him by the arm and drew him into a corner of the hall, +away from the others, and hurriedly said: "You know I am not one to ask +much of you, to ask anything of you, in fact. I merely reckon on a +receivership. That is easily done, eh? A mere nothing?" + +Sulpice, whose feelings were overcome by this great popular +consecration, felt a kind of anger stir his heart against this +solicitor, who, in the triumph of a great popular cause, saw only a +means of self-advancement, of securing an appointment. The deputy--for +he was a deputy now, each commune adding its total to the Vaudrey +vote--was moved by a feeling of disgust. + +The crowd followed him home that evening, shouting in triumph. + +Amid the joy of victory, Sulpice felt the burden of the anxiety caused +by duties to be done: a treaty of peace to be signed, and what a peace! +Must he, alas! append his signature to a document devoted to the +dismemberment of his country? Far into the night he stood in reverie in +his chamber, his brow resting against the cold window-pane. + +He retired to rest very late, and arose with the gray dawn of February, +but without having slept. + +He looked across the street to a convent garden, with its square and +lozenge-shaped beds regularly arranged, its bare trees and box-wood +borders, that he had often gazed upon. Some nuns in their black robes +passed slowly across this cold and calm horizon that for many years had +also been the range of his vision. + +Henceforth this familiar spot, this sad garden, whose cloistral +associations charmed him, would be lost to his view. It was Paris now +that awaited him, feverish Paris, burning with anger and odorous of +saltpetre. Its very pavements must burn. Sulpice was in haste, however, +to see it once more, to pass with head aloft beneath the garrets where +he had once dreamed as a student, fagging and striving to get knowledge. +How often he would regret that convent garden, those familiar +flower-beds, the deep silence that enveloped him as he sat working by +the open window, the passage of a bird near him, as if to fan him with +its wing, and the vague murmur of the canticles of the sisters ascending +to his window like the echo of a prayer! + +In the recess during one of the years following his election to the +Assembly, he married Mademoiselle Gerard. Doctor Reboux, her guardian, +charmed to give his ward to a man with a future like Vaudrey's, had not +hesitated long about consenting to the marriage. Adrienne delighted +Sulpice, and the young girl herself was quite happy to be chosen by this +good-natured, distinguished young man whom everybody at Grenoble, not +excepting his political adversaries, admired and spoke well of. With +large, brilliant, black eyes lighting up a thin, fair face, a full +beard, a high forehead with a deep furrow between the eyebrows, giving +to his usually wandering, keen and restless glance a somewhat +contemplative expression, Sulpice was a decidedly attractive man. He was +not a handsome or a charming fellow, but a good-natured, agreeable, +refined man, a fine conversationalist, persuasive, enthusiastic and +alert; learned without being pedantic, a man who could inspire in a +young girl a perfect passion. Adrienne joyfully married him, as he had +sought her from love. + +And now all the poetry and romance of his youth blossomed again in his +heart, in the thick of the political struggle in which he was engaged; +he forgot, amid the idyllic scenes of domestic life, the storms of +Versailles, the political troubles, forebodings as to the future, all +anxieties of the present, the routine life of the Assembly into which he +plunged with all his mind, and the excitement of his labors, his debates +and his duties. + +Sulpice thought again and again of the summer morning when he led his +wife to the altar, and compared it to a day's halt in the course of a +journey under the blaze of the sun; he recalled the old house full of +noisy stir, the crowd of relatives and friends in festive attire, the +stamping of the horses' feet before the great open gate, the neighbors +standing at the windows, and the little street-boys scuffling upon the +pavement, all the joyous bustle of that happy day. It seemed to Sulpice +that the sunlight came streaming in with Adrienne's entrance into the +vast salon, from the walls of which her pictured ancestresses in their +huge leg-of-mutton sleeves seemed to smile at her. + +Beneath the orange wreath sent from Paris, her face expressed the happy, +surprised, and sweetly anxious look of a young communicant wrapped in +her veil. + +Sulpice had never seen her look more beautiful. How prettily she came +towards him, blushing vividly, and holding out her two little white +gloved hands! He, somewhat bored by the company that surrounded them, +cast an involuntary glance at a mirror hanging opposite and decided that +he looked awkward and formal with his hair too carefully arranged. How +they had laughed since then and always with new pleasure at these +recollections, so sweet even now. + +His happiness on that joyous day would have been complete had his mother +been present, when in the presence of the old priest who had instructed +Adrienne in her catechism, Sulpice stood forward and took by its velvet +shield the taper that seemed so light to him, and awkwardly held the +wafer that the priest extended to him. It was a great event in Grenoble +when the leader of the Liberal Party, who headed the list at the last +election, was seen being married like a believing bourgeois. The organ +pealed forth its tender vibrations, some Christmas anthem, mysterious +and tremulous, like an alleluia sounding through the aisles of +centuries; the light streamed through the windows in floods and rested +upon Adrienne, who was kneeling with her childlike head leaning on her +gloved hands, kissing her fair locks with sunlight and illumining the +gleaming satin of her dress with its long train spreading out over the +carpet. + +Sulpice took away from this ceremony in the presence of a crowded +congregation an impression at once perfumed and dazzling: the perfumes +of flowers, the play of light, the greetings of the organ, and within +and about him, all the intoxication of love, singing a song of +happiness. + +All that was now far away! nearly six years had elapsed since that day, +six years of bitter struggle, during which Vaudrey fought the harder, +defended his ideas of liberty with fervid eloquence, disputed step by +step, and through intense work came to the front, living at Paris just +as he did in the province, having his books brought from there to his +apartment in the Rue de la Chaussee d'Antin, close to the railroad that +he took every morning when he regretfully left Adrienne, Adrienne to +whom he returned every evening that political meetings and protracted +sittings did not rob him of those happy evenings, which were in truth +the only evenings that he really lived. + +Adrienne seldom went out, not caring to display herself and shunning the +bustle, living at Paris, as at Grenoble, in peaceful seclusion, caring +only for the existence of her husband, his work, and his speeches that +he prepared with so much courageous labor. She sat up with him until +very late, glancing over the books, the summaries of the laws and the +old parliamentary reports. + +At times she was terrified at the ardor with which Sulpice devoted +himself to these occupations. She greatly desired to take her part and +was grieved at being unable to assist him by writing from his dictation, +or by examining these old books. She felt terribly anxious when Vaudrey +had to make a speech from the tribune. She dared not go to hear him, +but knowing that he was to speak, she had not the courage to remain at +home. Anxiously she ascended to the public gallery. She shuddered and +was almost ready to faint, when she heard the voice of the president +break what seemed to her an icy silence, with the words: _Monsieur +Vaudrey has the ear of the Assembly_. + +The sound of Sulpice's voice seemed changed to her. Fearfully she asked +herself if fright was strangling him. She dared not look at him. It +seemed to her that the people were laughing, making a disturbance and +coughing, but not listening to him. Why had she come? She would never do +so again. An icy chill took possession of her. Then suddenly she heard a +storm of applause that seemed like an outburst of sympathy. Hands were +clapped, voices applauded. She half raised herself, and leaning upon the +rail of the gallery, saw Sulpice between the crowded heads, towering +above the immense audience, radiant and calm, standing with his arms +folded or his hands resting on the tribune, below the chair occupied by +a motionless, white-cravatted man, and throwing back his fair head, +hurling, as from a full heart, his words, his wishes and his faith. All +this she saw with supreme happiness and felt proud of the man whose name +she bore. + +At that moment, she would fain have cried out to every one that she was +his, that she adored him, that he was her pride, even as she was his +joy! She would like to have folded him to her, to cling to his neck and +to repeat before all that crowd: _I love you!_ + +But she reserved all her tender effusions for the intimacy of their +home, in order to calm the enthusiasm, oftentimes desperate, of this +nervous man whom everything threw into a feverish excitement, this grand +man, as they called him at Grenoble, who was for her only a great child +whom she adored and kept in check by her girlish devotion combined with +her motherly, delicate attentions. + +Vaudrey, however, more ambitious to do good than to obtain power, and +spending his life in the conflicts of the Chamber, saw the years +slipping away without realizing that he was making any progress, not a +single step forward in the direction of his goal. Since the war, the +years had passed for him as well as for those of his generation, with +confusing rapidity, and suddenly, all at once, after having been in some +sense slumbering, flattering himself that a man of thirty has a future +before him, he was rudely awakened to the astonishing truth that he was +forty. + +Forty! Sulpice had experienced a certain melancholy in advancing the +figure by ten, and whatever position he had acquired within his party, +within the circle of his friends, his dream was to reach still higher, +he was tired of playing second-rate parts, and eager to stand before the +footlights in full blaze, in the first role. + +In the snug interior that Adrienne furnished, he enjoyed all material +happiness. She soothed him, brought his dreams back to the region of the +real, terrified at times by his discouragements, his anger, and still +more by his illusions concerning men and things. + +Sulpice often reproached her for having clipped the wings of his +ambition. + +"I!" she would say, "it is rather the fans of your windmills that I +break, you Don Quixote!" + +He would then smile at her, and look earnestly into the depths of the +timid creature's lovely blue eyes, causing her to blush as if ashamed of +having seemed to be witty. + +Her chief aim was to be the devoted, loving friend of this man whom she +thought so superior to herself, and although she was totally ignorant of +political intrigues, she was by virtue of the mere instinct of love, his +best and most perspicacious adviser and felt delighted only when +Vaudrey, by chance, listened to her counsel. + +"I love you so dearly!" she confessed with the unlimited candor of a +poor creature who has but a single affection, a single pretext for +loving. + +He saw in the life he led, only the penumbra: his neglected youth, his +hopes fled, his fears, the disgust which at times filled him as he +thought of the never-ending recommencements and trickeries of political +life. So dearly cherished, so beloved, it seemed to him, nevertheless, +that his life lacked something. He would have liked a child, a son to +bring up, a domestic tie, since political conditions prevented him from +accomplishing a civic duty. Ah! yes, a son, a being to mould, a brow to +kiss, a soul to fashion after the image of his own, a child who would +not know all the sorrows of life that his own generation had laid on +him! Perhaps it was only a child that he needed. Something, however, he +evidently lacked. + +Still he smiled, always in love with that young woman of twenty-four +years, delicate, slender, and full of the fears and artlessness of a +child. Accustomed to the quiet solitude of the house of her guardian, +she, when at Paris, in her husband's study, arranging his books, his +papers, his legislative plans and reports, sought to surround her dear +Sulpice with the comforting felicity of bourgeois happiness that was +enjoyed calmly, like a cordial sipped at the fireside. + +Then suddenly one day, the news of a startling political change broke in +on this household. + +Sulpice reached home one evening at one and the same time nervous, +anxious, and happy. + +His name was on almost every lip, in connection with a ministerial +combination. His last speech on domestic policy had more than ever +brought him into prominence and he was considered to have boldly +contributed to the development of a fearful crisis. + +A minister! he might, before the morning, be a minister! His policy was +triumphant. + +The advocate Collard--of Nantes,--who was pointed out as the future head +of the Cabinet, was one of his intimate friends. It was +suggested--positively--that Sulpice should be intrusted with one of the +most _important portfolios_, that of the Interior or of Foreign Affairs, +the _lesser portfolios_ being considered those of Public Instruction and +of Agriculture and Commerce, the former of which concerns itself with +the spiritual welfare of the people, and the latter with their food +supply. + +Sulpice told all this to Adrienne while eating his dinner mechanically +and without appetite. + +There was to be a meeting of his coterie at eight o'clock. It was +already seven. He hurried. + +Adrienne saw that he was very pale. She experienced a strange sensation, +evidently a joyful one although mingled with anxiety. Politics drew him +away from his wife so frequently, and for so long a time, that she was +already compelled to live in such solitude that the secluded creature +wondered if in future she would not be condemned to still greater +isolation. But all anxiety disappeared under the influence of Sulpice's +manifest joy. He was feverishly impatient. It seemed to him that never +had he known so decisive a moment in his life. + +The sound of the bell, suddenly ringing out its clear note in the +silence, caused him to start. + +The dining-room door was opened by a servant, who handed a letter to +Vaudrey, bearing on one corner of the envelope the word: _Urgent_. + +Sulpice recognized the writing. + +It was from Collard of Nantes. + +Adrienne saw her husband's cheek flush as he read this letter, which +Sulpice promptly handed her, while his eyes sparkled with delight. + +"It is done! Read!" + +Adrienne turned pale. + +Collard notified his "colleague" that the ministerial combination of +which he was the head had succeeded. The President awaited at the Elysee +the arrival of the new ministers. He tendered Vaudrey the portfolio of +the Interior. + +"A minister!" said Adrienne, now overcome with delight. + +Vaudrey had risen and, a little uneasy, was mechanically searching for +something, still holding his napkin in his hand. + +"My hat," he said. "My overcoat. A carriage." + +Adrienne, with her hands clasped in a sort of childish admiration, +looked at him as if he had become suddenly transformed. All his being, +in fact, expressed complete satisfaction. He embraced Adrienne almost +frantically, kissed her again and again, and left her, then descended +the staircase with the speed of a lover hastening to a rendezvous. + +This political honeymoon was still at its height at the moment when the +delighted Vaudrey, seeing everything rosy-hued, was satisfying his +astonished curiosity in the greenroom of the ballet. He entered office, +animated by all the good purposes inspired by absolute faith. It seemed +to him that he was about to save the world, to regenerate the +government, and to destroy abuses. + +"It is very difficult to become a minister," he said, smiling, "but +nothing is easier than to be a great minister. It only demands a +determination to do good!" + +"And the power to do it," replied his friend Granet, somewhat +ironically. + +What! power? Nothing was more simple, since Vaudrey held the reins of +power!--If others wrecked the hopes of their friends, it was because +they had not dared, because they had not the will! + +They would now see what he would do himself! Not to-morrow either, nor +in a month--but at once. + +He entered the ministry boldly, like a good-natured despot, determined +to reform, study and rearrange everything; and a victim to the feverish +and glorious zeal of a neophyte, he was a little surprised to encounter, +at the very outset, the obstinate resistance of routine, ignorance, and +the unyielding mechanism of that vast machine, more eternal than +empires: Ad-min-is-tra-tion. + +Bah! he would have satisfaction! Patience would overcome all. After all, +time is on one's side. + +"Time? Already!" replied Granet, who was a perpetual scoffer. + +Adrienne, overwhelmed with surprise, enjoyed the reflections from the +golden aurora of power that so sweetly tinted Sulpice's life. She +shared her husband's triumphs without haughtiness, and now, however she +might love her domestic life, it was incumbent upon her to pass more of +her time in society than formerly, _to show herself_, as Sulpice said, +and, surrounded by the success and flattery she enjoyed, she felt that +that obligation was only an added joy, whose contentment she reflected +on her husband. + +When she entered a salon, she was greeted with a flattering murmur of +admiration and good-natured curiosity. The women looked at her and the +men surrounded her. + +"Madame Vaudrey?" + +"The minister's wife!" + +"Charming!" + +"Quite young!" + +"Somewhat provincial!" + +"So much the more attractive!" + +"That is true, as fresh as a peach!" + +She endeavored to atone by a gracious, very sincere modesty, for the +enviable position in which chance had suddenly placed her. It was said +of her that she accepted a compliment as timidly as a boarding-school +miss receives a prize. They forgave her for retaining her rosy cheeks +because of her white and exquisitely shaped hands. She was not +considered to be "_trop de Grenoble_." Witty people called her the +pretty _Dauphinoise_, and the flatterers the little Dauphine. + +In short, her _success_ was great! So said the chroniclers; the entrance +of a fashionable woman into a salon being daily compared with that of an +actress on the stage. + +It was especially because Vaudrey appeared to be so happy, that his +young wife was so contented. She felt none of the vainglory of power. +Generally alone in the vast, deserted apartments of the ministry, with +all their commonplace, luxurious appointments, she more than once +regretted the home in the Chaussee-d'Antin, where they enjoyed--but too +rarely--a renewal of the cherished solitude of the first months of their +union, the familiar chats of the Grenoble days, the prolonged +conversations, exchanges of thoughts, hopes and reminiscences--already! +only recollections,--and she sometimes said to Sulpice, who was +feverishly excited and glowed with delight at having reached the summit +of power: + +"Do you know what this place suggests to me? Why, living in a hotel!" + +"And you are right," Vaudrey gaily answered; "we are at a hotel, but it +is the hotel in which the will of France lodges!" + +"You understand, my dear, that if you are happy--" + +"Very happy! it is only now that I can show what I am made of. You shall +see, Adrienne, you shall see what I will do and become within a year." + +Within a year! + + + + +IV + + +Guy de Lissac occupied a small summer-house forming a residence situated +at the end of a court on Rue D'Aumale. He had given carte-blanche for +the arrangement of this bachelor's nest,--a nest in which sitting-hens +without eggs succeeded each other rapidly,--to one of those upholsterers +who installed, in regulation style, the knickknacks so much in vogue, +and who sell at very high prices to Bourse operators and courtesans the +spurious Clodions and imitation Boulles that they pick up by chance at +auction sales. + +Lissac, who had sufficient taste to discover artistic nuggets in the +gutters of Paris, had found it very convenient to wake up one fine +morning in a little mansion crowded with Japanese bric-a-brac, Chinese +satin draperies, tapestries, Renaissance chests and terra-cotta figures +writhing upon their sculptured bases. The upholsterer had taste, Lissac +had money. The knickknacks were genuine. There was a coquettish +attractiveness about the abode that made itself evident in every detail. + +This bachelor's suite lacked, however, something personal, something +living, some cherished object, the mark of some particular taste, some +passion for a period, for a thing, or pictures or books. In this jumble +of ill-matched curiosities, where ivory _netzkes_ on tables surrounded +Barye bronzes and Dresden figures, there lacked some evidence of an +individual character that would give a dominant tone, an original key, +to the collection. This worldly dwelling, with its white lacquered bed +and Louis XV. canopy and its heads of birds carved in wood like the +queen's bed at Trianon, vaguely resembled the apartments of a +fashionable woman. + +But Guy had hung around here and there a Samourai sabre, Malay krises, +Oriental daggers in purple velvet sheaths, and upon the green tapestry +background of the antechamber a panoply on which keen-bladed swords with +steel guards were mingled with Scotch claymores with silver hilts, thus +giving a masculine character to this hotel of a fashionable lounger, +steeped with the odor of ylang-ylang like the little house of a pretty +courtesan. + +This Guy enjoyed in Paris a free and easy life, leaving to Vaudrey, his +old college-comrade at Grenoble, the pursuit of the pleasures of +political life, and, as Lissac said in that bantering tone which is +peculiar to Parisian gossip, the relish of the "sweets of power"; for +himself, what kept him in Paris was Paris itself, just that and nothing +more:--its pleasures, its first nights, its surprises, its women, that +flavor of scandal and perfume of refined immorality that seemed peculiar +to his time and surroundings. + +He had squandered two fortunes, one after the other, without feeling any +regret; he had made a brush at journalism, tried finance, won at the +Bourse, lost at the clubs, knew everybody and was known by all, had a +smiling lip, was sound of tooth, loved the girls, was dreaded by the +men, was of fine appearance, and was unquestionably noble, which +permitted him to enjoy all the frolics of Bohemian life without sullying +himself, having always discovered a forgotten uncle or met some +considerate friend to pay his gambling debts and adjust his differences +on the Bourse speculations at the very nick of time; just now he was +well in the saddle and decidedly attractive, with a sound heart and a +well-lined pocket, enjoying, not disliking life, which seemed to him a +term of imprisonment to be passed merrily--a Parisian to the finger-tips +and to the bottom of his soul, worse than a Parisian in fact, a +Parisianized provincial inoculated with _Parisine_, just as certain sick +persons are with morphine, judging men by their wit, actions by their +results, women by the size of their gloves; as sceptical as the devil, +wicked in speech and considerate in thought, still agile at forty, +claiming even that this is man's best time--the period of fortune and +gallantry--sliding along in life and taking things as he found them, +wisely considering that a day's snow or rain lasts no longer than a +day's sunshine, and that, after all, a wretched night is soon over. + +On leaving Vaudrey the previous night, Lissac had passed part of the +night at his club on Place Vendome. He had played and won. He had gone +to sleep over a fashionable novel, very faithfully written, but +wearisome in the extreme, and he had awakened late and somewhat +heavy-headed. There were fringes of snow upon the window-sills and upon +the house facing his little mansion. The roofs were hidden under a large +white sheet and half lost in the grayish-white background of the sky. + +"Detestable weather! So much the better," thought Lissac, "I shall have +no visitors." + +"I will see no one," he said to his servant. "In such weather no one but +borrowers will come." + +He had just finished his dejeuner, plunging a Russian enamelled silver +spoon into his egg, his tea smoking at his side in a burnished silver +teapot with Japanese designs, when, notwithstanding his orders, the +servant handed him a card written in pencil on a scrap of paper torn +from a note-book. + +"It is not a borrower, monsieur!" + +Guy seized the paper disdainfully, thinking, in spite of the servant's +opinion, that he would find the name of a beggar who had not even had +his name printed on a piece of Bristol-board, and, adjusting his glass, +he deciphered the fine writing on the paper; then after involuntarily +exclaiming: _Ah! bah_! and _well! well!_ greatly astonished, he said as +he rose: + +"Show her in!" + +He had thrown on a chair his damask napkin of Muscovite pattern, and +instinctively glanced at himself in the mirror, just as a coquette might +do before a rendezvous, smoothing out his flannel vest and spreading out +his cravat that only half-fastened the blue foulard collar of his +dressing-gown. + +At the moment that he was examining the folds made on his red leather +slippers by his ample flannel trousers, a woman half-raised the satin +portiere, and, standing within a frame formed by the folds of yellow +satin, looked at the young man, displaying her brilliant teeth as she +smilingly said: + +"Good-morning, Guy!" + +Lissac went straight toward her with outstretched hands. + +She allowed the large satin portiere to fall behind her, and after +having permitted her little suede gloved hands to be raised for a +moment, she boldly abandoned them to Guy, laughing the while, as they +looked at each other face to face. He betrayed some little astonishment, +gazing at her as a person examines one whom one has not seen for a long +time, and the young woman raised her head unabashed, displaying her +features in full light, as if submitting to an inspection with +confidence. + +"You did not expect me, eh?" + +"I confess--" + +"Doubtless it is a considerable time since you thought of me." + +Guy was inclined to bow and, as his only reply, to kiss the tips of her +fingers; but he reflected that, since they last met, the parting of his +brown locks had been devilishly widened, and he remained standing, +answering with the conceit of a handsome man: + +"You are mistaken, I often think of you." + +She had, with, a sweeping glance around the room, examined the furniture +of the apartment, the framed pictures, the designs and the gilding, and, +on sitting down near the fire with her little feet crossed, she +expressed her opinion: + +"Very stylishly ensconced! You always had good taste, I know, my dear +Guy." + +"I have less now than formerly, my dear Marianne," he said, giving to +this airy remark the turn of a compliment. + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders and smiled. + +"Do you find me very much altered?" she asked abruptly. + +"Yes, rejuvenated." + +"I don't believe a word of it." + +"Upon my honor. You look like a communicant." + +"Good heavens! what kind?" said Marianne, laughing in a clear, ringing, +but slightly convulsive tone. + +He was still looking at her curiously, seated thus near the fireplace. + +The bright and sparkling fire cast its reflections on the gold frames in +waving and rosy tints that brightened the somewhat pale complexion of +this young woman and imparted a warm tone to her small and brilliant +gray eyes. She half turned her fair face toward him, her retrousse nose +was tiny, spirituelle and mobile, her large sensuous mouth was provoking +and seductive, and suggested by its upturned corners, encouragement or a +challenge. + +She had allowed her cloak, whose fur trimming was well-worn, to slip +from her shoulders, exposing her form to the waist; she trembled +slightly in her tight-fitting dress, and golden tints played on her bare +neck, which was almost hidden under the waves of her copper-colored +hair. + +She had just taken off her suede gloves with a jerky movement and was +abstractedly twisting them between her fingers. + +In spite of the somewhat depressing effect of her worn garments, she +displayed a natural elegance, a perfect form and graceful movements, and +Guy, accustomed as he was to estimate at a glance the material condition +of people, divined that this woman felt some embarrassment. She whom he +had known four or five years previously so charming amid the din of a +life of folly, and the coruscation of an ephemeral luxury, was now +burned out like an exploded rocket. + +Marianne Kayser! + +Of all the women whom he had met, he had certainly loved her the most +sincerely, with an absolute love, unreflecting, passionate and half-mad. +She was not dissolute but merely turbulent, independent and impatient of +restraint. Too poor to be married, too proud to be a courtesan, too +rebellious to accept the humiliations of destiny. + +She was an orphan, and had been brought up by her uncle, Simon Kayser, a +serious painter, indifferent to all that did not concern his art,--its +morality, its dignity, its superiority--who had, under cover of his own +ignorance, allowed the ardent dreams of his niece and her wayward fits +to develop freely like poisonous plants; near this man, in the vicious +atmosphere of an old bachelor's disorderly household, Marianne had lived +the bitter life of a young woman out of her element, poor, but with +every instinct unswervingly leaning towards the enjoyments of luxury. + +She had grown up amid the incongruous society of models and artists and, +as it were, in the fumes of paradoxes and pipes. A little creature, she +served as a plaything for this painter without talent, and he allowed +her to romp, bound and leap on the divans like a kitten. Moreover, the +child lighted his stove and filled his pipe. + +The studio was littered with books. As chance offered, she read them all +eagerly and examined with curiosity the pictures drawn by an Eisen or a +Moreau, depicting passionate kisses exchanged under arbors, where +behind curtains, short silk skirts appeared in a rumpled state. She had +rapidly reached womanhood without Kayser's perceiving that she could +comprehend and judge for herself. + +This falsely inspired man, entirely devoted to mystical compositions, +vaguely painted--philosophical and critical, as he said--this thinker, +whose brush painted obscure subjects as it might have produced signs, +did not dream that the girl growing up beside him was also in love with +chimeras, and drawn toward the abyss, not however to learn the mysteries +hidden by the clouds, but the mystery of life, the secret of the visions +that haunted her, of the disquieting temptations that filled her with +such feverish excitement. + +If Uncle Kayser could for one moment have descended from the nebulous +regions, and touched the earth, he would have found an impatient ardor +in the depth of Marianne's glance, and something feverish and restless +in her movements. But this huge, ruddy, rotund man, speaking above his +rounded stomach, cared only for the morality of art, aesthetic dignity, +and the necessity of raising the standard of art, of creating a mission +for it, an end, an idea--_art the educator, art the moralizer_,--and +allowed this feverish, wearied, impulsive creature, moulded by vice, who +bore his name, to wander around his studio like a stray dog. + +Isolated, forgotten, the young girl sometimes passed whole days bending +over a book, her lips dry, her face pale, but with a burning light in +her gray eyes, while her fingers were thrust through her hair, or she +rested upon a window-sill, following afar off, some imaginary picture in +the depths of the clouds. + +The studio overlooked a silent, gloomy street in which no sound was +heard save the slow footfalls of weary and exhausted pedestrians. It was +stifling behind this window and Marianne's gloomy horizon was this frame +of stones against which her wandering thoughts bruised themselves as a +bird might break its wings. + +Ah! to fly away, to escape from the solemn egotism and the theories of +Simon Kayser, and to live the passionate life of those who are free, +loved, rich and happy! Such was the dream upon which Marianne nourished +herself. + +She had perpetually before her eyes, as well as before her life, the +gray wall of that high house opposite the painter's studio, pierced with +its many eyes, and whether on summer's stifling evenings, the shutters +closed--the whole street being deserted, the neighbors having gone into +the country--or in winter, with its gray sky, the roofs covered with the +snow that was stained all too soon, when the brilliant lights behind the +curtains looked like red spots on the varnished paper, Marianne ever +felt in her inmost being the bitter void of Parisian melancholy, the +overwhelming sadness of black loneliness, of hollow dreams, gnawing like +incurable sorrows. + +She grew up thus, her mind and body poisoned by this dwelling which she +never left except to drag her feet wearily through the galleries of the +Louvre, leaning on the arm of her uncle, who invariably repeated before +the same pictures, in the loud and bombastic tone of a _comediante_, the +same opinions, and grew enthusiastic and excited according as the +pictures of the masters agreed with his _style_, his _system_, his +_creed_. One should hear him run the gamut of all his great phrases: My +_sys-tem!_ Marianne knew when the expression was coming. All these +Flemish painters! Painters of snuff-boxes, without any ideal, without +grasp! "And the Titian, look at this Titian! Where is _thought_ +expressed in this Titian? And _mo-ral-i-ty?_ Titian! A vendor of pink +flesh! Art should have a majesty, a dignity, a purity, an ideality very +different." + +Ah! these words in _ty_, solemn, bombastic, pedantic, with a false ring, +they entered Marianne's ears like burning injections. + +These visits to the museum impressed her with a gloom such as a ramble +in a cemetery would create, she returned to the house with depressing +headaches and muttering wrathful imprecations against destiny. She even +preferred that studio with its worn-out divans and its worm-eaten +tapestries that were slowly shredding away. + +There, at least, she was all alone, face to face with herself, consumed +by a cowardly fear--the fear of the future--this young girl who had read +everything, learned everything, understood everything, knew everything, +sullied by all the jokes of the Kayser studio, which, in spite of the +exalted, sacrosanct, aesthetic discussions which took place therein, +sometimes shockingly resembled a smoking-room--this physical virgin +without any virginity of mind, could there take refuge in herself, and +there in the solitude to which she was condemned, she questioned herself +as to the end to which her present life would lead her. + +Of dowry she had none. Her father had left her nothing. Kayser was poor +and in debt. She had no occupation. To run about giving private lessons +on the piano, seemed to Marianne to degrade her almost to the level of +domestic service. Those who wished to pose for the Montyon prize might +do so! She never would! + +Ah! what sufferings! what would be the end of such a life? Marriage? But +who desired her? One of those talentless painters, who ventilated at +Kayser's house, not merely their contemptuous theories, but also their +down-at-the-heel shoes? To fall from one Bohemian condition to another, +from exigency to want, to be the wife of one of these greasy-haired +dreamers? Her whole nature shuddered in revolt at this idea. Through the +open window, the tepid breath of nature wafted toward her the odor of +the rising sap in gentle, warm whiffs that filled her with a feverish +astonishment. Stretched on the patched divan, her eyes closed and her +lovely form kissed by the tepid breeze, she dreamed, dreamed, dreamed-- + +The awakening was folly, a rash act, an elopement. + +In the house on Rue de Navarin there happened to be one fellow more +daring than the rest, he was an artist who, in the jostling daily life, +kindled his love at the strange flame that burned in the lustful +virgin's eyes. A glance revealed all. + +The meeting with a rake determined the life of this girl. She fell, not +through ignorance or curiosity, but moved by anger and, as it were, out +of bravado. Since she was without social position, motherless and +isolated, having no family, without a prop and unloved, well, she threw +off the yoke absolutely. She broke through her shackles at one bound. +She rebelled!-- + +She eloped with this man. + +He was a handsome fellow, who thirsted for pleasure, and took his prize +boldly about, plunging Marianne into the ranks of vulgar mistresses, and +had not the mad woman's superior intelligence, will, and even her +disgust, ruled at once over this first lover and the equivocal +surroundings into which he had thrust her, she would have become a mere +courtesan. + +Kayser had experienced only astonishment at the flight of his niece. How +was it that he had never suspected the cause that disturbed her +thoughts? "These diabolical women, nobody knows them, not even those who +made them. A father even would not have detected anything. The more +excuse therefore for an uncle!" So he resumed his musing on elevated +art, quieting his displeasure--for his comrades jeered him--by the +fumes of his pipe. + +Moreover, all things considered, the painter added, Marianne had +followed the natural law. Full liberty for everybody, was still one of +Simon Kayser's pet theories. Marianne was of age and could dispose of +her lot without the necessity of submitting to a strict endorsement of +her conduct. When she had "sounded all the depths of the abyss,"--and +Kayser pronounced these words while puffing his tobacco--she would +return. Uncle Kayser would always keep a place for her at what he called +_his fireside_. + +"The fireside of your pipe," Marianne once remarked to him. + +So Kayser consoled himself for this escapade by the sacredness of art, +the only sacredness he recognized. On that indeed he yielded nothing. +What mattered it to the world, if a girl went astray, even if that girl +were his niece? Public morality was not hurt thereby. Ah! if he, Kayser, +had exhibited to the world a lewd picture, it would have been "a horse +of a different color"! The dignity, seriousness, purity of art, that was +right enough!--But a woman! Pshaw! a woman!--Nor was he heard once to +express any uneasiness as to what might become of Marianne. + +In the course of her perilous career, which, however, was not that of a +courtesan, but that of a freed woman avenging herself, Marianne had met +Guy de Lissac and loved him as completely as her nature allowed her to +love. Guy entertained her. With him she talked over everything, she gave +herself up to him, and made plans for the future. Why should they ever +separate? They adored each other. Guy was rich, or at any rate he lived +sumptuously. Marianne was a lovely mistress, clever, in fact, ten women +in one. Guy became madly attached to her and he felt himself drawn +closer to her day by day. She often repeated with perfect sincerity that +she had never loved any one before. + +The first lover, then? She did not even know his name now! + +There was no reason why they should not live together for ever, a life +of mutual joy and happiness, led by the same fancies, stirred by the +same desires. Why ever leave each other, even once? But it was just this +that induced Guy to abandon this pretty girl. He was afraid. He saw no +end to such a union as theirs. The little love-affair that enticed him +assumed another name: _The Chain_. He sometimes debated with himself +seriously about marrying this Marianne, whose adventures he knew, but +who so intoxicated him that he forgot all the past. + +Uncle Kayser, entirely engrossed in the "dignity of art," and occupied +with the composition of an allegorical production entitled _The Modern +Family_,--a page of pure, mystic, social, regenerative art,--had +certainly forgotten his niece; nevertheless, Lissac at times felt +somewhat tempted to restore her to him. He was grieved at the thought +of abandoning Marianne to another. His dread of marriage triumphed over +his jealousy. One fine day, Guy suddenly brought about a separation. +Feeling ill, he took to his bed, when one morning Marianne came to him +and said in passionate tones: + +"Now I will never leave you again! You are in danger, and I am here to +save you!" + +Guy now felt himself lost. His rapid perception, whose operation was as +sudden as a blow of the fist, warned him that if he allowed this woman +to install herself in his house, he might say good-by to liberty, and +probably also to his life. This Parisian had laid down as a principle, +that a man should always be _unfettered_. He held in horror this +shameful half-marriage that the language of slang had baptized, as with +a stain: _Collage_. He therefore decided to play his life against his +liberty, and during the temporary absence of this nurse established at +his bedside, he packed his clothes in his trunk at random, shivering as +he was with fever, threw himself into a hack, and, with chattering teeth +and a morbid shudder creeping over his entire body, had himself driven +to the railroad station and departed for Italy. + +Marianne was heartbroken anew at this unexpected departure. A hope had +vanished. She loved Guy very sincerely, and she vainly hoped that she +would hold him. He fled from her! Whither had he gone? For a moment, +she was tempted to rejoin him when she received his letters. She +surmised, however, that Guy, desiring to avoid her, caused his brief +notes to be sent by some friend from towns that he had left. To play +there the absurd part of a woman chasing her lover would have been +ridiculous. She remained, therefore, disgusted, heartbroken for a moment +like a widow in despair, then she retraced her steps to the Rue de +Navarin, and returned to the fold, where she found Uncle Kayser still +quite unruffled, with the almost finished picture of _The Modern +Family_. + +"That is, I verily believe, the best I have done, the most moral," said +Kayser to her. "In art, morality before everything, my girl! Come, sit +down and tell me your little adventures." + +It was five years--five whole years--since Lissac had seen Marianne. +Their passion had subsided little by little into friendship,--expressed +though by letters. Marianne wrote, Guy replied. All the bitter reproofs +had been exchanged through the post, yet, in spite of this +correspondence, neither had sought the opportunity nor felt the desire +to meet. The fancy was dead! Nevertheless, they had loved each other +well! + +Suddenly, without overtures, on this bitingly cold morning, Marianne +arrived, half shivering, in the new apartment, warmed her tiny feet at +the fire and raised to him the rosy tip of her cold nose. + +Guy was somewhat surprised. + +He looked with a curiosity not unmixed with pain at that woman whom he +had loved truly enough to suffer love's pangs,--the innocents say to die +of it. He tried to find again in the depths of those gray eyes, +sparkling and malicious, the old burning passion, extinguished without +leaving even a fragment of its embers. To think that he had risked his +life for that woman; that he should have sacrificed his name; that he +should have torn himself from her with such harsh bravado; that he +should have cut deep into his own being in order to leave her; that he +had fled, leaving for Italy with a craving desire for solitude and +forgetfulness! Eh! yes, Marianne had been his true love, the true love +of this blase Parisian sceptic and braggart, and he sought, while again +looking at the lovely girl, to recover some of the sensations that had +flown, to recall some of those reminiscences which more than once had +agreeably affected him. + +Marianne evidently understood what was passing in Guy's mind. She smiled +strangely. Buried in the armchair, whose back supported her own, and +half-bending her fair neck that reclined on the lace-covered head-rest, +she looked at Lissac fixedly with an odd expression, the sidelong glance +of a woman, that seems to be her keenest scrutiny. + +Through her half-closed lashes he seemed to feel that a malicious glance +embraced him. The mobile nostrils of her delicate nose dilated with a +nervous trembling that intensified the mocking smile betrayed by her +curling lips. Her hands were resting upon her plump arms, and with a +trembling motion of the fingers beat a feverish little march as if she +were playing a scale on a keyboard. + +Guy sought to evoke from the well-set, gracefully reclining form, from +the half-sly and half-concealed glance, from the palpitating nostrils, +something that reminded him of his former ecstasies. Again he saw, +shadowed by the chin, that part of her neck where he loved to bury his +brow and to rest his lips, greedily, lingeringly, as when one sips a +liqueur. A strange emotion seized him. All that had not yet been +gratified of his shattered, but not wholly destroyed love, surged within +him. + +Were it fancy or reminiscence, beside this woman he still felt as of +old, a feeling that oppressed his heart and caused him that delightful +sensation of uneasiness to which he had been a stranger in connection +with his many later easy love adventures. A light, penetrating and sweet +odor floated around Marianne, reminding Lissac of the intoxicating +perfume of vanished days, an irritating odor as of new-mown hay. + +He said nothing, while she awaited his remarks with curiosity. Guy's +mute interrogation possibly embarrassed her, for she suddenly shook her +head and rose to her feet. + +"May one smoke here?" she said, as she opened a Russia leather +cigarette-case bearing her monogram. + +"What next?" said Guy, lighting a sponge steeped in alcohol that stood +in a silver holder and offering it to Marianne. + +She quickly closed her fine teeth on the end of the paper cigarette that +she had rolled between her fingers and lighted it at the flame. The +gleam of the alcohol brightened her eyes and slightly flushed her pale +cheeks, which Guy regarded with strange feelings. + +"Your invention is an odd one!" she said, as she returned him the little +sponge upon which a tongue of blue flame played. + +He extinguished it, and abandoning himself to the disturbing charm of +reminiscences, watched Marianne who was already half-enveloped in a +light cloud of smoke. + +"There is one thing you do not know," he said. "More than once--on my +honor--at the corner of the street, at some chance meeting, my old +Parisian heart has beaten wildly on seeing in some coquettish outline, +or in some fair hair falling loosely over an otter-skin cloak, or in +some fair, vanishing profile with a pearl set in the lobe of the ear, +something that resembled you. Those fur toques with little feathers that +everybody wears now, you wore before any one else, on your fair head. +Whenever I see one, I follow it. On my word, though, not for her. The +fair unknown trotted before me, making the sidewalks echo to the touch +of the high heels of her little shoes, while I continued to follow her +under the sweet illusion that she would lead me at the end of the +journey to a spot where it seemed to me a little of paradise had been +scattered. It is thus that phantoms of loved ones course through the +streets of Paris in broad daylight, and I am not the only one, Marianne, +who has felt the anguish and heart-fluttering that I have experienced. +Often have I found my eyes moist after such an experience; but if it +were winter, I attributed my tears simply to a cold. Tell me, Marianne, +was it really the cold that moistened my eyes?" + +Marianne laughed. + +"Come, but you are idyllic, my dear Guy," said she, looking at Lissac. + +"Melancholy, nothing more." + +"Let us say elegiac. Those little fits have come upon you rather late in +the day, have they not? A little valerian and quinine, made up into +silver-coated pills, is a sovereign remedy." + +"You are making fun of me." + +"No," she said. "But it was so easy then, seeing that the recollection +of me could inspire you with so many poetic ideas and cause you to trot +along for such a distance behind plumed toques--it was so easy not to +take the train for Milan and not to fly away from me as one skips from a +creditor." + +Guy could not refrain from smiling. + +"Ah! it is because--I loved you too dearly!" + +"I know that!" exclaimed Marianne with a tone, in contrast with her +elegance, of an artist's model giving a pupil a retort. "A madrigal that +has not answered, no; does it rain?" + +"I have perhaps been stupid, how can it be helped?" said Lissac. + +"Do not doubt it, my dear friend. It is always stupid to deprive one's +self of the woman who adores one. Such rarities are not common." + +"You remember, dear Marianne," said Guy, "the day when you boldly wrote +upon the photographs to some one who loved you dearly: 'To him I love +more than every one else in the world?'" + +"Yes," said Marianne, blowing a cloud of smoke upward. "Such things as +that are never forgotten when one writes them with the least sincerity." + +"And you were sincere?" + +"On the faith of an honest man," she answered laughingly. + +"And yet I have been assured since that time, that you adored another +before that one." + +"It is possible," said Marianne with sudden bitterness; "but, in the +life that I have led, I have been so often purchased that I have been +more than once able to mistake for love the pleasure that I have +derived." + +In those words, uttered sharply, and in a hissing tone like the stroke +of a whip-lash in the air, she had expressed so much suffering and +hidden anger that Lissac was strangely affected. + +Guy, the Parisian, experienced a sentiment altogether curious and +unexpected, and this woman whose bare neck was resting on the back of +the armchair, allowing the smoke that issued from her lips in puffs to +enter her quivering nostrils, seemed to him a new creature, a stranger +who had come there to tempt him. In her languishing and, as it were, +abandoned pose, he followed the outline of her graceful body, blooming +in its youth, the fulness of her bust, the lines of her skirt closely +clinging to her exquisite hips, and the unlooked-for return of the lost +mistress, the forgotten one, assumed in his eyes the relish of a caprice +and an adventure. And then, that bitter remark, spoken in the course of +their light Parisian gossip, whetted his curiosity still further and +awoke, perhaps, all the latent force of a passion formerly suddenly +severed. + +He was seated on an ottoman beside Marianne, gazing into the young +woman's clear eyes, his hand endeavoring to seize a white hand that +nimbly eluded his grasp. The movement of his hands suggested the embrace +that his feelings prompted. + +Marianne suddenly looked him full in the face and curtly said, in a tone +of raillery, that suggested a past that refused to reopen an account for +the future: + +"Oh! oh! but is that making love, my friend?" + +Lissac smiled. + +"Come," she said, "nonsense! That is a romance whose pages you have +already often turned over." + +"The romance of my life," whispered Lissac in Marianne's ear. + +"The more reason that it should not be read again. It is true there are +books one never reads but once. And for that reason, probably, one never +forgets them." + +She rose abruptly, threw the stump of her cigarette into the fire and +looked with a bright, penetrating glance, into Lissac's surprised eyes. + +"Ah! it is a long while, you see, since you spoke laughingly--we have +both heartily laughed at it--of the 'caprices of Marianne.' Do you know +what I am, my dear Guy? Yes, where is the mad creature who was formerly +your mistress? Abandoned to dark, profound and incurable _ennui_, I yawn +my life away, as some one said, I yawn it away even to the point of +dislocating my jaw. The days seem dull to me, people stupid, books +insipid, while fools seem idiots and witty people fools. It is to have +the blues, if you will, or rather to have the grays, to hate colorless +objects, to be weary of the commonplace, to thirst for the impossible. A +thirst that cannot be allayed, let me add. The pure, fresh spring that +should slake my thirst has not yet gushed." + +She talked in a dry, bitter tone, with a smile that frequently gave way +to slight outbreaks of convulsive laughter almost as if she were +attacked with a fit of coughing. From time to time, she blew away a +cloud of smoke that escaped from her lips, for she had resumed her +cigarette, or with the tip of her nail struck her papelito, knocking the +ashes on the carpet. + +Moved and greatly puzzled, but no longer thinking of the temptation of a +moment before, Guy looked at her and nodded his head gravely, like a +physician who finds a patient's illness more serious than the latter is +willing to acknowledge. + +"You are very unhappy, Marianne!" he remarked. + +"I? Nonsense! Weary, disgusted, bored, yes; but not unhappy. There is +still something great in misery. That can be battled against. It is like +thunder. But the rain, the eternal rain, incessantly falling, with its +liquid mud, that--ah! that, ugh! that is crushing. And in my life it +rains, it rains with terrible constancy." + +As she uttered these words, she stretched her arms out with a movement +that expressed boundless weariness and disclosed to Guy the dull +dejection that followed a great deception and a hopeless fall. + +"Life? My life? A mere millstone mechanically revolving. A perpetual +round of joyless love-episodes and intoxication without thirst. Do you +understand? The life of a courtesan endured by a true woman. My soul is +mine, my spirit and my intellect, but these are chained to a body that I +abandon to others--whom I have abandoned, thank God! for I am satiated +at length and have now no lover, nor do I desire one. I desire to be my +own mistress, in short, and not the mistress of any person. I have but +one desire, hear--" + +"What?" asked Guy, who was deeply moved by this outburst of anger and +suffering, this cry of pain that declared itself involuntarily, his +feelings vacillating between doubt and pity. + +"My pleasure," Marianne replied, "is to shut myself up alone in a little +room that I have rented at the end of an unfrequented lane near the +Jardin des Plantes, whither I have had transported all the wreckage +saved from my past life: books, knickknacks, portraits, and I know not +what. My intention is that I shall remain there unknown to all, my name, +whence I come, where I go, my thoughts, my hatred, my past loves, +everything, in fact, a secret. I shall cloister myself. I shall stretch +myself out on a reclining-chair and think that if, by chance,--as +happens sometimes--an aneurism, a congestion, or I don't know what, +should strike me down in that solitude, no one would know who I am, +nobody, nobody, and my body would be taken to the Morgue, or to the +grave, it matters little to me, that body of which the little +otter-trimmed toques recall to you the graceful, serpentine line. Ah! +those plans are not very lively, are they? Well, my dear, such are my +good moments. Judge of the others, then." + +Lissac was profoundly stirred and very greatly puzzled. To call on him: +that implied a need of him. But there was no attempt to find the marker +at the place where the romance had been interrupted: therefore the visit +was not to renew the relations that had been severed, yet not broken. + +What, then, brought this creature, still charming and giddy, whose heart +was gnawed and wrung with grief? And was she the woman--Guy knew her so +well!--to return thus, only to conjure up the vanished recollections, to +communicate the secret of her present sorrows and to permit Lissac to +inhale the odor of a departed perfume, more airy than the blue +smoke-wreaths that escaped from her cigarette? + +After entrusting Guy with the secret of her yearning for solitude, she +again indulged in her sickly smile, and still looking at Guy: + +"You are, I am told, a constant guest at Sabine Marsy's receptions?" she +said abruptly. + +"Yes," replied Lissac. "But I have no great liking for political +salons." + +"It is a political centre, and yet not, seemingly. It is about to become +a scientific one, if one may believe the reporters--Monsieur de Rosas is +announced.--By the way, my dear Guy, you still see Monsieur de Rosas!" + +While Marianne uttered this name with an indifferent tone, she slightly +bent her head in order to scrutinize Guy. + +He did not reply at once, seeking first to discover what object +Marianne had in speaking to him about De Rosas. In a vague way he +surmised that the great Castilian noble counted for something in +Marianne's visit. + +"I always see him when he is in Paris," he said after a moment's pause. + +"Then you will see him very soon, for he will arrive to-morrow." + +"Who told you that?" + +"The newspapers. You don't read the newspapers, then?--He is returning +from the East. Madame Marsy is bent on his narrating his travels, on the +occasion of a special soiree. A lecture! Our Rosas must have altered +immensely. He was wild enough of old." + +"A shy fellow, which is quite different. But," asked Lissac after a +moment, "what about Rosas?" + +"Tell me, in the first place, that you know perfectly well that he will +arrive to-morrow." + +"I know it through the reporters, as you say. To-day, it is through the +reporters that one learns news of one's friends." + +"The important fact is that you know him, and it is because I am +particularly anxious to hear Monsieur de Rosas that I come to ask you to +present me at Madame Marsy's." + +"Oh! that is it?" Guy began. + +"Yes, that is it. I am weary. I am crazy over the Orient. You remember +Felicien David's _Desert_ that I used to play for you on the piano? I +would like to hear this story of travel. It would make me forget Paris." + +"You shall hear it, my dear Marianne. Madame Marsy asked me to introduce +Vaudrey to her the other evening. You ask me to present you to Madame +Marsy. I am both crimp and introducer; but I am delighted to introduce +you to a salon that you will, I trust, find less gloomy than your little +room of the Jardin des Plantes. In fact, I thought you were one of +Sabine Marsy's friends. Did I dream so?" + +"I have occasionally met her, and have found her very agreeable. She +invited me to call on her, but I have not dared--my hunger for +solitude--my den yonder--" + +"Is the little room forbidden ground, is one absolutely prohibited from +seeing it?" said Guy with a smile. + +"It is not forbidden, but it is difficult. Moreover, I have nothing +hidden from my friends," said Marianne, "on one condition, which is, +that they are my friends--" + +She emphasized the words: "Nothing but my friends." + +"Friendship," said Guy, "is all very well, it is very good, very +agreeable, but--" + +"But--?" + +"Love--" + +"Do not mention that to me! That takes wings, b-r-r! Like swallows. It +flits. It leaves for Italy. But friendship--" + +She extended her small firm hand as rigid as steel. + +"When you desire to visit me over there, I shall be at home. I will give +you the address. But it is not Guy who will come, but Monsieur de +Lissac, remember. Is that understood?" + +"I should be very silly if I answered _yes_." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +"Compliments! How foolish you are! Keep that sort of talk for others. It +is a long time since they were addressed to me." + +She took that man's face between her hands and kissed his cheeks in a +frank, friendly way. Guy became somewhat pale. + +"I have loved you, and truly, that is enough. Do not complain or ask +aught besides." + +Ah! what an eager desire now prompted him to possess her again, to find +in her his mistress once more, to restrain her from leaving until she +had become his, as of old. + +She had already thrown her cloak over her shoulders, and said, as she +gently pushed open the door: + +"So it is agreed? I am to go to Madame Marsy's?" + +"To Madame Marsy's. I will have an invitation sent you." + +"And I will call for you and take you. Yes, I, here, like a jolly +companion. Or I'll go with my uncle. You will present me to Rosas. We +shall see if he recognizes me." + +She burst out laughing. "You will also introduce me--since that is your +occupation--" and here her smile disclosed her pretty, almost +mischievous-looking teeth--"to Monsieur Vaudrey, your comrade. A +minister! Such people are always useful for something. _Addio, caro!_" + +Guy de Lissac had hardly taken two steps toward Marianne before she had +vanished behind the heavy folds of the Japanese portiere that fell in +its place behind her. He opened the door. Mademoiselle Kayser was +already in the hall, with her hand on the handle of the door. + +"At nine o'clock I shall be with you," she said to Lissac as she +disappeared. + +She waved a salutation, the valet de chambre hastened to open the door, +and her outline, that for a moment stood out in the light of the +staircase, vanished. Guy was almost angry, and returned to his room. + +Now that she had left, he opened his window quickly. It seemed to him +that a little blue smoke escaped from the room, the cloud emitted by +Marianne's cigarette. And with this bluish vapor also disappeared the +odor of new-mown hay, bearing with it the passing intoxication that for +a moment threatened to ensnare this disabused man. + +The cold outside air, the bright sunshine, entered in quivering rays. +Without, the snow-covered roofs stood out clearly against a soft blue +sky, limpid and springlike. Light wreaths of smoke floated upward in the +bracing atmosphere. + +Guy freely inhaled this buoyant atmosphere that chased away the blended +odor of tobacco and that exhaled from the woman. It seemed to him that a +sort of band had been torn from his brow which, but a moment ago, felt +compressed. The fresh breeze bore away all trace of Marianne's kisses. + +"Must I always be a child?" he thought. "It is not on my account that +she came here, but on Rosas's. Our friends' friends are our lovers. +Egad! on my word, I was almost taken in again, nevertheless! Compelled, +in order to cut adrift again, to make another journey to Italy,--at my +age." + +Then, feeling chilly, he closed the window, laughing as he did so. + + + + +V + + +On the pavement of the Boulevard Malesherbes, two policemen, wrapped in +their hooded coats, restrained the crowd that gathered in front of the +huge double-door of the house occupied by Madame Marsy. A double row of +curious idlers stood motionless, braving benumbed fingers while +watching the carriages that rolled under the archway, which, after +quickly depositing at the foot of the brilliantly lighted perron women +enveloped in burnooses and men in white gloves, their faces half-hidden +by fur collars, turned and crossed the row of approaching coupes. + +For an hour past there had been a double file of carriages, and a +continuous stream of guests arriving on foot, who threw their cigars at +the foot of the perron, chatting as they ascended the steps, which were +protected by a covering of glass. The curious pointed out the faces of +well-known persons. It was said in the neighborhood that the greater +part of the ministers had accepted invitations. + +Madame Marsy's salons were brilliant under the blazing lights. Guests +jostled each other in the lobbies. Overcoats and mantles were thrown in +heaps or strung up in haste, the gloved hands reaching out as in the +lobby of a theatre to receive the piece of numbered pasteboard. + +"You have No. 113," said Monsieur de Lissac to Marianne, who had just +entered, wearing a pale blue cloak, and leaning on his arm. + +She smiled as she slipped the tiny card into her pocket. + +"Oh! I am not superstitious!" + +She beamed with satisfaction. + +People in the hall stood aside in order to allow this pretty creature +to pass by; her fair hair fell over her plump, though slender, white +shoulders, and the folds of her satin skirt, falling over her +magnificent hips, rustled as she walked. + +Lissac, with his eyeglass fixed, and ceremoniously carrying his +flattened opera-hat, advanced toward the salon, amid the greedy +curiosity of the guests who contemplated the exquisite grace of the +lovely girl as if they were inhaling its charm. + +Madame Marsy stood at the entrance of the salon, looking attractive in a +toilet of black silk which heightened her fair beauty, and, with +extended hands, smilingly greeted all her guests, while the charming +Madame Gerson, refined and tactful, aided her in receiving. + +Sabine appeared perfectly charmed on perceiving Marianne. She had felt +the influence formerly of this ready, keen and daring intelligence. She +troubled herself but little about Marianne's past. Kayser's niece was +received everywhere, and had not Kayser decided to accompany her? He +followed in the rear of the young girl. People had not observed him. He +chatted with a man about sixty years old, with a white beard and very +gentle eyes who listened to him good-naturedly while thinking perhaps of +something else. + +"Ah! my old Ramel, how glad I am to see you!" he said with theatrical +effusion. + +"It is a fact that we rarely see each other. What has become of you, +Kayser?" + +"I? I work. I protest, you know, I have never compromised--Never--The +dignity of art--" + +Their voices were drowned by the hubbub of the first salon, already +filled with guests; Sabine meanwhile took Marianne, whom Lissac +surrendered, and led her toward a larger salon with red decorations, +wherein the chairs were drawn up in lines before an empty space, +forming, thanks to the voluminous folds of the curtains, a sort of stage +on which, doubtless, some looked-for actor was about to appear. + +Nearly all these chairs were already occupied. The lovely faces of the +women were illuminated by the dazzling light. Everybody turned toward +Marianne as she entered the room, under the guidance of Sabine, who led +her quickly toward one of the unoccupied seats, close to the improvised +stage on which, evidently, Monsieur de Rosas was going to speak. + +Madame Gerson had taken her seat near Marianne, who searched her black, +bright eyes with a penetrating glance in order to interrogate the +thoughts of this friend of the family. Madame Gerson was delighted. +Sabine, dear Sabine, had achieved a success, yes, a success! Monsieur +Vaudrey was there! And Madame Vaudrey, too! And Monsieur Collard--of +Nantes--the President of the Council! And Monsieur Pichereau, who, after +all, had been a minister! + +"That makes almost three ministers, one of whom is President of the +Council! Sabine is overcome with joy, yes, absolutely crazy! Think of +it: Madame Hertzfield, Sabine's rival, never had more than two ministers +at a time in her salon." + +She added, prattling in soft, linnet-like tones, that Madame +Hertzfield's salon was losing its prestige. Only sub-prefects were +created there. But Sabine's salon was the antechamber to the +prefectures! + +"And if you knew how charming Monsieur Vaudrey is--a delightful +conversationalist--he has dined excellently--he was twice served with +an entree!" + +Marianne listened, but her mind was wandering far away. She was debating +with herself as to when Monsieur de Rosas would appear on that narrow +strip of waxed floor before her. + +Guy had correctly surmised: it was Rosas and Rosas only whom this woman +was seeking in Sabine's salon. She wished to see him again, to talk to +him, to tempt destiny. A fancy.--A final caprice. Why not? + +Marianne thought that she played a leading part there. She remembered +this Jose very well, having met him more than once in former days with +Guy. A Parisian Castilian, more Parisian than Spanish, he spoke with +exquisite finish the classic tongue, and with the free-and-easy manner +of a frequenter of the boulevards, chatted in the slang of the pavement +or of the greenroom; he was an eminent virtuoso and collector, an author +when the desire seized him, but only in his own interest, liberal in +his opinions, lavish in his disposition, attractive in his manners; an +eager traveller, he had, at thirty years of age, seen all that was to be +seen, he had visited India and Japan, drunk camel's milk under the tents +of the Kirgheez, and eaten dates with the Kabyles, and narrated with a +sort of appetizing irony, love adventures which might have seemed +romantic brag, if it were not that he lessened their improbability by +his raillery. He was a kind of belated Byron, who might have been cured +of his romantic tastes by the wounds and contact of reality. + +She especially recalled a visit in Guy's company to Jose at an apartment +that the duke had furnished in Rue de Laval. He occupied a painter's +large studio, draping it with Oriental tapestry, crowding it with +knickknacks and panoplies of weapons: an extravagant luxury,--something +like the embarrassment of riches in a plundered caravansary. It was +there that Jose had regaled Marianne and Guy with coffee served in +Turkish fashion, and while they chatted, they had smoked that pale +Oriental tobacco, that the Spaniard, quoting some Persian poets, +gallantly compared to the perfumed locks of Mademoiselle Kayser. + +During her years of hardship, she had many a time recalled that +auburn-haired, handsome fellow, with his blue eye, pensive and +searching, and lower lip curled disdainfully over his tawny beard +trimmed in Charles V. style, as he reclined there, stretched on Hindoo +rugs, chanting some monotonous song as slow as the movement of a +caravan. + +"Isn't my friend Rosas a delightful fellow?" Guy had asked her. + +"Delightful!" + +"And clever! and learned! and entertaining! and, what is not amiss, a +multi-millionaire!" + +Marianne thought of the absolute power, satisfied desires, whims and +possible dreams that were linked with that man. He was a mass of +perambulating gold. How many times she had dreamed, in the mists of her +recollection, of that somewhat haughty smile that curled his delicate +mustache, and those keen-edged teeth gleaming though his reddish beard, +as if greedy to bury themselves deep in flesh! + +But where was the duke now? Among the Kabyles or the Mormons? At Tahiti, +Greenland, or gone to the devil? The papers had once announced that he +was organizing an expedition to the North Pole. Perhaps he was lost +among the icebergs in the Arctic Seas! She smiled at that, sighing +involuntarily with sincere emotion, but prompted by selfish regret. + +It had seemed to her that Jose had more than once permitted himself to +express his affection for her. Politely, correctly, of course, as a +gallant man addresses a friend's mistress, but manifesting in his +reserve a host of understood sentiments and tender restraint that +suggested hidden or implied declarations. Marianne had pretended not to +understand him. At that time, she loved Guy or thought that she loved +him, which amounts to the same thing. She contented herself with smiling +at the flirtation of Monsieur de Rosas. + +"I have perhaps been very stupid," she said to herself. "Pshaw! he might +have been as silly as I, if occasion demanded. The obligations of +friendship! The phantom of Guy!" + +She suddenly stopped and this name escaped her lips: _Jose_--_Joseph!_ + +Nevertheless, this was one of the vexations of this girl: she was angry +because she had acted rightly. Others suffer remorse for their ill +deeds, but she suffered for her virtue. She often thought of the Duc de +Rosas, as her mother Eve must have thought of Paradise lost. She would +have stirred, astonished, conquered, crushed Paris, if she had been the +mistress of Rosas. + +"What then! Whose fault was it? How foolish of one not to dare +everything!" + +Now see how suddenly and unexpectedly, just as an adversary might offer +an opportunity for revenge, chance, at the turning-point of her life, +had brought back to Paris this Jose whom she had never forgotten, and +who perhaps remembered her, and by whom she would be recognized most +assuredly, in any case. It was an unhoped, unlooked-for opportunity that +restored Marianne's faith in herself, superstitious as she was, like all +successful gamblers. + +She had fallen, but how she could raise herself by the arms of the duke! +One must be determined. + +Guy and Sabine were met on the way, like two helpers. She profited by +this circumstance, using the one to reach the other and to gain Rosas +from the latter. She bore a grudge, nevertheless, against Guy de Lissac, +the insolent and silly fellow who had formerly left her. Bah! before +taking vengeance on him, it was most important to make use of him, and, +after all, revenge is so wearisome and useless. + +Now Kayser's niece, Guy's mistress, a woman who had given herself or who +had been taken, who had sold herself or who had been purchased, a young +girl who remained so in features, gracefulness and the virgin charms +that clothed her courtesan's body--her smile a virgin's, her glance full +of frolic--Marianne was now within a few feet of him whom she expected, +wishing for him as a seducer desires a woman. + +"If he has loved me one moment, one single moment, Rosas will love me," +she thought. + +The salon was stiflingly hot, but Marianne was determined to keep +herself in the first row, to be directly under the eye of the duke. + +She felt the waves of over-heated air rise to her temples, and at times +she feared that she would faint, half-stifled as she was and +unaccustomed now to attend soirees. She remained, however, looking +anxiously toward the door, watching for the appearance of the traveller +and wondering when the pale face of the Spaniard would show itself. + +At a short distance from her there was a young woman of twenty-three or +twenty-four, courted like a queen and somewhat confused by the many +questions addressed to her; robed in a white gown, she was extremely +pretty, fair, and wore natural roses in her ash-colored hair, her eyes +had a wondering expression, her cheeks were flushed, and in her amiable, +gracious manner, she disclosed a touch of provincialism, modesty and +hesitation--Marianne heard Madame Gerson say to her neighbors: + +"It is the minister's wife." + +"Madame Vaudrey?" + +"Yes! Very charming, isn't she?" + +"Ravishingly pretty! Fresh-looking!" + +Then in lowered tone: + +"Too fresh!" + +"Rather provincial!" + +And one voice replied, in an ironical, apologetic tone: + +"Bless me, my dear, nothing dashing! Hair and complexion peculiarly her +own! So much the better." + +Notwithstanding the low tone of this conversation, Marianne heard it +all. One by one, every one looked at this young woman who borrowed her +golden tints from the rising sun. She bore the popular name of the new +minister. She entered into prominence with him, accepting gracefully and +unaffectedly the weight of his fame. Her timid, almost restless, +uncertain smile, seemed to crave from the other women pardon for her own +success, and there, surrounded by a group of men seated near the window, +were two persons for whom chairs had just been placed, one of whom was a +young, happy man, who exhaled an atmosphere of joy, and looked from time +to time toward Adrienne and Marianne as if to see if the young wife were +annoyed. + +"Where is Monsieur Vaudrey then?" Marianne asked Madame Gerson. + +"Why, he is just opposite to you! There on your right, beside Monsieur +Collard, and he is devouring you with his glances." + +"Ah, bah!" said Marianne with an indifferent smile. + +And she looked in her turn. + +She had, in fact, already noticed this very elegant man who had been +watching her for some time. + +But how could she know that he was Monsieur Vaudrey? He was delightful, +moreover, sprightly in manner and of keen intelligence. A few moments +before, she had heard him, as she passed by him under Sabine's guidance, +utter some flattering remarks which had charmed her and made her smile. + +Ah! that was Vaudrey? + +She had often heard him spoken of. She had read of his speeches. She had +even frequently seen his photograph in the stationers' windows. + +The determined air of this young man, whom she knew to be eloquent, had +pleased her. She ought then to have recognized him. He was exactly as +his photographs represented him. + +Of all the glances bestowed on the minister, Marianne's especially +attracted Sulpice. A moment previously he had felt a singular charm at +the appearance of this woman, threading her way directly between the +rows of men by whom she was so crowded as to be in danger of having her +garments pulled from her body. In his love of definitions and analyses, +Vaudrey had never pictured the Parisian woman otherwise, with her +piquant and instantaneous seductiveness, as penetrating as a subtle +essence. + +Marianne, smiling restlessly, looked at him and allowed him to look at +her. + +Her cheeks, which were extremely pale, suddenly became flushed as if +their color were heightened by some feverish attack, when, amid the stir +caused by the curiosity of the guests, and a greeting manifested by the +shuffling of feet and the murmuring of voices, Monsieur de Rosas +appeared; his air was somewhat embarrassed, he offered his arm to Madame +Marsy, who conducted him to the narrow stage as if to present him. + +"At last! ah! it is he!" + +"It is really the Duc de Rosas, is it not?" + +"Yes, yes, it is he!" + +"He is charming!" + +The name of Rosas, although only repeated in an undertone by the lips +of these women, rung in Marianne's ears, sounding like a quickstep +played on a clarion. It seemed to her that a decisive moment in her life +was announced fantastically in those utterances. Even now, while burning +with the very fever of her eagerness, she felt the gambler's +superstition. As soon as she saw Jose, she said to herself at once that +if he saw her and recognized her first glance, then he had not forgotten +her and she could hope for everything. Everything! "Men happily forget +less quickly than women," she thought. "Through egotism, or from regret, +some abandon themselves to their reminiscences with complacency, like +this Guy, and recognize on our countenances the lines of their own +youth. Others, perhaps, mourn over the lost opportunity, and the duke is +sentimental enough to be of that class." + +She thought that Rosas must look at her, yes, at any cost; and with body +inclined, her chin resting on her gloved right hand, while the other +handled her fan with the skill peculiar to the Spanish women, she darted +at the duke a rapid glance, a glance burning with desire and in which +she expressed her whole will. The human eye has within it all the power +of attraction possessed by a magnetic needle. As if he had experienced +the actual effect of that glance fixed on his countenance, the duke +raised his head after a polite but somewhat curtly elegant bow, to look +at the audience of lovely women whom Sabine had gathered to greet him, +and, as if only Marianne had been present, he at once saw the +motionless young woman silently contemplating him. + +Rosas, as he appeared within the frame formed by the red curtains, his +thin, regular and ruddy face looking pale against the white of his +cravat and the bosom of his shirt, looked like a portrait of a Castilian +of the time of Philip II., clothed in modern costume, his fashionable +black clothes relieved only by a touch of vermilion, a red rosette. But +however fashionable the cut of his clothes might be, on this man with +the vague blue eyes, and looking contemplative and sad with his upturned +moustache, the black coat assumed the appearance of a _doublet_ of old, +on which the red ribbon of the Legion of Honor looked like a diminutive +cross of Calatrava upon a velvet cloak. + +In fixing, to some extent, his wandering glance on the fervent look of +Marianne, this melancholy Spanish face was instinctively lighted up with +a fleeting smile that immediately passed and was followed by a slight, +respectful bow, quite sufficient, however, to surround the young woman +with an atmosphere that seemed to glow. + +"He has recognized me! at once! come!