diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-8.txt | 9480 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 184477 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 815781 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/24604-h.htm | 9655 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/aquajules.png | bin | 0 -> 41583 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/boised.jpg | bin | 0 -> 20178 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/bustedm.jpg | bin | 0 -> 30565 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/covered.jpg | bin | 0 -> 47435 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/dessed1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 18388 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/etched1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 56122 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/etched2.png | bin | 0 -> 40700 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/etched3.jpg | bin | 0 -> 45402 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/frontjules.jpg | bin | 0 -> 31300 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/litoed.jpg | bin | 0 -> 40191 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/litofreres.jpg | bin | 0 -> 31283 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/medall.jpg | bin | 0 -> 25708 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/pageserie.jpg | bin | 0 -> 17854 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/pagetitre.jpg | bin | 0 -> 50759 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/photed.png | bin | 0 -> 16935 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/photed2.jpg | bin | 0 -> 16364 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/portred.jpg | bin | 0 -> 17056 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/portrfreres.jpg | bin | 0 -> 31858 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604-h/images/vignette.png | bin | 0 -> 42853 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604.txt | 9480 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 24604.zip | bin | 0 -> 184255 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
28 files changed, 28631 insertions, 0 deletions
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/24604-8.txt b/24604-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2d1cbcc --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9480 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Renée Mauperin, by Edmond de Goncourt and +Jules de Goncourt, et al, Translated by Alys Hallard + + +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: Renée Mauperin + + +Author: Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt + + + +Release Date: February 13, 2008 [eBook #24604] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENéE MAUPERIN*** + + +E-text prepared by Camille François, Suzanne Shell, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 24604-h.htm or 24604-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604/24604-h/24604-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604/24604-h.zip) + + + + + +The French Classical Romances +Complete in Twenty Crown Octavo Volumes + +Editor-in-Chief + +EDMUND GOSSE, LL.D. + +With Critical Introductions and Interpretative Essays by + +HENRY JAMES PROF. RICHARD BURTON HENRY HARLAND + +ANDREW LANG PROF. F. C. DE SUMICHRAST + +THE EARL OF CREWE HIS EXCELLENCY M. CAMBON + +PROF. WM. P. TRENT ARTHUR SYMONS MAURICE HEWLETT + +DR. JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY RICHARD MANSFIELD + +BOOTH TARKINGTON DR. RICHARD GARNETT + +PROF. WILLIAM M. SLOANE JOHN OLIVER HOBBES + +[Illustration: (signed) J. de Goncourt] + + + + +DE GONCOURT + +RENÉE MAUPERIN + +Translated from the French by Alys Hallard + +With a Critical Introduction by James Fitzmaurice-Kelly + +A Frontispiece and Numerous Other Portraits with Descriptive +Notes by Octave Uzanne + + + + + + + +P. F. Collier & Son +New York + +Copyright, 1902 +by D. Appleton & Company + + + + +EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT + +I + + +The partnership of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt is probably the most +curious and perfect example of collaboration recorded in literary +history. The brothers worked together for twenty-two years, and the +amalgam of their diverse talents was so complete that, were it not for +the information given by the survivor, it would be difficult to guess +what each brought to the work which bears their names. Even in the light +of these confidences, it is no easy matter to attempt to separate or +disengage their literary personalities. The two are practically one. +_Jamais âme pareille n'a été mise en deux corps._ This testimony is +their own, and their testimony is true. The result is the more +perplexing when we remember that these two brothers were, so to say, men +of different races. The elder was a German from Lorraine, the younger +was an inveterate Latin Parisian: "the most absolute difference of +temperaments, tastes, and characters--and absolutely the same ideas, the +same personal likes and dislikes, the same intellectual vision." There +may be, as there probably always will be, two opinions as to the value +of their writings; there can be no difference of view concerning their +intense devotion to literature, their unhesitating rejection of all that +might distract them from their vocation. They spent a small fortune in +collecting materials for works that were not to find two hundred +readers; they passed months, and more months, in tedious researches the +results of which were condensed into a single page; they resigned most +of life's pleasures and all its joys to dedicate themselves totally to +the office of their election. So they lived--toiling, endeavouring, +undismayed, confident in their integrity and genius, unrewarded by one +accepted triumph, uncheered by a single frank success or even by any +considerable recognition. The younger Goncourt died of his failure +before he was forty; the elder underwent almost the same monotony of +defeat during nearly thirty years of life that remained to him. But both +continued undaunted, and, if we consider what manner of men they were +and how dear fame was to them, the constancy of their ambition becomes +all the more admirable. + +[Illustration: Edmond de Goncourt] + +Despising, or affecting to despise, the general verdict of their +contemporaries, they loved to declare that they wrote for their own +personal pleasure, for an audience of a dozen friends, or for the +delight of a distant posterity; and, when the absence of all +appreciation momentarily weighed them down, they vainly imagined that +the acquisition of a new _bibelot_ consoled them. No doubt the passion +of the collector was strong in them: so strong that Edmond half forgot +his grief for his brother and his terror of the Commune in the pursuit +of first editions: so strong that the chances of a Prussian bomb +shattering his storehouse of treasures--the _Maison d'un artiste_--at +Auteuil saddened him more than the dismemberment of France. But, even +so, the idea that the Goncourts could in any circumstances subordinate +literature to any other interest was the merest illusion. Nothing in the +world pleased them half so well as the sight of their own words in +print. The arrival of a set of proof-sheets on the 1st of January was to +them the best possible augury for the new year; the sight of their names +on the placards outside the theatres and the booksellers' shops +enraptured them; and Edmond, then well on in years, confesses that he +thrice stole downstairs, half-clad, in the March dawn, to make sure that +the opening chapters of _Chérie_ were really inserted in the _Gaulois_. +These were their few rewards, their only victories. They were fain to be +content with such small things--_la petite monnaie de la gloire_. Still +they were persuaded that time was on their side, and, assured as they +were of their literary immortality, they chafed at the suggestion that +the most splendid renown must grow dim within a hundred thousand years. +Was so poor a laurel worth the struggle? This was the whole extent of +their misgiving. + +Baffled at every point, the Goncourts were unable to account for the +unbroken series of disasters which befell them; yet the explanation is +not far to seek. For one thing, they attempted so much, so continuously, +in so many directions, and in such quick succession, that their very +versatility and diligence laid them under suspicion. They were not +content to be historians, or philosophers, or novelists, or dramatists, +or art critics: they would be all and each of these at once. In every +branch of intellectual effort they asserted their claims to be regarded +as innovators, and therefore as leaders. Within a month they published +_Germinie Lacerteux_ and an elaborate study on Fragonard; and, while +they plumed themselves (as they very well might) on their feat, the +average intelligent reader joined with the average intelligent critic in +concluding that such various accomplishment must needs be superficial. +It was not credible that one and the same pair--_par nobile +fratrum_--could be not only close observers of contemporary life, but +also authorities on Watteau and Outamaro, on Marie Antoinette and Mlle. +Clairon. To admit this would be to emphasize the limitations of all +other men of letters. Again, the uncanny element of chance which enters +into every enterprise was constantly hostile to the Goncourts. They not +only published incessantly: they somehow contrived to publish at +inopportune moments--at times when the public interest was turned from +letters to politics. Their first novel appeared on the very day of +Napoleon III's _Coup d'état_, and their publisher even refused to +advertise the book lest the new authorities should see in the title of +_En 18_--a covert allusion to the 18th Brumaire. It would have been a +pleasing stroke of irony had the Ministry of the 16th of May been +supported by the country as it was supported by Edmond de Goncourt, for +that Ministry intended to prosecute him as the author of _La Fille +Élisa_. _La Faustin_ was issued on the morning of Gambetta's downfall; +and the seventh volume of the _Journal des Goncourt_ had barely been +published a few hours when the news of Carnot's assassination reached +Paris. Lastly, the personal qualities of the brothers--their ostentation +of independence, their attitude of supercilious superiority, and, most +of all, their fatal gift of irony--raised up innumerable enemies and +alienated both actual and possible friends. They gave no quarter and +they received none. All this is extremely human and natural; but the +Goncourts, being nervous invalids as well as born fighters, suffered +acutely from what they regarded as the universal disloyalty of their +comrades. + +They could not realize that their writings contained much to displease +men of all parties, and, living at war with literary society, they +sullenly cultivated their morbid sensibility. The simplest trifle stung +them into frenzies of inconsistency and hallucination. To-day they +denounced the liberty of the press; to-morrow they raged at finding +themselves the victims of a Government prosecution. Withal their +ferocious wit, there was not a ray of sunshine in their humour, and, +instead of smiling at the discomfiture of a dull official, they brooded +till their imaginations magnified these petty police-court proceedings +into the tragedy of a supreme martyrdom. Years afterward they +continually return to the subject, noting with exasperated complacency +that the only four men in France who were seriously concerned with +letters and art--Baudelaire, Flaubert, and themselves--had been dragged +before the courts; and they ended by considering their little lawsuit as +one of the historic state trials of the world. Henceforth, in every +personal matter--and their art was intensely personal--they lost all +sense of proportion, believing that there was a vast Semitic plot to +stifle _Manette Salomon_ and that the President had brought pressure on +the censor to forbid an adaptation of one of their novels being put upon +the boards. Monarchy, Empire, Republic, Right, Centre, Left--no shade of +political thought, no public man, no legislative measure, ever chanced +to please them. They sought for the causes of their failure in others: +it never occurred to them that the fault lay in themselves. Their minds +were twin whirlpools of chaotic opinions. Revolutionaries in arts and +letters as they claimed to be, they detested novelties in religion, +politics, medicine, science, abstract speculation. It never struck them +that it was incongruous, not to say absurd, to claim complete liberty +for themselves and to denounce ministers for attempting to extend the +far more restricted liberty of others. And as with the ordering of their +lives, so with their art and all that touched it. Unable to conciliate +or to compromise, they were conspicuously successful in stimulating the +general prejudice against themselves. They paraded their +self-contradictions with a childish pride of paradox. In one breath they +deplored the ignorance of a public too uncultivated to appreciate them; +in another breath they proclaimed that every government which strives to +diminish illiteracy is digging its own grave. Priding themselves on the +thoroughness of their own investigations, they belittled the results of +learning in others, mocked at the superficial labour of the +Benedictines, ridiculed the inartistic surroundings of Sainte-Beuve and +Renan, and protested that antiquity was nothing but an inept invention +to enable professors to earn their daily bread. Not content with +asserting the superiority of Diderot to Voltaire, they pronounced the +Abbé Trublet to be the acutest critic who flourished during that +eighteenth century which they had come to consider as their exclusive +property. Resolute conservatives in theory, piquing themselves on their +descent, their personal elegance, their tact and refinement, these +worshippers of Marie Antoinette admired the talent shown by Hébert in +his infamous _Père Duchêne_, and then went on to lament the influence of +socialism on literature. They were _papalini_ who sympathized with +Garibaldi; they looked forward to a repetition of '93, and almost +welcomed it as a deliverance from the respectable uniformity of their +own time; they trusted to the working men--masons, house-painters, +carpenters, navvies--to regenerate an effete civilization and to save +society as the barbarians had saved it in earlier centuries. Whatever +the value of these views, they can scarcely have found favour among +those who rallied to the Second Empire and who imagined that the +Goncourts were a pair of firebrands: whereas, in fact, they were +petulant, impulsive men of talent, smarting under neglect. + +If we were so ingenuous as to take their statements seriously, we might +refuse to admit their right to find any place in French literature. For, +though it would be easy to quote passages in which they contemn the +cosmopolitan spirit, it would be no less easy to set against these their +assertions that they are ashamed of being French; that they are no more +French than the Abbé Galiani, the Prince de Ligne, or Heine; that they +will renounce their nationality, settle in Holland or Belgium, and there +found a journal in which they can speak their minds. These are wild, +whirling words: the politics of literary men are on a level with the +literature of politicians. On their own showing, it does not appear that +the Goncourts were in any way fettered. The sum of their achievement, as +they saw it, is recorded in a celebrated passage of the preface to +_Chérie_: "_La recherche du vrai en littérature, la résurrection de +l'art du XVIIIe siècle, la victoire du japonisme._" These words are the +words of Jules de Goncourt, but Edmond makes them his own. If the +brothers were entitled to claim--as they repeatedly claimed--to be held +for the leaders of these "three great literary and artistic movements of +the second half of the nineteenth century," it is clear that they were +justified in thinking that the future must reckon with them. It is +equally clear that, if their title proves good, their environment was +much less unfavourable than they assumed it to be. + +The conclusion is that their sublime egotism disabled them from forming +a judicial judgment on any question in which they were personally +concerned. They never attempted to reason, to compare, to balance; their +minds were filled with the vapour of tumultuous impressions which +condensed at different periods into dogmas, and were succeeded by fresh +condensations from the same source. But, amid all changes, their +self-esteem was constant. They had no hesitation in setting Dunant's +_Souvenir de Solférino_ above the _Iliad_; but when Taine implied that +he was somewhat less interested in _Madame Gervaisais_ than in the +writings of Santa Teresa, they were startled at his boldness. And, to +define their position more precisely, Edmond confidently declares (among +many other strange sayings) that the fifth act of _La Patrie en Danger_ +contains scenes more dramatically poignant than anything in Shakespeare, +and that in _La Maison d'un Artiste au XIXe Siècle_ he takes under his +control--though he candidly avows that none but himself suspects it--a +capital movement in the history of mankind. These are extremely high +pretensions, repeatedly renewed in one form or another--in prefaces, +manifestos, articles, letters, conversation, and, above all, in nine +invaluable volumes which consist of extracts from a diary covering a +period of over forty years. This extraordinary record incidentally +embodies the rough sketches of the Goncourts' finished work, but its +interest is far wider and more essentially characteristic. Other men +have written confessions, memoirs, reminiscences, by the score: mostly +books composed long after the events which they relate, recollections +revised, reviewed in the light of after events. The Goncourts are +perhaps alone in daring to unbosom themselves with an absolute sincerity +of their emotions, intentions, aims. If they come forth damaged from +such a trial, it is fair to remember that the test is unique, and that +no other writers have ever approached them in courage and in what they +most valued--truth: _la recherche du vrai en littérature_. + + + + +II + + +A most authoritative critic, M. Brunetière, has laid it down that there +is more truth, more fidelity to the facts of actual life, in any single +romance by Ponson du Terrail or by Gaboriau than in all the works of the +Goncourts put together, and so long as we leave truth undefined, this +opinion may be as tenable as any other. But it may be well to observe at +the outset that the creative work of the Goncourts is not to be +condemned or praised _en bloc_, for the simple reason that it is not a +spontaneous, uniform product, but the resultant of diverse forces +varying in direction and intensity from time to time. They themselves +have recorded that there are three distinct stages in their intellectual +evolution. Beginning, under the influence of Heine and Poe, with purely +imaginative conceptions, they rebounded to the extremest point of +realism before determining on the intermediate method of presenting +realistic pictures in a poetic light. Pure imagination in the domain of +contemporary fiction seemed to them defective, inasmuch as its processes +are austerely logical, while life itself is compact of contradictions; +and their first reaction from it was entirely natural, on their own +principles. It remains to be seen what sense should be attached to the +formula--_la recherche du vrai en littérature_--in which they summarized +their position as regards their predecessors. + +Obviously we have to deal with a question of interpretation. The +Goncourts did not--could not--pretend that they were the first to +introduce truth into literature: they merely professed to have attained +it by a different route. The innovation for which they claimed credit is +a matter of method, of technique. Their deliberate purpose is to +surprise us by the fidelity of their studies, to captivate and convince +us by an accumulation of exact minutiæ: in a word, to prove that truth +is more interesting than fiction. So history should be written, and so +they wrote it. First and last, whatever form they chose, they remained +historians. Alleging the example set by Plutarch and Saint-Simon, they +make their histories of the eighteenth century a mine of anecdote, a +pageant of picturesque situations. State-papers, blue-books, ministerial +despatches, are in their view the conventional means used for +hoodwinking simpletons and forwarding the interests of a triumphant +faction. The most valuable historical material is, as they believed, to +be sought in the autograph letter. They held that the secret of the +craftiest intriguer will escape him, despite himself, in the expansion +of confidential correspondence. The research for such correspondence is +to be supplemented by the study of sculpture, paintings, engravings, +furniture, broadsides, bills--all of them indispensable for the +reconstruction of a past age and for the right understanding of its +psychology. But these means are simply complementary. The chief vehicle +of authentic truth is the autograph letter, and, though they professed +to hold the historical novel in abhorrence, they applied their +historical methods to their records of contemporary life. Thus we +inevitably arrive at the famous theory of the _document humain_--a +phrase received with much derision when first publicly used in the +preface to _La Faustin_, and a theory conscientiously adopted by many +later novelists. And here, again, it is important to realize the +restricted extent of the authors' claim. + +The Goncourts draw a broad, primary distinction between ancient and +modern literature: the first deals mainly with generalities, the second +with details. They then proceed to establish an analogous distinction +between novels written before and after Balzac's time, the modern novel +being based on _des documents racontés, ou relevés d'après nature_, +precisely as formal history is based on _des documents écrits_. But they +make no pretence of having initiated the revolution; their share was +limited to continuing Balzac's tradition, to enlarging the field of +observation, and especially to multiplying the instruments of research. +They declared that Gautier had, so to say, endowed literature with +vision; that Fromentin, in describing the silence of the desert, had +revealed the literary value of hearing; that with Zola, Loti--and they +might surely have added Maupassant--a fresh sense was brought into play: +_c'est le nez qui entre en scène_. Their personal contribution was their +nervous sensibility: _les premiers nous avons été les écrivains des +nerfs_. And they were prouder of this morbid quality than of their +talent. They were ever on the watch for fragments of talk caught up in +drawing-rooms, in restaurants, on omnibuses: ever ready to take notes at +death-beds, church, or taverns. Their life was one long pursuit of +_l'imprévu, le décousu, l'illogique du vrai_. These observations they +transcribed at night while the impression was still acute, and these +they utilized more or less deftly as they advanced towards what they +rightly thought to be the goal of art: the perfect adjustment of +proportion between the real and the imagined. + +It would seem that we are now in a position to judge the Goncourts by +their own standard. _Le dosage juste de la littérature et de la +vie_--this formula recurs in one shape or another as a leading +principle, and it is supplemented by other still more emphatic +indications which should serve to supply a test. Unhappily, with the +Goncourts these indications are unsystematic and even contradictory. The +elder brother has naturally no hesitation in saying that the highest +gift of any writer is his power of creating on paper real beings--_comme +des êtres créés par Dieu, et comme ayant eu une vraie vie sur la +terre_--and he is bold enough to add that Shakespeare himself has failed +to create more than two or three personages. He protests energetically +against the academic virtues, and insists on the importance of forming a +personal style which shall reproduce the vivacity, brio, and feverish +activity of the best talk. It is, then, all the more disconcerting to +learn from another passage in the _Journal_ that the creation of +characters and the discovery of an original form of expression are +matters of secondary moment. The truth is that if the Goncourts had, as +they believed, something new to say, it was inevitable that they should +seek to invent a new manner of utterance. Renan was doubtless right in +thinking that they were absolutely without ideas on abstract subjects; +but they were exquisitely susceptible to every shade and tone of +concrete objects, and the endeavour to convey their innumerable +impressions taxed the resources of that French vocabulary on whose +relative poverty they so often insist. The reproaches brought against +them in the matter of verbal audacities by every prominent critic, from +Sainte-Beuve in one camp to Pontmartin in the other, are so many +testimonies to the fact that they were innovators--_apporteurs du +neuf_--and that their intrepidity cost them dear. Still their boldness +in this respect has been generally exaggerated. Setting out as imitators +of two such different models as Gautier and Jules Janin, they slowly +acquired an individual manner--the manner, say, of _Germinie Lacerteux_ +or _Manette Salomon_--but they never attained the formula which they had +conceived as final. It was not given to them to realize their +ambition--to write novels which should not contain a single bookish +expression, plays which should reveal that hitherto undiscoverable +quantity--colloquial speech, raised to the level of consummate art. The +famous _écriture artiste_ remained an unfulfilled ideal. The expression, +first used in the preface to _Les Frères Zemganno_, merely foreshadows a +possible development of style which shall come into being when realism +or naturalism, ceasing to describe the ignoble, shall occupy itself with +the attempt to render refinements, reticences, subtleties, and +half-tones of a more elusive order. It is an aspiration, a counsel of +perfection offered to a younger school by an artist in experiment, who +declares the quest to be beyond his powers. It is nothing more. + +Leaving on one side these questions of style and manner, it may safely +be said that in the novels of the Goncourts the characters are less +memorable, less interesting as individuals than as illustrations of an +epoch or types of a given social sphere. Charles Demailly, Madame +Gervaisais, Manette Salomon, Renée Mauperin, Soeur Philomène, are not so +much dramatic creations as figures around which is constituted the life +of a special _milieu_--the world of journalism, of Catholicism seen from +two opposite points of view, of artists, of the _bourgeoisie_, as the +case may be. There are in the best work of the Goncourts astonishingly +brilliant scenes; there is dialogue vivacious, witty, sparkling, to an +extraordinary degree. And this dialogue, as in _Charles Demailly_, is +not only supremely interesting, but intrinsically true to nature. It +could not well be otherwise, for the speeches assigned to Masson, +Lampérière, Remontville, Boisroger, and Montbaillard are, as often as +not, verbatim reports of paradoxes and epigrams thrown off a few hours +earlier by Théophile Gautier, Flaubert, Saint-Victor, Banville, and +Villemessant. But these flights, true and well worth preserving as they +are, fail to impress for the simple reason that they are mere exercises +in bravura delivered by men much less concerned with life than with +phrases, that they are allotted to subordinate characters, and that they +rather serve to diminish than to increase the interest in the central +figures. The Goncourts themselves are much less absorbed in life than in +writing about it: just as landscapes reminded them of pictures, so did +every other manifestation of existence present itself as a possible +subject for artistic treatment. They had been called the detectives of +history; they became detectives, inquisitors in real life, and, much as +they loathed the occupation, they never rested from their task of spying +and prying and "documentation." As with _Charles Demailly_, so with +their other books: each character is studied after nature with a grim, +revolting persistence. Their aunt, Mlle. de Courmont, is the model of +Mlle. de Varandeuil in _Germinie Lacerteux_; Germinie herself is drawn +from their old servant Rose, who had loved them, cheated them, blinded +them for half a lifetime; the Victor Chevassier who figures in _Quelques +créatures de ce temps_ is sketched from their father's old political +ally, Colardez, at Breuvannes; the original of the Abbé Blampoix in +_Renée Mauperin_ was the Abbé Caron; the painter Beaulieu and that +strange Bohemian Pouthier are both worked into _Manette Salomon_. And +the novel entitled _Madame Gervaisais_ is an almost exact transcription +or record of the life of the authors' aunt, Mme. Nephthalie de Courmont: +a report so literal that in three hundred pages there are but two +trifling departures from the strictest historical truth. + +Mommsen himself has not excelled the Goncourts in conscientious +"documentation"; and yet, for all their care, their personages do not +abide in the memory as living beings. We do not see them as individuals, +but as types; and, strangely enough, the authors, despite the remarkable +skill with which they materialize many of their impressions, are +content to deliver their characters to us as so many illustrations of a +species. Thus Marthe Mance in _Charles Demailly_ is _un type, +l'incarnation d'un âge, de son sexe et d'un rôle de son temps_; +Langibout is _le type pur de l'ancienne école_; Madame Gervaisais, too, +is _un exemple et un type_ of the intellectual _bourgeoise_ of +Louis-Philippe's time; Madame Mauperin is _le type_ of the modern +_bourgeoise_ mother; Renée is the type of the modern _bourgeoise_ girl; +the Bourjots "represent" wealth; Denoisel is a Parisian--_ou plutôt +c'était le Parisien_. The Goncourts, in their endeavour to be more +precise, resort to odd combinations of conflicting elements. Within some +twenty pages Renée Mauperin is _une mélancolique tintamarresque_; the +adjectives _bourgeoise_ and _diabolique_ are used to characterize the +same thing; the Abbé Blampoix is at once "priest and lawyer, apostle and +diplomatist, Fénelon and M. de Foy." And the same types constantly +reappear. The physician Monterone in _Madame Gervaisais_ is simply an +Italian version of Denoisel in _Renée Mauperin_; the Abbé Blampoix has +his counter-part in Father Giansanti; Honorine is Germinie, before the +fall; Nachette and Gautruche might be brothers. The procedure, too, is +almost invariable. The antecedents of each personage are given with +abundant detail. We have minute information as to the family history of +the Mauperins, the Villacourts, Germinie, Couturat, and the rest; and +the mention of Father Sibilla involves a brief account of the order of +Barefooted Trinitarians from January, 1198, to the spring of 1853! There +is a frequent repetition of the same idea with scarcely any verbal +change: _un dos d'amateur_ in _Renée Mauperin_ and _le dos du cocher_ in +_Germinie Lacerteux_. And the possibilities of the human back were +evidently not exhausted, for at Christmas, 1882, Edmond de Goncourt +makes a careful note of the _dos de jeune fille du peuple_. + +It is by no means an accident that the most frequent theme of the +brothers is illness: the insanity of Demailly, the tortures of Germinie, +the consumption of Madame Gervaisais, the decay of Renée Mauperin, the +record of pain in _Soeur