--I am not forgotten." + +As in the glorious moment of victory, her bloodless face was overspread +with a dazzling expression of joy. Boldly raising her head and inviting +his glances as she had braved them, she listened, with glowing eyes, +drinking each word that flowed from his lips, her nostrils distended as +if to scent the approach of an Oriental perfume, to the recital of the +narrative commenced by the duke in a measured, cajoling tone, which grew +animated and louder. + +Everybody listened to Rosas. Only the slight fluttering of fans was +heard like a beating of wings. Without changing the tone of his +discourse, and recounting his travels to his audience as if he were +addressing only Marianne, he told in a voice more Italian than Spanish, +in musical, non-guttural cadences, of his experiences on the borders of +the Nile, of the weariness of the caravans, of the nights passed under +star-strewn skies, of the songs of the camel-driver, slowly intoned like +prayers, of the gloom of solitary wastes and of the poetic associations +of the ruins slumbering amid the red sands of the desert. At times he +recited a translation of an Arabian song or remarked in passing, on some +mournful ballad, refined as a Sennett, deep as the infinite, in which +the eternal words of love, tender and affecting in all languages, +assumed an intensely poetic character under the influence of their +Semitic nature; songs in which passers-by, strangers, lovers dead for +centuries, who had strewed, as it were, their joys and their sobs over +the sands of the desert, told the color of the hair and of the eyes of +their dear ones, pleaded with their betrothed dead for the alms of love, +and promised to spectres of women rose-colored garments and flowers that +time would never wither. + +These songs of Arabs dying for Nazarenes, of sons of Mohammed +sacrificing themselves for the daughters of Aissa were so translated by +this Castilian that the exquisite charm of the original, filtered +through his rendering, lost none,--even in French,--of the special +characteristics of his own nation, a half-daughter of the Orient. And +inevitably, with its melancholy repetition, the poetry he spoke of dwelt +on wounded, suffering love, on the anguish of timid hearts, and the sobs +of unknown despairing Arabs, buried for ages under the sands of the +desert. + +The duke seemed to take pleasure in dwelling on these poetic quotations +rather than on the reminiscences of his travels. His individuality, his +own impressions vanished before this passionate legacy bequeathed by one +human race to another. Marianne trembled, believing that she could see +even in Rosas's thoughts a desire to speak especially for her and to +her. Was it not thus that he spoke in his own house in the presence of +Lissac, squatting on his divan like an Arab story-teller? + +She felt her youth renewed by the memory of all those past years. She +thought herself back once more in the studio on Rue de Laval. Sabine +Marsy's salon disappeared, Rosas was whispering in her ear, looking at +her, and allowing the love that he felt to be perceived, in spite of +Guy. + +Guy! who was Guy? Marianne troubled herself about no one but De Rosas. +Only the duke existed now. Had Guy been blended with her life but for a +single moment? She embraced Rosas with her burning glance. + +She no longer saw Sulpice, but he never looked away from Mademoiselle +Kayser. He thought her a most charming woman. A magnetic fluid, as it +were, flowed from her to this man, and he, with wandering mind, did not +hear one word of Monsieur de Rosas's narrative, but concentrated his +thoughts upon that pretty, enticing woman, whom he could not refrain +from comparing with his wife, sitting so near her at this moment. + +Adrienne was very pretty, her beauty was more regular than the other's. +Her smooth, blond hair was in contrast with the tumbled, auburn locks of +Marianne, and yet, extraordinary as it was--Adrienne had never seemed to +be so cold as on that evening, as she sat there motionless, watching, +while a timid habitual smile played over her lips. + +Sulpice suffered somewhat in consequence of this awkwardness on +Adrienne's part, contrasted as it was with the clever freedom of manner, +graceful attitude, and flowing outlines of that disturbing neighbor, +with her dull white countenance, half-closed mouth, strange curl of her +lips, which seemed turned up as if in challenge. She was decidedly a +Parisian, with all her intoxicating charms, that alluring, if vicious +attraction that flows from the eyes of even modest girls. Some words +spoken by Monsieur de Rosas reaching Vaudrey's ears--a description of +the somewhat fantastical preparation of poison by the Indians, +explained by the duke by way of parenthesis--suggested to Sulpice that +the most subtle, the gentlest and most certainly deadly poison was, +after all, the filtering of a woman's glance through the very flesh of a +man, and he thirsted for that longed-for poison, intoxicating and +delicious-- + +He was anxious for the duke to finish his remarks. What interest had he +in all those travels, those Arabic translations, that Oriental poetry, +or that poison from America? He was seized with the desire to know what +such a charming creature as Marianne thought. Ah! what a pretty girl! He +had already inquired her name; he happened to know Uncle Kayser; the +painter had formerly sent him a printed memoir _On the Method of +Moralizing Art through the Mind_. + +The minister experienced on hearing Rosas the feeling of enervation that +attacked him in the Chamber when, near the dinner-hour, an orator became +too long-winded in his speech. He was unable to resist remarking in a +whisper to the President of the Council, who was near him: + +"Suppose we call for the cloture?" + +Monsieur Collard in a diplomatic way expressed his approval of Rosas by +a look that at the same time rebuked his colleague Vaudrey for his lack +of sufficient gravity. + +The duke did not tire any one except Sulpice. He was listened to with +delight. The sentimental exterior of this man concealed a jester's +nature, and the sober appearance of this Castilian wore all the +characteristics of a polished lounger. The least smile that animated his +passive countenance became at once attractive. Marianne thought him most +delightful, or rather, she found him just what she had formerly believed +him to be, a refined, delicate and very simple man in spite of his +graciously haughty manner. When he concluded, the room echoed with the +thunder of the applause. Even in the adjoining rooms the people +applauded, for silence had been secured so as to hear his remarks. With +a wave of his gloved hand, Rosas seemed to disclaim that his discourse +merited the applause, and he received the greetings as a man of the +world receives a salutation, not as a tenor acknowledging the homage +paid to him. He strove to make his way through the group of young men +who were stationed behind him. + +"At last!" said Vaudrey, in a half-whisper. + +It was the moment for which he had been waiting. He would be able now to +address himself to Mademoiselle Kayser! + +He hastened to offer his arm to Marianne. + +Madame Marsy, eagerly and quickly, had already appropriated Monsieur de +Rosas, who was moreover surrounded and escorted by a crowd who +congratulated him noisily. Except for that, Marianne would have gone +direct to him in obedience to her desires. + +Vaudrey's arm, however, was not to be despised. The new minister was +the leading figure in the assembly. She looked at Sulpice full in the +face as if to inquire the cause of his eagerness in placing himself at +her side, and observing that this somewhat mocking interrogation +disconcerted him, she smiled at him graciously. + +She passed on smiling, amid the double row of guests who bowed as she +passed. She suddenly felt a sort of bewilderment, it seemed to her that +all these salutations were for her benefit. She believed herself created +for adoration. Inwardly she felt well-disposed towards Sulpice now, +because he had so gallantly chosen and distinguished her among all these +women. + +After all, she would easily find Rosas again. And who knows? It would +perhaps be better that the duke should seek her. Meanwhile, she crossed +the salons, leaning on the arm of the minister. It was a kind of +triumph. + +Good-naturedly and politely, but without pride, the minister received +all these attentions, becoming as they were to him in his official +capacity, and as he moved on he uttered from time to time some +commonplace compliment to Marianne, reserving his more intimate remarks +for the immediate future. + +Before the buffet, brilliant with light and the gleaming of crystal, the +golden-tinted champagne sparkling in the goblets, the ruddy tone of the +punch, the many fruits, the bright-colored _granite_ and the ices, +Vaudrey stopped, releasing the arm of the young girl but remaining +beside her and passing her the sherbet which a lackey handed him over +the piled-up plates. + +Groups were always encircling him; searching, half-anxious glances +greeted his. An eager hunt after smiles and greetings accompanied the +hunt for _tutti frutti_. But the minister confined his attentions to +Marianne, chafing under the eagerness of his desires, though bearing +them with good grace, as if he were really the lover of the pretty girl. + +Marianne stood stirring the sherbet with the point of a silver-plated +spoon, examining this statesman, as seductive as a fashionable man, with +that womanly curiosity that divines a silent declaration. A gold weigher +does not balance more keenly in his scales an unfamiliar coin than a +woman estimates and gauges _the value_ of a stranger. + +Marianne readily understood that she had fascinated Vaudrey. This +Vaudrey! Notwithstanding that he possessed a charming wife, he still +permitted himself to recognize beauty in other women, and to tell them +so, for he so informed Marianne! He declared it by his smile, his +sparkling eyes, and the protecting bearing that he instinctively +manifested in the presence of this creature who glanced at him with +perfect composure. + +In the confusion attending the attack on the buffet and in the presence +of the crowd that formed a half-circle round the minister, it was not +possible for him to commit himself too much; and the conversation, +half-drowned by the noise of voices, was carried on by fits and starts; +but in order to make themselves understood, Vaudrey and Marianne drew +nearer each other and found themselves occasionally almost pressed +against each other, so that the light breath of this woman and the scent +of new-mown hay that she exhaled, wafted over Sulpice's face. He looked +at her so admiringly that it was noticeable. She was laced in a light +blue satin gown that showed her rosy arms to the elbows, and her +shoulders gleamed with a rosy tint that suggested the rays of a winter +sun lighting up the pure snow. A singular animation, half-feverish, +beamed in her small, piercing, restless eyes, and her delicate ears with +their well-marked rims were quite red. The light that fell from the wax +candles imparted to her hair a Titian red tint as if she had bound her +locks with henna during the night. She was visibly assured of her power +and smiled with a strange and provoking air. + +Vaudrey felt really much disturbed, he was attracted and half-angered by +this pretty girl with dilating nostrils who calmly swallowed her glass +of sherbet. He thought her at once exquisite and lovely, doubly charming +with her Parisian grace and in her ball costume, her bare flesh as +lustrous as mother-of-pearl under the brilliant light. + +Her corsage was ornamented on the left side by an embroidered black +butterfly, with outstretched wings of a brownish, brilliant tint, and +Vaudrey, with a smile, asked her, without quite understanding what he +said, if it were an emblematic crest. + +She smiled. + +"Precisely," she replied. "What I wear in my corsage I have in my mind. +Black butterflies--or _blue devils_, as you choose." + +"You are not exceptional," said Sulpice. "All women are such." + +"All women in your opinion then, are a little--what is it called? a +little out of the perpendicular--or to speak more to the point, a little +queer, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +The minister smiled in his turn, and looked at Marianne, whose eyes, +seen between the blinking lids, gleamed as the electric eyes of a cat +shine between its long lashes. + +"No," he said, "no, but I blame them somewhat for loving the blue only +in the butterflies of which you speak, the _blue devils_ that penetrate +their brain! They are born for blue, however, for that which the +provincial poets style 'the azure', and they shun it as if blue were +detestable. _Blue!_ Nonsense! Good for men, those simpletons, who in the +present age, are the only partisans of _blue_ in passion and in life." + +Whether he desired it or not, he had drawn still closer to this creature +who studied him like a strategist while he fawned on her with his +glances, losing himself in that "blue" of which he spoke with a certain +elegance, in which he desired to express mockery, but which was +nevertheless sincere. In the same jesting tone, pointing to the light +blue of her gown, she said: + +"You see, your Excellency, that all women do not dislike blue." + +"If it is fashionable, _parbleu!_ And if it becomes their beauty as well +as this stuff of yours, they would adore it, most assuredly." + +"They love it otherwise, too--In passion and in life. That depends on +the women--and on men," she added, showing her white teeth while smiling +graciously. + +She dropped her spoon in the saucer and handed the sherbet to a servant. +With an involuntary movement--or perhaps, after all, it was a shrewdly +calculated one--she almost grazed Sulpice's cheek and lips when she +extended her round and firm arm, and Sulpice, who was somewhat +bewildered, was severely tempted, like some collegian, to kiss it in +passage. + +He closed his eyes and a moment after, on reopening them, the disturbing +element having passed, he saw Marianne before him with her fan in her +hand, and as if the image of which he spoke only now recurred to his +memory, he said: + +"Mademoiselle, it seems to me that in this very costume and as charming +as you are at this moment, I have seen your portrait at the Salon; is it +not so?" + +"Yes," she said. "It is the very best painting that my uncle has +produced." + +"I thought it excellent before seeing you," said Sulpice, "but now--" + +She did not feel satisfied with the smile that accompanied the +compliment. She wished to hear the entire phrase. + +"Now--?" said she, as a most seductive smile played on her lips. + +"Now, I find it inferior to the original!" + +"One always says so, your Excellency, except perhaps to the artist; but +I was greatly afraid that you would not think me so, arrayed in +this--this famous blue--this sky-blue that you love so much." + +"And that I love a hundred times more from this evening forward," said +he, in a changed and genuinely affected tone. + +She did not reply, but looked at him full in the face as if to inform +him that she understood him. He was quite pale. + +"Would you not like to be one of the bright ornaments of my salon, as +you are of that of Madame Marsy?" said he, in a whisper. + +"With the greatest happiness, your Excellency." + +What Sulpice said was not heard by the others; but Marianne felt that +she was observed, envied already, and manifested her complete +satisfaction with a toss of her head. In this atmosphere of flattery, +oppressive as with the heavy odor of incense, she experienced a +sensation of omnipotence, the intoxication of that power with which +Vaudrey was invested, whose envied reflection was cast on her by that +simple aside spoken in the midst of the crowd. + +She was delighted and exceedingly proud. She almost forgot that her +visit had been made on Rosas's account. + +Vaudrey was about to add something, when Madame Marsy in passing to +greet her guests, noticed Marianne and grasping her hand: + +"I beg your pardon, your Excellency," she said, "but I must take her +away from you. I have been asked for her." + +"By whom?" said Vaudrey. + +"Monsieur de Rosas!" + +Vaudrey looked at Marianne. He observed distinctly a flash of joy +illuminate her pale face and he felt a sudden and singular discontent, +amounting almost to physical anguish. And why, great heavens? + +Marianne smiled a salutation; he half-bowed and watched her as she went +away, with a sort of angry regret, as if he had something further to say +to this woman who was almost a stranger to him, and who, guided by +Sabine, now disappeared amid the crowd of black coats and bright +toilets. And then, almost immediately and suddenly, he was surrounded +and besieged by his colleagues of the Chamber, men either indifferent or +seeking favors, who only awaited the conclusion of the conversation with +Mademoiselle Kayser, which they would certainly have precipitated, +except for the fear of acting indiscreetly, in order to precipitate +themselves on him. Amid all those unknown persons who approached him, +Vaudrey sought a friend as he felt himself lost and taken by assault by +this rabble. + +The sight of the face of a friend, older than himself, a spare man with +a white beard very carefully trimmed, caused him a feeling of pleasure, +and he joyfully exclaimed: + +"Eh! _pardieu!_ why, here is Ramel!" + +He immediately extended both hands in warm greeting to this man of sixty +years, wearing a white cravat twisted round his neck, like a neckerchief +in the old-fashioned style, and whose black waistcoat with its standing +collar of ancient pattern was conspicuous amid the open waistcoats of +the fashionably-dressed young men who had been very eagerly surrounding +the minister for the last few moments. + +"Good day, Ramel!--How delighted I am to see you!"-- + +"And I also," said Ramel in a friendly and affectionate tone, while his +face, that seemed severe, but was only good-natured and masculine, +suddenly beamed. "It is not a little on your account that I came here." + +"Really?" + +"Really. I was anxious to shake hands with you. It is so long since I +saw you. How much has happened since then!" + +"Ah! Ramel, who the devil would have said that I should be minister when +I took you my first article for the _Nation Francaise_!" said Vaudrey. +"Bah! who is not a minister?" said Ramel. "You are. Remember what +Napoleon said to Bourrienne as he entered the Tuileries: 'Here we are, +Bourrienne! now we must stay here!'" + +"That is exactly what Granet said to me when he told me of the new +combination." + +"Granet expressed in that more of an after-thought than your old Ramel." + +"My best friend," said Sulpice with emotion, grasping this man's hands +in his. + +"It is so much more meritorious on your part to tell me that," said +Ramel, "seeing that now you do not lack friendships." + +"You are still a pessimist, Ramel?" + +"I--A wild optimist, seeing that I believe everything and everybody! But +I must necessarily believe in the stupidity of my fellows, and upon this +point I am hardly mistaken." + +"But what brings you to Madame Marsy's, you who are a perfect savage?" + +"Tamed!--Because, I repeat to you, I knew that you were coming and that +Monsieur de Rosas was to speak on the subject of savages, and these +please me. If I had been rich or if I only had enough to live on, I +should have passed my life in travelling. And in the end, I shall have +lived between Montmartre and Batignolles: a tortoise dreaming that he is +a swallow--" + +"Ramel, my dear fellow," said the minister, "would you wish me to give +you a mission where you could go and study whatever seemed good to you?" + +"With my rheumatism? Thanks, your Excellency!" said Ramel, smiling. "No, +I am too old, and never having asked any one for anything, I am not +going to begin at my age." + +"You do not ask, it is offered you." + +"Well, I have no desire for that. I am at the hour of the _far niente_ +that precedes the final slumber. It is a pleasant condition. One has +seen so many things and persons that one has no further desires." + +"The fact is," said the minister, "that if all the people you have +obligated in your life had solicited an invitation from Madame Marsy, +these salons would not be large enough to contain them." + +"Bah! they have all forgotten as I have, myself," said Ramel, with a +shake of his head and smiling pleasantly. + +Vaudrey felt intense pleasure in meeting, in the midst of this crowd of +indifferent or admiring persons, the man who had formerly seen him +arrive in Paris, and with whom he had corresponded from the heart of his +province, as with a kinsman. There was, in fact, between them, a +relationship of mind and soul that united this veteran of the press with +this young statesman. + +The ideal sought was the same, but the temperaments were different. +Ramel, although he had known them, had for a long time avoided those +excitements of struggle and power that inflamed Vaudrey's blood. + +"It was a glorious day when my pulse became regulated," he said. +"Experience brought me the needed tonic." + +Denis Ramel was a wise man. He took life as he found it, without +enthusiasm as without bitterness. He was not wealthy. More than sixty +years old, he found himself, after a life of hard, rough and continuous +struggle, as badly off as when he started out on his career, full of +burning hopes. He had passed his life honorably as a journalist--a +journalist of the good old times, of the school of thought, not of +news-tellers,--he had loyally and conscientiously exercised a profession +in which he took pleasure; he had read much, written much, consumed much +midnight oil, touched upon everything; put his fingers into every kind +of pie without soiling them, and after having valiantly turned the heavy +millstone of daily labor incessantly renewed for forty years, he had +reached the end of his journey, the brink of the grave, almost +penniless, after having skirted Fortune and seen Opportunity float +toward him her perfumed and intoxicating locks more than a hundred +times. Bent, weary, almost forgotten, and unknown and misunderstood by +the new generation, that styled this enthusiasm, more eager, moreover, +than that of juvenile faith, "old"--he saw the newcomers rise as he +might have beheld the descent of La Courtille. + +"It amuses me." + +Ramel had, in the course of his career as a publicist, as a dealer in +fame, assisted without taking part therein, in the formation of +syndicates, allotments of shares and financial intrigues; and putting +his shoulder to the wheel of enterprises that appeared to him to be +solid, while seeking to strike out those which appeared to be doubtful, +he had created millionaires without asking a cent from them, just as he +had made ministers without accepting even a thread of ribbon at their +hands. + +This infatuating craft of a maker of men pleased him. All those pioneers +in the great human comedy, he had seen on their entrance, hesitating and +crying to him for assistance. This statesman, swelling out with his +importance in the tribune, had received the benefit of his correction of +his earlier harangues. He had encouraged, during his competition for the +Prix de Rome, this member of the Institute who to-day represented +national art at the Villa Medicis; he had seen this composer, now a +millionaire, beg for a private rehearsal as he might ask alms, and slip +into one's hands concert tickets for the Herz hall. He was the first to +point out the verses of the poet who now wore _l'habit vert_. He had +first heralded the fame of the actor now in vogue, of the tenor who +to-day had his villas at Nice, yes, Ramel was the first to say: "He is +one of the chosen few!" + +Old, weary and knowing, very gentle and refined in his banter, and +refusing to be blinded or irritated by the trickeries of destiny, Denis +Ramel, when asked why, at his age and with his talents, he was neither a +deputy, nor a millionaire, nor a member of the Institute, but only a +Warwick living like a poor devil, smiled and said, with the tone of a +man who has probed to the bottom the affairs of life: + +"Bah! what is the use? All that is not so very desirable. Ministers, +academicians, millionaires, prefects, men of power, I know all about +them. I have made them all my life. The majority of those who strut +about at this very time, well! well! it is I who made them!" + +And, like a philosopher allowing the rabble to pass him, who might have +been their chief, but preferred to be their judge, he locked himself in +his apartments with his books, his pictures, his engravings, his little +collection slowly gathered year by year, article by article, smoking his +pipe tranquilly, and at times reviewing the pages of his life, just as +he might have fingered the leaves of a portfolio of engravings, thinking +when he chanced to meet some notable person of the day who shunned him +or merely saluted him curtly and stiffly: + +"You were not so proud when you came to ask me to certify your pay-slip +for the cashier of the journal." + +Ramel had always greatly esteemed Sulpice Vaudrey. This man seemed to +him to be more refined and less forgetful than others. Vaudrey had never +"posed." As a minister, he recalled with deep emotion the period of his +struggles. Ramel, the former manager of the _Nation Francaise_, was one +of the objects of his affection and admiration. He would have been +delighted to snatch this man from his seclusion and place him in the +first rank, to make this sexagenarian who had created and moulded so +many others, noteworthy by a sudden stroke. + +Amid the tumultuous throng, and feeling overjoyed to find once more one +whom he could trust, to whom he could abandon himself entirely, he +repeated to him in all sincerity: + +"Come, Ramel! Would you consent to be my secretary general?" + +"No! your Excellency," Ramel answered, as a kindly smile played beneath +his white moustaches. + +"To oblige me?--To help me?" + +"No--Why, I am an egotist, my dear Vaudrey. Truly, that would make me +too jealous. Take Navarrot," he added, as he pointed to a fashionable +man, elegantly cravatted, carrying his head high, who had just greeted +Vaudrey, using the same phrase eight times: "My dear minister--your +Excellency--my minister--" + +"Navarrot?" + +"He appears to be very much attached to you!" + +"You are very wicked, Ramel. He holds to the office and not to the man. +He is not the friend of the minister, but of ministers. He is one of the +ordinary touters of the ministry. He applauds everything that their +Excellencies choose to say." + +"Oh! I know those touters," said the old journalist. "When a minister is +in power, they cheer him to the echo; when he is down, they belabor +him." + +Vaudrey looked at him and laughingly said: "Begone, journalist!" + +"But at any rate,"--and here he extended his hand to Ramel,--"you will +see me this evening?" + +"Certainly." + +"And you still live at--?" + +"Rue Boursault, Boulevard des Batignolles." + +"Till then, my dear Ramel! If occasion require, you will not refuse to +give me your advice?" + +"Nor my devotion. But without office, remember without office," said +Ramel, still smiling. + +Vaudrey took great delight in chatting with his old friend, but for a +moment he had been seized with an eager desire to find amid the +increasing crowd that thronged the salons, the pretty girl who had +appeared to him like a statue of Desire, whetted desire, but even in her +charms somewhat unwholesome, yet disturbing and appetizing. + +He had come to Sabine Marsy's only by chance and as if to display in +public the joy of his triumph, just as a newly decorated man willingly +accepts invitations in order to show off his new ribbon, but he now felt +happy for having done so. He had promised himself only to put himself in +evidence and then disappear with Adrienne to the enjoyment of their +usual chats, to taste that intimacy that was so dear to him, but which, +since his establishment on Place Beauvau, had vanished. + +He habitually disliked such receptions as that in which he now took +part, those soirees as fatiguing as those crowds where one packs six +hundred persons in salons capable of holding only sixty: commonplace +receptions, where the master of the house is as happy when he refuses +invitations as a theatre-manager when his play is the rage; where one is +stifled, crushed, and where one can only reach the salon after a +pugilistic encounter, and where the capture of a glass of syrup entails +an assault, and the securing of an overcoat demands a battle. He held in +horror those salons where there is no conversation, where no one is +acquainted, where, because of the hubbub of the crowd or the stifling +silence attending a concert, one cannot exchange either ideas or +phrases, not even a furtive handshake, because of the packing and +crushing of the guests. It was a miracle that he had just been able to +exchange a few words with Mademoiselle Kayser and Ramel. The vulgarity +of the place had at once impressed him,--the more so because he was the +object of attraction for all those crowded faces. + +All that gathering of insignificant, grave and pretentious young men, +who, while they crowded, made their progress in the ranks of the +sub-prefects, councillors of prefectures, picking up nominations under +the feet of the influential guests as they would cigar stumps, disgusted +him; men of twenty years, born, as it were, with white cravats, +pretentious and pensive, creatures of office and not of work, haunting +the Chambers and the antechambers, mere collectors of ideas, repeaters +of serious commonplaces, salon democrats who would not offer their +ungloved hand to a workman on the street; staff-majors ambitious of +honors and not of devotion, whom he felt crowding around him, with +smiles on their lips and applications in their pockets. How he preferred +the quiet pleasure of reading at the fireside, a chat with a friend, or +listening to one of Beethoven's sonatas, or a selection from Mendelssohn +played by Adrienne, whose companionship made the unmarked flight of the +hours pass more sweetly. + +It was for that that he was created. At least he thought so and believed +it. And now this salon that he had simply desired to traverse, at once +seemed altogether delightful to him. And all this was due to his meeting +a divine creature in the midst of this crowd. He was eager to find +Marianne, to see her again. She aroused his curiosity as some enigma +might. + +What, then, was this woman, was she virtuous or of questionable status? +Ah! she was a woman, or rather ten women in one, at the very least! A +woman from head to foot! A woman to her finger tips, a refined, Parisian +woman, perverse even in her virginity, and a virgin perhaps in her +perversity. A problem in fair flesh. + +As Vaudrey hurriedly left the buffet, every one made way for him, and he +crossed the salons, eagerly looking out for Marianne. As he passed +along, he saw Guy de Lissac sitting on a chair upholstered in garnet +satin, his right hand resting on the gilded back and chatting with +Adrienne who was fanning herself leisurely. On noticing Sulpice, the +young woman smiled at him even at a distance, the happy smile of a +loving woman, and she embraced him with a pure glance, asking a question +without uttering a word, knowing well that he habitually left in great +haste. + +"Do you wish to return?" was the meaning of her questioning glance. + +He passed before her, replying with a smile, but without appearing to +have understood her, and disappeared in another salon, while Lissac said +to Adrienne: + +"What about the ministry, madame?" + +"Oh! don't speak to me of it!--it frightens me. In those rooms, it seems +to me that I am not at home. Do you know just what I feel? I fancy +myself travelling, never, however, leaving the house. Ministers +certainly should be bachelors. Men have all the honor, but their wives +endure all the weariness." + +"There must, however, be at the bottom of this weariness, some pleasure, +since they so bitterly regret to take leave of it." + +"Ah! _Dieu!_" said Adrienne. "Already I believe that I should regret +nothing. No, I assure you, nothing whatever." + +She, too, might have desired,--as Vaudrey did formerly--to leave the +soiree, to be with her husband again, and she thought that Sulpice found +it necessary to remain longer, since he had not definitely decided on +going away. + +The new salon that he entered, communicated with a smaller, circular +one, hung with Japanese silk draperies, and lighted by a Venetian +chandelier that cast a subdued light over the divans upon which some of +the guests sat chatting. Sulpice immediately divined, as if by instinct, +that Marianne was there. He went straight in that direction, and as he +entered the doorway, through the opening framed by two pale blue +portieres, he saw in front of him, sitting side by side, the pretty girl +and the Duc de Rosas to whom she had listened so attentively, almost +devotedly, a little earlier; he recalled this now. + +The light fell directly on Mademoiselle Kayser's shoulders and played +over her fair hair. The duke was looking at her. + +Vaudrey took but a single step forward. + +He experienced an altogether curious and inexplicable sensation. This +tete-a-tete displeased him. + +At that moment, on half-turning round,--perhaps by chance--she perceived +the minister and greeting him with a sweet smile, she rose and beckoned +to him to approach her. + +The sky-blue satin hangings, on which the light fell, seemed like a +natural framework for the beautiful blonde creature. + +"Your Excellency," she said, "permit me to introduce my friend, the Duc +de Rosas, he is too accomplished not to appreciate eloquence and he +entertains the greatest admiration for you." + +Rosas had risen in his turn, and greeted the minister with a very +peculiar half-inclination, not as a suitor in the presence of a powerful +man, but as a nobleman greeting a man of talent. + +Vaudrey sought to discover an agreeable word in the remarks of this man +but he failed to do so. He had, nevertheless, just before applauded +Rosas's remarks, either out of condescension or from politeness. But it +seemed to him that here the duke was no longer the same man. He gave him +the impression of an intruder who had thrust himself in the way that led +to some possible opportunity. He nevertheless concealed all trace of the +ill-humor that he himself could not define or explain, and ended by +uttering a commonplace phrase in praise of the duke, but which really +meant nothing. + +As he was about to move away, Marianne detained him by a gesture: + +"Well, your Excellency," she remarked, with a charming play of her lips +as she smiled, "you see,"--and she pointed to the blue draperies of the +little salon, as dainty as a boudoir--"you see that there are some women +who like blue." + +"Yes, Madame Marsy!--" Vaudrey answered, with an entirely misplaced +irony that naturally occurred to him, as a reproach. + +"So do I," said Marianne. "We have only chatted together five minutes, +but I have found that time enough to discover that you and I have many +tastes in common. I am greatly flattered thereby." + +"And I am very happy," replied Vaudrey, who was disturbed by her direct +glances that pierced him like a blade. + +She had resumed her place on the divan, but Vaudrey had already forgiven +her tete-a-tete with Rosas--and in truth, what had he to forgive?--This +burning glance had effaced everything. He bore it away like a bright ray +and still shuddered at the sensation he experienced. + +He was in a hurry to leave. He now felt a sudden attack of nervousness. +He was at the same moment charmed and bored. Again he resumed--amid the +throng that made way for him, humbly performing its duty as a crowd--his +role of minister, raising his head, and greeting with his official +smile, but, at the bottom of his heart, really consumed by an entirely +different thought. His brain was full of blue, of floating clouds, and +he still heard Marianne's voice ringing in his ears with an insinuating +tone, whispering: "We have many tastes in common," together with all +kinds of mutual understandings which, as it were, burned like a fire in +his heart. + +He saw Adrienne still seated in the same place and smiling sweetly at +him,--a smile of ardent devotion, but which seemed to him to be +lukewarm. He leaned toward her, reached his hands out and said to De +Lissac, hurriedly, as he grasped his hand: "We meet later, do we not, +Guy?" Then he disappeared in the antechamber, while the servants +hurried toward Madame Vaudrey, bearing her cloak, and as Vaudrey put on +his overcoat, a voice called out: + +"His Excellency's carriage." + +"I am exhausted," said Adrienne, when she had taken her place in the +carriage. "What about yourself?" + +"I? not at all! I am not at all tired. It was very entertaining! One +must show one's self now--" + +"I know that very well," the young wife replied. + +Like a child who is anxious to go to sleep, she gently rested her +hood-covered head on Sulpice's shoulder. Her tiny hands sought her +husband's hand, to press it beneath her cloak, as warm as a nest; and +after she had closed her eyes, overcome as she was by weariness, her +breathing seemed to become gradually almost as regular as in slumber, +and Sulpice Vaudrey recalled once more, beneath the light of the +chandeliers, that pretty blonde, with her half-bare arms and shoulders, +and strange eyes, who moistened her dry lips and smiled as she swallowed +her sherbet. + + + + +VI + + +In the pretty little Japanese salon, with its panels of sky-blue satin, +framed with gilded bamboo, Marianne was seated on the divan, half-facing +the duke as if to penetrate his inward thoughts, and she seemed to the +Castilian as she did to Vaudrey, to be a most charming creature amid +all those surroundings that might have been made expressly to match her +fair beauty. Moreover, with Rosas, her freedom of manner was entirely +different from that which she manifested to Sulpice, and she embraced +the young man with a passionate, fervent glance. + +Jose felt himself grow pale in the presence of this exquisite creature +whose image, treasured in the depths of his heart, he had borne with him +wherever his fancy had led him to travel. He gazed at her as a man looks +at a woman whom he has long desired, but whom some urgent necessity has +kept out of his way, and who by chance is suddenly brought near him, +fate putting within our reach the dream-- + +She was prettier than ever, graceful and blooming, "more matured," like +a fruit whose color is more tempting to the appetite. Sabine had just +before very naturally brought these two together and instinctively, as +if they had to exchange many confidences, they had immediately sought a +retired spot away from that crowd and were seated there in that salon +where Vaudrey, already half-jealous, guessed that Marianne would be. + +Yes, indeed, she had many confidences to impart to that man who had +suddenly entered the sphere of her life and had suddenly disappeared, +remaining during several years as if dead to her. It seemed to her as +they sat face to face that this flight of wasted time had made her still +younger, and Rosas, notwithstanding his cold demeanor, allowed his +former passion to be divined: the women one loves unmask one's secret +before a man can himself explain what he feels. + +She felt a profound, sincere joy. She recalled a similar conversation +with Jose in his studio, that Oriental corner hidden in the Rue de +Laval. The Japanese satin enhanced the illusion. + +"Do you know that it seems to me," she said, "that I have been dreaming, +and that I am not a whit older?" + +"You are not altered, in fact," said Rosas. "I am mistaken--" + +"Yes, I know. I have grown lovelier. That is a compliment that I am used +to--Lissac has told me that already, only the other morning." + +She bit her lips almost imperceptibly, as if to blame herself for her +imprudence, but had she mentioned Guy's name designedly, she could not +have been better satisfied with the result. Monsieur de Rosas, usually +very pale, became pallid, and a slight curl of his lip, although +immediately suppressed, gave an upward turn to his reddish moustache. + +"Ah!" he said, "You still see Guy." + +"I!--I had not spoken a single word to him until I asked him to have an +invitation sent me for this soiree, and then it was merely because I +knew you would be here." + +"Ah!" said Jose again, without adding a word. + +Marianne was satisfied. She knew now that the duke still loved her, +since the mention of Lissac's name had made him tremble. Well! she had +shrewdly understood her Rosas. + +"And what have you been doing, my dear duke, for such an age?" she said. + +She looked at him as she had looked at Vaudrey, with her sweet and +shrewd smile, which moved him profoundly, and her glance penetrated to +the inmost depths of his being. + +"You know the old saying: 'I have lived.' It is great folly, perhaps, +but it is the truth." + +"And I wager," boldly said Marianne, "that you have never thought of +me." + +"Of you?" + +"Of me. Of that mad Marianne, who is the maddest creature of all those +you have met in your travels from the North Pole to Cambodia, but who +has by no means a wicked heart, although a sufficiently unhappy one, and +that has never ceased to beat a little too rapidly at certain +reminiscences which you do not recall, perhaps--who knows?" + +"I remember everything," replied the duke in a grave voice. + +Marianne looked at him and commenced to laugh. + +"Oh! how you say that, _mon Dieu!_ Do you remember I used to call you +Don Carlos? Well, you have just reminded me of Philip II. 'I remember +everything!' B-r-r! what a funereal tone. Our reminiscences are not, +however, very dramatic." + +"That depends on the good or ill effects that they cause," said Rosas +very seriously. + +"Ah! God forgive me if I have ever willingly done you the least harm, my +dear Rosas. Give me your hand. I have always loved you dearly, my +friend." + +She drew him gently toward her, half bending her face under the cold +glance of the young man: + +"Look at me closely and see if I lie." + +The duke actually endeavored to read the gray-blue eyes of Marianne; but +so strange a flash darted from them, that he recoiled, withdrawing his +hands from the pressure of those fingers. + +"Come, come!" she said, "I see that my cat-like eyes still make you +afraid. Are they, then, very dreadful?" + +She changed their expression to one of sweetness, humility, timidity and +winsomeness. + +"After all, that is something to be proud of, my dear duke. It is very +flattering to make a man tremble who has killed tigers as our sportsmen +kill partridges." + +"You know very well why I am still sufficiently a child to tremble +before you, Marianne," murmured Jose. "At my age, it is folly; but I am +as superstitious as gamblers--or sailors, those other gamblers, who +stake their lives, and I have never met you without feeling that I was +about to suffer." + +"To suffer from what?" + +"To suffer through you," said the duke. "Do you know that if I had +never met you, it is probable that I should never have seen all those +countries of which I spoke just now, and that I should have been married +long ago, at Madrid or at Toledo?" + +"And I prevented you?--" + +Rosas interrupted Marianne, saying abruptly, and smiling almost sadly: + +"Ah! my dear one, if you only knew--you have prevented many things." + +"If I have prevented you from being unhappy, I am delighted. Besides, it +is evident that you have never had a very determined inclination for +marriage, seeing that you have preferred to trot around the world." + +"Like Don Quixote, eh? Do you know, moreover, since we are talking of +all these things, that you have saved me from dying in the corner like +an abandoned dog?" + +"I?" said Marianne. + +"You or your songs, as you please. Yes, in Egypt I suffered from fever +something like typhus. They left me for dead, as after a battle, in the +most wretched and frightful of native villages. No doctors, who might, +perhaps, have cured me, not a bed, not even a mattress. My servants, +believing me past hope, abandoned me--or rather, for I prefer your +Parisian word--cast me adrift--there is no other expression. There I +was, stretched out on a heap of damp straw--in short, on a dunghill--" + +"You, Rosas?" + +"In all conscience, I correctly portrayed Job there; lean, with a three +months' old beard, and with the death-rattle in my throat; in the open +air--don't alarm yourself, the nights were warm. In the evening the +fellah-women gathered round me, while I watched the sun that tinted +their cheeks with bronze--there were some pretty ones among them, I have +painted them in water-colors from memory--they poured out their insults +upon me in guttural tones, which I unfortunately understood, as I am an +Orientalist,"--he smiled--"and in addition to those insults they threw +mud at me, a fetid mass of filth. The women were charming, although they +took part in it. These people did not like the _roumi_, the shivering +Christian. Besides, women do not like men who have fallen. They do not +like feeble creatures.--" + +"Bah!--and where were the hospitals, the Sisters of Charity?" + +"Are you quite sure that the Sisters of Charity are women, my dear +Marianne?--In a word, I swear that I asked only one thing, as I lay on +that devilish, poisonous dunghill, and that was, to end the matter in +the quickest possible way, that I might be no longer thought of, +when--don't know why, or, rather, I know very well--in my fever, a +certain voice reached me--whence?--from far away it commenced +humming,--I should proclaim it yours among a thousand--a ridiculously +absurd refrain that we heard together one evening at the Varietes, at +an anniversary celebration. And this Boulevard chant recurred to me +there in the heart of that desert, and transported me at a single bound +to Paris, and I saw you again and these fair locks that I now look at, I +saw them, too, casting upon your forehead the light shadow that they do +now. I heard your laugh. I actually felt that I had you beside me in one +of the stage-boxes at the theatre, listening to the now forgotten singer +humming the refrain that had so highly amused you, Guy and myself--" + +It seemed to Marianne that the duke hesitated for a moment before +pronouncing Guy's name. It was an almost imperceptible hesitation, +rather felt than seen. + +Rosas quickly recovered: + +"On my word, you will see directly that the Boulevard lounger was hidden +under your gloomy Castilian,--that refrain took such a hold on my poor +wandering brain, such an entire possession, that I clung to it when the +fever was at its height--I hummed it again and again, and on my honor, +it banished the fever, perhaps by some homeopathic process, for at any +other time, this deuced refrain would have aroused a fever in me." + +"Why?--Because it was I who formerly hummed it?" + +"Yes," said Rosas in a lowered tone. "Well! yes, just for that +reason!--" + +He drew closer to her on the divan, and she said to him, laughingly: + +"How fortunate it is that Faure is singing yonder! He attracts +everybody and so leaves us quite alone in this salon. It is very +pleasant. Would you like to go and applaud Faure? It is some years since +I heard him." + +"You are very malicious, Marianne," said the duke. "Let me steal this +happy, fleeting hour. I am very happy." + +"You are happy?" + +"Profoundly happy, and simply because I am near you, listening to you +and looking at you--" + +"My poor Job," she said, still laughing, "would you like me to sing you +the refrain that we heard at the Varietes?" + +De Rosas did not reply, but simply looked at her. + +He felt as if he were surrounded with all the perfume of youth. On a +console beside Marianne, stood a vase of inlaid enamel containing sprigs +of white lilacs which as she leaned forward, surrounded her fair head as +with an aureole of spring. Her locks were encircled with milk-white +flowers and bright green leaves, transparent and clear, like the limpid +green of water; and at times these sprigs were gently shaken, dropping a +white bud on Marianne's hair, that looked like a drop of milk amid a +heap of ruddy gold. + +Ah! how at this moment, all the poetry, all the past with its +unacknowledged love swelled Rosas's heart and rushed to his lips. In +this brilliantly-lighted salon, under the blaze of the lights, amid the +shimmering reflections of the satin draperies, he forgot everything in +his rapture at the presence of this woman, lovely to adoration, whose +glance penetrated his very veins and filled him with restless thoughts. + +The distant music, gentle, penetrating and languishing, some soothing +air from Gounod, reached them like a gentle breeze wafted into the room. + +Jose believed himself to be in a dream. + +"Ah! if you only knew, madame," he said, becoming more passionate with +each word that he spoke, as if he had been gulping down some liqueur, +"if you only knew how you have travelled with me everywhere, in thought, +there, carried with me like a scapular--" + +"My portrait?" said Marianne. "I remember it. I was very slender then, +prettier, a young girl, in fact." + +"No! no! not your portrait. I tore that up in a fit of frenzy." + +"Tore it up?" + +"Yes, as I thought that those eyes, those lips and that brow belonged to +another." + +Marianne's cheeks became pallid. + +"But I have taken with me something better than that portrait: I +preserved you, you were always present, and pretty, so pretty--as you +are now, Marianne--Look at yourself! No one could be lovelier!" + +"And why," she said slowly, speaking in a deep, endearing tone, "why did +you not speak to me thus, of old?" + +"Ah! of old!" said the duke angrily. + +She allowed her head to fall on the back of the divan; looking at this +man as she well knew how, and insensibly creeping closer to him, she +breathed in his ears these burning words: + +"Formerly, one who was your friend was beside me, is that not so?" + +"Do not speak to me of him," Jose said abruptly. + +"On the contrary, I am determined to tell you that even if I had loved +him, I should not have hesitated for a moment to leave him and follow +you. But I did not love him." + +"Marianne!" + +"You won't believe me? I never loved him. I have never been his +mistress." + +"I do not ask your secret. I do not speak of him," said the duke, who +had now become deadly pale. + +"And I am determined to speak to you of him. Never, you understand, +never was Guy de Lissac my lover. No, in spite of appearances; he has +never even kissed my lips. I thought I loved him, but before yielding, I +had time to discover that I did not love him! And I waited, I swear to +you, expecting that you would say to me: 'I love you!'" + +"I?" + +"You," said Marianne, in a feeble tone. "You never guessed then?" + +And she crept with an exquisitely undulating movement still closer to +Rosas, who, as if drawn by some magnetic fluid, surrendered his face to +this woman with the wandering eyes, half-open lips, from which a gentle +sigh escaped and died away in the duke's hair. + +He said nothing, but hastily seizing Marianne's hand, he drew her face +close to his lips, her pink nostrils dilated as if the better to breathe +the incense of love; and wild, distracted, intoxicated, he pressed his +feverish, burning lips upon that fresh mouth that he felt exhaled the +perfume of a flower that opens to the morning dew. + +"I love you now, I loved you then!--" Marianne said to him, after that +kiss that paled his cheeks. + +Rosas had risen: a thunder of applause greeted the termination of a song +in the other salon and the throng was pouring into the smaller salon. +Marianne saw Uncle Kayser, who was arguing with Ramel, whose kindly, +lean face wore an expression of weariness. She also rose, grasped the +duke's hands with a nervous pressure and said as she still gazed at him: + +"There is my uncle. We shall see each other again, shall we not?" + +She crushed Rosas with her electric glance. + +Preceding the duke, she went straight to Kayser and took his arm, +leaning on it as if to show that she was not alone, that she had a +natural protector, and was not, as Rosas might have supposed, a girl +without any position. + +Kayser was almost astonished at the eagerness of his niece. + +"Let us go!" she said to him. + +"What! leave? Why, there is to be a supper." + +"Well! we will sup at the studio," she replied nervously. "We will +discuss the morality of art." + +She had now attained her end. She realized that anything she might add +would cool the impression already made on the duke. She wished to leave +him under the intoxication of that kiss. + +"Let us go!" said Kayser, drawing himself up in an ill-humored way. +"Since you wish it--what a funny idea!--Ramel," he said, extending his +hand to the old journalist, "if your feelings prompt you, I should like +to show you some canvases." + +"I go out so rarely," said Ramel. + +"Huron!" said the painter. + +"Puritan!" said Marianne, also offering her hand to Denis Ramel. + +Rosas looked after her and saw her disappear amongst the guests in the +other salon, under the bright flood of light shed by the chandeliers; +and when she was gone, it seemed to him that the little Japanese salon +was positively empty and that night had fallen on it. Profound ennui at +once overcame him, while Marianne, in a happy frame of mind, on +returning to Kayser's studio, reviewed the incidents of that evening, +recalling Vaudrey's restless smile, and seeming again to hear Rosas's +confidences, while she thought: "He spoke to me of the past almost in +the same terms as Lissac. Is human nature at the bottom merely +commonplace, that two men of entirely different characters make almost +identical confessions?" While she was recalling that passionate moment, +the duke was experiencing a feeling of disappointment because of their +interrupted conversation, and he reproached himself for not having +followed Marianne, for having allowed her to escape without telling +her-- + +But what had he to tell her? + +He had said everything. He had entirely surrendered, had opened his +soul, as transparent as crystal. And this notwithstanding that he had +vowed in past days that he would keep his secret locked within him. He +had smothered his love under his frigid Castilian demeanor. And now, +suddenly, like a child, on the first chance meeting with that woman, he +had allowed himself to be drawn into a confession that he had been +rigidly withholding! + +Ah! it was because he loved her, and had always loved her. There was +only one woman in the whole world for him,--this one. He did not lie. +Marianne's smile haunted him, wherever he was. In her glance was a +poison that he had drunk, which set his blood on fire. He was hers. +Except for the image of Lissac, he would most certainly have returned +long since to Paris to seek Mademoiselle Kayser. + +But Lissac was there. He recalled how much Guy had loved her. He had +more than once made the third in their company. He had often accompanied +Lissac to Marianne's door. How then had she dared to say just now that +she had never been his mistress? + +But how was he to believe her? + +And why, after all, should she have lied? What interest had she?-- + +In proportion as Rosas considered the matter, he grew more angry with +himself, and in the very midst of the crowd, he was seized with a +violent attack of frenzy, such as at times suddenly determined him to +seek absolute solitude. He was eager to escape. + +In order to avoid Madame Marsy, who was perhaps seeking him, he slipped +through the groups of people and reached the door without being seen, +leaving without formal salutation, as the English do. + +He was in the hall, putting on his overcoat, while a servant turned up +its otter-fur collar, when he heard Guy say: + +"You are going, my dear duke? Shall we bear each other company?" + +The idea was not distasteful to Rosas. Involuntarily, perhaps, he +thought that a conversation with Lissac was, in some way, a _chat_ with +Marianne. These two beings were coupled in his recollections and +preoccupations; besides, he really liked Guy. The Parisian was the +complement of the Castilian. They had so many reminiscences in common: +fetes, suppers, sorrows, Parisian sadnesses, girls who sobbed to the +measure of a waltz. Then they had not seen each other for so long. + +Rosas experienced a certain degree of pleasure in finding himself once +more on the boulevard with Guy. It made him feel young again. Every +whiff of smoke that ascended from his cigar in the fresh air, seemed to +breathe so many exhalations of youth. They had formerly ground out so +many paradoxes as they strolled thus arm in arm, taking their recreation +through Paris. + +In a very little time, and after the exchange of a few words, they had +bridged the long gap of years, of travel and separation. They expressed +so much in so few words. Rosas, as if invincibly attracted by the name +of Marianne, was the first to pronounce it, while Guy listened with an +impassive air to the duke's interrogations. + +In this way they went toward the boulevard, along which the rows of +gas-jets flamed like some grand illumination. + +"Paris!" said Rosas, "has a singular effect on one. It resumes its +dominion over one at once on seeing it again, and it seems as if one had +never left it. I have hardly unpacked my trunks, and here I am again +transformed into a Parisian." + +"Paris is like absinthe!" said Guy. "As soon as one uncorks the bottle, +one commences to drink it again." + +"Absinthe! there you are indeed, you Frenchmen, who everlastingly +calumniate your country. What an idea, comparing Paris with absinthe!" + +"A Parisian's idea, _parbleu!_ You have not been here two days and you +are already intoxicated with _Parisine_, you said so yourself. The +hasheesh of the boulevard." + +"Perhaps it is not _Parisine_ only that has, in fact, affected my +brain," said Rosas. + +"No doubt, it is also the _Parisienne_. Madame Marsy is very pretty." + +"Charming," said Rosas coldly. + +"Less charming than Mademoiselle Kayser!" + +Guy sent a whiff of smoke from his cigar floating on the night breeze, +while awaiting the duke's reply; but Jose pursued his way beside his +friend, without uttering a word, as if he were suddenly absorbed, and +Lissac, who had allowed the conversation to lapse, sought to reopen it: +"Then," he said suddenly,--dropping the name of Mademoiselle +Kayser:--"You will be in Paris for some time, Rosas?" + +"I do not in the least know." + +"You will not, I hope, set out again for the East?" + +"Oh! you know what a strange fellow I am. It won't do to challenge me +to!" + +Lissac laughed. + +"I don't challenge you at all, I only ask you not to leave the +fortifications hereafter. We shall gain everything. You are not a +Spaniard, you are a born Parisian, as I have already told you a hundred +times. If I were in your place, I would set myself up here and stick to +Paris. Since it is the best place in the world, why look for another?" + +"My dear Guy," interrupted the duke, who had not listened, "will you +promise to answer me, with all frankness, a delicate, an absurd +question, if you will, one of those questions that is not generally put, +but which I am going to ask you, nevertheless, without preface, +point-blank?" + +"To it and to any others that you put me, my dear duke, I will answer as +an honest man and a friend should." + +"Have you been much in love with Mademoiselle Kayser?" + +"Very much." + +"And has she loved you--a little?" + +"Not at all." + +"That is not what she has just told me." + +"Ah!" said Lissac, as he threw away his cigar. "You spoke of me, then?" + +"She told me that she believed she loved you sincerely." + +"That is just what I had the pleasure of telling you." + +"And--Marianne?--" + +"Marianne?" repeated Lissac, who perfectly understood the question from +De Rosas's hesitation. + +"My dear friend, when a man feels sufficiently anxious, or sufficiently +weak, or sufficiently smitten, whichever you please, to stake his life +on the throw of the dice, he is permitted to put one of those misplaced +questions to which I have just referred. Well! you can tell me what, +perhaps, none other than I would dare to ask you: Have you been +Marianne's lover?" + +Before replying, Guy took the arm of the duke in a friendly way, and, +leaning upon it, felt that it trembled nervously. Then, touching his +hand by chance, he observed that Rosas was in a burning fever. + +"My dear fellow, it is the everlasting question of honor between men and +of duty to a woman that you put before me. Had I been Marianne's lover, +I should be bound to tell you that Marianne had never been my mistress. +These falsehoods are necessary. No; I have not been Marianne's lover, +but I advise you, if you do not wish to be perfectly miserable, not to +seek to become so. You are one of those men who throw their hearts open +as wide as a gateway. She is a calculating creature, who pursues, madly +enough I admit, without consistency or constancy in her ideas, any plan +that she may have in view. She might be flattered to have you as a +suitor, as I was, or as a lover, as I have been assured others were. I +do not affirm this, remember; but she will never be moved by your +affection. She is a pure Parisian, and is incapable of loving you as +you deserve, but you could not deceive her, as they say she has been." + +"Deceived?" asked Rosas, in a tone of pity that struck Lissac. + +"Deceived! yes! deceit is the complementary school of love." + +"Then--if I loved Marianne?" asked Rosas. + +"I would advise you to tell it to her at first, and prove it afterward, +and finally to catalogue it in that album whose ashes are sprinkled at +the bottom of the marriage gifts." + +"You speak of Mademoiselle Kayser as you would speak of a courtesan," +said the duke, in a choking voice. + +"Ah! I give you my word," said Lissac, "that I should speak very +differently of Mademoiselle Alice Aubry, or of Mademoiselle Cora +Touchard. I would say to you quite frankly: They are pretty creatures; +there is no danger." + +"And Marianne, on the contrary, is dangerous." + +"Oh! perfectly, for you." + +"And why is she not dangerous for you?" + +"Why, simply, my dear duke, because I am satisfied to love her as you +have hitherto done and because I had, as I told you, the good fortune +not to be her lover." + +"But you brought her to Madame Marsy's this evening?" + +"Oh! her uncle accompanied us, but I was there." + +"You offer your arm then to a woman whom, as you have just told me, you +consider dangerous?" + +"Not for Sabine!--and then, that is a drop of the absinthe, a little of +the hasheesh of which I spoke to you. One sees only concessions in +Paris, and even when one is dead, one needs a further concession, but in +perpetuity. One only becomes one's self"--and Guy's jesting tone became +serious,--"when a worthy fellow like you puts one a question that seems +terribly like asking advice. Then one answers him, as I have just +answered you, and cries out to him: 'Beware!'" + +"I thank you," said Rosas, suddenly stopping short on the pavement. "You +treat me like a true friend." + +"And if I seem to you to be too severe," added Lissac, smiling, "charge +that to the account of bitterness. A man that has loved a woman is never +altogether just toward her. If he has ceased to love her, he slights +her, if he still loves her, he slanders her. I have perhaps, traduced +Marianne, but I have not slighted you, that is certain. Now, take +advantage of this gossip. But when?" + +"I don't know," replied the duke. "I will write you. I shall perhaps +leave Paris!" + +"What is that?" + +"Just what I say." + +"The deuce!" said Lissac. "Do you know that if you were to fly from the +danger in question, I should be very uneasy? It would be very serious." + +"That would not be a flight. At the most, a caprice," the duke replied. + +They separated, less pleased with each other than they were at the +commencement of their interview. Lissac felt that in some fashion or +other, he had wounded Rosas even in adopting the flippant tone of the +lounger, without any malice, and the Spaniard with his somewhat morose +nature, retired within himself, almost gloomy, and reproached Guy for +the first time for smiling or jesting on so serious a matter. + +Discontented with himself, he entered his house. His servant was waiting +for him. He brought him a blue envelope on a card-tray. + +"A telegram for monsieur le duc." + +Rosas tore it open in a mechanical way. It was from one of his London +friends, Lord Lindsay, who having learned of Rosas's return, sent him a +pressing invitation. If he did not hasten to Paris to welcome him, it +was simply because grave political affairs demanded his presence in +London. + +The duke, while taking off his gloves, looked at the crumpled despatch +lying under the lamp. He was, like most travellers, superstitious. +Perhaps this despatch had arrived in the nick of time to prevent him +from committing some act of folly. + +But what folly? + +He still felt Marianne's kiss on his lips, burning like ice. +To-morrow,--in a few hours,--his first thought, his only thought would +be to find that woman again, to experience that voluptuous impression, +that dream that had penetrated his heart. A danger, Lissac had said. The +feline eyes of Marianne had a dangerous ardor; but it was their charm, +their strength and their adorable seductiveness, that filtered like a +flame through her long, fair lashes. + +He closed his eyes to picture Mademoiselle Kayser, to inhale the +atmosphere, to enjoy something of the perfume surrounding her. + +A danger! + +Guy was perhaps right. The best love is that which is never gathered, +which remains immature, like a blossom in spring that never becomes a +fruit. Lord Lindsay's despatch arrived seasonably. It was a chance or a +warning. + +In any case, what would Rosas risk by passing a few days in London, and +losing the burning of that kiss? The sea-breezes would perhaps efface +it. + +"I am certainly feverish," the duke thought. "It was assuredly necessary +to speak to Lissac. It was also necessary to speak to her," he added, in +a dissatisfied, anxious, almost angry tone. + +A danger! + +Lissac had acted imprudently in uttering that word, which addressed to +such a man as Rosas, had something alluring about it. What irritated the +duke was Guy's reply, asserting that he had not been Marianne's lover, +but that Marianne had had other lovers. Others? What did Lissac know of +this? A species of jealous frenzy was blended with the feverish desire +that Marianne's kiss had injected into Rosas's veins. He would have +liked to know the truth, to see Marianne again, to urge Guy to further +confidences. And, then, he felt that he would rather not have come, not +have seen her again, not have gone to Sabine's. + +"Well, so be it! Lord Lindsay is right, I will go." + +The following morning, Guy de Lissac found in his mail a brief note, +sealed with the arms of the duke, with the motto: _Hasta la muerte_. + +Jose wrote to him as he was leaving Paris: + + "You are perhaps right. I am a little intoxicated with + _Parisine_. I am going to London to visit a friend and if I + ever recount my voyages there, it will only be to the + serious-minded members of the Geographical Society. There, at + least, there is no 'danger.' With many thanks and until we meet + again. + + "Your friend, + "J. DE R----" + +"Plague on it," said Lissac, who read the letter three times, "but our +dear duke is badly bitten! _Ohime!_ Marianne Kayser has had a firm and +sure tooth this time!--We shall see!--" he added, as he broke the seal +of another letter, containing a request for a loan on the part of +someone richer than himself. + + + + +VII + + +The soiree at Sabine Marsy's had caused Vaudrey to feel something like +the enervation that follows intoxication. The next morning he awoke with +his head heavy, after a night of feverish sleep, interrupted by sudden +starts, wherein he saw that pretty, fair girl standing before him +devouring sherbet and smiling gayly. + +Every morning since he had been at the ministry, Sulpice had experienced +a joyous sensation at finding himself again on his feet and rejoicing in +life. He paced about his apartments, feeling a sort of physical delight, +opening his window and looking out on the commonplace garden through +which so many ministers had passed and which he called, as so many +before him had done: _My garden_. His thoughts took him back then to +that little convent garden at Grenoble. What a distance he had travelled +since then! and how good it was to live! + +That morning, on the contrary, the black and bare trees in the garden +appeared to him to be very gloomy. He felt morose. He had been awakened +early so that the despatches from the provinces might be laid before +him. The information in them was quite insignificant. But then his +spirit was not present. Once again he was at Sabine's, beside Marianne, +so lovely in her sky-blue gown, and with her wavy locks. + +If he had been free, he would have gladly sought the opportunity to see +that woman again as soon as the morning commenced. He felt a kind of +infantile joy in being thus perturbed and haunted. It seemed to him that +this emotion made him feel younger. Formerly, on awakening, the dream of +the night had followed him like some intoxication. + +Formerly! but "formerly" he was not the important man, the distinguished +personage of to-day.--He had not the charge of power as some others have +the charge of souls. A minister has something else to do than to be +under the sway of a vision. Sulpice dressed hurriedly, went down to his +office, where a huge log-fire flamed behind an antique screen. He sat +down in front of his large mahogany bureau, covered with papers, and on +which was lying a huge black portfolio stuffed with documents bearing +this title in stamped letters: _Monsieur le Ministre de l'Interieur_. In +the centre of the bureau had been placed a leather portfolio filled with +sheets of paper bearing the title: _Documents to be signed by Monsieur +le Ministre_. Beside this were spread out various reports, bearing upon +one corner of the sheet a printed headline: _Office of the Prefect of +Police_ and _Director-General of the Press_. + +Vaudrey settled down in his chair with the profound satisfaction of a +man who has not grown weary of an acquired possession. This huge salon +with its blackened pictures, cold marbles, and large, severe-looking +bookcases, presented a sober bourgeois harmony that pleased him. It was +like the salon of a well-to-do notary, with its tall windows overlooking +the courtyard, already full of the shadows of importunate callers and +favor seekers whom the secretary-general received in a room adjoining +the ministerial cabinet. The minister inhaled once more the atmosphere +of his new domicile before settling down to work. Every morning it was +his custom to read the reports of the Director of the Press and of the +Prefect of Police before all else. + +He took up the report of the Prefect. Nothing serious. A slight accident +on the Vincennes line near the fortifications of Paris. A train +derailed. A few injured. In the Passage de l'Opera, the previous +evening, the early speech of the Minister of the Interior upon general +policy, and that of the Finance Minister, who was to reply to the rumor, +falsely or prematurely announcing the conversion of the five per cents, +had caused an upward movement in value. All was satisfactory, all was +quiet. The new minister enjoyed public confidence. Perfect. + +Sulpice was delighted and passed on to the report of the Director of the +Press. Except a small number of disgruntled and irreconcilable party +journals, all the French and foreign papers warmly praised and supported +the newly-created ministry. The _Times_ declared that the coalition +perfectly met the requirements of the existing situation. The Berlin +papers did not take umbrage at it, although Monsieur Vaudrey had more +than once declared his militant patriotism from the tribune. "In short," +the daily report concluded, "there is a concert of praise, and public +opinion is delighted to have finally secured a legitimate satisfaction +through the choice of a homogeneous ministry, such as has long been +desired." + +"What strange literature," muttered Sulpice, almost audibly, as he threw +the report with the other documents. + +He recalled how, on that morning when Sulpice Vaudrey sat there for the +first time, the morning following Pichereau's sudden dismissal from +office, the editor of this daily press bulletin, like an automaton, +mechanically and indifferently laid on the table of the minister a +report wherein he said in full: + +"Public opinion, by the mouth of the accepted journals, has for too long +a time reposed confidence in the Pichereau administration, for the +ministry to be troubled about the approaching and useless interpellation +announced some days ago by Monsieur Vaudrey--of Isere--." + +And it was to Vaudrey, the elected successor of Pichereau, that the +report was handed naturally and as was due. + +"The compilers of these little chronicles are very optimistic," thought +Sulpice. "After all, probably, it is the office that is responsible for +this, as, doubtless, ministers do not like to know the truth. I will +see, however, that I get it." + +He had, this time, a burdensome morning. Prefects were arriving by the +main entrance to the ministry, the vast antechambers on the left; and +friends, more intimate suitors, waited on the right, elbowing the +ushers, in order to have their cards handed to the secretary-general or +to the minister. There were some who, in an airy sort of way, said: +"Monsieur Vaudrey," in order to appear to be on familiar terms. + +Sulpice felt himself attacked on both sides at once; blockaded in his +office; and he despatched the petitioners with all haste, extending his +hand to them, smiling, cheerfully making them promises, happy to promise +them, but grieved in principle to see humbug depicted on the human face. +From time to time, in the midst of his ministerial preoccupations and +conversations, the disturbing smile of Marianne suddenly appeared like a +flash of lightning in a storm; and though shaking his head, to give the +appearance of listening and understanding, the minister was in reality +far away, near a brilliant buffet and watching a silver spoon glide +between two rosy lips. + +In that procession, which was to be a daily one, of petitioners, of +deputies urging appointments in favor of their constituents, asking the +removal of mayors, the decoration of election agents, harassing the +minister with recommendations and petitions which, although couched in +a humble tone, always veiled a threat, Vaudrey did not often have to do +with his friends. It was a wearisome succession of lukewarm friends or +recognized enemies, who rallied around a successful man. This man, +although a minister for so short a time, had already a vague, +disquieting impression that the administration was the property of a +great number of clients, always the same, frequenters of these +corridors, guests in these antechambers, well known to the ushers, and +who, whoever the minister might be, had the same access and the same +influence with the ministry. + +There were some whom the clerks saluted in a familiar way, as if they +were old acquaintances: intrepid office-seekers, unmoved by any changes +in ministerial combinations. Such entered Vaudrey's cabinet in a +deliberate, familiar manner, and as if feeling at home. Sulpice had once +heard one of them greet an usher by his first name: "Good-morning, +Gustave." + +The minister asked Gustave: "Who is that gentleman?" The usher replied, +with a tinge of respect in his tone: "It is one of our visitors, +Monsieur le Ministre, Monsieur Eugene Renaudin. We call him only +Monsieur _Eugene_. We have known him a long time." + +This "Monsieur Eugene" had already petitioned for a prefecture, or a +sub-prefecture, or--it mattered little--whatever place the minister +might choose to give him. + +His claims? None: he was an office-seeker. + +The minister was already overwhelmed by this vulgar procession of +petitioners and intermediaries, when an usher brought him a card bearing +this name: _Lucien Granet_. + +In the Chamber it was thought that Granet did not like Vaudrey too well, +and Sulpice vaguely scented in him a candidate for his office. The more +reason, then, that he should make himself agreeable. + +"What does he want?" the minister thought. + +This Granet was, moreover, a typical politician; by the side of the +minister of to-day, he was the inevitable minister of to-morrow, the +positive reformer, the man appointed to cleanse the Augean stables, +whose coming, it was said, would immediately mark the end of all abuses, +great and small. + +"Ah! when Granet is minister!" + +The artist without a commission consoled himself with the prospect of +the Granet ministry. He would decorate the monuments when Granet became +minister. The actress who looked with longing eyes toward the Comedie +Francaise, and dreamed of playing in Moliere, had her hopes centered in +Granet. Granet promised to every actress an engagement at the Rue de +Richelieu. _I am waiting for the Granet ministry!_ was the consolatory +reflection, interrupted by sighs, of the licentiates in law. Meanwhile +those office-seekers danced attendance on Granet, and their smile was +worth to the future Excellency all the sweets of office. + +Granet had thus everywhere a host of clients, women and men, sighing for +his success, working to bring about his ministry, intriguing in advance +for his advent, and working together for his glory. + +"Ah! if Granet were in power!" + +"Such abuses would not exist under a Granet ministry!" + +"All will be changed when Granet becomes minister!" + +"That dear Granet! that good Granet! Long live Granet!" + +Vaudrey was not ignorant of the fact that for some time past, Lucien +Granet had been manoeuvring for his appointment to any office whatever, +the most important obtainable. He was within an ace of becoming a member +of the last Ministerial Coalition. He might have been Vaudrey's +colleague instead of his rival. Sulpice was as glad to have him as an +opponent in the Chamber as a colleague in the ministerial council. He +was, however, not an adversary to be trifled with. Granet was a power in +himself. + +"Well!" said the minister to Granet, who entered smiling, and with a +very polite greeting, "you come then to inspect your future office? +Already!--" + +"I?" said Granet, who did his best to be agreeable, "God prevent me from +thinking of this department. It is too well filled." + +"That is very gallant, my dear Granet." + +"Far from disputing your portfolio, I come, on the contrary, to give +you some advice as to strengthening your already excellent position." + +"Advice from you, my dear colleague, should be excellent. Let us hear +it." + +"My dear minister, it is about the appointment of an Under Secretary of +State for the Interior. Well! I have come to urge the claims of my +friend, our colleague Warcolier." + +While speaking, Granet, who was seated near the bureau of the minister, +with his hat on his knee, was watching Vaudrey through his eyeglass; he +saw that his lips twitched slightly as he hesitated before replying. + +"But I am bound to Jacquier--of l'Oise," Vaudrey said abruptly. + +Granet smiled. Certainly Jacquier would be a most excellent choice. He +was a cool, solid and remarkable man. But he had little influence with +the Chamber, frequented society rarely, was morose and exclusive, while +Warcolier was a most amiable man, an excellent speaker and one who was +well-known in the Chamber. He was a fine orator. He was highly esteemed +by the Granet group. + +"My personal friend, too, my dear minister. You would, I assure you, +displease me if you did not support Warcolier this morning at the +Ministerial Council, at which the nomination of under secretaries should +take place. It is this morning, isn't it?" + +"Certainly, in an hour's time." + +Granet left the minister, repeating with considerable emphasis, which +Vaudrey could not fail to remark, that the nomination of Warcolier would +be favorably viewed by the majority of the deputies. A hundred times +more so than that of Jacquier--of l'Oise. + +"Jacquier is a bear. They don't like bears," said Granet, tapping his +thumb lightly with his eyeglass. + +He left Vaudrey out of humor, and very much disgusted at finding that +Warcolier had already exploited the field. + +In truth, Vaudrey liked Warcolier as little as he did Granet. Warcolier +took life easily. He was naturally of a contented disposition. He liked +people who were easily pleased. An Imperialist under the Empire, he was +now a Republican under the Republic. Epicurean in his tastes, he was +agreeable, clever and fond of enjoyment, and he approved of everything +that went the way he desired. He sniffed the breeze light-heartedly and +allowed it to swell his sail and his self-love. He did not like +ill-tempered people, people who frowned or were discontented or gloomy. +Having a good digestion, he could not understand the possibility of +disordered stomachs. A free-liver, he could not realize that hungry +people should ever think of better food. Everything was good; everything +was right; everything was beautiful. Of an admirably tranquil +disposition, he felt neither anger nor envy. Thinking himself superior +to every one else, Warcolier never made comparisons, he did not even +prefer himself: he worshipped himself. The world belonged to him, he +trod the ground with a firm step, swinging his arms, his paunch smooth, +his head erect and his shoulders thrown forward. He seemed to inhale, at +every step, the odor of triumph. He was not the man to compromise with a +defeated adversary. + +Of Warcolier's literary efforts, people were familiar with his _History +of Work and Workers_ that he had formerly dedicated to His Majesty +Napoleon III. in these flattering terms: "To you, sire, who have +substituted for the nobility of birth, that of work, and for the pride +of ancestry, that of shedding blood for one's country." + +Later, in 1875, Warcolier had re-issued his _History of Work_ and his +dedication was anxiously awaited. It did not take him long to get over +the difficulty. He dedicated his work to another sovereign: "To the +People, who have substituted the nobility of work for that of birth, and +that of blood shed for the country for that of blood shed by ancestors." + +And that very name which was formerly read at the foot of professions of +faith:--_Appeal to Honest People. The Revolution overwhelms us!_ is now +found at the foot of proclamations wherein this devil of a Warcolier +exclaims:--_Appeal to Good Citizens. Reaction now threatens us!_ + +This was the man whom Granet and his friends had worked so hard to +thrust into the position of Undersecretary of State of the Interior. +Vaudrey reserved his opinion on this subject to be communicated to the +President by and by. + +The hour for the meeting of the Council drew near. Sulpice saw, through +the white curtains of the window, his horses harnessed to his coupe and +prancing in the courtyard, although it was but a short distance from +Place Beauvau to the Elysee. He slipped the reports of the Prefect of +Police and the Director of the Press into his portfolio and was about to +leave, when the usher brought him another card. + +"It is useless, I cannot see any one else." + +"But the gentleman said that if the minister saw his name, he would most +assuredly see him." + +Vaudrey took the card that was extended to him on the tray: + +"Jeliotte! He is right. Show him in." + +He removed his hat and went straight toward the door, that was then +opened to admit a pale-faced, lean man with long black whiskers that +formed a sort of horsetail fringe to his face. Jeliotte was a former +comrade in the law courts, an advocate in the Court of Appeal, and he +entered, bowing ceremoniously to Sulpice, who with a pleased face and +outstretched hands, went to welcome the old companion of his youth. + +Jeliotte bowed with a certain affectation of respect, and smiled +nervously. + +"How happy I am to see you," Vaudrey said. + +"You still address me in the old familiar way," Jeliotte answered, +showing his slightly broken and yellow teeth. + +"What an idea! Have I forfeited your good opinion, that I should abandon +our familiar form of address?" + +"Honors, then, have not changed you; well! so much the better," said +Jeliotte. "You ask me how I am? Oh! always the same!--I work hard--I am +out of your sight--but I applaud all your successes." + +While Jeliotte was speaking of Vaudrey's successes, he sat on the edge +of a chair, staring at his hat, and wagging his jaw as if he were +cracking a nut between his frail teeth. + +"I have been delighted at your getting into the cabinet. Delighted for +your sake--" + +"You ought also to be delighted on your own account, my good Jeliotte. +Whatever I may hereafter be able to do--" + +Jeliotte cut the minister short and said in a tone as dry as tinder: + +"Oh! my dear Sulpice, believe one thing,--that I ask you nothing." + +"Why?" + +"Because--no, nothing. And I repeat, nothing." + +"And you would be wrong if I could be friendly to you or useful." + +"I have said _nothing_, and I stick to _nothing_. You will meet quite +enough office-seekers in your career--" + +"Evidently!" + +"Petitioners also!" + +"Most assuredly!" + +"Well! I am neither a petitioner nor an office-seeker nor a sycophant. I +am your friend." + +"And you are right, for I have great affection for you." + +"I am your friend and your devoted friend. I should consider it a +rascally thing to ask you for anything. A rascally thing, I say! You are +in office, you are a minister, so much the better, yes, so much the +better! But, at least, don't let your friends pester you, like vermin +crawling before you, because you are all-powerful. I will never crawl +before you, I warn you. I shall remain just what I am. You will take me +just as I am or not at all. That will depend altogether upon the change +of humor that the acquisition of honors may produce in you--" + +"Jeliotte! we shall see, Jeliotte!" + +"Well! You can take me or leave me. And as I do not wish to be +confounded with the cringing valets who crowd your antechambers--" + +"You crowd nothing, you will not dance attendance. Have I asked you to +dance attendance?" + +"No, not yet--I called simply to see if I should be received. Yes, it is +merely in the nature of an experiment--it is made. It is to your honor, +I admit, but I will not repeat it--I shall disappear. It is more simple. +Yes, I have told you and I was determined to tell you that you will +never see me, so long as you are a minister." + +"Ah! Jeliotte! Jeliotte!" + +"Never--not until you have fallen--For one always falls--" + +"Fortunately," said Sulpice, with a laugh. + +"Fortunately or unfortunately, that depends. I say: when you have +fallen--then, oh! then, don't fear, I will not be the one to turn my +back on you--" + +"You are very kind." + +"Whatever you may have said or done, you understand, while you are in +power--and power intoxicates men!