Philomène_, in _Les Frères Zemganno_, and in +other works of the Goncourts. Emotion in less tragic circumstances they +rarely convey; and when they attempt it they are prone to stumble into +an unimpressive sentimentalism. Their strength lay in pure observation, +not in the philosophic or psychological presentment of nature. For their +fine powers to have full play, it was necessary that they should deal +with things seen: in other words, that feeling should take a concrete +shape. Once this condition is fulfilled, they can focus their own +impressions and render them with unsurpassable skill. We shall find in +them nothing epic, nothing inventive on a grand scale: the +transfiguring, ennobling vision of the greatest creators was denied +them. But they remain consummate masters in their own restricted +province: delicate observers of externals, noting and remembering with +unmatched exactitude every detail of gesture, attitude, intonation, and +expression. The description of landscape--of the Bois de Vincennes in +_Germinie Lacerteux_, the Forest of Fontainebleau in _Manette Salomon_, +or of the Trastevere quarter in _Madame Gervaisais_--commonly affords +them an occasion for a triumph; but the description of prolonged malady +gives them a still greater opportunity. Nor is this due simply to the +fact that they, who had never known what it was to enjoy a day of +perfect health, spoke from an intimate knowledge of the subject. Each +landscape preserves at least its abstract idiosyncrasy; illness is an +essentially "typical" state in which individual characteristics diminish +till they finally disappear. And it is especially in the portraiture of +types, rather than of individuals, that the genius of the Goncourts +excels. + +In their own opinion, their initiative extended over a vast field and in +all directions. They seriously maintained that they were the first to +introduce the poor into French fiction, the first to awaken the +sentiment of pity for the wretched; they admitted the priority of +Dickens, but they apparently forgot that they had likewise been +anticipated by George Sand--that George Sand whose merits it took them +twenty years to recognise. They forgot, too, that compassion is +precisely the quality in which they were most lacking. Gavarni had +killed the sentiment of pity in them, and had communicated to them his +own mocking, sardonic spirit of inhumanity, his sinister delight in +every manifestation of cruelty, baseness, and pain. In their most candid +moods they confessed that they were all brain and no heart, that they +were without real affections; and their writings naturally suffer from +this unsympathetic attitude. But when every deduction is made, it is +impossible to deny their importance and significance. For they represent +a distinct stage in an organized movement--the reaction against +romanticism in the novel and lyrism in the theatre. And there is some +basis for their bold assertion that they led the way in every other +development of the modern French novel. They believed that they had +founded the naturalistic school in _Germinie Lacerteux_, the +psychological in _Madame Gervaisais_, the symbolic in _Les Frères +Zemganno_, and the satanic in _La Faustin_. It is unnecessary to +recognise all these claims in full: to discuss them at all, even if we +deny them, is to admit that the Goncourts were men of striking +intellectual force, of singular ambition, of exceptionally rich and +diverse gifts amounting, at times, to unquestionable genius. If they +were unsuccessful in their attempt to create an entire race of beings as +real as any on the planet, their superlative talent produced, in the +form of novels, invaluable studies of manners and customs, a brilliant +series of monographs on the social history of the nineteenth century. +And Daudet and M. Zola, and a dozen others whom it would be invidious to +name, may be accounted as in some sort their literary descendants. + +It is not unnatural that Edmond de Goncourt should have ended by +disliking the form of the novel, which he came to regard as an exhausted +convention. His pessimism was universal. Art was dying, literature was +perishing daily. The almost universal acceptance of Ibsen and of Tolstoi +was in itself a convincing symptom of degeneration, if the vogue of the +latter writer were not indeed the result of a cosmopolitan plot against +the native realistic school. It was some consolation to reflect that, +after all, there was more "philosophy" in Beaumarchais than in Ibsen; +that the name of Goncourt was held in honour by Scandinavians and Slavs. +Yet it could not be denied that, the world over, aristocracy of every +kind was breaking down. To the eyes of the surviving Goncourt all the +signs of a last great catastrophe grew visible. Mankind was ill, +half-mad, and on the road to become completely insane. There were +countless indications of intellectual and physical decadence. Sloping +shoulders were disappearing; the physique of the peasant was not what +it had been; good food was practically unattainable; in a hundred years +a man who had once tasted genuine meat would be pointed out as a +curiosity. The probability was, that within half a century there would +not be a man of letters in the world; the reporter, the interviewer, +would have taken possession. As it was, the younger generation of +readers no longer rallied to the Goncourts as it had rallied when +_Henriette Maréchal_ was first replayed. The weary old man buried +himself in memoirs, biographies, books of travel; then turned to his +first loves--to Poe and Heine--and found that "we are all commercial +travellers compared to them." But, threatened as he was by blindness, +despairing as were his presentiments of what the future concealed, his +confidence in the durability of his fame and his brother's fame was +undimmed. There would always be the select few interested in two such +examples of the _littérateur bien né_. There would always be the +official historians of literature to take account of them as new, +perplexing, elemental forces. There would always be the curious who must +turn to the Goncourts for positive information. "Our romances," as the +brothers had noted forty years earlier, "will supply the greatest number +of facts and absolute truths to the moral history of this century." And +Edmond de Goncourt clung to the belief, ending, happily and +characteristically enough, by conceiving himself and his brother to be +"types," and the best of all types: _le type de l'honnête homme +littéraire, du persévérant dans ses convictions, et du contempteur de +l'argent_. The praise is deserved. It is a distinction of which greater +men might well be proud. + +JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY. + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + + +_The Goncourts were the sons of a cavalry officer, commander of a +squadron in the Imperial army._ EDMOND _was born at Nancy, on the 26th +of May, 1822, and his brother_ JULES _in Paris, on the 17th of December, +1830. They were the grandsons of the deputy of the National Assembly of +1789, Huot de Goncourt. A very close friendship united the brothers from +their earliest youth, but it appears to have been in the younger that +the irresistible tendency to literature first displayed itself. They +were originally drawn almost exclusively to the study of the history of +art. They devoted themselves particularly to the close of the eighteenth +century, and in their earliest important volumes, "La Révolution dans +les Moeurs" (1854), "Histoire de la Société Française pendant la +Révolution" (1854), and "Pendant le Directoire" (1855), they invented a +new thing, the evolution of the history of an age from the objects and +articles of its social existence. They were encouraged to continue these +studies further, more definitely concentrating their observations around +individuals, and some very curious monographs--made up, as some one +said, of the detritus of history--were the result, "Une Voiture de +Masques," 1856; "Les Actrices (Armande)," 1856; "Sophie Arnauld," 1857. +The most ingenious efforts of the brothers in this direction were, +however, concentrated upon "Portraits Intimes du XVIIIe Siècle," +1857-'58, and upon the "Histoire de Marie Antoinette," 1858. + +Towards 1860 the Goncourts closed their exclusively historical work, and +transferred their minute observation and excessively meticulous +treatment of small aspects of life to realistic romance. Their first +novel, "Les Hommes de Lettres," 1860 (now known as "Charles Demailly"), +showed some lack of ease in using the new medium, but it was followed by +"Soeur Philomène," 1861, one of the most finished of their fictions, and +this by "Renée Mauperin," 1864; "Germinie Lacerteux," 1864; "Manette +Salomon," 1867; and "Madame Gervaisais," 1869. Meanwhile, numerous +studies of the art of the bibelot appeared under the name of the two +Goncourts, and in particular their great work on "L'Art du XVIIIe +Siècle," which began to be published in 1859, although not completed +until 1882. All this while, moreover, they were secretly composing their +splenetic "Journal." On the 20th of June, 1870, the fair companionship +was broken by the death of Jules de Goncourt, and for some years Edmond +did no more than complete and publish certain artistic works which had +been left unfinished. Of these, the most remarkable were, a monograph on +the life and work of Gavarni, 1873; a compilation called "L'Amour au +XVIIIe Siècle," 1875; studies of the Du Barry, the Pompadour, and the +Duchess of Châteauroux, 1878-'79 (these three afterward united in one +volume as "Les Maîtresses de Louis XV"); and notes of a tour in Italy, +1894. + +Edmond de Goncourt, however, after several years of silence, returned +alone to the composition of prose romance. He published in 1877 "La +Fille Élisa," an ultra-realistic tragedy of low life. In 1878, in the +very curious story of two mountebanks, "Les Frères Zemganno," he +betrayed the secret of his own perennial sorrow. Two more novels, "La +Faustin," 1882, and "Chérie," the pathetic portrait of a spoiled child, +close the series of his works in fiction. He returned to a close +examination of the history of art, and published_ catalogues raisonnés +_of the entire work of Watteau (1875) and of Prud'hon (1876). His latest +interests were centred around the classical Japanese designers, and he +published elaborate monographs on Outamaro (1891) and Hokousaï (1896). +In 1885 he collected the Letters of his brother Jules, and issued from +1887 to 1896, in nine volumes, as much as has hitherto been published of +the celebrated "Journal des Goncourts." + +Edmond de Goncourt died while on a visit to Alphonse Daudet, at +Champrosay, the country-house of the latter, on the 16th of July, 1896. +He left his considerable fortune, which included valuable collections of +bibelots, mainly for the purpose of endowing an Academy of Prose +Literature, in opposition to the French Academy. In spite of extreme +hostility from the members of his family, and innumerable legal +difficulties, this "Académie des Goncourts" was formed, on what seems to +be a secure basis, in 1901, and M. Joris Karl Huysmans was elected its +first president._ + +E. G. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGES + + Edmond and Jules de Goncourt v-xxix + _James Fitzmaurice-Kelly_ + + Lives of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt xxxi-xxxiii + _Edmund Gosse_ + + Renée Mauperin 1-349 + + The Portraits of Edmond and Jules de + Goncourt 351-367 + _Octave Uzanne_ + + + + + + + +RENÉE MAUPERIN + + + + +I + + +"You don't care about society, then, mademoiselle?" + +"You won't tell any one, will you?--but I always feel as though I've +swallowed my tongue when I go out. That's the effect society has on me. +Perhaps it is that I've had no luck. The young men I have met are all +very serious, they are my brother's friends--quotation young men, I call +them. As to the girls, one can only talk to them about the last sermon +they have heard, the last piece of music they have learned, or their +last new dress. Conversation with my contemporaries is somewhat +restricted." + +"And you live in the country all the year round, do you not?" + +"Yes, but we are so near to Paris. Is the piece good they have just been +playing at the Opéra Comique? Have you seen it?" + +"Yes, it's charming--the music is very fine. All Paris was at the first +night--I never go to the theatre except on first nights." + +"Just fancy, they never take me to any theatre except the Opéra Comique +and the Français, and only to the Français when there is a classical +piece on. I think they are terribly dull, classical pieces. Only to +think that they won't let me go to the Palais Royal! I read the pieces +though. I spent a long time learning 'The Mountebanks' by heart. You are +very lucky, for you can go anywhere. The other evening my sister and my +brother-in-law had a great discussion about the Opera Ball. Is it true +that it is quite impossible to go to it?" + +"Impossible? Well----" + +"I mean--for instance, if you were married, would you take your wife, +just once, to see it?" + +"If I were married I would not even take----" + +"Your mother-in-law. Is that what you were going to say? Is it so +dreadful--really?" + +"Well, in the first place, the company is----" + +"Variegated? I know what that's like. But then it's the same everywhere. +Every one goes to the Marche and the company is mixed enough there. One +sees ladies, who are rather queer, drinking champagne in their +carriages. Then, too, the Bois de Boulogne! How dull it is to be a +_young person_, don't you think so?" + +"What an idea! Why should it be? On the contrary, it seems to me----" + +"I should like to see you in my place. You would soon find out what a +bore it is to be always proper. We are allowed to dance, but do you +imagine that we can talk to our partner? We may say 'Yes,' 'No,' 'No,' +'Yes,' and that's all! We must always keep to monosyllables, as that is +considered proper. You see how delightful our existence is. And for +everything it is just the same. If we want to be very proper we have to +act like simpletons; and for my part I cannot do it. Then we are +supposed to stop and prattle to persons of our own sex. And if we go off +and leave them and are seen talking to men instead--oh, well, I've had +lectures enough from mamma about that! Reading is another thing that is +not at all proper. Until two years ago I was not allowed to read the +serials in the newspaper, and now I have to skip the crimes in the news +of the day, as they are not quite proper. + +"Then, too, with the accomplishments we are allowed to learn, we must +not go beyond a certain average. We may learn duets and pencil drawing, +but if we want anything more, why, it's affectation on our part. I go in +for oil-painting, for instance, and that is the despair of my family. I +ought only to paint roses and in water-colours. There's quite a current +here, though, isn't there? I can scarcely stand." + +This was said in an arm of the Seine just between Briche and the Île +Saint Denis. The girl and the young man who were conversing were in the +water. They had been swimming until they were tired, and now, carried +along by the current, they had caught hold of a rope which was fastened +to one of the large boats stationed along the banks of the island. The +force of the water rocked them both gently at the end of the tight, +quivering rope. They kept sinking and then rising again. The water was +beating against the young girl's breast; it filled out her woollen +bathing-dress right up to the neck, while from behind little waves kept +dashing over her which a moment later were nothing but dewdrops hanging +from her ears. + +She was rather higher up than the young man and had her arms out of the +water, her wrists turned round in order to hold the rope more firmly, +and her back against the black wood of the boat. Instinctively she kept +drawing back as the young man, swayed by the strong current, approached +her. Her whole attitude, as she shrank back, suspended from the rope, +reminded one of those sea goddesses which sculptors carve upon galleys. +A slight tremor, caused partly by the cold and partly by the movement of +the river, gave her something of the undulation of the water. + +"Ah, now this, for instance," she continued, "cannot be at all +proper--to be swimming here with you. If we were at the seaside it would +be quite different. We should have just the same bathing costumes as +these, and we should come out of a bathing-van just as we have come out +of the house. We should have walked across the beach just as we have +walked along the river bank, and we should be in the water to the same +depth, absolutely like this. The waves would roll us about as this +current does, but it would not be the same thing at all; simply because +the Seine water is not proper! Oh, dear! I'm getting so hungry--are +you?" + +"Well, I fancy I shall do justice to dinner." + +"Ah! I warn you that I eat." + +"Really, mademoiselle?" + +"Yes, there is nothing poetical about me at meal-times. If you imagine +that I have no appetite you are quite mistaken. You are in the same club +as my brother-in-law, are you not?" + +"Yes, I am in M. Davarande's club." + +"Are there many married men in it?" + +"Yes, a great many." + +"How odd! I cannot understand why a man marries. If I had been a man it +seems to me that I should never have thought of marrying." + +"Fortunately you are a woman." + +"Ah, yes, that's another of our misfortunes, we women cannot stay +unmarried. But will you tell me why a man joins a club when he is +married?" + +"Oh, one has to be in a club--especially in Paris. Every man of any +standing--if only for the sake of going in there for a smoke." + +"What! do you mean to say that there are any wives nowadays without +smoking-rooms? Why, I would allow--yes, I would allow a halfpenny pipe!" + +"Have you any neighbours?" + +"Oh, we don't visit much. There are the Bourjots at Sannois, we go there +sometimes." + +"Ah, the Bourjots! But, here, there cannot be any one to visit." + +"Oh, there's the curé. Ha! ha! the first time he dined with us he drank +the water in his finger-bowl! Oh, I ought not to tell you that, it's too +bad of me--and he's so kind. He's always bringing me flowers." + +"You ride, don't you, mademoiselle? That must be a delightful recreation +for you." + +"Yes, I love riding. It is my one pleasure. It seems to me that I could +not do without that. What I like above everything is hunting. I was +brought up to that in the part of the world where papa used to live. I'm +desperately fond of it. I was seven hours one day in my saddle without +dismounting." + +"Oh, I know what it is--I go hunting every year in the Perche with M. de +Beaulieu's hounds. You've heard of his pack, perhaps; he had them over +from England. Last year we had three splendid runs. By-the-bye, you have +the Chantilly meets near here." + +"Yes, I go with papa, and we never miss one. When we were all together +at the last meet there were quite forty horses, and you know how it +excites them to be together. We started off at a gallop, and you can +imagine how delightful it was. It was the day we had such a magnificent +sunset in the pool. Oh, the fresh air, and the wind blowing through my +hair, and the dogs and the bugles and the trees flying along before +you--it makes you feel quite intoxicated! At such moments I'm so brave, +oh, so brave!" + +"Only at such moments, mademoiselle?" + +"Well--yes--only on horseback. On foot, I own, I am very frightened at +night; then, too, I don't like thunder at all--and--well, I'm very +delighted that we shall be three persons short for dinner this evening." + +"But why, mademoiselle?" + +"We should have been thirteen! I should have done the meanest things for +the sake of getting a fourteenth--as you would have seen. Ah, here comes +my brother with Denoisel; they'll bring us the boat. Do look how +beautiful it all is from here, just at this time!" + +She glanced round, as she spoke, at the Seine, the river banks on each +side, and the sky. Small clouds were sporting and rolling along in the +horizon. They were violet, gray, and silvery, just tipped with flashes +of white, which looked like the foam of the sea touching the lower part +of the sky. + +Above them rose the heavens infinite and blue, profound and clear, +magnificent and just turning paler as they do at the hour when the +stars are beginning to kindle behind the daylight. Higher up than all +hung two or three clouds stretching over the landscape, heavy-looking +and motionless. + +An immense light fell over the water, lying dormant here, flashing +there, making the silvery streaks in the shadow of the boats tremble, +touching up a mast or a rudder, or resting on the orange-coloured +handkerchief or pink jacket of a washerwoman. The country, the outskirts +of the town, and the suburbs all met together on both sides of the +river. There were rows of poplar trees to be seen between the houses, +which were few and far between, as at the extreme limit of a town. + +Then there were small, tumble-down cottages, inclosure's planked round, +gardens, green shutters, wine-trade signs painted in red letters, acacia +trees in front of the doors, old summer arbors giving way on one side, +bits of walls dazzlingly white, then some straight rows of +manufactories, brick buildings with tile and zinc-covered roofs, and +factory bells. Smoke from the various workshops mounted straight upward +and the shadow of it fell in the water like the shadows of so many +columns. + +On one stack was written "Tobacco," and on a plaster façade could be +read "Doremus Labiche, Boats for Hire." + +Over a canal which was blocked up with barges, a swing-bridge lifted +its two black arms in the air. Fishermen were throwing and drawing in +their lines. The sound of wheels could be heard, carts were coming and +going. Towing-ropes scraped along the road, which was hard, rough, +black, and dyed all colours by the unloading of coal, mineral refuse, +and chemicals. + +From the candle, glucose, and fecula manufactories and sugar-refining +works which were scattered along the quay, surrounded by patches of +verdure, there was a vague odour of tallow and sugar which was carried +away by the emanations from the water and the smell of tar. The noise +from the foundries and the whistle of steam engines kept breaking the +silence of the river. + +It was like Asnières, Saardam, and Puteaux combined, one of those +Parisian landscapes on the banks of the Seine such as Hervier paints, +foul and yet radiant, wretched yet gay, popular and full of life, where +Nature peeps out here and there between the buildings, the work and the +commerce, like a blade of grass held between a man's fingers. + +"Isn't it beautiful?" + +"Well, to tell the truth, I am not in raptures about it. It's +beautiful--in a certain degree." + +"Oh, yes, it is beautiful. I assure you that it is very beautiful +indeed. About two years ago at the Exhibition there was an effect of +this kind. I don't remember the picture exactly, but it was just this. +There are certain things that I feel----" + +"Ah, you have an artistic temperament, mademoiselle." + +"Oh!" exclaimed the young girl, with a comic intonation, plunging +forthwith into the water. When she appeared again she began to swim +towards the boat which was advancing to meet her. Her hair had come +down, and was all wet and floating behind her. She shook it, sprinkling +the drops of water all round. + +Evening was drawing near and rosy streaks were coming gradually into the +sky. A breath was stirring over the river, and at the tops of the trees +the leaves were quivering. A small windmill, which served for a sign +over the door of a tavern, began to turn round. + +"Well, Renée, how have you enjoyed the water?" asked one of the rowers +as the young girl reached the steps placed at the back of the boat. + +"Oh, very much, thanks, Denoisel," she answered. + +"You are a nice one," said the other man, "you swim out so far--I began +to get uneasy. And what about Reverchon? Ah, yes, here he is." + + + + +II + + +Charles Louis Mauperin was born in 1787. He was the son of a barrister +who was well known and highly respected throughout Lorraine and Barrois, +and at the age of sixteen he entered the military school at +Fontainebleau. He became sublieutenant in the Thirty-fifth Regiment of +infantry, and afterward, as lieutenant in the same corps, he signalized +himself in Italy by a courage which was proof against everything. At +Pordenone, although wounded, surrounded by a troop of the enemy's +cavalry and challenged to lay down arms, he replied to the challenge by +giving the command to charge the enemy, by killing with his own hand one +of the horsemen who was threatening him and opening a passage with his +men, until, overcome by numbers and wounded on the head by two more +sword-thrusts, he fell down covered with blood and was left on the field +for dead. + +After being captain in the Second Regiment of the Mediterranean, he +became captain aide-de-camp to General Roussel d'Hurbal, went through +the Russian campaign with him, and was shot through the right shoulder +the day after the battle of Moscow. + +In 1813, at the age of twenty-six, he was an officer of the Legion of +Honour and major in the army. He was looked upon as one of the +commanding officers with the most brilliant prospects, when the battle +of Waterloo broke his sword for him and dashed his hopes to the ground. + +He was put on half-pay, and, with Colonel Sauset and Colonel Maziau, he +entered into the Bonapartist conspiracy of the _Bazar français_. + +Condemned to death by default, as a member of the managing committee, by +the Chamber of Peers, constituted into a court of justice, he was +concealed by his friends and shipped off to America. + +On the voyage, not knowing how to occupy his active mind, he studied +medicine with one of his fellow-passengers who intended taking his +degree in America, and on arriving, Mauperin passed the necessary +examinations with him. After spending two years in the United States, +thanks to the friendship and influence of some of his former comrades, +who had been taken again into active service, he obtained pardon and was +allowed to return to France. + +He went back to the little town of Bourmont, to the old home where his +mother was still living. This mother was one of those excellent old +ladies so frequently met with in the provincial France of the eighteenth +century. She was gay, witty, and fond of her glass of wine. Her son +adored her, and on finding her ill and under doctor's orders to avoid +all stimulants, he at once gave up wine, liqueurs, and coffee for her +sake, thinking that it would be easier for her to abstain if he shared +her privations. It was in compliance with her request, and by way of +humouring her sick fancies, that he married a cousin for whom he had no +especial liking. His mother had selected this wife for her son on +account of a joint claim to certain land, fields which touched each +other, and all the various considerations which tend to unite families +and blend together fortunes in the provinces. + +After the death of his mother, the narrow life in the little town, which +had no further attraction for him, seemed irksome, and, as he was not +allowed to dwell in Paris, M. Mauperin sold his house and land in Bourmont, +with the exception of a farm at Villacourt, and went to live with his young +wife on a large estate which he bought in the heart of Bassigny, at +Morimond. There were the remains of a large abbey, a piece of land +worthy of the name which the monks had given it--"_Mort-au-monde_"--a +wild, magnificent bit of Nature with a pool of some hundred acres or +more and a forest of venerable oak trees; meadows with canals of +freestone where the spring-tide flowed along under bowers of trees, a +veritable wilderness where the vegetation had been left to itself since +the Revolution; springs babbling along in the shade; wild flowers, +cattle-tracks, the remains of a garden and the ruins of buildings. Here +and there a few stones had survived. The door was still to be seen, and +the benches were there on which the beggars used to sit while taking +their soup; here the apse of a roofless chapel and there the seven +foundations of walls _à la Montreuil_. The pavilion at the entrance, +built at the beginning of the last century, was all that was still +standing; it was complete and almost intact. + +M. Mauperin took up his abode in this and lived there until 1830, +solitary and entirely absorbed in his studies. He gave himself up to +reading, educating himself on all subjects, and reaping knowledge in +every direction. He was familiar with all the great historians, +philosophers, and politicians, and was thoroughly master of the +industrial sciences. He only left his books when he felt the need of +fresh air, and then he would rest his brain and tire his body with long +walks of some fifteen miles across the fields and through the woods. + +Every one was accustomed to see him walk like this, and the country +people recognised him in the distance by his step, his long frock-coat, +all buttoned up, his officer's gait, his head always slightly bent, and +the stick, made from a vine-stalk, which he used as a cane. The only +break in his secluded and laborious life was at election time. M. +Mauperin then put in an appearance everywhere from one end of the +department to the other. He drove about the country in a trap, and his +soldierly voice could be heard rousing the electors to enthusiasm at all +their meetings; he gave the word of command for the charge on the +Government candidates, and to him all this was like war once more. + +When the election was over he left Chaumont and returned to his regular +routine and to the obscure tranquility of his studies. + +Two children had come to him--a boy in 1826 and a girl in 1827. After +the Revolution of 1830 he was elected deputy. When he took his seat in +the chamber, his American ideas and theories were very much like those +of Armand Carrel. His animated speeches--brusque, martial, and full of +feeling--made quite a sensation. He became one of the inspirers of the +_National_ after being one of its first shareholders, and he suggested +articles attacking the budget and the finances. + +The Tuileries made advances to him; some of his former comrades, who +were now aides-de-camp under the new king, sounded him with the promise +of a high military position, a generalship in the army, or some honour +for which he was still young enough. He refused everything point-blank. +In 1832 he signed the protestation of the deputies of the Opposition +against the words "Subjects of the King," which had been pronounced by +M. de Montalivet, and he fought against this system until 1835. + +That year his wife presented him with a child, a little girl whose +arrival stirred him to the depths of his being. His other two children +had merely given him a calm joy, a happiness without any gaiety. +Something had always seemed wanting--just that something which brightens +a father's life and makes the home ring with laughter. + +M. Mauperin loved his two children, but he did not adore them. The fond +father had hoped to delight in them, and he had been disappointed. +Instead of the son he had dreamed of--a regular boy, a mischievous +little urchin, one of those handsome little dare-devils with whom an old +soldier could live over again his own youth and hear once more, as it +were, the sound of gunpowder--M. Mauperin had to do with a most rational +sort of a child, a little boy who was always good, "quite a young lady," +as he said himself. This had been a great trouble to him, as he felt +almost ashamed to have, as his son and heir, this miniature man who did +not even break his toys. + +With his daughter, M. Mauperin had had the same disappointment. She was +one of those little girls who are women when they are born, and who play +with