--I will always offer you my hand. Yes, +this hand shall always be extended to you. You will find plenty of +people who will turn their backs on you at that moment. Not I! I am a +friend in dark days--" + +"That is understood." + +"I will leave you to your glory, Vaudrey. I crave pardon for not styling +you: Monsieur le Ministre; I could not. It is not familiar to me. I +cannot help it. I am not the friend for the hour of success, but for +that of misfortune." + +"And you will return?" + +"When you are overthrown!--" + +"Thank you!" + +"That is like me! I love my friends." + +"When they are down!" said Sulpice. + +"That is so!" exclaimed Jeliotte. + +"And is that all you had to say to me?" the minister asked. + +"Is not that enough?" + +"Yes! yes! _Au revoir_, Jeliotte." + +"_Au revoir!_ Till--you know when." + +"Yes. When I feel my position threatened, I will call upon you. Don't be +afraid. That time will come." + +"The idiot!" said Sulpice, angrily shrugging his shoulders, when the +advocate was gone. + +He snatched his hat and went out hurriedly to his carriage, the +messengers rising to bow to him as he passed through the antechamber. + +It was hardly necessary for him to order his coachman to drive to the +Elysee. The duties of each day were so well ordered in advance, and +besides, the attendants at the department knew quite as well as the +minister if a Council was to be held at the Elysee. + +Sulpice was somewhat upset. Jeliotte's visit, following that of Granet, +presented the human species in an evil aspect. He had never felt envious +of any one, and it seemed to him that the whole world should be +gratified at his modest bearing under success. + +"For, after all, I triumph, that is certain!--That animal of a Jeliotte +is not such a simpleton!--There are many who, if they were in my place, +would swagger!" + +So he complacently awarded himself a patent of modesty. + +The carriage stopped at the foot of the steps of the Elysee. Sulpice +always felt an exquisite joy in alighting from his carriage, his +portfolio pressed to his side, and leaping over the carpet-covered steps +of the stone staircase leading to the Council Chambers. He passed +through them, as he did everywhere, between rows of spectators who +respectfully bowed to him. Devoted friends extended their hands +respectfully toward his overcoat. Certainly, he only knew the men by +their heads, bald or crowned with locks, as the case might be. His +colleagues were gathered together, awaiting him, and chatting in the +salon, decorated in white and gold, the invariable salon of official +apartments with the inevitable Sevres vases with deep-blue, light-green +or buff color grounds, placed upon consoles or pedestals. The portfolios +appeared stuffed or empty, limp or bursting with paper bundles, under +the arms of their Excellencies. Suddenly a door was opened, the ushers +fell back and the President approached, looking very serious and taking +his accustomed place opposite to the President of the Council with the +formality of an orderly, the Minister of the Interior on the left of the +President of the Republic, with the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the +right. + +Then, in turn, each minister, beginning at the right, reported the +business of his department, sometimes debated in private council. Each +having completed his information, bowed to his neighbor on the right, +and said: + +"I have finished. It is your turn, my dear colleague." + +The President listened. Sulpice sometimes allowed himself to muse while +seated at this green-covered table, forgetting altogether the affairs +under consideration. Sometimes he recalled those green-covered tables of +the Council Chambers of the Grenoble Prefecture, finding that this +Ministerial Council recalled the mean impression invoked by his +provincial recollections, at other times, a vein of poesy would flit +across his mind, or an eloquent word would reach his ear, suggesting to +him the thought that, after all, these men seated there before their +open portfolios, turning over or scattering about the papers, +nevertheless represented cherished France and held in their leather +pouches the secrets, the destinies, aye, even the very fate of the +fatherland. + +And this Sulpice, overjoyed to expand at his ease in the delights of +power, sitting there in his accustomed chair,--a chair which now seemed +to be really his own--enjoying a sort of physical satisfaction ever new, +inhaling power like the fumes of a nargileh, forgot himself, however, +and suddenly felt himself recalled to the urgent reality when his +colleague, the Minister of War, a spare man with a grizzled moustache, +dropped an infrequent remark in which, in the laconic speech of a +soldier, could be comprehended some cause of anxiety or of hope. Sulpice +listened then, more moved than he was willing to have it appear, +trying, in his turn, to hide all his artistic and patriotic anxieties +under that firm exterior which his colleague of the Department of +Foreign Affairs wore, a dull-eyed, listless face, and cheeks that might +be made of pasteboard. + +The business of the Council was of little importance that morning. The +Keeper of the Seals, Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--a fat, puffing, +apoplectic man with somewhat glassy, round eyes, proposed to the +President, who listened attentively but without replying, some reform to +which Vaudrey was perfectly indifferent. He did not even hear his +colleague's dull speech, the latter lost himself in useless +considerations, while the Minister of War looked at him, as if his eyes, +loaded with grapeshot said, in military fashion: "_Sacrebleu!_ get +done!" + +Vaudrey looked out of the window at the dark horizon of the winter sky +and the gray tints of the leafless trees, and watched the little birds +that chased one another among the branches. His thoughts were far, very +far away from the table where the sober silence was broken by the +interminable phrases of the Minister of Justice, whose words suggested +the constant flow of an open spigot. + +The vision of a female form at the end of the garden appeared to him, a +form that, notwithstanding the cold, was clothed in the soft blue gown +that Marianne wore yesterday at Sabine's. He seemed to catch that +fleeting smile, the exact expression of which he sought to recall, that +peculiar glance, cunning and enticing, that exquisite outline of a +perfect Parisian woman. How charming she was! And how sweet that name, +Marianne! + +Let us see indeed, what in reality could such a woman be! Terrible, +perhaps, but certainly irresistible! + +Not for years had Vaudrey felt such an anxiety or allowed himself to be, +as it were, carried away by such a dominating influence. Waking, he +found Marianne the basis of all his thoughts, as she was during his +slumber. + +And so charming! + +"Monsieur le Ministre de l'Interieur is the next to address the +Council." + +Vaudrey had not noticed that Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--had finished +his harangue, and that after the Minister of Justice, the Minister of +Foreign Affairs had just concluded his remarks. Vaudrey, therefore, +needed a moment's reflection, a hasty self-examination to recognize his +own personality: _Monsieur le Ministre de l'Interieur!_ This title only +called up his _ego_ after a momentary reflection, a sort of simulated +astonishment under the cloak of a pensive attitude. Vaudrey's colleagues +did not perceive that this man seated beside them was, as it were, lost +in meditation. + +Sulpice, moreover, had little to say. Nothing serious. The confirmation +of the favorable reports that had been made to him. Within a week he +would finish his plan of prefectorial changes. He simply required the +Council to deal at once with the nomination of the Undersecretaries of +State. + +It was then that Vaudrey realized the extraordinary influence that +Lucien Granet must possess. From the very opening of the discussion, the +minister felt that his candidate, Jacquier--of l'Oise--was defeated in +advance by Warcolier. Granet must have laid siege to the ministers one +by one. The President was entirely in Warcolier's favor. Warcolier's +amiability, tact, the extraordinary facility with which he threw +overboard previous opinions, were so many claims in his favor. It was +necessary to give pledges to new converts, to prove that the government +was not closed against penitents. + +"That is a very Christian theory," said Vaudrey, "and truly, I am +neither in favor of jacobinism nor suspicion, but there is something +ironical in granting this amnesty to turncoats." + +"But it is decidedly politic," said Monsieur Collard--of Nantes. + +"It is a premium offered to the new converts." + +"Eh! eh! that is not so badly done!" + +Vaudrey knew perfectly well that it was useless to insist, he must put +up with Warcolier. It was his task to manage matters so that this man +should not have unlimited power in the ministry. + +Warcolier was elected and the President signed his appointment at the +earliest possible moment. + +"A nomination discounted in advance," thought Vaudrey, who again +recalled Granet's polite but threatening smile. + +He felt somewhat nervous and annoyed at this result. But what could be +done? To divert his thoughts, he listened to his colleagues' +communications. The Minister of War commenced to speak, and in a tone of +irritated surprise, instead of the lofty, patriotic considerations that +Vaudrey expected of him, Vaudrey heard him muttering behind his +moustache about soldiers' cap-straps, shakos, gaiter-buttons, +shoulder-straps, cloth and overcoats. That was all. It was the vulgar +report of a shoemaker or a tailor, or of a contractor detailing the +items of his account. + +Sulpice was anxious for the Council to be over. The President, before +the close of the session, repeated, with all the seriousness of a judge +of the Court of Appeal: "Above all, messieurs, no innovations, don't try +to do too well, let things alone. Don't let us trouble about business! +Let us be content to live! The session is ended." + +"Not about business?" said Vaudrey to himself. + +He understood power in quite a different way. Longing for improvements, +he did not understand how to let himself be dragged on like a cork upon +a stream, by the wave of daily events. He was determined to put his +ideas into force, to give life and durability to his ministry. There was +no use in being a minister if he must continue the habitual +go-as-you-please of current politics. In that case, the first chief of +bureau one might meet would make as good a minister as he. + +At the moment of leaving the Council Chamber, the Minister of War said +to him, in a jocose, brusque way: "Well! my dear colleague, Warcolier's +election does not seem to have pleased you? Bah! if he has changed +shoulders with his gun, that only proves that he knows how to drill." + +And the soldier laughed heartily behind his closely buttoned frock coat. + +Vaudrey got into his carriage and returned to the ministry to breakfast. + +Formerly the breakfast hour was generally the time of joyous freedom for +Sulpice. He felt soothed beside Adrienne and forgot his daily struggles. + +In their home on Chaussee d'Antin, he usually abandoned himself freely +to lively and cheerful conversation, to allow his wife to find in him, +the man of forty years, the fiance, the young husband of former days. +But here, before these exclusive domestics, the familiars of the +ministry, planted around the table like so many inspectors, rather than +servants, he dared not manifest himself. He scarcely spoke. He felt that +he was watched and listened to. The valet who passed him the dishes +watched over Monsieur le Ministre. He imagined that _his attendants_ in +their silent reflections compared the present minister with those that +had gone before him. On one occasion, one of the domestics replied to a +remark made by Adrienne: "Monsieur Pichereau, who preceded Monsieur le +Ministre, and Monsieur le Comte d'Harville, who preceded Monsieur +Pichereau, considered my service very proper, madame." + +Adrienne accepted as well as she could the necessities of her new +position. Since that was power, let power rule! She was resigned to +those wastes whose luxury was apparent, since the political fortunes of +her husband cast her there, like a prisoner, in that huge, commonplace, +ministerial mansion, wherein none of the joys of home or of that +Parisian apartment that she had furnished with such refined taste were +left her. She felt half lost in those vast, cold salons of that ancient +Hotel Beauvau,--cold in spite of their stoves, and which partook at one +and the same time of the provisional domicile and the furnished +apartment,--with its defaced gilded panels, and here and there a crack +in the ceiling, and those vulgar ornaments, those wearisome imitation +Chardins with their cracked colors and those old-fashioned pictures of +Roqueplan, giving to everything at once _one date_, a bygone style. With +what a truly melancholy smile Adrienne greeted the friends who came to +see her on her reception day, when they remarked to her: "Why, you are +in a palace!" + +"Yes, but I much prefer my accustomed furniture and my own house." + +Sulpice, free at last from that Council and the morning receptions, as +he alighted from his carriage, caused _Madame_ to be informed that he +had returned. + +Adrienne, who was looking pretty in a tight-fitting, black velvet gown, +approached him with a smile and was suddenly overcome with sadness on +seeing him absorbed in thought. She dared not question him, but being +somewhat anxious, she, nevertheless, inquired the cause of his frowning +expression. + +"You have your bad look, my good Sulpice," she smilingly said. + +He then quickly explained the Warcolier business. + +"Is that all? Bah!" she said, "you will have many other such +annoyances." + +She was smiling graciously. + +"That is politics!--And then you like it--At least, confine your likes +to that, Sulpice," she said, drawing near to Vaudrey. + +She was about to present her forehead for his kiss, as formerly, but she +drew back abruptly. A valet entered with a dignified air and +ceremoniously announced that breakfast was served. + +Vaudrey ate without appetite. Adrienne watched him tenderly, her eyes +were kind and gentle. How nervous he was and quickly disturbed! Truly, +Warcolier's appointment was not worth his giving himself the least +anxiety about. + +She was going to speak to him about it. Vaudrey imposed silence by a +sign. The motionless domestics were listening. + +Like Sulpice, Adrienne suffered the annoyance of a constant +surveillance. She was hungry when she sat down to table, but her +appetite had vanished. The viands were served cold, brought on plates +decorated with various designs and marked with the initials of Louis +Philippe, L.P., intertwined, or with the monogram of the Empire, N.; the +gilt was worn off, the fillets of gold half obliterated: a service of +Sevres that had been used everywhere, in imperial dwellings, national +palaces, and was at last sent to the various ministries as the remnant +of the tables of banished sovereigns. + +Instead of eating, Adrienne musingly looked at the decorations. It +seemed to her that she was in a gloomy restaurant where the badly served +dishes banished her appetite. Sulpice, sad himself, scarcely spoke and +in mute preoccupation, in turn confused the shrewd, sly Granet, the +intriguing Warcolier, and Marianne Kayser, whose image never left him. +He was discontented with himself and excited by the persistency with +which the image of this woman haunted him. + +In vain did Adrienne smile and seek to divert him from the thoughts that +besieged him--she was herself in a melancholy mood, without knowing why, +and her endeavors were but wasted; if he abandoned the train of his +reflections, it was merely to express a thought in rapid tones, and he +seemed momentarily to shake off his torpor; he replied to his wife's +forced smile by a mechanical grimace, and immediately relapsed into his +nervously silent state. + +In the hours of anxious struggle, she had often seen him thus, hence she +was not alarmed. If she had been in her own home, instead of occupying +this strange mansion, she would have rushed to him, and seated on his +knees, taken his burning head between her little hands and said: "Come +now! what ails you? what is the matter? Tell me everything so that, +child as I may be, I may comfort my big boy." + +But there, still in the presence of those people, always in full view, +she dared not. She carefully and anxiously watched Sulpice's mortified +countenance. Since his entry on his ministerial functions, this was the +first occasion, probably, that he had been so preoccupied. + +"There is something the matter with you, is there not, my dear?" + +"No--nothing--Besides--" + +The minister's glance was a sufficient conclusion to his remark. +Moreover, how could he, even if he had some trouble to confide, make it +known before the ever watchful lackeys? Before these impassive +attendants, who, though apparently obsequious, might in reality be +hostile, and who looked at them with cold glances? What a distance +separated them from the old-time intimacies, the cherished interchange +of thought interrupted by piquant kisses and laughter, just like a +young husband and wife! + +In truth, Adrienne had not thought of it: Sulpice could not talk. + +"You will serve the coffee at once," she said. + +She made haste in order that she might take refuge in her own apartment +to be alone with her husband. He, however, as if he shunned this +tete-a-tete, eager as he was for solitude, quickly attributed his +unpleasant humor to neuralgia or headache. Too much work or too close +application of mind. + +"At the Ministerial Council perhaps?" remarked Adrienne inquiringly. + +"Yes, at the Council,--I must take a little fresh air--I will take a +round in the Bois--The day is dry--That will do me good!" + +"Will you take me?" she said gayly. + +"If you wish," he replied. Then, in an almost embarrassed tone, he +added: + +"Perhaps it will be better for me to go alone--I have to think--to +work--There is no sitting at the Chamber to-day; and the day is entirely +at my own disposal." + +"Just as you please," Adrienne replied, looking at Sulpice with a tender +and submissive glance. "It would, however, have been so delightful and +beneficial to have gone to the Bois together on such a bright day! But +you and your affairs before everything, you are right; take an airing, +be off, come, breathe--I shall be glad to see you return smiling +cheerfully as in the sweet days." + +Sulpice looked at his young wife with a fondness that almost inspired +him with remorse. In her look there was so complete an expression of her +love. Then her affection was so deep, and her calm like the face of a +motionless lake was so manifest, and she loved him so deeply, so +intelligently. And how trustful, too! + +He was impelled now to beg her don her cloak and to have a fur robe put +into the coupe and set out now, when the sun was gradually showing +itself, like two lovers bound for a country party. At the same time he +felt a desperate longing to be alone, to abandon himself to his new idea +and to the image that beset him. He felt that he was leaving Adrienne +for Marianne. + +He did not hold to the suggestion, in fact, he repeated that it would be +better if he were alone. As there would be no session of the Chamber for +a whole week, he would go out with Adrienne the next day. The coachman +could drive them a long distance, even to Saint-Cloud or Ville-d'Avray. +They would breakfast together all alone, unknown, in the woods. + +"Truly?" said Adrienne. + +"Truly! I feel the necessity of avoiding so many demonstrations in my +honor." + +Sulpice laughed. + +"I am stifled by them," he said, as he kissed Adrienne, whose face was +pink with delight at the thought of that unrestrained escapade. + +"How you blush!" said Sulpice, ingenuously. "What is the matter with +you?" + +"With me? Nothing." + +She looked at him anxiously. + +"You think my complexion too ruddy! I have not the Parisian tint. Only +remain a minister for some time, and that will vanish. There is no +dispraise in that." + +She again offered her brow to him. + +He left her, happy to feel himself free. + +At last! For an entire day he was released from the ordinary routine of +his life; from the wrangling of the assembly, the hubbub of the +corridors, the gossip of the lobbies, interruptions, interrupted +conversations, from all that excitement that he delighted in, but which +at times left him crushed and feverish at the close of the day. He +became once more master of his thoughts, of his meditation. He belonged +to himself. It was almost impossible to recover his self-mastery in the +stormy arena into which he was thrust, happy to be there, and where his +distended nostrils inhaled, as it were, the fumes of sulphur. + +At times, amid the whirlwind of politics, he suffered from a yearning +for rest, a sick longing for home quiet, a desire to be free, to go +between the acts, as it were, to vegetate in some corner of the earth +and to resume in very truth an altogether different life from the +exasperating, irritating life that he led in Paris, always, so to speak, +under the lash; or, still better, to change the form of his activity, to +travel, to feed his eyes on new images, the fresh verdure, or the varied +scenes of unknown cities. + +But the years had rolled by amid the excitement and nervous strain of +political life. He lived with Adrienne in an artificial and overheated +atmosphere. Happy because he was loved, that his ambitions were +realized, that he charmed an assembly of men by the same power that had +obtained him the adoration of this woman, yes, he was happy, very happy: +to bless life, to excite envy, to arouse jealousy, to appear simply +ridiculous if he complained of destiny; and nevertheless, at the bottom +of his soul, discontented without knowing why, consumed by intangible, +feverish instincts, ill-defined desires for Parisian curiosities, having +dreamed in his youth of results very inferior to those he had realized, +yet finding when he analyzed the realities that he enjoyed, that the +promises of his dreams were more intoxicating than the best +realizations. + +Vaudrey was an ambitious man, but he was ambitious to perform valiant +feats. Life had formerly seemed to him to be made up of glory, triumphal +entries into cities, accompanied by the fluttering of flags and the +flourish of trumpets. He pictured conquests, victories, exaltations! +Theatrical magnificence! But now, more ironical, he was contented with +quasi-triumphs, if his restless, anxious nature could be satisfied with +what he obtained. + +Adrienne loved him. He loved her profoundly. + +Why had the meeting with Marianne troubled him so profoundly, then? +Manifestly, Mademoiselle Kayser realized the picture of his vanished +dreams, and the desires of a particular love that the passion for +Adrienne, although absolute, could not satisfy. This man had a nature of +peculiar ardor--or rather, curious desires, a greedy desire to know, an +itching need to approach and peep into abysses. + +Sometimes it seemed to Vaudrey that he had not lived at all, and this +was the fear and desire of his life: to live that Parisian life which +flattered all his instincts and awoke and reanimated all his dreams. But +yesterday it had appeared to him when he met this young woman who raised +her eyes to him, half-veiled by her long eyelashes, that a stage-curtain +had been raised, disclosing dazzling fairy scenery, and since then that +scenery had been always before him. It banished, during his drive, all +peace, and while the coupe threaded its way along the Faubourg +Saint-Honore toward the Arc-de-Triomphe, the minister who, but two hours +before, had been plunged in state affairs, settled himself down in a +corner of the carriage, his legs swaddled in a robe and his feet resting +on a foot-warmer, looking at, but without observing the cold figures +that walked rapidly past him, the houses lighted up by the sun's rays, +and the dry pavements, and he thought of those strange eyes and those +black butterflies, which seemed to him to flutter over that fair hair +like swallows over a field of ripe wheat. + +It pleased him to think of that woman. It was an entirely changed +preoccupation, a relaxation. A curious, strangely agreeable sensation: +his imagination thus playing truant, and wandering toward that vision, +renewed his youth. He experienced therein the perplexities that troubled +him at twenty. Love in the heart means fewer white hairs on the brow. +And then, indeed, he would never, perhaps, see Mademoiselle Kayser +again! He would, however, do everything to see her again at the coming +soiree at the ministry, an invitation--Suddenly his thoughts abruptly +turned to Ramel, whom he also wished to invite and meet again. He loved +him so dearly. It was he who formerly, in the journalistic days, and at +the time of the battles fought in the _Nation Francaise_, had called +Denis "a conscience in a dress-coat." + +Therefore, since he had an afternoon to spare, he would call on Ramel. +He was determined to show him that he would never preserve the dignity +of a minister with him. + +"Rue Boursault, Batignolles," he said to the coachman, lowering one of +the windows; "after that, only to the Bois!" + +The coachman drove the coupe toward the right, reaching the outer +boulevards by way of Monceau Park. + +Vaudrey was delighted. He was going to talk open-heartedly to an old +friend. Ah, Ramel! he was bent on remaining in the background, on being +nothing and loving his friends only when they were in defeat, as +Jeliotte had said. Well, Vaudrey would take him as his adviser. This +devil of a Ramel, this savage fellow should govern the state in spite of +himself. + +The minister did not know Ramel's present lodging which he had occupied +only a short time. He expected to find dignified poverty and a cold +apartment. As soon as Denis opened the door to him, he found himself in +a workman's dwelling that had been transformed by artistic taste into +the small museum of a virtuoso. After having passed through a narrow +corridor, and climbed a small, winding staircase, Vaudrey rang at the +third floor of a little house in Rue Boursault and entered a well-kept +apartment full of sunlight. + +Hanging on the walls were engravings and crayons in old-fashioned +frames. A very plain mahogany bookcase contained some select volumes, +which, though few, were frequently perused and were swollen with markers +covered with notes. The apartment was small and humble: a narrow bedroom +with an iron bedstead, a dressing room, a tiny dining-room furnished +with cane-seated chairs, and the well-lighted study with his portraits +and his frames of the old days. But with this simplicity, as neat as a +newly-shaved old man, all was orderly, and arranged and cared for with +scrupulous attention. + +This modest establishment, the few books, the deep peace, the oblivion +found in this Batignolles lodging, in this home of clerks, poor, petty +tradesmen and workmen, sufficed for Ramel. He rarely went out and then +only to take a walk from which he soon returned exhausted. He had +formerly worked so assiduously and had given, in and out of season, all +his energy, his nerves and his body, improvising and scattering to the +winds his appeals, his protests, his heart, his life, through the +columns of the press. What an accumulation of pages, now destroyed or +buried beneath the dust of neglected collections! How much ink spilled! +And how much life-blood had been mingled with that ink! + +Ramel willingly passed long hours every day at his study window, looking +out on the green trees or at the high walls of a School of Design +opposite, or at the end of a tricolored flag that waved from the frontal +of a Primary Normal School that he took delight in watching; then at the +right, in the distance, throbbing like an incessant fever, he saw the +bustling life of the Saint-Lazare Station, where with every shrill +whistle of the engines, he saw white columns of smoke mount skyward and +vanish like breaths. + +"Smoke against smoke," thought Ramel, with his pipe between his teeth. +"And it would be just as well for one to struggle--a lost unity--against +folly, as for a single person to desire to create as much smoke as all +these locomotives together!" + +Ramel appeared to be delighted to see Vaudrey, whose name the +housekeeper murdered by announcing him as _Monsieur Vaugrey_. He placed +a chair for him, and asked him smilingly, what he wanted "with an +antediluvian journalist." + +"A mastodon of the press," he said. + +What had Vaudrey come for? + +His visit had no other object than to enjoy again a former faithful +affection, the advice he used to obtain, and also to try to drag the +headstrong Ramel into the ministry. Would not the directorship of the +press tempt him? + +"With it, the directing of the press!" said Denis. "It is much better to +have an opposition press than one that you have under your thumb. +Friendly sheets advise only foolishly." + +"Why, Vaudrey, do you know," suddenly exclaimed the veteran journalist, +"that you are the first among my friends who have come into power--I say +the first--who has ever thought of me?" + +"You cannot do me a greater pleasure than tell me so, my dear Ramel. I +know nothing more contemptible than ingrates. In my opinion, to remember +what one owes to people, is to be scrupulously exact; it is simply +knowing orthography." + +"Well! mercy! there are a devilish lot of people who don't know if the +word gratitude is spelled with an _e_ or an _a_. No, people are not so +well skilled as that in orthography. There are not a few good little +creatures to be sent back to school. All the more reason to be thankful +for having learned by heart--by heart, that is the way to put it, my +dear Vaudrey--your participles." + +Sulpice was well acquainted with Ramel's singular wit, a little sly, but +tinged with humor, like pure water into which a drop of gin has been +poured, more perfumed than bitter. He knew no man more indulgent and +keen-sighted than him. + +"For what should I bear a grudge against people?" said the veteran. "For +their stupidity? I pity them, I haven't time to dislike them; one can't +do everything." + +Besides, the minister felt altogether happy to be with this man no +longer in vogue, but who might be likened to coins that have ceased to +be current and have acquired a higher value as commemorative medals. He +could unbosom himself to him: treachery was impossible. He longed to +have such a stay beside him, and still urged him, but Ramel was +inflexible. + +"But as I have already said--if I have need of you?" + +"Of me? I am too old." + +"Of your advice?" + +"Well! it is not necessary for me to give you my address, since you find +yourself here now, or to tell you that you can depend on me, seeing you +know me." + +Vaudrey felt that it was useless to pursue the matter further. He was +not talking with a misanthrope or a scorner, but with a learned man. He +would find at hand whenever he needed it, the old, ever faithful +devotedness of this white-haired man, who, with skull-cap on his head, +was smoking his pipe near the window when the minister entered. + +"Then, you are happy, Ramel?" said Sulpice, a little astonished, +perhaps. + +"Perfectly so." + +"You have no ambition for anything whatever?" + +"Nothing, I await philosophically the hour for the monument." + +He smiled when he saw that his own familiar remark was puzzling Vaudrey. + +"The monument, there, on one side: Villa Montmartre!--Oh! I am not +anxious to have done with life. It is amusing enough at times. But, +after all, it is necessary to admit that the comedy ends when it is +finished. One fine day, I shall be found sleeping somewhere, here in my +armchair, or in my bed, suddenly, or perhaps after a long illness--this +would weary me, as a lingering illness is repugnant to me--and you will +read in one or two journals a short paragraph announcing that the +obsequies of Monsieur Denis Ramel, one-time editor of a host of +democratic newspapers, a celebrated man in his day, but little known +recently, will take place on such a day at such an hour. Few will +attend, but I ask you to be present--that is, if there is no important +sitting at the Chamber." + +Old Ramel twirled his moustache with his long, lean fingers as he spoke +these last words into which he infused a dash of irony. He nullified it, +however, as he extended his frankly opened hand and said to Sulpice +Vaudrey: + +"What I have said to you is very cheerful! A thousand pardons. The more +so that I do not think of doubting you for a single moment--You have +always been credulous. That is your defect, and it is a capital one. In +the world of business men and politicians, who are for the most part +egotists, of mediocrities, or to speak plainly--I know no more +picturesque term--of _dodgers_,--you move about with all the illusions +and tastes of an artist. You are like the brave fellows of our army, +poets of war, as it were, who hurled themselves to their destruction +against regiments of engineers. Certainly, my dear minister, I shall +always be delighted to give you my counsel, you whom I used to call my +dear child, and if the observations of a living waif can serve you in +anything, count on me. Dispose of me, and if by chance I can be useful +to you, I shall feel myself amply repaid." + +"Ah!" cried Sulpice, "if you only knew how much good it does me to hear +the sincere thoughts of a man one can rely on! How different is their +ring from that of others!" + +He then allowed himself to pass by an easy transition to the confessions +of his first deceptions or annoyances. + +The selection that very morning, of Warcolier as Under Secretary of +State in a Republican administration, a man who had played charades at +Compiegne, had thrown him into a state of angry excitement. + +Ramel, however, burst into laughter. + +"Ah, nonsense! You will see many other such! Why, governments always do +favors to their enemies when their opponents pretend to lower their +colors! What good is it to serve friends? They love you." + +"This does not vex you, then, old Republican?" + +"I, an old soldier grown white in harness," said Ramel, whose moustache +still played under his smile, "that doesn't disturb my peace in the +least. I comfort myself with the thought that my dream, my _ideal_, to +use a trite expression, is not touched by such absurdities, and I am +persuaded that progress does not lag and that the cause of liberty gains +ground, in spite of so much injustice and folly. I confess, however, +that I sometimes feel the strange emotion that a man might experience on +seeing, after the lapse of years, the lovely woman whom he loved to +distraction at twenty, in the arms of a person whom he did not +particularly respect." + +Ramel had lighted his pipe, and half-hidden by the bluish wreaths of +smoke, chatted away, quite happy on his side to give himself up to the +revelation of the secret of his heart without the least bitterness, and +like an elder brother, advised this man, who was still young and whom +he had compared formerly to one of those too fine pieces of porcelain +that the least shock would crack. + +"Ah!" he said abruptly, "above all, my dear Vaudrey, do not fear to +appear in the tribune more uncouth and assertive than you really are. In +times when the word _sympathetic_ becomes an insult, it is wiser to have +the manners of a boor. Tact is a good thing." + +"I shall never succeed in that," said Sulpice, smiling as usual. + +"So much the worse! What has been wanting in my case is not to have been +able to secure the title of _our antipathetic confrere_. The modest and +refined people are dupes. By virtue of swelling their necks, turkeys +succeed in resembling peacocks. Believe me, my dear friend, it is +dangerous to have too refined a taste, even in office, even in the rank +in which you are placed. One hesitates to proclaim the excessively +stupid things that stir the crowd, and the blockhead who is bold enough +to declare his folly creates a hellish noise with his nonsense, while a +man of refinement, who is not always a squeamish man, remains in his +corner unseen. Remember that more moths are caught at night with a +greasy candle than with a diamond of the first water." + +"You speak in paradox--" Sulpice began. + +"And you think I am making paradoxes? Not in the least, I will give +you--not at cost, for it has cost me dearly, but in block,--my stock of +experience. Do with it what you please, and, above all, beware of _alle +donne!_" + +"Women?" asked the minister, with involuntary disquiet. + +"Women, exactly. Encircling every minister there is a squadron of +seductive women, who though perhaps more fully clothed than the flying +squadron of the Medicis, is certainly not less dangerous. Women who +complain that they are denied political rights, have in reality all, +since they are able to rule administrations and knock ministers off, as +the Du Barry did her oranges! When I speak of women, you will observe +well that I do not speak of your admirable wife," said Ramel, with a +respect that was most touching, coming from this honest veteran. + +"While we are gossiping," he resumed, "I am going to tell you frankly +what strikes me most clearly in the present conjuncture. You will gather +from it what you choose. In these days, my dear Vaudrey, what is most +remarkable is the facility men have for destroying their credit and +wearing themselves out. Politics, especially, entails a formidable +consumption. It seems that the modern being is not cut out to wear long. +This, perhaps, is due to the fact that public business, whichever party +wins, is always committed to men who are ill-prepared for their good +fortune. I do not say this of you, who, intellectually speaking, are an +exception. But men are no longer bathed in the Styx, or perhaps they +show the heel too quickly. For some years, moreover, the strange +phenomenon has presented itself of the provincial towns being the prey +of Parisian manufacturers, who reconstruct them and demolish their +picturesque antiquity, in order to garnish their boulevards and fine +mansions, while Paris, on the contrary, is directed and governed by +provincials, who provincialize it just as the Parisian companies +parisianize the provinces. Our provincials, astonished to find +themselves at the head of Parisian movement, lose their heads somewhat +and rush with immoderate appetites at the delicate feast. They have the +gluttony of famished children, and on the most perilous question they +are simply gourmands. It is _woman_ again to whom I refer. The country +squires and gentlemen riders, who have grown old in their province with +the love of farm-wenches, or small tradesmen professing medicine or law +within their sub-prefectures, after having made verses for the female +tax-gatherer, all, you understand, all are hungry to know that unknown +creature: _woman_. And speedily enough the woman has drained their +Excellencies. Oh! yes, even to the marrow! She robs the Opposition of +its energy; the faithful to liberty, of the virility of their faith. +Energetic ministers or ministers with ideas are not long before woman +destroys both their strength and their ideas. Eh! _parbleu!_ it is just +because they do not rule Paris as one pleads a civil suit in a +provincial court." + +The minister listened with a somewhat anxious, sober air to these +truisms, clear-cut as with a knife, expressed by the old journalist +without passion, without exasperation, without anger. He was, in fact, +pleased that Ramel should speak to him so candidly. + +Yes, indeed, what the old "veteran,"--as Denis sometimes called +himself--said, were Vaudrey's own sentiments. These sufficiently +saddening observations he had himself made more than once. It was +precisely to put an end to such abuses, folly, and provincialism, this +hobbling spirit inculcated in a great nation, that he had assumed power, +and was about to increase his efforts. + +He thanked Ramel profusely and sincerely. This visit would not be his +last, he would often return to this Rue Boursault where he knew that a +true friend would be waiting. + +"And you will be right," said Denis. "Nowhere will you find a love more +profound, or hear truths more frankly spoken. You see, Vaudrey, the +walls of the ministerial apartments are too thick. There, neither the +noise of carriages nor the sound of street-cries is heard. I have passed +a few days in a palace--in '48,--at the Tuileries, as a national guard: +at the end of two hours, I heard nothing. The carpets, the curtains, +stifled everything, and, believe me, a cannon might have been fired +without my hearing anything more than an echo, much less could I hear +the truth! Besides, people do not like to pronounce truth too loudly. +They are afraid." + +"I swear to you that I will listen to everything," replied Sulpice, "and +I will strive to understand everything. And since I have the power--" + +Denis Ramel shook his head: + +"Power? Ah! you will see if that is ever taken in any but homoeopathic +doses! Why, you will have against you the _bureaux_, those sacrosanct +_bureaux_ that have governed this country since bureaucracy has existed, +and they will cram more than one Warcolier down your throat, I warn +you." + +"Yes, if I allow it," said Vaudrey haughtily. + +"Eh! my poor friend, you have already allowed it," said the veteran. + +He had risen, Vaudrey had taken his hat, and he said to the minister, +leaning on his arm, with gentle familiarity, as he led him to the door: + +"Power is like a kite, but there is always some rascal who holds the +thread." + +"Come, come," said Vaudrey, "you are a pessimist!" + +"I confess that Schopenhauer is not unpleasant to me--sometimes." + +Thereupon they separated, after a cordial grasp of the hand, and Denis +Ramel resumed his pipe and his seat at the window corner, while the +minister carried away from this interview, as if he had not already been +in the habit of a frank interchange of opinions, an agreeable though +perhaps anxious impression. + +He felt the need of _mentally digesting_ this conversation: the idea of +going back, on this beautiful February day, to his official apartments +did not enter his mind. He was overcome by a springtime hunger. + +"To the Bois! Around the Lake!" he said to the coachman, as he +re-entered his carriage. + +The air was as balmy as on an afternoon in May. Vaudrey lowered the +carriage window to breathe freely. This exterior boulevard that he +rolled along was full of merry pedestrians. One would have thought it +was a Sunday afternoon. Old people, sitting on benches, were enjoying +the early sun. + +Sulpice looked at them, his brain busy with Ramel's warnings. He had +just called him a pessimist, but inwardly he acknowledged that the old +stager, who had remained a philosopher, spoke the truth. Woman! Why had +Ramel spoken to him of woman? + +This half-disquieting thought speedily left Sulpice, attracted as he was +by the joyous movement, the delight of the eyes which presented itself +to his view. + +In thus journeying to the Bois, he felt a delightful emotion of solitude +and forgetfulness. He gradually recovered his self-possession and became +himself once more. He drew his breath more freely in that long avenue +where, at this hour of the day, few persons passed. There was no +petition to listen to, no salutation to acknowledge. + +Ah! how easy it would be to be happy, to sweetly enjoy the Paris that +fascinated him instead of burning away his life! Just now, at the foot +of the Arc de Triomphe, he had seen people dressed in blouses, sleeping +like Andalusian beggars before the walls of the Alhambra. Little they +cared for the fever of success! Perhaps they were wise. + +An almost complete solitude reigned over the Bois. Vaudrey saw, as he +glanced between the copsewood, now growing green, only a few isolated +pedestrians, some English governesses in charge of scampering children, +the dark green uniform of a guard or the blue blouse of a man who +trimmed the trees. + +The coachman drove slowly and Sulpice, enjoying the intoxication of this +early sun, lowered the shade and breathed the keen air while he repeated +to himself that peaceful joy was within the reach of everybody at Paris. + +"But why is this wood so deserted? It is so pleasant here." + +He almost reproached himself for not having brought Adrienne. She would +have been so happy for this advanced spring day. She required so little +to make her smile: mere crumbs of joy. She was better than he. + +He excused himself by reflecting that he would not have been able to +talk to Ramel. + +And then it would have been necessary to talk to Adrienne, whereas the +joy of the present moment was this solitary silence, the bath of warm +air taken in the complete forgetfulness of the habitual existence. + +The sight of the blue, gleaming lake before him, encircled with pines, +like an artificial Swiss lake, compelled him to look out of the window. + +The coachman slowly drove the carriage to the left in order to make the +tour of the Lake. + +Vaudrey looked at the sheet of water upon which the light played, and on +which two or three skiffs glided noiselessly, even the sound of their +oars not reaching his ears. + +At the extremity of the alley, a carriage was standing, a hackney coach +whose driver was peacefully sleeping in the sunshine, with his head +leaning on his right shoulder, his broad-brimmed hat, bathed in the +sunshine, serving him as a shade. + +It was the only carriage there, and a few paces from the border of the +water, standing out in dark relief against the violet-blue of the lake, +a woman stood surrounded by a group of ducks of all shades, running +after morsels of brown bread while uttering their hoarse cries. + +Two white swans had remained in the water and looked at her with a +dignified air, at a distance. + +At the first glance at this woman, Sulpice felt a strange emotion. His +legs trembled and his heart was agitated. + +He could not be mistaken, he certainly recognized her. Either there was +an extraordinary resemblance between them, or it was Mademoiselle Kayser +herself. + +Marianne? Marianne on the edge of this Lake at an hour when there was +no one at the Bois? Vaudrey believed neither in superstitions nor in +predestination. Nevertheless, he considered the meeting extraordinary, +but there is in this fantastic life a reality that brings in our path +the being about whom one has just been thinking. He had frequently +observed this fact. He had already descended from his carriage to go to +her, taking a little pathway under the furze in order to reach the +water's edge. There was no longer any doubt, it was she. Evidently he +was to meet Mademoiselle Kayser some day. But how could chance will that +he should desire to take that promenade to the Lake at the very hour +that the young woman had driven there? + +As he advanced, he thought how surprised Marianne would be. As he walked +along, he looked at her. + +She stood near a kind of wooden landing jutting out over the water. Over +her black dress she had flung a short cloak of satin, embroidered with +jet which sparkled in the sunlight. The light wind gently waved a black +feather that hung from her hat, in which other feathers were entwined +with a fringe of old gold bullion. Vaudrey noted every detail of this +living statuette of a Parisian woman: between a little veil knotted +behind her head and the lace ruching of her cloak, light, golden curls +fell on her neck, and in that frame of light, this elegant woman, this +silhouette standing out in full relief against the sky and the horizon +line of the water, with a pencil of rays gilding her fair locks, seemed +more exquisite and more the "woman" to Sulpice than in the decollete +of a ball costume. + +When she heard the crushing of the sand by Sulpice's footsteps as he +approached her with timid haste, she turned abruptly. Under her small +black veil, drawn tightly over her face, and whose dots looked like so +many patches on her face, Vaudrey at first observed Marianne's almost +sickly paleness, then her suddenly joyous glance. A furtive blush +mounted even to the young girl's cheek. + +"You here?" she said--"you, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +She had already imparted an entirely different tone to these questions. +There was more abandon in the first, which seemed more like a cry, but +the second betrayed a sudden politeness, perhaps a little affected. + +Vaudrey replied by some commonplace remark. It was a fine day; he was +tired; he wished to warm himself in this early sunshine. But she?-- + +"Oh! I--really I don't know why I am here. Ask the--my coachman. He has +driven me where he pleased." + +She spoke in a curt, irritated tone, under which either deception or +grief was hidden. + +She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, which +were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks, white or gray, +black, spotted, striped like tulips, marbled like Cordovan leather, with +iridescent green or blue necks, whose tone suggested Venetian +glassware, all of them hurrying, stretching their necks, opening their +bills, or casting themselves at Marianne's feet, fighting, then almost +choking themselves to swallow the enormous pieces of bread that were +sold by a dealer close at hand. + +"Ah! bless me! I did not think I should have the honor of meeting you +here," she said. + +"The honor?" said Vaudrey. "I, I should say the joy." + +She looked straight into his eyes, frankly. + +"I do not know what joy is, to-day," she said. "I come from the +Continental Hotel, where I hoped to see--" + +"What is that?" + +"Nothing--" + +"If it were nothing, you would not have frowned so." + +"Oh! well! a friend--a friend whom I have again found--and who has +disappeared. Just so,--abruptly--No matter, perhaps, after all! What +happens, must happen. In short--and to continue my riddle, behold me +feeding these ducks. God knows why! I detest the creatures. The state +feeds them badly, Monsieur le Ministre, I tell you: they are famished. +Well? well?" she said to a species of Indian duck, bolder than the +others, who snapped at the hem of her skirt to attract attention and to +demand fresh mouthfuls. + +She commenced to laugh nervously, and said: + +"That one isn't afraid." + +She threw him a morsel that he swallowed with a greedy gulp. + +"Do you know, Monsieur le Ministre, that the story of these ducks is +that of the human species? There are some that have got nothing of all +the bread that I have thrown them, and there are others who have gorged +enough to kill them with indigestion. How would you classify that? Poor +political economy." + +"Oh, oh!" said Vaudrey. "You are wandering into the realms of lofty +philosophy!--" + +"Apropos of that, yes," said Marianne, as she pointed to the line of +birds that hurried on all sides, left the water, waddled about, uttering +their noisy cries. "You know that when one is sad, one philosophizes +anent everything." + +"And you are sad?" asked Sulpice, in a voice that certainly quivered +slightly. + +She threw away, without breaking it, the piece of bread that was left, +brushed her gloved fingers, and, turning toward the minister, said with +a smile that would make the flesh creep: + +"Very sad. Oh! what would you have? The black butterflies, you know, the +blue devils." + +He saw her again, just as she had appeared before him yesterday, with +arms and shoulders bare, lovely and seductive, and now, with her +shoulders hidden under her cloak, her face half-veiled and quite pale, +he thought her still more disquietingly charming. Moreover, the +strangeness of the situation, the chance meeting, imparted something of +mystery to their conversation and the attraction of an assignation. + +Ah! how happy he felt at having desired to breathe the air of the Bois! +It now seemed to him that he had only come there for her sake. Once more +it appeared to him that some magnetic thought led to this deserted spot +these two beings, who but yesterday had only exchanged commonplace +remarks and who, in this sunbathed solitude, under these trees, in the +fresh breeze of the departing winter, met again, impelled toward each +other, drawn on by the same sympathy. + +"Do you know what I was thinking of?" she said, smiling graciously. +"Yes, of what I was thinking as I cast the brown bread to those ducks? +An idyll, is it not? Well! I was thinking that if one dared--a quick +plunge into such a sheet of water--very pure--quite tempting--Eh! well! +it would end all." + +Vaudrey did not reply. He looked at her stupidly, his glance betraying +the utmost anxiety. + +"Oh! fear nothing," she said. "A whim! and besides, I can swim better +than the swans, there is no danger." + +He had seized her hands instinctively and he experienced a singular +delight in feeling the flesh of Marianne's wrists under his fingers. + +"You are feverish," he said. + +"I should be, at any rate." + +Her voice was still harsh, as if she were distressed. + +"The departure of--of that friend--has, then, caused you much +suffering?" + +"Suffering? No. Vexation, yes--You have built many castles of cards in +your life--Come! how stupid I am!" she said bitterly. "You still build +many of them. Well! there it is, you see!" + +She had withdrawn her hands from Sulpice, and walked away slowly from +the border of the lake, going toward the end of the path where her +coachman awaited her, his eyes closed and his mouth open. + +"Where are you going on leaving the Bois?" asked Vaudrey. + +"I? I don't know." + +He had made a movement. + +"Oh! once more I tell you, don't be afraid," she said. "I want to live. +Fear nothing, I will go home, _parbleu_." + +"Home?" + +"Or to my uncle's." + +"But, really, Monsieur le Ministre," she said, "you are taking upon +yourself the affairs of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police. I +know him well, and certainly he asks fewer questions than Your +Excellency." + +"That, perhaps," said Vaudrey, with a smile, "is because he has less +anxiety about you than I have." + +"Ah! bah!" said Marianne. + +She had by this time got close to her hackney coach and looked at the +coachman for a moment. "Don't you think it would be very wrong to waken +him?" she said. "Will you accompany me for a moment, Monsieur le +Ministre?" + +Vaudrey paled slightly, divining under this question a seductive +prospect. + +Marianne's gray eyes were never turned from him. + +They walked along slowly, followed by the coupe whose lengthened shadow +was projected in front of them along the yellow pathway, moving beside +the lake where the swans floated with their pure white wings extended +and striking the water with their feet, raising all around them a white +foam, like snow falling in flakes. The blue heavens were reflected in +the water. The grass, of a burnt-green, almost gray color, looked like +worn velvet here and there, showing the weft and spotted with earth. + +Side by side they walked, Vaudrey earnestly watching Marianne, while she +gazed about her and pointed out to him the gray, winter-worn rocks, the +smooth ivy, and on the horizon some hinds browsing, in the far distance, +as in a desert, the bare grass as yellow as ripe wheat, around a pond, +in a gloomy landscape, russet horizons against a pale sky, presenting a +forlorn, mysterious and fleeting aspect. + +"One would think one's self at the end of the world," said Sulpice, with +lowered voice and troubled heart. + +A slight laugh from Marianne was her only reply, as she pointed with the +tip of her finger to an inscription on a sign: + +"_To Croix-Catelan!_" she said. "That end of the world is decidedly +Parisian!" + +"Nevertheless, see how isolated we are to-day." + +It seemed as if she had divined his thought, for she took a path that +skirted a road and there, in the narrowest strip of soft, fresh soil, on +which the tiny heels of her boots made imprints like kisses upon a +cheek, she walked in front of him, the shadows of the small branches +dappling her black dress, while Vaudrey, deeply moved, still looked at +her, framed as she was by trees with moss-covered trunks and surrounded +with brambles, a medley of twisted branches. + +And Sulpice felt, at each step that he took, a more profound emotion. +Along this russet-tinted wood, stood out here and there the bright +trunks of birch-trees, and far above it, the pale blue sky; the abyss of +heaven, strewn with milky clouds and throughout the course of this +pathway arose like a Cybelean incense, a healthful and fresh odor that +filled the lungs and infused a desire to live. + +To live! and, thought Sulpice, but a moment ago this lovely, slender +girl spoke of dying. He approached her gently, walking by her side, at +first not speaking, then little by little returning to that thought and +almost whispering in her ear--that rosy ear that stood out against the +paleness of her cheek: + +"Is it possible to think of anything besides the opening spring, in this +wood where everything is awakening to life? Is it really true, +Marianne, that you really wished to die?" + +He did not feel astonished at having dared to call her by name. It +seemed as if he had known her for years. He forgot everything, as if the +world was nothing but a dream and that this dream presented this woman's +face. + +"Yes," she replied. "Upon my honor, I was weary of life, but I see that +most frequently at the very moment when one despairs--" + +She stopped suddenly. + +"Well?" he asked, as he waited for her to continue. + +"Nothing. No, nothing!" + +She commenced to laugh, calling his attention to the end of the path, to +a broader alley which brought them back to the edge of the lake, whose +blue line they saw in the distance. + +"Blue on blue," she said, pointing to the sky and the water. "You +reproach me for not liking blue, Monsieur le Ministre, see! I am taking +an azure bath. This horizon is superb, is it not?" + +Vaudrey debated with himself if she were jesting. Why should she give +him that title which here and at such a moment, had such an out-of-place +ring? + +She glanced at him sidelong with a little droll expression, her pretty +mouth yielding to a smile that enticed a kiss. + +"We shall soon have returned to my carriage," she said. "Already!" + +"That _already_ pleases me," said Sulpice. + +"It is true. This short promenade is nothing, but it suffices to make +one forget many things." + +"Does it not?" exclaimed Vaudrey. + +The shadow of his coupe was still projected between them along the +ochre-colored road. + +"Do you come to the Bois often?" asked the minister. + +"No. Why?" + +"Because I shall frequently return here," he said in a trembling voice. + +"Really!--Then, oh! why then, it would be love-making?" said Marianne, +who pierced him with her warm, tender glances. + +He wished to seize this woman's hand and print a kiss thereon, or to +press his lips upon her bare neck upon which the golden honey-colored +ringlets danced in the bright sunlight. + +"On these clear, fine days," she said in an odd tone, emphasizing every +word, "it is very likely that I shall return frequently to visit this +pathway. Eh! what is that?" she said, turning around. + +She was dragging a dry bramble that had fastened its thorns to the folds +of her satin skirt and she stopped to shake it off. + +"Stop," said Sulpice. + +He desired to tread on the russet-colored bramble. + +"You will tear my gown," said Marianne. "The bramble clings too +tightly." + +Then he stooped, gently removed the thorn, and Marianne, her bosom +turned toward him and half-stooping, looked at that man--a +minister--almost kneeling before her in this wood. + +He cast the bramble away from him. + +"There," he said. + +"Thanks." + +As he rose, he felt Marianne's fresh breath on his forehead. It fell on +his face, as sweet as new-mown hay. He became very pale and looked at +her with so penetrating an expression that she blushed slightly--from +pleasure, perhaps,--and until they reached the carriage where her +coachman was still sleeping, they said nothing further, fearing that +they had both said too much. + +At the moment when she entered her carriage, Sulpice, suddenly, with an +effort at boldness, said to her, as he leaned over the door: + +"I must see you again, Marianne." + +"What is the use?" she said, keeping her eyes fixed on his. + +"Where shall I see you?" he asked, without replying to her question. + +"I do not know--at my house--" + +"At your house?" + +"Wait," she added abruptly, "I will write to you." + +"You promise me?" + +"On my word of honor. At the ministry, _Personal_, isn't that so?" + +"Yes!--Ah! you are very good!" he cried, without knowing what he was +saying, while Marianne's coachman whipped his horses and the carriage +disappeared in the direction of Paris. + +It seemed to Vaudrey, who remained standing, that little gloved fingers +appeared behind the window and that he caught glimpses of a face hidden +under a black, dotted veil. + +The carriage disappeared in the distance. + +"To the ministry!" said the minister, as he got into his carriage. + +He stretched himself out as if intoxicated. He looked at all the +carriages along the drive of the Bois de Boulogne, the high life was +already moving toward the Lake. In caleches, old ladies in mourning +appeared with pale nuns, and old men with red decorations stretched out +under lap-robes. Pretty girls with pale countenances pierced with bright +eyes, like fragments of coal in flour, showed themselves at the doors of +the coupes, close to the muzzles of pink-nosed, well-combed, +white-haired little dogs. Vaudrey strove to find Marianne amid that +throng, to see her again. She was far away. + +He thought only of her, while his coupe went down the Avenue des +Champs-Elysees, bustling with noise and movement and flooded with light. +The coachman took a side street and the carriage disappeared through an +open gateway between two high posts surmounted by two lamps, in a +passage leading to a huge white mansion whose slate roof was ablaze +with sunlight. An infantry soldier in red trousers, with a shako on his +head, mounted guard and stood motionless beside a brown-painted +sentry-box that stood at the right. Above the gateways a new tricolor +flag, in honor of the new ministry, waved in the sunshine. + +Against the ministerial edifice were two gas fixtures bearing two huge +capital letters: R.F., ready to be illuminated on important reception +nights. + +Two lackeys hastily opening the door, rushed up to the halted carriage +and stood at its door. + +"Adieu! Marianne," thought Sulpice, as he placed his foot in the +antechamber of this vast mansion as cold as a tomb. + + + * * * * * + +_She was still mechanically throwing crumbs of bread around her, +which were eagerly snatched at by the many-colored ducks_ ... + +[Illustration: VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS] + + + + +VIII + + +Marianne Kayser was superstitious. She believed that in the case of +compromised affairs, salvation appeared at the supreme moment of playing +the very last stake. She had always rebounded, for her part,--like a +rubber-ball, she said--at the moment that she found herself overthrown, +and more than half conquered. Fate had given some cause for her +superstitious ideas. She thought herself lost, and was weary of +searching, of living, in fact, when suddenly Monsieur de Rosas reached +Paris from the other end of the world. That was salvation. + +The duke did not prove very difficult to ensnare. He had yielded like a +child in Sabine's boudoir. Marianne left that soiree with unbounded +delight. She had recovered all her hopes and regained her _luck_. The +next day she would again see Rosas. She passed the night in dreams. +Light and gold reigned upon her life. She was radiant on awaking. + +Her uncle, on seeing her, found her looking younger and superb. + +"You are as beautiful as a Correggio, who though a voluptuous painter, +must have been talented. You ought to pose to me for a Saint Cecilia. It +would be magnificent, with a nimbus--" + +"Oh! let your saint come later," said Marianne, "I haven't time." + +Simon Kayser did not ask the young woman, moreover, why "she had not +time." Marianne was perfectly free. Each managed his affairs in his own +way. Such, in fact, was one of the favorite axioms of this painter, a +man of principle. + +Marianne breakfasted quickly and early, and after dressing herself, +during which she studied coquettish effects while standing before her +mirror, she left the house, jumped into a cab and drove to the Hotel +Continental. With proud mien and tossing her head, she asked for the +duke as if he belonged to her. She was almost inclined to exclaim before +all the people: "I am his mistress!" + +But she suddenly turned pale upon hearing that Monsieur de Rosas had +left. + +"What! gone?" + +Gone thus, suddenly, unceremoniously, without notice, without a word? It +was not possible. + +They were obliged to confirm this news to her several times at the hotel +office. Monsieur le duc had that very morning ordered a coupe to take +him to catch a train for Calais. It was true that he had left some +baggage behind, but at the same time he notified them that they would +perhaps have to forward it to him in England later. + +Marianne listened in stupid astonishment. She became livid under her +little veil. + +"Monsieur de Rosas did not receive a telegram?" + +"Yes, madame." + +"Ah!" + +Something serious had, perhaps, suddenly intervened in the duke's life. +Nevertheless, this abrupt departure without notification, following the +exciting soiree of the previous day, greatly astonished this woman who +but now believed herself securely possessed of Jose. + +"Nonsense!" she thought. "He was afraid of me--Yes, that's it!--Of +course, he was afraid of me. He loves me much, too much, and distrusts +himself. He has gone away." + +She commenced to laugh uneasily as she got into her carriage again. + +"Assuredly, that is part of my fate. That stupid Guy leaves for Italy. +Rosas leaves for England. Steam was invented to admit of escape from +dangerous women. I did not follow Lissac. What if I followed the duke?" + +She shrugged her shoulders, and gnawed her cambric handkerchief under +her veil, her head resting on the back of the coach, while the driver +waited, standing on the sidewalk in front of the hotel, ignorant of the +direction in which the young woman wished to go. + +Marianne felt herself beaten. She was like a gambler who loses a +decisive game. Evidently, Rosas only showed more clearly by the action +he had taken, how much he was smitten; she measured his love by her own +dismay; but what was the good of that love, if the duke escaped in a +cowardly fashion?--But where could she find him? Where follow him? Where +write to him?--A man who runs about as he does! A madman! Perhaps on +arriving at Dover he had already re-embarked for Japan or Australia. + +"Ah! the unexpected happens, it seems," thought Marianne, laughing +maliciously, as she considered the ludicrousness of her failure. + +"Madame, we are going--?" indifferently asked the coachman, who was +tired of waiting. + +"Where you please--to the Bois!" + +"Very good, madame." + +He looked at his huge aluminum watch, coolly remarking: + +"It was a quarter of twelve when I took Madame--" + +"Good! good!--to the Bois!" + +The movement of the carriage, the sight of the passers-by, the sunlight +playing on the fountains and the paving-stones of the Place de la +Concorde fully occupied Marianne's mind, although irritating her at the +same time. All the cheerfulness attending the awakening spring, +delightful as it is in Paris, seemed irony to her. She felt again, but +with increased bitterness, all the sentiments she experienced a few +mornings previously when she called on Guy and told him of her +burdensome weariness and distaste of life. Of what use was she now? She +had just built so many fond dreams on hope! And all her edifices had +crumbled. + +"All has to be recommenced. To lead the stupid life of a needy, lost, +harassed woman; no, that is too ridiculous, too sad! What then--" she +said to herself, as with fixed eyes she gazed into the infinite and +discovered no solution. + +She was savagely annoyed at Rosas. She would have liked to tear him in +pieces like the handkerchief that she shredded. Ah! if he should ever +return to her after this flight! + +But perhaps it was not a flight--who knows? The duke would write, would +perhaps reappear. + +"No," a secret voice whispered to Marianne. "The truth is that he is +afraid of you! It is you, you, whom he flees from." + +To renounce everything was enough to banish all patience. Yesterday, on +leaving Rosas, she believed herself to be withdrawn forever from the +wretched Bohemian life she had so painfully endured. To-day, she felt +herself sunk deeper in its mire. Too much mire and misery at last! +However, if she only had courage! + +It was while looking at the great blue lake, the snowy swans, the +gleaming barks, that she dreamed, as she had just told Vaudrey, of +making an end of all. Madness, worse than that, stupidity! One does not +kill one's self at her age; one does not make of beauty a valueless +draft. In order to occupy herself, she had bought some brown bread, +which she mechanically threw to the ducks, in order to draw her out of +herself. It was then that Sulpice saw her. + +"Assuredly," she thought, as she left the minister, "those who despair +are idiots!" + +In fact, it seemed that chance, as her fingers had cast mouthfuls of +bread to the hungry bills, had thrown Vaudrey to her in place of Rosas. + +A minister! that young man who smiled on her just now in the alleys of +the Bois and drew near her with trembling breath was a minister. A +minister as popular as Vaudrey was a power, and since Marianne, weary of +seeking love, was pursuing an actuality quite as difficult to +obtain--riches, Sulpice unquestionably was not to be despised. + +"As a last resource, one might find worse," thought Marianne, as she +entered her home. + +She had not, moreover, hesitated long. She was not in the mood for +prolonged anger. She was at an age when prompt decisions must be made on +every occasion that life, with its harsh spurs, proposed a problem or +furnished an opportunity. On the way between the Lake and Rue de +Navarin, Marianne had formed her plan. Since she had to reply to +Vaudrey, she would write him. She felt an ardent desire to avenge +herself for Rosas's treatment, as if he ought to suffer therefor, as if +he were about to know that Sulpice loved her. + +Had she found the duke awaiting her, as she entered the house, she would +have been quite capable of lashing his face with a whip, while making +the lying confession: + +"Ah! you here? It is too late! I love Monsieur Vaudrey." + +She would, moreover, never know any but gloomy feelings arising from her +poverty in that house. The thought suggested itself to her of at once +inviting Vaudrey to call on her. But surrounded by the vulgar +appointments of that poor, almost bare, studio, concealing her poverty +under worn-out hangings, indifferent studies, old, yellowed casts +covered with dust--to receive Vaudrey there would be to confess her +terribly straitened condition, her necessities, her eagerness, all that +repels and freezes love. In glancing around her uncle's studio, she +scrutinized everything with an expression of hatred. + +It smacked of dirty poverty, bourgeois ugliness. She would never dare to +ask Vaudrey to sit upon that divan, which was littered with old, torn +books and tobacco grains, and which, when one sat upon it, discharged a +cloud of dust whose atoms danced in the sunlight. + +"What are you looking at?" asked Kayser, as he followed his niece's +glances about the room. "You seem to be making an inspection." + +"Precisely. And I am thinking that your studio would not fetch a very +high figure at Drouot's auction mart." + +"Lofty and moral creations don't sell in times like these," gravely +replied the old dauber. "For myself, I am not a painter of obscene +subjects and lewd photography." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders and went out, coughing involuntarily. +Old Kayser passed his time steeped in the odors of nicotine. + +"I am lost, if Vaudrey comes here," she said to herself. + +She knew well enough that caprice, the love of those who do not love, +lives on luxury, intoxicating perfumes, shimmering silk, and all the +mysterious surroundings of draperies which are the accompaniment of the +adventure. Vaudrey would recoil before this Bohemian studio. The famous +"nimbus," of which Kayser spoke, was the creature of his tobacco smoke. +What was to be done, then? Receive the minister yonder in that remote +apartment where, all alone,--it was true--she went to dream, dream with +all the strange joys attending isolation? Draw this man to a distant +corner of Paris, in the midst of the ruins of former luxury, as mean as +the wretch's studio?--Eh! that was to acknowledge to Vaudrey that she +was intriguing for a liaison with the single object of quitting the +prison-walls of want. She realized that this man, full of illusions, +believing that he had to do with perhaps a virtuous girl, or, at least, +one who was not moving in her own circle, who was giving herself, but +not selling herself, would shrink at the reality on finding himself face +to face with an adventuress. + +"Illusion is everything! He must be deceived! They are all stupid!" she +mused. + +But how was she to deceive this man as to her condition, how cloak her +want, how cause herself to pass for what she was not? With Rosas it +would have been a simple matter. Poor, she presented herself to him in +her poverty. He loved her so. She could the better mislead him. But with +Vaudrey, on the contrary, she must dazzle. + +"Two innocents," Marianne said to herself, "the one thirsts for virtue, +the other for vice." + +Should she confess everything to Sulpice as she had done to Rosas? Yes, +perhaps, if she discovered no better way, but a better plan had to be +found, sought, or invented. Find what? Borrow? Ask? Whom? Guy? She would +not dare to do so, even supposing that Lissac was sufficiently well off. +Then she wished to keep up appearances, even in Guy's eyes. Further, +she had never forgiven him for running off to Italy. She never would +forget it. No, no, she would ask nothing from Guy. + +To whom, then, should she apply? She again found herself in the +frightful extremity of those who, in that almost limitless Paris, +involved in the terrible intricacies of that madly-directed machine, +seek money, a loan, some help, an outstretched hand, but who find +nothing, not an effort to help them in all its crowd. She was overcome +with rage and hatred. Nothing! she had nothing! She would have sold +herself to any person whatsoever, to have speedily obtained a few of the +luxuries she required. Yes; sold herself now, to sell herself more +dearly to-morrow. + +Sold! Suddenly from the depths of her memory she recalled a form, +confused at first, but quickly remembered vividly, of an old woman +against whom she had formerly jostled, in the chance life she had led, +and who, once beautiful, and still clever and rich, it was said, had +been seized with a friendly desire to protect Marianne. It was a long +time since the young woman had thought of Claire Dujarrier. She met her +occasionally, her white locks hidden under a copious layer of golden +powder, looking as yellow as sawdust. The old woman had said to her: + +"Whenever you need advice or assistance, do not forget my address: Rue +La Fontaine, Auteuil." + +Marianne had thanked her at the time, and had forgotten all about it +till now, when in the anguish of her pursuit she recalled the name and +features of Claire Dujarrier as from the memories of yesterday. Claire +Dujarrier, a former danseuse, whose black eyes, diamonds, wild +extravagance, and love adventures were notorious formerly, had for the +last two or three years buried herself in a little house, fearing that +she would be assassinated; she kept her diamonds in iron-lined safes +built in the wall, and had a young lover, a clerk in a novelty store, +who was stronger than a market-house porter, and who from time to time +assumed a high tone and before whom she stood in awe. + +"Claire Dujarrier! The very thing!--Why not?" thought Marianne. + +She had been introduced to the ex-danseuse by Guy de Lissac. He was +considered as one of Claire's old lovers. They quarrelled when the old +dame had heard one of Guy's bons mots that had become familiar at the +Club: + +"When I see her, I always feel a slight emotion: she recalls my youth to +me!--But alas! not hers!" + +Claire was well-off and perhaps miserly. Marianne instinctively felt, +however, that she would get help at her hands. + +Money! + +"I will return her all! It is usury. Her pledge is here!" + +With brazen front, Kayser's niece struck her bosom, looking at the same +time at the reflection of her fine bust and pale face in the mirror. + +The next day she went straight to the former danseuse's. + +Claire Dujarrier lived in that long Rue La Fontaine at Auteuil which +partook of the characteristics of a suburban main street and a +provincial faubourg, with its summer villas, its little cottages +enclosed within gloomy little gardens, railed-off flower-beds, +boarding-schools for young people, and elbowing each other as in some +village passage, the butcher's store, the pharmacy, the wine-dealer's +shop, the baker's establishment,--a kind of little summer resort with a +forlorn look in February, the kiosks and cottages half decayed, the +gardens full of faded, dreary-looking leaves. Marianne looked about, +seeking the little Claire house. She had visited it formerly. A +policeman wandered along sadly,--as if to remind one of the town,--and +on one side, a gardener passed scuffling his wooden shoes, as if to +recall the village. + +However, here it was that the formerly celebrated girl, who awoke storms +of applause when she danced beside Cerrito at the Opera, now lived +buried in silence,--a cab going to the Villa Montmorency seemed an event +in her eyes,--forgotten, her windows shut, and as a diversion looking +through the shutters at the high chimneys of some factory in the +neighboring Rue Gras that belched forth their ruddy or bluish fumes, or +yellow like sulphuric acid, or again red like the reflection of fire. + +Marianne rang several times when she arrived at the garden railing of +the little house. The bells sounded as if they were coated with rust. An +ancient maid-servant, astonished and morose, came to open the door. + +She conducted the young woman into the salon where Claire Dujarrier sat +alone, eating cakes, with her terrier on her lap. + +The dog almost leaped at Marianne's throat while Claire, rising, threw +herself on her neck. + +"Ah! dear little one!--How pleased I am! What chance brings you?" + +Marianne looked at the Dujarrier. She might still be called almost +lovely, although she was a little painted and her eyes were swollen, and +her cheeks withered; but she knew so perfectly well all the secrets for +rejuvenating, the eyebrow preparation, the labial wash, that she was a +walking pharmaceutical painting done on finely sculptured features. The +statue, although burdened with fat, was still superb. + +She listened to Marianne, smiled, frowned and, love-broker and advisory +courtesan that she was, ended by saying to the "little one" that she had +a devilish good chance and that she had arrived like March in Lent. + +"It is true, it has purposely happened. Vanda, you know her well?" + +"No!" answered Marianne. + +"What! Vanda, whom that big viper Guy called the Walking Rain?" + +"I do not remember--" + +"Well! Vanda has gone to Russia, she left a month ago. She will be there +all the winter and summer, and part of next winter. Her _general_ +requires her. He is appointed to keep an eye on the Nihilists. So she +wishes to rent her house in Rue Prony. That is very natural. A charming +house. Very _chic_. In admirable taste. You have the chance. And not +dear." + +"Too dear for me, who have nothing!" + +"Little silly! You have yourself," said Claire Dujarrier. "Then you have +me, I have always liked you. I will lend you the ready cash to set +yourself up, you can give me bills of exchange, little documents that +your minister--pest! you are going on well, you are, ministers!--that +His Excellency will endorse. Vanda will not expect anything after the +first quarter. Provided that her house is well-rented to someone who +does not spoil it, she will be satisfied. If she should claim all, why, +at a pinch I can make up the amount. But, my dear,"--and the old woman +lowered her voice,--"on no account say anything to Adolphe." + +"Adolphe?" + +"Yes, my _husband_. You do not know him?" + +She took from the table a photograph enclosed in a photograph-case of +sky-blue plush, in which Marianne recognized a swaggering fellow with +flat face, large hands, fierce, bushy moustache, who leaned on a cane, +swelling out his huge chest in outline against a mean, gray-tinted +garden ornamented with Medicis vases. + +"A handsome fellow, isn't he? Quite young!--and he loves me--I adore +him, too!" + +The tumid eyes of Claire Dujarrier resembled lighted coals. She pressed +kiss after kiss of her painted lips on the photograph and reverently +laid it on the table. + +Marianne almost pitied this half-senile love, the courtesan's +terrifying, last love. + +She was, however, too content either to trouble herself, or even to +reflect upon it. She was wild with joy. It seemed to her that a sudden +rift had opened before her and a gloriously sunny future pictured itself +to her mind. What an inspiration it was to think of Claire Dujarrier! + +She would sign everything she wished, acknowledge the sums lent, with +any interest that might be demanded. Much she cared about that, +indeed!