their parents merely to amuse them. She scarcely had any childhood, +and at the age of five, if a gentleman called to see her father, she +always ran away to wash her hands. She would be kissed on certain +spots, and she seemed to dread being ruffled or inconvenienced by a +father's caresses and love. + +Thus repelled, M. Mauperin's affection, so long hoarded up, went out to +the cradle of the little newcomer whom he had named Renée after his +mother. He spent whole days with his little baby-girl in divine +nonsense. He would keep taking off her little cap to look at her silky +hair, and he taught her to make grimaces which charmed him. He would lie +down beside her on the floor when she was rolling about half naked with +all a child's delightful unconsciousness. In the night he would get up +to look at her asleep, and would pass hours listening to this first +breath of life, so like the respiration of a flower. When she woke up he +would be there to have her first smile--that smile of little girl-babies +which comes from out of the night as though from Paradise. His happiness +kept changing into perfect bliss; it seemed to him that the child he +loved so much was a little angel from heaven. + +What joy he had with her at Morimond! He would wheel her all round the +house in a little carriage, and at every few steps turn round to look at +her screaming with laughter, with the sunshine playing on her cheeks, +and her little supple, pink foot curled up in her hand. Or he would take +her with him when he went for a walk, and would go as far as a village +and let the child throw kisses to the people who bowed to him, or he +would enter one of the farm-houses and show his daughter's teeth with +great pride. On the way, the child would often go to sleep in his arms, +as she did with her nurse. At other times he would take her into the +forest, and there, under the trees full of robin-redbreasts and +nightingales, towards the end of the day when there are voices overhead +in the woods, he would experience the most unutterable joy on hearing +the child, impressed by the noises around, try to imitate the sounds, +and to murmur and prattle as though she were answering the birds and +speaking to the singing heavens. + +Mme. Mauperin had not given this last daughter so hearty a welcome. She +was a good wife and mother, but Mme. Mauperin was eaten up with that +pride peculiar to the provinces--namely, the pride of money. She had +made all her arrangements for two children, but the third one was not +welcome, as it would interfere with the pecuniary affairs of the other +two, and, above all, would infringe on her son's share. The division of +land which was now one estate, the partition of wealth which had +accumulated, and in consequence the lowering of social position in the +future and of the importance of the family--all this was what the second +little daughter represented to her mother. + +M. Mauperin very soon had no more peace. The mother was constantly +attacking the politician, and reminding the father that it was his duty +to sacrifice himself to the interests of his children. She endeavoured +to separate him from his friends and to make him forsake his party and +his fidelity to his ideas. She made fun of what she called his +tomfoolery, which prevented him from turning his position to account. +Every day there were fresh attacks and reproaches until he was fairly +haunted by them; it was the terrible battle of all that is most prosaic +against the conscience of a Deputy of the Opposition. Finally, M. +Mauperin asked his wife for two months' truce for reflection, as he, +too, would have liked his beloved Renée to be rich. At the end of the +two months he sent his resignation in to the Chamber and opened a +sugar-refinery at Briche. + +That had been twenty years ago. The children had grown up and the +business was thriving. M. Mauperin had done very well with his refinery. +His son was a barrister, his elder daughter married, and Renée's dowry +was waiting for her. + + + + +III + + +Every one had gone into the house, and in a corner of the drawing-room, +with its chintz hangings gay with bunches of wild flowers, Henri +Mauperin, Denoisel, and Reverchon were talking. Near to the +chimney-piece, Mme. Mauperin, with great demonstrations of affection, +was greeting her son-in-law and daughter, M. and Mme. Davarande, who had +just arrived. She felt obliged on this occasion to make a display of +family feeling and to exhibit her motherly love. + +The greeting between Mme. Mauperin and Mme. Davarande was scarcely over +when a little old gentleman entered the drawing-room quietly, wished +Mme. Mauperin good-evening with his eyes as he passed, and walked +straight across to the group where Denoisel was. + +This little gentleman wore a dress-coat and had white whiskers. He was +carrying a portfolio under his arm. + +"Do you know that?" he asked Denoisel, taking him into a window recess +and half opening his folio. + +"That? I should just think I do. It's the 'Mysterious Swing,' an +engraving after Lavrience's." + +The little old gentleman smiled. + +"Yes, but look," he said, and he half opened his portfolio again, but in +such a way that Denoisel could only just see inside. + +"'Before letters.' It's a proof before letters! Can you see?" + +"Perfectly." + +"And margins!--a gem, isn't it? They didn't give it me, I can tell you, +the thieves! It was run up--and by a woman, too!" + +"Oh, of course!" + +"A _cocotte_, who asked to see it every time I went any higher. The +rascal of an auctioneer kept saying, 'Pass it to the lady.' At last I +got it for five pounds eight. Oh, I wouldn't have paid one halfpenny +more." + +"I should think not! If I had only known--why, there's a proof like +that, exactly like it, at Spindler's, the artist's--and with larger +margins, too. He does not care about Louis Seize things, Spindler. If I +had only asked him!" + +"Good heavens!--and before letters, like mine? Are you quite sure?" + +"Before letters--before--Oh, yes, it's an earlier one than yours. It's +before--" and Denoisel whispered something to the old man which brought +a flush of pleasure to his face and a moisture to his lips. + +Just at this moment M. Mauperin entered the drawing-room with his +daughter. She was leaning on his arm, her head slightly thrown back in +an indolent way, rubbing her hair against the sleeve of her father's +coat as a child does when it is being carried. + +"How are you?" she said as she kissed her sister. She then held her +forehead to her mother's lips, shook hands with her brother-in-law, and +ran across to the little man with the portfolio. + +"Can I see, god-papa?" + +"No, little girl, you are not grown-up enough yet," he replied, patting +her cheek in an affectionate way. + +"Ah, it's always like that with the things you buy!" said Renée, turning +her back on the old man, who tied up the ribbon of his portfolio with +the special little bow so familiar to the fingers of print collectors. + +"Well, what's this I hear?" suddenly exclaimed Mme. Mauperin, turning to +her daughter. + +Reverchon was sitting next her, so near that her dress touched him every +time she moved. + +"You were both carried away by the current," she continued. "It was +dangerous, I am sure! Oh, that river! I really cannot understand how M. +Mauperin allows----" + +"Mme. Mauperin," replied her husband, who was by the table looking +through an album with his daughter, "I do not allow anything--I +tolerate----" + +"Coward!" whispered Renée to her father. + +"I assure you, mamma, there was no danger," put in Henri Mauperin. +"There was no danger at all. They were just slightly carried along by +the current, and they preferred holding on to a boat to going half a +mile or so lower down the river. That was all! You see----" + +"Ah, you comfort me," said Mme. Mauperin, the serenity of her expression +gradually returning at her son's words. "I know you are so prudent, but, +you see, M. Reverchon, our dear Renée is so foolish that I am always +afraid. Oh, dear, there are drops of water on her hair now. Come here +and let me brush them off." + +"M. Dardouillet!" announced a servant. + +"A neighbour of ours," said Mme. Mauperin in a low voice to Reverchon. + +"Well, and where are you now?" asked M. Mauperin, as he shook hands with +the new arrival. + +"Oh, we are getting on--we are getting on--three hundred stakes done +to-day." + +"Three hundred?" + +"Three hundred--I fancy it won't be bad. From the green-house, you see, +I am going straight along as far as the water, on account of the view. +Fourteen or sixteen inches of slope--not more. If we were on the spot I +shouldn't have to explain. On the other side, you know, I shall raise +the path about three feet. When all that's done, M. Mauperin, do you +know that there won't be an inch of my land that will not have been +turned over?" + +"But when shall you plant anything, M. Dardouillet?" asked Mlle. +Mauperin. "For the last three years you have only had workmen in your +garden; sha'n't you have a few trees in some day?" + +"Oh, as to trees, mademoiselle, that's nothing. There's plenty of time +for all that. The most important thing is the plan of the ground, the +hills and slopes, and then afterward trees--if we want them." + +Some one had just come in by a door leading from another room. He had +bowed as he entered, but no one had seen him, and he was there now +without any one noticing him. He had an honest-looking face and a head +of hair like a pen-wiper. It was M. Mauperin's cashier, M. Bernard. + +"We are all here; has M. Bernard come down? Ah, that's right!" said M. +Mauperin on seeing him. "Suppose we have dinner, Mme. Mauperin, these +young people must be hungry." + + * * * * * + +The solemnity of the first few moments when the appetite is keen had +worn off, and the buzz of conversation could be heard in place of the +silence with which a dinner usually commences, and which is followed by +the noise of spoons in the soup plates. + +"M. Reverchon," began Mme. Mauperin. She had placed the young man by +her, in the seat of honour, and she was amiability itself, as far as he +was concerned. She was most attentive to him and most anxious to please. +Her smile covered her whole face, and even her voice was not her +every-day voice, but a high-pitched one which she assumed on state +occasions. She kept glancing from the young man to his plate and from +his plate to a servant. It was a case of a mother angling for a +son-in-law. "M. Reverchon, we met a lady just recently whom you +know--Mme. de Bonnières. She spoke so highly of you--oh, so highly!" + +"I had the honour of meeting Mme. de Bonnières in Italy--I was even +fortunate enough to be able to render her a little service." + +"Did you save her from brigands?" exclaimed Renée. + +"No, it was much less romantic than that. Mme. de Bonnières had some +difficulty about the bill at her hotel. She was alone and I prevented +her from being robbed." + +"It was a case of robbers, anyhow, then," said Renée. + +"One might write a play on the subject," put in Denoisel, "and it would +be quite a new plot--the reduction of a bill leading to a marriage. +What a good title, too, 'The Romance of an Awkward Moment, _à la_ +Rabelais!'" + +"Mme. de Bonnières is a very nice woman," continued Mme. Mauperin. "I +like her face. Do you know her, M. Barousse?" she asked, turning to +Renée's godfather. + +"Yes, she is very pleasant." + +"Oh! why, god-papa, she's like a satyr!" exclaimed Renée. + +When the word was out some of the guests smiled, and the young girl, +turning red, hastened to add: "I only mean she has a face like one." + +"That's what I call mending matters!" said Denoisel. + +"Did you stay long in Italy, monsieur?" asked M. Mauperin, by way of +changing the subject. + +"Six months." + +"And what did you think of it?" + +"It's very interesting, but one has so much discomfort there. I never +could get used to drinking coffee out of glasses." + +"Italy is the most wretched place to go to; it is the least practical of +all places," said Henri Mauperin. "What a state agriculture is in +there--and trade, too! One day in Florence at a masked ball I asked the +waiter at a restaurant if they would be open all night. 'Oh, no, sir,' +he said, 'we should have too many people here.' That's a fact, I heard +it myself, and that shows you what the country is. When one thinks of +England, of that wonderful initiative power of individuals and of the +whole nation, too; when one has seen the business genius of the London +citizen and the produce of a Yorkshire farm--Oh, a fine nation that!" + +"I agree with Henri," said Mme. Davarande, "there is something so +distinguished about England. I like the politeness of the English +people, and I approve of their way of always introducing people. Then, +too, they wrap your change up in paper--and some of their dress +materials have quite a style of their own. My husband bought me a poplin +dress at the Exposition--Oh, mamma, I have quite decided about my cloak. +I was at Alberic's--it's most amusing. He lets one of the girls put a +cloak over your shoulders and then he walks round you and just marks +with an ebony ruler the places where it does not fit; he scarcely +touches you with it, but just gives little taps--like that--and the girl +marks each tap with chalk. Oh, he certainly has a lot of character, that +Alberic! And then he's the only one--there isn't another place--he has +such good style for cloaks. I recognised two of his yesterday at the +races. He is very expensive though." + +"Oh, those people get what they like to ask," said Reverchon. "My +tailor, Edouard, has just retired--he's made over a hundred thousand +pounds." + +"Oh, well, quite right," remarked M. Barousse. "I'm always very glad +when I see things like that. The workers get the money nowadays--that's +just what it is. It's the greatest revolution since the beginning of the +world." + +"Yes," said Denoisel, "a revolution that makes one think of the words of +Chapon, the celebrated thief: 'Robbery, Monsieur le Président, is the +principal trade of the world!'" + +"Were the races good?" asked Renée. + +"Well, there were plenty of people," answered Mme. Davarande. + +"Very good, mademoiselle," said Reverchon. "The Diana prize especially +was very well run. Plume de coq, that they reckoned at thirty-five, was +beaten by Basilicate by two lengths. It was very exciting. The hacks was +a very good race, too, although the ground was rather hard." + +"Who is the Russian lady who drives four-in-hand, M. Reverchon?" asked +Mme. Davarande. + +"Mme. de Rissleff. She has some splendid horses, some thoroughbred +Orloffs." + +"You ought to join the Jockey Club, Jules, for the races," said Mme. +Davarande, turning to her husband. "I think it is so common to be with +everybody. Really if one has any respect for one's self--a woman I +mean--there is no place but the jockey stand." + +"Ah, a mushroom patty!" exclaimed M. Barousse. "Your cook is surpassing +herself, she really is a veritable _cordon-bleu_. I shall have to pay +her my compliments before leaving." + +"I thought you never eat that dish," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"I did not eat it in 1848--and I did not eat it up to the second of +December. Do you think the police had time then to inspect mushrooms? +But now that there is order again." + +"Henriette," said Mme. Mauperin to Mme. Davarande, "I must scold your +husband. He neglects us. We have not seen you for three weeks, M. +Davarande." + +"Oh, my dear mother, if you only knew all I have had to do! You know I +am on very good terms with Georges. His father has his time taken up at +the Chamber and the business falls on Georges as principal. There are +hundreds of things that he can only trust to people in whom he has +confidence--friends, in fact. There was that big affair--that _début_ at +the Opéra. There was no end of interviews and parleyings and journeys +backward and forward. It would not have done to have had any strife +between the two ministries. Oh, we have been very busy lately. He is so +considerate that I could not----" + +"So considerate?" put in Denoisel. "He might pay your cab-fares at +least. It's more than two years since he promised you a +sub-prefectship." + +"My dear Denoisel, it's more difficult than you imagine. And then, too, +when one does not care about going too far from Paris. Besides, between +ourselves, I can tell you that it's almost arranged. In about a month +from now I have every reason to believe----" + +"What _début_ were you speaking of?" asked Barousse. + +"Bradizzi's," answered Davarande. + +"Ah, Bradizzi! Isn't she astounding!" said Reverchon. "She has some runs +that are wonderfully light. The other day I was in the manager's box on +the stage and we couldn't hear her touch the ground when she was +dancing." + +"We expected to see you yesterday evening, Henri," said Mme. Davarande +to her brother. + +"Yesterday I was at my lecture," he answered. + +"Henri has been appointed reporter," said Mme. Mauperin proudly. + +"Ah," put in Denoisel, "the d'Aguesseau lecture? That's still going on +then, your speechifying affair? How many are there in it?" + +"Two hundred." + +"And all statesmen? It's quite alarming. What were you to report on?" + +"A law that was proposed with reference to the National Guard." + +"You go in for everything," said Denoisel. + +"I am sure you do not belong to the National Guard, Denoisel?" observed +M. Barousse. + +"No, indeed!" + +"And yet it is an institution." + +"The drums affirm that it is that, M. Barousse." + +"And you do not vote either, I would wager?" + +"I would not vote under any pretext." + +"Denoisel, I am sorry to say so, but you are a bad citizen. You were +born as you are, I am not blaming you, but the fact remains----" + +"A bad citizen--what do you mean?" + +"Well, you are always in opposition to the laws." + +"I am?" + +"Yes, you are. Without going any farther back, take for instance the +money you came into from your Uncle Frédéric. You handed it over to his +illegitimate children----" + +"What of that?" + +"Well, that is what I call an illegal action, most deplorable and +blameworthy. What does the law mean? It is quite clear--the law means +that children not born in wedlock should not be able to inherit their +father's money. You were not ignorant of this, for I told you that it +was so; your lawyer told you and the code told you. What did you do? +Why, you let the children have the money. You ignored the code, the +spirit of the law, everything. To give up your uncle's fortune in that +way, Denoisel, was rendering homage to low morals. It was simply +encouraging----" + +"I know your principles in the matter, M. Barousse. But what was I to +do? When I saw those three poor lads I said to myself that I should +never enjoy the cigars I smoked with their bread-money. No one is +perfect----" + +"All that is not law. When there is a law there is some reason for it, +is there not? The law is against immorality. Suppose others imitated +you----" + +"You need not fear that, Barousse," said M. Mauperin, smiling. + +"We ought never to set a bad example," answered Barousse, sententiously. +"Do not misunderstand me," he continued, turning to Denoisel. "I do not +respect you any the less for it, on the contrary, I appreciate your +disinterestedness, but as to saying that you were right--no, I cannot +say that. It's the same with your way of living--that is not as it +should be. You ought to have your time occupied--hang it all! You ought +to do something, go in for something, take up some work, pay your debt +to your country. If you had begun in good time, with your intelligence, +you would perhaps have had a post bringing you in a thousand or +more----" + +"I have had a better thing than that offered me, M. Barousse." + +"More money?" asked Barousse. + +"More money," answered Denoisel tranquilly. + +Barousse looked at him in astonishment. + +"Seriously," continued Denoisel, "I had the most brilliant +prospects--just for five minutes. It was on the twenty-fourth of +February, 1848. I did not know what to do with myself, for when one has +done the Tuileries in the morning it rather unsettles one for the rest +of the day. It occurred to me that I would go and call on one of my +friends who has a Government appointment--a Government appointment, you +know, on the other side of the water. I arrived, and there was no one +there. I went upstairs into the minister's office where my friend +worked--no friend there. I lighted a cigarette, intending to wait for +him. A gentleman came in while I was smoking, and seeing me seated, +imagined I belonged to the place. He had no hat on, so that I thought he +also did. He asked me very politely to show him the way about the house. +I took him round and then we came back. He gave me something to write +down, just telling me the sense of it. I took my friend's pen and wrote. +He then read it and was delighted. We talked; he admired my orthography. +He shook hands with me and found I had gloves on. To cut it short, at +the end of a quarter of an hour he was pressing me to be his secretary. +It was the new minister." + +"And you did not accept?" + +"My friend arrived and I accepted for him. He is at present quite a high +functionary in the Council of State. It was lucky for him to be +supernumerary only half a day." + +They were having dessert, and M. Mauperin had pulled one of the dishes +nearer and was just helping himself in an absent-minded way. + +"M. Mauperin!" exclaimed his wife, looking steadily at him. + +"I beg pardon, my dear--symmetry--you are quite right. I wasn't +thinking," and he pushed the dish back to its place. + +"You always do disarrange things----" + +"I'm sorry, my dear, I'm very sorry. My wife is an excellent woman, you +know, gentlemen, but if you disarrange her symmetry for her--It's quite +a religion with my wife--symmetry is." + +"How ridiculous you are, M. Mauperin!" said Mme. Mauperin, blushing at +being convicted of the most flagrant provincialism; and then, turning +upon her daughter, she exclaimed, "Oh, dear, Renée, how you stoop! Do +sit up, my child----" + +"That's always the way," murmured the young girl, speaking to herself. +"Mamma avenges herself on me." + +"Gentlemen," said M. Mauperin, when they had returned to the +drawing-room, "you can smoke here, you know. We owe that liberty to my +son. He has been lucky enough to obtain his mother's----" + +"Coffee, god-papa?" asked Renée. + +"No," answered M. Barousse, "I shouldn't be able to go to sleep----" + +"Here," put in Renée, finishing his sentence for him. + +"M. Reverchon?" + +"I never take it, thank you very much." + +She went backward and forward, the steam from the cup of hot coffee she +was carrying rising to her face and flushing it. + +"Is every one served?" she asked, and without waiting for any reply she +sat down to the piano and struck the first notes of a polka. + +"Are we going to dance?" she asked, breaking off. "Let us dance--oh, do +let us dance!" + +"Let us smoke in peace!" said M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, daddy," and going on with her polka she danced it herself on her +music-stool, only touching the floor with her tip-toes. She played +without looking at her notes, her face turned towards the drawing-room, +smiling and animated, her eyes lighted up and her cheeks flushed with +the excitement of the dance; like a little girl playing dance music for +other people and moving about herself as she watches them. She swung her +shoulders, her form swayed as though she were being guided along, while +her whole body marked the rhythm and her attitude seemed to indicate +the step she was dancing. Then she turned towards the piano again and +her eyes followed her hands over the black and white keys. Bending over +the music she was playing, she seemed to be striking the notes, then +caressing them, speaking to them, scolding them or smiling on them, and +then lulling them to sleep. She would sustain the loud parts, then +linger over the melody; there were movements that she would play with +tenderness and others with little bursts of passion. She bent over the +piano, then rose again, the light playing on the top of her +tortoise-shell comb one moment, while the next moment it could scarcely +be seen in her black hair. The two candles on the piano flickered to the +noise, throwing a light over her profile or sending their flame over her +forehead, her cheeks, and her chin. The shadow from her ear-rings--two +coral balls--trembled all the time on the delicate skin of her throat, +and her fingers ran so quickly over the keyboard that one could only see +something pink flying backward and forward. + +"And it's her own composition," said M. Mauperin to Reverchon. + +"She has had lessons from Quidant," added Mme. Mauperin. + +"There--I've finished!" exclaimed Renée, suddenly leaving the piano and +planting herself in front of Denoisel. "Tell me a story now, Denoisel, +to amuse me--anything you like." + +She was standing before him, her arms crossed and her head slightly +thrown back, the weight of her body supported on one leg, and a +mischievous, daring look on her face which lent additional grace to her +slightly masculine dress. She was wearing a high collar of piqué with a +cravat of black ribbon, and the revers of her white front turned back +over her jacket bodice of cloth. There were pockets on the front of her +skirt. + +"When shall you cut your wisdom teeth, Renée?" asked Denoisel. + +"Never!" she answered, laughing. "Well, what about my story?" + +Denoisel looked round to see that no one was listening, and then +lowering his voice began: + +"Once upon a time a papa and a mamma had a little daughter. The papa and +mamma wished her to marry, and they sent for some very nice-looking +gentlemen; but the little daughter, who was very nice-looking, too----" + +"Oh, how stupid you are!--I'll get my work, there--" and taking her work +out of a basket on the table she went and sat down by her mother. + +"Are we not going to have any whist to-night?" asked M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, of course, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin. "The table is +ready--you see there are only the candles to light." + +"Going, going, gone!" called out Denoisel in M. Barousse's ear. + +The old gentleman was just beginning to doze in a corner by the +chimney-piece and his head was nodding like a passenger's in a +stage-coach. M. Barousse started up and Denoisel handed him a card: + +"The King of Spades! _before the letter!_ You are wanted at whist." + +"You are not over-tired this evening, mademoiselle?" asked Reverchon, +approaching Renée. + +"I? I could dance all night. That's how I feel." + +"You are making something--very pretty----" + +"This?--oh, yes, very pretty! It is a stocking--I am knitting for my +little poor children. It's warm, that's all it is. I am not very clever +with my needle, you know. With embroidery and wool-work you have to +think about what you are doing, but with this, you see, your fingers go; +it just makes itself when once you start, and you can think about +anything--the Grand Turk if you like----" + +"I say, Renée," observed M. Mauperin, "it's odd; it's no good my losing, +I can't catch up again." + +"Oh, that's clever--I shall remember that for my collection," answered +Renée. "Denoisel, come here," she called out, suddenly, "come here a +minute--nearer--nearer still. Will you come here at once--there +now--kneel down----" + +"Are you mad, child?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin. + +"Renée," said Denoisel, "I believe you have made up your mind to prevent +my getting married." + +"Come, come, Renée!" said M. Mauperin paternally from the card-table. + +"Well--what is it?" asked Renée threatening Denoisel playfully with a +pair of scissors. "Now if you move! Denoisel's head always looks +untidy--his hair is badly cut--he always has a great, ugly lock that +falls over his forehead. It makes people squint when they look at him. I +want to cut that lock. There--he's afraid. Why, I cut hair very +well--you ask papa," and forthwith she gave two or three clips with her +scissors, and then crossing over to the fireplace, shook the hair into +the grate. "If you fancy it was for the sake of getting a lock of your +hair--" she said, turning round as she spoke. + +She had paid no attention to the nudge her brother had given her as she +passed. Her mother, who an instant before was perfectly crimson, was now +pale, but Renée had not noticed that. Her father left the whist-table +and came across to her with an embarrassed expression, looking as though +he were vexed with her. She took the cigarette which he had lighted +from him, put it between her own lips, and drawing a puff of smoke, +blew it away again quickly, turning her head away, coughing and +blinking. "Ugh!--how horrid it is!" + +"Well, really, Renée!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin severely, and evidently +in great distress, "I really don't know--I have never seen you like +this----" + +"Bring the tea in," said M. Mauperin to a servant who had entered in +answer to his peal at the bell. + + + + +IV + + +"A quarter past ten already!" said Mme. Davarande. "We shall only just +have time to get to the station. Renée, tell them to bring me my hat." + +Every one rose. Barousse woke up from his nap with the noise, and the +little band of guests from Paris set out for Saint-Denis. + +"I'll come with you," said Denoisel. "I should like a breath of air." + +Barousse was in front, arm-in-arm with Reverchon. The Davarandes +followed, and Henri Mauperin and Denoisel brought up the rear. + +"Why don't you stay all night? You could go back to Paris to-morrow," +Denoisel began. + +"No," answered Henri, "I won't do that. I have some work to do to-morrow +morning. I should get to Paris late and my day would be wasted." + +They were silent, and every now and then a few words from Barousse to +Reverchon in praise of Renée came to them through the silence of the +night. + +"I say, Denoisel, I'm afraid it is all up with that, don't you think +so?" + +"Yes, I think it is." + +"Oh, dear! Will you tell me, my dear fellow, what made you humour Renée +in all the nonsense that came into her head this evening? You have a +great deal of influence over her and----" + +"My dear boy," answered Denoisel, puffing at his cigar, "you must let me +give you a social, philosophical, and historical parenthesis. We have +quite finished, have we not, and when I say we, I mean the majority of +the French people, with the pretty little young ladies who used to talk +like mechanical dolls. They could say 'papa' and 'mamma,' and when they +went to a dance they never lost sight of their parents. The little +childlike young lady who was always so timid and bashful and who used to +blush and stammer, brought up to be ignorant of everything, neither +knowing how to stand up on her legs nor how to sit down on a chair--all +that sort of thing's done with, old-fashioned, worn out. That was the +marriageable young lady of the days of the Gymnase Theatre. There is +nothing of that kind nowadays. The process of culture has changed; it +used to be a case of the fruit-wall, but at present the young person +grows in the open. We ask a girl now about her impressions and we expect +her to say what she thinks naturally and originally. She is allowed to +talk, and indeed is expected to talk, about everything, as that is the +accepted thing now. She need no longer act sweet simplicity, but native +intelligence. If only she can shine in society her parents are +delighted. Her mother takes her to classes. If she should have any +talent it is encouraged and cultivated. Instead of ordinary governesses +she must have good masters, professors from the Conservatoire, or +artists whose pictures have been hung. She goes in for being an artist +and every one is delighted. Come, now, isn't that the way girls are +being educated now in middle-class society?' + +"And the result?" + +"Now, then," continued Denoisel without