--She was sure now to free herself and to _succeed_. + +"You are jolly right," said the ancient danseuse. "The nest is entirely +at the birds' disposal. Your minister--I don't ask his name, but I shall +learn it by the bills of exchange--would treat you as a grisette if he +found you at your uncle's. Whereas at Vanda's--ah! at Vanda's! you will +have news to tell me. So, see this is all that is necessary. I will +write to Vanda that her house is rented, and well rented. Kiss me and +skip! I hear Adolphe coming. He does not care to see new faces. And +then, yours is too pretty!" she added, with a peculiar significance. + +She got the old servant to show Marianne out promptly, as if she felt +fearful lest her _husband_ should see the pretty creature. Claire +Dujarrier was certainly jealous. + +"It is not I that would rob her of her porter!" Marianne thought, as she +walked away from Rue La Fontaine. + +Evening was now darkening the gray streets. A faint bluish mist was +rising over the river and spreading like breath over the quays. Marianne +saw Paris in the distance, and her visit seemed like a dream to her; she +closed her eyes, and a voice within her whispered confusedly the names +of Rosas, Vaudrey, Vanda, Rue Prony; she pictured herself stretched at +length on a reclining chair in the luxurious house of a courtesan, and +she saw at her feet that man--a minister--who supplicatingly besought +her favor, while in the distance a man who resembled Rosas was +travelling, moving away, disappearing-- + +"Nonsense!" the superstitious creature said to herself, "it was one or +the other! The duke or the minister! I have not made the choice." + +Then looking at the confused image of herself thrown on the window of +the cab, she threw a kiss at her own pale reflection, happy with the +unbounded joy of a child, and cried aloud while laughing heartily: + +"Bonjour, Vanda! I greet you, Mademoiselle Vanda." + + + + + +PART SECOND + +I + + +The Monceau plain is the quarter of changed fortunes and dice-throwing. +An entire town given over to luxury, born in a single night, suddenly +sprung into existence. The unpremeditated offspring of the aggregation +of millions. Instead of the cobbler's stall, the red-bedaubed shop of +the dealer in wines, the nakedness of an outer boulevard, here in this +spot of earth all styles flourish: the contrast of fancy, the chateau +throwing the English cottage in the shade; the Louis XIII. dwelling +hobnobbing with the Flemish house; the salamander of Francis I. hugging +the bourgeois tenement; the Gothic gateway opening for the entry of the +carriages of the courtesan. A town within a town. Something novel, +white, extravagant, overdone: the colossal in proximity to the +attractive, the vastness of a grand American hotel casting its shadow +over an Italian loggia. It partook at once of the Parisian and the +Yankee. The Chateau de Chambord sheltering a chocolate maker, and the +studio of an artist now become the salon of a rich curbstone broker. + +The little Hotel de Vanda,--_one of our charming fugitives_, as those of +the chroniclers who still remember Vanda, say of her in their articles +sometimes--is an elegant establishment, severe in external appearance, +but of entirely modern interior arrangements, with a wealth of choice +knickknacks, and is regarded as one of the most attractive houses in Rue +Prony. Since the flight of the pretty courtesan, it bears the sad +notice: _Residence to let_. Its fast closed shutters give it the gloomy +appearance of a deserted boudoir. Complete silence succeeds feverish +bustle! Vanda was a boisterous, madcap spendthrift. Through the old +windows with their old-fashioned panes there often used to escape +snatches of song, airs of waltzes, fragments of quadrilles. Vanda's +horses pawed the ground spiritedly as they started at the fashionable +hour for the Bois, through the great gateway leading to the stables. And +now, for months, a corner of Rue Prony had been silent and drowsy, and +weighted with the melancholy that surrounds forsaken objects. + +It was here that Marianne, in carrying out her determination, entered +with a high head, resolved to cast off her sombre misery or to sink, her +plans defeated. The Dujarrier had greatly assisted her in taking up her +abode, building her hopes on Mademoiselle Kayser's beauty as on some +temporary profitable investment. As the old woman looked at her, she +shook her head. Marianne had to be quick. She was pale, already weary, +and her beauty, heightened by this weariness, was "in full blast," as +the former bungling artiste said in her capacity of a connoisseur. + +"After all," Dujarrier said to herself, "it is the favorable moment for +success. One does not become a _general_ except through seniority." + +Marianne also experienced the same feelings as the Dujarrier. She +realized that she had reached the turning-point of her life, it was like +a game of baccarat that she was playing with fate. She might come out of +it rich and preserved from the possibility of dying in a hospital or a +hovel after having dragged her tattered skirts through the streets, or +overwhelmed with debts, ruined forever, strangled by liabilities. This +commercial term made her smile ironically when she thought of it. +Against her she had her past, her adventurous life, almost the life of a +courtesan, carried away by the current of her amorous whims; it now +needed only the burden of liabilities for her to become not only +completely disclassed, but ruined by Parisian life. She had given the +Dujarrier receipts for all that that quasi-silent-partner had advanced +her, the old lady excusing herself for the precaution she took by saying +precisely: + +"In that way one can hold people. Grateful acknowledgments are good; +written acknowledgments are better!" + +The Dujarrier considered herself witty. + +Marianne had signed, moreover, all that the other had asked. She still +needed, indeed, to make further outlay. And what mattered it if she +plunged deeper while she was _taking a dive_, as she expressed it in her +language, which was a mixture of street slang and the elegant +phraseology of the salon. + +"Bah! I know how to swim." + +She suddenly straightened herself under this anxiety, reassured, +moreover, and spurred on as she was by the Dujarrier herself, who said +as she shrugged her shoulders: + +"When a woman like you has a man like Vaudrey,--a minister,--she has her +nest lined." + +Sulpice was not the man long to resist so refined a Parisienne as +Marianne. In him, the repressed ardors, the poetic ideas of a man of +twenty, had become the appetites of a man of forty. This provincial, +hungry for Parisianism,--very young in feelings and soul,--felt, as soon +as he found himself in Marianne's company, mad with desire for a new +life. The dazzling honors attending his entry into the ministry found +their culmination in the burning glance of Marianne, as their eyes met. + +Hardly was she installed in Rue Prony than she reminded him of his +promise to call on her. He hastened to her with strange eagerness and he +left her more disturbed, as if he had just taken a peep at an unknown +world. The feminine elegance of the Hotel de Vanda had suddenly +intoxicated him. Marianne played her part very calmly in producing the +daily ravage that passion was making on Sulpice. She studied its rapid +progress with all the sang-froid of a physician. She regulated the doses +of her toxicant, the poison of her glance instilled into the veins of +this man. Determined to become his mistress, she desired to fall in the +guise of a woman madly in love, and not as an ordinary courtesan. With +any other man than Vaudrey, she would, perhaps, have yielded more +quickly. But she acted with Vaudrey as formerly she had done with Rosas. +Seeing that these idealists caressed their dreams, she coquetted with +platonic love, besides, she preferred to remain free for a short time, +without the burden of those pleasures of which she had grown tired, and +which had always caused her more disgust than delight. + +Moreover, she said to herself that it was necessary in Sulpice's case to +have the appearance of playing frankly, of loving truly, as in the case +of Rosas. But, this time, she would not let Vaudrey escape her by +flight, as the duke did. She would yield at the desired moment, certain +that Sulpice would not leave her the next day. + +"Rosas would be here," she said to herself self-confidently, "if he had +been my lover." + +After a moment of regretful preoccupation, she shrugged her shoulders +and said quickly: + +"Bah! _what is written is written_, as he said. If I haven't him, I have +the other." + +The "other" grew day by day more deeply enamored. He rushed off in hot +haste to visit Marianne; his hired hack, in which he sometimes left his +minister's portfolio peacefully at rest, pending his return, stood +before the little door in the Avenue Prony. He was happier when he +thought he had made a forward step in Marianne's affections than when he +had acquired new votes from the minority in the Chamber. Ambitious +projects yielded to the consuming desire that he felt toward this woman. +At the ministry, during the familiar conversations at table with +Adrienne and even during the hurly-burly attendant on private receptions +and morning interviews, he sometimes remained silent, lost in thought, +his mind wandering and, in reality, with Marianne. + +Adrienne, at such times, with a sweet smile which made Sulpice shudder +with remorse, would beseech him to work less, to take some recreation, +and not allow himself to be so absorbed in politics. + +"You are extremely pale, I assure you. You look worn out. You work too +hard." + +"It is due to administrative changes. There are so many documents to +examine." + +"I know that very well, but isn't Monsieur Warcolier there? In what way +does he help you?" + +"In no way," replied the minister sharply, speaking with truth. + +Public affairs, in fact, absorbed him, and he found it necessary to +steal the precious time to make a hasty trip to Rue Prony. A vacation, +it is true, was near. In less than a month, Vaudrey would have more +time at his disposal. But for more than three weeks yet, the minister +would have everything to modify and change,--everything to put into a +healthy shape, as Warcolier said--in the Hotel Beauvau. + +What matter! He found the time to fly incognito to the Maison de Vanda, +leaving his coupe at the ministry. Marianne was always there for him +when he arrived. The male domestic or the femme de chambre received him +with all the deference that "domestics" show when they suspect that the +visitor brings any kind of subsidy to the house. To Vaudrey, there was a +sort of mystery in Mademoiselle Kayser's life. Ramel, who knew her uncle +Kayser, had told him of the poverty of the painter. How then, seeing +that her uncle was so shabby, could the niece be so sumptuously +established? + +Kayser, whom he had once met at Marianne's, had answered such a question +by remarking that his niece was a _sly puss_ who understood life +thoroughly and would be sure to make headway. But that was all. + +"I have suspected for a long time that that little head was not capable +of much," the painter had added. "I considered her a light-headed +creature, nothing more. Fool that I was! she is a shrewd woman, a clever +woman, a true woman. I only find fault with her for one thing." + +"What?" asked Vaudrey. + +"Do you ask what, Monsieur le Ministre? The style of her establishment. +It is flashy, tawdry, noisy, it is boudoir art. It lacks seriousness! It +lacks morality! I would have in it figures that have style, character. I +don't ask for saintly pictures, but moral allegories, austere art. I +understand only the severe in art. I am a puritan in the matter of the +brush. For that reason, I shall attain nothing in these days of _genre_ +and water-color painting." + +And Kayser went on painting allegories, to digest his dinner, the pate +de foie gras washed down with kummel, of which he had just partaken at +his niece's. + +Vaudrey himself viewed those Japanese trifles, those screens, those +carpets, those pedestals surmounted by terra-cotta figures presenting in +their nudity the flesh tints of woman, those clock-cases above the +doors, that profusion of knickknacks, of furniture, of ottomans, that +soft upholstery that seemed to be made only to excuse a fall--nay, even +urged to sudden temptations, to chance love, to violent caprices; and on +leaving the house, where he had spoken to Marianne only in compliments a +hundred times repeated, and where she had but re-echoed sarcasms full of +tender, double meanings, as a woman who would undoubtedly yield, but +would not offer herself, he bore away with him in his nostrils and, as +it were, in his clothes, a permeating, feminine odor, which would now +follow him everywhere, and everywhere float about him in whiffs, urging +him to return to that house in which a new world seemed to be opening to +him. + +He would not long persist in enquiring how Marianne Kayser had procured +all those baubles that so highly incensed the puritan instincts of her +honest uncle. He found himself urged forward with profound delight in +this adventure whose mysterious features pleased him. Bah! the very fact +that he found so much inexplicable in the life of this woman enticed him +all the more. It seemed to him that not only had he entered upon a +romantic course, but that he was himself the hero of the romance. Never, +in the days when he rolled about, an unknown student, on the Parisian +wave, and had lifted his thoughts toward some pale patrician girl, +toward some pretty creature he had caught a glimpse of, leaning back in +a dark-blue coupe, or framed in by the red velvet hangings of a +proscenium box, had he more perfectly incarnated the ideal of his desire +than in so charming a creature. Dreams of power, visions of love of his +twentieth year, had now become tangible to him and at forty he stretched +out his feverish hand toward them all. + +"Could Ramel have been right?" he said to himself, "and I, only a +provincial, athirst for Parisine? But what matter? Let Mademoiselle +Kayser be what she will and I what I may be, it seems to me that I have +never loved any one as I love this woman." + +"Not even Adrienne," added a faint, trembling voice from within. But +Sulpice had a ready answer to stifle it: Adrienne could not be compared +with any creature in the world. Adrienne was the charm, the daily +comfort of the domestic hearth. She was the wife, not the "woman." She +was the darling, not the love. Vaudrey would have severed one of his +arms to spare her any heavy sorrow, but he was not anxious about +Adrienne. She knew nothing, she would know nothing. And what fault, +moreover, had he committed hitherto? In that word _hitherto_, a host of +mental reservations were involved that Sulpice would gladly have +obliterated with his nails, he was ready to cry out with the same good +faith,--that of the husband who deceives the wife whom he loves: + +"What wrong have I done?" + +One afternoon,--there was no session of the Chamber that day,--Marianne +was seated in her little salon. She was warming the tips of her +slippers, that furtively peeped from beneath the lace of her skirt as a +little bird might protrude its beak from a nest, her right leg crossed +over the other, and she appeared to be musing, her chin resting on her +delicate hand. + +She was weary. Justine, her recently engaged femme de chambre, who, like +the silverware, was provided by the Dujarrier, came to announce with the +discreet, bantering little smile of servants, that Monsieur Dachet, the +upholsterer, had called twice. + +"The upholsterer!" + +Marianne frowned slightly. + +"What did he say?" + +"Nothing, that he would return to-morrow." + +"You call that nothing?" said Marianne, with a short laugh. + +When Justine had left the room, she went straight to a small, black, +Italian cabinet inlaid with ivory, of which one drawer was locked. In +opening it, the sound of gold coins rattling on the wood caused her to +smile; then, with the tips of her white fingers, she spread out the +louis at the bottom of the drawer, which she abruptly closed, making a +wry face, and folding her arms, she returned to her seat in front of the +fire, beating her right foot nervously upon the wrought-iron fender. + +"The Dujarrier's money will not go much further," she thought. "It is +finished." + +She thought of striking a decisive blow. Up to the present time, her +relations with Sulpice had floated in the regions of the +sentimentalities of the novel, or of romance. The minister believed +himself loved for love's sake. He saw in Marianne only an eccentric girl +free from all prejudices and every duty, who disposed of her life as +seemed best to her, without being under the necessity of accounting to +either husband or lover. Free, she made of her liberty pleasure or +passion according to her fancy. The frightful, practical questions, the +daily necessities, were lost sight of by this man who was burdened with +the governmental question of France. Again, he never asked himself the +source of Marianne's luxury. He delighted in it without thinking of +analyzing anything or of knowing anything, and this ingenuously. +Mademoiselle Kayser's first word must necessarily awaken him to the +situation. + +She knew that Vaudrey was to come, and suddenly leaving the fire, she +arrayed herself for him in a black satin peignoir lined with red surah, +with lapels of velvet thrown widely apart and allowing the whiteness of +her neck and chest to be seen under folds of old lace. Her fair hair +fell upon her velvet collar, and surmounting this strange costume, her +pale face against the background of the red-draped salon assumed the +disturbing charm of an apparition. + +On seeing her, Sulpice could not refrain from stopping short and looking +at her in admiration. Seated there, in the centre of her salon, she was +awaiting him and arranging bundles of papers in a basket with gilded +feet and lined with pink satin. She extended her hand to him. It was a +pale hand, as inanimate as the hand of a dead person, and she languidly +asked him why he remained there stupefied without approaching her. + +"I am looking," said the minister. + +"You are always the most gallant of men," said Marianne, and she added: + +"You are not already tired then of looking at me? Usually, caprices do +not last so long." + +"The affection that I have for you is not a caprice." + +"What is it, then? I am curious--" + +"It is a passion, Marianne, an absolute, deep, mad passion--" + +"Oh! nonsense! nonsense!" said Marianne. "I know that you speak +wonderfully well, I have heard you in the tribune. A declaration of love +costs you no more than a ministerial declaration. But to-day, my dear +minister, I am not disposed to listen to it even from you." + +In these last words, there was a certain tenderness that in a measure +modified the expression of weariness or sulkiness which Marianne +suggested. Sulpice inferred therefrom an implied acceptance of his +proffered love. + +"Yes," said she abruptly; "I am very sad, frightfully sad." + +"Without a cause?" asked Vaudrey. + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +"Oh! I am not of those who allow their nerves to control them. When I am +out of sorts, there is invariably a cause. Let that be understood once +for all." + +"And the cause?--I should be delighted to learn it, Marianne, for I +swear to you that I would always bear a half of your troubles and +pains." + +"Thanks!--But in life there are troubles so commonplace that one could +only acknowledge them to the most intimate friends." + +"You have no more devoted friend than I am," replied Vaudrey, in a tone +that conveyed unmistakable conviction. + +She knew it positively. She could read that heart like an open page. + +"When one meets friends like you, one is the more solicitous to keep +them and to avoid saddening them with stupid affairs." + +"But why?" asked Vaudrey, drawing close to Marianne. "What troubles you? +I beseech you to tell me!" + +He gazed earnestly at her eyes, seeking in the depths of their blue +pupils a secret or a confession that evaded him, and with an instinctive +movement he seized Marianne's hands which she abandoned to him; they +were quite cold. As he bent toward her to plead with her to speak, he +felt her gentle breath, inhaled the perfume of her delicate, fair skin, +and saw the exquisite curves of her body outlined beneath the black +folds of her satin peignoir. Marianne's knee gently pressed his own +while her heavy eyelids fell like veils over the young woman's eyes, in +which Vaudrey thought he observed tears. + +"Marianne, I entreat you, if you have any sorrow whatever, that I can +assuage, I pray you, tell me of it!" + +"Eh! if it were a sorrow!--" she said, quickly withdrawing her left hand +from Sulpice's warm grasp. "But it is worse: it is a financial worry, +yes, financial," she said brusquely, on observing that Vaudrey's face +depicted astonishment. + +She seized the handful of papers that she had thrown into the +work-basket, and said in a tone that was expressive of mingled wrath and +disgust: + +"There now, you see that? They are bills for this house: the accounts of +clamorous creditors, upholsterers, locksmiths, builders and I don't know +what besides!" + +"What! your house?" + +"You thought that I had paid for it? It is a rented one and nothing in +it is paid for. I owe for all, and to a hungry pack." + +She began to laugh. + +"Do you imagine then that old Kayser's niece could lead this life in +which you see her? Without a sou, should I possess all that you see +here?--No!--I have perpetrated the folly of ordering all these things +for which I am now indebted and which must be paid for at once, and now +I am about to be sued. There! you were determined to urge me to confess +all that--Such are my worries and they are not yours, so I ask your +pardon, my dear Vaudrey: so let us talk of something else. Well! how did +the Fraynais interpellation turn out?--What has taken place in the +Chamber?" + +"Let us speak only of you, Marianne," said the minister, who looked at +the young woman with a sort of frank compassion as a friendly physician +looks at a sick person. + +She nervously snapped her fingers and with her feet crossed, beat the +little feverish march that she had previously done. + +He drew still closer to her, trying to calm her and to obtain some +explanation, some information from her; and Marianne, as if she had +already yielded in at once confiding her secret unreflectingly, refused +at present to accord him the full measure of her confidence. She +repeated that nothing that could be a source of annoyance or sordid, +ought to sadden her friends. Besides, one ought to draw the line at +one's life-secret. She was entitled, in fact, to maintain silence. That +Vaudrey should question her so, caused her horrible suffering. + +"And you, Marianne," he said, "you torture me much more by not replying +to me, to whom the least detail of your life is interesting. To me who +see you preoccupied and distressed, when I wish, I swear to you, to +banish all your sadness." + +She turned toward him with an abrupt movement and with her gray, +gold-speckled eyes flashing, she seemed to yield to a violent, sudden +and almost involuntary decision and said to Sulpice: + +"Then you wish to know even the wretchedness of my life? So be it! But I +warn you that it is not very cheerful. For," said she, after a moment's +silence,--Sulpice shuddered under her glance,--"it is better to be +frank, and if you love me as you say you do, you should know me +thoroughly; you can then decide what course to take. For myself, I am +accustomed to deception." + +Ah! although this woman were ready to tell him everything, Vaudrey felt +sure that her confidence could only intensify the love that he felt. She +had risen, her arms were crossed over her black gown whose red velvet +trimming suggested open wounds, her ardent eyes were in strong contrast +with her pale face, her lips of unusually heightened color expressed a +strange sensuality that invited a kiss, while her nostrils dilated under +the impulse of bitter anger--standing thus, she began to narrate her +life to Vaudrey who was seated in front of her, looking up to her--as if +at her knees. Her story was a sad one of a wicked childhood, ignorant +youth, wasted early years, melancholy, sins, outbursts of faith, falls, +returns of love, pride, virtue, restitution through repentance, scourged +hopes, dead confidences, the entire heartrending existence of a woman +who had left more of her heart than of the flesh of her body clinging to +the nails of her calvaries:--all, though ordinary and commonplace, was +so cruel in its truth that it appealed at once to Sulpice's heart, a +heart bursting with pity, to that credulous man who was attracted by all +that seemed to him so exquisitely painful and new about this woman. + +"Perhaps I am worrying you?" she asked abruptly. + +"You!" said he. + +He looked at her with a tear in his eye. + +Marianne's eyes gleamed with a sudden light. + +"Well!" she said, "such is my life! I have loved, I have been betrayed. +I have had faith in some one and I awakened one fine morning with this +prospect before me: to sink in the deep mud or to do like so many +others,--to take a lover and save myself through luxury, since I could +not recover myself through passion. Bah! the world shows more leniency +toward those who succeed than toward those who repent. All that is +necessary is to succeed, and on my word--you know Monsieur de Rosas +well?" + +"No," stammered Vaudrey, before whose mind the duke's blond face +appeared. + +"You heard him the other evening!" + +"I mean that I have never spoken to him. Well! what of Monsieur de +Rosas?" + +"Monsieur de Rosas loved me. Oh!" she said, interrupting a gesture made +by Vaudrey, "wait. He said that he loved me. He is rich. Why should I +not have been Rosas's mistress? Deal for deal, that was a good bargain, +at least! I accept Rosas! It was to receive him that I was foolish +enough to make my purchases without reckoning, without knowing. What's +that for a Rosas?" she said, as she crushed the bundle of bills between +her fingers. + +"And--Monsieur de Rosas?" asked Vaudrey, who was quite pale. + +"He?" + +Marianne laughed. + +"Well, he has gone--I have told you as much. He has, moreover, perhaps, +done wisely. I regretted him momentarily--but, bah! I should have sent +him away--yes, very quickly, just so! without even allowing him to +touch the tips of my fingers." + +"Rosas?" repeated the minister, looking keenly into Marianne's eyes. + +"Rosas!" she again said, lowering her voice. "And do you know why I +would have done that?" + +"No--" answered Sulpice trembling. + +"Simply because I no longer loved him, and that I loved another." + +She had spoken these last words slowly and in such passionate, vibrating +tones that Sulpice felt himself shudder with delight. + +"Ah," he said, as he went toward her, "is that the reason? Truly, +Marianne, is that the reason?" + +She had not confessed whom she loved, she had spoken only by her looks. +But Sulpice felt that he belonged to her, he was burning with passion, +transported, insane from this avowal; his hands sought hers and drew her +to him. He clasped her to his bosom, intoxicated by the pressure of this +body against his own, and added in a very low tone while his fingers +alternately wandered over her satiny neck and her silky hair: + +"How can I help loving you, Marianne? Is it true, really true? You love +me?--Ah! what the great nobleman has not done, do you think I cannot do? +You are in your own home, you understand, Marianne.--Then, as he touched +the young woman's exquisite ears with his lips, he added: + +"Our home--will you have it so?--Our home!--" + +He felt, as she remained in his embrace with her body leaning against +his, that she quivered throughout her frame; his lips wandered from her +ear to her cheek and then to her lips, there they rested long in a +ravishing kiss that filled him with the languishing sensation of +swooning, he holding her so tightly that, with a smile, she disengaged +herself, pink with her blushes, and bright-eyed, said, with an +expression of peculiar delight: + +"It is sealed now!" + +Sulpice, even in his youthful days, had never felt so intoxicating a +sensation as that which he enjoyed to-day. It was a complete abandonment +of himself, a forgetfulness of everything in the presence of his +absolute intoxication. All the realities of life that were ready to take +possession of him on leaving this place melted before this dream: the +possession of that woman. He forgot the assembly, the foyer, that human +crowd that he ruled from the height of the tribune, and Adrienne, who +was seated yonder at the window, awaiting him. He forgot everything. +Like those who possess the singular faculty of easily receiving and +losing impressions, he fancied that his horizon was limited to these +walls with their silken hangings, these carpets, this feminine salon, +opening on a boudoir, a retreat whence escaped the odors of flowers and +perfume bottles. + +Then, too, a special feeling of pride entered his heart. He felt his joy +increased tenfold at the thought that he, the petty bourgeois from +Grenoble, had snatched this woman from a duke and, like a great +nobleman, had paid the debts that she had contracted. He raised his head +proudly from an instinctive impulse of vanity. Rosas! He, the son of +honest Dauphiny folks, would crush him with his liberality. + +"What shall I do to silence those creditors?" he said to +Marianne,--whose hands he held and whose face grazed his in a way that +almost made him frantic. + +"Nothing," she replied. "What you have promised me is enough. Now I feel +that I am saved. Our house, you said so, we are in our own house here. +If the creditors will not believe me when I tell them to have +patience--" + +"They will believe you," said Vaudrey. "Come, we will find the means--On +my signature, any one will lend me money." + +It seemed that Marianne was expecting this word _money_, coarse but +eloquent, in order to tell Vaudrey that an old friend, Claire Dujarrier, +was on intimate terms with a certain Adolphe Gochard, who upon the +endorsement of a responsible person, would certainly advance a hundred +thousand francs that he had at this moment lying idle. Gochard only +needed a bill of exchange in his favor for one hundred thousand francs +at three months' date, plus interest at five per cent. This Gochard was +a very straightforward capitalist, who did not make it a business to +lend money, but merely to oblige. It was Madame Dujarrier who had +introduced him and Marianne would have already availed herself of his +courtesy, if she had believed herself able to repay it at the appointed +date. + +"And where does this Monsieur Gochard live?" Vaudrey promptly asked. + +"Oh! it would not be necessary for you to go to see him," replied +Marianne. "On receipt of a bill of exchange from me, Madame Dujarrier +would undertake to let me have a hundred thousand francs from hand to +hand." + +"A hundred thousand francs!--In three months," said Vaudrey to himself, +"in a vast placer like Paris, one can find many veins of gold." + +He had, besides, his personal property and land in Dauphiny. If need be, +without Adrienne's even knowing it, he could mortgage his farms at +Saint-Laurent-du-Pont! + +"Monsieur de Rosas would not have hesitated. But in his case there would +have been no merit," said Mademoiselle Kayser. + +At the name of that man, coupled with the recollection of him, Sulpice +felt himself spurred to a decision. Clearly the great millionaire noble +would not have delayed before snatching this woman from the claws of her +creditors. A hundred thousand francs, a mere trifle for the count! Well, +Vaudrey would give it as the Spaniard would have done. He would find it. +Within three months, he would have put everything right; he did not +know how, but that mattered little. + +"Have you a pen, Marianne?" + +The minister had not noticed the sheet of white paper that was lying on +the blotting pad of Russia leather, among the satin finished envelopes +and the ivory paper-cutters. + +"What are you going to do, my friend?" + +She pretended to put away the green, sharkskin penholder lying near the +inkstand, but drew it imperceptibly nearer to Sulpice, who with a quick +movement had already seated himself in front of the secretaire. + +"A minister's signature is sufficient, I suppose?" he said with a smile. + +He commenced to write. + +"What did you say?--Gochard?--" + +She was quite pale as she looked over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him +rapidly write several lines on the paper, then she spelled: + +"Adolphe Gochard--Go-go-c-h-ar-d." + +"There it is!" he said, as he handed her the sheet of paper. + +"I wish to know what is thereon, or I would never consent." + +She took the paper between her fingers as if to tear it to pieces. +Sulpice prevented her. + +"No," he said, "I request you to keep it; it is the best reply you can +give to those people.--Rely on me!" + +"Do you wish it?" asked Marianne, with a toss of her head, speaking in a +very sweet voice. + +"Decidedly. It is selfish, but I wish to feel myself not a little at +home here," Sulpice replied. + +He seized her hands, her plump, soft, coaxing hands, and as he clasped +them within his own, he carried them to his lips and kissed them, as +well as her face, neck, ear and mouth, which he covered with kisses; and +Marianne, still holding the satin paper that the minister had just +signed, said with a laugh as she feebly defended herself: + +"Come--come--have done with it! Oh! the big boy!--You will leave nothing +for another time!" + +He left the house, his head was swimming, and he was permeated with +strong odors. He flung to the coachman an address half-way to the +ministry. + +"Place de la Madeleine." + +He shut his eyes to picture Marianne. + +As soon as she was alone, her lips curled as a smile of satisfied vanity +played over them. She began by reading the lines that he had so hastily +written: _I guarantee to Monsieur Adolphe Gochard a bill of exchange at +three months, if he agrees to advance that amount to Mademoiselle +Dujarrier who will hand it to Mademoiselle Marianne Kayser_. + +"Well! the Dujarrier was right," she said; "a woman's scheming works +easier than a sinapism." + +Then, after a slight toss of the head and still smiling, she opened one +of the drawers of the small Inaltia cabinet and slipped into it the +satin paper to which the minister had affixed his signature and which +she had carefully folded four times. She considered that autograph worth +a thousand times more gold than the few pieces that remained scattered +about the drawer, like so many waifs of luxury. Then, slowly returning +to her armchair, she sank into it, clasping her two hands behind her +head and gazing at the ceiling, her thoughts wandered in dreams--a crowd +of little ambitious thoughts passed through her brain like drifting +clouds across the sky--and while with the top of her foot she again beat +her nervous march on the hem of her petticoat, her lips, the lips whose +fever had been taken away by Vaudrey, still preserved the strange turn +of the corners that indicated the unsatiated person who sees, however, +his opportunity arrive. + +She was as fully mistress of herself as Vaudrey was embarrassed and +unbalanced. He seemed to hear voices laughing and singing within him and +his brain was inflamed with joy. Before him opened the immense prospects +of his dreams. Glorious as it was to be all-powerful, it was better to +be loved. Everything whirled about within his brain, he thought he still +heard Denis Ramel talking to him, and in a twinkling, Marianne's smiling +face appeared, and with a kiss she interrupted the old journalist's +sallies, and Sulpice saw her, too, as it were half-fainting, through the +window of her fiacre, like a pastel half-hidden beneath the glass. + +He was delighted to walk about for a moment when the carriage had set +him down on the asphalted space that surrounds the Madeleine. The walk +was beneficial. He raised his head instinctively, expanded his lungs +with the air, and threw out his chest. He thought that people looked at +him attentively. Some passers-by turned round to see him. He would have +felt prouder to have heard them say: "That is Mademoiselle Kayser's +lover!" than: "That is Monsieur Vaudrey, the minister!" + +He felt a kind of annoyance on returning to Place Beauvau. He was still +with Marianne. He recalled her attitudes, her smile, the tone of her +voice. Public matters now fastened their collar on him, there were +signatures to be subscribed, reports to be read, telegrams, routine +work; in a word, vulgar professional duties were to be resumed. He did +not at once go to his cabinet. Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State, +received and despatched ordinary matters. + +Through some strange caprice, he felt a desire to see Adrienne very soon +after leaving Marianne, perhaps to know how he would feel and if "_cela +se voyait_" as they say. There was also a feeling of remorse involved in +this eagerness. He wished to satisfy himself that Adrienne was not +suffering, and as formerly, to smile on her as if redoubled affection +would, in his own eyes, obliterate his fault. + +Adrienne was in her salon. Sulpice heard the sound of voices beyond the +door. Some one was talking. + +"Madame has a visitor?" he inquired of the domestic. + +"Yes, Monsieur le Ministre--Monsieur de Lissac." + +"What! Guy! what chance brings him here!" Sulpice thought. + +He opened the door and entered, extending his hand to his friend. + +"How lucky! it is very kind of you to come." + +Guy stood, hat in hand, while Vaudrey stooped toward Adrienne to kiss +her brow unceremoniously in the presence of his friend. + +"Oh!" said Lissac, "I have not come to greet Your Excellency. It is your +charming wife that I have called on." + +"I thank you for it," said Sulpice, "my poor Adrienne does not receive +many visits outside the circle of official relations." + +"And she does not get very much entertainment! So I promise myself to +come and pay court to her--or such court as you would wish--from time to +time. Madame," said Lissac jocosely, "it is a fact that this devilish +minister deserves that you should receive declarations from morning to +night while he is over yonder ogling his portfolio. Such a husband as he +is, is not to be found again--" + +Adrienne, blushing a little, looked at Vaudrey with her usual expression +of tender devotion as profound as her soul. Sulpice made an effort to +smile at Lissac's pleasantries. + +"No, take care, you know!" added Guy. "As Madame Vaudrey is so often +alone, I shall allow myself to come here sometimes to keep her company, +and I won't guarantee to you that I won't fall in love with her." + +He turned respectfully toward Adrienne and added, with the correct +bearing of a gentleman: + +"Madame, all this is only to make him comprehend that nothing in the +world, not even a rag of morocco,--is his portfolio a morocco one?--is +worth the happiness of having such a wife as you. And the miserable +fellow doesn't suspect it. You see, I speak of you as the Opposition +journals do." + +Sulpice tried to smile but he divined under Guy's jesting, a serious and +truthful purpose. Perhaps Adrienne had just been allowing herself to +complain of the sadness and dreariness of her life. He was hurt by it. +After all, he did all that he could to gratify his wife. But a man like +him was not, in fact, born to remain forever tied down. The wife of a +minister must bear her part of the burden, since there must be a burden. + +As if Adrienne had divined Sulpice's very thoughts, she quickly added, +interrupting the jester who had somewhat confused the minister: + +"Don't pay any attention to Monsieur de Lissac. I am very happy just as +I am." + +Vaudrey had taken her hand to clasp it between his fingers with a +slightly nervous grasp. The trustful, good-natured, pure smile that +Adrienne gave him, recalled the anxious, distracted expression on +Marianne's lip. + +"Dear wife!" + +He sought to find a word, a cry, some consolation, a sort of caress, +proceeding from one heart and penetrating the other. He could find none. + +"Come!" said Guy. "I am going to leave you, and if you will allow me, +madame, I will occasionally come here and tell you all the outside +tittle-tattle." + +"You will always be welcome, Monsieur de Lissac," Adrienne said, as she +extended her hand to him. + +Guy bowed to Madame Vaudrey in a most profoundly respectful way. + +Sulpice accompanied him through the salons as far as the hall. + +"Do you want me to tell you?" said Lissac. "Your wife is very weary, +take care! This big mansion is not very cheerful. One must inevitably +catch colds in it, and then a woman to be all alone here! A form of +imprisonment! Do not neglect to wheedle the majority, my dear minister, +but don't forget your wife. Come! I will not act traitorously toward +you, but I warn you that if I often find your wife melancholy, as she is +to-day, I will tell her that I adore her. Yes! yes! your wife is +charming. I would give all the orders in the world for a lock of her +hair. Adieu, Monsieur le Ministre." + +"Great idiot," said Vaudrey, giving him a little friendly, gentle tap on +the neck. + +"Be it so, but if you do not love her well enough, I shall fall in love +with her, and I forewarn you that it is much better that I should than +any other. Au revoir." + +"Au revoir!" Sulpice repeated. + +He tried now to force a smile and went down to his cabinet, where he +found heaped-up reports awaiting his attention and he turned the pages +over nervously and read them in a very bad humor. + + + * * * * * + +_She was quite pale as she looked +over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him rapidly write several lines on the +paper, then she spelled: + +"Adolphe Gochard--Go-go-ch-a-r-d."_ + +[Illustration: SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE] + + + + +II + + +Madame Vaudrey drew no real pleasure from the commonplace receptions at +the ministry, or at her Wednesday _at homes_, except when by chance, +Denis Ramel permitted himself to abandon the Batignolles to call at +Place Beauvau, or when Guy enlivened this dull spot by recounting the +happenings of the outside world. + +Adrienne felt herself terribly isolated; she knew hardly any one in +Paris. Since Vaudrey had installed himself in Rue de la +Chaussee-d'Antin, she had not had time to form acquaintances among the +wives of the deputies to the Assembly, the majority of whom lived in the +provinces or dwelt at Versailles for economical reasons. + +Evidently the residence at the ministry had only brought her ready-made +relations, depressingly inevitable visitors who resembled office-seekers +or clients. These official receptions filled her with sadness. The +conversation always took the same hackneyed tone, disgusting in its +flattery or disquieting by reason of its allusions. People discussed +coming interpellations of ministers; government majorities, projected +legislation; the same phrases, as dreary as showers, fell with all the +regularity of drops of rain. Even young girls, brought up in this centre +of infuriated politicians, spoke of the breaking up of the majority, +reports or ballots, in the same manner as shopkeepers talk of their +trade. + +Poor Adrienne exerted herself to acquire an interest in these matters. +Since her husband's very existence was involved therein, hers should +also be. She had, however, formerly dreamed of an entirely different +youth and on bright, sunshiny days she reflected that yonder on the +banks of the Isere, it was delightful in her sweet, little, provincial +house. + +Besides, she carefully concealed her melancholy. She knew that she was +already reproached for being somewhat sad. A minister's wife should know +how to smile. This was what Madame Marsy never failed to repeat to her +as often as possible when she visited her at Place Beauvau. This woman +who hardly concerned herself at all about her son, allowing him to grow +up badly enough and committing all her maternal duties to the +grandmother, was perpetually cheerful, notwithstanding that her life had +been chequered by chance and her widowhood of sufficiently dramatic +character, as was said. She endeavored to play the part of an adviser, +an intimate friend to Adrienne. She frequently said to Madame Gerson, +who rarely left her, that Madame Vaudrey would be altogether charming if +she had _chic_. + +"Unfortunately, she is provincial; not in her element. She still smacks +of Dauphiny. And then--what is the funniest thing: she knows nothing of +politics." + +"She does not even concern herself about it," said the pretty Madame +Gerson, laughing heartily. + +According to these ladies she did not take the trouble to fulfil the +role of a minister's wife faultlessly. Ah! if only Sabine or Blanche +Gerson occupied the position filled by this _petite bourgeoise_ of +Grenoble! Well! Paris would have seen what an Athenian Republic was. + +Sabine Marsy was decidedly clever. She politely advised Adrienne, +without appearing to do so, as to many matters, in such a way as to +convey reproof under the guise of kindness. Madame Vaudrey would have +done well, as Madame Gerson also observed, to have studied the _Code du +Ceremonial_ on reaching Place Beauvau. + +Like Madame Marsy, Madame Gerson had gradually gained Adrienne's +friendship. From an ostentatious desire to be able to tell of what +happened at the ministry; to be on the first list of guests, when the +minister received or gave a ball, Sabine Marsy, who had suffered from +the mania of aspiring to become an artist, patronized the +_intransigeant_ painters and exhibited at the salon, now set her mind on +playing the role of a political figure in Paris. Madame Gerson, +_Blanche_, as Sabine called her, had a similar ambition, but simply from +a desire to be in fashion. + +She wished to bring herself into notice. Everything attracted her, +tempted her. She belonged, body and soul, to that machine with its +manifold gearing, brilliant, noisy, active, puffing like a locomotive, +that is called _chic_. _Chic_, that indefinite, indefinable word, +changeable and subtle like a capillary hygrometer, is a Parisian tyranny +that grinds out more fashionable lives than the King of Dahomey offers +as victims on his great feast days. For Blanche, everything in this most +stimulated, over-excited, feverishly deranged life, was reduced to these +two inevitable conclusions: what was _chic_ and what was not _chic_. Not +only was this the inevitable guide in reference to style, clothing, hat, +gloves, costume, material, jewelry, the dress that she should wear, but +also the book that should be read, the play that should be heard, the +operatic score that should be strummed on the piano, the bonbon that +should be presented, the opinion that one should hold, the picture one +should comment upon, all was hopelessly a question of _chic_. + +Madame Gerson would have preferred to be compromised in the matter of +her honor rather than to be ridiculed as to her opinions or to express +an idea that was not chic. The necessary result was that all this +woman's conversation--and she often came to see Madame Vaudrey,--was on +well-known topics; so that Adrienne knew in advance what Blanche's +opinion was upon such and such a matter, and that ideas could only pass +muster with Madame Gerson when they bore the stamp of chic, just as a +coin, to escape suspicion of being counterfeit, must bear the stamp of +the mint. + +Blanche would have been heartbroken if she had not been seen in the +President's salon on the occasion of a great reception at the Elysee; at +the ministry, on the evening of a comedy; if she had not been in the +front rank of the ladies' gallery on the day of interpellation at the +Assembly; if she had not been greeted from the top of the grand stand by +some minister, on Grand Prix day; if she had not been the first at the +varnishing; the first at the general rehearsals, a little _chic_,--the +first everywhere. Slender, delicate, but hardy as a Parisian, she +dragged her exhausted husband, with her hand of fine steel, through +receptions, balls, soirees, salons, talking loudly, judging everything, +chattering, cackling and haranguing, delighted to mount, with head +erect, the grand staircase of a minister and feel the joy of plunging +her little feet into the official moquettes as if her heels had been +made for state carpets; swelling with pride when she heard the usher, +amid the hubbub of the reception, call loudly the name which meant the +fashionable couple, a couple found at every fete: + +"Monsieur and Madame Gerson!" + +While the husband, fatigued, weary, left his office heavy-headed, after +having eaten a hasty meal, put on his dress coat and white tie in +haste, got into his carriage in haste, hurriedly accompanied his wife, +left her in order to take a doze on an armchair during the height of the +ball, woke in haste, returned home in haste, slept hurriedly, rose the +same, dragging this indefatigable creature about with him like a +convict's chain, she smiled at others, enticed others, waltzed with +others, adorned herself for others, keeping for him only her weariness, +her yawns, her pallor and her sick-headaches. + +For these two galley-slaves of _chic_, the winter passed in this manner, +as fatiguing as months of penal servitude, and they went none too soon, +when the summer arrived, to breathe the sea air or enjoy the sunshine of +the country, in order to restore their frames, wan, worn-out, seedy and +"gruelled," as Sabine Marsy said, when she recalled her connection with +the artists. + +"Ah! how much better I like my home!" thought Madame Vaudrey. + +Sabine and Madame Gerson, with the wives of the ministers, those of the +chiefs of departments, and the regular visitors, were the most assiduous +in their attentions to Adrienne, whom they considered decidedly +provincial. She, stupefied, was alarmed by these Parisian bustlers, that +resembled machines in running order, jabbering away as music-boxes play. + +"Do they tire you?" said Guy de Lissac to her bluntly one evening, +succumbing to a feeling of pity for this pensive young woman,--who was a +hundred times prettier than Madame Gerson, whose beauty was so highly +extolled in the journals,--this minister's wife, who voluntarily kept +herself in the background with a timidity that betrayed no awkwardness, +but was in every way attractive, especially to a man about town like +Guy. + +"They do not tire me, they upset me," Adrienne replied. + +"Ah! they are in full _go_, as it is called. An express train. But they +amuse themselves so much that they have not even time to smile. When the +locomotive spins along too rapidly, try to distinguish the scenery!" + +Adrienne instinctively felt that under his irony this sceptic disguised +a sort of sincerity. Lissac's wit pleased her. He surprised her somewhat +at times, but the probably assumed raillery of the young man compensated +for the insipid nonsense of the conversation to which she listened +daily. + +At first from mere curiosity and after from a sentiment of respectful +devotion, Guy was impelled to study that delicate and sensitive nature, +entirely swayed by love of Sulpice, that suffered at times a vague +pressure as of some indefinable anguish at the throat, as if a vacuum--a +choking vacuum--had been created about her by some air-pump. + +This huge mansion seemed to her to be entirely innocent of all memories, +and though peopled with phantoms, was as commonplace and vulgar as an +apartment house. There were no associations save dust and cracks. These +salons, built for the Marechal de Beauvau, these walls that had +listened to the sobs of Madame d'Houdetot at the death-bed of +Saint-Lambert, appeared to Adrienne to exude ennui, strangling and +inevitable ennui, solemn, official, absolute ennui, nothing but ennui in +the very decorum of the place, and isolation in the midst of power. + +She cursed her loneliness, she felt lost amid the salons of this +furnished ministerial mansion, whose cold, gloomy apartments, with the +chairs symmetrically arranged along the walls, she wandered through, but +evidently without expecting any one: state chairs lacking +occupants,--ordinary chairs, domestic chairs seem to have tongues--that +never exchanged conversation. Vast, deserted rooms where the green +curtains behind the glass doors of the bookcases were eternally drawn, +bookcases without books, forever open, mournful as empty sepulchres. + +Yes, this immense gilded dwelling with its Gobelins tapestries stifled +her with its terrifying gloom, where nothing, not a single article, +recalled her charming provincial home, her Grenoble house with its +garden filled with lilacs where she was often wont to read while Sulpice +worked upstairs, bent over his table crowded with papers, before his +open window. Ah! those cherished rooms, in the humble corner of the +provincial home, their happy crouching in the peaceful nest; aye, even +the happy first days in Paris, in the Chaussee-d'Antin apartments, in +which Adrienne at least felt herself in her own home, free in her +actions and thoughts, and where she could talk aloud without feeling +that an eye was constantly watching her, and ears were always strained, +in fact, a perpetual espionage upon all her actions and a criticism of +all her words. + +She had reached a point when she asked herself if, even for Sulpice, +happiness was not far removed from this life of slavery, of feverish +politics, which for some time past had been visibly paling his cheeks +and rendering him nervous and altogether different from of old. + +"If you did not love me so much," she said with a sweet smile, "I could +believe that you loved me no longer." + +"What folly! you have only one rival, Adrienne." + +"Ah! I know that very well, but that robs me of everything. It is +politics. Come! be great, and I shall be happy or resigned, as you wish. +I adore you so much! I would give you my life, so I would gladly give +you my days of weariness!" + +Although she was rich, she strove to introduce into her official +surroundings the bourgeois and provincial orderly methods that she had +been so virtuously taught. She found that her desserts vanished with +frightful rapidity, that dishes scarcely touched and bottles whose +contents had only been tasted, were removed to the kitchen. She +commented thereon, but the somewhat contemptuous smile of her domestics +was her only reply and it made her feel ashamed. + +Vaudrey's predecessor, Monsieur Pichereau, was exacting, +_close-fisted_. His table was meagre but there was nothing astonishing +in that, Monsieur Pichereau had a delicate stomach. Well and good, but +the predecessors of Monsieur Pichereau, they had given fetes, they had! +It is true that one was a count and the other a marquis. One can always +tell a gentleman anywhere. + +One evening, they heard one of the domestics of the ministry say to +another: + +"As if it were not our money that the ministers spend! It is the +electors' money. They give us wages: we give them salaries. There it +is!" + +The domestic was discharged immediately, but these remarks, however, +recurred to Adrienne's memory and filled her with dislike for the +flunkeyism that surrounded her, waiting on her with cold civility, but +without any attachment, like hotel waiters or girls at an inn that one +will leave the next day, giving them a gratuity. + +Vaudrey saw much less of these daily little wounds. He lived in an +atmosphere of constant flattery, favor-begging cloaked under +complimentary phrases. Had he leisure, he would have been able to +calculate with mathematical exactitude how many angles the human form +would describe in the process of bowing and scraping. In his department, +everybody asked for something or got someone else to ask. _Promotion_, +that insatiable hunger, was the greedy dream of all that little world of +intriguing, underhand, begging employes, who opened up around the new +minister so many approaches, like military lines around a redoubt. + +Sulpice felt himself besieged and the target for a crowd of greedy +ambitions. The sub-heads of departments cast bitterly envious glances at +the offices of chiefs, like hungry beggars hypnotized by the display at +Chevet's. Commendatory letters rained on him. This shower of +begging-missives nauseated the minister to such an extent that he +endeavored to arrest the stream, ordering Warcolier, the Under Secretary +of State, to be called and requesting him to reply to the deputies, to +the senators, to everybody, in fact: that he had no influence to use, +that the era of favoritism was over; that he, Vaudrey, understood that +only merit would receive official gifts. "Merit only. You understand, +Monsieur Warcolier?" + +Warcolier rolled his huge eyes in astonishment; then, with the +self-satisfied smile of an expressionless beau, after passing his fat +hand through his long whiskers, yellow and streaked with gray, that +decorated his rosy cheeks, he remarked doctorally, that Monsieur le +Ministre was entering on a path that, in all conscience, he could +qualify as being only dangerous. Eh! _bon Dieu!_ one must do something +for one's friends!--Vaudrey's accession to the Department of the +Interior had given birth to many new hopes; on all grounds they must be +satisfied. Vaudrey would never be forgiven for such deception. + +"What deception?" asked Sulpice. "I promised reforms and I am going to +carry them out, but people laugh at my reforms and ask what?--Places." + +"Bless me!" replied Warcolier, "entirely logical." + +"Be it so! but there are places and places. I cannot, however, retire a +whole staff of employes to give place to a new one. That's precisely +what they want. There is not a deputy who has not one candidate to +recommend to me." + +"That's very natural, Monsieur le Ministre, seeing that there is not a +deputy who may not himself be a candidate." + +"Still, he should be independent of his electors, but in truth, it is +not the rights of those who have elected them that my colleagues defend, +it is their own interests." + +"Every man for himself, Monsieur le Ministre. Yesterday, even yesterday, +one of my electors whose wife has just given birth to a child, wrote me, +asking for a good nurse. That is like one of our colleagues, Perraud--of +the Vosges.--One of his electors commissioned him to take back an +umbrella with him upon his early return. The electors regard their +deputies in the light of commission merchants." + +"And as tobacco bureaus! Well, I wish to have more morality than that in +State affairs. I like giving, but I know how to refuse," said Vaudrey. + +"That will be easy enough so long as you are popular and solid in +Parliament; but on the day that it is clearly proved that such and such +a future minister can make himself more useful than you to the personal +interests of everybody--and there are such ministers in sight--" + +"Granet, yes, I know! He promises more butter than bread, to cry quits +later in giving more dry crusts than fresh butter. But I don't care to +deceive any one." + +"As you please, Monsieur le Ministre, as you please," answered +Warcolier, in a mocking and gentle tone. + +Sulpice did not like this man. He was a phrase-maker. He had a vague +feeling that this Warcolier who in public affected strictly severe +principles was privately undermining him and that he yielded to favors +in order to win support. It was enough for the minister to discourage +coarse, greedy ambitions, provided that the Under Secretary of State +encouraged unsavory, eager hopes by shrewd smiles and silence that +assented to all that was desired. This little underhand work going on in +his office was unknown to Vaudrey; he did not know that out of every +refusal he gave, Warcolier secured friends; but he maintained a watchful +distrust for this republican who had become so stanch a supporter of the +Republic only since that form of government had triumphed. Besides, what +had he to fear? The President of the Council, Monsieur Collard, of +Nantes, had the unbounded confidence of the head of the State and of the +Chamber; and he was Collard's intimate friend. The majority of the +cabinet was compact. The perfect calm of the horizon was undisturbed by +a cloud. Vaudrey could rule without fear, without excitement and give +all his spare time to that woman whose piercing glance, wandering smile, +palpitating nostrils, dishevelled, fair hair, kisses, fondness, cries, +and tones pursued him everywhere. + +Marianne, how he loved her! From day to day, how his love of her +increased like a madman's! It seemed to him that he suddenly found +himself in the presence of the only woman who could possibly understand +him, and in the only world in which he could live; his petty bourgeois, +sensual inexperience flourished in the little hotel of the courtesan. + +He had doubtless loved; often enough he had thought himself once more in +love; the poor grisettes, to whom he had written in verse, as he might +have sung songs to them, were gone from his thoughts, though they had +occupied his heart for a short time. He had profoundly loved her who +bore his name, perhaps he loved her still as warmly, as sincerely--the +unfortunate man!--as of old. He sometimes recalled with tearful eye, how +his whole frame trembled with love in the presence of that young girl +who had given herself entirely to him, in all her trust and sincerity, +in all her candor, and all her chastely-timid innocent modesty. But +Adrienne's love was insipid compared with the intoxicating and +appetizing voluptuousness of this woman, so adorable in her exquisite +luxury, the refinements of her charm, the singular grace of her +attitudes, of her mind, of her disjointed conversation which dared +everything, mocked, caressed, beginning with a pout and ending with some +drollery, and challenged passion by exasperating it with refusals and +mockery that changed into distracting lasciviousness. + +When she extended to Vaudrey her little hand, covered with rings, and +indolent and soft, he felt as if he had received an electric shock and +that his marrow had been touched. This man of forty felt all the +enthusiasm and distraction of a youth. It seemed to him that this was +the only woman that he possibly could love, and in truth she was the +only one that he could have loved as he did, with his forgetfulness of +self, his outbursts of madness, the distracted sentiment of a love for +which he would have braved and risked everything. + +When he confessed it frankly, she had a way of answering with a +questioning manner full of doubt, which conveyed the delicacy of the +woman's self-love and the intentionally refined doubt of the coquette, a +questioning _yes_: + +"Yes?" + +Simply that. + +And in this _yes_, there was a world of tenderness, excitement and +burning promises for Sulpice. + +Then he drew her to him: + +"Yes, yes, yes, yes!" he repeated in burning tones, as he thrust his +head between her shoulders that emerged from her embroidered chemise, +and her neck perfumed and satiny, that he covered with eager kisses. + +Yes! And he would have uttered this _yes_ before every one like a +bravado. _Yes!_ It was his delight to give himself wholly to Marianne +and to tell her again and again that nothing in the whole world could +take the place of this mistress who made him forget everything: +politics, the home, the ambition that had been his life, and his +affection for Adrienne that had been his joy. + +Thanks to the Dujarrier, Marianne had paid the rent of the house, the +servants and the pressing debts. Claire Dujarrier advanced the hundred +thousand francs demanded by Mademoiselle Kayser, and which she had +apparently--in reality she took them from her own funds--borrowed from +Adolphe Gochard, her lover, who had not a sou, and in whose favor +Vaudrey signed in regular legal form, a bill of exchange at three +months' date _value received in cash_. The Dujarrier merely retained +twenty thousand francs as her commission and handed only eighty thousand +to Marianne. + +"But Vaudrey's acceptance to Gochard is for one hundred thousand!" + +"You are silly, my girl! What if I lose the balance? If your minister +should not pay?" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Stranger things have happened, my little one." + +Vaudrey having paid, given his name, signed this bill of exchange, felt +the extreme joy arising from the base self-love of the man who pays a +lovely creature and who, nevertheless, believes himself loved. + +In the early days, Sulpice went to Rue Prony only during the day or at +night after dinner, or on leaving a reception or the theatre. Marianne +awaited him. He came stealthily, distracted with joy. There, in the +closed chamber he remained with Marianne, who was full of pride at the +complete subjugation of the will of this man in her embrace. She amused +herself occasionally by calling him _Your Excellency_, in reading to him +from some book which spun out the ceremonial necessary in applying for +an interview with a minister: + +"If ever I ask you for an audience, do you know how I must address +myself to the secretary? Listen to this book, it is funny: 'Ordinary +toilet. The etiquette for the toilet is not very strict, but it is, +however, in good taste to appear dressed as for a ceremonious call. For +women, the toilet should be simple and the gloves new.'" + +She laughed as she rested almost naked in Sulpice's arms, and repeated, +looking into his eyes: + +"A simple toilet!" + +"And again, listen!" she said, as she resumed the book. "'In speaking to +a minister as in writing to him, one should address him as _Monseigneur_ +or _Your Excellency_. On reaching the door as you leave the salon, you +should again bow respectfully.' That is amusing, ah! how amusing it +is!--Then they respect you as much as that? Your Excellency! +Monseigneur! Shall I be obliged to courtesy to you?--Your lips, give me +your lips, Monseigneur! I adore you!--You are my own minister; my +finance minister, my lover, my all! I do not respect you, but I love +you, I love you!" + +He trembled to the very roots of his hair when she spoke to him thus. He +felt transports of joy in clasping her in his arms and genuine despair +when he left her. Leave her! leave her there under that lamp alone, in +that low bed where he had just forgotten that there existed anything +else in the world besides that apartment, warm with perfumes. He would +have liked to pass the whole night beside her, separating only when +satiated and overwhelmed with caresses. But how could he leave Adrienne +alone over there in the ministerial mansion? However trustful this young +wife might be, and innocent, credulous and incapable of suspicion, if he +had passed a night absent from her, she would have been terrified and +warned. + +He easily invented prolonged receptions and night sessions that detained +him until an advanced hour. + +"One would say that the evening sessions grow more frequent than +formerly," Adrienne remarked gently at breakfast. + +"Don't talk to me about it," replied Sulpice. "In order to reach the +vacation sooner, the deputies talk twice as long." + +Adrienne never opened the _Officiel_, which Vaudrey received in his +private office, pretending that the sight of a newspaper too vividly +recalled the fatiguing political life that absorbed him. One day, +however, he allowed the journals to be brought into the salon and to lie +about in Madame's room. He informed Adrienne that he was going to pass +the day in Picardy, at Guise or at Vervins, where an important deputy +had invited him to visit his factory. He would leave in the morning and +could not return until the following day toward noon. + +"What a long time!" said Adrienne. + +"It is still longer for me than for you, since you remain here, in our +home." + +"Oh! our home! we have only one home: in Chaussee-d'Antin, or the house +at Grenoble, you know." + +"Dear wife!" cried Vaudrey, as he embraced her tenderly,--sincerely, +perhaps. + +And he left. He set out for Guise, returned in the evening and ordered +the Director of the Press to send to all the journals by the Havas +agency, a message which ran: _The Minister of the Interior passed the +entire day yesterday at Guise, at Monsieur Delair's, the deputy from +L'Aisne. He dined and slept at the house of his host. Monsieur Vaudrey +is to return to Paris this morning, at eleven o'clock._ + +Then he showed the news to Adrienne, and laughed as he said: + +"It is surprising! one cannot take a single step without it appears in +print and the entire population is informed at once!" + +"Tell me everything," Adrienne replied, as she embraced him with her +glance. "Are you tired? You look pale. How did you spend the day? You +made a speech? Were you applauded?" + +It was mainly by kisses that Vaudrey answered. What could he say to +Adrienne? She knew perfectly well how similar all these gatherings were, +with their official routine. Monsieur Delair had been very agreeable, +but the minister had necessarily had to endure much talk, much +importunity. + +"The day seemed very long to me!" + +"And to me also," she said. + +Sulpice indeed returned from Guise, but the last train on the previous +night had taken him to Rue Prony, at Marianne's. He had then found out +the secret of remaining at her side undisturbed for a long time, and the +telegraph, managed by the Director of the Press, enabled him to prove an +alibi to Adrienne from time to time. He had taken to Marianne a huge +bouquet of fresh flowers gathered in the park at Guise for Madame +Vaudrey by Monsieur Delair's two daughters. That appeared to him to be +quite natural. + +Marianne, who was waiting for him, put the flowers in the Japanese vases +and said to him as she threw her bare arms around him: + +"Very good! You thought of me!----" + +The next morning Vaudrey left, more than ever enchained by the delight +of her embraces. He sometimes returned on foot, to breathe the +vivifying freshness of the roseate dawn, or taking a cab, he stretched +himself out wearily therein, as he drove to the ministry, musing over +the hours so recently passed and striving to arrest them in their +flight, to enjoy again their seductive joy and to squeeze as from a +delicious fruit, all their intoxicating poetry, delight and fascination. + +He closed his eyes. He saw Marianne again with her eyes veiled as he +kissed her, he drank in the odor of her hair that fell like a sort of +fair cover over the lace pillow. It seemed that he was permeated with +her perfume. He breathed the air with wide-open nostrils to inhale it +again, to recover its scent and preserve it. His whole frame trembled +with emotion at the recollection of that lovely form that he had left +whiter than the sheet of the bed, in the dim light that filtered through +the opal-shaded lamp. + +Then he thought that he must forget, and invent some tale for Adrienne. +Again he opened his eyes and trembled in spite of himself, as he saw, on +both sides of the cab, workmen slowly trudging along the sidewalks with +their hands in their pockets, their noses red, a wretched worn-out silk +scarf about their necks and swinging on their arms the supply of food +for the day, or again with their fingers numb with the cold, holding +some journal in their hands in which they read as they marched along, +the speech of "Monsieur le Ministre de l'Interieur," that magnificent +speech not made during the night session as Sulpice had told Adrienne, +but the day before yesterday, in broad day, when the majority, +faithfully grouped about him, had applauded this phrase: _I, whose hours +are consecrated to the amelioration of the lot of the poor and who can +say with the poet,--I shall be pardoned for this feeling of vanity:_ + +"What I steal from my nights, I add to my days!" + +Sulpice heard again the applause that he received. He saw those devoted +hands reached out to him as he descended from the tribune; he again +experienced a feeling of pride, and yet he felt dissatisfied with +himself now that he saw the other hands, the servile hands of the +applauders, hidden by the red, cold hands of a mason who held this +speech between his horny fingers. + +Sulpice returned to the ministry, shaking himself as if to induce +forgetfulness, busy, weary, and still,--eternally,--as if immovably +fixed in an antechamber of Place Beauvau, he found the inevitable +place-hunters, the hornets of ministries. + +Vaudrey caused these urgent people, as well as some others, to be +received by Warcolier, who asked nothing better than to make tools, to +sow the seed of his clientage. Guy de Lissac and Ramel had +simultaneously called Vaudrey's attention to the eagerness which +Warcolier manifested in toying with popularity. + +"He is not wholly devoted to you, is this gentleman who prefers every +government!" said Guy. + +"He will undermine you quietly!" added Ramel. + +"I am satisfied of that. But I am not disturbed: I have the majority. +Oh! faithful and compact." + +"Woman often changes," muttered Ramel. + +Guy was troubled about Vaudrey for another reason. He vaguely suspected +that Sulpice was neglecting Adrienne. Political business, doubtless. +Vaudrey unquestionably loved his wife, who adored him and was herself +adorable. But he manifestly neglected her. + +Lissac found them one day smilingly discussing a question that was +greatly occupying the journalists: divorce. Apropos of a trifle, of a +suit for separation that Adrienne had just read in the _Gazette +Tribunaux_. It referred to an adulterous husband, a pottery dealer in +Rue Paradis, Monsieur Vauthier, the lover of a singer at a rather +notorious _cafe-concert_, named Lea Thibault. The wife had demanded a +separation. Adrienne had just read the pleadings. + +"Poor woman!" she said. "She must have suffered, indeed." + +Sulpice did not reply. + +"Do you know that if that were my case, I could never forgive you?" + +"You are mad! What are you thinking of?" + +"Oh! it is true, the idea that you could touch another woman, that you +could kiss her as you kiss me, that would make me more than angry, +horrified and disgusted. I tell you, I would never forgive you." + +"Who puts all this stuff in your head? Come, I will do as I used to do," +said Vaudrey. "Not another paper shall enter your house! What an idea, +to read the _Gazette des Tribunaux_!" + +"It is because this name: _Vauthier_, somewhat resembles your own that I +was induced to read it. And then this very mournful title: _Separation +de corps_. I would prefer divorce myself. A complete divorce that severs +the past like a knife-cut." + +"But what an idea!" repeated Sulpice, who was somewhat uneasy. + +Vaudrey was delighted to hear Guy announced in the midst of this +discussion. They would then change the topic. But Adrienne, who was much +affected by her reading, returned to the same subject in an obstinate +sort of way and Lissac commenced to laugh. + +"What a joke! To speak of divorce between you two! Never fear, madame, +your husband will never present to the Chamber a law in favor of +divorce." + +"Who knows?" Sulpice answered. "I am in favor of divorce myself, yes, +absolutely." + +"And I cannot understand, for my part, how a woman can belong to two +living men," said Adrienne. + +"You reason for yourself. But the unhappy women who suffer--and the +unhappy men--The existing law, in fact, seeing that it admits +separation, permits divorce, but more cruel, heartrending, and unjust. +Divorce without freedom. Divorce that continues the chain." + +"Sulpice is right, madame, and sooner or later, we shall certainly +arrive at that frightful divorce." + +"After all, what does it matter to me?" Adrienne replied. + +She threw the accursed _Gazette des Tribunaux_ into the waste basket +with its _Suit of Vauthier vs. Vauthier_. "We are not interested, +neither my husband nor I; he loves me and I love him. I am as sure of +him as he is sure of me. He may demand all the laws that are possible: +it would not be for selfish interest, for he would not profit by them." + +"Never!" said Sulpice with a laugh, delighted to be released from the +magnetic influence of Adrienne's strange excitement. + +There was, however, a somewhat false ring in this laugh. Face to face +with the avowed trustfulness of his wife, Sulpice experienced a slight +pricking of conscience. He thought of Marianne. His passion increased +tenfold, but this very increase of affection made him afraid. He +hastened to find himself again at Rue Prony. The Hotel Beauvau depressed +him. It became more than ever a prison. How gladly he escaped from it! + +Yes, it was a prison for him as it was for Adrienne; a prison that he +fled from to seek Marianne's boudoir, to enjoy her kisses and mirth, +while, at the same moment, his wife, the dear abandoned, disdained +creature, sad without being cognizant of the cause of her melancholy, +terrified by the emptiness of that grand ministerial mansion, that +"sounded hollow," as she said, quietly and stealthily took the official +carriage that Vaudrey sent back to her from the Chamber, and had herself +driven--where?--only she knew! + +"You ought to make a great many calls," the minister had frequently +said. "It would divert your mind and it is well to appear to know a +great many persons." + +But she only found pleasure in making one visit, she gave the coachman +the address of the apartments on Chaussee-d'Antin, where she had lived +long, happy years with Sulpice, sweet and peaceful under the clear light +of the lamp. She entered this deserted apartment, now as cold as a tomb, +and had the shutters opened by the concierge in order that she might see +the sunlight penetrate the room and set all the motes dancing in its +cheerful rays. She shut herself in and remained there happy, consoled; +sitting in the armchair formerly occupied by Sulpice, she pictured him +at the table at which he used to work, his inkstand before him and +surrounded by his books, his cherished books! She lived again the +vanished life. "Return!" she said to the dream, the humble dream she had +at last recovered. She rambled about those deserted rooms that on every +side reminded her of some sweet delight, here it was a kiss of chaste +and eternal love, there a smile. Ah! how easy life would have been there +all alone, happy for ever! + +The Ministry! Power! Popularity! Fame! Authority! What were they worth? + +Is all that worth one of the blessed hours in this little dwelling, +where the cup of bliss would have been full if the wife could have heard +the clear laugh or the faint cry of a child? + +Poor Sulpice! how he was exhausting himself now in an overwhelming task! +He was giving his health and life to politics, while here he only +experienced peace, consoling caresses and the quieting of every +excitement. On the study-table there still remained some pens and some +books that were formerly in constant use. + +Adrienne went away with reddened eyes from these pilgrimages, as it +were, to her former happiness. She returned to her carriage and +moistened her cambric pocket handkerchief with her warm breath, in order +to wipe her eyes so that Sulpice might not see that she had been +weeping. Then when her well-known carriage passed before the shops in +the Faubourg Saint-Honore, the wives of mercers or booksellers, +dressmakers, young girls, all of whom enviously shook their heads, said +to each other: + +"The minister's wife!--Ah! she has had a glorious dream!--She is +happy!" + + + + +III + + +Marianne was contented. Not that her ambition was completely satisfied, +but after all, Sulpice in place of Rosas was worth having. Though a +minister was only a passing celebrity, he was a personage. From the +depths of the bog in which she lately rolled, she would never have dared +to hope for so speedy a revenge. + +Speedy, assuredly, but perhaps not sufficient. Her eager hunger +increased with her success. Since Vaudrey was hers, she sought some +means of bringing about some adventure that would give her fortune. What +could be asked or exacted from Sulpice? She recalled the traditions of +fantastic bargains, of extensive furnishings. She would find them. She +had but to desire, since he had abandoned himself, bound hand and foot, +like a child. + +She knew him now, all his candor, all his weakness, for, in the presence +of this blase woman, weary of love, Vaudrey permitted himself to confide +his thoughts with unreserved freedom, opening his heart and disclosing +himself with a clean breast in this duel with a woman:--a duel of +self-interest which he mistook for passion. + +She had studied him at first and speedily ranked him, calling him: + +"An innocent!" + +She felt that in this house in Rue Prony, where she was really not in +her own home but was installed as in a conquered territory, Sulpice was +dazzled. Like a provincial, as Granet described him so often, he entered +there into a new world. + +Uncle Kayser frequently called to see his niece. Severe in taste, he +cast long, disdainful looks at the tapestries and the artistic trifles +that adorned the house. In his opinion, it was rubbish and the luxury of +a decaying age. He never changed his tune, always riding the hobby-horse +of an aesthetic moralist. + +"It lacks severity, all this furnishing of yours," was his constantly +repeated criticism to Marianne, as he sat smoking his pipe on a divan, +as was his custom in his own, wretched studio. + +Then, in an abrupt way, with his eye wandering over the ceiling as if he +were following the flight of a chimera, he would say: + +"Why! your minister must do a great deal, if all this comes from the +ministry!" + +Marianne interrupted him. It was no business of his to mix himself up +with matters that did not concern him. Above all, he must hold his +tongue. Did he forget that Vaudrey was married? The least indiscretion-- + +"Oh! don't alarm yourself," the painter broke in, "I am as dumb as a +carp, the more so since your escapade is not very praiseworthy!--For you +have, in fact, deserted the domestic hearth--yes, you have deserted the +hearth.--It is pretty here, a little like a courtesan's, perhaps, but +pretty, all the same.--But you must acknowledge that it is a case of +interloping. It is not the genuine home with its dignity, its virtuous +severity, its--What time does your minister come? I would like to speak +to him--" + +"To preach morality to him?" asked Marianne, glancing at her uncle with +an ironical expression. + +"Not at all. I am considered to be ignorant--No, I have a plan to +decorate in a uniform way, all the mayors' offices in Paris and I want +to propose it to him--_The Modern Marriage_, an allegorical +treatment!--_Law Imposing Duty on Love_. Something noble, full of +expression, moralizing. Art that will set people thinking, for the +contemplation of lofty works can alone improve the morals and the +masses--You understand?" + +"Perfectly. You want a commission!" + +"Ah! that's a contemptible word, hold! A commission! Is a true artist +commissioned? He obeys his inspiration, he follows his ideal--A +commission! a commission! Ugh!--On my word, you would break the wings of +faith! Little one, have you any of that double zero Kummel left, that +you had the other day?" + +Marianne sought to spare Sulpice the importunities of her uncle. She +wished to keep the minister's entire influence for herself. + +She had nothing to fear, moreover. Sulpice was hers as fully as she +believed. Like so many others who have lived without living, Sulpice +did not know _woman_, and Marianne was ten times a woman, woman-child, +woman-lover, woman-courtesan, woman-girl, and every day and every night +she appeared to her lover renewed and surprising, freshly created for +passion and pleasure. Everything about her, even the frame that +surrounded her beauty, the dwelling, perfumed with passionate love, +distractedly captivated Sulpice. Behind the dense curtains in the +dressing-room upholstered like a boudoir, with its carpet intended only +for naked feet, as the reclining chair with its extra covering of +Oriental silk was adapted to moments of languishing repose, Sulpice saw +and contemplated the vast wardrobe with its three mirrors reflecting the +huge marble washstand with its silver spigots, its silver bowl, wherein +the scented water gleamed opal-like with its perfumes, the gas +illuminating the brushes decorated with monograms, standing out against +the white marble, the manicure sets of fine steel, the dark-veined +tortoise-shell combs, the coquettish superfluity of scissors and files +scattered about amongst knickknacks, inlaid enamels, and Japanese ivory +ornaments, and there, stretched out and watching Marianne, who came and +went before him with a smile on her face, her hair unfastened, sometimes +with bare shoulders, Sulpice saw, through a half-open door in the middle +of a bathroom floored with blue Delft tiles, the bath that steamed with +a perfumed vapor, odorous of thyme, and the water which was about to +envelop in its warm embrace that rosy form that displayed beneath the +lights and under the full blaze of the gas, the nudity of her flesh +beneath a transparent Surah chemise, silky upon the living silk. + +Milk-white reflections seemed to play on her shoulders and Sulpice never +forgot those ardent visions that followed him, clung to him, thrust +themselves before his gaze and into his recollections, never leaving +him, either at the Chamber, the Council Board or even when he was with +Adrienne.--The young woman, seeing his absorption, hesitated to disturb +his thoughts, political as they were, no doubt, while he mused upon his +hours of voluptuous enjoyment, forever recalling the youthful roundness +of her shoulders, and the inflections of her body, the ivory-like curve +of her neck, whose white nape rested upon him, and her curls escaped +from the superb arrangement of her hair, held in its place at the top by +a comb thrust into this fair mass like a claw plunged into flesh. + +Vaudrey must have had an active and prompt intelligence at times to +forget suddenly these passionate images, when he unexpectedly found +himself compelled to ascend the tribune during a discussion or to +express his opinion clearly at the Ministerial Council. He increased his +power, finding, perhaps, a new excitement, a new spur in the love that +renewed his youth. He had never been seen more active and more stirring +in the Chamber, though he was somewhat nervous. He determined to put +himself in evidence at the Ministry and to prove to the phrase-monger +Warcolier that he knew how to act. The President of the Council, +Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--said several times to Sulpice: + +"Too much zeal, my dear minister. A politician ought to be cooler." + +"I shall be cooler with age!" Sulpice replied with a laugh. + +From time to time he went to seek advice from Ramel, as he had promised. +The little shopkeepers and laundresses of Rue Boursault hardly suspected +when they saw a coupe stop at the door of the old journalist, that a +minister alighted from it. + +Sulpice felt amid the bustle of his life, amid the spurring and +over-excited events of his existence, the need of talking with his old +friend. Besides, Rue Boursault was on the way to Rue Prony. As Marianne +was frequently not at home, Sulpice would spend the time before her +return in chatting with Ramel. + +"Well! Ramel, are you satisfied with me?" + +"How could I be otherwise? You are an honest man and faithful and +devoted to your ideas. I am not afraid of you, but I am of those by whom +you are surrounded." + +"Warcolier?" + +"Warcolier and many others, of those important fellows who ask me--when +they deign to speak to me--with an insignificant air of superiority and +almost of pity, the idiots: 'Well! you are no longer doing anything! +When will you do something?' As if I had not done too much already, +seeing that I have made them!" + +Denis Ramel smiled superciliously and the minister looked with a sort of +respect at this vanguard warrior, this laborer of the early morn who had +never received his recompense or even claimed it. + +"I should like you to resume your journal in order to announce all these +truths," Vaudrey said to him. + +"Do you think so? Why, a journal that would proclaim the truth to +everybody would not last six months, since no one would buy it." + +As Sulpice was about to go, there was a ring at Ramel's door. + +"Ah! who can it be? A visit. I beg you will excuse me, my dear Vaudrey." + +Denis went to open the door. + +It was a man of about fifty, dressed in the garb of a poor workman, +wearing a threadbare greatcoat and trousers that were well polished at +the knees, who as he entered held his round, felt hat in his hand. He +was thin, pale and tired-looking, with a dark, dull complexion and a +voice weak rather than hoarse. He bowed timidly, repeating twice: "I +earnestly ask your pardon;" and then he remained standing on the +threshold, without advancing or retiring, in an embarrassed attitude, +while a timid smile played beneath his black beard, already sprinkled +with gray. + +"Pardon--I disturb you--I will return--" + +"Come in, Garnier," said Ramel. + +The man entered, saluting Vaudrey, who was not known to him, and at a +gesture from Denis, he took a seat on the edge of a chair, scarcely +sitting down and constantly twirling his round-shaped hat between his +lean fingers. From time to time, he raised his left hand to his mouth to +check the sound of a dry cough which rose in his muscular throat, that +might be supposed to be a prey to laryngitis. + +"You ask for the truth--Listen a moment, a single moment," Ramel +whispered in the ear of the minister. + +Without mentioning Sulpice's name, he began to question Garnier, who +grew bolder and talked and gossiped, his cheek-bones now and then +heightened in color by small, pink spots. + +"Well! Garnier, about the work?--Oh! you may speak before monsieur, it +interests him." + +The man shrugged his shoulders with a sad, somewhat bitter smile, but +resigned at least. He very quietly, but without any complaint, +acknowledged all that he was enduring. Work was in a bad way. It +appeared that it was just the same everywhere in Europe, in fact, but +indeed that doesn't provide work at the shop. The master, a kind man, in +faith, had grown old, and was anxious to sell his business of an art +metal worker. He had not found a purchaser, then he had simply closed +his shop, being too ill to continue hard work, and the four or five +workmen whom he employed found themselves thrown into the street. There +it is! Happily for Garnier, he had neither wife nor child, nothing but +his own carcass. One can always get one's self out of a difficulty, but +the others who had households and brats! Rousselet had five. Matters +were not going to be very cheerful at home. He must rely on charity or +credit, he did not know what, but something to stave off that distress, +real and sad distress, since it was not merited. + +"Do you interest yourself in politics?" asked Vaudrey curiously, +surmising that this man was possessed of strong and quick intelligence, +although he looked so worn and crushed and his cough frequently +interrupted his remarks. + +Garnier looked at Ramel before replying, then answered in a quiet tone: + +"Oh! not now! That is all over. I vote like everybody else, but I let +the rest alone. I have had my reckoning." + +He had said all this in a low tone without any bitterness and as if +burdened with painful memories. + +"It is, however, strange, all the same," added the workman, "to observe +that the more things change, the more alike they are. Instead of +occupying themselves over there with interpellations and seeking to +overthrow or to strengthen administrations, would it not be better if +they thought a little of those who are dying of hunger? for there are +some, it is necessary to admit that such are not wanting! What is it to +me whether Pichereau or Vaudrey be minister, when I do not know at the +moment where I shall sleep when I have spent my savings, and whether +the baker will give me credit now that I am without a shop?" + +At the mention of Vaudrey's name, Ramel wished to make a sign to this +man, but Sulpice had just seized the hand of his old friend and pressed +it as if to entreat him not to interrupt the conversation. The voice +that he heard, interrupted by a cough, was the voice of a workman and he +did not hear such every day. + +"Note well that I am not a blusterer or a disturber, isn't that so, +Monsieur Ramel? I have always been content with my lot, myself--One +receives and executes orders and one is satisfied. Everything goes on +all right--My politics at present is my work; when I shall have broken +my back to bring journalists into power--I beg your pardon, Monsieur +Ramel, you know very well that it is not of you that I speak thus--I +shall be no fatter for it, I presume. I only want just to keep life and +soul together, if it can be done. I suppose you could not find me a +place, Monsieur Ramel? I would do anything, heavy work if need be, or +bookkeeping, if it is desired. I would like bookkeeping better, although +it is not my line, because the forge fire, the coal and heat, as you +see, affect me there now--he touched his neck--it strangles me and +hastens the end too quickly. It is true for that I am in the world." + +Vaudrey felt himself stirred even to his bones by the mournful, musical +voice of the consumptive, by this true misery, this poverty expressed +without phrases and this claim of labor. All the questions _yonder_, as +Garnier said, in the committees and sub-committees, in the tribune and +in the lobbies, discussions, disputes, personal questions cloaked under +the guise of the general welfare, suddenly appeared to him as petty and +vain, narrow and egotistical beside the formidable question of bread +which was propounded to him so quietly by this man of the people, who +was not a rebel of the violent days, but the unfortunate brother, the +eternal Lazarus crying, without threat, but simply, sadly: "And I?" + +He would have liked, without making himself known, to give something to +this sufferer, to promise him a position. He did not dare to offer it or +to mention his name. The man would have refused charity and the +minister, in all the personnel of bustling employes, often useless, that +fill the ministry, had not a single place to give to this workman whose +chest was on fire and whose throat was choking. + +"I will return and we will talk about him," he said to Ramel, as he +arose, indicating Garnier by a nod. "Do not tell him who I am. On my +word, I should be ashamed--Poor devil!" + +"Multiply him by three or four hundred thousand, and be a statesman," +said Ramel. + +Vaudrey bowed to the workman, who rose quickly and returned his salute +with timid eagerness, and the minister went rapidly down the stairs of +the little house and jumped into his carriage, making haste to get +away. + +He bore with him a feeling akin to remorse, and in all sincerity, for he +still heard ringing in his ears, the poor consumptive's voice saying: + +"What is it to me, who am suffering, whether Vaudrey or Pichereau be +minister?" + +On reaching Place Beauvau, he found a despatch requesting his immediate +presence at the Elysee. At the Palace he received information that +surprised him like a thunderbolt. Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--had just +been struck down by apoplexy in the corridors of the ministry. The +President of the Council was dead and the Chief of the State had turned +to Vaudrey to fill the high position which, but two hours before, had +been held by Monsieur Collard. + +President of the Council! He, Vaudrey! Head of the Ministry! The first +in his country after the supreme head? The joyful surprise that such a +proposition caused him, so occupied his mind that he was unable to feel +very much moved by the loss of Monsieur Collard--of Nantes--. Sulpice, +moreover, had never profoundly cared for this austere advocate, although +he had been much associated with him. His liking for this man who +brought to the Council old-time opinions and preconceived ideas was a +merely political affection. The President's offer proved to him that his +own popularity, as well as his influence over parliament, had only +increased since his recent entry on public life. He was then about to be +in a position to assert his individuality still better. What a glorious +time for Grenoble and what wry faces Granet would make! + +Sulpice hastened to announce this news to Adrienne, although it would +not become official until after Collard's funeral obsequies. He returned +almost triumphantly to the Hotel Beauvau. Only one thought, a sombre +image, clouded his joy: it was not the memory of Collard, but the sad +image of the man whom he had met at Ramel's, and who, when the +_Officiel_ should speak, should make the announcement, would shrug his +shoulders and say ironically: + +"Well! and what then?" + +He had scarcely whispered these words to Adrienne: "President of the +Council! I am President of the Council!" when, without being astonished +at the faint, almost indifferent smile that escaped the young wife, he +suddenly thought that he was under obligation to make a personal visit +to the Ministry of Justice where Collard was lying dead. + +He ordered himself to be driven quickly to Place Vendome. + +At every moment, carriages brought to the ministry men of grave mien, +decorated with the red ribbon, who entered wearing expressions suitable +to the occasion and inscribed their names in silence on the register, +passing the pen from one to another just as the aspergillus is passed +along in church. Everybody stood aside on noticing Vaudrey. It seemed to +him that they instinctively divined that Collard being out of the way +it was he who must be the man of the hour, the necessary man, the +President of the Council marked out in advance, the chief of the coming +_ministry_. + +"Poor Collard!" thought Sulpice, as he inscribed his name on the +register. "One will never be able to say: the _Collard Administration_. +But it would be glorious if one day history said: the _Vaudrey +Administration_." + +He re-entered the Hotel Beauvau, inflated with the idea. In the +antechamber, there were more office-seekers than were usually in +attendance. One of them, on seeing Vaudrey, rose and ran to him and said +quickly to Sulpice, who did not stop: + +"Ah! Monsieur le Ministre--What a misfortune--Monsieur Collard--If there +were no eminent men like Your Excellency to replace him!--" + +Vaudrey bowed without replying. + +"What is the name of that gentleman?" said he as soon as he entered his +cabinet, to the usher who followed him. "I always find him, but I cannot +recognize him." + +"He! Monsieur le Ministre? Why, that is, _Monsieur Eugene_!" + +"Ah! very good! That is right! The eternal Monsieur Eugene!" + +Just then Warcolier opened the door, looking more morose than sad, and +holding a letter that he crushed in his hand, while at the same time he +greeted Vaudrey with a number of long phrases concerning the dreadful, +unexpected, sudden, unlooked-for, crushing death--he did not select his +epithets, but allowed them to flow as from an overrunning cask--the +dramatic decease of Collard--of Nantes--. From time to time, Warcolier, +while speaking, cast an involuntary, angry glance at the paper that he +twisted in his fingers, so much so that Vaudrey, feeling puzzled, at +last asked him what the letter was. + +"Don't speak to me about it--" said the fat man. "An imbecile!" + +"What imbecile?" + +"An imbecile whom I received with some little courtesy the other +morning--I who, nevertheless, go to so much trouble to make myself +agreeable." + +"And that is no sinecure!--Well, the imbecile in question?" + +"Left furious, no doubt, because of the reception accorded him--and to +me, me, the Under-Secretary of State, this is the letter that he writes, +that he dares to write! Here, Monsieur le Ministre, listen! Was ever +such stupidity seen? '_Monsieur le Secretaire d'Etat, you have under +your orders a very badly trained Undersecretary of State, who will make +you many enemies, I warn you. As you are his direct superior, I permit +myself to notify you of his conduct_,' etc., etc. You laugh?" said +Warcolier, seeing that a smile was spreading over Vaudrey's +blond-bearded face. + +"Yes, it is so odd!--Your correspondent is evidently ignorant that there +are only Under-Secretaries of State in the administration!--unless this +innocent is but simply an insolent fellow." + +"If I thought that!" said Warcolier, enraged. "No, but it is true," he +said with astonishing candor, a complete overflowing of his satisfied +egotism, "there are a lot of people who ask for everything and are good +for nothing!--Malcontents!--I should like to know why they are +malcontents!--What are they dreaming about, then? What do they want? I +am asking myself ever since I came into office: What is it they want? +Doesn't the present government carry out the will of the majority?--It +is just like those journalists with their nagging articles!--They squall +and mock! What they print is disgusting! Granted that we have demanded +liberty, but that does not mean license!" + +While Warcolier, entirely concerned about himself, with erect head and +oratorical gesture, spoke as if in the presence of two thousand hearers, +Sulpice Vaudrey again recalled, still sad and sick, the dark and sunken +cheeks and the colorless ears, the poor projecting ears of the +consumptive Garnier with whom he had come in contact at Ramel's. + +He was anxious to be with Adrienne again, and above all, with Marianne. +What would his mistress say to him when she knew of his reaching the +presidency of the Council? + +Adrienne had certainly received the news with little pleasure. + +"If you are happy!"--was all she said, with a sigh. + +It was the very expression she had used at the moment when, on the +formation of the "Collard Cabinet," he had gone to her and cried out: "I +am a minister!" + +Adrienne was impassive. + +In truth, Sulpice was beginning to think that she was too indifferent to +the serious affairs of life. The delightful joys of intimacy, now, +moreover, discounted, ought not to make a woman forget the public +successes of her husband. Instinctively comparing this gentle, slender +blonde, resigned and pensive, with Marianne, with her tawny locks and +passionate nature, whom he adored more intensely each day, Vaudrey +thought that a man in his position, with his ambition and merit, would +have been more powerfully aided, aye, even doubled in power and success +by a creature as strongly intelligent, as energetic and as fertile in +resource as Mademoiselle Kayser. + +He still had before him a peculiar smile of indefinable superiority +expressed by his mistress when Adrienne and Marianne chanced to meet one +evening at the theatre, which made him feel that his mistress was +watching and analyzing his wife. The next day, Marianne with exquisite +grace, but keen as a poisoned dart, said to him: + +"Do you know, my dear, Madame Vaudrey is charming?" + +He felt himself blush at these words hurled at him point-blank, then his +cheeks grew cold. Never, till that moment, had Mademoiselle Kayser +mentioned Adrienne's name. + +"You like blondes, I see!" said Marianne. "I am almost inclined to be +jealous!" + +"Will you do me a great favor?" then interrupted Sulpice. "Never let us +speak of her. Let us speak of ourselves." + +"Yes," continued the perfidious Marianne in a patronizing tone, as if +she had not heard him, "she is certainly charming! A trifle--just a +trifle--bourgeoise--But charming! Decidedly charming!" + +Knowing Vaudrey well, she understood what a keen weapon she was plunging +straight into him. A little _bourgeoise_! This conclusion rendered by +the Parisienne with a smile now haunted Sulpice, who was annoyed at +himself and he sought to discover in his wife, the dear creature whom he +had so tenderly loved, whom he still loved, some self-satisfying excuse +for his passion and adultery. + +"Bah!" he thought. "Is it adultery? There is no adultery save for the +wife. The husband's faithlessness is called a caprice, an adventure, a +craving or madness of the senses. Only the wife is adulterous." + +In all candor, what sin had he committed? Was Adrienne less loved? He +would have sacrificed his life for her. He overwhelmed her with +presents, created surprises for her that she received without emotion, +and simply said in a doleful tone: + +"How good you are, my dear!" + +He was ruining neither her nor his children! Ah! if he but had children! +Why had not Adrienne had children? A woman should be a mother. It is +maternity that in the marriage estate justifies a man in abandoning his +freedom and a woman her shame. + +A mother! And was Marianne a mother? + +No, but Marianne was Marianne. Marianne was not created for the domestic +fireside and the cradle. Her statuesque and seductively lovely limbs +only craved for the writhings of pleasure, not the pangs of maternity. +Adrienne, on the contrary, was the wife, and the childless wife soon +took another name: the friend. No, he robbed her of nothing, Adrienne +lost none of his affection, none of his fortune. The money squandered at +Rue Prony, Vaudrey had acquired; it was the savings of the honest people +of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, the parents, the _old folks_, that he +threw--as in smelting--into the crucible of the girl's mansion. + +Adrienne expressed no desire that was not fulfilled, and Sulpice who +was, moreover, confident and lulled by her quietude, felt no remorse. He +did not enquire if his passion for Marianne would endure. He flung +himself upon this love as upon some prey; nor was desire the only +influence that now attached him to this woman, he was drawn to her also +by the admiration that he felt for her boldness of thought, her +singular opinions, her careless expressions, her devilish spirit; her +appetizing and voluptuous attractions surprised and ensnared him-- + +What a counselor and ally such a woman would be! + +Well and good! When Vaudrey informed her that he was about to become +first minister, to preside over the Council, to show his power--this was +his eternal watchword--Marianne immediately comprehended the new +situation and what increase of influence in the country such a fortunate +event would give him. + +He observed with pleasure that something like a joyful beam gleamed in +Mademoiselle Kayser's gray eyes. + +She also doubtless thought that it was desirable to take advantage of +the occasion, to seize and cling to the opportunity. + +"Then it is official?" she asked. + +"Not yet. But it is certain." + +What could Marianne hope for? Again, she had no well-defined object; but +she watched her opportunity, and since Vaudrey's power was enlarged, +well, she was to profit by it. Claire Dujarrier, who had already served +her so well, could be useful to her again and advise her advantageously. +That will be seen. + +"Are you desirous of attending Collard's funeral?" Vaudrey asked +Marianne. + +She laughed as she asked: + +"Why! what do you think that would be to me?" + +"It will be very fine. All the authorities, the magistrates, the +Institute, the garrison of Paris will be present." + +"Then you think it is amusing to see soldiers file past? I am not at all +curious! You will describe it all to me and that will be quite +sufficient for me." + +Vaudrey walked at the head of the cortege that accompanied through Place +Vendome and Rue de la Paix, black with the crowd, the funeral procession +of Collard--of Nantes--to the Madeleine. Troops of the line in parade +uniforms lined the route. From time to time was heard the muffled roll +of drums shrouded in crepe. The funeral car was immense and was crowded +with wreaths. As with bowed head he accompanied the funeral procession +of his colleague, almost his friend,--but, bah! friendship of committees +and sub-committees!--Sulpice was sufficiently an artist to be somewhat +impressed with the contrast afforded by the display of official pomp +crowning the rather obscure life of the Nantes advocate. He had ever +obtrusively before him, as if haunted by the spectre of the Poor Man +before Don Juan, the lean face of Garnier and the white moustache of +Ramel. Which of the two had better served his cause, Ramel vanquished or +Collard--of Nantes--dying in the full blaze of success? + +He pondered over this during the whole of the ceremony. He thought of it +while the notes of the organ swelled forth, while the blue flames of the +burning incense danced, and while the butts of the soldiers' muskets +sounded from time to time on the flagstones, as the men stood around +the bier and followed the orders of the officer who commanded them. + +On leaving the ceremony, Granet approached Sulpice while gently stroking +his waxed moustache, and said in an ironical tone: + +"Do you know that it is suggested that a statue be raised in Collard's +honor?" + +"Really?" + +"Yes, because he is considered to have shown a great example." + +"What?" + +"He is one of those rare cases of ministers dying in office. Imitate +him, my dear minister,--to the latest possible moment." + +Sulpice made an effort to smile at Granet's pleasantry. This cunning +fellow decidedly displeased him; but there was nothing to take offence +at, it was mere diplomatic pleasantry expressed politely. + +Before returning to the ministry, Vaudrey had himself driven to Rue +Prony. Jean, the domestic, told him that Madame had gone out; she had +been under the necessity of going to her uncle's. After all, Sulpice +thought this was a very simple matter; but he was determined to see +Marianne, so he ordered his carriage to be driven to the artist's +studio. Uncle Kayser opened the door, bewildered at receiving a call +from the minister and, at the same time, showing that he was somewhat +uneasy, coughing very violently, as if choked with emotion, or perhaps +as a signal to some one. + +"Is Mademoiselle Kayser here?" asked Sulpice. + +"Yes--Ah! how odd it is--Chance wills that just now one of our +friends--a connoisseur of pictures--" + +Vaudrey had already thrust open the door of the studio and he perceived, +sitting near Marianne and holding his hat in his hand, a young man with +pale complexion and reddish beard, whom Mademoiselle Kayser, rising +quickly and without any appearance of surprise, eagerly presented to +him: + +"Monsieur Jose de Rosas!" + +In the simple manner in which she had pronounced this name, she had +infused so triumphant an expression, such manifest ostentation, that +Vaudrey felt himself suddenly wounded, struck to the heart. + +He recalled everything that Marianne had said to him about this man. + +He greeted Rosas with somewhat frigid politeness and from the tone in +which Marianne began to speak to him, he at once realized that she had +some interest in allowing the Spaniard to surmise nothing. She unduly +emphasized the title by which she addressed him, repeating a little too +frequently: "Monsieur le Ministre."--Whenever Vaudrey sought to catch +her glance she looked away in a strange fashion and managed to avoid +carrying on any formal conversation with Sulpice. On the contrary, she +addressed Rosas affably, asking what he had done in London, what he had +become and what he brought back new. + +"Nothing," Jose answered with a peculiar expression that displeased +Vaudrey. "Nothing but the conviction that one lives only in Paris +surrounded by persons whom one vainly seeks to avoid and toward whom one +always returns--in spite of one's self, at times." + +Vaudrey observed the almost proud, triumphant expression that flashed in +Marianne's eyes. He vaguely realized an indirect confession expressed in +that trite remark made by Rosas. The Spaniard's voice trembled slightly +as he spoke. + +Marianne smiled as she listened. + +"You have taken a new journey, monsieur?" asked Sulpice, uncertain what +bearing to assume. + +"Oh! just a temporary absence! A trip to London--" + +"Have you returned long?" + +"Only this morning." + +His first call was at Simon Kayser's house, where perhaps, he expected +to see Marianne. And the proof-- + +Vaudrey instinctively thought that it was a very hasty matter to call so +soon on Uncle Kayser. This man's first visit was not to the painter's +studio, but in reality to the woman who--Sulpice still heard Marianne +declare that--who would not become his mistress. There was something +strange in that. Eh! _parbleu!_ it was perhaps Monsieur de Rosas who had +sent for Marianne. + +She endeavored to make it clear that only chance was responsible for +bringing them together here, but Sulpice doubted, he was uneasy and +angry. + +He felt almost determined to declare, if it were only by a word, the +prize of possession, the conquest of this woman, whom he felt that Rosas +was about to contend with him for. + +She surmised everything and interrupted Sulpice even before he could +have spoken and, with a sort of false respect, displayed before Rosas +the friendship which Monsieur le Ministre desired to show her and of +which she was proud. + +"By the way, my dear minister, as to your appointment as President of +the Council?" + +Vaudrey knit his brows. + +"That is so! I ask your pardon. I am betraying a state secret. Monsieur +de Rosas will not abuse it. Isn't that so, Monsieur le Duc?" + +Rosas bowed; Vaudrey was growing impatient. + +"Madame Vaudrey will, of course, be delighted at this appointment, +Monsieur le Ministre?" continued Marianne. + +She smiled at Sulpice who was greatly astonished to hear Adrienne's name +mentioned there; then, turning to Rosas, she charmingly depicted a +quasi-idyllic sketch of the affection of Monsieur le Ministre for Madame +Vaudrey. A model household. There was nothing surprising in that, +moreover. "Monsieur le Ministre" was so amiable--yes, truly amiable, +without any flattery,--and Madame Vaudrey so charming! + +Sulpice, who was very nervous and had become slightly pale, endeavored +to discover the meaning of this riddle. He asked himself what Marianne +was thinking about, what she meant to say or dissimulate. + +Monsieur de Rosas sat motionless on his chair, very cool, looking calmly +on without speaking a word. + +He seemed to await an opportunity to leave the studio, and since Vaudrey +had arrived he had only spoken a few brief phrases in strict propriety. + +Marianne, all smiles and happy, with beaming eyes, interrogated Vaudrey +and sought to provide a subject of conversation for the unexpected +interview of these two men. Was there a great crowd at Collard's +funeral? Who had sung at the ceremony? Vaudrey answered these questions +rapidly, like a man absorbed in other thoughts. + +After a moment's interval, Monsieur de Rosas arose and bowed to Marianne +with gentlemanly formality. + +"Are you going, my dear duke?" + +"Yes, I have seen you again. You are getting along well. I am +satisfied." + +"You will come again, at any rate? My uncle has some new compositions to +show you." + +"Oh! great ideas," began Kayser. "Things that will make famous +frescoes!--For a palace--or the Pantheon!--either one!" + +He had looked alternately at the duke and Vaudrey. + +Rosas bowed to the minister and withdrew without replying, followed by +Kayser and Marianne who, on reaching the threshold of the salon, seized +his hand and pressed it nervously within her own soft one and said +quickly: + +"You will return, oh! I beg you! Ah! it is too bad to have run away! You +will come back!" + +She was at once entreating and commanding him. Rosas did not reply, but +she felt in the trembling of his hand, as he pressed her own, in his +brilliant glance, that she would see him again. And since he had +returned to Paris alone, weary of being absent from her, perhaps, seeing +that he had hastened back after having desired to free himself from her, +did it not seem this time that he was wholly captivated? + +All this was expressed by a pressure of the fingers, a glance, a sigh. + +Rosas went rapidly away, like one distracted. Marianne, who motioned to +Uncle Kayser to disappear, reappeared in the studio, entirely +self-possessed. + +Vaudrey had risen from the divan on which he had been sitting and he was +standing, waiting. + +"I believed that I understood that you had dismissed Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"I might have told you that I did so, since it is true." + +"You smiled at him, nevertheless, just now." + +"Yes." + +"A man who begged you to be his mistress!" + +"And whom I rejected, yes!" + +She looked at Sulpice with her winsome, sidelong glance, curling her +lovely pink lips that he had kissed so many times. + +"Then you love that man?" + +"I! not at all, only it is flattering to me to have him return like +that, just like some penitent little boy." + +"I do not understand--" + +"_Parbleu!_ you are not a woman, that is all that that proves!--It is +irritating to our self-love to see people too promptly accept the +dismissal one gives them. What! Don't they suffer? Don't they say +anything? Don't they complain? Monsieur de Rosas comes back to me, that +proves that he was hurt, and I triumph. Now, do you understand?" + +"And--that joy that I observed is--?" + +"It is because Monsieur de Rosas is in Paris." + +"And you don't love him? You don't love him?" asked Vaudrey, clasping +Marianne's hands in his. + +She laughed and said: + +"I do not love him in the least." + +"And you love me?" + +"Yes, you, I love you!" + +"Marianne, you know that it would be very wicked and wrong to lie! It is +not necessary to love me at all if you must cease to love me!" + +"In other words, one should never lend money unless one is obliged to +lend one's whole fortune." + +He felt extremely dissatisfied with Marianne's ironical remark. She +looked at him with an odd expression which was all the more disquieting +and intoxicating. + +"Let us speak no more about that, shall we?" she said. "I repeat to you +that I am satisfied at having seen Monsieur de Rosas again, because it +affords my self-love its revenge. Now, whether he comes back or not, it +matters little to me. He has made the _amende honorable_. That is the +principal thing, and you, my dear, must not be jealous; I find Othello's +role tiresome; oh! yes, tiresome!--The more so, because you have no +right to treat me as a Desdemona. The Code does not permit it." + +"You want to remind me again, then, that I am married? A moment ago, you +stabbed me by pin-thrusts." + +"In speaking of your household? Say then with knife-thrusts." + +"Why did you mention my wife before Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"Why," said Marianne, "you do not understand anything. It was for your +sake, for you alone, in order to explain the presence in Marianne's +house, of a minister who is considered to lead a puritan life. Nothing +could be more simple!--Would you have me tell him that you neglect your +wife and that you are my lover? Perhaps you would have liked that +better!" + +"Yes, perhaps," said Vaudrey passionately. + +"Vain fellow!" the pretty girl said as she placed upon his mouth her +little hand which he kept upon his lips. "Then you would like me to +parade our secrets everywhere and to publicly announce our happiness?" + +"I should like," he said, as he removed his lips from the soft palm of +her hand, "that all the world should know that you are mine, mine +only--only mine, are you not?--That man?" + +His eyes entreated her and lost their fire. + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +"Let Monsieur de Rosas alone in tranquillity and let us return to my +house, _our house_," she said, with a tender expression in her eyes. + +"You do not love him?" + +"No." + +"And you love me?" + +"I have told you so." + +"You love me? You love me?" + +"I love you!--Ah!" she said, "how unhappy you would be, nevertheless, if +I told you aloud some day in one of the lobbies of the Assembly what you +ask me to repeat here in a whisper." + +"I should prefer that to losing you and to knowing that you did not love +me." + +"He is telling the truth, however, the great fool!" cried Marianne, +laughing. + +"The real, sincere, profound truth!" + +He drew her to him, seated on the vulgar divan where Simon Kayser was +wont to display his paradoxes, and encircling her waist with both arms +he felt her yielding form beneath her satin gown, and wished her to bend +her fair face to his lips that were craving a kiss. + +Marianne took his face between her soft hands, and looking at him with +an odd smile, tender and ironical at once, at this big simpleton who was +completely dominated by her mocking tenderness, she said: + +"You are just the same Sulpice!"--as she spoke, she bent over him +engagingly, and laughed merrily while he kissed her. + + + + +IV + + +Jose de Rosas thought himself much more the master of himself than he +actually was. + +This energetic man, firm as a very fine steel blade, had hoped to find +that in living at a distance from Marianne, he might forget her or at +least strengthen himself against her influence. He found on his return +that he was, however, more seduced by her than before, his heart was +wholly filled and gnawed by the distracting image of the pretty girl. He +had borne away with him to London, as everywhere in fact, the puzzling +smile, the sparkling glance of this woman's gray eyes that ceaselessly +appeared to him at his bedside, and beside him, like some phantom. + +The phantom of a living creature whose kiss still burned his lips like a +live coal. A phantom that he could clasp in his arms, carry away and +possess. All the virgin sentiments of this man whose life had been the +half-savage one of a trapper, a savant or a wanderer, turned toward +Marianne as to an incarnated hope, a living, palpitating chimera. + +Jose felt certain that if he returned to Paris it was all over with him, +and that he was giving his life to that woman. But he returned. His +fight against himself over, the first visit he made, once again, was to +the den where he knew well that he could discover Marianne's +whereabouts. He went to her as he might walk to a gulf. Under his cold +demeanor of a Castilian of former days, he was intensely passionate and +would neither reflect nor resist. He had experienced that delightful +sensation of impulse when, upon the rapids at the other end of the +globe, the river carried into a whirlpool his almost engulfed boat. He +would doubtless have been stupefied had he found Marianne installed in a +fashionable little mansion. She promised herself to explain that to him +when she next saw him while informing him, there and then, that she had +taken up her abode there. A mere whim: Mademoiselle Vanda having gone +away, the idea had attracted her of sleeping within a courtesan's +curtains. "I will tell him that this transient luxury recalls my former +follies when I made him believe that I was spending an inheritance from +my grandmother." + +She had, indeed, already lied to him, for the money she had formerly +squandered had been provided by De Lissac, but even then it was +necessary--for the duke was in expectancy--to conceal its source from +Rosas, hence the story of the inheritance that never existed. But she at +once thoroughly realized that the surroundings which were favorable to +the progress of the duke's love were not the bedroom and the +dressing-room of Mademoiselle Vanda. What difference would Rosas have +found between her and the fashionable courtesans whom he had loved, or +rather, enriched, in passing? He would not believe this new lie this +time. + +All that luxury might seduce Sulpice Vaudrey; it would have disgusted +Jose. What satisfied the appetite of the little, successful bourgeois +would nauseate the gentleman. + +As soon as Rosas returned to her, happy and stupefied at the same time, +extravagantly happy in his joy, her plan of campaign was at once +arranged. She did not wish to receive him in the vulgar hotel, where the +clubmen had wiped their feet upon the carpets. She entreated him, since +he wished to see her again, to see her at her "own house," yes, really, +at her own house, in that little, unknown room, in Rue Cuvier, far from +the noise of Paris and near the Botanical Garden, a kind of hidden cell +into which no one entered. + +"No one but me," she said. + +The order had been given to Uncle Kayser in advance: in case Rosas +should reappear, Simon was to at once inform his niece and prevent the +duke from discovering Marianne's new address. And this had been done. + +The duke was then going to see Mademoiselle Kayser only at Rue Cuvier, +after having rediscovered her at Uncle Simon's. + +He felt in advance a kind of gratitude to this woman who thus abandoned +the secret of her soul to him; giving him to understand that it was +there that she passed her days, buried in her recollections, dreaming of +her departed years, of that which had been, of that which might be, a +living death. + +Marianne had shrewdly divined the case. For this great soul, mystery +added a new sentiment to the feelings that Rosas experienced. The first +time that he found himself in that little abode where Simon Kayser's +niece awaited him, he was deeply moved, as if he had penetrated into the +pure chamber of a young girl. There, yonder, in that distant quarter, he +found a peaceful retreat for one wounded by life, thirsting for solitude +and passing there secret hours in the midst of loved books; in fact, the +discreet dwelling of a poor teacher who had collected some choice +_bibelots_ that she had found by chance. Rosas there felt himself +surrounded by perfect virtue, amid the salvage of a happier past. +Marianne thus became what he imagined her to be, superior to her lot, +living an intellectual life, consoling herself for the mortification of +existence and the hideous experiences of life by poet's dreams, in +building for herself in Paris itself a sort of Thebais, where she was +finally free and mistress of herself and where, when she was sad, she +was not compelled to wear a mask or a false smile, and was free from all +pretended gaiety. And she was so often sad! + +She had occasionally mentioned to Rosas the assumed name under which she +lived at that place. + +"Mademoiselle Robert!" + +He had manifested surprise thereat. + +"Yes, I do not wish them to know anything of me, not even my name. You +should understand the necessity that certain minds have for repose and +forgetfulness. Did not one of your sovereigns take his repose lying in +his coffin? Well! I envy him and when I have pushed the bolt of my +little room in Rue Cuvier, I tremble with delight, just as if I felt my +heart beating in a coffin. Do not tell any one. They would desire to +know and see. People are so curious and so stupid!" + +Marianne now seemed to be still more strange and seductive to Rosas. All +this romantic conduct, commonplace as it was, with which she surrounded +herself, exalted her in the estimation of the duke. She became in that +little chamber where she was simply Mademoiselle Robert, a hundred times +more charming and attractive to him than any problem: a veritable +Parisian sphinx. + +She was not his mistress. He loved her too deeply, with a holy, +respectful passion, to take her hastily, as by chance, and Marianne was +too skilful to risk any imprudent act, well-knowing that if she yielded +too quickly, it would not be a woman who would fall into the duke's +arms, but an idol that descended from its pedestal. + +In the silence of the old house in the deserted quarter, they held +conversations in the course of which Rosas freely abandoned himself, and +through which she gained every day a more intimate knowledge of the +character of that man who was so different from those who hitherto had +sought her for pleasure. + +Thus, the very respect that he instinctively felt for her, impelled her +to love him. + +She had not been accustomed to such treatment. Every masculine look that +since her puberty she had felt riveted upon her, clearly expressed even +before the lips spoke: "You are beautiful. You please me. Will you?" +Rosas, at least, said: "I love you," before: "I desire you." + +Tainted in the body which she had given, offered, abandoned, sold, she +felt that she was respected by him even in that body, and although she +considered him silly, she thought him superior to all others, or at +least different, and that was a sufficient motive for loving him. + +One day she said to him in a peculiar tone and with her distracting +smile: + +"Do you know, my dear Jose, there is one thing I should not have +believed? You are bashful!" + +He turned slightly pale. + +"Sincere love is always bashful and clumsy. By that it may be known." + +"Perhaps!" said Marianne. + +Their conversations, however, only concerned love, so that Rosas might +speak of his passion or of his reminiscences. + +She once asked him if he would despise a woman if she became his +mistress. + +"No!" he said, with a smile, "it is only a Frenchman who would despise +the woman who surrendered herself. Other nations treat love more +seriously. They do not consider the gift of one's self in the light of a +fall." + +Marianne looked at him full in the face with a strange expression. + +"What, then, if I love you well enough to become your mistress?" + +"I should still esteem you enough to become your husband!" + +She felt her color change. + +Was it a sport on the part of Monsieur de Rosas? Why had he spoken to +her thus? Had he reflected upon what he had just said? + +Jose added in a very gentle tone: + +"Will you permit me to ask you a question, Marianne?" + +"You may ask me anything. I will frankly answer all your questions." + +"What was Monsieur Sulpice Vaudrey doing at your uncle's the other day? +Was he there to see you?" + +Marianne smiled. + +"Why, the minister simply came to talk of business matters. I hardly see +him except for Uncle Kayser, who is soliciting an official +commission,--you heard him--" + +"Does Monsieur Vaudrey pay his addresses to you?" + +"Necessarily. Oh! but only out of pure French gallantry. Mere +politeness. He loves his wife and he knows very well that I don't love +any one." + +"No one?" asked Rosas. + +"I do not love any one yet," repeated Marianne, opening her gray eyes +with a wide stare under the Spaniard's anxious glance. + +From that day, her mind was possessed of a new idea that imperiously +directed it. When Rosas had returned to her, she had only regarded him +as a possible lover, rich and agreeable. The mistress of a minister, she +would become the mistress of a duke. A millionaire duke. The change +would be profitable, assuming that she could not retain both. Her +calculations were speedily made. She would only make Rosas pay more +dearly for the resistance he had offered before surrendering himself. + +But now, abruptly and without her having thought of it, he had, with the +incautiousness of a soldier who discloses his attack and lays himself +open to a bully who tries to provoke him, the duke showed her the +extent of his violent passion by a single phrase that feverishly +agitated her. + +His mistress! Why his mistress, since he had shown her that perhaps?-- + +"Idiot that I am!" thought Marianne. "Suppose I play my cards for +marriage?" + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +"It will cost no more!" + +Married! Duchess! and Duchesse de Rosas! At first she laughed. Duchess! +I am asking a little from you! The mistress of Pierre Meran, the +artist's drudge, the wretch who abducted her and debauched her, adding +his depravity to hers, and who died of consumption while quite young, +after having plunged this girl into vice, this Marianne Kayser, born and +moulded for vice: she a duchess! + +"It would be too funny, my dear!" she thought. + +Never had Vaudrey, whom she saw that evening at Rue Prony, seemed so +provincial, or, as she said, so _Sulpice_. Besides, he was gloomy and +unable to express himself clearly at first, but finally he brought +himself to acknowledge that he was embarrassed about providing for the +bill of exchange--she understood-- + +"No, I do not know!" + +"The bill of exchange in favor of Monsieur Gochard!" + +"Ah! that is so. Well! if you cannot pay it, my dear, I will advise--I +will seek--" + +There was nothing to seek. Vaudrey would evidently get himself out of +the affair--but the document matured at an unfortunate time. He did not +dare to mortgage La Sauliere, his farm at Saint-Laurent-du-Pont. He had +reflected that Adrienne might learn all about it. And then-- + +Marianne broke in upon his confidences. + +"Don't speak to me about these money matters, my friend, you know that +sort of thing disgusts me!--" + +"I understand you and ask your pardon." + +They were to see each other again the next day, as parliament was to +take a rest. + +"What joy! Not to be away from you for the whole of the day!" remarked +Vaudrey. + +"Well then, till to-morrow!" + +She felt intense pleasure in being alone again, wrapped in her sheets, +with the light of the lamp that ordinarily shone upon her hours of love +with Sulpice, still burning, and to be free to dream of her Spanish +grandee who had said, plainly, with the trembling of passion on his +lips: "I should esteem you enough to become your husband!" + +She passed the night in reverie. + +Vaudrey, in spite of the joy of the morrow,--a long tete-a-tete with his +mistress,--thought with increasing vexation of the approaching maturity +of his bill of exchange; within two months he would have to pay the +hundred thousand francs which he had undertaken to pay Marianne's +creditor. + +"It is astonishing how quickly time passes!" + +At breakfast the following day, Adrienne saw that her husband was more +than usually preoccupied. + +"Are political affairs going badly?" + +"No--on the contrary--" + +"Then why are you melancholy?" + +"I am a little fatigued." + +"Then," said Madame Vaudrey, "you will scold me." + +"Why?" + +"I have led Madame Gerson to hope--You know whom I mean, Madame Marsy's +friend,--I have almost promised her that you would accept an invitation +to dine at her house." + +For a moment Vaudrey was put out. + +Another evening taken! Hours of delight stolen from Marianne! + +"I have done wrong?" asked Adrienne, as she rested her pretty but +somewhat sad face on her husband's bosom. "I did it because it is so +great a pleasure to me to spend an entire evening with you, even at +another's house. Remember you have so many official dinners, banquets +and invitations that you attend alone. When the minister's wife is +invited with him, it is a fete-day for the poor, little forsaken thing. +I do not have much of you, it is true, but I see you, I hear you talking +and I am happy. Do not chide me for having said that we would go to +Madame Gerson's. The more so, because she is a charming woman. Ah! when +she speaks of you! 'So great a minister!' Don't you know what she calls +you?--'A Colbert!'" + +Vaudrey could not restrain a smile. + +"Come, after that, one cannot refuse her invitation. It is the +_Monseigneur_ of the beggar," said he, kissing Adrienne's brow. "And +when do we dine at Madame Gerson's?" + +"On Monday next; I shall have at least one delightful evening to see +you," said the young wife sweetly. + +The minister entered his cabinet. Almost immediately after, a messenger +handed him a card: _Molina, Banker_. + +"How strange it is!" thought Sulpice. "I had him in mind." + +In the course of his troublesome reflections concerning the Gochard +paper, Vaudrey persistently thought of that fat, powerful man who +laughed and harangued in a loud voice in the greenroom of the ballet, as +he patted with his fat fingers the delicate chin of Marie Launay. + +Why! if he were willing, this Molina--Molina the Tumbler!--for him it is +a mere bagatelle, a hundred thousand francs! + +Salomon Molina entered the minister's cabinet just as he made his way +into the foyer of the Opera, with swelling chest, tilted chin and +stomach thrust forward. + +"Monsieur le Ministre," he said in a clear voice, as he spread himself +out in the armchair that Vaudrey pointed out to him, "I notify you that +you have my maiden visit!--I am still in a state of innocency! On my +honor, this is the first time I have set my foot within a minister's +office!" + +He manifested his independence--born of his colossal influence--by his +satisfied and successful air. The former Marseillaise clothes-dealer, in +his youth pouncing upon the sailors of the port and Maltese and +Levantine seamen, to palm off on them a second-hand coat or trousers, as +the wardrobe dealers of the Temple hook the passer-by, Salomon Molina, +who had paraded his rags and his hopes on the Canebiere, dreaming at the +back of his dark shop of the triumphs, the pleasures, the revels and the +indigestions that money affords, had, moreover, always preserved the +bitterness of those wretched days and his red, Jewish lip expressed the +gall of his painful experiences. + +His first word as he entered Vaudrey's cabinet, asserting the virginity +of his efforts at solicitation, betrayed his bitterness. + +Now, triumphant, powerful, delighted, feasted and fat, his massive form, +his gross flesh and his money were in evidence all over Paris. His huge +paunch, shaking with laughter, filled the stage-boxes at the theatres. +He expanded his broad shoulders as he reclined in the caleche that +deposited him on race-days at the entrance of the weighing-enclosure. He +held by the neck, as it were, everything of the Parisian quarry that +yelps and bounds about money, issues of stock, and the food of public +fortune: bankers, stock-brokers, and jobbers, financial, political and +exchange editors, wretches running after a hundred sous, statesmen in a +fair way to fortune; and he distributed to this little crowd, just as he +would throw food into a kennel, the discounts and clippings of his +ventures, taking malicious pleasure, the insolent delight of a fortunate +upstart, in feigning at the moment when loans were issued, sickness that +had no existence, in order to have the right of keeping his chamber, of +hearing persons of exalted names ringing at his door and dancing +attendance upon him,--powerful, influential and illustrious +persons,--him, the second-hand dealer and chafferer from Marseilles. + +It was then that he tasted the joy of supreme power, that delight which +titillated even his marrow, and after having rested all day, the prey of +a convenient neuralgia, he experienced the unlimited pleasure of force +overcoming mind, the blow of a fist crushing a weakling, as with a white +cravat he appeared in some salon, in the greenroom of the ballet, or in +the dressing-room of a _premiere_, saying with the mocking smile of +triumph and the assurance attending a gorged appetite: + +"I was sick to-day, I suffered from neuralgia! The Minister of Finance +called on me!--Baron Nathan came to get information from me!" + +Among all the pleasures experienced by this man, he valued feminine +virtue occasionally purchased with gold as little in comparison with the +virgin souls, honor and virtue that he often succeeded in humiliating, +in bending before him like a reed, and snuffing out with his irony, +whenever necessity placed at his mercy any of those puritanical beings +who had passed sometimes with haughty brow before the millions of this +man of money. It was then that the clothes-dealer took his revenge in +all its hideousness. There was no pity to be expected from this fat, +smiling and easy-going man. His fat fingers strangled more certainly +than the lean hands of a usurer. Molina never pardoned. + +Ah! if this fellow went to see the minister, most assuredly he wanted a +favor from him. + +But what? + +It was extraordinary, but before Vaudrey, Molina who could hold his own +among rascals, found himself ill at ease. There was in the frank look of +this _ninny_, as Molina the _Tumbler_ had one evening called him while +talking politics, such direct honesty that the banker, accustomed as he +was to dealings with sharks and intriguers, did not quite know how to +open the question, nevertheless a very important matter was in hand. + +"A rich plum," thought Molina. + +A matter of railways, a concession to be gained. A matter of private +interest, disguised under the swelling terms of the public welfare, the +national needs. Millions were to be gained. Molina was charged with the +duty of sounding the President of the Council and the Minister of Public +Works. Two honest men. The _dodge_, as the _Tumbler_ said, was to make +them swallow the affair under the guise of patriotism. A strategical +railroad. The means of rapid locomotion in case of mobilization. With +such high-sounding words, _strategy_, _frontier_, _safety_, they could +carry a good many points. + +Unfortunately, Vaudrey was rather skittish on these particular +questions, besides he was informed on the matter. He felt his flesh +creep while Molina was speaking. Just before, on seeing the banker's +card, the idea of the money of which the fat man was one of the +incarnations, had suddenly dawned upon him as a hope. Who knows? By +Molina's aid, he might, perhaps, free himself from anxiety about the +Gochard bill of exchange!--But from the minister's first words, although +the banker could not get to the point, intimidated as he was by +Sulpice's honest look, it was clear that Vaudrey surmised some repugnant +suggestions in the hesitating words of this man. + +What! Molina hesitating? He did not go straight to the point, squarely, +according to his custom, Molina the illustrious _Tumbler_? Eh! no! the +intentionally cold bearing of the minister decidedly discomposed him. +Vaudrey's glance never wandered from his for a moment. When the promoter +pronounced the word Bourse, a disdainful curl played upon Sulpice's +lips, but not a word escaped him. Molina heard his own voice break the +silence of the ministerial cabinet and he felt himself entangled. He +came to propose a combination, a bonus, and he did not suspect that +Vaudrey would refuse to have a hand in it. And here, this devilish +minister appeared not to understand, did not understand, perhaps, or +else he understood too well. Molina was not accustomed to such +hard-of-hearing people. With his fat hand, he had dropped into the hands +of senators and ministers of the former regime, a sum for which the only +receipt given was a smile. He was accustomed to the style of +conversation carried on by hints and ended between intelligent people by +a _shake of the hand_, that in which some bits of paper rested: +bank-notes or paid-up shares. And this Vaudrey knew nothing! So he felt +himself obliged to explain himself clearly, to stoop to dotting every +_i_, at the risk of being shown out of doors. + +Molina was too shrewd to run this risk. He would return at another time, +seeing that the minister turned a deaf ear, but _pecaire_! he sweat huge +drops in seeking roundabout phrases, this man who never minced his words +and habitually called things by their proper names. Was the like ever +seen! A pettifogger from Grenoble to _floor_ Salomon Molina! + +"It made me warm," said the money-maker, on leaving the cabinet, "but, +deuce take it! I'll have my revenge. One is not a minister always. You +shall pay me dearly, my little fellow, for that uncomfortable little +time." + +Vaudrey had thoroughly understood the matter, but he did not intend to +allow it to be seen that he did. That was a simpler way. He had not had +to dismiss the buyer of consciences; he had enjoyed his embarrassment +and that was sufficient. + +"What, however, if I had spoken to him of money before he had shown his +hand! If I had accepted from him--!" he said to himself. + +He shuddered at the thought as he had previously done while Molina was +talking to him. A single imprudence, a single confidence might easily +have placed him under the hand of this fat man. He must, however, find +some solution. The days were rolling away and the bills signed for +Marianne would in a very short time reach maturity. + +"When I think that this Molina could in one day enable me to gain three +times this sum." + +Salomon had just told him: "To forestall the news on the Bourse is +sometimes worth gold ingots!" A _forestaller_! As well say the +revelation of a State secret, base speculation, almost treachery! And +yet on hearing these words that covered up an insult, he had not even +rung for the messenger to show Molina out, but had striven to comprehend +nothing! + +As the result of this conversation, he felt uncomfortable. The man had +left an odor of pollution, as it were, behind him. + +Vaudrey must needs be soon reassured respecting the Gochard paper. In +visiting Marianne, he observed that his mistress was a shrewd woman. She +informed him immediately that Claire Dujarrier whom she had seen, would +secure a renewal from Gochard, who was unknown to Vaudrey, from three +months to three months until the expiration of six months in +consideration of an additional twenty thousand francs for each period of +ninety days. + +"I did not understand that at first," Marianne began by remarking. + +"Oh!" said Sulpice, "I understand perfectly, it is absolute usury. But +time is ready money, and in six months it will be easier for me to pay +one hundred and forty thousand francs than a hundred thousand to-day. I +have plans." + +"What?" + +"Very difficult to explain, but quite clear in my mind! The important +part is not to have the date of maturity on the first of June, but on +the first of December." + +"Then nothing is more simple. Madame Dujarrier will arrange it." + +"Is Madame Dujarrier a providence then?" + +"Almost," said Marianne coldly. + +Sulpice was intoxicated with joy, realizing that he had before him all +the necessary time in which to free himself from his embarrassment, when +Marianne should have returned him his first acceptance for one hundred +thousand francs against a new one for one hundred and forty thousand. He +breathed again. From the twenty-sixth of April to the first of December, +he had nearly seven months in which to free himself. He repeated the +calculation that he had formerly made when he said: "I have ample time!" + +He reentered the Hotel Beauvau in a cheerful mood, Adrienne was +delighted. She feared to see him return nervous and dejected. + +"Then you will be brilliant presently at Madame Gerson's." + +"Stop! that's so. It is this evening in fact!--" + +He had forgotten it. + +Marianne, too, was not free. She was going, she said, to Auteuil for +that bill of exchange. Vaudrey did not therefore, regret the soiree. His +going to Madame Gerson's was now a matter of indifference to him. + +"As for me, I am so happy, oh! so happy!" said Adrienne, clapping her +little hands like a child. + +In undressing, Vaudrey fortunately found this document which he had +folded in four and left in his waistcoat pocket: + + "On the first of June next, I will pay to the order of Monsieur + Adolphe Gochard of No. 9, Rue Albouy, the sum of One Hundred + Thousand Francs, value received in cash. + + "SULPICE VAUDREY, + "Rue de la Chaussee-d'Antin, 37." + +He turned pale on reading it. If Adrienne had seen it!-- + +He burned the paper at a candle. + +"I am imprudent," he said to himself. "Poor Adrienne! I should not like +to cause her any distress." + +She was overjoyed as she made the journey in the ministerial carriage +from Place Beauvau to the Gersons' mansion. At last she had a rapid, +stolen moment in which she could recover the old-time joy of happy +solitude, full of the exquisite agitation of former days. + +"Do you recall the time when you took me away like this, on the evening +of our marriage?" she whispered to him, as the carriage was driven off +at a gallop. + +He took her hands and pressed them. + +"You still love me, don't you, Sulpice?--You believe too, that I love +you more than all the world?" + +"Yes, I believe it!" + +"You would kill me if I deceived you?--I, ah, if you deceived me, I do +not know what I should do.--Although I think that you are here, that I +hold you, that I love you, you may still belong to another woman--" + +"Again! you have already said that. Are you mad?" said Sulpice. "See! we +have reached our destination." + +Madame Gerson had brilliantly illuminated her house in Rue de Boulogne +with lights, filled it with flowers, and spread carpets everywhere to +receive the President of the Council. The house was too small to +accommodate the guests, who were about to be stifled therein. She packed +them into her dining-room. For the soiree which was to follow, she had +sounded the roll-call of her friends. She was bent on founding a new +salon, on showing Madame Marsy that she was not alone to be the rival of +Madame Evan. + +Madame Gerson was not on friendly terms with Sabine Marsy. People were +ignorant as to the cause. Adrienne, who was not familiar with the +history of such little broils, was very much surprised to learn of this +fact. + +"She claims that we take away all her _personnel_," said Madame Gerson. +"It is not my fault if people enjoy themselves at our house. I hope that +you will find pleasure here, Monsieur le President." + +Vaudrey bowed. "Madame Gerson could not doubt it." + +The guests sat down to dinner. Madame Gerson beamed with joy beside the +minister. Guy de Lissac, Warcolier, some senators and some deputies were +of the dinner party. Monsieur and Madame Gerson never spoke of them by +their names but: _Monsieur le Senateur, Monsieur le Depute!_ They +lubricated their throats with these titles, just as bourgeois who come +in contact with highnesses swell out in addressing a prince as +_Monseigneur_, absolutely as if they were addressing themselves. + +Sulpice felt in the midst of this circle in which everything was +sacrificed to _chic_, as he invariably did, the painful sensation of a +man who is continually on show. He never dined out without running +against the same menu, the same fanfare, and the same conversation. + +Monsieur Gerson endeavored to draw the President of the Council into +political conversation. He wished to know Vaudrey's opinion as to the +one-man ballet. Sulpice smiled. + +"Thanks!" he said. "We have just been dealing with that. I prefer +truffles, they are more savory." + +Through the flowers, Adrienne could see her husband who was seated +opposite to her beside Madame Gerson. She conversed but little with Guy +de Lissac, who was sitting on her right, although the formalities of the +occasion would have suggested that Monsieur le Senator Crepeau and +Monsieur de Prangins, the deputy, should have been so placed. Madame +Gerson, however, had remarked with a smile, that Madame Vaudrey would +not feel annoyed at having Monsieur de Lissac for her neighbor. "I have +often met Monsieur de Lissac at the ministry; he is received noticeably +well there." + +Not knowing any one among the guests, Adrienne was, in fact, charmed to +have Guy next to her. He was decidedly pleasing to her with his sallies, +his skepticism which, as she thought, covered more belief than he wished +to disclose. For a long time, he had felt himself entirely captivated by +her cheerful modesty and the grace of her exquisite purity. She was so +vastly different from all the other women whom he had known. How the +devil could Vaudrey bring himself to neglect so perfect a creature, who +was more attractive in her fascinating virtue than all the damsels to be +met with in society, among the demi-monde, or those of a still lower +grade? For Vaudrey remained indifferent to Adrienne; and this was a +further and manifest blow. A specialist in matters of observation like +Guy was not to be deceived therein. Madame Vaudrey had not yet +complained, but she was already suffering. Was it merely politics, or +was it some woman who was taking her husband from Adrienne? Guy did not +know, but he would know. The pretty Madame Vaudrey interested him. + +"If that idiot Sulpice were not my friend, I would make love to her. +Besides," he said to himself, as he looked at Adrienne's lovely, limpid +eyes, "I should fail; there are some lakes whose tranquillity cannot be +disturbed." + +Adrienne, pleased to have him beside her, enquired of him the names of +the guests. On the left of Madame Gerson sat a little, broad-backed man, +with black hair pasted over his temples, long leg-of-mutton whiskers +decorating his bright-colored cheeks, and a keen eye: he was Monsieur +Jouvenet, formerly an advocate; to-day Prefect of Police. + +Senator Crepeau sat further away. He was a fat manufacturer, who talked +about alimentary products and politics. In the _Analytical Table of the +Accounts of the Sittings of the Senate_, his name shone brilliantly, +with the following as his record: "CREPEAU, of L'Ain, Life +Senator--Apologizes for his absence--8 January--. Apologizes for his +absence--20 February--. Member of a commission--_Journal Officiel_, p. +1441. Apologizes for not being able to take part in the labors of the +commission--4 March--. Apologizes for his absence--20 March--. Asks for +leave of absence--5 April--." Such were his services during the ordinary +work of that year. Monsieur Crepeau--of L'Ain--had earned the right to +take a rest. + +"He eats very heartily," said Lissac. "His appetite is better than his +eloquence." + +Next to Crepeau was another legislator, Henri de Prangins, a publicist, +an old, wrinkled, stooping, dissatisfied grumbler. + +"Ah! that is Monsieur de Prangins," said Adrienne, "I have heard much +about him." + +"He is a typical character," Lissac said, with a smile. "You know +Granet, _the gentleman who will become a minister_; well, Prangins is +the gentleman who would be a minister, but who never will be! Moreover, +he is five hundred times more remarkable than a hundred others who have +been in office ten times, for what reason cannot be said." + +For nearly half a century Prangins, the old political wheel-horse, had +plotted and jockeyed in politics, set up and overthrown ministries, +piled up review articles on newspaper articles, contradiction on +contradiction, page on page, spoiled cartloads of paper in his vocation +of daily or fortnightly howler, and withal he was applauded, rich and +popular, famous and surrounded by flatterers, knife-and-fork companions, +without friends but not wanting clients, as he had made and spoiled +reputations, ministers, governments, and although he well knew the +vanity and nothingness of power, he aspired to secure that vain booty, +oft alleging, with bitter enviousness of authority and impatient of +tyranny, that to enjoy popularity uninterruptedly was not worth a +quarter of an hour of power, approaching with greedy eagerness the +desired lot, yet seeing it inevitably, eternally, relentlessly escape +and recede from him, plucked from his grasp as it were, like a shred of +flesh from the jaw of a Molossian. And now, in his unquenchable lust of +power, amid the monuments of combination and deception he had created, +this man was weary, disgusted and irritated,--believing himself +vanquished and smothering the anger of defeat in the luxurious isolation +of his wealth. He was neither officially influential nor liked. Feared +he was, probably, and envied because of his good fortune, recognized, +too, as a _force_, but only as acting in the whirlwind of his ideas and +struggling in the emptiness of his dreams. After having immolated +everything, youth, family, friendship, love, to this chimera: power, he +found himself old, worn-out, broken by his combats, face to face with +the folly of his hopes and the worthlessness of his will. Never had his +nervous hand been able to grasp in its transition, the fragment of +morocco of a portfolio and now that his parchment-like fingers were old +and feeble, they would never cling to that shred of power! And now this +Prangins avenged himself for the contempt or the injustice of his +colleagues and the folly of circumstances, by criticism, defiance, +mockery, denial and by loudly expressing his opinion: + +"The defect of every government is that it will try to play new airs on +an old violin! Your violin is cracked, Monsieur Vaudrey! I do not +reproach you for that, you did not make it!" + +Vaudrey laughed at the sally, but Warcolier felt that he was choking. +How could the minister allow his policy to be thus attacked at table? +Ah! how Warcolier would have clinched the argument of this Prangins. + +Madame Gerson was delighted. The dinner was served sumptuously and went +off without a hitch. The _maitre d'hotel_ directed the service +admirably. The soiree that was to follow it would be magnificent. The +journals would most certainly report it. Gerson had invited one reporter +in spite of his dislike of journalists. Ah! those gossipers and foolish +fellows, they never forgot to describe the toilettes worn by "the pretty +Madame Gerson" at _first nights_, at the Elysee or at Charity Bazaars. +Occasionally, her husband pretended to be angered by the successes of +his wife: + +"Those journalists! Just imagine, those journalists! They speak about my +wife just as they would about an actress! 'The lovely Madame Gerson wore +a gown of _crepe de Chine_!' The lovely Madame Gerson! What has my +wife's beauty or her toilette to do with them?" + +In truth, however, he felt flattered. He was only sincerely annoyed +when people respected the devilish wall of private life, the cement of +which he would have stripped off himself, in order to show his wife's +beauty. To be quoted in the paper, why! that is _chic_. + +Adrienne felt a little stunned by the noise of the conversation which +increased in proportion as the dinner advanced. She was also very much +astonished and not a little grieved when Madame Gerson abruptly spoke in +a loud voice before all the guests concerning Madame Marsy, at whose +house it was, in fact, that she made the acquaintance of Vaudrey. Madame +Gerson showed her pretty teeth in a very charming manner as she tore her +old friend Sabine to pieces, as it were. In a tenderly indulgent tone +which was the more terrible, she repeated the tales that were formerly +current: the affecting death of Philippe Marsy, the painter of +_Charity_, and a particular escapade in which Sabine was involved with +Emile Cordier, one of the leaders of the _intransigeante_ school of +painters. + +"What! you did not know that?" said the pretty Madame Gerson in +astonishment. + +Adrienne knew nothing. She was delighted moreover to know nothing. She +heard this former friend relate how Sabine had, at one time, exhibited +at the Salon. Oh! mere students' daubs, horrid things! Still-life +subjects that might have passed for buried ones, and yet, perhaps, +Cordier retouched them. + +"I thought that Madame Gerson was on the best of terms with Madame +Marsy," whispered Adrienne to Lissac, who replied: + +"They have been on better! They perhaps will be so again. That is of +very little importance. Women revile each other and associate at the +same time." + +Adrienne decided that she would not listen. She knew Sabine Marsy only +slightly; she was not interested as a friend; but this little execution, +gracefully carried out here by a woman who recently did the honors at +the Salon of Boulevard Malesherbes seemed to her as cowardly as +treachery. This, then, was society! And how right was her choice in +preferring solitude! + +Then, in order that she might not hear the slander that was greeted with +applause by those very persons who but yesterday besieged Madame Marsy's +buffet, and who would run to-morrow to pay court to that woman, she +conversed with Lissac. She frankly told him what she suffered at Place +Beauvau. She spoke of Sulpice, as Sulpice was loved by her beyond all +else in the world. + +"Fancy! I do not see him, hardly ever! The other week he passed two days +at Laon, where an exposition was held at which he was present." + +"An exposition at Laon?" asked Lissac, astonished. "What exposition?" + +"I do not know. I know nothing myself. Perhaps it is wrong of me not to +keep myself informed of passing events, but all that wearies me. I +detest politics and journals--I am told quite enough about them. +Politics! that which takes my husband from me! My uncle, Doctor Reboux, +often said to me: 'Never marry a doctor; he is only half a husband.' +Vaudrey is like a doctor. Always absent, with his everlasting +night-sessions." + +"Night-sessions?" asked Lissac. + +"Yes, at the Chamber--continually--" + +Guy determined to betray nothing of his astonishment; but he knew now as +surely as if he had learned everything, why Sulpice neglected Adrienne. +The fool! some girl from the Opera! some office-seeker who was skilfully +entangling His Excellency! That appertained to his functions then? He +was exasperated at Vaudrey and alternately looked at him and at +Adrienne. So perfect a woman! Ravishing. What an exquisite profile, so +delicate and with such a straight nose and a delightful mouth! Was +Vaudrey mad then? + +The guests rose from the table, and, as usual, the men went into the +smoking-room, leaving the salon half-empty. Madame Gerson profited +thereby to continue distilling her little slanders about Sabine, which +she did while laughing heartily. In the smoking-room the men chatted +away beneath the cloud that rose from their _londres_. The clarion tones +of Warcolier rung out above all the other voices. + +Guy, seated in a corner on a divan, was still thinking of Adrienne, of +those _night-sessions_, of those expositions, of those agricultural +competitions invented by Sulpice, and caught but snatches of the +conversation, jests, and nonsensical stories which were made at the cost +of the colleagues of the Chamber and political friends: + +"You know how Badiche learned at the last election that he was not +elected?" + +"No, how?" + +"He returned to his house, anxious as to the result of the ballot. And +he heard, what do you think? His children, a little boy and a little +girl, who on receipt of the telegram that papa was waiting for and that +mamma in her feverish expectation had opened, had already composed a +song to the air of _The Young Man Poisoned_: + + Resultat tres negatif, + Ballottage positif! + Badiche est ballo-- + Bate, + Est ballotte! + Oui, Badiche est ballotte; + C'est papa qu'est ballotte! + +Happy precocity! genuine frightful gamins!" + +"_Du Gavarni_!" + +"Apropos, on what majority do you count, Monsieur le President?" + +"One hundred and thirty-nine." + +"That is a large one." + +"I! my dear fellow,"--it was old Prangins speaking to Senator +Crepeau,--"I do not count myself as likely to be included in the next +ministry, no! I do not delude myself, but I shall be in the second--or +rather in the third--no, in the fourth--yes, in the fourth +ministry--Assuredly!" + +An asthmatic cough, the cough of an old man, interrupted his remarks. + +Guy heard Warcolier, as he held a small glass of kirsch in his hand, say +with a laugh: + +"I have a way of holding my electors in leash. Not only when I visit +them do I address them as _my friend, my brave_, which flatters them, +but from time to time, I write them autograph letters. They look upon +that like ready money. Some of them, the good fellows, are flattered: +'He has written to me, he is not proud!' Others, the suspicious fellows, +are reassured: 'Now--I have his signature, I have him!' And there you +are!" + +They laughed heartily. + +"How they laugh _afterward_," thought Lissac, "at the electors whose +shoes they would blacken _beforehand_." + +"The course that I have followed is very simple," said another. "I +desired to become sub-prefect so as to become a prefect and a prefect to +become a deputy, and a deputy so as to reach a receiver-generalship. The +salaries assured, why, there's the crowning of a career." + +"Why, that fellow _plays the whole gamut_," again thought Guy, "but he +is frank!" + +"I read very little," now replied Crepeau to Warcolier--"I do not much +care for pure literature--we politicians, we need substantial reading +that will teach us to think." + +"I believe you!