answering the question, "in the +midst of this education, which I am not criticising, remember--in the +midst of all this, let us imagine a father who is an excellent sort of +man, goodness and kindness personified, encouraging his daughter in her +new freedom by his weakness and his worship of her. Let us suppose, for +instance, that this father has countenanced all the daring and all the +mischievousness of a boy in a woman, that he has allowed his daughter +little by little to cultivate manly accomplishments, which he sees with +pride and which are after his own heart----" + +"And you, my dear fellow, who know my sister so well and the way she has +been brought up, the style she has gone in for, authorized as she +considers herself (thanks to father's indulgence), you, knowing how +difficult it is to get her married, allowed her to do all kinds of +unseemly things this evening when you might have stopped her short with +just a few words such as you always find to say and which you alone can +say to her?" + + * * * * * + +The friend to whom Henri Mauperin was speaking, Denoisel, was the son of +a compatriot, and old school friend and brother-in-arms of M. Mauperin. +The two men had been in the same battles, they had shed their blood in +the same places, and during the retreat from Russia they had eaten the +same horse-flesh. + +A year after his return to France, M. Mauperin had lost this friend, who +on his death-bed had left him guardian to his son. The boy had found a +second father in his guardian. When at college, he had spent all his +holidays at Morimond, and he looked upon the Mauperins as his own +family. + +When M. Mauperin's children came it seemed to the young man that a +brother and sister had been just what he had wanted; he felt as though +he were their elder brother, and he became a child again in order to be +one with them. + +His favourite was, of course, Renée, who when quite little began to +adore him. She was very lively and self-willed and he alone could make +her listen to reason and obey. As she grew up he had been the moulder of +her character, the confessor of her intellect, and the director of her +tastes. His influence over the young girl had increased day by day as +they grew more and more familiar. A room was always kept ready for +Denoisel in the house, his place was always kept for him at table, and +he came whenever he liked to spend a week with the Mauperins. + + * * * * * + +"There are days," continued Henri, "when Renée's nonsense does not +matter, but this evening--before that man. It will be all off with that +marriage, I'm sure! It would have been an excellent match--he has such +good prospects. He's just the man in every respect--charming, too, and +distinguished." + +"Do you think so? For my part, I should have been afraid of him for your +sister. That is really the reason why I behaved as I did this evening. +That man has a sort of common distinction about him--a distinction made +up of the vulgarity of all kinds of elegancies. He's a fashion poster, a +tailor's model, morally and physically. There's nothing, absolutely +nothing, in a little fellow like that. A husband for your sister--that +man? Why, how in the world do you suppose he could ever understand her? +How is he ever to discover all the warmth of feeling and the elevation +and nobility of character hidden under her eccentricities? Can you +imagine them having a thought in common? Good heavens! if your sister +married, no matter whom, so long as the man were intelligent and had +some character and individuality, as long as there were something in him +that would either govern or appeal to a nature like hers--why, I would +say nothing. A man has often great faults which appeal to a woman's +heart. He may be a bad lot, and there is the chance that she will go on +loving him through sheer jealousy. With a busy, ambitious man like you +she would have all the thought and excitement and all the dreams about +his career to occupy her mind. But a dandy like that for life! Why, your +sister would be absolutely wretched; she would die of misery. She isn't +like other girls, you know, your sister--one must take that into +consideration. She is high-minded, untrammelled by conventionalities, +very fond of fun, and very affectionate. At bottom she is a +_mélancolique tintamarresque_." + +"A _mélancolique tintamarresque_? What does that mean?" + +"I'll explain. She----" + +"Henri, hurry up!" called out Davarande from the platform. "They are +getting into the train. I have your ticket." + + + + +V + + +M. and Mme. Mauperin were in their bed-room. The clock had just struck +midnight, gravely and slowly, as though to emphasize the solemnity of +that confidential and conjugal moment which is both the _tête-à-tête_ of +wedded life and the secret council of the household--that moment of +transformation and magic which is both _bourgeois_ and diabolic, and +which reminds one of that story of the woman metamorphosed into a cat. +The shadow of the bed falls mysteriously over the wife, and as she lies +down there is a sort of charm about her. Something of the bewitchments +of a mistress come to her at this instant. Her will seems to be roused +there by the side of the marital will which is dormant. She sits up, +scolds, sulks, teases, struggles. She has caresses and scratches for the +man. The pillow confers on her its force, her strength comes to her with +the night. + +Mme. Mauperin was putting her hair in papers in front of the glass, +which was lighted by a single candle. She was in her skirt and +dressing-jacket. Her stout figure, above which her little arms kept +moving as if she were crowning herself, threw on the wall a fantastic +outline of a woman of fifty in deshabille, and on the paper at the end +of the room could be seen wavering about one of those corpulent shadows +which one could imagine Hoffman and Daumier sketching from the back of +the beds of old married couples. M. Mauperin was already lying down. + +"Louis!" said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Well?" answered M. Mauperin, with that accent of indifference, regret, +and weariness of a man who, with his eyes still open, is beginning to +enjoy the delight of the horizontal position. + +"Oh, if you are asleep----" + +"I am not asleep. What is it?" + +"Oh, nothing. I think Renée behaved most improperly this evening; that's +all. Did you notice?" + +"No, I wasn't paying any attention." + +"It's just a whim. There isn't the least reason in it. Hasn't she said +anything to you? Do you know anything? I'm nowhere--with all your +mysteries and secrets. I'm always the last to know about things. It's +quite different with you--you are told everything. It's very fortunate +that I was not born jealous, don't you think so?" + +M. Mauperin pulled the sheet up over his shoulder without answering. + +"You certainly are asleep," continued Mme. Mauperin in the sharp, +disappointed tone of a woman who is expecting a parry for her attack. + +"I told you I wasn't asleep." + +"Then you surely don't understand. Oh, these intelligent men--it's +curious. It concerns you though, too; it's your business quite as much +as mine. This is another marriage fallen through--do you understand? A +marriage that was most suitable--money--good family--everything. I know +what these hesitations mean. We may as well give up all idea of it. +Henri was talking to me about it this evening; the young man hadn't said +anything to him; of course, he's too well-bred for that. But Henri is +quite persuaded that he's drawing out of it. One can always tell in +matters of this kind; people have a way of----" + +"Well, let him draw out of it then; what do you want me to say?" M. +Mauperin sat straight up and put his two hands on his thighs. "Let him +go. There are plenty of young men like Reverchon; he is not unique, we +can find others; while girls like my daughter----" + +"Good heavens! Your daughter--your daughter!" + +"You don't do her justice, Thérèse." + +"I? Oh, yes, I do; but I see her as she is and not with your eyes. She +has her faults, and great faults, too, which you have encouraged--yes, +you. She is as heedless and full of freaks as a child of ten. If you +imagine that it doesn't worry me--her unreasonableness, her uncertain +moods, and so many other absurdities ever since we have been trying to +get her married! And then her way of criticising every one to whom we +introduce her. She is terrible at interviews of this kind. This makes +about the tenth man she has sent about his business." + +At Mme. Mauperin's last words a gleam of paternal vanity lighted up M. +Mauperin's face. + +"Yes, yes," he said, smiling at the remembrance, "the fact is she is +diabolically witty. Do you recollect her words about that poor Prefect: +'Oh, he's a regular old cock!' I remember how she said it directly she +saw him." + +"It really is very funny, and above all very fit and proper. Jokes of +this kind will help her to get married, take my word for it. Such things +will induce other men to come forward, don't you think so? I am quite +certain that Renée must have a reputation for being a terror. A little +more of her precious wit and you will see what proposals you will get +for your daughter! I married Henriette so easily! Renée is my cross." + +M. Mauperin had picked up his snuff-box from the table by the side of +the bed and appeared to be intent on turning it round between his thumb +and first finger. + +"Well," continued Mme. Mauperin, "it's her own lookout. When she is +thirty, when she has refused every one, and there is no one left who +wants her, in spite of all her wit, her good qualities and everything +else, she will have time to reflect a little--and you will, too." + +There was a pause. Mme. Mauperin gave M. Mauperin time enough to imagine +that she had finished, and then changing her tone she began again: + +"I want to speak to you, too, about your son----" + +Hereupon M. Mauperin, whose head had been bent while his wife was +talking, looked up, and there was a half smile of mischievous humour on +his face. In the upper as well as the lower middle class there is a +certain maternal love capable of rising to the height of passion and of +sinking to mere idolatry. There are mothers who in their affection and +love will fall down and worship their son. Theirs is not that maternal +love which veils its own weaknesses, which defends its rights, is +jealous of its duties, which is careful about the hierarchy and +discipline of the family, and which commands respect and consideration. +The child, brought near to his mother by all kinds of familiarity, +receives from her attentions which are more like homage, and caresses in +which there is a certain amount of servility. All the mother's dreams +are centred in him, for he is not only the heir but the whole future of +the family. Through him the family will reap the benefits of wealth, of +all the improvements and progressive rise of the _bourgeoisie_ from one +generation to another. The mother revels in the thought of what he is +and what he will be. She loves him and is glorified herself in him. She +dedicates all her ambitions to him and worships him. This son appears to +her a superior being, and she is amazed that he should have been born of +her; she seems to feel the mingled pride and humility of the mother of a +god. + +Mme. Mauperin was a typical example of one of these mothers of modern +middle-class life. The merits, the features, the intellect of her son +were for her those of a divinity. His whole person, his accomplishments, +everything he said and everything he did, all was sacred to her. She +would spend her time in contemplation of him; she saw no one else when +he was there. It seemed to her as though the whole world began and ended +in her son. He was in her eyes perfection itself, the most intelligent, +the handsomest, and, above all, the most distinguished of men. He was +short-sighted and wore an eye-glass, but she would not even own that he +was near-sighted. + +When he was there she watched him talk, sit down or walk about, and she +would smile at him when his back was turned. She liked the very creases +of his coat. When he was not there she would lean back for a few minutes +in her arm-chair and some reminiscence of infinite sweetness would +gradually brighten and soften her face. It was as though light, +restfulness, and peace had suddenly come to her; her expression was +joyous at such times, her eyes were looking at something in the past, +her heart was living over again some happy moment, and if any one spoke +to her she seemed to wake up out of a dream. + +It was in a certain measure hereditary, this intense maternal love. Mme. +Mauperin came of a race which had always loved its sons with a warm, +violent, and almost frenzied love. The mothers in her family had been +mothers with a vengeance. There was a story told of her grandmother in +the Haute-Marne. It was said that she had disfigured a child with a +burning coal who had been considered handsomer than her own boy. + +At the time of her son's first ailments Mme. Mauperin had almost lost +her reason; she had hated all children who were well, and had hoped that +God would kill them if her son died. Once when he had been seriously ill +she had been forty-eight nights without going to bed, and her legs had +swelled with fatigue. When he was about again he had been allowed +anything and everything. If any one came to complain to her that he had +been fighting with the village children she would say feelingly: "Poor +little dear!" As the boy grew up his mother's spirit preceded him on +his walk through life, strewing his pathway with hope as he emerged into +manhood. She thought of all the heiresses in the neighbourhood whose age +would be suitable to his. She used to imagine him visiting at all the +country-houses, and she saw him on horseback, riding to the meet in a +red coat. She used to be fairly dazzled by all her dreams of the future. + +Then came the time when he went away to college, the time when she had +to separate from him. Mme. Mauperin struggled for three months to keep +her son, to have him educated at home by a tutor, but M. Mauperin was +resolute on this score. All that Mme. Mauperin could obtain from him was +the permission to select the college for her son. She chose one with the +mildest discipline possible, one of those colleges for the children of +wealthy parents, where there is no severity, where the boys are allowed +to eat pastry when they are taking their walks, and where the professors +believe in more theatrical rehearsals than punishments. During the seven +years he was there, Mme. Mauperin never missed a single day going from +Saint-Denis to see him during the recreation hour. Rain, cold, fatigue, +illness, nothing prevented her. In the parlour or in the courtyard the +other mothers pointed her out to each other. The boy would kiss her, +take the cakes she had brought him, and then, telling her he had a +lesson to finish learning, he would hurry back to his games. It was +quite enough for his mother, though, for she had seen him and he was +well. She was always thinking about his health. He was weighed down with +flannel, and in the holidays she fed him well with meat, giving him all +the gravy from underdone beef so that he should grow strong and tall. +She bought him a small mat to sit on at school because the forms were so +hard. There were separate bed-rooms for the pupils, and Mme. Mauperin +furnished her son's like a man's room. At twelve years of age he had a +rosewood dressing-table and chest of drawers of his own. The boy became +a young man, the young man left college, and Mme. Mauperin's passion for +him increased with all that satisfaction which a mother feels in a tall +son when his looks begin to change and his beard makes its first +appearance. Forgetting all about the tradespeople whose bills she had +paid, she was amazed at the style in which her son dressed, at his +boots, and the way in which he did his hair. There was a certain +elegance of