--" murmured this Parisian Guy, still smoking and +listening. "Go to school, my good man!" + +The conversation thus intermingled and confused, horrified and irritated +this _blase_ by its gravity and selfishness. He summed up an entire +character in a single phrase and shook his head as he very shrewdly +remarked: "Suppose _Universal Suffrage_ were listening?" + +Lissac did not take any part in these conversations. It was his delight +to observe. He drew amusement from all these wearisome commonplaces, +according to his custom as a curious spectator. + +He was about, however, to rise and approach Vaudrey, who was +instinctively coming toward him, when the Prefect of Police, Monsieur +Jouvenet, without noticing it, placed himself between the minister and +his friend. + +Jouvenet spoke in a low tone to Vaudrey, smiling at the same time very +peculiarly and passing his fingers through his whiskers. Whatever +discretion the prefect employed, Guy was near enough to him to hear the +name of Marianne Kayser, which surprised him. + +Marianne! what question of Marianne could there be between these two +men? + +Lissac observed that Vaudrey suddenly became very pale. + +He drew still nearer, pretending to finish a cup of coffee while +standing. Then he heard these words very distinctly: + +"A reporter saw you leave her house the other evening!" + +Guy moved away very quickly. He felt a sort of sudden bewilderment, as +if the few words spoken by the Prefect of Police were the natural result +of his conversation with Adrienne, an immediate response thereto. + +"It would be astonishing if Marianne--" thought Lissac. + +Besides, he would know soon. He would merely question Vaudrey. + +As soon as Jouvenet, always polite, grave and impassive, had left +"Monsieur le Ministre" in a state of visible nervousness, almost of +anxiety, he entered upon his plan. + +"You know Mademoiselle Kayser intimately then?" he asked Vaudrey, who, +taken aback, looked at him for a moment without replying and endeavored +to grasp Lissac's purpose. + +"Am I imprudent?" further asked Guy. + +"No, but who has told you--?" + +"Nothing, your Prefect of Police only spoke a little too loud. He seemed +to me to understand." + +Vaudrey's hand rapidly seized Lissac's wrist. + +"Hush! be silent!" + +"Very well! Good!" said Lissac to himself. "Poor little Adrienne." + +"I will tell you all about that later. Oh! nothing is more simple! It +isn't what you think!" + +"I am sure of that!" answered Lissac, with a smile. + +In a mechanical way, and as if to evade his friend, Sulpice left the +smoking-room for the salon, tritely observing: + +"We must rejoin the ladies--the cigar kills conversation--" + +He felt uncomfortable. It was the first time that Jouvenet had informed +him that there are agents for learning the movements of ministers. The +Prefect of Police, in a chance conversation at the Opera with the +editor-in-chief of a very Parisian journal, had suppressed a rumor which +stated that a minister hailing from Grenoble set propriety at defiance +in his visits to Rue Prony. It would have been as well to print +Vaudrey's name. + +Hitherto he had been able to enjoy his passion for Marianne without +scandal and secretly. His mysterious intrigue was now known to the +police, to everybody, to a reporter who had stumbled against him on +leaving a supper-party at the house of a courtesan in the neighborhood. + +The minister was bitterly annoyed. The very flattering applause that +the women bestowed upon him when he returned to the salon could not +dissipate his ill-humor. He tried to chat and respond to the affected +remarks of Madame Gerson and to the smiles of the women; but he was +embarrassed and nervous. Adrienne thought he looked ill. + +Everything was spoken of in the light but pretentious, easy tone of the +conversation of those second-rate salons where neither ideas nor men are +made, where, on the contrary, they are accepted, ready-made and _en +bloc_. On every question, the picture in vogue, the favorite book, the +man of the hour, they expressed themselves by the same stereotyped, +expected word, borrowed from the ceaseless repetition of current +polemics. Nothing was new. The conversation was as well worn as an old +farthing. Adrienne was pained to see a man of Vaudrey's intelligence +compelled to listen to these truisms and wondered if he would presently +reproach her for having brought him into the suffocating void of this +Parisian establishment where all was superficial, glittering and _chic_. + +She was in a hurry to get away. She saw that Sulpice was growing weary, +and took advantage of the first opportunity to whisper to him: + +"Would you like to go?" + +"Yes, let us go!" he said. + +He sought Lissac and repeated to him that he would have something to say +to him, and Guy bowed to the Minister and Madame Vaudrey, who left too +early to please the Gersons. + +Adrienne, out of heart and discouraged by commonplace gossip and +slander, was eager to be again with her husband, to tell him that +nothing could compensate her for the deep joy of the tete-a-tete, their +evenings passed together as of old--he remembered them well,--when he +read to her from the works of much-loved poets. + +"Poetry!" said Vaudrey. "Will you be quiet! The Gersons would find me as +antiquated as Ramel. It is old-fashioned." + +"I am no longer surprised," added the young wife, "at being so little +fashionable. Morally speaking, those hot-houses of platitudes stifle +one. Never fear, Sulpice, I shall not be the one to ever again drag you +into salons. Are you tired? Are you weary?" + +"No, I was thinking of something else," replied Vaudrey, who really was +thinking of Marianne. + +Madame Vaudrey had not left Madame Gerson's salon before that pretty +little Parisian whispered imprudently enough in the ear of a female +friend: + +"Our ministers' wives are always from Carpentras, Pont-a-Mousson, or +Moulins; don't you think so?" + +"And what would you have!" said Lissac, who on this evening heard +everything that he ought not to hear, "it is as good as being from the +_Moulin-Rouge_!" + +Madame Gerson smiled, thought the expression charming, very apt, very +happy, but again reflected that Lissac was exceedingly considerate +toward Adrienne and that Madame Vaudrey was a little too indulgent +toward Monsieur de Lissac. + + + + +V + + +Since the moment when it had entered her mind that she might find +something more than a lover in Monsieur de Rosas, Marianne had been +sorely puzzled. She was playing a strong hand. Between the minister and +the duke she must make a choice. + +She did not care seriously for Vaudrey. In fact she found that he was +ridiculously unreserved. "He is a simple fellow!" she said to Claire +Dujarrier. But she had sufficient _amour-propre_ to retain him, and she +felt assured that Sulpice was weak enough to obey her in everything: +such an individual was not to be disdained. As to Rosas, she felt a +sentiment which certainly was not love, but rather a feeling of +astonishment, a peculiar affection. Rosas held her in respect, and she +was flattered by his timid bearing, as he had in his veins the blood of +heroes. He spoke almost entirely of his love, which, however, he never +proposed to her to test, and this platonic course, which in Vaudrey's +case she would have considered _simple_, appeared to her to be "good +form" in the great nobleman's case. The duke raised her in her own +eyes. + +He had never repeated that word, doubtless spoken by him at random: +marriage, and Marianne was too discreet and shrewd to appear to have +specially noticed it. She did not even allude to it. She waited +patiently. With the lapse of time, she thought, Rosas would be the more +surely in her grasp. Meantime it was necessary to live and as she was +bent on maintaining her household, she kept Vaudrey, whom she might need +at any moment. + +Her part was to carry on these two intrigues simultaneously, leading +Rosas to believe that the minister was her friend only, nothing more, +the patron of Uncle Kayser, and making Vaudrey think that since she had +dismissed the duke he had become resigned and would "suppress his +sighs." She could have sworn, in all sincerity, that Jose was not her +lover. + +To mislead Vaudrey was not a very difficult task. Sulpice was literally +blinded by this love.--For a moment, he had been aroused by Jouvenet's +intimation that his secret was known to others. For a while he seemed to +have kept himself away from Marianne; but after taking new precautions, +he returned trembling with ardent passion to Mademoiselle Vanda's hotel, +where his mistress's kiss, a little languid, awaited him. + +Months passed thus, the entire summer, the vacation of the Chamber, the +dull season in Paris. Adrienne set out for Dauphiny, where Vaudrey was +to preside over the Conseil-General, and she felt a childish delight on +finding herself once more in the old house at Grenoble, where she had +formerly been so happy! Yet even beneath this roof, within these walls, +the mute witnesses of his virtuous love, especially when alone, Vaudrey +thought of Marianne, he had but one idea, that of seeing her again, of +clasping her in his arms, and he wrote her passionate letters each day, +which she hardly glanced over and with a shrug of her shoulders burned +as of no importance. + +In the depths of his province he grew weary of the continual bustle of +fetes, receptions held in his honor, addresses delivered by him, +ceremonies over which he had to preside, deputations received, statues +inaugurated. Statues! always statues! In the lesser towns, at Allevard +or Marestel, he was dragged from the _mairie_ to the _Grande Place_, +between rows of firemen, in noisy processions, whose accompanying brass +instruments split his ears, under pink-striped tents, draped with +tricolor flags, before interminable files of gymnastic societies, glee +clubs, corporate bodies, associations, Friends of Peace, or Friends of +War societies! Then wandering harangues; commonplace remarks, spun out; +addresses, sprinkled with Latin by professors of rhetoric; declarations +of political faith by eloquent municipal councillors, all delighted to +grab at a minister when the opportunity offered. How many such harangues +Vaudrey heard! More than in the Chamber. More thickly they came, more +compressed, more severe than in the Chamber. What advice, political +considerations and remonstrances winding up with demands for offices! +What cantatas that begged for subsidies! Everywhere demands: demands for +subsidies, demands for grants, demands for help, demands for +decorations! Nothing but harass, enervation, lassitude, deafening +clamor. They wished to kill him with their shouts: _Vive Vaudrey!_ + +The Prefect and the Commandant General of the division were constantly +on guard about Vaudrey, who was dragged about in torture between these +two coat-embroidered officers. From the lips of the prefect, Vaudrey +heard the same commonplace utterances: progress, the future, the fusion +of parties and interests, the greatness of the department, the cotton +trade and the tanneries, the glory of the minister who--of the minister +whom--of the glorious child of the country--of the eagle of Dauphiny. +_Vive Vaudrey! Vive Vaudrey!_ The general, at least, varied his effects. +He grumbled and wrung his hands, and on the day of the inauguration of +the statue of a certain Monsieur Valbonnans, a former deputy and +celebrated glove manufacturer,--also the glory of the country,--Vaudrey +heard the soldier murmur from morning till night, with a movement of his +jaw that made his imperial jerk: "_I love bronze! I love bronze!_" with +a persistency that stupefied the minister. + +This was, perhaps, the only recollection of a cheerful nature that +Vaudrey retained of his trips in Isere. This eternal murmuring of the +general: _I love bronze! I love bronze!_ had awakened him, and he gayly +asked himself what devilish sort of appetite that soldier had who +continually repeated his phrase in a ravenous tone. Seated beside him on +the platform, while the glee-club sung an elegy in honor of the late +Monsieur Valbonnans, which was composed for the occasion by an amateur +of the town: + + Monsieur Valbonnans' praise let's chant, yes, chant! + His gloves the best, as all must grant, + The best extant! + +while the flourish of trumpets took up the refrain and the firemen +unveiled, amid loud acclamations, the statue of Monsieur Valbonnans, +which bore these words on the pedestal: _To the Inventor, the Patriot, +the Merchant_; while, too, the prefect still poured in Vaudrey's left +ear his inexhaustible observations: the glove trade, the glory of Isere; +the progress, the interest, the greatness of the department, the +minister who--the minister whom--(_Vive Vaudrey!_) Sulpice still heard, +even amid the acclamations, the mechanical rumbling of the general's +voice, repeating, reasserting, rehearsing: "_I love bronze! I love +bronze!_" + +On the evening of the banquet, the minister at length obtained an +explanation of this extraordinary affection. The general rose, grasping +his glass as if he would shiver it, and while the _parfait_ overflowed +on to the plates, he cried in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head +of his division: + +"I love bronze--I love bronze--because it serves for the erection of +statues and the casting of cannon. I love bronze because its voice wins +battles, the artillery being to-day the superior branch, although the +cavalry is the most chivalrous! I love bronze because it is the image of +the heart of the soldier, and I should like to see in our country an +army of men of bronze who--whom--" + +He became confused and muddled, and rolled his white eyes about in his +purpled face and to close his observations brandished his glass as if it +had been his sword, and amid a frenzy of applause from the guests, he +valiantly howled: "I love bronze! I love bronze!" + +Vaudrey could scarcely prevent himself from laughing hysterically, in +spite of his ministerial dignity, and when he returned to Grenoble, his +carriage full of the flowers that they had showered on him, he could +only answer to Adrienne, who asked him if he had spoken well, if it had +been a fine affair, by throwing his bouquets on the floor and saying: + +"I have laughed heartily, but I am crushed, stupefied! What a headache!" + +And Sulpice wrote all that to Marianne, and innocent that he was, told +her: "Ah! all those applauding voices are not worth a single word from +you! When shall I see you, Marianne, dear heart?" + +"At the latest possible date!" _the dear heart_ said. + +She regarded the close of summer and the beginning of autumn with +extreme vexation, for it would bring with it the parliamentary session +and Vaudrey, and inflict on her the presence of her lover. + +Sulpice provided her liberally with all that her luxurious appetites +demanded, and it was for good reasons that she decided not to break with +him, although for a long time she had sacrificed this man in her +inclinations. "Ah! when I shall be able to bounce him!" she said, +expressing herself like a courtesan. She could not, she would not accept +anything from Rosas. On that side, the game was too fine to be +compromised. She could with impunity accept the position of mistress of +Vaudrey, but with Jose she must appear to preserve, as it were, an +aureole of modesty, of virginal charms, that she did not possess. + +In fact, the Spaniard's mind became singularly crystallized, and she +turned this result to good account: in proportion as he associated +himself with the real Marianne, he created a fictitious Marianne, ideal, +kind, _spirituelle_, perhaps ignorant, but subtile and corrupted in +mind, who amused and disconcerted him at one and the same time. He had +left the Continental Hotel, and rented a house on Avenue Montaigne, +Champs-Elysees, where he sometimes entertained Marianne as he might have +done a princess. At such times she gossiped while smoking Turkish +tobacco. Her Parisian grace, her champagne-like effervescent manner, +seduced and charmed this serious, pale traveller, whose very smile +was tinged with melancholy. + +He completely adored this woman and no longer made an effort to resist. +He entirely forgot that it was through Guy that he had known her. It +seemed to him that he had himself discovered her, and besides, she had +never loved Guy. No, certainly not. She was frank enough to acknowledge +everything. Then she denied that Lissac ever--Then what! If it should be +true? But no! no! Marianne denied it. He blindly believed in Marianne. + +All the conflicting, frantic arguments that men make when they are about +to commit some foolish action were at war in Jose's brain. The more so +as he did not attempt to analyze his feelings. He passed, near this +pretty woman whose finger-tips he hardly dared kiss, the most delicious +summer of his life. Once, however, on going out with Marianne in the +Champs-Elysees, he had met the old Dujarrier with the swollen eyelids +and the yellow hair that he had known formerly. One of his friends, the +Marquis Vergano, had committed suicide at twenty for this woman who was +old enough to be his mother. The Dujarrier had stopped and greeted +Marianne, but as she remarked herself, a thousand bows and scrapes were +thrown away, for Rosas had hardly noticed her with a glacial look. + +"Why do you return that woman's salutation?" he at once asked Marianne. + +"I need her. She has done me services." + +"That is surprising! I thought her incapable of doing anything but +harm." + +He did not dream of Mademoiselle Kayser's coming in contact with +courtesans. In the tiny, virtuous room in Rue Cuvier, Rosas thought that +Marianne was in her true surroundings. She would frequently sit at the +piano--one of the few pieces of furniture contained in this +apartment,--and play for Rosas Oriental melodies that would transport +him far away in thought, to the open desert, by the slow lulling of +David's _Caravane_, then abruptly change to that familiar air, that +rondeau of the Varietes that he hummed yonder, on his dunghill, +forsaken-- + + "Voyez-vous, la-bas, + Cette maison blanche--" + +"I love that music-hall air!" she said. + +He now no longer meditated resuming travel, or quitting Paris. +Mademoiselle Kayser's hold on him grew more certain every day. The +suspicion of odd mystery that enveloped this girl intensified his +passion. + +He sometimes asked her what her uncle was doing. + +"He? Why, he has obtained, thanks to Monsieur Vaudrey, the decoration of +a hydropathic establishment, _Les Thermes des Batignolles_. He has +commenced the cartoon for a fresco: _Massage Moralizing the People_. We +shall see that in his studio." + +"Do you know," Marianne continued, "what I would like to see?" + +"What, then?" + +"Spain, your own country. Where were you born, Rosas?" + +"At Toledo. I own the family chateau there." + +"With portraits and armor?" + +"Yes, with portraits and armor." + +"Well, I would like to go to Toledo, to see that chateau. It must be +magnificent." + +"It is gloomy, simply gloomy. A fortress on a rock. Gray stone, a red +rock, scorched by the sun. Huge halls half Moorish in style. Walls as +thick as those of a prison. Steel knights, standing with lance in hand +as in _Eviradnus_! Old portraits of stern ancestors cramped in their +doublets, or Duchesses de Rosas, with pale faces, sad countenances, +buried in their collars whose _guipures_ have been limned by Velasquez +or Claude Coello. Immense cold rooms where the visitors' footfalls echo +as over empty tombs. A splendor that savors of the vault. You would die +of ennui at the end of two hours and of cold at the end of eight days." + +"Die of cold in Spain?" + +"There is a cold of the soul," the duke replied with a significant +smile. "That I have travelled so much, is probably due to my desire to +escape from that place! But you at Toledo, at Fuentecarral,--that is the +name of my castle,--a Parisian like you! It would be cruel. As well +shut up a humming-bird in a bear-pit. No! thank God, I have other nooks +in Spain that will shelter us, my dear sparrow of the boulevards! Under +the Andalusian jasmines, beneath the oleanders of Cordova or Seville, +under the fountains whose basins are decorated with azulejos, and in +which sultanas bathe, my jasmins could never sufficiently exhale their +perfume, my fountains could never murmur harmoniously enough to furnish +you a joyous welcome--when you go--if you go--But Toledo! My terrible +castle Fuentecarral! It is in vain that I am impenitently romantic, I +would not take you there for anything in the world. It would be as if +ice fell on your shoulders. Fuentecarral? Ugh!--that smacks of death." + +While he spoke, Marianne looked at him with kindling eyes and in thought +roamed through those sweet-scented gardens, and she craved to see +herself in that tomblike fortress Fuentecarral, passing in front of the +pale female ancestors of Rosas, aghast at the _froufrou_ of the +_Parisian woman_. + +Jose thought Marianne's burning glance was an expression of her love. +Ah! how completely the last six months in Paris had riveted him to this +woman, who was the mistress of another! One day,--Vaudrey had just left +Marianne at the _rond-point_ of the Champs-Elysees,--the duke seeing her +enter his house, said abruptly to her: + +"I was about to write you, Marianne." + +"Why, my dear duke?" + +"To ask an appointment." + +"You are always welcome, my friend, at our little retreat." + +He made her sit down, seized both her hands, and looked at her earnestly +as he said: + +"Swear to me that you have never been Lissac's mistress!" + +She did not even quiver, but was as calm as if she had long awaited this +question. + +She boldly met Jose's glance and said: + +"Does one ask such a question of the woman one loves?" + +"Suppose that I ask this question of the Duchesse de Rosas!" said the +Spaniard, with quivering lip. + +She became as pale as he. + +"I do not understand--" she said. + +The duke remained silent for a moment; then his entire soul passed into +his voice: + +"I have no family, Marianne. I am entirely my own master, and I love +you. If you swear to me that you have not been Guy's mistress--" + +"Nobody has the right to say that he has even touched my lips," replied +Marianne firmly. "Only one man, he who took me, an innocent girl, and +left me heart-broken, disgusted, believing I should never again love, +before I met you. He is dead." + +"I know," said Rosas, "you confided that to me formerly.--A widow save +in name, I offer you, yes, I! my name, my love, my whole life--will you +take them?" + +"Eh! you know perfectly well that I love you!" she exclaimed, as she +frantically gave him the burning and penetrating kiss that had never +left his lips since the soiree at Sabine's. + +"Then, no one--no one?" Jose repeated. + +"No one!" + +"On honor?" + +"On honor!" + +"Oh! how I love you!" he said, distractedly, all his passion shattering +his coldness of manner, as the sun melts the snow. "If you but knew how +jealous and crazed I am about you!--I desire you, I adore you, and I +condemn myself to remain glacial before you, beneath your glance that +fires my blood--I love you, and the recollection of Guy hindered me from +telling you that all that is mine belongs to you--I am a ferocious +creature, you know, capable of mad outbursts, senseless anger, and +unreasoning flight--Yes, I have wished to escape from you again. Well! +no, I remain with you; I love you, I love you!--You shall be my wife, do +you hear? My wife!--Ah! what a moment of bliss! I have loved you for +years! Have you not seen it, Marianne?" + +"I have seen it and I loved you! I also have kept silence! I saw plainly +that you believed that I had given myself to another--No, no, I am +yours, nothing but yours! All my love, all myself, take it; I have kept +it for you; for I hate the past, more than that, I do not know that it +exists--It is despised, obliterated, it is nothing! But you, ah! you, +you are my life!" + +She left Jose's, her youth renewed, haughty, intoxicated with delight. +She walked along alone, in the paths of the Champs-Elysees, the rusty +leaves falling in showers at the breath of the already cold wind, her +heels ringing on the damp asphalt. She marched straight ahead, her +thoughts afire from her intoxicating emotions. It seemed that Paris +belonged to her. + +That evening, she was to go to the theatre. It was arranged that Vaudrey +should wait for her at the entrance with a hired carriage and take her +to Rue Prony. She wrote to him that she could not leave the house. A +slight headache. Uncle Kayser undertook to have the letter taken by a +commissionaire. + +"Unless you would rather have me go to the ministry!" + +"Are you mad?" Marianne said. + +"That is true, it would be immoral." + +She wished to have the evening to herself, quite alone, so that she +could let her dreams take flight. + +Dreams? Nonsense! On the contrary, it was a dazzling reality: a fortune, +a title, a positive escape from want and the mire. What a revenge! + +"It is enough to drive one mad!" + +Sudden fears seized her; the terror of the too successful gambler. What +if everything crumbled like a house of cards! She wished that she were +several weeks older. + +"Time passes so quickly, and yet one has a desire to spur it on." + +Now in the solitude of her house she felt weary. She could neither read +nor think, and became feverish. She regretted that she had written to +Vaudrey. She wished to go to the theatre. A new operetta would be a +diversion, and why should she not go? She had the ticket for her box. +She could at once inform Vaudrey that her headache had vanished. + +"And then he bores me!--Especially now." + +Matters, however, must not be abruptly changed. Suppose Rosas should +take a sudden fancy to fly off again! Besides, she had mutual interests +with the minister, there was an account to be settled. + +"The Gochard paper?--Bah! he will pay it. More-ever, I am not involved +in that." + +Suddenly she thought that she would act foolishly if she did not go +where she pleased. Sulpice might think what he pleased. She got her maid +to dress her hair. + +"Madame is going to the theatre?" + +"Yes, Justine. To the Renaissance!" + +She was greatly amused at the theatre, and was radiant with pleasure. +She was the object of many glances, and felt delighted at being alone. +One of the characters in the operetta was a duchess whose adventures +afforded the audience much diversion. She abandoned herself to her +dreams, her thoughts wandering far from the theatre, the footlights and +the actors, to the distant orange groves yonder. + +During an entr'acte some one knocked at the door of her box. She turned +around in surprise. It was Jouvenet, the Prefect of Police, who came to +greet her in a very gallant fashion. The prefect--he had gained at the +palais in former days, the title of _L'Avocat Pathelin_,--with +insinuating and wheedling manners, hastened to pay his meed of respect +to Marianne when he met her. There was no necessity to stand on ceremony +with him. He knew all her secrets. Such a man, more-ever, must be +treated prudently, as he can make himself useful. Never had Jouvenet +spoken to her of Vaudrey, he was too politic in matters of state. But as +a man who knows that everything in this world is transient, he skilfully +maintained his place in the ranks, considering that a Prefect of Police +might not be at all unlikely to succeed a President of the Council. + +Marianne permitted him to talk, accepted all his gallantries as she +might have done bonbons, and with a woman's wit kept him at a distance +without wounding his vanity. + +Jouvenet with the simple purpose of showing her that he was +well-informed, asked her, stroking his whiskers as he did so, if she +often saw the Duc de Rosas. What a charming man the duke was! And while +the young woman watched him as if to guess his thoughts, he smiled at +her. + +The prefect, not wishing to appear too persistent, changed the +conversation with the remark: + +"Ah! there is one of our old friends ogling you!" + +"An old friend?" + +It was in fact Guy de Lissac who was standing at the balcony training +his glass upon the box. + +Marianne had only very occasionally met Lissac, but for some time she +had suspected him of being secretly hostile to her. Guy bore her a +grudge for having taken Sulpice away from Adrienne. He pitied Madame +Vaudrey and perhaps his deep compassion was blended with another +sentiment in which tenderness had taken the place of a more modified +interest. He was irritated against the blind husband because he could +not see the perfect charms of that delicate soul, so timid and at the +same time so devoted. Although he had not felt justified in showing his +annoyance to Vaudrey, he had manifested his dislike to Marianne under +cover of his jesting manner, and she had been exceedingly piqued +thereby. Wherefore did this man who could not understand her, interfere, +and why did he add to the injuries of old the mockery of to-day? + +"After all, perhaps it is through jealousy," she thought. "The dolt!" + +Guy did not cease to look at her through his glass. + +"Does that displease you?" Jouvenet asked. + +"Not at all. What is that to me?" + +"This Lissac was much in love with you!" + +"Ah! Monsieur le Prefet!" Marianne observed sharply. "I know that your +office inclines you to be somewhat inquisitive, but it would be polite +of you to allow my past to sleep in your dockets. They are famous +shrouds!" + +Jouvenet bit his lips and in turn brought his glass to bear on Lissac. + +"See," he said, "he makes a great deal of the cross of the Christ of +Portugal! It is in very bad taste! I thought he was a shrewder man!" + +"The order of Christ is then in bad odor?" + +"On the contrary; but as it is like the Legion of Honor in color, he is +prohibited from wearing it in his buttonhole without displaying the +small gold cross--And I see only the red there--" + +"I beg your pardon, Monsieur le Prefet, there is one." + +"Oh! my glass is a wretched one!--But even so, I do not believe Monsieur +de Lissac is authorized by the Grand Chancellor to wear his decoration. +That is easily ascertained!--I will nevertheless not fail to insert in +the _Officiel_ to-morrow a note relative to the illegality of wearing +certain foreign decorations--" + +"Is this note directed against Lissac?" + +"Not at all. But he reminds me of a step that I have wished to take for +a long time: the enforcement of the law." + +The entr'acte was over. Jouvenet withdrew, repeating all kinds of +remarks with double meanings that veiled declarations of love; that if +the occasion arose, he would place himself entirely at her service, and +that some day she might be very glad to meet him-- + +"I thank you, Monsieur le Prefet, and I will avail myself of your +kindness," replied Marianne, out of courtesy. + +Something suggested to her that Guy would pay his respects to her during +the next entr'acte, were it only to jest about Jouvenet's visit, seeing +that he was regarded as a compromising acquaintance, and she was not +wrong. + +Behind his monocle, his keen, mocking glance seemed like a taunting +smile. + +"Well," he said, in a somewhat abrupt tone, as he sat near Marianne, "I +congratulate you, my dear friend." + +"Why?" she answered with surprise. + +"On the great news, _parbleu!_ Your marriage." + +She turned slightly pale. + +"How do you know?--" + +"I have seen the duke. He called on me." + +"On you? What for?" + +"Can't you make a little guess--a very little guess--" + +"To ask you if I had been your mistress? Lissac, you are very silly." + +"Yes, my dear Marianne, prepare yourself somewhat for the position of a +duchess. A gentleman, to whom you have sworn that I have never been +your lover, could not doubt your word!--Jose asked me nothing. He simply +stated his determination to see what I would say, or gather from my +looks what I thought of it." + +"And you said?" + +"What I had to say to him: I congratulated him!" + +Marianne raised her gray eyes to Lissac's face. + +"Congratulate?" she said slowly. + +"The woman he marries is pretty enough, I think?" + +"Ah! my dear, a truce to insolent trifles!--what is it that has +possessed you for some time past?" + +"Nothing, but something has possessed you--or some one." + +"Rosas?" + +"No, Vaudrey!" + +"I will restore him to you. Oh! oh! you are surprisingly interested in +Vaudrey. Vaudrey or his wife?" she remarked. + +She smiled with her wicked expression. + +"Duchess," said Lissac, "accustom yourself to respect virtuous women!" + +"Is it to talk of such pleasant trifles that you have gained access to +my box?" + +"No, it is to ask you for some special information." + +"What?" + +"Is it true, is it really true that you are about to wed Rosas?" he +asked in an almost cordial tone. + +"Why not?" she replied, as she raised her head. + +"Because--I am going to be frank--I have always regarded you as an +absolutely straightforward woman, a woman of honor--You once claimed so +to be. Mad, fantastic, you often are; charming, always; but dishonest, +never. To take Rosas's love, even his fortune, would be natural enough, +but to take his name would be a very questionable act and a skilful one, +but lacking in frankness." + +"That is to say that I may devour him like a courtesan, but not marry +him as a--" + +"As a young girl, no, you cannot do that. And you put me--I am bound to +tell you so and I take advantage of the intermission to do so--in a +delicate position. If I declared the truth to Rosas, I act toward you as +a rascal. If I keep silent to my friend, my true friend, I act almost +like a knave." + +"Did Rosas ask you to speak to me?" + +"No, but there is a voice within me that pricks me to speech and tells +me that if I allow you to marry the duke, I am committing myself to a +questionable affair--Do you know what he asked me?--To be his witness." + +If Marianne had been in a laughing mood, she would have laughed +heartily. + +"It is absurd," she said. "You did not consent?" + +"Yes, indeed, I have consented. Because I really hoped that you would +relieve me from such an undesirable duty, a little too questionable." + +"You would like?--What would you like?" + +"I wish--no, I would have you not marry Monsieur de Rosas." + +Marianne shrugged her shoulders. + +She clearly felt the threat conveyed in Lissac's words, but she desired +to show from the first that she disdained them. What right, after all, +had this casual acquaintance to mix himself up in her life affairs? +Because, one day, she had been charitable enough to give him her youth +and her body! The duty of friendship! The rights of friendship! To +protect Vaudrey! To defend Rosas! Words, tiresome words! + +"And what if I wish to marry him, myself?--Would you prevent it?" + +"Yes, if I could!" he said firmly. "It is time that to the freemasonry +of women we should oppose the freemasonry of men." + +"You are cruelly cowardly enough when you are alone, what would you be +then when you are together?" said Marianne, with a malignant expression. +"In fact," said she, after a moment's pause, "what would you have? What? +Decide!--Will you send my letters to the duke?" + +"That is one way," said Lissac, calmly. "It is a _woman's_ way, that!" + +"You have my letters still?" + +"Preciously preserved." + +He had not contemplated such a threat, but she quickly scented a danger +therein. + +"Suppose I should ask the return of those letters, perhaps you would +restore them to me?" + +"Probably," he said. + +"Suppose I asked you to bring them to me, you know, in that little out +of the way room of which I spoke to you one day?" + +She had leaned gently toward Lissac and her elbows grazed the knees of +her former lover. + +"I would wear, that day, one of those otter-trimmed toques that you have +not forgotten." + +She saw that he trembled, as if he were moved by some unsatisfied desire +for her. She felt reassured. + +"Nonsense!" she said with a smiling face. "You are not so bad as you +pretend to be." + +The manager tapped the customary three blows behind the curtain, and the +orchestra began the prelude to the third act. + +"Adieu for a brief period, my enemy!" said Marianne, extending her hand. + +He hesitated to take that hand. At length, taking it in his own, he +said: + +"Leave me Rosas!" + +"Fie! jealous one! Don't I leave Vaudrey to you?" + +She laughed, while Lissac went away dissatisfied. + +"I will have my letters, at all risks," thought Marianne when he had +disappeared. "It is more prudent." + +That night she slept badly, and the following morning rose in a very +ill-humor. Her face expressed fatigue, her eyes were encircled with dark +rings and burned feverishly, but withal, her beauty was heightened. All +the morning she debated as to the course she should take, and finally +decided to write to Guy, when Sulpice Vaudrey arrived, and beaming with +delight, informed Marianne that he had the entire day to spend with her. + +"I learned through Jouvenet this morning that you were able to go to the +theatre. Naughty one, to steal an evening from me. But I have all +to-day, at least." + +And he sat down in the salon like a man spreading himself out in his own +house. Marianne was meditating some scheme to get rid of him when the +chamber-maid entered, presenting a note on a tray. + +"What is that?" + +"A messenger, madame, has brought this letter." + +Marianne read the paper hurriedly. + +Vaudrey observed that she blushed slightly. + +"Is the messenger still there, Justine?" + +"No, madame, he is gone. He said that there was no reply." + +Marianne quickly tore in small pieces the note she had just read. + +"Some annoyance?" asked Vaudrey. + +"Yes, exactly." + +"May I know?" + +"No, it does not interest you. A family affair." + +"Ah! your uncle?" asked Vaudrey, smiling. + +"My uncle, yes!" + +"He has asked that he be permitted to exhibit at the Trocadero the +cartoons that he has finished: _The Artist's Mission_, _Hydropathy the +Civilizer_, I don't know what in fact, a series of symbolical +compositions--" + +"With the _mirliton_ device underneath?--Yes, I know," said Marianne. + +She snapped her fingers in her impatience. + +The letter that she had torn up had been written by Rosas, and received +by Uncle Kayser at his studio, whence he had forwarded it to his niece. +The duke informed Marianne that he would wait for her at five o'clock at +Avenue Montaigne. He had something to say to her. He had passed the +entire night reflecting and dreaming. She remembered her own wild +dreams. Had Rosas then caught her thought floating like an atom on the +night wind? + +At five o'clock! She would be punctual. But how escape Vaudrey? She +could not now feign sickness since she had received him! Moreover, he +would instal himself near her and bombard her with his attentions. Was +there any possible pretext, any way of getting out now? Her lover had +the devoted, radiant look of a loved man who relied on enjoying a long +interview with his mistress. He looked at her with a tender glance. + +"The fool--The sticker!" thought Marianne. "He will not leave!" + +The best course was to go out. She would lose him on the way. + +"What time have you, my dear minister?" + +"One o'clock!" + +"Then I have time!" she said. + +Vaudrey seemed surprised. Marianne unceremoniously informed him, in +fact, that she had some calls to make, to secure some purchases. + +"How disagreeable!" + +"Yes, for me!" + +"I beg your pardon," said Sulpice, correcting himself. + +She sent for a coupe and damp and keen as the weather was, she +substituted for the glorious day of snug, intimate joy that Vaudrey had +promised himself, a succession of weary hours passed in the draught +caused by badly-fitting windows, while making a series of trips hither +and thither, Marianne meantime cudgelling her brains to find a way to +leave her lover on the way, or at least to notify Rosas. + +But above all to notify Lissac! It was Lissac whom she was determined to +see. Yes, absolutely, and at once. The more she considered the matter, +the more dangerous it appeared to her. + +Sulpice had not given her a moment of freedom at her house, in which to +write a few lines. He might have questioned her and that would be +imprudent. + +"I wish, however, to tell Guy to expect me!--Where? Rue Cuvier? He +would not go there!--No, at his house!" + +On the way she found the means. + +Vaudrey evidently was at liberty for the day and, master of his time, he +would not leave her. This he repeated at every turn of the wheel. She +ordered the driver to take her to _The Louvre_. + +"I have purchases to make!" + +Sulpice could not accompany her, so he waited for her at the entrance on +Place du Palais-Royal, nestled in a corner of the carriage, the blinds +of which were lowered in order that he might not be seen. He felt very +cold. + +Marianne slowly crossed between the stalls on the ground floor, hardly +looking at the counters bearing the Japanese goods, the gloves and the +artificial flowers. She ascended a winding iron stairway draped with +tapestries, her tiny feet sinking into the moquette that covered the +steps, and entered a noiseless salon where men and women were silently +sitting before three tables, writing or reading, just as in the +_drawing-room_ of a hotel. At a large round table, old ladies and young +girls sat looking at the pictures in _Illustration_, the caricatures in +the _Journal Amusant_, and the sketches in _La Vie Parisienne_. Others, +at the second table, were reading the daily papers, some of which were +rolled about their holders like a flag around its staff, or the _Revue +des Deux Mondes_. Further on, at a red-covered table furnished with +leather-bound blotters and round, glass inkstands in which the ink +danced with a purple reflection, people were writing, seated on chairs +covered in worn, garnet-colored velvet, with mahogany frames. This +gloomy apartment was brightened by broad-leaved green plants, and was +lighted from the roof by means of a flat skylight. + +Marianne walked direct to the table on which the paper was symmetrically +arranged in a stationery rack, and quickly seating herself, she laid her +muff down, half-raised her little veil, and beat a tattoo with her tiny +hand on the little black leather blotter before her, then taking off her +gloves, she took at random some sheets of paper and some envelopes +bearing the address of the establishment on the corners. As she looked +around for a pen, Marianne could not refrain from smiling, she thought +of that poor Sulpice down there, waiting in the carriage and probably +shivering in the draughts issuing from the disjointed doors. And he a +minister! + +"Such is adultery in Paris!" she said to herself, happy to make him +suffer. + +She did not hurry. She was amused by her surroundings. A uniformed man +promenaded the salon, watching the stationery in the cases and replacing +it as it was used. If required, he sold stamps to any one present. A +letter-box was attached near the tall chimney, bearing the hours of +collection. + +Beside Marianne, elbow to elbow, and before her, were principally women, +some writing with feverish haste, others hesitatingly, and amongst them +were two girls opposite her, who as they finished their letters chuckled +in a low tone and passed them one to the other, say-to each other, as +they chewed their plaid penholders: + +"It is somewhat cold, eh! He will say: _Eh, well, it is true then!_" + +The two pretty, cheerful girls before her were doubtless breaking in +this way some liaison, amusing themselves by sending an unexpected blow +to some poor fellow, and enjoying themselves by spoiling paper; the one +writing, the other reading over her companion's shoulder and giving vent +to merry laughter under her Hungarian toque, a huge Quaker-collar almost +covering her shoulders and her little jacket with its large steel +buttons. + +This feminine head-gear made Marianne think of Guy. Her eyes, catlike in +expression, gleamed maliciously. + +She took some paper and essayed to frame some tempting, tender phrases, +something nebulous and exciting, but she could not. + +"What I would like to write him is that he is a wretch and that I hate +him!" she thought. + +Then she stopped and looked about her, altogether forgetting Vaudrey. + +The contrast between that silent reading-room and the many-colored crowd +in that Oriental bazaar, whose murmurs reached her ears like the roaring +of a distant sea, and of which she could see only the corner clearly +defined by the framework of the doors, amused Marianne, who with a smile +on her lips, enjoyed the mischievous delight of fooling a President of +the Council. + +"At least that avenges me for the cowardice that the _other_ forced me +to commit!" + +Then mechanically regarding the crowd that flowed through these _docks_, +that contained everything that could please or disgust a whole world at +once, the crowd, the clerks, the carpets, the linen, the crowding, the +heaping,--all seemed strange and comic to her, novel and not Parisian, +but American and up-to-date. + +"Oh! decidedly up-to-date!--And so convenient!" she said, as she heard +the young girls laugh when they finished their love-letters. + +Then she began to write, having surely found the expressions she sought. +She sent Rosas a letter of apology: she would be at his house to-morrow +at the same hour. To-day, her uncle took up her day, compelling her to +go to see his paintings, to visit the Louvre, to buy draperies for an +Oriental scene that he intended to paint. If Rosas did not receive the +letter in time, it mattered little! To Lissac,--and this was the main +consideration,--she intimated that she would call on him the next +morning at ten o'clock. + +"Rendezvous box!" she said, as she slipped her two letters into the +letter-box. "This extreme comfort is very ironical." + +She smiled as she thought how long it would take to count the number of +the little hands, some trembling, some bold, that had slipped into the +rectilinear mouth of the letter-box some little missive that was either +the foretaste or the postscript of adultery. + +Then she went downstairs and rejoined Vaudrey, who was impatiently +tapping the floor of the carriage with his foot. + +"I was a long time there, I ask your pardon," said Marianne. + +"At any rate, I hope you have bought something that suited you?" asked +Vaudrey, who seemed to have caught a cold. + +"Nothing at all. There is nothing in that store!" + +Vaudrey was alarmed. Were they to visit one after the other all the +fancy goods stores? + +Marianne took pity on him. + +"Let us return, shall we?" she asked. + +She called to the coachman: "Rue Prony!" while Sulpice, whom she +unwillingly took with her, though he wearily yawned, seized her hand and +said as he sneezed: + +"Ah! how kind you are!" + +The next day, Marianne rang the bell of Lissac's house in Rue d'Aumale, +a little before the appointed hour. + +"Punctual as a creditor!" she thought. + +She reached Guy's, ready for anything. She was very pale and charming in +her light costume, and she entered as one would go into a fray with +head high. She would not leave the place until she had recovered her +letters. + +It was only for those scraps of paper that she again, as it were, bound +and tied herself to her past; she wished to cut herself away from it and +to tear them to pieces with her teeth. But what if Guy should refuse to +give them up to her? That could not be possible, although he was +sincerely attached to Rosas. Still, between gratitude to a woman and +duty to a friend, a man might hesitate, when he is a corrupted Parisian +like Lissac. + +"His affection for Jose will not carry him to the length of forgetting +all that I have given him of myself!" Marianne thought. + +Then shrugging her shoulders: + +"After all, these men have such a freemasonry between them, as _he_ +said!--And they speak of our fraternity, we women!--It is nothing +compared with theirs!" + +Guy did not show any displeasure on hearing Mademoiselle Kayser +announced. He was waiting for her. As Marianne could not feel free so +long as he held the proof of her imprudence, some day or other she must +inevitably seek him to supplicate or threaten him. The letter received +overnight had apprised him that that moment had arrived. + +He had just finished dressing when she entered. His suede gloves were +laid out flat on a little table beside his hat, his stick and a small +antique cloisonne vase into which were thrown the many-colored rosettes +of his foreign decorations, some of them red, amid which a little gold +cross glistened like some brilliant beetle settled on a deep-hued rose. + +"I wager that you are going out!" Marianne remarked abruptly. "Clearly, +you did not expect me!--Haven't you received my letter?" + +"My dear Marianne," he replied, as he slowly finished adjusting the knot +of his cravat, "that is the very remark you made when you condescended +to reappear at my house after a lapse of some years. You have too modest +a way of announcing yourself; I assure you that, for my part, I always +expect you--and that with impatience. But to-day, more than on any other +occasion, because of your charming note." + +She knew Guy well enough to perceive that his exquisite politeness only +concealed a warlike irony. She did not reply, but stood smiling in front +of the fireplace and warmed her toes at the light flames that leapt +about the logs. + +"You are exceedingly polite," she said at last. "On honor, I like you +very much--you laugh? I say very much--Yes, in spite--In no case, have +you had aught to complain of me." + +She half turned, resting her left hand on the edge of the velvet-covered +mantel, and cast a furtive, gentle glance at Lissac that recalled a +multitude of happy incidents. + +"I have never complained," said the young man, "and I have frequently +expressed my thanks!" + +Marianne laughed at the discreet manner so ceremoniously adopted by +Lissac. + +"You are silly, come!--We have a great liking for each other, and it is +in the name of that affection that I come to ask a service." + +"You have only to speak, my dear Marianne," Lissac answered, as if he +had not noticed the intimacy her words expressed. + +He affected a cold politeness; Marianne replied to him with apparent +renewed tenderness. She looked at him for some time as if she hesitated +and feared, her glance penetrating Lissac's, and begging with a tearful +petition that wished to kindle a flame in his eyes. + +"What I have to say to you will take some time. I am afraid--" + +"Of what?" he asked. + +"I don't know. You are in a hurry? I interfere with you, perhaps!" + +"Not the least in the world. I breakfast at the Club, take a turn in the +Bois, and drop in at the _Mirlitons_ to see the opening. You see that I +should be entitled to very little merit in sacrificing to you a +perfectly wasted day." + +"Is the present Exposition of the _Mirlitons_ well spoken of?" asked +Marianne, indifferently. + +"Very. It is a collection of things that are to be sold for the benefit +of a deceased artist. Would you like to go there at four o'clock?" + +"No, thanks!--And I repeat, my dear Guy, that I will not hinder you, you +know, if I have been indiscreet in giving you an appointment!--" + +She seemed to be mechanically toying with the silk rosettes in the +little vase; she picked them up and let them drop from her fingers like +grains. + +"These are yours?" she asked.--"Come near that I may put them on!" + +She went to Guy, smilingly, and resting her body against his for its +entire length, she paused for a moment while she held the lapel of his +jacket, and from head to foot she gazed at him with a look that seemed +to impregnate him with odor and turned him pale. + +"What an idea, Marianne! I do not wear these ribbons now." + +"A childish one. I remember that I was the first to place in this +buttonhole some foreign decoration that Monsieur de Rosas brought you--" + +She pronounced this name boldly, as if she would bring on the battle. + +"That suits you well," she continued. "Orders on your coat are like +diamonds in our ears--they are of no use, but they are pretty." + +She had passed a red rosette through the buttonhole, and lowering his +head, Guy saw her fair brow, her blond locks within reach of his lips. +They exhaled a perfume--the odor of hay, that he liked so well--and +those woman's fingers on his breast, the fingers of the woman whom he +had mocked the previous night at the theatre, caused him a disturbing +sensation. He gently disengaged himself, while Marianne repeated: "That +suits you well--" Then her hand fell on his and she pressed his fingers +in her burning and soft palm and said, as she half lowered her head +toward him: + +"Do you know why I have come? You know that I am silly. Well, naughty +one, the other evening in that box when you punished me with your irony, +all my love for you returned!--Ah! how foolish we are, we women! Tell +me, Guy, do you recall the glorious days we have spent? Those +recollections retain their place in the heart! Has the idea of living +again as in the past never occurred to you? It was so sweet!" + +Lissac laughed a little nervously and trembled slightly, trying to joke +but feeling himself suddenly weakening in the presence of this woman +whose wrath or contemptuous smile he preferred. + +He recognized all the vanished perfumes. The sensation of trembling +delight that years had borne away now returned to him. The silent +pressure of the hands recalled nights of distraction. He half shut his +eyes, a sudden madness overcame him, although he was sufficiently calm +to say to himself that she had an end in view, this woman's coming to +him, loveless, to speak of love to him, herself unmoved by the senses, +to awaken vanished feelings, to offer herself with the irresistible +skill of desire: a dead passion born of caprice. + +"Nevertheless, it is you who left me, satiated after taking from me all +that you were capable of loving," she said. "Do you know one thing, +however, Guy? There is more than one woman in a woman. There are as many +as she possesses of passions or joys, and the Marianne of to-day is so +different from the one who was your mistress formerly!--You would never +leave me, if you were my lover now!" + +She tempted this man whose curiosity was aroused, accustomed as he was +to casual and easy love adventures. He foresaw danger, but there within +reach of his lips were experienced kisses, an ardent supplicant, a +proffered delight, full of burning promise. In a sort of anger, he +seized the woman who recalled all the past joys, uttered the well-known +cries, and who suddenly, as in a nervous attack, deliriously plucked the +covering from her bosom, and bared with the boldness of beauty that +knows itself to be irresistible, her white arms, her brilliant, +untrammeled breasts, the sparkling splendor of her flesh, with her +golden hair unfastened, as she used to appear lying on a pillow of fair +silk, almost faint and between her kisses, that were as fierce as bites, +uttering: "I love you--you--I adore you--" And the lovely, imperious +girl again became, almost without a word having been exchanged, the +submissive woman carried away by lascivious ardor; and Guy, confused and +speechless, no longer reasoning, was unable to say whether Marianne +belonged to him, or he to the mistress of former days, become the +mistress of to-day. + +He held her clasped to him, his hand raising her pale, languishing face +about which her fair hair fell loosely; to him she looked like one +asleep, her pink nostrils still dilating with a spasmodic movement, and +it seemed to him that he had just suffered from the perturbing contact +of a courtesan in the depths of some luxurious den. + +It was an immediate reawakening, enervating but furious. She had given +herself impulsively. He recovered himself similarly. The sudden contact +of two bodies resulted in the immediate recoil of two beings. + +With more bitter shame, he had had similar morose awakenings after a +dissipated night, his heart, his brave heart thumping against the +passionate form, often lean and sallow, of some satiated girl, fearfully +weary. + +What cowardice! Was it Vaudrey's mistress or the future wife of Rosas +who had clung to his lips? + +He felt disgusted at heart. + +Yet she was adorable, this still young and lovely Marianne. + +With cruel perspicacity, he already foresaw that he would be guilty of +cowardly conduct in yielding to this sudden weakness, and ashamed of +himself he disengaged himself from her hysterical embrace, while +Marianne squatted on his bed, throwing back her hair from her face, +still smiling as she looked at him and asked: + +"Well--what? What is the matter with you, then?" + +She rose slowly, slipping upon the carpet while he went to the window to +look mechanically into the yard. Between these two creatures but a +moment before clasped together, a sudden icy coldness sprung up as if +each had divined that the hour was about to sound, terrible as a knell, +when their affairs must be settled. The kisses of love are to be paid +for. + +Standing before the mirror, half undressed, Marianne was arranging her +hair. Her white shoulders, her still heaving and oppressed bosom were +still exposed within the border of her fine chemisette. She felt her +wrists, instinctively examining her bracelets, and looked toward the bed +in an absent sort of way as if to see if some charm had not slipped from +them. + +"Guy," she said abruptly, but in a tone which she tried to make +endearing, "promise me that you will not refuse what I am about to ask +you." + +"I promise." + +They now quite naturally substituted for the "thou" of affectionate +address, the more formal "you," secretly realizing that after the +intertwining of their bodies, their real individualities independent of +all surprises or sensual appetite, would find themselves face to face. + +"I could wish that our affection--and it is profound, is it not, +Guy?--dated only from the moment that we have just passed." + +"I do not regret the past," he said. + +"Nor I! Yet I would like to efface it--yes, by a single stroke!" + +She held between her white fingers some rebellious little locks of hair +that had come out, which she had rolled and twisted, and casting them +into the clear flame, she said: + +"See! to burn it like that!--_Pft!_--" + +"Burn it?" Lissac repeated. + +He had left the window, returned to Marianne and smiling in his turn, he +said: + +"Why burn it?--Because it is tiresome or because it is dangerous?" + +"Both!" she replied. + +She paused for a moment before continuing, drew up over her arms the +lace of her chemisette, then half bending her head, and looking at Guy +like a creditor of love she said: + +"You still have my letters, my dear?" + +"Your letters?" + +"Those of the old days?" + +"That is so," he said. "The past." + +He understood everything now. + +"You came to ask me to return them?" + +"I have been, you must admit, very considerate, not to have claimed +them--before!" + +"You have been--generous!" answered Lissac, with a gracious smile. + +He opened his secretaire, one of the drawers of which contained little +packages folded and tied with bands of silk ribbon, that slept the sleep +of forgotten things. + +"There are your letters, my dear Marianne! But you have nothing to fear; +they have never left this spot." + +The eyes of the young woman sparkled with a joyous light. Slowly as if +afraid that Guy would not give them to her, she extended her bare arm +toward the packet of letters and snatched it suddenly. + +"My letters!" + +"It is an entire romance," said Lissac. + +"Less the epilogue!" she said, still enveloping him with her intense +look. + +She placed the packet on the velvet-covered mantelpiece and hastily +finished dressing. Then taking between her fingers those little letters +in their old-fashioned envelopes bearing her monogram, and that still +bore traces of a woman's perfume, she looked at them for a moment and +said to Lissac: + +"You have read them occasionally?" + +"I know them by heart!" + +"My poor letters!--I was quite sincere, you know, when I wrote you +them!--They must be very artless! Yours, that I have burned, were too +clever. I remember that one day you wrote me from Holland: 'I pass my +life among chefs-d'oeuvre, but my mind is far away from them. I have +Rembrandt and Ruysdael; but the smallest millet seed would be more to my +liking: millet is _fair!_' Well, that was very pretty, but much too +refined. True love has no wit.--All this is to convey to you that +literature will not lose much by the disappearance of my disconnected +scrawls." + +She suddenly threw the packet into the fire and watched the letters as +they lightly curled, at first spotted with fair patches, and enveloped +in light smoke, then bursting into flame that cast its rosy reflection +on Marianne's face. Little by little all disappeared save a patch of +black powder on the logs, that danced like a mourning veil fluttering in +the wind and immediately disappeared up the chimney:--the dust of dead +love, the ashes of oaths, all black like mourning crepe. + +Marianne watched the burning of the letters, bending her forehead, while +a strange smile played on her lips, and an expression as of triumphant +joy gleamed in her eyes. + +When the work was done, she raised her head and turned toward Guy and in +a quivering voice, she said proudly and insolently: + +"_Requiescat!_ See how everything ends! It is a long time since lovers +who have ceased to love invented cremation! Nothing is new under the +sun!" + +She was no longer the same woman. A moment before she manifested a sort +of endearing humility, but now she was ironically boastful, looking at +Lissac with the air of one triumphing over a dupe. He bit his lips +slightly, rubbing his hands together, while examining her sidelong, +without affectation. Marianne's ironical smile told him all that she now +had to say. + +It was not the first time that he had been a witness to such a +transformation of the feminine countenance before and after the return +of letters. Guy for some time had ceased to be astonished at anything in +connection with women. + +"Now, my dear," said Marianne, "I hope that you will do me the kindness +of allowing me to go on in my own way in life, and that I shall not have +the annoyance of finding you again in the way of my purpose." + +"I confess," Lissac replied, "that I should be the worst of ingrates if +I did not forget many things in consideration of what I owe you, both in +the present and in the past. Your burned letters still shed their +fragrance!" + +Marianne touched the half-consumed logs with the tip of her foot and the +debris of the paper fluttered around her shoe like little black +butterflies. + +"I wish I could have destroyed the past as I have made those letters +flame! It weighs on me, it chokes me! You do not imagine, perhaps," she +said, "that I have forgiven you for your flight and all that followed +it?--If, for a moment, I almost stumbled in the mire, the fault was +yours, for I loved you and you abandoned me, as a man forsakes a +strumpet.--So, you see, my dear, a woman never forgets it, and I would +have cried out long before, if I had felt myself free, free as I am now +that those letters are burned, the poor letters of a stupid mistress, +confiding in her lover who is overcome with weariness, and who is only +thinking of deserting her, while she is still intoxicated in yielding to +him--and because I adored you--yes, truly--because I was your mistress, +do you arrogate to yourself the right of preventing me from marrying as +I wish, and of drawing myself out of the bog into which, perhaps, by +your selfishness, I have fallen? Ah, my dear fellow, really I am +somewhat surprised at you, I swear!--I said nothing because of those +scraps of paper, that you would have been cowardly enough, I assert, to +show Rosas and every line of which told how foolish I had been to love +you." + +"Monsieur de Rosas would never have seen them!" said Lissac severely. + +She did not seem to hear him. + +"But now, what? Thank God," she continued, "there is nothing, and you +have delivered those letters to me that you ought never to have +returned. And I have paid you for them, paid for them with new caresses +and a last prostitution! Well! that ends it, doesn't it? There is +nothing more between us, nothing, nothing, nothing!--And these two +beings, who exchanged here their loveless kisses, the kisses of a +debauchee and a courtesan, will never recognize each other again, I +hope--you hear, never recognize each other again--when they meet in +life. Moreover, I will take care to avoid meetings!" + +Guy said nothing. + +He twirled his moustache slightly and continued to look at Marianne +sideways without replying. + +This indifference, though doubtless assumed, nevertheless annoyed the +young woman. + +"Go, find Monsieur de Rosas now!" she said. "Tell him that you have been +my lover, he will not believe you." + +"I am satisfied of that," Lissac replied very calmly. + +She realized a threat in his very calmness. But what had she to fear +now? + +She fastened her ironical glance on Lissac, the better to defy him, and +to enjoy his defeat. + +With extended hands, he noiselessly tapped his fingers together, the +gesture of a person who waits, sure of himself and displaying a mocking +silence. + +"Then adieu!" she said abruptly. "I hope that we shall never see each +other again!" + +"How can you help it?" said Lissac, smiling. "In Paris!" + +He sat down on a chair, while Marianne stood, putting on her gloves. + +"On my word, my dear Marianne, for a clever woman you are outrageously +sanguine." + +"I?" + +"And credulous! You credit me with the simplicity of the Age of Gold, +then?--Is it possible?--Do you think a corrupted Parisian like myself +would allow himself to be trifled with like a schoolboy by a woman as +extremely seductive as I confess you are? But, my dear friend, the first +rule in such matters is only to completely disarm one's self when it is +duly proved that peace has been definitely signed and that a return to +offensive tactics is not to be feared. You have shown your little pink +claws too nimbly, Marianne. Too quickly and too soon. In one of those +drawers, there are still one or two letters left, I was about to say, +that belong to the series of letters that are slumbering: exquisite, +perfumed, eloquent, written in that pretty, fine and firm writing that +you have just thrown into the fire, and those letters I would only have +given you on your continuing to act fairly. They were my reserve. It is +an elementary rule never to use all one's powder at a single shot, and +one never burns _en bloc_ such delicate autographs. They are too +valuable! Tell me, will you disdain to recognize me when you meet me, +Miss Marianne?" + +She remained motionless, pale and as if frozen. + +"Then you have kept?--" she said. + +"A postscriptum, if you like, yes." + +"Are you lying now, or did you lie in giving me the packet that has been +burned?" + +"I did not tell you that the packet was complete, and what I now tell +you is the simple truth! I regret it, but you have compelled me to keep +my batteries, in too quickly unmasking your own." + +Marianne pulled off her gloves in anger. + +"If you do not give me everything here that belongs to me, you are a +coward; you hear, a coward, Monsieur de Lissac!" + +"Oh! your insults are of as little importance as your kisses! but they +are less agreeable!" + +She clearly saw that she had thrown off the mask too soon, and that +Lissac would not now allow himself to be snared by her caresses or +disarmed by her threats. The game was lost. + +Lost, or merely compromised? + +She looked about her with an expression of powerless rage, like a very +graceful wild beast enclosed in a cage. Her letters, her last letters +must be here, in one of those pieces of furniture whose drawers she +might open with her nails. She threw her gloves on the floor and +mechanically tore into shreds--as she always did when in a rage--between +her nervous fingers, her fine cambric handkerchief reduced to rags. + +"Be very careful what you are doing, Guy," she said at last, casting a +malicious look at him, "I have purchased these letters from you, for I +hate you, I repeat it, and these letters you owe to me as you would owe +money promised to a wench. If you do not give them to me, I will have +them, notwithstanding." + +"Really?" + +"I promise you I will." + +"And suppose I have burned them?" + +"You lie, you have them here, you have kept them. You have behaved +toward me like a thief." + +"Nonsense, Marianne," said Lissac coldly, "on my faith, I see I have +done well to preserve some weapon against you. You are certainly very +dangerous!" + +"More than you imagine," she replied. + +He moved slightly backward, seeing that she wished to pass him to reach +the door. + +"You will not give me back my letters?" she asked in a harsh and +menacing tone as she stood on the threshold of the room. + +Guy stooped without heeding her and picked up the gloves that were lying +on the carpet and handed them to the young woman: + +"This is your property, I think?" + +This was said with insolently refined politeness. + +Marianne took the gloves, and as a last insult, like a blow on the +cheek, she threw them at Guy's face, who turned aside and the gloves +fell on the bed where just before these two hatreds had come together in +kisses of passion. + +"Miserable coward!" said Marianne, surveying Lissac from head to foot +with an expression of scorn, while he stood still, his monocle dangling +at the end of a fine cord on his breast, near the buttonhole of his +jacket that bore the red rosette; his face was pale but wore a sly +expression. + +That silk rosette looked there like a vermilion note stamped on a dark +ground, and it seemed to pierce like a luminous drill into Marianne's +eyes; and with her head erect, pallid face and trembling lip she passed +before the domestic who hastened to open the door and went downstairs, +repeating to herself with all the distracted fury of a fixed idea: + +"To be avenged! To be avenged! Oh! to be avenged!" + +She jumped into a cab. + +"Well?"--said the coachman, looking with blinking eyes at this +pale-faced, distraught-looking woman. + +She remained there as if seeking an idea, a purpose. + +"Where shall we go?" repeated the driver. + +Suddenly Marianne's face trembled with a joyous expression and she +abruptly said: + +"To the Prefecture of Police!" + + + * * * * * + +_The general rose, grasping his glass as if he would shiver it, +and while the _parfait_ overflowed on to the plates, he cried +in a hoarse voice, as if he were at the head of his division:_ + +_"I love bronze--I love bronze--...."_ + +[Illustration: THE BANQUET] + + + + +VI + + +There was a crowd at the _Mirlitons_ Exposition. + +A file of waiting carriages lined the kerbstone the whole length of +Place Vendome. Beneath the arch and within the portal, groups of +fashionable persons elbowed each other on entering or leaving, and +exchanged friendly polite greetings; the women quizzing the new hats, +little hoods of plush or large _Rembranesque_ hats in which the +delicate Parisian faces were lost as under the roof of a cabriolet. The +liveried lackeys perfunctorily glanced at the cards of admission that +the holders hardly took the trouble to present. One was seated at a +table mechanically handing out catalogues. Through the open door of the +Club's Theatre could be seen gold frames suspended from the walls, terra +cottas and marbles on their pedestals, and around the pictures and +sculptures a dense crowd, masses of black hats inclined toward the +paintings, side by side with pretty feminine heads crowned with +Gainsborough hats adorned with plumes. It was impossible to see at close +quarters the pieces offered for the sale that was for that day the +engrossing topic of conversation of _All Paris_. + +"A veritable salon in miniature!" said Guy aloud to an art critic who +was taking notes. "But to examine it comfortably one should be quite +alone. For an hour past I have been trying to get a look at the +Meissonier, but have not been able to do so. It is stifling here. I will +return another time." + +He quickly grasped the hand that held the pencil, and which was extended +to him, and tried to make a passage through the crowd to the exit. +Pushed and pushing, he smiled and apologized for his inability to +disengage his arms that were held by the crowd as if in a vise, in order +to salute the friends he recognized. At length he reached, giving vent +to a grunt of satisfaction, the hall where visitors were sitting on +divans, chatting, either less eager to view the pictures or satisfied +in their desires. There, Guy instinctively looked at a mirror and +examined the knot of his cravat. He did not notice that a gentleman with +a closely buttoned frock-coat, on seeing him, quietly rose from the +divan on which he had been sitting, and approached him, mechanically +pulling the skirts of his coat meanwhile, so as to smooth the creases. + +He simply touched Monsieur de Lissac's shoulder with the tip of his +finger. + +Guy turned round, expecting to recognize a friend. + +"You are surely Monsieur de Lissac?" said the man in the frock-coat, +with the refined manners of a gentleman. + +"Yes!" said Lissac, somewhat astonished at the coldness of his manner. + +"Be good enough to accompany me, monsieur, I am a Commissioner of the +Judiciary Delegations!" + +Lissac thought he misunderstood him. + +"I confess that I don't quite understand you," he began, with a rather +significant smile. + +"I am a Commissioner of Police," the other replied, "and I am ordered to +arrest you." + +He suddenly exposed his insignia like the end of a sash, and by a very +polite gesture, with an amiable and engaging manner, pointed to the way +out by the side of the archway of the hotel. + +"I have two of my men yonder, monsieur, but you will not place me under +the necessity of--" + +"What is this, monsieur?" said Lissac. "I frankly confess that I +understand nothing of this enigma. I hope you will explain it to me." + +All this was said in a conversational tone, _mezzo voce_, and +accompanied with smiles. No one could have guessed what these two men +were saying to each other. Only, Guy was very pale and his somewhat +haughty glance around him seemed to indicate that he was seeking some +support or witness. + +He uttered a slight exclamation of satisfaction on perceiving the +journalist to whom he had just before spoken a few words before a little +canvas by Meissonier. + +"My dear Brevans," he said in a loud voice, "here is an unpublished item +for your journal. This gentleman has laid his hand on my collar." + +With a sly look he indicated the Commissioner of Police, who did not +budge. + +"What! my dear fellow?" + +"They have arrested me, that is all," said Lissac. + +"Monsieur," the Commissioner quickly interrupted in a low voice, "no +commotion, please. For my sake--and for yours." + +He lightly touched Lissac's buttonhole with the end of his finger, as if +to intimate that there was the explanation of his arrest, and Guy +suddenly became very red and stamped his foot. + +"Idiot that I am!--I am at your orders, monsieur," he said, making a +sign to the Commissioner to pass out. + +He again saluted the stupefied journalist, and the Commissioner bowing +to him, out of politeness or prudence, Guy passed before him, angrily +twirling his mustache. + +Besides Brevans, nobody in all that crowd suspected that a man had just +been arrested in the midst of the Exposition. Unless the journalist had +hawked the news from group to group, it would not have been suspected. + +Lissac found at the door of the Club on Place Vendome a hired carriage +which had come up as soon as the driver saw the Commissioner. Two +agents, having the appearance of good, peaceable bourgeois, were walking +about, chatting together on the sidewalk, as if on duty. The +Commissioner said to one of them: + +"I have no further need of you, Crabot will do." + +Crabot, a little man with the profile of a weasel, slowly mounted the +box beside the coachman, and the Commissioner of Police took his seat +next to Lissac, who had nervously plucked the rosette of the Portuguese +Order of Christ from his buttonhole. + +"What!" he said. "Really, then, it is for this? Because I wear this +ribbon without having paid five or six louis into the Chancellery?--I +have always intended to do so, but, believe me, I have not had the time. +But a fiscal question does not warrant publicly insulting--" + +"I do not know if it is for that," interrupted the Commissioner; "but it +is evident that a recent note in the _Officiel_ points directly to the +illegal wearing of foreign decorations. You do not read the _Officiel_, +Monsieur de Lissac." + +Guy shrugged his shoulders as if he considered the matter perfectly +ridiculous. It seemed to him that behind the alleged pretext there was +some secret cause, something like a feminine intrigue. He vaguely +recalled that he had seen Marianne one evening at Madame de Marsy's +smile at the Prefect of Police, that Jouvenet who flirted so agreeably +with that pretty girl in a corner of the salon. And then, too, at the +theatre, in Marianne's box, the prefect found his way. At the first +moment, the idea that Marianne had a hand in this arrest took possession +of his mind. He saw her standing before him at his house, posing her +little nervous, fidgety hand on his breast at the very spot occupied by +this rosette; again he saw her smiling mysteriously, accompanying it +with a caress which seemed to suggest the desire to end in a scratch. + +Was it really true that Marianne was sufficiently audacious to have +brought about this coup de theatre? No, there was some error. The stupid +zeal of some subordinate officer was manifested in this outrage. Some +cowardly charge had perhaps been made against him at the prefecture. +Every man who crosses a street has so many enemies that look at him as +he passes as if they would spy on him! There are so many undeclared +hatreds crawling in the rotten depths of this Parisian bog! One fine +morning one feels one's self stung in the heel. It is nothing: only +some anonymous gossip; some unknown person taking revenge! + +At the prefecture, they would doubtless inform Guy as to the cause of +the attack: in questioning him, he would himself certainly be permitted +to interrogate. He was stunned on arriving at the clerk's office to find +that they took his description, just as they would that of a common +offender, a night-walker or a rascal. He wished to enter a protest and +became annoyed. He flew into a rage for a moment, then he reflected that +there was nothing to be done but to submit to the bites of the iron +teeth of the police routine in which he was suddenly entangled. They +searched his pockets and he felt their vile hands graze his skin. He +experienced a strongly rebellious sentiment and notwithstanding his +present enforced calm, from time to time he demanded to see the Prefect +of Police, the Chief of the Municipal Police, the _Juge d'Instruction_, +he did not know whom, but at least some one who was responsible. + +"You have my card, send my card to Monsieur Jouvenet; he knows me!" + +They made no reply. + +The Commissioner who had arrested him was not there. Guy found himself +in the presence of what were as pieces of human machinery, working +silently, without noise of wheels, and caring for his protests no more +than they did for the wind that blew through the corridors. + +"See, on my honor, I am not a rascal!" he said. "What have I done? I +have stupidly passed this bit of red ribbon into my buttonhole. Well! +that is an offence, it is not a crime! People are not arrested for that! +I will pay the fine, if fine there is! You are not going to keep me here +with thieves?" + +In that jail, he endeavored to preserve his appearance as a fashionable +elegant and an ironical man of the world, treating his misadventure in a +spirit of haughty disdain; but his overstrained nerves led him to act +with a sort of cold fury that gave him the desire to openly oppose, as +in a duel, his many adversaries. + +"I beg you to remain calm," one of these men repeated to him from time +to time in a passionless way. + +"Oh! that is easy enough for you to say," cried Lissac. "I ask you once +more, where is Monsieur Jouvenet?--I wish to see Monsieur Jouvenet!" + +"Monsieur le Prefect cannot be seen in this way," was the reply. +"Moreover, you haven't to see any one; you have only to wait." + +"Wait for what?" + +They led Guy de Lissac through the passages to the door of a new cell, +which they opened before him. + +"Then," he said, as he tried to force a troubled smile, "I am a +prisoner? Quite seriously? As in melodrama? This is high comedy!" + +He asked if he would soon be examined, at least. They didn't know. They +hardly replied to him. Could he write, at any rate? Notify any one? +Protest? What should he do? He heard from the lips of a keeper who had +the appearance of a very honest man, the information, crushing as a +verdict: "You are in close confinement, as it is called!" + +_In close confinement?_ Were they mocking him? In secret, he, Lissac? +Evidently, they wanted to make fun; it was absurd, it was unlikely, such +things only happened in operettas. He would heartily relish it at the +Cafe Riche presently, when he went to dine. _In close confinement?_ He +was no longer annoyed at the jest, so amusing had it become. For an old +Parisian like him, it was a facetious romance and almost amusing. + +"A climax!" + +Evening passed and night came. They brought Lissac a meal, and the +_jest_, as he called it, in no way came to an end. He did not close his +eyes for the whole night. He was stifled, and grew angry within the +narrow cage in which they had locked him. All sorts of wild projects of +revenge passed through his brain. He would send his seconds to Monsieur +Jouvenet, he would protest in the papers. He would have public opinion +in his favor. + +Then his scepticism came to his aid, and shrugging his shoulders, he +said: + +"Bah! public opinion! It will ridicule me, that's all! It will accuse me +of desiring to make a stir, to cut off my dog's tail. To-day, Alcibiades +would thus cut off his, but the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to +Animals would bring an action against him." + +He waited for the next morning with the feverish anxiety of those who +cannot sleep. Certainly he would be examined at the first moment. They +did so in the case of the vagabonds gathered in during the night and +dumped into the _lions' den_. The whole day passed without Lissac's +seeing any other faces than those of his turnkeys, and these men were +almost mutes. Then his irritation was renewed. He turned his useless +anger against himself, as he could not insult the walls. + +Night came round, and spite of himself, he slept for a short time on the +wretched prison pallet. He began to find the facetious affair too +prolonged and too gloomy. They took him just in time, the second day +after his arrest, before a kind of magistrate or police judge, who, +after having reminded him that the law was clear in respect of the +wearing of foreign orders, announced that the matter was settled by a +decree of _nolle prosequi_. + +"That is to say," said Lissac, in anger, "that two nights passed in +close confinement is regarded as ample punishment? If I am guilty of a +crime, I deserve much more than that. But, if only a mere peccadillo is +attributable to me, I consider it too much; and I swear to you that I +intend, in my turn, to summon to justice for illegal arrest--" + +"Keep quiet," curtly interrupted the magistrate. "That is the best thing +you can do!" + +Lissac, meantime, felt a sort of physical delight in leaving those cold +passages and that stone dwelling. + +The fresh breeze of a gray November day appeared to him to be as gentle +as in spring. It seemed that he had lived in that den for weeks. He +flung himself into a carriage, had himself driven home, and was received +by his concierge with stupefied amazement. + +"You, monsieur?" he said. "Already!" + +This _already_ was pregnant with suggestiveness, and puzzled Lissac. The +rumor had, in fact, spread throughout the quarter, and probably the +porter had helped it along--that Guy had been arrested for complicity in +some political intrigue, though of what nature was unknown. +Nevertheless, the previous evening, the agents of police had come to the +apartments in Rue d'Aumale and had searched everything, moved, tried and +probed everything. Evidently they were in quest of papers. + +"Papers?" cried Lissac. "Her letter, _parbleu!_" + +He was no longer in doubt. The delicate, dreaded hand of Marianne was at +the bottom of all that. She had made some bargain with Monsieur +Jouvenet, as between a woman and a debauchee! The Prefect of Police was +not the loser: Marianne Kayser had the wherewithal to satisfy him. + +"The miserable wench!" Lissac repeated as he went up to his apartment. + +He rang and his servant appeared, looking as bewildered as the porter. + +The apartment was still topsy-turvy. The valet de chambre had not dared +to put the things in order, as if there reigned, amid the scattered +packages and the yawning drawers, the majesty of the official seal. + +They had examined everything, forced locks and removed packets of +letters. + +The small Italian cabinet, that contained Marianne's letter, had had its +drawers turned over, like pockets turned inside out. Marianne's letter +to Lissac, the scrap of paper which the police hunted, without knowing +whose will they were obeying, that confession of a crazy mistress to a +lover who was smitten to his very bones, was no longer there. + +"Ah! I will see Vaudrey! I will see him and tell him!" said Lissac +aloud. + +"Will monsieur breakfast?" + +"Yes, as quickly as possible. Two eggs and tea, I am in a hurry." + +He was anxious to rush off to the ministry. Was the Chamber sitting +to-day? No. He would perhaps then find Sulpice at his first call. The +messengers knew him. + +He speedily hastened to Place Breda, looking for a carriage. On the way, +he stumbled against a man who came down on the same side, smoking a +cigar. + +"Oh! Monsieur de Lissac!" + +Guy instinctively stepped back one pace; he recognized Uncle Kayser. +Then, suddenly, his anger, which up to that time he had been able to +restrain, burst forth, and in a few words energetic and rapid, he told +Simon, who remained bewildered and somewhat pale, as if one had tried +to force a quarrel on him, what he thought of Marianne's infamy. + +The uncle said nothing, regretted that he had met Lissac, and contented +himself with stammering from time to time: + +"She has done that?--What! she has done that?--Ah! the rogue." + +"And what do you say about it, you, Simon Kayser?" + +"I?--What do I say about it?--Why--" + +Little by little he recovered his sang-froid, looking at matters from +the lofty heights of his artist's philosophy. + +"It is rather too strong. What do you want?--It is not even moral, but +it has _character!_ And in art, after the moral idea comes _character!_ +Ah! bless me! character, that is something!--Otherwise, I disapprove. It +is brutal, vulgar, that lack of ideal. I defy you to symbolize that. +_Love Avenging Itself Against Love_--_Jealousy Calling the Police to Its +Aid in Order to Triumph over Dead Love!_ It is old, it lacks +originality, it smacks of Prud'hon!--The Correggio of the decollete!--It +is like Tassaert, it is of the sprightly kind!--I would never paint so, +that is what I say about it!" + +Guy had no reply for this imperturbable moralist and he regretted that +he had lost time in speaking to him. But his uncontrollable rage choked +him. Enough remained however to show all his feelings to Vaudrey. + +The minister was not in his cabinet. A messenger asked Lissac if he +would speak to Monsieur Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State. + +"I, I," then said a man who rose from the chair in which he had been +sitting in the antechamber, "I should be glad to see Monsieur +Warcolier--Monsieur Eugene, you know." + +"Very well, Monsieur Eugene, I will announce you." Lissac explained that +his visit was not official, he called on a personal matter. + +"Is the minister in his apartments?" + +"Yes, monsieur, but to-day, you know--" + +What was going on to-day, then? Lissac had not noticed, in fact, that a +marquee with red stripes was being erected at the entrance to the hotel, +and that upholsterers were bringing in wagons benches covered with red +velvet with which they were blocking the peristyle. There was a +reception at the ministry. + +"That will not prevent Monsieur Vaudrey from seeing me," he said. + +One of the messengers opened the doors in front of him and conducted him +to the floor above, where Monsieur le Ministre was then resting near the +fire and glancing over the papers after breakfast. + +He appeared pleased but a little astonished at seeing Lissac. + +"Eh! my dear Guy, what a good idea!--Have you arrived already for the +soiree? You received your invitation?" + +"No," answered Lissac, "I have received nothing, or if the invitation +arrived, the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet have taken it away with many +other things." + +"The agents! what agents?" asked the minister. + +He had risen to receive Guy and remained standing in front of the +fireplace looking at his friend, who questioned him with his glance to +discover if Vaudrey could really be in ignorance as to such a matter. + +"Ah, so! but," said Lissac with trembling voice and in a tone of angry +bitterness, "do you not know then, what takes place in Paris?" + +"What is happening?" asked Sulpice, who had turned slightly pale. + +"They arrest men for nothing, and keep them in close confinement for two +days in order to have time to search their correspondence for a document +that compromises certain persons. It is very proper, no doubt; but that +smacks too much of romanticism and the Bridge of Sighs. It is very +old-fashioned and worn-out. I would not answer for your long employing +such methods of government." + +"Come, are you mad? What does it all signify?" asked the minister, in +astonishment. + +He appeared as if he really did not understand. It was clear that he did +not know what Guy meant. + +"Don't you read the papers, then?" Lissac asked him. + +"I read the reports of the Director of the Press." + +"Well, if those reports have not informed you of my arrest in the heart +of the Exposition des Mirlitons, on Wednesday, they have told you +nothing!--" + +"Arrested! you?" + +"By the agents of Monsieur Jouvenet, your Prefect of Police, to gratify +your mistress, Mademoiselle Kayser!" + +"Ah! my dear Guy!" said the minister, whose cheek became flushed in +spots. "I should be glad if you--" + +He paused for a phrase to express clearly and briefly that he required +Lissac to be silent, but could not frame one. He received, as it were, a +sudden and violent blow on the head. Beyond question, he did not know a +word of all that Lissac had informed him. And yet this was the gossip of +Paris for two days! Either naming in full, or in indicating him +sufficiently clearly, the newspapers had related the adventure on their +front page. Moreover, much attention had been attracted to an article in +a journal with which Lucien Granet was intimately connected, wherein, in +well-turned but perfidious phrases, a certain Alkibiades--Lissac had +guessed that this name was applied to him--had been arrested by the +orders of the archon Sulpicios at the instance of a certain Basilea, one +of the most charming hetaires of the republic of Perikles. Under this +Greco-Parisian disguise it was easy for everyone to discover the true +names and to see behind the masks the faces intended. + +At the very moment that Lissac called to ask the minister for an +explanation of the acts of the Prefect Jouvenet, Madame Vaudrey was +opening a copy of a journal in which these names travestied by some +Hellenist of the boulevard were underlined in red pencil. The article +entitled _The Mistress of an Archon_, had been specially sent to her +under a cover bearing the address in a woman's handwriting, Sabine Marsy +or Madame Gerson! Some friend. One always has such. + +It was of Adrienne that Vaudrey thought while Lissac was giving vent to +his ironical, blunt complaint. Was Guy mad to speak of Marianne aloud in +this way, and in this place, a few feet away from his wife, who could +hear everything? Yes, Lissac was over-excited, furious and apparently +crazy. He did not lower his tone, in spite of the sudden terror +expressed by Vaudrey, who seized his hand and said to him eagerly: "Why, +keep quiet! Suppose some one is listening?" + +He felt himself, moreover, impelled by a violent rage. If what Guy told +him were correct, Marianne had made use of him and of the title of +mistress that she ought to have concealed. She had played it in order to +compel Jouvenet to commit an outrage. + +"Nonsense!" said Lissac, sneeringly. "Are you innocent enough to believe +that she has seduced the Prefect of Police by simply telling him that +she was your mistress? You don't know her. She only did this in becoming +his!" + +Sulpice had become livid, and he looked at Lissac with a sudden +expression of hatred, as if this man had been his enemy. Guy had +directly attacked his vanity and his heart with a knife-thrust, as it +were, without sparing either his self-love or his passion. + +"Ah! yes," said Lissac, "I know very well that that annoys you, but it +is so! I knew this young lady before you did. Let her commit all the +follies that she chooses with others and throw me overboard at a pinch, +as she did three days ago, all is for the best. She is playing her role. +I am only an imbecile and I am punished for it, and it is well; but, in +order to attack me, to secure a very tiny paper, which put her very +nicely at my mercy, that she should commit a foolish and brutal outrage +against you who answer for the personnel of your administration, I +cannot forgive. She thought then that I would make use of this note +against her? She takes me for a rascal? If I wished to commit an act of +treachery, could I not go this very moment, even without the weapon that +Jouvenet's agents have taken from me, straight to her Rosas?" + +"Rosas?" asked Sulpice, whose countenance contorted, and who feverishly +twisted his blond beard. + +"Eh! _parbleu_, yes, Rosas! On my honor, one would take you for the +Minister of the Interior of the Moon! Rosas, who perhaps is her lover, +but will be her husband if she wishes it! and she does!" + +Poor Sulpice looked at Lissac with a terrified expression which might +have been comic, did it not in its depth portray a genuine sorrow. He +was oblivious to everything now, where he was, if Guy spoke too loudly, +or if Adrienne could hear. He was only conscious of a terrible strain of +his mind. This sudden revelation lacerated him--as if his back received +the blows of a whip. He wished to know all. He questioned Lissac, +forcing him into a corner, and making him hesitate, for he now feared +that he would say too much, and limited himself to demanding Jouvenet's +punishment. + +"As to Marianne, one would see to that after," he said. + +Ah! yes, certainly, Jouvenet should be punished! How? Vaudrey could not +say, but from this moment the Prefect of Police was condemned. Guy's +arrest, which was an act of brutal aggression, was tantamount to a +dismissal signed by the Prefect himself. And Marianne! she then made a +sport of Sulpice and took him for a child or a ninny! + +"Not at all. For a man who loves, that is enough," replied Lissac. + +Vaudrey had flung himself into an armchair, striking his fist upon the +little table, covered with the journals that he had scarcely opened, and +absent-mindedly pushing the chair back, the better to give way to his +excessively violent threats, after the manner of weak natures. + +"Do you want my advice?" Lissac abruptly asked him. "You have only what +you deserve, ah! yes, that is just it! I tell you the sober truth. A +wife like yours should never be forsaken for a creature like Marianne!" + +"I love Adrienne sincerely!" replied Vaudrey eagerly. + +"And you deceive her entirely. That is foolish. You deserve that +Mademoiselle Kayser should have ridiculed, deceived and ruined you +irretrievably, and that your name should never be uttered again. When +one has the opportunity to possess a wife like yours, one adores her on +bended knees, you understand me, and one doesn't destroy her true +happiness to divert it in favor of the crowd. And what pleasure! +Jouvenet has had the same dose at a less cost!" + +"You abuse the rights of friendship, somewhat," said Sulpice, rising +suddenly. "I do what pleases me, as it pleases me, and I owe no account +to any one, I think!" + +He stopped suddenly. His feet were, as it were, nailed to the floor and +his mouth closed. He seized Guy's hand and felt his flesh creep, as he +saw Adrienne standing pale, and supporting herself against the doorpost, +as if she had not the strength to proceed, her eyes wide open, like +those of a sick person. + +Assuredly, beyond all possible doubt, she had heard everything. + +She was there! she heard! + +She said nothing, but moved a step forward, upheld by a terrible effort. + +Her look was that of a whipped child, of a poor creature terrified and +in despair, and expressed not anger but entire collapse. She was so wan, +so sad-looking, that neither Lissac nor Vaudrey dared speak. A chill +silence fell upon these three persons. + +While Adrienne approached the table upon which the journals were piled, +Guy was the first to force a smile to throw her off the scent; Adrienne +stopped him with a gesture that was intended to express that to +undeceive her, that is to say, to deceive her afresh, would be a still +more cowardly act. She took from among the journals that which she had +just been reading without at first quite understanding it, the one that +had been sent to her, underlined as with a venomous nail, and showing to +Vaudrey the article that spoke of Sulpicios and Basilea, she said gently +in a feeble voice, crushed by this crumbling of her hopes: + +"That is known then, that affair!" + +Then she sunk exhausted into the armchair in which Sulpice had been +sitting, and her breast heaved with a violent sob that tore it as if it +would rend it. + +Sulpice looked at Lissac who was standing half-inclined, as in the +presence of a misfortune. He instinctively seized the minister by the +shoulder and gently forced him toward Adrienne, saying to him in a +whisper, in ill-assured tones: + +"Kiss her then! One pardons when one loves!" + +With a supplicating cry, Vaudrey threw himself on his knees before +Adrienne, while Lissac hastily opened the door and left, feeling indeed +that he could not say a word and that Vaudrey only could obtain +Vaudrey's pardon. + +"I, in my anger," he said, "he, in his jealousy, have allowed ourselves +to get into a passion. It is stupid. One should speak lower." + +He went away, much dissatisfied with himself and but little less with +Vaudrey. Again he considered this man foolish, adored as he was by such +a wife, whom he deceived. He was not sure that at the bottom of his own +heart he did not feel a sentiment of love toward Adrienne. Ah! if he had +been loved by such a creature, he would have been capable of great +things!--He would have arranged and utilized his life instead of +spoiling it. In place of vulgar love, he would have kept this unique +love intact from the altar to the tomb! + +Pale and tottering, and a child once more under her sorrow, as he had +just seen her, she was so adorably lovely that he had received an +entirely new impression, one of almost jealousy against Sulpice, and +therefore, brusquely overcoming this strange, unseemly emotion, he had +himself thrust Vaudrey toward his wife and had departed hastily, as if +he felt that he must hurry away and never see them again. But as he +left, on the contrary, he saw her again with her sad, wretched, +suffering look and the young wife's sorrowful voice went with him, +repeating in a tone of broken-hearted grief: + +"That is known then!" + +"Ah! that miserable fellow, Vaudrey!" thought Guy. + +In going out, he had to wait a moment in the antechamber, to admit of +the passage of some vases of flowers, green shrubs and variegated +foliage plants that were being brought in to decorate the salons. A +fete! And this evening! In the arrival of those flowers for decoration, +at the moment when chance, clumsily or wickedly, so suddenly revealed +that crushing news, Guy saw so much irony that he could not forbear +looking at them for a moment, almost insulting in their beauty and their +hothouse bloom. + +Would Adrienne have the courage or strength to undertake the reception +of the evening, within a few hours? Guy was annoyed at having come. + +"I could well have waited and kept my anger to myself. The unhappy woman +would have known nothing." + +"Bah!" he added. "She is kind, she adores Sulpice, it is only a passing +storm. She will forgive!" + +He promised himself, moreover, to return in the evening, to excuse +himself to Adrienne, to comfort her if he could. + +"There is some merit, after all, in that," he thought again. "On my +word! I believe I love her and yet I am angry with that animal Vaudrey +for not loving her enough." + +She will forgive!--Lissac knew courtesans but he did not know this +woman, energetic as she was under her frail appearance, a child, a +little provincial lost in the life of Paris, lost and, as it were, +absorbed in the hubbub of political circles, smitten with her husband, +who comprehended in her eyes every seduction and superiority, having +given herself entirely and wishing to wholly possess the elect being who +possessed her, in whom she trusted and to whom she gave herself, body +and soul, with all her confidence, her innocence and her modesty. He did +not know what such a sensitive, nervously frail nature could feel on the +first terrible impulses, full of enthusiasm under her exterior coldness, +of resolution concealed under her timid manners, capable of madness, +distracted in spite of her reason and calm; this candor of thought, of +education, and associations that made her, with all her irresistible +attractiveness, the virtuous woman with all her charm. + +Adrienne had at first read the journal that had been sent to her without +understanding anything about it. Alkibiades, Basilea, the mistress of +the Archon, what signified that to her? What did it mean? Then suddenly +her thought rested on the name of Sulpice, travestied in the Greek of +parody, Sulpicios. Was it of her husband that they intended to speak? +She immediately felt a bitter anguish at heart, but it was a matter only +of allowing one's self to be impressed by a journalistic pleasantry, as +contemptible as an anonymous letter! She would think no more about it. +She must concentrate her thoughts on the evening's reception. There was +to be an official repast, followed by a soiree. She had nothing to +concern herself about in regard to the menu; Chevet undertook that. For +the ministerial dinners there was a fixed price as in restaurants. Hosts +and guests live _au cabaret_, they dine at so much a head. Adrienne +endeavored to occupy herself with the musical soiree, with the +programmes that they brought her, with the names of comedians and female +singers, printed on vellum, and with those bouquets with which the vases +of her little salon were decorated. Ah! well, yes, in spite of the +feverish activity, she could think only of that article in the journal, +that miserable article, every line of which flamed before her eyes just +as when one has looked too long at a fire. She had been seized with the +temptation there and then to openly ask Sulpice what these veiled +illusions meant. + +"I hope, indeed," she thought, with her contempt of all lying, "that he +will not charge me with suspecting him. No, certainly, I do not suspect +him." + +She went to the little cabinet where Sulpice sometimes read or worked +after breakfast, and there, as if she had thrown herself upon an open +knife, she suddenly heard those sinister words which pierced her very +flesh like pointed blades. + +They were speaking of another woman. Lissac said in a loud tone: Your +mistress! and Vaudrey allowed it to be said!-- + +A mistress! what mistress? Marianne Kayser! Oh, that woman of whom +Sulpice had so often spoken in an indifferent manner, that pretty +creature, so often seen, seductive, wonderfully beautiful, terrifyingly +beautiful, it was she! Your mistress! Sulpice had a mistress! He lied, +he deceived. He? She was betrayed! Was it possible? If it were possible? +But it was true! Eh! _parbleu_, yes, it was true--And this, then, was +why they had sent her this horrible article! She knew now. + +She had been tempted to enter the room suddenly, to throw herself +between these men and interrupt their conversation. She had not the +strength. And then, what Lissac said had the effect of consoling +her!--Guy's reproaches to Sulpice were such as she would have liked to +cast at him, if she could have found speech now. But not a word could +she frame. She was stunned, dumb and like a crushed being. She knew only +one thing, that she suffered horribly, as she had never before suffered. + +At first she allowed Vaudrey, who knelt at her feet, as Lissac had told +him on going away, to take her hand that hung listlessly down. Then she +gently withdrew it as if she felt herself seized by an instinctive sense +of outraged modesty. + +Vaudrey tried to speak. At first only confused words, silly excuses, +clumsy falsehoods, cruelly absurd phrases--_caprices_, _nothing serious_, +_whim_, _madness_--so many avowals, so many insults, came to his lips. But +then, before the silence of Adrienne, he could say nothing more, he was +speechless, overwhelmed, and sought a hand that was refused. + +"Will you never forgive me?" he asked at last, not knowing too well what +he said. + +"Never!" she said coldly. + +She rose and with as much sudden energy as but a moment before she had +felt of weakness, she crossed the room. + +"Are you going away?" stammered Sulpice. + +"Yes, I must be alone--Ah! quite alone," she said, with a sort of +gesture of disgust as she saw her husband approach her. + +He stopped and said, as if by chance: + +"You know that--this evening--" + +"Yes, yes," she replied, "do not be anxious about anything! I am still +the minister's wife, if I am Madame Vaudrey no longer." + +He tried in vain to reply. + +Adrienne had already disappeared. + +"There is the end of my happiness!" Sulpice stammered as he suddenly +confronted an unknown situation dark as an abyss. "Ah! how wretched I +am! Very wretched! whose fault is it?" + +He plunged gladly into the work of examining the bundles of reports from +the prefects, feverishly inspecting them to deafen and blind his +conscience, and seized at every moment with a desire to make an appeal +to Adrienne or to go and insult Marianne. Oh! especially to tell +Marianne that she had betrayed him, that she was a wretch, that she was +the mistress of Rosas, the mistress of Jouvenet, a strumpet like any +other strumpet, yes, a strumpet! + +Amid all the disturbance of that day of harsh misfortune, perhaps he +thought more of the Marianne that he had lost than of the Adrienne that +he had outraged; while the wife questioned with herself if it were +really she coming and going, automatically trying on her ball costume, +abandoning her head to the hair-dresser, feeling that in two hours she +would be condemned to smile on the minister's guests, the senators and +the deputies and play the part of a spectre, marching in the land of +dreams, in a nightmare that choked her, fastened on her throat and heart +and prompted her to cry and weep, all her poor nerves intensely strained +and sick, subdued by the energy of a tortured person, imposing on +herself the task of not appearing to suffer and--a still more atrocious +thing--of not even suffering in reality and waiting, yes, waiting to +sob. + +In the evening, everything blazed on the facade of the ministry. The +rows of gas-jets suggested that a public fete was being held in the +Hotel Beauvau. The naming capital letters R.F. were boldly outlined +against the dark sky, the three colors of the flags looked bright in the +ruddy light of the gas. Carriages rolled over the sanded courtyard, +giving up at the carpeted entrance to the hotel the invited guests +dressed in correct style, the women wrapped in ample cloaks with gold +fringe or trimmed with fur, and all poured into the antechamber, +brushing against the _Gardes de Paris_ in white breeches, with grounded +arms, forming a row and standing out like Caryatides against the +shining, large leaved green flowers on which their white helmets shone +by the light of the lustres. In the dressing-room, the clothing was +piled up, tied together in haste; the antechamber was quickly crossed, +the women in passing casting rapid glances at the immense mirrors; a +servant asked the names of the guests and repeated them to an usher, +whose loud voice penetrated these salons that for many years had heard +so many different names, of all parties, under all regimes, and +proclaimed them in the usual commonplace manner, while murdering the +most celebrated of them. Upon the threshold of the salon, filled with +fashionable people and flooded with intense light, stood the minister, +who had been receiving, greeting, bowing, ever since the opening of the +soiree, to those who arrived, some of whom he did not know; crowding +behind him, correctly dressed, stood his secretaries, the members of his +cabinet appropriating their shares of the greetings extended to the +Excellency, and at his side stood Madame Vaudrey, pale and smiling as +the creatures of the other world; she also bowed and from time to time +extended her gloved hand mechanically; pale she looked in her decollete +gown of white satin, clasped at the shoulders with two pearl clasps, a +bouquet of natural roses in her corsage, and standing there like a +melancholy spectre on the very threshold of the festive salons. + +When she perceived Guy enter, she greeted him with a sad smile, and +Vaudrey eagerly offered his hand to him as if he relied greatly on him +to arrange matters. + +Adrienne's repressed grief had pained Lissac. While to the other guests +she appeared to be only somewhat fatigued, to him the open wound and +sorrow were visible. He plunged into the crowd. Beneath the streaming +light the diamonds on the women's shoulders gleamed like the lustres' +crystals. Within a frame of gobelins and Beauvais tapestry taken from +the repository, was an improvised scene that looked like a green and +pink nest of camellias, dracaenas and palms. The bright toilettes of the +women already seated before this scenic effect presented a wealth of +pale blue, white or pink silk, mother-of-pearl shoulders, diamonds, and +bows of pink or feather headdresses. Guy recognized Madame Marsy in the +front row, robed in a very low-cut, sea-green satin robe with a bouquet +of flowers at the tip of the shoulder, who while fanning herself looked +with haughty impertinence at the pretty Madame Gerson, her former +friend. Madame Evan was numerously surrounded, she was the most charming +of all the stylish set and the woman whom all the others tried to copy. + +Behind this species of female flower-bed the black coated ranks crowded, +their sombre hue relieved here and there by the uniform of some French +officer or foreign military attache. There was a profusion of orders, +crosses and strange old faces, with red ribbons at the neck, deputies +evidently in dress, youthful attaches of the ministry or embassy, +correct in bearing and officious, their crush-hats under their arms and +holding the satin programme of the _musicale soiree_ in their hands, +some numbers of which were about to be rendered. Under the ceilings that +were dappled with painted clouds, surrounded by brilliant lights and a +wealth of flowers, this crowd presented at once an aspect of luxury and +oddity, with its living antitheses of old parliamentarians and tyros of +the Assembly. + +Intermingled with strains of music, were whisperings and the confused +noise of conversations. + +Guy watched with curiosity, as a man who has seen much and compares, all +this gathering of guests. From time to time he greeted some one of his +acquaintance, but this was a rare occurrence. He was delighted to see +Ramel whom he had often met at Adrienne's _Wednesdays_, and whom he +liked. He appeared to him to be fatigued and sick. + +"I am not very well, in fact," said Ramel. "I have only come because I +had something serious to say to Vaudrey." + +"What then?" asked Lissac. + +"Oh! nothing! some advice to give him as to the course to be followed. +There is decidedly much underhand work going on about the President." + +"Who is it?" + +"Most of them are here!" + +"His guests?" + +"You know very well that when one invites all one's friends, one finds +that three-quarters of one's enemies will be present." + +"At least," said Lissac. + +He continued to traverse the salons, always returning instinctively +toward the door at which Adrienne stood, with pale face and wandering +look, and scarcely hearing, poor woman, the unfamiliar names that the +usher uttered at equal intervals, like a speaking machine. + +"Monsieur Durosoi!--Monsieur and Madame Brechet!--Monsieur the Minister +of Public Works!--Monsieur the Prefect of the Aube!--Monsieur the Count +de Grigny!--Monsieur Henri de Prangins!--Monsieur the General +d'Herbecourt!--Monsieur the Doctor Vilandry!--Monsieur and Madame +Tochard!" + +She had vowed that she would be strong, and allow nothing to be seen of +the despair that was wringing her heart. She compelled herself to smile. +In nightmares and hours of feverish unrest, she had suffered the same +vague, morbid feeling that she now experienced. All that passed about +her seemed to be unreal. These white-cravatted men, these gaily-dressed +women, the file of guests saluting her at the same spot in the salon, +with the same expression of assumed respect and trite politeness, +appeared to her but a succession of phantoms. Neither a name nor an +association did she attach to those countenances that beamed on her with +an official smile or gravely assumed a correct seriousness. She felt +weary, overwhelmed and heavy-headed at the sight of this continued +procession of strangers on whom it was incumbent that she should smile +and to whom she must bow out of politeness, in virtue of that duty of +state which she wished to fulfil to the last degree, poor soul! + +The distant music of Fahrbach's polkas or Strauss's waltzes seemed like +an added accompaniment that mocked the sadness of her unwholesome dream. + +"And yet, in all that crowd of women who salute her, there are some who +are jealous of her! Many envy her!" thought Guy, who was looking on. + +Adrienne did not look at Vaudrey. She was afraid that if her eyes met +her husband's fixed on her own, she would lose her sang-froid and +suddenly burst into sobs, there before the guests. That would have been +ridiculous. This blonde, so feebly gentle, isolated herself, therefore, +with surprising determination and seemed to see nothing save her own +thought, the unique thought: "Be strong. You shall weep at your ease +when you are alone, far away from these people, far away from this +crowd, alone with yourself, entirely alone, entirely alone!" + +Vaudrey was very pale, but carried away, in spite of himself, by the joy +which he felt in receiving all the illustrious and powerful men of the +state, foreign ambassadors, the Presidents of the Senate and the +Chamber, the ministers, his colleagues, deputies, wealthy financiers, +renowned publicists, in fact, everything that counts and has a name in +Paris,--this minister, happy to see the crowd running to him, at his +house, bowing, paying homage to him, for a moment forgot the crushing +events of that day, the sudden thunderbolt falling on him and perhaps, +as he had said, crushing his hearthstone. + +He no longer thought of anything but what he saw: salutations, bowed +heads, inclinations that succeeded each other with the regularity of a +clock, that succession of homages to the little Grenoble advocate, now +become Prime Minister. + +Oblivious of everything else, he had lost the recollection of his +mistress, and he suddenly grew pale and looked instinctively with terror +at Adrienne, who was as pale as a corpse.--A visitor had just been +announced by the usher, in his metallic voice, and the name that he +cried mechanically, as he had uttered all the others, echoed there like +an insult. + +Guy de Lissac shook through his entire frame, as he too heard it. + +"Monsieur Simon Kayser and Mademoiselle Kayser!"--cried the usher. + +Still another name rang out from that clarion voice: + +"Monsieur le Duc de Rosas!" + +Neither Vaudrey nor Adrienne heard this name. Sulpice felt urged to rush +toward Marianne to entreat her to leave. It is true, he had invited her. +In spite of Jouvenet who knew all, and in spite of so many others who +suspected the truth, she desired to be present at that fete at the +ministry and to show herself to all. Vaudrey had warned her, however. He +had written to her a few hours before, entreating her, nay, almost +commanding, her, not to come, and she was there. She entered, advancing +with head erect, leaning on the arm of her uncle, his white cravat +hidden by his artist's beard and on his lips a disdainful smile. + +Adrienne asked herself whether she was really dreaming now. Approaching +her, she saw, crossing the salon with a queenly step, that lovely, +insolent creature, trailing a long black satin skirt, her superb bosom +imprisoned in a corsage trimmed with jet, and crossed, as it were, with +a blood-red stripe formed by a cordon of roses. Marianne's fawn-colored +head seemed to imperiously defy from afar the pale woman who stood with +her two hands falling at her side as if overwhelmed. + +The vision, for vision it was, approached like one of the nightmares +that haunt people's dreams. Adrienne's first glance encountered the +direct gaze of Marianne's gray eyes. Behind Mademoiselle Kayser came De +Rosas, his ruddy Castilian face that was ordinarily pensive beamed +to-day, but Madame Vaudrey did not perceive him. She saw only this +woman, the woman who was approaching her, in her own house, insolently, +impudently, to defy her after having outraged her, to insult her after +having deceived her! + +Adrienne felt a violent wrath rising within her and suddenly her entire +being seemed longing to bound toward Marianne, to drive her out after +casting her name in her teeth. + +Instinctively she looked around her with the wild glance of a wretched +woman who no longer knows what to do, as if seeking for some assistance +or advice. + +Vaudrey's wan pallor and Lissac's supplicating gesture appealed to her +and at once restored her to herself. It was true! she had no right to +cause a scandal. She was within the walls of the ministry, in a common +salon into which this girl had almost a right to enter, just like so +many others lost in the crowd of guests. For Adrienne, it was not merely +a question of personal vanity or honor that was at stake, but also +Vaudrey's reputation. She felt herself _in view_, ah! what a word:--in +view, that it to say, she was like an actress to whom neither a false +step nor a false note is permitted; compelled to smile while death was +at her heart, to parade while her entrails were torn with grief, forced +to feign and to wear a mask in the presence of all who were there, and +to lie to all the invited guests, indifferent and inimical, as Ramel +said, and who were looking about ready at any moment to sneer and to +hiss. + +She recovered, by an effort that swelled her heart, strength to show +nothing of the feeling of indignant rebellion that was stifling her. + +She closed her eyes. + +Marianne Kayser passed onward, losing herself with Simon and De Rosas in +the human furrow that opened before her and immediately closed upon her, +and followed by a murmur of admiration. + +Adrienne had not however seen the pale, insolent countenance of the +young woman so closely approach her suffering and disconsolate face. +Above all, she had not seen the jealous, rapid glance that flashed +unconsciously in Vaudrey's eyes when he saw Jose de Rosas triumphantly +following the imperious Marianne. Ah! that look of sorrowful anger would +have penetrated like a red-hot iron into Adrienne's soul. That glance +that Guy caught a glimpse of told eloquently of wounded love and bruised +vanity on the part of that man who, placed here between these two women, +his mistress and the other, suffered less from the sorrow caused to +Adrienne than from Marianne's treason in deserting him for this +Spaniard. + +Lissac was exasperated. He felt prompted to rush between Marianne and +Rosas and say to him: + +"You are mad to accompany this woman! Mad and ridiculous! She is +deceiving you as she has deceived Vaudrey, as she has deceived me, and +as she will deceive everybody." + +He purposely placed himself in Mademoiselle Kayser's way. She had +appeared scarcely to recognize him and had brushed against him without +apparent emotion, but with a disdainful pout. Her arm had sought that +of Rosas, as if she now were sure of her duke. + +Guy too, felt that he could not cause a scene at the ball, for this +would have brought a scandal on Vaudrey. He had just before repeated to +Adrienne: "Courage." This was now his own watchword, and yet he sought +out Jouvenet to whisper to the Prefect of Police what he thought of his +conduct. Jouvenet had come and gone. Granet, as if he had divined +Lissac's preoccupation, looked at him sneeringly as he whispered to the +fat Molina who was seated near him: + +"Alkibiades!" + +The soiree, moreover, was terribly wearisome to Lissac. He wandered from +group to group to find some one with whom to exchange ideas but he +hardly found anyone besides Denis Ramel. The same political commonplaces +retailed everywhere, at Madame Gerson's or at Madame Marsy's, as in the +corridors of the Chamber, were re-decocted and reproduced in the corners +of the salon of the Ministry, and around the besieged buffet attacked by +the most ferocious gluttony. _Interpellation_, _Majority_, _New +Cabinet_, _Homogeneous_, _Ministry of the Elections_, _Ballot_, _One Man +Ballot_. Guy went, weary of the conflict, to the room in which the +concert was given and listened to some operatic piece, or watched +between the heads, the hidden profile of some female singer or an actor +and heard the bursts of laughter that greeted the new monologue _The +Telephone_, rendered in a clear voice with the coolness of an English +clown, by a gentleman in a dress coat: _See! I am Monsieur Durand--you +know, Durand--of Meaux?--Exactly--A woman deceives me--How did I learn +it?--By the telephone. My friend Durand--Durand--of Etampes--We are not +related--Emile Durand said to me: Durand, why haven't you a +telephone?--It is true, I hadn't one--Durand--the other +Durand--Durand--of Etampes--has one--Then--_And Lissac, somewhat +listless, left this corner of the salon and stumbled against a group of +men who surrounded an old gentleman much decorated, wearing the _grand +cordon rouge_ crosswise, a yellow ribbon at his neck, who, with the +gravity of an English statesman, said, thrusting his tongue slightly +forward to secure his false teeth from falling: + +"I like monologues less than chansonnettes!--I, who address you, have +taken lessons from Levassor." + +"Levassor, Your Excellency?" answered in chorus a lot of little +bald-headed young men--diplomats. + +"Levassor," replied the old gentleman who was the very celebrated +ambassador of a great foreign power. "Oh! I was famous in the song: _The +Englishman Who Was Seasick_!" + +While the little young men smiled, approved and loudly applauded, the +old ambassador to whom the interests of a people were entrusted, hummed +in a low tone, amid the noise of the reception: + + "Aoh! aoh! Je suis _melede_, + Bien _melede_! Tres _melede_!" + +Guy de Lissac shrugged his shoulders. He had heard a great deal of this +man. This diplomat of the chansonnette evoked his pity. Where was he +then? At Paris or at Brives-la-Gaillarde? At a ball at the Hotel Beauvau +or in some provincial sub-prefecture? + +Just before, he had heard Warcolier utter this epic expression: + +"If I were minister, I would give fireworks. They are warlike and +inoffensive at the same time!" + +The voice of a young man with a Russian accent who talked politics in a +corner, pleased him: + +"I am," he said aloud, "from a singular country: the Baltic provinces, +where society is governed by deputies who, by birth, have the right to +make laws, and I consider politics so tiresome, fatiguing and full of +disgust and weariness as an occupation, that one ought to consider one's +self most fortunate that there are people condemned to take hold of this +rancid pie, while others pass their lives in thinking, reading, talking +and loving." + +"That is good," thought Lissac. "There is one, at least, who is not so +stupid. It is true, perhaps because I think just the same." + +Nevertheless, he went and listened, mixing with the crowd, haphazard. +His preoccupation was not there. In reality, he thought only of +Adrienne. How the poor woman must suffer! + +With a feeling of physical and moral overthrow, she had left the +threshold of the salon, where she had been standing since the +commencement of the soiree. She was mixing with the crowd in her desire +to forget her sorrows amid the deafening of the music, the songs, the +laughter, and the murmur of the human billows that filled her salons. +She had taken her place in front of the little improvised theatre, +beside all those ladies who dissected her toilette, scanned her pallid +face, analyzed and examined her piece by piece, body and soul. But +there, seated near the stage, exactly in front of her, exposing, as in a +stall, her blonde beauty, and radiant as a Titian, was that Marianne +whose gleaming white shoulders appeared above her black satin corsage. +Again she saw her, as but a little while before, unavoidable, haughty +and bold, smiling with insolence. + +At every minute she was attracted by a movement of a head, or fan, or a +laugh from this pretty creature, who leaned toward Sabine Marsy, then +raised her brow and showed, in all the brilliancy of fatal beauty, her +black corsage, striped with those fine red roses. And now Adrienne's +anger, the grief that she had trampled under for some hours, increased +from moment to moment, heightened and stung by the sight of this +creature, by all kinds of bitter thoughts and by visions of treason and +baffled love. She felt that she was becoming literally mad at the +thought that, upon those red and painted lips, Sulpice had rested his, +that his hands had stroked those shoulders, unwound that hair, that +this woman's body had been folded in his arms. Ah! it was enough to make +her rise and cry out to that creature: "You are a wretch. Get you gone! +Get you gone, I say!" + +And if she did so? + +Why not? Had they the right to scorn her thus in public because she +owned an official title and position? Was not this vulgar salon of a +furnished mansion _her_ salon then? + +Now it seemed to her that they were whispering about her; that they were +sneering behind their fans, and that all these women knew her secret and +her history. + +Why should they not know them? All Paris must have read that mocking, +offensive and singular article: _The Mistress of an Archon_! All these +people had, perhaps, learned it by heart. There were people here who +frequented the salons and who probably kept the article in their +pockets. + +Yes, that would be to commit a folly, to brave everything and to destroy +all! + +Sulpice, then, did not know her; he believed her to be insignificant +because she was gentle, resigned to everything because she was devoted +to his love and his glory?--Ah! devoted even to the point of killing +herself, devoted to the extent of dying, or living poor, working with +her own hands, if only he loved her, if only he never lied to her! + +"And here was his mistress!" + +His mistress! His mistress! + +She repeated this name with increasing rage, reiterating it, inwardly +digesting it, as if it were something terribly bitter. His mistress, +that lovely, insolent creature! Yes, very lovely, but manifestly +terrible and capable of driving a feeble being like Vaudrey to commit +every folly, nay, worse, infamy. + +"And it is such women that are loved! Ah! Idiots! idiots that we are!" + +The first part of the concert was terminating. Happily, too, for +Adrienne was choking. The minister must, as a matter of politeness, +express his thanks to the cantatrices from the Opera, and to the +actresses from the Comedie Francaise, the artistes whose names appeared +on the programme. Vaudrey was obliged to pass the rows of chairs in +order to reach the little salon behind the stage, which served as a +foyer. Adrienne saw him coming to her side, and looking very pale, +though he made an effort to smile. He was uncomfortable and anxious. In +passing before Marianne, he tried to look aside, but Mademoiselle Kayser +stopped him in spite of himself, by slightly extending her foot and +smiling at him, when he turned toward her, with a prolonged, interested +and strange expression. + +Adrienne felt that she was about to faint. She took a few tottering +steps out of the salon, then she stopped as if her head were swimming. +Some one was on hand to support her. She felt that a hand was holding +her arm, she heard some one whisper in her ear: + +"It is too much, is it not?" + +She recognized Lissac's voice. + +Guy looked at her for a moment, quite prepared for this great increase +of suffering. + +"Take me away," she murmured. "I can bear no more!--I can bear no more!" + +She was longing to escape from all that noise, that atmosphere that +lacked air, and from Marianne's look and smile that pierced her. She +went, as if by chance, instinctively guiding Lissac, led by him to a +little, salon far from the reception rooms, and which was reserved for +her and protected by a door guarded by an usher. It might have been +thought that she expected this solitude would be necessary to her as an +escape from the fright of that reception, to which her overstrained and +sick nerves made her a prey. + +In passing, Lissac had whispered to Ramel, who was at his elbow: + +"Tell Sulpice that Madame Vaudrey is ill!" + +"Ill?" + +"You see that she is!" + +When Adrienne was within the little salon hung with garnet silk +draperies, in which the candelabras and sconces were lighted, she sank +into an armchair, entirely exhausted and overwhelmed by the fearful +resistance she had made to her feelings. She remained there motionless, +her eye fixed, her face pale, and both hands resting on the arms of her +chair, abstractedly looking at the pattern of the carpet. + +Guy stood near, biting his lips as he thought of the madman Vaudrey and +that wretched Marianne. + +"She at least obeys her instincts! But he!" + +"Ah! it is too much; yes, it is too much!" repeated Adrienne, as if +Lissac were again repeating that phrase. + +It seemed to her that she had been thrust into some cowardly situation; +that she had been subjected to a shower of filth! It was hideous, +repugnant. She now saw, in the depths of her life, events that she had +never before seen; her vision had suddenly become clear. Dark details +she could now explain. Vaudrey's falsehoods were suddenly manifested. + +"He lied! Ah! how he had lied!" + +She recalled his anxiety to hide the journals from her, his oft-repeated +suggestions, his precautions, the increasing number of his +night-sessions that made him pale. Pale from debauchery! And she pitied +him! She begged him not to kill himself for the politics that was eating +his life. Again she saw on the lips of her _Wednesday's_ guests the +furtive smiles that were hidden behind muffs when she spoke of those +nocturnal sessions of the Chamber, which were only nights passed in +Marianne's bed! How those Parisians must have laughed at her and +ridiculed the credulity of the woman who believes herself loved, but who +is deceived and mocked at! Madame Gerson, Sabine! How overjoyed they +must have been when, in their salons, they referred to the little, +stupid Provincial who was ignorant of these tricks! + +She felt ridiculed and tortured, more tortured than baffled, for her +vanity was nothing in comparison with her love, her poor, artless and +trusting love! + +"Sulpice, I should never have believed--Never!--" + +Why had they left Grenoble, their little house on the banks of the +Isere? They loved each other there, it was Paris that had snatched him +away! Paris! She hated it now. She hated that reputation that had +carried Vaudrey into office, the politics that had robbed her of a kind +and loving husband,--for he had loved her, she was sure of that,--and +which had made him the lover of a courtesan, the liar and coward that he +was! + +"Do you see?" she said to Lissac suddenly. "I detest these walls!" + +She pointed to the gilded ceilings with an angry gesture. + +"Since I entered here, my life has come to a close!--It is that, that +which has taken him from me!--Ah! this society, this politics, these +meannesses, this life exposed to every one and everything, to temptation +and to fall, I am entirely sick of, I am disgusted with. Let me be +snatched from it, let me be taken away! Everywhere here, one might say, +there is an atmosphere of lying!" + +"Do you hear? She laughs, she is happy! She! And I, ah! I!" + +She had risen to her feet, suddenly recovering all her energy, as if +stirred by the air of a Hungarian dance, whose strains dimly reached +them from the distant, warm salons, where Marianne was disporting her +beauty-- + +"Ah! I hate this hotel, the noise and the women!" said Adrienne. "This +horde ranged about the buffet, this salon turned into a restaurant, the +false salutations, the commonplace protestations,--this society, all +this society, I detest it!--I will have no more of it!--It seems to me +that it all is mocking me, and that its smiles are only for that +courtesan!--But if I had driven her out?--Who brought her?" + +"Her uncle and Monsieur de Rosas!" + +"Monsieur de Rosas?" + +"Who marries her!" + +Adrienne nervously uttered a loud, harsh laugh, as painful as if it were +caused by a spasm. + +"Who marries her! Then these creatures are married?--Ah! they are +married--They are honored, too, are they not? And because they are more +easy of approach, they are thought more beautiful and more agreeable +than those who are merely honest wives? Ah! it is too silly!--Rosas! I +took him for a man of sense!--If I were to tell him myself that she is +my husband's mistress, what would the duke answer?" + +"He would not believe you, and you would not do that, madame!" said +Lissac. + +"Why?" + +"Because it would be an act of cowardice, and because you are the best, +the noblest of women!" + +Instinctively he drew near her, lowering his voice, embracing with his +glance that fine, charming beauty, that grief heightened by a burning +brilliancy. + +She raised her fine, clear eyes to Lissac, whose look troubled her, and +said: + +"And how have these served me?--Kindness, trickery!--Trickery, +chastity!--Ask all these men! All of them will go to Mademoiselle Kayser +and not to me!" + +"To you, madame," murmured Guy, "all that there is of devotion and +earnestness, yes, all of the tenderest and the truest will go to you as +respectful homage." + +"Respect?--Yes, respect to us!--And with it goes the home! But to her! +Ah! to her, love! And what if I wish to be loved myself?" + +"Loved by him!" said Lissac in a low tone, as if he did not know what he +said; and his hands instinctively sought Adrienne's. They trembled. + +A woman's perfume and something like the keen odor of flowers assailed +his nostrils. He had never felt the impulse of burning compassion which +at a sign from this saint, would have driven him to attempt the +impossible, to affront the noisy throng yonder. + +"Loved by him, yes, by him!" answered Adrienne, with the mournful shake +of the head of one who sees her joy vanish in the distance like a +sinking bark. + +She had been so happy! She had thought herself so dearly loved! Ah! +those many cowardly lies uttered by Sulpice! + +"Do not speak to me of him!" she suddenly said. "I hate him, too!--I do +more than that! I despise him! I never wish to see him again!--never. +You hear! never!" + +"What will you do?" Lissac asked. + +"I know nothing about it!--I wish to leave! Now, I have no more parading +to make in this ball, I think, I have no longer to receive the guests +whose insulting smiles were like blows! I will go, go!" + +"Adrienne!" + +"Will go at once!" + +She felt no astonishment at hearing the name Adrienne spoken suddenly +and unreflectingly by Guy de Lissac. + +She looked at him with a glance that reached his soul, not knowing what +she said: + +"Leave now! While the ball is in progress. To leave solitude to him, +suddenly--here! And that woman, if he wishes her, and if the other who +is marrying her will yield her to him!" + +She was carried away, her mind wandered, as if unbalanced by her grief, +all her efforts at self-control ending in a relaxation of her strained +nerves. + +"I will leave!--I do not wish to see him again!" + +"Leave to-night?" + +"For Grenoble--I don't know where!--But to fly from him; ah! yes; to +escape from him! Take me away, Monsieur de Lissac!" she said +distractedly, as she seized his hand. "I should go mad here!" + +She had unconsciously taken refuge, as it were, in the arms of the man +who loved her, and Lissac felt the exquisite grace of the body abandoned +to him, without the woman's reflecting upon it, without loving him, +lost-- + +It is quite certain that in her nervous, heart-broken condition, +Adrienne was not considering whether his affection for her sprung from +friendship or from love. + +For a moment this master skeptic, Guy, felt that he was committing the +greatest folly of his life. + +The young woman did not understand; nevertheless, even without love, he +clearly felt that this chasteness and grace, all that there was +exquisitely seductive about her, belonged to him--if he dared-- + +"You are feverish, Adrienne," he said, as he took her hands as he would +a child's. + +"I am choking here!--I wish to leave!--take me away!" + +"Nonsense," said Lissac. "What are you thinking about? They are calling +for you, yonder." + +"It is because they call for me that I wish to escape. Don't you see +that I abhor all those people; that I detest them as much as I despise +them? Take me away!" + +Lissac had become very pale. He tried to smile at Adrienne--the heroic +smile of a wounded man undergoing amputation--and he whispered: + +"Don't you know very well, madame, that you would not have taken two +steps in the street, on my arm, before you would become a lost woman?" + +"Well," she said, "what of that, since it is they who are loved!--" + +"No, madame," Guy replied, "I love you. I may say so, because you are a +virtuous woman, and I have no right to take you away, do you understand? +because I love you." + +He, too, had summoned all his strength to impart to his confession, +which he would have expressed with ardor, the cold tone of a phrase. + +But that was enough. Adrienne recoiled before this avowal. + +He loved her. He told her so! + +It is true, she could not leave the mansion on his arm. + +She rested her glance on Lissac and extended her hand to him, saying, as +she felt suddenly recalled to herself: + +"You are an honest man!" + +"According to my moods," said Guy, with a sad smile. + +The door of the little salon opened, and Ramel entered. + +"I have called in a doctor," he said. + +"For me?" asked Adrienne. "Thanks! I am quite strong!" + +Then boldly going to Ramel: + +"Will you have the goodness to take me to Rue de la Chaussee-d'Antin, +Monsieur Ramel?" + +"Why?" + +"Because I will not remain one hour longer in a house where my husband +has the right to receive his mistress!--Monsieur de Lissac refuses to +accompany me. Your arm, Ramel!" + +"Madame," Ramel answered gently, "I knew that Monsieur de Lissac was a +man of intelligence. It seems to me that he is a man of heart. You +should remain here for your own sake, for your name's sake, for your +husband's. It is your duty. As to Mademoiselle Kayser, you can return to +the salons, for she has just left with Monsieur de Rosas." + +Adrienne remained for a moment with her sad eyes fixed on Ramel; then +shaking her head: + +"You knew it also? Everybody knew it then, except me?" + +"Well!" said Ramel, a good-natured smile playing in his white mustache, +"now it is necessary to forget." + +"Never!" replied Adrienne. + +Then proudly drawing herself up, she took Denis's arm and without even +glancing in her mirror, she went off toward the salons. + +"Your bouquet, madame," said Lissac, who was still pale and his voice +trembled. + +"True!" said Adrienne. + +She fastened her bouquet of drooping roses to her corsage and without +daring to look at Lissac again, she re-entered, leaning on Ramel's arm. + +Left alone in the salon, Guy remained a moment to shake his head. + +"Poor, dear creature!" he said. "If I had been young enough not to +understand the position in which her madness placed me, or base enough +to profit by it, what a pretty little preface to a great folly she was +about to commit this evening! Well! this attack of morality will perhaps +count in my favor some day." + +He stooped down and picked up a rose that had fallen from Adrienne's +bouquet to the carpet. + +He smiled as he took up the flower and looked at it. + +"One learns at any age!" he thought, as he put the flower in his coat. +"That, at least, is a love souvenir that they will not send the police +to rob me of." + + + + +VII + + +On rising the following morning, after a feverish night, Sulpice +realized a feeling of absolute moral destruction. It seemed to him that +he had lost a dear being. In that huge, silent hotel one would have +thought that a corpse was lying. He did not dare to present himself to +Adrienne. He could not tell what to say to her. He went downstairs +slowly, crossing the salons that were still decorated with the now +fading flowers, to reach his cabinet. The carpet was littered with the +broken leaves of dracaenas and petals that had fallen from the azaleas, +and presented the gloomy, forsaken aspect peculiar to the morrow of a +fete. The furniture, stripped of its coverings, offered the faded tint +of old maids at their rising. With heavy head, he sat at his desk and +looked at the piled-up documents with a vague expression. Always the +eternal pile of despatches, optimistic reports, and banal summaries of +the daily press. Nothing new, nothing interesting, all was going well. +This tired world had no history. + +The minister still remained there, absorbed as after an unhealthy +insomnia, when Warcolier entered, ever serious, with his splendid, +redundant phrases and his usual attitude of a pedantic rhetor. He came +to inform the minister that a matter of importance, perhaps of a +troublesome nature, loomed on the horizon. Granet was preparing an +interpellation. Oh! upon a matter without any real importance. An affair +of a procession that had taken place at Tarbes, accompanied by some +little disturbance. It was only a pretext, but it was sufficient, +perhaps, to rally a majority around the _minister of to-morrow_. Old +Henri de Prangins, with his eye on a portfolio, and always thirsting for +power, was keeping Granet company: the man who would never be a minister +with the man who was sure to be. + +"Well, what has this to do with me?" asked Vaudrey indifferently. + +Granet! Prangins! He was thinking of a very different matter. Adrienne +knew all and Marianne deceived him. She was to marry Rosas. + +The very serious Warcolier manifested much surprise at the little energy +displayed by Monsieur le Ministre. He expected to see him bound, in +order to rebound, as he said, believing himself witty. Was Vaudrey +himself giving up the game? Was Granet then sure of the game? He +surmised it and had already taken the necessary measures in that +direction. But surely if Granet were the rising sun, Vaudrey was himself +abandoning his character of the setting sun. He was not setting, he was +falling. A sovereign contempt for this man entered Warcolier's lofty +soul, Warcolier the friend of success. + +"Then you do not understand, Monsieur le President?" + +Vaudrey drew himself up with a sudden movement that was frequent with +him. He struck the table on which his open portfolio rested, and said: + +"I understand that Granet wants that portfolio! Well, be it so! I set +little store by it, but he does not have it yet!" + +"That is something like it! It is worthy of a brave man to show a +resolute front to his enemies! It is in battle that talent is +retempered, as formerly in the Styx were tempered--" + +"I know," said Sulpice. + +Warcolier's intelligent smile was not understood by the minister. + +Sulpice, who was in despair over his shattered domestic joys, had no +wish to enter on a struggle except to bring about a reaction on himself. +To hold his own against Granet, was to divert his own present sadness. + +"All right," he said to Warcolier. "Let Granet interpellate us when he +pleases--In eight days, to-morrow, yes, to-day even, I am ready!" + +"Interpellate _us_!" thought Warcolier. "You should say, interpellate +_you_." + +He had already got out of the scrape himself. + +Vaudrey debated with himself as to whether he would try to see Adrienne. +No? What should he say to her? It would be better to let a little time +shed its balm upon the wound. Then, too, if he wished to bar the way to +Granet, he had not too much time before him. The shrewd person should +act promptly. + +"I shall see him on the Budget Committee!" thought Vaudrey. + +He found it necessary now to force an interest in the struggle which a +few months before would have found him eagerly panting to enter on. The +honeymoon of his love of power had passed. He had too keenly felt, one +after another, the discouragements of the office that he sought in order +to _do good_, to reform, to act, in the pursuit of which he found +himself, from the first moment, clashing with routine, old-fashioned +ideas, petty ambitions, the general welfare, all the brood of selfish +interests. It had been his to dream a sort of Chimera bearing the +country toward Progress on outstretched wings: he found himself +entangled in the musty mechanism of a worn-out and rancid-smelling +engine, that dragged the State as a broken-winded horse might have done. +Then, little by little, weariness and disgust had penetrated the heart +of this visionary who desired to live, to assert himself in putting an +end to so many abuses, and whom his colleagues, his chiefs of division, +his chief of service, the chief of the State himself cautiously advised: +"Make no innovations! Let things go! That has gone on so for so long! +What is the use of changing? It will still do very well!" + +Ah! it was to throw off the shackles and to try the impossible! Vaudrey +found himself hemmed in between his dearest hopes and the most +disheartening realities. He was asked for offices, not reforms. The men +charged with the fate of the country were not straggling after progress, +they were looking after their own interests, their landed and +shopkeeping interests. He felt nauseated by all this. He held those +deputies in contempt who besieged his cabinet and filled his antechamber +in order to beg, claim and demand. All of them sought something, and +they were almost strangled by the solicitations of their own +constituents. They appeared to Sulpice to be rather the commissionaires +of universal suffrage than the servants. This abasement before the +manipulators of the votes made Vaudrey indignant. He felt that France +was becoming by degrees a vast market for favors, a nation in which +everyone asked office from those who to keep their own promised +everything, and the thought filled him with terror. The ministers, +wedded to their positions, became the mere servants of the deputies, +while the latter obeyed the orders of their constituents. All was kept +within a vast network of office-seeking and trafficking. And with it +all, a hatred of genuine talent, bitter selfishness and the crushing +narrowness of ideas! + +Vaudrey recalled a story that had been told him, how during the Empire, +the Emperor, terrified, feeling himself isolated, asked and searched for +a man, and how a certain little bell in the Tuileries was especially +provided to warn the chamberlains of the entry into the chateau of a new +face, of the visit of a stranger, in order that the camarilla, warned by +the particular ring, would have time to place themselves on their guard, +and to send the newcomer to the right about if he might become an aid to +the master and a danger to the servants. Well! Sulpice did not hear that +invisible and secret bell, but he guessed its presence, he divined its +presence around him, warning the interested, always ready to chase away +the stranger; he felt that its secret thread was everywhere thrown +around the powerful, the mighty of four days or a quarter of a century +and that, so long as influence existed in the world, there would be +courtiers and that these courtiers, eager for a crumb, would prevent the +stranger, that is to say, truth, from reaching the light, fearing that +this stranger might play the part of the lion and chase the flies away +from the honeycomb. + +Thus, how much nausea and contempt he felt for that transient power +which in spite of himself was rendered useless! A power that placed him +at the mercy of the bawling of a colleague or an enemy, and even at the +mercy of that all-powerful master so readily dissatisfied: everybody. He +had seen, at too close quarters, the vile intrigues, the depressing +chafferings, the grinding of that political kitchen in which so many +people,--this Warcolier with his voluble rhetoric, this Granet with his +conceited smile of superiority,--were hungering to hold the handle of +the saucepan. He recalled a remark that Denis Ramel had often repeated +to him: "What is the use of putting one's self out in order to bask in +the sunshine? The best are in the shade." + +He was seized with lawful indignation against his own ambitions, against +the lack of energy that prevented him from sweeping away all +obstacles,--men, and routine,--and he recalled with afflicting +bitterness his entry on public life, in the blaze of divine light, and +his dreams, his poor noble dreams! "A great minister! I will be a great +minister!" + +"Ah! yes, indeed! one is a minister, that is all! And that is enough! It +is often too much! We shall see indeed what he will do, that Granet who +ought to do so much!" + +Vaudrey laughed nervously. + +"What he will do? Nothing! Nothing! Still nothing! That is very easy! To +do anything, one should be a great man and not a politician captivated +with the idea of reaching the summit of power. Ah! _parbleu!_ to be a +great man! 'That is the question.'" + +He grew very excited over the proud rebellion of his old faith and +shattered hopes against the negative success he had obtained. Besides, +there was no reason for giving up the struggle. There was a council to +be held at the Elysee. He went there, but at this moment of disgust, +disgust of everything and himself, this palace like all the rest, seemed +to him to be gloomy and mean. An usher in black coat and white cravat, +wearing a chain around his neck, wandered up and down the antechamber, +according to custom, his shoes covered with the dust from the carpet +trodden upon by so many people, either applicants or functionaries. The +gaslight burning in broad day as in the offices in London was reflected +on the cold walls that shone like marble. Doors ornamented with gilt +nails and round, ivory knobs and without locks, were noiselessly +swinging to and fro. Wearied office-seekers with tired countenances were +spread out upon the garnet-colored velvet chairs, which were like those +of a middle-class, furnished house. + +From time to time, the tiresome silence was broken by the sound of near +or distant electric bells. Vaudrey, who arrived before his colleagues, +studiously contemplated the surroundings ironically. An estafette, a +gendarme, arrived with a telegram; the usher signed a receipt for it. +That was all the life that animated this silent palace. A man with a +military air, tall, handsome and in tightly-buttoned frock-coat, passed +and saluted the President of the Council; then, Jouvenet, the Prefect of +Police, looking like a notary's senior clerk, his abundant black hair +plastered on his head, a large, black portfolio under his arm, +approached the minister and bowed. Vaudrey, having Lissac in mind, +returned his salutation coldly. + +"I will speak to you presently, Monsieur le Prefet." + +"Good! Monsieur le Ministre!" + +In spite of the foot-soldier and the Parisian guard on duty at the door +of the palace, all that now seemed to Vaudrey to lack official +solemnity, and resembled rather a temporary and melancholy occupation. + +"Bah! And if I should never set my foot in this place again," he +thought, as he remembered Granet's interpellation, "what would it matter +to me?" + +He was informed first at the Council and then at the Chamber, that +Granet would not introduce his question until the next day. Vaudrey had +the desired time to prepare himself. In the Budget Committee, where he +met Granet, the _minister of to-morrow_ asked him an inopportune +question concerning the expenses of the administration. Vaudrey was +angered and felt inclined to treat it as a personal question. It now +only remained for his adversaries to begin to suspect him! To appear so +was even now too much. Sulpice took Granet up promptly, the latter +assured him that "his colleague and friend, the President of the +Council," had entirely misconstrued the meaning of his words. + +"Well and good!" said Vaudrey. + +He was not sorry that the interpellation was not to take place at once. +Before to-morrow, he would have placed his batteries. And then he would +think of quieting Adrienne, of regaining her, perhaps. On returning to +the ministry, he caused some inquiries to be made as to whether Madame +were not sick. Madame had gone out. She had gone out as if she were +making a pilgrimage to a cemetery, to the apartment in Rue de la +Chaussee-d'Antin, whereon might have been written: _Here lies_. It was +like the tomb of her happiness. + +She would not see Sulpice again. In the evening, however, she consented +to speak to him. + +Her poor, gentle face was extremely pale, and as if distorted by some +violent pain. + +"You will find some excuse," she said, "for announcing that I am ill. I +am leaving for Grenoble. I have written to my uncle, the Doctor expects +me, and all that now remains to me is a place in his house." + +"Adrienne!" murmured Sulpice. + +She closed her eyes, for this suppliant voice doubtless caused her a +new grief, but neither gesture nor word escaped her. She was like a +walking automaton. Even her eyes expressed neither reproach nor anger, +they seemed dim. + +There was something of death in her aspect. + +After a few moments, she said: "I hope that my resolve will not work any +prejudice to your political position. In that direction I will still do +my duty to the full extent of my strength. But people will not trouble +themselves to inquire whether I am at Grenoble or Paris. They trouble +themselves very little about me." + +By a gesture, he sought to retain her. She had already entered her room, +and Vaudrey felt that between this woman and him there stood something +like a wall. He had now only to love Marianne. + +To love Marianne, ah! yes, the unhappy man, he still loved her. When he +thought of Marianne, it was more in wrath, when he thought of Adrienne, +it was more in pity; but, certainly, his wife's determination to leave +Paris caused him less emotion than the thought that his mistress was to +wed Rosas. + +That very evening he went to Marianne's. + +They told him that Madame was at the theatre. Where? With whom? Neither +Jean nor Justine knew. + +Vaudrey despised himself for jealously questioning the servants who, +when together, would burst with laughter in speaking of him. + +"Oh! miserable fool!" he said to himself. "There was only one woman who +loved you:--Adrienne!" + +Nevertheless, he recalled Marianne in the hours of past love, and the +recollection of her kisses and sobs still made his flesh creep. The +tawny tints that played in her hair as it strayed unfastened over the +pillow, the endearing caresses of her bare arms, he wished to see and +feel again. He calculated in his ferocious egotism that Adrienne's wrath +would afford him more complete liberty for a time, and that he would +have Marianne more to himself, if she were willing. + +He had written to Mademoiselle Kayser, but his letter had remained +unanswered. He thought that he would go to Mademoiselle Vanda's house +the next day, after the Chamber was up. Very late, he added, since the +sitting would be prolonged. Long and decisive, as the fate of his +ministry was at stake. + +Granet's interpellation did not make him unusually uneasy. He had +acquainted himself in the morning with a resume of the journals. Public +opinion seemed favorable to the Vaudrey ministry, _except in the case of +some insufferable radical organs, and with which he need not in anyway +concern himself_, read the report. Vaudrey did not remember that it was +in almost these very terms that the daily resume of the press expressed +itself on the eve of Pichereau's fall, to the Minister of the Interior, +in speaking of Pichereau's cabinet. + +"I shall have a majority of sixty votes," he said to himself. +"Everything will be carried--save honor!" + +He thought of Adrienne as he thus wished. + +The session of the Chamber was to furnish him the most cruel deception. +Granet had most skilfully prepared his plan of attack. Vaudrey's +ministry was threatened on all sides by lines of approach laid out +without Sulpice's knowledge. Granet had promised, here and there, new +situations, or had undertaken to confirm the old. He came to the assault +of the ministry with a compact battalion of clients entirely devoted to +his fortunes, which were their own. They did not reproach Vaudrey too +strongly with anything, unless it was that these impatient ones +considered that he had given away all that he had to give, prefectures, +sub-prefectures, councillors' appointments, crosses of the Legion of +Honor, and especially for having lasted too long. Vaudrey would fall +less because he had forfeited esteem than because others were impatient +to succeed him. Granet was tired of being only the _minister of +to-morrow_, he wished to have his day. He had just affirmed his policy, +he asserted that the whole country, weary of Vaudrey's compromises, +demanded a more homogeneous ministry. Homogeneity! Nothing could be said +against such a word. Granet favored the policy of homogeneity. This +vocable comprehended his entire programme. The Vaudrey Cabinet lacked +homogeneity! The President of the Republic decidedly ought to form a +homogeneous cabinet. + +"Granet is then homogeneous?" said Sulpice, with a forced laugh, as he +sat on the ministerial bench while Lucien Granet was speaking from the +tribune, his right hand thrust into his frock-coat. + +The _bon mot_ uttered by the President of the Council, although spoken +loudly enough, did not enliven any one, neither his colleagues who felt +themselves threatened nor his usual _claqueurs_ who felt themselves +vanquished. Navarrot, the ministerial claqueur, was already applauding +Granet most enthusiastically. _Monsieur le Ministre_ felt himself about +to become an ex-minister. He vaguely felt as if he were in the vacuum of +an air-pump. + +The order of the day of distrust, smoothed over by Granet with the +formulas of perfidious politeness--castor-oil in orange-juice, as +Sulpice himself called it, trying to pluck up courage and wit in the +face of misfortune,--that order of the day that the Vaudrey Cabinet +would not accept, was adopted by a considerable majority: one hundred +and twenty-two votes. + +For Sulpice, it was a crushing defeat. + +"One hundred and twenty-two deputies," he said, still speaking in a loud +voice in the corridors, "to whom I have refused the appointment of some +mayor or the removal of some rural guard!" + +Warcolier, ever dignified, remarked in his usual style, that this manner +of defending himself probably lacked some of that nobility which becomes +a defeat bravely endured. + +Vaudrey had only one course open, to send in his resignation. He was +beaten, thoroughly beaten. He returned to the Hotel Beauvau and after +preparing his letter he took it himself to the President at the Elysee. + +The President accepted it without betraying any feeling, as an employe +at the registry office receives any deed of declaration. Two or three +commonplace expressions of regret, a diplomatic shake of the hand, +expressive of official sympathy, that was all. Vaudrey returned to the +ministry and ordered his servants to prepare everything for leaving the +ministerial mansion. + +"When is that to be, Monsieur le Ministre?" + +"To-morrow," answered Vaudrey, to whom the title seemed ironical and +grated on his nerves. + +He caused himself to be announced to Adrienne. + +Adrienne, weary looking, was seated before a small desk writing, and +beneath her fair hair, her face still looked as white as that of a +corpse. + +"There is some news," Vaudrey said to her abruptly. "I am no longer +minister!" + +"Ah!" she said. + +Not a tremor, not a word of consolation. Three days previously, she +would have leaped to his neck and said: "How happy we shall be! I have +you back; I have found you again! What joy!" + +Again, she would have tried to console him had he been suffering. + +Now, she remained passive, frozen, indifferent to that news. + +"We shall leave the Hotel Beauvau!" said Sulpice. + +"I am already preparing to leave," she replied. "My trunks are packed." + +"Will you do me the kindness of leaving here with me and of going back +to Rue de la Chaussee-d'Antin with me?--After that, you can set out at +once for Grenoble. But let us have no sign of scandal. The world must be +considered." + +She had listened to him coldly, unmoved by his trembling voice. + +"That is proper," she said ironically. "The world must be thought of. I +will wait then before leaving." + +He was stupefied to find so much coldness and so unswerving a +determination in this woman, as gentle as a child--my _wife-child_, he +so frequently said to her of old. In her presence he felt ill at ease, +discontented, hesitating whether he should throw himself at her feet and +wring pardon from her, or fly from her and be with Marianne, perhaps +forever. But no, it was Adrienne, his poor, his dear Adrienne that he +would keep and love! Ah! if she pardoned him! If he had dared to kneel +at her feet, to plead and to weep! But this living corpse froze him, he +was afraid of her, of that gentle and devoted creature. + +He went downstairs again, saying to himself that he would take a hurried +dinner and then go to Rue Prony. + +He was, however, obliged to occupy himself in despatching the last +current business. He must hand over his official duties to his +successor. There was a mocking expression in these words: _his +successor!_ + +"After all, he will have one also!" + +He still had unexpected heartbreakings to experience. People to whom he +had promised appointments and decorations came, almost breathless, +suddenly stirred by the news, to entreat him to sign the nominations and +to prepare the decrees while he was _still_ minister. The ravens were +about the corpse. _Monsieur Eugene_, still bowing low, although not +quite so low as heretofore, endeavored to dismember Vaudrey the +Minister. He wanted a little piece, only one piece! A sub-prefecture of +the third class! + +He had already been informed at the Elysee that Granet was to be his +successor. _Parbleu!_ he expected it! But the realization of his fears +annoyed him. And who would Granet keep for his Secretary of State? +Warcolier, yes Warcolier, with the promise of giving him the first +vacant portfolio. + +"How correct was Ramel's judgment?" thought Sulpice. + +Vaudrey, with a sort of rage urging him, immediately set himself about a +task as mournful as a funeral: packing up. It now seemed to him that he +had just suffered a total overthrow. Books and papers were being packed +in baskets. Before he was certain of his fall, he thought it was +delightful to escape from so much daily bother, but now he felt as if he +were being discrowned and ruined. Ruin! It truly threatened him indeed +and held him by the throat. He had realized on many pieces of property +within the past year for Marianne! + +Adrienne, on the contrary, left this great cold hotel of Place Beauvau, +as if she were leaving a prison, with a comforting sense of deliverance. +A bad dream was ended. She could lay down her official mask, weep at +ease, complain at will, fly to that Dauphiny where her youth was left. +She would leave to-morrow. Doctor Reboux awaited her in ignorance. + +After having given his first orders and arranged his most important +documents, Sulpice went out to walk to Marianne's. At first he wandered +along mechanically without realizing that he was going toward the quays, +almost fearing the interview with his mistress, now that he was only a +defeated man. He had nearly reached the Seine before he was aware of it. +He looked at his watch. + +Eleven o'clock. + +Marianne had been awaiting him for some time. + +He now followed, with the slow march of persons oppressed with a sense +of weariness, these deserted quays, that terrace on the bank of the +river, whose balustrades permitted glimpses of the silhouettes of +slender trees. He met no one. Upon the Place de la Concorde, still wet +with the scarce dried rain of this November night, as mild as an evening +in spring, permeated by a warm mist, he looked for a moment at the +Palace of the Corps Legislatif, gloomy-looking and outlining its roofs +against the misty sky, whose gleams fell on the horizon with a bluish +tint, while upon the broad sidewalks, the jets of gas magnified the +reddened reflections with their own ruddy hues. Along the grand avenue +of the Champs-Elysees there were only two immense parallel rows of +gas-lamps and here and there, moving, luminous points that looked like +glow-worms. Vaudrey mechanically stopped a moment to contemplate the +scene. + +That did not interest him, but something within him controlled him. He +continued to walk unwittingly in the direction of Parc Monceau. The +solitude of the Champs-Elysees pleased him. While passing before an +important club with its windows lighted, he instinctively shuddered. +Through the lace-like branches of the trees, he looked at the green +shades, the lustres, the unpolished sconces, with the backgrounds of red +and gold hangings, and the great, gold frames, and he imagined that they +were discussing the causes of his defeat and the success of Granet. + +"They are speaking of me, in there! They are talking about my fall! He +is fallen! Fallen! Beaten!--They are laughing, they are making jokes! +There are some there who yesterday were asking me for places." + +He continued on his way without quickening his pace; the deserted cafe +concerts, as melancholy-looking as empty stages, the wreaths of +suspended pearl-like lamps illuminated during the summer months but now +colorless, seemed ironical amid the clumps of bare trees as gloomy as +cemetery yews, exhaling a sinister, forsaken spirit as if this solitude +were full of extinct songs, defunct graces, phantoms, and last year's +mirth. And Vaudrey felt a strangely delicious sensation even in his +bitterness at this impression of solitude, as if he might have been +lost, forgotten forever, in the very emptiness of this silent corner. + +Going on, he passed before the Elysee. + +A _sergent de ville_ who was slowly pacing up and down in front of an +empty sentry-box, his two hands ensconced in the sleeves of his coat, +the hood of which he had turned up, cast a sidelong glance at him, +almost suspiciously, as if wondering what a prowler could want to do +there, at such an hour. + +"He does not know whom he has looked at," he said. "And yesterday, only +yesterday, he would have saluted me subserviently!" + +The windows of the Elysee facing the street were still lighted up and +Vaudrey thought that shadows were moving behind the white curtains. + +"The President has not yet retired! He has probably received Granet! And +Warcolier!--Warcolier!" + +Before the large door opening on Faubourg Saint-Honore, four lamps were +burning over the head of a Parisian guard on duty, with his musket on +his shoulder, the light shining on the leather of his shako. Some +weary-looking guardians of the peace were chatting together. At the end +of the court before the perron, a small, red carpet was laid upon the +steps and in front of the marquee faint lights gleamed. Vaudrey recalled +that joyous morning when he entered there, arriving and descending from +his carriage with his portfolio under his arm. + +He hurried his steps and found himself on Place Beauvau. His glance was +attracted by the grille, the hotel, the grand court at the end of the +avenue. Sulpice experienced a feeling of sudden anger as he passed in +front of the Ministry of the Interior whose high grille, now closed, he +had many times passed through, leaning back in his coupe. He pictured +himself entering there, where he would never again return except as a +place-seeker like those eternal beggars who blocked its antechambers. He +still heard the cry of the lackey when the coachman crushed the sand of +the courtyard under the wheels of the carriage: "Monsieur le Ministre's +carriage!"--He went upstairs, the lackeys saluted him, the coupe rolled +off toward the Bois. + +Now, here in that vulgar mansion another was displaying himself, seated +on the same seats, eating at the same table, sleeping in the same bed +and giving his orders to the same servants. He experienced a strange +sensation, as of a theft, of some undue influence, of suffering an +ejectment by a stranger from some personal property, and this Granet, +the man sent there as he had been, by a vote, seemed to him to be a +smart fellow, a filibuster and an intruder. + +"How one becomes accustomed to thinking one's self at home everywhere!" +thought Vaudrey. + +He partially forgot the keen wound given to his self-love by the time +that he found himself close to Parc Monceau approaching Rue Prony. In +Marianne's windows the lights were shining. To see that woman and hold +her again in his arms, overjoyed, that happiness would console him for +all his mortifications. Marianne's love was worth a hundred times more +than the delights of power. + +Marianne Kayser was evidently waiting for Sulpice. She received him in +her little, brilliantly-lighted salon, superb amid these lights, in a +red satin robe de chambre that lent a strange seductiveness to her bare +arms and neck which shone with a pale and pearly lustre beneath the +light. + +Vaudrey felt infinitely moved, almost painfully though deliciously +stirred, as he always did when in the presence of this lovely creature. + +She extended her hand to him, saying in a singular tone that astonished +him: + +"_Bonjour, vous!_" + +"Well!" she said at once, pointing to a journal which was lying on the +carpet, "is there anything new?" + +"Yes," he said. "But what is that to me? I don't think of that when I am +near you!" + +"Oh! besides, my dear," Marianne continued, "your darling sin has not +been to think of two things at one time! I don't understand anything of +politics, it bothers me. I have been advised, however, that you have +been thrashed by that Granet!" + +"Thrashed, yes," said Sulpice, laughing, "you use peculiar phrases!--" + +"Topical ones. I am of the times! But it appears that one must read the +journals to learn about you. I am going to tell you some news however, +before it appears in print." + +"That interests me?" + +"Perhaps, but it most assuredly interests me!" + +"Important news?" asked Sulpice. + +"Important or great, as you will!" + +He nibbled his blond moustache nervously. + +Guy had not deceived him. + +"Then I think I know your news, my dear Marianne!" + +"Tell me!" she said, as she stretched herself on a divan, her arms +crossed, looking ravishingly lovely in her red gown. + +He sought some forcible phrase that would crush her, but he could find +none. His only desire was to take that fair face in his hands and to +fasten his lips thereon. + +Marianne smiled maliciously. + +"It is true then," Vaudrey exclaimed, "that you love Monsieur de +Rosas?" + +"There, you are well-informed! It is strange! Perhaps that is because +you are no longer a minister!" + +"You love Rosas?" + +"Yes, and I am marrying him. I have the honor to announce to you my +marriage to Monsieur le Duc Jose de Rosas, Marquis de Fuentecarral. It +surprises me, but it is so!--I have known days when I have not had six +sous to take the omnibus, and now I am to be a duchess! This does not +seem to please you? Are you selfish, then?" + +Stretched on her divan, her neck and arms sparkling under the light of +the sconces, she appeared to make sport of Vaudrey's stupefaction as he +looked at her almost with fright. + +"Now, my dear," she said curtly, but politely, as she toyed with a ring +on her finger, "this is why I desired to see you to-day. It is to tell +you that if you care to remain friendly on terms that forbid sensual +enjoyment, which is not objectionable in putting a lock on the past, you +may visit the Duchesse de Rosas just as you have Mademoiselle Kayser. +But if you are bent on finding in the Duchesse de Rosas the good-natured +girl that I have been toward you, and you are quite capable of it, for +you are a sentimental fellow, then it will be useless to even appear to +have ever known each other. I am turning the key on my life. _Crac! +Bonsoir_, Sulpice!" + +The unhappy man! He had cherished the thought of still visiting his +mistress, but he found there an unlooked-for being, a new creature, who +was unmistakably determined, in spite of her cunning charm, and she +spoke to him in stupefying, ironical language. + +"You would have me go mad, Marianne?" + +"Why! what an idea! The phrase is decidedly romantic.--You should +dispense with the blue in love as well as the exaggeration in politics." + +"Marianne," Vaudrey said abruptly, "do you know that for your sake I +have destroyed my home and mortally wounded my wife?" + +"Well," she replied, "did I ask you to do so? I pleased you, you pleased +me; that was quite enough. I desire no one's death and if you have +allowed everything to be known, it is because you have acted +indiscreetly or stupidly! But I who do not wish to mortally wound," she +emphasized these words with a smile--"my husband, I expect him to +suspect nothing, know nothing, and as you are incapable of possessing +enough intelligence not to play Antony with him, let us stop here. +Adieu, then, my dear Vaudrey!" + +She extended her hand to him, that soft hand that imparted an electrical +influence when he touched it. + +"Well, what!--You are pouting?" + +"I love you," he replied distractedly. "I love you, you hear, and I wish +to keep you!" + +"Ah! no, no! no roughness," she said with a laugh, as he, taking a seat +near her, tried to draw her to him in his arms. + +"To keep you, although belonging to another," whispered Vaudrey slowly. + +"For whom do you take me?" said Marianne, proudly drawing herself up. +"If I have a husband, I require that he be respected. A man who gives +his name to a woman is clearly entitled to be dealt with truthfully!" + +"Then," stammered Sulpice, "what?--Must we never see each other again?" + +"We shall recognize each other." + +"You drive me away?" + +"As a lover!" + +"Ah! stay," said Vaudrey, as, pale with anger, he walked across the +room, "you are a miserable woman, a courtesan, you understand, a +courtesan!--Guy has told me everything! You gave yourself to Jouvenet to +avenge yourself on Lissac, you made a tool of me and you are making a +sport of Rosas who is marrying you!--What have I not done for you!--I +have ruined myself! yes, ruined myself!" + +"My dear," interrupted Marianne, "see the difference between a gentleman +like Monsieur de Rosas and a little bourgeois like yourself. The duke +might have ruined himself for me but he would never have reproached me. +One never speaks of money to a woman. You are a very honest, domestic +man and you were born to worship your wife! You should stick to her! You +are not made of the stuff of a true-born lover. What you have just told +me is the remark of a loon!" + +"Ah! if I had only known you!" + +"Or anything! But I am better than you, you see. I was better advised +than you. The bill of exchange that you owe to the Dujarrier or to +Gochard,--whichever you like--it inconveniences you, I know!" + +"Yes," said Vaudrey, "but--" + +"You would not, I think, desire me to pay it with the duke's money, that +Monsieur de Rosas should pay your debts?" + +"Marianne," cried Sulpice, livid with rage. + +"Bless me! you speak to me of money? You chant your ruin to me! The _De +Profundis_ of your money-box, should I know that? I question with myself +as to what it means!--However, knowing you to be financially +embarrassed, I have myself found you help--Yes, I told someone who +understands how to extricate business men, that you were embarrassed!" + +"I?" + +"There is nothing to blush about. I told Molina the _Tumbler_--You know +him?" + +Did he know him! At that very moment he saw the ruddy gold moon that +represented the banker's face amid all the expanse of his shining flesh. +He trembled as if in the face of temptation. + +"Molina is a man of means," said Marianne. "If you need money, you can +have it there! And now, once more, leave me to my new life! The past is +as if it had never been!--_Bonjour, Bonsoir!_--and adieu, go!--Give me +your hand!" + +She smiled so strangely, half lying on the divan, and stretched out her +white hand, which he covered with kisses, murmuring: + +"Well, yes, adieu! Yes, adieu!--But once more--once!--this evening--I +love you so dearly!--Will you?" + +She quietly reached out her bare arm toward a silk bell-rope that she +jerked suddenly and Vaudrey rose enraged and humiliated. + +"Show Monsieur Vaudrey out," Marianne said to Justine, as she appeared +at the door. "Then you may go to bed, my girl!" + +Vaudrey left this woman's house in a fit of frenzy. She had just treated +him who had paid for the divan on which she was reclining as a genuine +duchess might have treated a man who had been insolently disrespectful +toward her. He was almost inclined to laugh at it. + +"It is well done! well done for you! Ah! the dolt! To trust a wanton! To +trust Warcolier! To trust everybody! To trust everybody except +Adrienne!--" + +He, mechanically and without thought, resumed the way to Place Beauvau, +forgetting that the ministerial home was no longer his. The porter--who +knows? might not have opened the gate to him. The lackeys would have +driven him off as the girl had done whom he had paid, yes, paid, paid! +For she was a harlot, nothing more! + +Gradually, the thought of that debt swelled by successive bills of +exchange, and almost forgotten during the recent days of feverish +excitement, took possession of his mind, he remembered that it must be +discharged on the first day of December, in five days, and the thought +troubled him like an impending danger. The prospect had often, during +the last few weeks, made him anxious. He saw the months pass, the days +flit with extraordinary rapidity, and the maturity, the inevitable due +date draw near with the mathematical regularity of a clock. So long as +months were ahead he felt no anxiety. Like gamblers he counted on +chance. Besides, he still had some farms in Dauphiny. In short, a word +to his notary and he could speedily get out of danger. Then, too, the +date of payment was far away. He calculated that by economy as to his +personal income and his official salary he could meet the bill to +Gochard, whose very name sometimes made him laugh. But Marianne's +exactions, unforeseen outlays, the eternal _leakage_ of Parisian life +had quite prevented saving, and had dissipated in a thousand little +streams the money that he wished to pay out in a lump in December. He +soon grew alarmed by degrees at the approach of the maturity of the +debt. He had written to his notary at Grenoble, and this old friend had +replied that the farms of Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, mortgaged and cut up +one after another, now represented only a ridiculous value, but that +after all, Vaudrey had nothing to be concerned about, seeing that +Madame Vaudrey's fortune was intact. + +Adrienne's fortune! That then was all that remained to Vaudrey, and that +might be his salvation. A fortune that was not very considerable, but +still solid and creditable. But even if he were strangled by debt, +dunned and driven into a corner, could he pay the debts he had +contracted for his mistress by means of his wife's fortune? He was +disgusted at the thought. It was impossible. + +Vaudrey felt his head turn under the humiliation of his double defeat, +the loss of parliamentary confidence, and Marianne's insulting laugh, +and urged by the anxiety he felt about the obligation to be met in eight +days, in his bewilderment he thought of writing to Gochard of Rue des +Marais, to ask for time. This Gochard must be a half-usurer. Certain of +being paid, some day, he would perhaps be delighted to renew the bill of +exchange in inordinately swelling the amount. The letter was written and +Vaudrey mailed it himself the following morning. + +That very evening Adrienne was to leave. He endeavored to dissuade her +from her plan. She did not even reply to him. She stood looking at a +crystal vase on the chimney-piece in which were some winter roses, +Christmas roses, fresh and milk-white, that had been sent as a souvenir +from yonder Dauphiny. Her glance rested fixedly on that fair bouquet +that seemed like a bursting cloud of whiteness. + +"Then," said Vaudrey, "it is settled--quite settled--you are going?" + +"I am." + +"In three hours?" + +"In three hours!" + +"I know where those roses were gathered," said Sulpice tenderly. "It was +at the foot of the window where we leaned elbow to elbow and dreamed." + +"Yes," Adrienne answered, in a broken voice whose sound was like that +which might have been given out by the vase had it been struck and +shattered. "We had lovely dreams! The reality has indeed belied them!" + +"Adrienne!" he murmured. + +She made no reply. + +He tried to approach her, feeling ashamed as he thought that he had +similarly wished to approach Marianne. + +She instinctively drew back. + +"You remember," she said coldly, "that one day when we were speaking +about divorce, I told you that there was a very simple way of divorce? +It was never to see each other again, never, to be nothing more to each +other from the day on which confidence should die?--You have deceived +me, it is done. I am a stranger to you! If I were a mother, I should +have duties to fulfil. I would not have failed therein. I would have +endured everything for a son!--Nothing is left to me. I have not even +the joy of caressing a child that would have consoled me. I am your +widow while you yet live. Well, be it so. You have willed it, there, +then, is divorce!" + +For the third time since Adrienne had learned everything, he tried to +stammer the word _pardon_. He felt it was useless. This sensitive being +had withdrawn within herself and wrapped herself, as with a cloak, in +all her outraged chastity. He could only humiliate himself without +softening her. All Adrienne's deceived trustfulness and insulted love +strengthened her in her determination never to forgive. + +She would go. + +Vaudrey in despair returned to his study, where the books that had been +sent from the ministry were piled upon the carpet in all the confusion +attending an entry into occupation. The servant at once brought him his +lamp and handed him a package of cards in envelopes,--cards of +condolence as for a death--and a large card, saying: "That gentleman is +here!" + +"Molina!" said Vaudrey, becoming very pale. "Show him in!" + +The fat Salomon entered puffing and smiling, and spread himself out on +an armchair as he said to the former minister: + +"Well, how goes it?--Not too badly crushed, eh?--Bah! what is it after +all to quit office?--Only a means for returning to it, sometimes!" + +"All the same," he said with his cackling laugh that sounded like the +jingling of a money-bag, "there are too many changes of ministers! They +change them like shirts! It puts me out. I get used to one Excellency +and he is put aside! So it is settled, henceforth I will not say +Excellency save to the usher or an office-boy!" + +He accompanied his clumsy jests with a loud laugh, then, changing his +tone: + +"Come, that is not all. I came to speak of business to you." + +He looked Vaudrey full in the face with his piercing glance, took from +his pocketbook a printed sheet and said in a precise tone: + +"Here is an opportunity where your title of former minister will serve +you better than that of minister. So much is being said of Algeria, its +mines and its fibre. Well, read that!" + +Vaudrey took the paper. It was the prospectus, very skilfully drawn, of +a company established to introduce gas into Algeria, almost as far as +the Sahara. They promised the subscribers wonders and miracles: acres +upon acres of land as a bonus. There was a fortune to be made. Meantime, +they would issue six thousand shares of five hundred francs. It was +three millions they were asking from the public. A mere trifle. + +"They might ask ten," said Molina, smiling. "They would give it!" + +"And you wish me to subscribe to your Algerian gas?" asked Vaudrey. + +The fat Molina burst out into loud laughter this time. + +"I? I simply wish to give you the opportunity to make a fortune!" + +"How?" + +"That is one scheme. I will bring you four, five, ten of them! I have +another, the Luxemburg coal. A deposit equal to that of Charleroi. You +have only to allow me to print in the list of directors: Monsieur +Sulpice Vaudrey, former President of the Council." + +Vaudrey looked the fat man squarely in the face. + +"Besides you will be in good company!" said the banker as he read over +the names of deputies, senators, statesmen, coupled with those of +financiers. + +Sulpice knew most of them. + +He despised nearly all of them. It was such that Molina styled _good +company!_ + +"And those mines, are you certain they will produce what you promise?" + +"Ah!" said Salomon, "that is the engineers' matter! Here is the report +of a mining engineer who is perhaps straining after effect and doing a +little puffing up! But one must go with the times! He who ventures +nothing, has nothing. In war, one risks one's skin; in business, one +risks one's money. That is war." + +Vaudrey debated with himself whether he should tear the prospectus in +pieces and throw them in the face of the fat man. + +"My dear Vaudrey," said the _Tumbler_, "you have a vein that is +entirely your own. A former minister remains always a former minister. +Well, such a title as that is turned to account. It is quoted, like any +other commodity. You are not rich, that fact proves your honesty, +although in America, and we are Americanizing ourselves devilishly much, +that would only be the measure of your stupidity. You can become rich, I +have the means of making myself agreeable to you and you have the +opportunity of becoming useful to us." + +"In a word, you buy my name?" + +"I hire it from you! Very dearly," said Molina, still laughing. + +"Certainly," said Vaudrey, "you did not understand me on the first +occasion that you called on me to speak about money, and when I +questioned with myself whether I should ask you not to call again." + +Molina interrupted him abruptly by rising. He felt that an insult was +about to be uttered. He parried it by anticipating it. + +"Stupidity!" he said. "Here is the prospectus. There are the names of +the directors. You will consider. It has never injured any one to take +advantage of his position. The puritans, in an age of trickery, are +idiots; I say so. What I propose to you surprises you. To place your +name beside that of Monsieur Pichereau or Monsieur Numa de Baranville! +It is as simple as saying good-day. Perhaps you think then that you will +be the only one? They all do it, all those who are extravagant and +shrewd. It is a matter of coquetting in these days over a hundred-sou +piece! Come, I will wager that Monsieur Montyon would not mince +matters--especially if he had transferable paper in circulation!" + +"You know that?" said Vaudrey, turning pale. + +"Ah! I know many others in like condition! Come, no false modesty! It is +a matter of business only! I tell you again, I have many other cases. +All this is in order to have the pleasure of offering you certificates +for attendance fees. I will open a credit for you of two hundred +thousand francs, if you wish. We will arrange matters afterwards." + +"I will leave you these declarations of faith!" added Molina, showing +the prospectus of the gas undertaking. "Fear nothing! It is not more +untruthful than the others! It is unnecessary to show me out. _A la +revista!_" + +He disappeared abruptly, Vaudrey hearing the floor of the hall creak +under this man's hippopotamus feet, and the unhappy Sulpice who had spun +so many, such glorious and grand dreams, dreams of liberty, freedom and +virtue, civic regeneration, reconstructed national morals and character, +the sacredness of the hearth and the education of the conscience; this +Vaudrey, bruised by life, overthrown by his vices, was there under the +soft light of his lamp, looking with staring eye, as a being who wishes +to die contemplates the edge of an abyss, looking at that printed paper +soliciting subscriptions, beating the big drum of the _promoter_ in +order to entrap the vast and ever-credulous horde. + +His name! To put his name there! The name of Vaudrey that he had dreamed +of reading at the foot of so many noble, eternal and reforming laws, to +inscribe it upon that paper beneath so many cunning names, jugglers, +habitual drainers of the public cash-box. To fall to that! To do that! + +To lend himself? + +To sell himself! + +And why not sell himself? Who would discharge this bill of exchange? The +Gochard paper! The debt of the past! The price of the nights spent with +Marianne! The hundred thousand francs for that girl's kisses! + +Sulpice felt in the weakness increased by a growing fever, that his +self-possession was leaving him. All his ideas clashed confusedly. Amid +the chaos, only one clear idea remained; a hundred and sixty thousand +francs had to be found. Where were they to be found? Yes, where? Through +Molina, who offered him two hundred thousand! This open credit seemed to +him like an opened-up placer in which he had only to dig with his nails. +The cunning and thick voice of the Hebrew banker echoed in Sulpice's +ears: "They all do it!" It was not so difficult to give his name, or to +_hire_ it, as Salomon said. Who the devil would notice it at a time when +indifference passes over scandals as the sea covers the putrid +substances on the shore and washes them with its very scum? + +"They all do it!" + +No, despite the irony of the handler of money, there are some +consciences that refuse to yield: and then, what then?--Vaudrey had +desired virtue of a different kind and other morals! Ah! how he had +suffered the poison to penetrate him; even to his bones! How Marianne +had deformed and moulded him at her fancy, and he still thought of her +only with unsatisfied longings for her kisses and ardor! Ah! women! +Woman! Yes, indeed, yes, woman was the great source of moral weakness +and inactivity. She used politics in her own way, in destroying +politicians. If he had only left office with head erect and not dragging +the chain-shot of debt! But that bill of exchange! Who would pay that? + +"Eh! Molina, _parbleu!_ Molina! Molina!" + +He was right, too, that triumphant Jew with his insolent good humor. It +is an absurd thing, after all, to be prudish and to thrust away the dish +that is offered you. To be rich is, in fact, quite as good as to be +powerful! Money remains! That is the only real thing in the world! It +would be a fine sight to see a man refuse the opportunity to make a +fortune, and to refuse it--why? For a silly, conscientious scruple. And +after all, business was the very life of modern society. This Molina, +circulating his money, was as useful as many others who circulate +ideas. + +"His Algerian gas is a work of civilization just like any other!" + +Urged by the necessity of escaping from that debt that strangled him +like a running noose, Sulpice gradually arrived at argumentative +sophistries, which were but capitulations to his own probity, cowardly +arrangements with his own conscience. His name? Well, he would turn it +into money since it was worth a gold ingot! The journalist who sells his +thought, the artist who sells his marble, the writer who sells his +experiences and his recollections, equally sell their names and for +money, the flesh of their flesh. Like a living answer and a remorse, he +saw the lean face and white moustache of Ramel, who was seated at the +window, breathing the warm rays of the sun, in the little room on Rue +Boursault, but he answered, speaking aloud: + +"Well, what?--Ramel is a saint, a hero!--But I am no saint. I am a man +and I will live!" + +Somewhat angered, he took the prospectus that Molina had left him and +rereading it again and again, he relapsed into a sitting posture and +with haggard eyes scanned the loud-swelling lines of that commercial +announcement, seeking therein some pretext for accepting. For he would +accept, that was done. Nothing more was to be said, his conscience +yielded. He was inclined to laugh. + +"Still another victim caught and floored by Molina the _Tumbler!_" + +He remained there, terrified at the prospect of the quasi-association he +had determined on and by his complicity with a jobber of questionable +business. + +With his eye fixed upon this solicitation for capital, wherein were the +words which would formerly have repelled him: _joint stock company_, +_capital stock_, _public subscription_, _subscription certificate_, and at +the head of which he was about to inscribe his name as one of the +directors, at the foot of a capitulation, as it were, Sulpice had not +seen, standing in the doorway of his half-lighted study, a woman in +travelling costume, who stopped for a moment to look at the unfortunate, +dejected man within the shade of the lamp which made him look more bald +than he was, then advanced gently toward him, coughing slightly--for she +did not dare to call him by his name or touch him with her gloved +hand--to warn him that she was there. + +Vaudrey turned round abruptly, instinctively pushing aside Molina's +prospectus, as if he already felt some shame in holding it in his hands. + +He flushed as he recognized Adrienne. + +The young woman's reserved attitude showed absolute firmness. She came +to say adieu, she was about to leave. + +He had not even the energy to keep her. He was afraid of an unbending +reply that would have been an outrage. + +"Do you intend to become associated with Molina?" Adrienne asked in a +clear voice, as she looked at Sulpice, who had risen. + +"What! Molina?" he stammered. + +"Yes, oh! he understands business. On leaving, he called on me. He +thought that I had still sufficient influence over you to urge you, as +he says, to make your fortune. He told me that you were in want of +money, and after having been sharp enough to try the husband, he offered +me, as you might give a commission to a courtesan, I do not know what +emerald ornament, if I would advise you to accept his proposals!--That +gentleman does not know the people with whom he is dealing!" + +"Wretch!" said Vaudrey. "He did that?" + +"And I thanked him," Adrienne replied calmly. "I did not know that you +had debts and that, in order to pay them, you had come so near accepting +the patronage of such a man. He told me so and he rendered me and you a +service." + +"Me?" + +Vaudrey snatched up the prospectus of the Algerian gas and angrily tore +it in pieces. + +"We shall probably not see each other again," said Adrienne, in a firm +voice that contrasted strangely with her gentle grace; "but I shall +never forget that I bear your name and that being mine, I will ever +honor it." + +She handed Sulpice a document. + +"Here is a power of attorney to Monsieur Beauvais, my notary. All that +you need of my dowry to free yourself from liabilities is yours. I do +not wish to know why you have incurred debts, I am anxious only to know +that you have paid them, and my signature provides you with the means to +do so." + +Dejected, his heart burning, and his sobs rising, Sulpice uttered a loud +cry as he rushed toward her: + +"Adrienne!" + +She withdrew her hand slowly while he was trying to seize it. + +"You have nothing to thank me for," she said. "I am a partner, saving, +as I best can, the honor of the house. That association is better than +Molina's." + +"Adieu," she added bitterly. + +"Are you going--? Going away?" asked Sulpice, trying to give to his +entreaty something like an echo of the love of the former days. + +"Whose fault is it?" replied the young woman, in a voice as chilly as +steel. + +She was no longer the Adrienne of old, the little timid provincial with +blushing cheek and trembling gesture. Sorrow, the most terrible of +disillusions, had hardened and, as it were, petrified her. Vaudrey felt +that to ask forgiveness would be in vain. Time only could soften that +poor woman, obstinately unbending in her grief. He needed but to observe +her attitude and cutting tones to fully realize that. + +"It is quite understood," she continued, treating this question of her +happiness as if she were cutting deep into her flesh and severing the +tenderest fibres of her being, but without trembling,--"it is quite +understood, is it not, that we shall make no scene or scandal? We are +separated neither judicially nor even in appearance. We live apart by +mutual consent, far from each other, without anything being known by +outsiders of this definitive rupture." + +"Adrienne!" Sulpice repeated, "it is impossible, you will not leave!" + +"Oh!" she said. "I gave myself and I have taken myself back. Your +entreaties will not now alter my determination. I am eager to leave +Paris. It seems to me that I have regained myself and that I escape from +falsity, lies, and infamy, and from a swarm of insects that crawl over +my body!--I bid you farewell, and farewell it is!" + +"Well, let it be so!" exclaimed Vaudrey. "Go! But if it is a stranger +who leaves me, I will accept nothing from her. Here is the authority. +Will you take it back?" + +"I? No, I will not take it back! If you desire me to be worthy of the +name that you have given me, keep it honored, at least, in the sight of +the world, since to betray a woman, to mock and insult her, is not +dishonoring. I alone have the right to save you from shame. Do not deny +me the privilege that I claim. I do not desire that the man who has been +my husband should descend to the questionable intrigues of a Molina. +You have outraged me enough, do not impose this last insult on me!" + +"For the last time, adieu!" + +She went out, and he allowed her to disappear, overwhelmed by this +living mourning of a faith. She fled and he allowed her to descend the +stairway, followed by her femme de chambre. She entered the carriage +that was waiting for her below, in Rue Chaussee-d'Antin, but he had not +the courage, hopeless as he was, to follow the carriage whose rumbling +he heard above the noise of the street as it rolled away more quickly +and more heavily than the others, and it seemed to him that its wheels +had crushed his bosom. + +"Ah! what a wretch I have been!" he said as he struck his knee with his +closed fist. "How unhappy I am! Adrienne!" + +He rose abruptly, as if moved by a spring, and bounded toward a window +which he threw wide open to admit the cold wind of this November +evening, and tried to distinguish among the many carriages that rolled +through the brownish mud, with their lighted lamps shining like so many +eyes, to discover, to imagine the carriage that was bearing Adrienne +away. He believed that he recognized it in a vehicle that was threading +its way, loaded with trunks, almost out of sight yonder. + +He leaned upon the window-sill, and like a shipwrecked sailor who sees a +receding ship, he called out, with a loud cry lost in the tempest of +that bustling and busy street: + +"Adrienne! Adrienne!" + +No reply! The carriage had disappeared in the distance, in the fog. + +For a moment, Sulpice remained there crushed but drawn by the noise of +the street, as if by some whirlpool in the deep sea. Had he been thrown +out and been dashed upon the pavements, he would have been happy. Only a +void seemed about him, and before him that black hollow in which moved +confusedly only strangers who in no way formed part of his life. + +This isolation terrified him. At last, he went downstairs in haste, +threw himself into a carriage and had himself driven to the railway, +intending to see Adrienne again. + +"Quickly! quickly! at your best speed!" + +The driver whipped up his horses and the carriage-windows clattered with +the noise of old iron. + +Vaudrey arrived too late. The train had left twenty minutes before. He +had reflected too long at his window. + +"Besides," he said to himself sadly, "she would not have forgiven me! +She will never forget!" + +Buried in the corner of the coach that took her away, and closing her +eyes, recalling all her past life, so cruelly ironical to-day, Adrienne, +disturbed by the noise and rolling of the train that increased her +feverish condition, felt her heart swell, and poor, broken creature +that she was, called all her strength to her aid to refrain from +weeping, from crying out in her grief. She was taking away, back to the +country, the half-withered Christmas roses received from Grenoble, and +in the morbid confusion of the ideas that clashed in her poor brain, she +saw once more Lissac's blanched face and heard Guy tell her again: "It +is because you are a virtuous woman that I love you!" + +"A virtuous woman! Does he know how to love as well as the others?" she +murmured, as she thought of Vaudrey whom she would never see again, and +whom she no longer loved. + +"See! I am a widow now, and a widow who will never love anyone, and who +will never marry again." + + + + +VIII + + +Alone in Paris now, a body without a soul, distracted, and the prey of +ennui, with sad and bitter regret for his wasted life, repeating to +himself that Adrienne, far away from him, would never forgive, and was +doubtless, at this moment, saying and saying again to herself in her +solitude at Grenoble, that these politicians, at least, owed her +divorce, Vaudrey, not knowing what to do after a weary day of troubled +rest, mechanically entered the Opera House to distract his eyes if not +his mind. + +They were rendering _Aida_ that evening, and a debutante had been +announced as a star. + +Sulpice Vaudrey, since Adrienne's departure,--already two weeks!--had +wandered about Paris like a damned soul when he did not attend the +Chamber, where he experienced the discomforts and the weakness of a +fallen man. Weary, disgusted and melancholy, Vaudrey took his seat in +the theatre to kill an evening. + +There was what was called in the language of a Paris editor, a _swell +house_. In front of the stage there was literally a shower of diamonds +and the boxes were gaily adorned. The _fauteuils_ were occupied by +Parisian glories and foreign celebrities. Not a stall in the +amphitheatre without its _celebrity_. Chance had placed in this +All-Paris gathering, Madame Sabine Marsy and Madame Gerson, the two +friends who detested each other. The pretty little Madame Gerson +occupied and filled with her prattle, the box of the Prefect of +Police--No. 30, in which Monsieur Jouvenet showed his churchwarden's +profile. She was talking aloud about her salon, her receptions, her +acquaintances. She was eclipsing Madame Marsy with her triumphs. At the +back of the box, Monsieur Gerson was sleeping, overcome by fatigue. +Madame Gerson laughed on observing Sulpice in the orchestra-stalls. + +"See! there is Monsieur Vaudrey! He still looks a little _beaten!_" she +said. + +And she told her friends, crowded in the box, leaning over her and +looking at the pretty, plump bosom of this little, well-made brunette, +how Vaudrey was to dine at her house on the very evening when he fell +from power. + +"Of course, he did not come!" she said. "I remember what Madame Marsy +advised me, one day,--she has passed through that in her time: one +should think of the invitations to dinner before dismissing a ministry! +Oh! it is tiresome; think of it!--One invites the Secretary of the +President of the Council to dinner. He is named on the card. He comes. +It is all over; he is no longer Secretary of the President, the +President of the Council is no longer President, there is no longer a +President, perhaps not even a Council; one should be certain of one's +titles and rank before accepting an invitation to dinner!" + +She laughed heartily and loud, and Madame Marsy, who was half dethroned, +fanned herself nervously in her box, or levelled her glass at some one +in the audience, affecting a little disdainful manner toward her fair +neighbor. A friendship turned to acid. + +Vaudrey, looking fatigued and abstracted, sat in his stall during the +entr'acte. He looked unconsciously about the theatre and still felt +surprised at not receiving salutations and bows, as formerly. He felt +that he was becoming a waif. Bah! he consoled himself with the thought +that the human race is thus constructed: everything is in success, he +gets most who offers most. Why then trouble about it? + +His eyes followed the movement of his glass and one after another he saw +Madame Marsy, Jouvenet, Madame Gerson, so many living and exceedingly +taunting recollections, when suddenly Sulpice trembled, shaken by a +keener and almost angry feeling as his glance was directed to a box +against the dark-red of which two faces were boldly outlined: those of +Rosas and Marianne. + +He was excited and unpleasantly piqued. + +There before him he saw, between two large pillars, bearing gigantic, +gilded masts that seemed to mock at him, the woman whom he had adored +and the sight of whom still tore his heart. Pale and dressed in a white +gown, she was leaning toward Rosas in a most adorable attitude, with her +fair hair half-falling on her white shoulders--those shoulders that he +still saw trembling under his kisses, those shoulders on which he might +have pressed his burning lips and his teeth. + +That livid beauty, strangely adorable, with her hair and ears dazzling +with jewels, stood clearly out against the background of the box in +which, like an enormous Cyclopean eye, appeared the round, ground glass +let into the door, forming a nimbus of light around Marianne's brow. +Paler than her, with a sickly but smiling countenance, Rosas showed his +bloodless, pale, Spanish face beside that of Marianne, as tragic looking +as a portrait by Coello. His tired-looking, pensive, thin face was +resting on his hand, which through the opera-glass looked a transparent +hand of wax, on which an enormous emerald ring flashed under the +gaslight. Monsieur de Rosas did not move. + +She, on the contrary, at times inclined toward him, bringing her mouth +close to the Castilian's ear, standing out against his reddish beard as +if detached therefrom, and she whispered to Rosas words that Vaudrey +surmised, and which caused a spark of feverish delight to lighten up +Jose's sad eyes. As she leaned back tilting her chair, her satin corsage +below the bust was hidden from Sulpice by the edge of the box and he saw +only her face, neck and white shoulders, and she seemed to him to be +quite naked, the lines of her serpentine body sharply marked by the red +line of the velvet border. And with his greedy glance he continued to +trace the curves of that exquisite torso, the back that he had pressed, +all the being moulded by voluptuousness, that had been his. + +This was the vanishing of his last dream! This love gone, this deception +driven into his heart like a knife, his last faith mocked at, insulted, +and branded with its true name, _folly_, he felt as if a yawning chasm +had been opened in him. Life was over! He was old now and he had wasted, +yes, wasted his happiness in playing at youth. He had believed himself +loved! Loved! Imbecile that he was! + +He felt himself urged by a strong temptation to go to that box and open +its door and cry out to that man who had not yet given his name to that +woman: + +"You do not know her! She is debauchery and falsehood itself!" + +It seemed to Vaudrey that at times a bearded face, surmounting a white +cravat, appeared behind Rosas and Marianne: the haughty face of Uncle +Simon. + +While the throng of Egyptians filed on the stage, Sulpice endeavored to +turn away his thoughts and remove his glances from that group that +attracted him. He still, however, looked at it, in spite of himself, and +voluntarily wounded his own heart. + +Marianne did not seem to have even noticed him. + +The curtain fell and he wandered into the wings, less to be there than +to escape that irritating sight. In breathing that atmosphere of a +theatre, he experienced a strange sensation that pained and consoled him +at the same time. The scene-shifters were rolling back the illuminating +apparatus pierced with light, and dragged to the rear the huge white +sphinxes and the immense canvas on which the palm-trees were outlined +upon a blue sky. Sulpice felt the cruelly ironical sensation of finding +himself, disheartened and defeated, once more on the very boards where +he had entered the first time, smiling, swelling with joy, saluting and +saluted and hearing on every side the same murmur, sweet as a May +zephyr: + +"Monsieur le Ministre." + +It was the same scene, the same dress-coats upon the same luminous +boards, the same electric rays that fell around him in the hour of his +accession, creating the same vulgar aureole. Some firemen crossed the +stage slowly and with a wearied expression made their examinations; some +water-carriers were sprinkling the parquet, while others were brushing +away the dust. And as if these common duties interested Sulpice, he +looked on with a vacant expression, as if his thoughts had taken wing. + +Suddenly, in the centre of a group, with his hat on, escorted by bending +men, whose lips expressed flattery, Sulpice recognized Lucien Granet, +who in the dazzling triumph of his new kingdom, crossed and recrossed +the stage, distributing here and there patronizing bows. + +The coarse Molina accompanied the new minister, laughing in a loud tone +like the sound of a well-filled cash-box suddenly shaken. + +Vaudrey felt just as if he had received a blow full in the chest. + +He recalled his own meeting as a successful man with Pichereau the +beaten one, on these very boards and almost in the same place, and in +order to avoid having to endure the friendly ironical hand-shake that +Pichereau was approaching him to give--the hand-shake formerly given to +Pichereau--he quickly hid himself behind a wing, receiving as he did so, +a blow, accompanied with a: _Pardon, monsieur_, from a workman who was +pushing along a piece of scenery, and a: _What a clumsy fellow!_ from a +little danseuse, the tip of whose pink slipper he had unwittingly grazed +with his heel. + +He turned to the danseuse to apologize, when he perceived a young girl, +all in pink, whose blue eyes looked frightened and her cheeks reddened +when she recognized Vaudrey. It was Marie Launay, whom he had seen in +the greenroom the previous year, who had not yet scored a _success_, +while he was _retired_. + +"Oh! I did not recognize you," she said. "I beg your pardon, Monsieur le +Ministre!" + +He wished to make some reply; but this title used by the young girl, +ignorant of the political change, grated on his heart like the +scratching of a nail and he saw on the other side of the stage, reaching +the house by the communicating door, Lucien Granet, surrounded by his +staff, and followed by the eternal cortege of powerful ones, among whom +Warcolier was talking loudly, and Molina the Tumbler was recognizable by +his enormous paunch and loud laugh. + +"Perhaps Madame Marsy has asked that this Granet be presented to her," +thought Vaudrey as he mockingly recalled how Guy de Lissac ran after him +there in order to conduct him to the fashionable woman's box. + +How long it was since then! + +Sabine Marsy was dethroned. And he!-- + +He felt a friendly tap on the shoulder as he was moving away, and +turning around he saw Warcolier who, having seen him in the distance, +doubtless came to him to enjoy the simple pleasure of treating him +patronizingly, he who had so long called him _Monsieur le Ministre_. + +"Well, my dear Vaudrey, what is the news?" said Warcolier, bearing his +head high and smiling with a silly, but an aggressively benign +expression, with the superior tone of satisfied fools. + +"Nothing!" said Sulpice. "I think Verdi's music is superb!" + +"Oh! a little Wagnerian," Warcolier replied, repeating what he had +heard. "But what of politics?" + +"Ah! politics concerns you now!" + +"Well! why," Warcolier replied, "that goes on well. There is a little +relaxation! a ministry more--more--" + +"More homogeneous!" said Vaudrey, in a slightly mocking tone. + +"Exactly. And, after all, the duty of every good citizen is to defend +the government under which we live." + +Ah! assuredly, Vaudrey considered that his former Secretary of State, +now become the vassal of Granet, displayed a rather ridiculous +assurance. He smiled as if he would have laughed in his face and turned +his back upon him. + +Warcolier was not annoyed, for he felt certain that he had angered the +former minister, and he was delighted. It was a kick from an ass. The +witticism of a fool. + +Vaudrey regained his place, much dissatisfied at having come and furious +at this pretentious imbecile, when, on leaving the wings, he ran against +Lissac who was entering a sort of hall where Louis sat writing the names +of the entrances on the sheet. + +Guy flushed slightly on seeing him. + +"In order to see you, one has to meet you here," said Sulpice. "Why have +you not called on me? Is it because I am no longer a minister?" + +"That would be a reason for seeing me more frequently," said Lissac. +"But it is not that. What do you want me to tell you? You know my +sentiments. I don't care to become a bore, as it is called, or a +ceaseless prater of morality, which is the same thing. Besides, morality +to me is something like the Montyon prize to a harlot! Then, too, I am +keeping in my corner and I shall stick to it hereafter closer than ever. +I have put the brake on. I am getting old, and I shall bury myself in +some suburb and look after my rheumatism." + +In Lissac's tone there was an unexpected melancholy. + +"Then you will not call on me again?" + +"What is the use of worrying you?--Reflect for yourself, my good man! +You don't need me to emphasize your blunders. By the way, you know, our +mad mistress?--She is in the theatre." + +"I have seen her!" said Vaudrey, turning very pale. + +"She is not yet a duchess, but that will be patched up in four days. If +one were only a rascal, how one could punish the hussy! But what is the +use? And this devilish Rosas, who is mad enough over her to tie himself +to her and to overlook everything he ought to know, would be capable of +marrying her all the same! Much good may it do him!" + +"But, tell me," continued Lissac, whose cutting tone suddenly became +serious, "have you read the paper?" + +"No! What is there in it?" + +They were then in the corridor of the Opera, and heard the prelude to +the curtain-raising. Guy took the _Soir_ from his pocket and handed it +to Vaudrey: + +"Here, see!--That poor Ramel!--You were very fond of him, were you not?" + +"Ramel!" + +Vaudrey had no need to read. He knew everything as soon as Guy showed +him the paper and mentioned Denis's name in a mournful tone. + +Dead!--He died peacefully in his armchair near the window, as if falling +asleep.--"The death is announced," so read the paragraph, "of one of the +oldest members of the Parisian press, Monsieur Denis Ramel, who was +formerly a celebrated man and for a long time directed the _Nation +Francaise_, once an important journal, now no longer in existence."--Not +a word beyond the brief details of his death. No word of praise or +regret, merely the commonplace statement of a fact. Vaudrey thought it +was a trifling notice for a man who had held so large a place in the +public eye. + +"What do you think of it?" he said to Lissac. "People are ungrateful." + +"Why, what would you have? Why didn't he write operettas?" + +They parted after exchanging almost an ordinary grasp of the hand, +though, perhaps, somewhat sad. Sulpice wished to cast a last look at +Rosas's box. Marianne was standing, her outline clearly defined against +the brightly-lighted background of the box. She was holding a saucer in +her hand, eating an ice. He saw her once more as she stood near the +buffet at Madame Marsy's, stirring her sherbet, a silver-gilt spoon +smoothly gliding over her tongue. He closed his eyes, and with a nervous +start quickly descended the grand stairway, where he found himself +alone. + +In order to forget Marianne, he turned his thoughts to Ramel. + +Denis had been suffering for a long time. He smiled as he felt the hour +of his departure draw near. He wished to disappear without stir, and in +a civil way as he said, without attracting attention, _a l'Anglaise_. +Poor man! his wish was accomplished. + +Vaudrey threw himself into a carriage and was driven to Batignolles. On +the way he thought of the eternal antitheses of Parisian life: the news +of the death of a friend communicated to him at the Opera while a +waltz-tune was being played! + +And thinking to himself: + +"_From the Opera to the Opera!_ That, moreover, is the history of my +ministry--and that of the Granet administration, probably!" + +The portress at Rue Boursault led him to Denis Ramel's apartment. Lying +on his bed with a kindly smile on his face, the old journalist seemed +as if asleep. The cold majesty of death gave a look of power to his +face. One might almost believe at times, from the scintillating light +placed near his bony brow, that its rigid muscles moved. + +Denis Ramel! the sure guide of his youth and his counsellor through +life! He recalled his entry on public life, his arrival in Paris, the +first articles brought into the old editorial rooms of the _Nation +Francaise_! If for a moment he had been one of the heads of the State, +it was due to the man stretched out before him now! + +He gently stooped over the corpse and pressed a farewell kiss on the +dead man's brow. + +As he turned round, he saw a man whom he had not at first seen and who +had risen. + +The man was very pale and greeted him with a timid air. + +Vaudrey recognized Garnier, the man whom he had seen previously at +Ramel's, a cough-racked, patient, dying man. + +The consumptive had nevertheless outlived the old man. + +"It is good of you to have come, monsieur," said the workman. "He loved +you dearly." + +"He died suddenly then?" + +"Yes, and quite alone, while reading a book. He was found thus. They +thought he was sleeping. It is all over, he is to be buried to-morrow. +Will you come, monsieur?--I did not know who you were when--you know--I +said--In fact, it is kind--let us say no more about it--I beg your +pardon--There will be a vast gathering at Denis Ramel's funeral, if +there are present only a quarter of those whom he has obliged." + +Vaudrey was heartbroken the next day. Behind Ramel's coffin, not a +person followed. Himself, Garnier, and one or two old women from the +house on Rue Boursault, who did not go all the way to the cemetery of +Saint-Ouen because it was too far, were all that were present. At the +grave Sulpice Vaudrey stood alone with the grave-digger and the workman +Garnier. They buried Ramel in a newly-opened part close to the foot of a +railway embankment. + +For years Ramel had been forgotten, had even forgotten himself, he had +let ambitious men pass beyond him, ingrates succeed and selfish men get +to the top! He no longer existed! And those very men who had entreated +him and called him _dear master_ in the old days, soliciting and +flattering him, now no longer knew his name. Had he disappeared, or did +he still live, that forerunner, a sort of Japanese idol, an ancient, a +useless being who had known neither how to make his fortune nor his +position, while building up that of others? Nobody knew or cared. +Occasionally when circumstances called for it, they laughed at this +romantic figure in politics, living like a porter, poor, lost, and +buried under a mass of unknown individuals, after having made ministers +and unmade governments. Yet, at the news of his death, not one of those +who were indebted to him for everything, not a single politician who was +well in the saddle, and for whom he had held the stirrup, not a comedian +of the Chambers or the theatre who had pleaded with him, urged and +flattered him, was to be found there to pay the most ordinary respects +of memory to the man who had disappeared. That fateful solitude, added +to a keen winter's wind, appeared to Sulpice to be a cruel abandonment +and an act of cowardice. Two men followed the cortege of that maker of +men! + +"Follow journalism and you make the fame of others," said Vaudrey, +shaking his head. + +"After all," answered Garnier, "there are dupes in every trade, and they +are necessarily the most honest." + +When this man, who had been a minister, left the grave above which the +whistling trains passed, a freezing rain was falling and he passed out +of the cemetery in the company of the poor devil who coughed so sadly +within the collar of his overcoat that was tightly drawn up over his +comforter. + +Before leaving him, Vaudrey, with a feeling of timidity, desired to ask +him if work was at least fairly good. + +"Thanks!" replied Garnier. "I have found a situation--And then--" he +shook his head as he pointed out behind the black trees and the white +graves, the spot where they had lowered Ramel--"One has always a place +when all is over, and that perhaps is the best of all!" + +He bowed and Vaudrey left in a gloomy mood. It seemed to him that his +life was crumbling away, that he was sowing, shred by shred, his flesh +on the road. The black hangings of Ramel's coffin--and he smiled sadly +at this new irony--recalled to him the bills of the upholsterers that he +still owed for the furnishing of that fete at the ministry on the last +day of his power and his happiness. The official decorations of Belloir +and the Gobelins were not sufficient for him. He had desired more modern +decorations. He gave the coachman the upholsterer's address, Boulevard +des Capucins. He hardly dared to enter and say: "I have come to pay the +account of the furnishing supplied at the ministry!" It still seemed +like a funeral bill he was paying. This upholsterer's account, paid for +forgotten display, seemed to him a sort of mortuary transaction. + +When he paid the upholsterer, the latter seemed to wear a cunning smile. + +On finding himself again outside, he felt a sensation of relief; being +cold, he was inclined to walk with a view to warming his chill blood. + +On hearing his name spoken by some one, he turned round and perceived +before him his compatriot Jeliotte, the friend of his childhood, the +comrade, who, with a smile, cordially extended his hands toward him. + +"I told you that you would always find me when I should not appear +before you as a courtier! Well, then, here I am," said Jeliotte. "Now +you may see me as much as you please!" + +"Ah!" said Vaudrey. + +Jeliotte took his arm. + +"Probably you are going to the Chamber?" + +"Yes, exactly." + +"Well, I will accompany you!--Ah, since you are no longer minister, my +dear friend, and that one does not appear to be a flatterer or a seeker +of patronage, one can speak to you--You have faults enough!--You are too +confident, too moderate--It is necessary to have a firm hand--And then +that could not last. Those situations are all very fine but they are too +easily destroyed!--They are like glass, my old friend!--A place is +wanted for everybody, is it not?--Bah! must I tell you?--Why, you are +happier! I like you better as it is!" + +Vaudrey felt strongly inclined to shake off this pretentious ninny who +was clinging to his arm. + +"That is like me!" continued Jeliotte. "I like my friends better when +they are down! What would you have? It is my generous nature. By the +way, do you know that the reason I have not seen you before is because I +have not been in Paris! I have returned from Isere!" + +"Ah!" said Vaudrey, thinking of Adrienne. + +"Well, you know, I have still some good news for you. If you have had +enough of politics, you can retire at the approaching election!" + +"How?" asked Sulpice. + +"Why, Thibaudier is stirring up Grenoble. He has got the whole city with +him. He is very much liked and is a model mayor. He is a very +_mere_--mother--that mayor!--Jeliotte laughed heartily, believing that +he was funny.--If there is a list balloted for, and there certainly will +be, Thibaudier will head the list. If they had maintained the _scrutin +d'arrondissement_, he would have been capable of passing muster, all the +same!" + +"Against me?" + +"Against you. Thibaudier is very popular!--And as firm as a rock!--He +thinks you moderate, too moderate, as everybody else does!" + +"He?--He was a member of the Plebiscite Committee under the Empire!" + +"Exactly! He is an extreme Republican, just as he was an extreme +Bonapartist. Oh! Thibaudier is a man, there is no concession with him. +Never! He is always the same. He will beat you. Moreover, in Isere, they +want a homogeneous representation--" + +"Again!" said Vaudrey, who felt that he was pursued by this word. + +After all, what did Thibaudier matter to him, or the deputation, the +election or politics? Denis Ramel had sounded its depths in his grave in +the cemetery of Saint-Ouen. + +"Let us drop Thibaudier. By the way," said Jeliotte, "I saw your wife at +Grenoble." + +Vaudrey grew pale. + +He again repeated: "Ah!" + +"She is greatly changed. She doesn't leave the house of her uncle, the +doctor, nor does she receive any one." + +"Is she sick, then?" + +"Yes, slightly." + +"And you are separated, then?" + +"No," replied Sulpice. + +Jeliotte smiled. + +"Ah! joker, I understand!--Your wife was too strict!--Bless me, a +provincial! Bah! that will come right! And if it doesn't, why, you will +be free, that's all! But, say, then, if you are not re-elected, you will +rejoin her at Grenoble. Oh! your clients will return to you. You are +highly esteemed as an advocate, but as a minister, I ought to say--" + +"I shall be re-elected," said Vaudrey, in a decisive tone, so as to cut +short Jeliotte's interminable phrases. + +He was exceedingly unnerved. This man's stupidity would exasperate him. +He would never come across any but subjects of irritation or +disheartenment. He felt inclined to seek a quarrel with some one. He +would have liked to wrench Marianne's wrist with his fingers. + +As he entered the hall leading to the assembly, he unwittingly stumbled +against a gentleman who was walking rapidly and without saluting him, +although he thought that he recognized him. + +"Yet I know him!" + +He had not gone three steps before he perfectly recalled this eternal +lobbyist, always bending before him and clinging to the armchairs of the +antechambers, like an oyster to a rock, and whom the messengers, +accustomed to his soliciting, bowing and scraping for years past, called +_Monsieur Eugene_--out of courtesy. + +It was too much! And, in truth, this strange fellow's impoliteness was +ill-timed. + +Sulpice suddenly turned round, approached Renaudin, and said to him +sharply: + +"You bowed more obsequiously to me a short time since, monsieur! It +seems to me that you were in the ministerial antechambers every +morning!" + +He expected a haughty reply from Renaudin, and that this man would have +compensated him for the others. + +_Monsieur Eugene_ smiled as he answered: + +"Why, I am still there, monsieur!" + +Vaudrey looked at him with a stupefied air, then in an outburst of +anger, as if he conveyed in the reply that he hurled at this +contemptible fellow, all the projects of his future revenge upon the +fools, the knaves, the dull valets and the ungrateful horde, he said, +boldly: + +"Well, you will salute me again, for I shall return there." + +He turned on his heels away from this worthless fellow, and entered the +Chamber. + +He heard an outburst of bravos; a perfect tempest of enthusiasm reached +him. He looked on and bit his lips. + +Lucien Granet was in the tribune, and the majority were applauding him. + + + + +IX + + +Marianne Kayser had the good taste, and perhaps the good sense not to +desire a solemnized marriage. It mattered little to her if she entered +her duchy surreptitiously, provided she was sovereign there. She would +have time later to assume a lofty air under her ducal coronet; +meanwhile, she would act with humility while wearing the wreath of +orange blossoms. She had discharged Jean and Justine with considerable +presents, thinking it undesirable to keep any longer about her people +who knew Vaudrey. She had advised Justine to marry Jean. + +"Marriage is amusing!" she had said. + +"Madame is very kind," answered Justine, "but she sees, herself, that it +is better to wait sometimes. There is no hurry, one does not know what +may happen." + +The future duchess showed that she was but little flattered by the +girl's reflections. It was scarcely worth while not to put on airs even +with servants, to meet such fools who become over-familiar with you +immediately. So, in future, she would strive to be not such a +kind-hearted girl. She would keep servants at a distance. They would +see. Meanwhile, she was delighted to have made a clean sweep in the +house, she could now lie to Rosas as much as she pleased. + +Besides, the duke, who was madly in love and whose desire was daily +whetted by Marianne, would have been capable, as Lissac said, of +accepting everything and forgetting all, so that he might clasp the +woman in his arms. She held him entirely in her grasp, under the +domination of her intoxicating seductiveness, skilfully granting by a +kiss that kindled the blood in Jose's veins the promise of more ardent +caresses. In this very exercise, she assumed a passionate tenderness +like a courtesan accustomed to easy defeat who resists her very +disposition so that she may not be too soon vanquished. She had +ungovernable impulses that carried her toward Rosas as to an unknown +pleasure. + +The ivory-like pallor of this red-haired man with sunken eyes and +trembling lips, almost cold when she sought them under his tawny +moustache, pleased her. She sometimes said to him that under his gentle +manner he had the appearance of a tiger. "Or of a cat, and that pleases +me, for I am myself of that nature. Ah! how I love you!" She felt +herself tremble with fear of that being whom she felt that she had +conquered and who was entirely hers, but she was strangely troubled in +divining some of his secret thoughts. + +She was in a hurry to have the marriage concluded. Secretly if it were +desired, but legally and positively. She dreaded Jose's reawakening, as +it were. She did not know how, perhaps an anonymous letter, a chance +meeting with Guy, an explanation, who knows? + +"Although, after all," she thought, "I have been foolish to trouble +myself about this Guy. Word threats, that's all!" + +The duke had treated her as a virtuous girl, requiring her to declare +that she had never loved any but him, or that, at least, no living +person had the right to say that he had possessed her. She had sworn all +that he desired, saying to Uncle Kayser: "Oaths like that are like +political promises, they bind one to nothing!" + +The uncle began to entertain an extravagant admiration for his "little +Marianne." There is a woman, sure enough! Wonderful elegance! She had +promised to have a studio built for him, in which he could, instead of +painting, take his ease, stretched on a divan, smoking his pipe, and +pass his days in floating to the ceiling his theories of high and moral +art! An ideal picture! + +He also was in favor of prompt action in respect to the marriage. As +little noise as possible. The least hitch and all was lost. What a pity! + +"Do you wish me to tell you? It seems to me that you are walking to the +mayor's office on eggs!" + +"Be easy," Marianne replied, laughing heartily, "there will be none +broken." + +The marriage was celebrated. At last! as Kayser said. It was a formality +rather than a ceremony. Marianne, ravishingly beautiful, was exultant at +realizing her dream. Her pale complexion took on tints of the bloom of +the azalea pierced by the rays of the sun. Never had Rosas seen her so +lovely. How stupidly he had acted formerly in yielding to appearances +and flying from her, instead of telling her that he loved her. He had +lost whole years of love that he would never recover, even in the +blissful fever of this union. Those joys, formerly disdained, were, +alas! never to be restored. + +Ah! how he would love her now, adore her and keep her with him as his +living delight! They would travel; in three days they would set out for +Italy. The baggage already filled the house in the Avenue Montaigne, +their nuptial mansion. Marianne would take away all the souvenirs that +she had preserved in the grisette's little room at Rue Cuvier, where +Rosas had so often seen her and where he had said to her: "I love you!" + +"People took their penates," she said, "but I take my fetishes!" + +Rosas was wild with joy. The possession of this woman, sought after as +mistress, but more intensely ardent than a mistress, with her outbursts +of tears and kisses, threw him into ecstasies and possessed him with +distracting joy. Something within him whispered, as in the days of early +manhood, at the ecstatic hour of sunrise. Already he wished to be on +the way to Italy with Marianne, far from the mire and mists of Paris. + +"These rain-soaked sidewalks on which the gaslight is reflected seem +gloomy to me," he said. "Let us seek the blue skies, Marianne, the +orange groves of Nice, the stars of Naples." + +She smiled. + +"The _blue_ again!" she thought. "They all desire it, then?" + +She desired to remain a few days longer in Paris, delighted to proclaim +her new name in its streets, its Bois and its theatres, where she had +been known in her sadness, displaying her desperate melancholy. It +seemed to her that, in her present triumph, she crushed both men and +things. What was Naples to her? She had not miserably dragged her +disillusions and her angers along the Chiaja. Florence might take her +for a duchess, as well as any other, but Paris, every corner of which +was familiar to her, and where every scene had been, as it were, a frame +for her follies, her hopes, her failures, her heartbreaks, her +deceptions, all her sorrows of an ambitious woman, which had made her +the daring woman that she was,--those boulevards, those paths about the +Lake, those proscenium boxes at the theatre, she would see them in her +triumph, as she had seen them in her untrammelled follies or in the +moments of her ruin and abandonment. + +"Two days more! One day more," she said. "After the first +representation at the Varietes, we will leave, are you willing?" + +"Ah! you Parisienne! Hungry Parisienne!" Jose replied. + +She looked at him with her gray eyes sparkling, and smiling. + +"The Varietes?--Don't you know the old rondel?--The one you hummed when +you were sick, you know?--It seems to me that I can hear it yet: + + Do you see yonder + That white house, + Where every Sunday + Under the sweet lilacs--" + +Uncle Kayser, ever prudent, advised a speedy departure. He feared he +scarcely knew what. He feared everything, "like Abner, and feared only +that." Every morning he dreaded seeing some indiscreet articles in the +papers respecting the Duke and the Duchesse de Rosas. + +"These journalists disregard, without scruple, the wall of private life! +It is a moral wall, however!" + +At last, they would leave in two days, so it was determined. Rosas had +wished to see Guy again for the last time. At Rue d'Aumale they informed +him that Monsieur de Lissac was travelling. The shutters of the +apartment were not, however, closed. The duke had for a moment been +tempted to insist on entering; then he withdrew and returned home +without analyzing too closely the feeling of annoyance that came over +him. The weather was splendid and dry. He returned on foot to Avenue +Montaigne, where he expected to find Marianne superintending her trunks. + +On entering the house, the doors of which were open, as at the hour of +packing and removing, giving the whole house the appearance of neglect +and flight, he was astonished to hear a man's voice, which was neither +that of Simon Kayser nor that of the valet, and evidently answering in a +violent tone the equally evident angry voice of Marianne. + +He did not know this voice, and the noise of a bell-rope hastily pulled, +in a fit of manifest anger, made him quicken his steps, as if he +instinctively felt that the duchess was in danger. + +In the shadow of a dull December evening, the house, with its disordered +appearance that resembled a sacking, assumed a sinister aspect. Jose +suddenly felt a sentiment of anguish. + +He quickly reached the salon, where Marianne was in a robe de chambre of +black satin, and was standing near the chimney with an expression of +anger in her eyes, holding the bell-rope, whose iron chain had struck +against the wall. + +Before her stood a young man with a heavy moustache, his hat tilted over +his ear, whom Monsieur de Rosas did not know. + +His manner was insolent and he looked thick-set in his black, +close-buttoned frock-coat. His style was vulgar, and, with his hands in +his pockets, he appeared both low and threatening. + +Marianne rang for a servant. She was flushed with rage. She became livid +on seeing Jose. + +"What is the matter, then?" asked Rosas coldly, as he stepped between +the duchess and the man. + +The man looked at him, took off his hat, and in a loud voice that was +itself odoriferous, said: + +"You are Monsieur le Duc de Rosas, doubtless?" + +"Yes," said Jose, "and may I know--?" + +"Nothing! it is nothing!" cried Marianne, running hastily to Jose and +taking his hands as if she desired to drag him away. + +"How, nothing?" the man then said, as he took a seat, holding his hat in +his hand and placing his fist on his left hip, in the attitude of a +fencing-master posing for an elegant effect. "To treat a gentleman as +you have just treated me; you call that nothing?" + +He turned to Rosas and said, as he saluted him with the airs of a _sub. +off._ on the stage: + +"Adolphe Gochard! You do not know me, Monsieur le duc?" + +"No," said Jose. + +"What do you want?--" + +"Ah! pardon me," said Gochard, as he interrupted Marianne. "You rang, +you wished to have the presence of the servants. You threatened to have +me pitched out of the door by the shoulders. Since you have called, +they shall hear me." + +The servants, hurrying to the spot, now appeared in the indistinct +shadow of the doorway. + +"Be off!" cried Marianne. + +"Why?" asked the duke severely, and astonished. + +"Because madame prefers that I should only tell you what I have to say +to you," said Gochard. "Ah! you claimed that I wanted to extort +blackmail. I, an old brigadier, extort blackmail? Well, so let it be! +Let us sing our little song!" + +"Monsieur," said the duke, who had become pallid and whose clenched +teeth showed beneath his red beard, "I do not know what Madame la +Duchesse de Rosas has said to you, or what you have dared to say to her, +but you will leave this place instanter!" + +"Is that so?" said the man, as he shrugged his shoulders, which were +like those of a suburban bully. + +"Just so!" + +"That would surprise me!" said Gochard. "But, _saperlipopette_, you are +not very polite in your set!" + +"Not very polite with boors! You are in my house!" + +"Oh! you can't teach me where I am!" said the Dujarrier's lover, with a +wink of his eye. "But, madame has been perching at my cost for a long +time at Rue Prony and it is upon my signature, yes, my own signature, if +you please, that she has obtained the means of renting the Hotel Vanda. +She has not so much to be impudent about!" + +"Your signature?--The Hotel Vanda?" + +The duke looked at Marianne, who, as white as a corpse, instead of +becoming indignant, entreated and tried to lead her husband away from +this man, as if they were in the presence of grave danger. + +"Ah! bless me!" cried Jose, "you will explain to me--!" + +"That is very easy!--I was in want of money. The Dujarrier furnished me +with a little for that affair. She is too niggardly. I ask madame for +some. She assumes a haughty tone, and, instead of comprehending that I +come as a friend, she threatens to have me put out of doors. Blackmail! +I?--I?--What nonsense!" + +A friend! This man dared to say before her who bore the name of Duchesse +de Rosas that he came to her as an intimate. This alcoholic braggart had +assisted Marianne in sub-renting, he knew not what hotel, from a +wanton!--Rue Prony!--Vanda!--What was there in common between these +names and that of the duchess? And the Dujarrier, that Dujarrier whose +manner of living was known to the Castilian, how had she become +associated with Marianne's life? + +Ah! since he had commenced, this Gochard would make an end of it. He +would tell everything! Even if he did not wish it, he would speak now. +Rosas, frightened himself, and terrified at the prospect of some +unknown baseness and doubtful transaction, felt Marianne's hand tremble +in his, and by degrees, as Gochard proceeded, the duke realized that +Marianne wished to get away and it was he who now retained her; holding +the young woman's wrist tightly within his fingers, he forcibly +prevented her from escaping, insisting that she should listen and hear +everything. + +"Ah! if you think that I am afraid of speaking," said Gochard, "you will +soon see!" + +And then with a sort of swaggering air like that of a fencing-master or +tippler, searching for some droll expressions, cowardly avenging himself +by jests ejected like so many streams of tobacco, against this woman who +had just insulted him, who spoke of blackmail and the police, and of +thrusting the miserable fellow out of doors, he told everything that he +knew; Marianne's neediness, her weariness, her loves, the Dujarrier +connection, the renting of the Hotel Vanda, the Vaudrey paper and its +renewals, his own foolishness as a too artless and tender, good sort of +fellow, relying on Claire Dujarrier's word, and not reserving to himself +so much per cent in the affair! + +Rosas listened open-mouthed, his ears tingling and his blood rushing to +his temples, while he sunk his fingers into Marianne's arms, she, +meanwhile, glaring at Gochard. + +When he had finished, she disengaged herself from Rosas's clutch by an +extreme effort, and ran to the rascal and spat in his face. + +He lifted his hand to her and said: + +"Ah! but!--" + +"Begone!" said the duke. "You wish to be paid?" + +"The money is not all. I demand respect!" replied Gochard, as he wiped +his cheek. + +He placed his card on the mantelpiece. + +"Adolphe Gochard! there is my address. Besides, Madame knows it. With +the pistol, the sabre, or the espadon, as you please! I am afraid of no +one." + +"You will be paid, you have been told, you shall be paid!" cried +Marianne, absolutely crazy and ready to tear him with her nails. "Be +off! ruffian! begone, thief!" + +"Fiddle-faddle!" replied Adolphe, as he replaced his hat on the side of +his bald head. "I have said what I have to say. I do not like to be made +a fool of!" + +He disappeared, waddling away like a strolling player uncertain of his +exit. + +Rosas did not even see him go. + +He had seized Marianne by both hands and was dragging her toward the +window, through which the daylight still entered, and convulsed with +rage he penetrated her eyes with his glance, his face looking still more +pallid, in contrast with his red beard. + +She was terrified. She believed herself at the point of death. She felt +that he was going to kill her. + +She suddenly fell on her knees. + +He still looked at her, leaning over her with the appearance of a +madman. + +"Vaudrey?--Vaudrey? The man whom I saw at your uncle's?--The man whom I +have elbowed with you?--Vaudrey?--This man was your lover, then?" + +She was so alarmed that she did not reply. + +"You have lied to me, then? But, tell me, wretched woman, have you not +lied to me?" + +"I loved you and I desired you!" said Marianne. + +"Nonsense!" said Rosas, in a strident, deep-chested voice. "You wanted +what that rascal wanted: money! You should have asked me for it! I would +have given you everything, all my fortune, all! But not my name! Not my +name!" + +He roughly repelled her. + +She remained on her knees. Her hands hung down and rested on the carpet. +She looked at it stupefied, hardly distinguishing its rose pattern. + +She was certain that she was about to die. Jose's sudden anger had the +fitfulness of a wild beast's. He crushed her with a terrible glance from +his bloodshot eyes. + +Then he began to laugh hysterically, like a young girl. + +"Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!--In a wanton's house yonder in Rue Prony, at +Vanda's! Vanda's! At Vanda's, in a harlot's bed, she gave herself, sold +herself!--A Rosas, for she is a Rosas! A Duchesse de Rosas now! Idiot! +Idiot that I am!" + +Marianne would have spoken, entreated, but fear froze her, coming over +her flesh and through her veins. She realized that an implacable +resolution possessed this trusting man. She found a master this time. + +"Jose!" said Marianne softly, in a timid voice. + +He drew himself up as if the mention of this name were an insult. + +"Come!" he said calmly, "so let it be. What is done, is done. So much +the worse for the fools! But listen carefully." + +This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame. + +His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists. + +"You are called the Duchesse de Rosas?--You were ambitious for that +name, you eagerly desired and struggled hard for that title, did you +not? Well, I will not, at least, suffer you to drag it like so many +others into intruders' salons, under ironical glances, before mocking +smiles and lorgnettes, in view of the papers, and into the gossip of the +Paris whose gutter-odor tempts you so strongly that you have not yet +been able to leave it. _Parbleu!_ you have another lover in it, I +wager!--Vaudrey!--Or Lissac and many others!--Is it as I say?" + +"I swear to you--" + +"Ah! you have lied to me, do not swear! We are about to leave. Not for +Italy. It is good for those who love each other. You do not know +Fuentecarral?--You are about to make its acquaintance. It is your +chateau now. Yours, yours, since you are a Rosas!" + +He again broke into laughter, such as a judge might indulge in who +should mock at a condemned man. + +"We are about to leave for Toledo. You asked me, one day, about the +castle in which I was born. It is a prison, simply a prison. It is +habitable nevertheless. But when one enters it, one rarely leaves it. +The device that you will bear is not very cheerful, but it is eloquent, +you know it: _Hasta la muerte!_--"Until death!"--What do you say about +it?--We shall be at Toledo in three days. There are Duchesses de Rosas +who will look on you, as you pass, over their plaited collars, and as +there were neither adulteresses nor courtesans among them, they will +probably ask what the Parisian is doing among them. Well, I will answer +them myself, that she is there to live out her life, you understand, +there, face to face with me, as you have _desired_, as you said, and no +one will have the right to sneer before the Duc de Rosas, who will see +no one. Oh! yes, I know that I belong to another period! I am +ridiculous, romantic!--I am just that!--You have awakened the half-Arab +that lurks in the Castilian. So much the worse for you if you have made +me remember that I am a Rosas!" + +She remained there, thunderstruck, hearing the duke come and go, his +heels ringing in spite of the muffling of the carpet, like the heels of +an armed man. + +At times, when he passed quite close to her, his attenuated shadow was +cast at full length over her and she was filled with terror. + +She experienced a feeling of fear, as if she were before an open tomb, +or that a puff of damp air chilled her face, or that she was suddenly +enveloped by the odor of a cellar. She shuddered and wished to plead +with him, murmuring: + +"Pity!--Pardon!--" + +"Madame la duchesse," Rosas replied coldly, "I am one of those who may +be deceived, no one is beyond the reach of treason; but I am not one of +those who pardon. I have been extremely foolish, ridiculous, credulous! +So much the worse for me! So much the worse for you! Rosas you are, +Rosas you will be! I have been your victim, eh? Exactly, that is +admitted: you shall be mine! Nothing could be juster, I think! I wish no +scandal resulting from a lawsuit or the notoriety of one or more duels. +I should become ridiculous in the eyes of others. But in my own and your +eyes, I do not propose to be! I did not desire to be your lover, I have +hardly been your husband. Now I am your companion forever. _Hasta la +muerte!_ For me, the cold of an Escurial has no terror. I am accustomed +to it. If it makes you quake, whose fault is it? You willed it. A double +suicide! We leave this evening!" + +"This evening!" repeated Rosas, terribly, while Marianne, terrified, +felt stifled under the crushing weight of that name: _Duchesse de +Rosas!_ + +Simon Kayser came to dine. He was deeply moved when he learned that the +housekeeping was upset. + +What! the devilish duke knew all then? + +And he has taken the matter up in a dramatic fashion? + +"Folly!" + +"It is a serious matter, all the same!" said the uncle, after debating +with himself as to where he should dine. "He will break her heart as he +said, immured yonder within his four walls!--Ah! it was hardly worth +while to handle her affairs so cleverly for a Gochard to come on the +scenes and spoil everything, the rascal! For myself, I pity the little +Marianne!--Her plan of battle was excellently arranged, well disposed +and admirably put together! It was superb! And it failed!--Come, it +amounts to this in everything: it is said that the pursuit of a great +art is to ply the trade of a dupe! Destiny lacks morality! We should +perhaps be happier, both, if she were simply a _cocotte_ and I engaged +in photography!--But!" the brave fellow added: "one has lofty ideas, +as-pi-ra-tions, or one has not!--One cannot remake one's self when one +is an artist!" + +PARIS, 1880-1881. + + + * * * * * + +_This little, pale, blond man seemed, in the growing darkness, like a +portrait of former days stepped forth from its frame._ + +_His hand of steel again seized Marianne's wrists._ + +[Illustration: MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT] + + + + +List of Illustrations + + PAGE + +IN THE GREENROOM OF THE OPERA _Fronts._ + +VAUDREY MEETS MARIANNE IN THE BOIS 216 + +SULPICE BECOMES SURETY FOR MARIANNE 272 + +THE BANQUET 376 + +MARIANNE HEARS HER SENTENCE OF BANISHMENT 544 + + +[Transcriber's Note: Illustrations have been moved to appropriate +positions.] + +[Transcriber's Note: The following apparent misprints have been +corrected for this electronic edition: + +"antechamber"--from "ante-chamber" +"knickknacks"--from "knick-knacks" +"of the Opera house"--from "of the Opera house" +"wings of the Opera"--from "wings of the Opera" +"wrote Monsieur J.-J. Weiss in the Journal des Debats"--from "Debats" +"The President awaited at the Elysee"--from "Elysee" +"above all, my dear Vaudrey, do not fear to appear"--from + "Vaudrey, "do not fear" +"He shut his eyes to picture Marianne."--from ""He shut his eyes" +"asserting the virginity of his efforts"--from "assertting" +"There was a council to be held at the Elysee"--from "Elysee" +"he took it himself to the President at the Elysee."--from "Elysee" +"He had already been informed at the Elysee"--from "Elysee" +"Along the grand avenue of the Champs-Elysees"--from + "Champs-Elysees" +"The solitude of the Champs-Elysees pleased him."--from + "Champs-Elysees"] + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's His Excellency the Minister, by Jules Claretie + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIS EXCELLENCY THE MINISTER *** + +***** This file should be named 15934.txt or 15934.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/9/3/15934/ + +Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jonathan Niehof and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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