taste in everything that he liked, in his luxurious habits, +in his ways, and in his whole life, to which she bowed down in +astonishment and delight, as though she herself were not the mainspring +of it all and his cashier. Her son's valet did not seem to her like an +ordinary domestic; his horse was not merely a horse, it was her son's +horse. When her son went out she gave orders that she should be told so +that she might have the satisfaction of seeing him get into the +carriage and drive away. + +Every day she was more and more taken up with this son. She had no +diversions, nothing to occupy her imagination; she did not read, and had +grown old living with a husband who had brought her no love and whom she +had always felt to be quite apart from her, engrossed as he had ever +been in his studies, politics, and business. She had no one left with +her but a daughter to whom she had never given her whole heart, and so +she had ended by devoting her life to Henri's interests and putting all +her vanity into his future. And her one thought--the thought which +occupied every hour of her days and nights, her fixed idea--was the +marriage of this adored son. She wanted him to marry well, to make a +match which should be rich enough and brilliant enough to make up to her +and repay her for all the dulness and obscurity of her own existence, +for her life of economy and solitude, for all her own privations as wife +and mother. + +"Do you even know your son's age, M. Mauperin?" continued Mme. Mauperin. + +"Henri, why, my dear, Henri must be--He was born in 1826, wasn't he?" + +"Oh, that's just like a father to ask! Yes, 1826, the 12th of July, +1826." + +"Well, then, he is twenty-nine. Fancy that now, he is twenty-nine!" + +"And you fold your arms and take things easily! You don't trouble in the +least about his future! You say, 'Fancy that now, he's twenty-nine'--just +like that, quite calmly! Any other man would stir himself and look +round. Henri isn't like his sister, he wants to marry. Have you ever +thought of finding a suitable match for him--a wife? Oh, dear, no, not +any more than for the King of Prussia, of course not! It's just the same +as it was for your elder daughter. I should like to know what you did +towards that marriage? Whether she found any one or not, it appeared to +be all the same to you. How I did have to urge you on to do anything in +the matter! Oh, you can wipe your hands of that marriage; your +daughter's happiness can't weigh much on your conscience, I should +think! If I had not been there you would have found a husband like M. +Davarande, shouldn't you? A model husband, who adores Henriette--and +such a gentleman!" + +Mme. Mauperin blew out the candle and got into bed by the side of M. +Mauperin, who had turned over with his face towards the wall. + +"Yes," she went on, stretching herself out full length under the sheets, +"a model husband! Do you imagine that there are many sons-in-law who +would be so attentive to us? He would do anything to give us pleasure. +You invite him to dinner and give him meat on fasting-days and he never +says a word. Then, too, he is so obliging. I wanted to match some wools +for my tapestry-work the other day----" + +"My dear, what is it we were talking about? I must tell you that I +should like to get a bit of sleep to-night. You began with your +daughter, and now you've started the chapter of M. Davarande's +perfections. I know that chapter--there's enough to last till to-morrow +morning. Come now, you want your son to marry, don't you? That's it, +isn't it? Well, I'm quite willing--let's get him married." + +"Just as though I could count on you for getting him married! A lot of +trouble you'll go to about it; you are the right sort of man to +inconvenience yourself for anything." + +"Oh, come, come, my dear, that's unjust. It seems to me that about a +fortnight ago I showed you what I was capable of. To go and listen to +the dullest of operas, to eat ices at night, which is a thing I detest, +and to talk about the weather with a provincial man who shouted about +his daughter's dowry on the boulevards. If you don't call that +inconveniencing myself! I suppose you'll say it didn't come to anything? +Was it my fault, though, if the gentleman wanted '_a handsome, manly +husband_,' as he put it, for his daughter? Is it my fault and mine only +if our son has not the frame of a Hercules?" + +"M. Mauperin----" + +"Oh, yes, it is, of course. I am to blame for everything, according to +you. You would make me pass everywhere for a selfish----" + +"Oh, you are like all men!" + +"Thank you on behalf of them all." + +"No, it's in your character--it's no good blaming you. It's only the +mothers who worry. Ah, if you were only like I am; if at every instant +you were thinking of what might happen to a young man. I know Henri is +sensible; but a young man's fancy is so quickly caught. It might be some +worthless creature--some bad lot--one never knows--such things happen +every day. I should go mad! What do you say to sounding Mme. Rosières? +Shall we?" + +There was no reply, and Mme. Mauperin was obliged to resign herself to +silence. She turned over and over, but could not sleep until daylight +appeared. + + + + +VI + + +"Ah, what's that mean? Where in the world are you going?" asked M. +Mauperin in the morning as Mme. Mauperin stood at the glass putting on a +black lace cape. + +"Where am I going?" said Mme. Mauperin, fastening the cape to her +shoulder with one of the two pins she was holding in her mouth. "Is my +cape too low down? Just look." + +"No." + +"Pull it a little." + +"How fine you are!" said M. Mauperin, stepping back and examining his +wife's dress. + +She was wearing a black dress of the most elegant style, in excellent +taste though somewhat severe looking. + +"I am going to Paris." + +"Oh! you are going to Paris? What are you going to do in Paris?" + +"Oh, dear, how you do worry always with your questions: 'Where are you +going? What are you going to do?' You really want to know, do you?" + +"Well, I was only asking you----" + +"My dear, I am going to confession," said Mme. Mauperin, looking down. + +M. Mauperin was speechless. His wife in the early days of her married +life had gone regularly on Sundays to church. Later she had accompanied +her daughters to their catechism class, and these were all the religious +duties he had ever known her to accomplish. For the last ten years it +seemed to him that she had been as indifferent as he was about such +things--naturally and frankly indifferent. When the first moment of +stupefaction had passed, he opened his mouth to speak, looked at her, +said nothing, and, turning suddenly on his heels, went out of the room +humming a kind of air to which music and words were about all that were +missing. + + * * * * * + +On arriving at a handsome, cheerful-looking house in the Rue de la +Madeleine, Mme. Mauperin went upstairs to the fourth story and rang at a +door where there was no attempt at any style. It was opened promptly. + +"M. l'Abbé Blampoix?" + +"Yes, madame," answered a servant-man in black livery. + +He spoke with a Belgian accent and bowed as he spoke. He took Mme. +Mauperin across the entrance-hall, where a faint odour was just dying +away, and through a dining-room flooded with sunshine, where the cloth +was simply laid for one person. Mme. Mauperin then found herself in a +drawing-room decorated and scented with flowers. Above a harmonium with +rich inlaid work was a copy of Correggio's "Night." On another panel, +framed in black, was the Communion of Marie Antoinette and of her +gendarmes at the Conciergerie, lithographed according to a story that +was told about her. Keepsakes, a hundred little things that might have +been New Year's gifts, filled the brackets. A small bronze statue of +Canova's "Madeleine" was on a table in the middle of the room. + +The tapestry chairs, each one of a different design and piously worked +by hand, were evidently presents which devoted women had done for the +abbé. + +There were men and women waiting there, and each by turn went into the +abbé's room, stayed a few minutes, then came out again and went away. +The last person waiting, a woman, stayed a long time, and when she came +out of the room Mme. Mauperin could not see her face through her double +veil. + +The abbé was standing by his chimney-piece when Mme. Mauperin entered. +He was holding apart the flaps of his cassock like the tails of a coat. + + * * * * * + +The Abbé Blampoix had neither benefice nor parish. He had a large +connection and a specialty: he was the priest of society people, of the +fashionable world, and of the aristocracy. He confessed the frequenters +of drawing-rooms, he was the spiritual director of well-born +consciences, and he comforted those souls that were worth the trouble of +comforting. He brought Jesus Christ within reach of the wealthy. "Every +one has his work to do in the Lord's vineyard," he used often to say, +appearing to groan and bend beneath the burden of saving the Faubourg +Saint-Germain, the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, and the Chaussée-d'Antin. + +He was a man of common sense and intellect, an obliging sort of priest +who adapted everything to the precept, "_The letter killeth, and the +spirit maketh alive._" He was tolerant and intelligent, could comprehend +things and could smile. He measured faith out according to the +temperament of the people and only gave it in small doses. He made the +penances light, he loosened the bonds of the cross and sprinkled the way +of salvation with sand. From the hard, unlovely, stern religion of the +poor he had evolved a pleasant religion for the rich; it was easy, +charming, elastic, adapting itself to things and to people, to all the +ways and manners of society, to its customs and habits, and even to its +prejudices. Of the idea of God he had made something quite comfortable +and elegant. + +The Abbé Blampoix had all the fascination of the priest who is well +educated, talented, and accomplished. He could talk well during +confession, and could put some wit into his exhortations and a certain +graciousness into his unction. He knew how to move and interest his +hearers. He was well versed in words that touch the heart and in +speeches that are flattering and pleasing to the ear. His voice was +musical and his style flowery. He called the devil "_the Prince of +evil_," and the eucharist "_the Divine aliment_"! He abounded in +periphrases as highly coloured as sacred pictures. He talked of Rossini, +quoted Racine, and spoke of "_the Bois_" for the Bois de Boulogne. He +talked of divine love in words which were somewhat disconcerting, of +present-day vices with piquant details, and of society in society +language. Occasionally, expressions which were in vogue and which had +only recently been invented, expressions only known among worldly +people, would slip into his spiritual consultations and had the same +effect as extracts from a newspaper in an ascetic book. There was a +pleasant odour of the century about him. His priestly robe seemed to be +impregnated with all the pretty little sins which had approached it. He +was very well up and always to the point with regard to subtle +temptations, admirably shrewd, keen, and tactful in his discussions on +sensuality. Women doted on him. + +His first step, his _début_ in the ecclesiastical career, had been +distinguished by a veritable seduction and capturing of souls, by a +success which had been a perfect triumph and indeed almost a scandal. +After taking the catechism classes for a year in the parish of B----, +the archbishop had appointed him to other work, putting another priest +in his place. The result of this was a rebellion, as all the girls who +had attended the catechism classes refused to speak or listen to the +newcomer. They had lost their young hearts and heads, and there were +tears shed by all the flock, a regular riot of wailing and sorrow, which +before long changed into revolt. The elder girls, the chief members of +the society, kept up the struggle several months. They agreed together +not to go to the classes, and they went so far as to refuse to hand over +to the curé the cash-box which had been intrusted to them. It was with +the greatest difficulty that they were appeased. + +The success which all this augured to the Abbé Blampoix had not failed +him. His fame had quickly spread. That great force, Fashion, which in +Paris affects everything, even a priest's cassock, had taken him up and +launched him. People came to him from all parts. The ordinary, +commonplace confessions were heard by other priests; but all the choice +sins were brought to him. Around him was always to be heard a hubbub of +great names, of large fortunes, of pretty contritions, and the rustling +of beautiful dresses. Mothers consulted him about taking their +daughters out, and the daughters were instructed by him before going +into society. He was appealed to for permission to wear low-necked +dresses, and he was the man who regulated the modesty of ball costumes +and the propriety of reading certain books. He was also asked for titles +of novels and lists of moral plays. He prepared candidates for +confirmation and led them on to marriage. He baptized children and +listened to the confession of the adulterous in thought. Wives who +considered themselves slighted or misunderstood came to him to lament +over the materiality of their husbands, and he supplied them with a +little idealism to take back to their homes. All who were in trouble or +despair had recourse to him, and he ordered a trip to Italy for them, +with music and painting for diversions and a good confession in Rome. + +Wives who were separated from their husbands addressed themselves to him +when they wanted to return quietly to their home. His conciliations came +between the love of wives and the jealousy of mothers-in-law. He found +governesses for the mothers and lady's maids of forty years of age for +young wives. Newly married wives learned from him to secure their +happiness and to keep their husband's affection by their discreet and +dainty toilettes, by cleanliness and care, by the spotlessness and +elegance of their linen. "My dear child," he would say sometimes, "a +wife should have just a faint perfume of the _lorette_ about her." His +experience intervened in questions of the hygiene of marriage. He was +consulted on such matters as maternity and pregnancy. He would decide +whether a wife should become a mother and whether a mother should suckle +her child. + +This vogue and rôle, the dealings that he had with women and the +possession of all their secrets, so many confidences and so much +knowledge on all subjects, his intercourse of all kinds with the +dignitaries and lady-treasurers of various societies, and the +acquaintance he had, thanks to the steps he was obliged to take in the +interests of charity, with all the important personages of Paris, all +the influence that, as a clever, discreet, and obliging priest, he had +succeeded in obtaining, had given to the Abbé Blampoix an immense power +and authority which radiated silently and unseen. Worldly interests and +social ambitions were confessed to him. Nearly all the marriageable +individuals in society were recommended to this priest, who professed no +political preferences, who mixed with every one, and who was admirably +placed for bringing families together, for uniting houses, arranging +matches of expediency or balancing social positions, pairing off money +with money, or joining an ancient title to a newly made fortune. It was +as though marriages in Paris had an occult Providence in the person of +this rare sort of man in whom were blended the priest and the lawyer, +the apostle and the diplomatist--Fénelon and M. de Foy. The Abbé +Blampoix had an income of sixteen hundred pounds, the half of which he +gave to the poor. He had refused a bishopric for the sake of remaining +what he was--a priest. + +"To whom have I the honour," began the abbé, who appeared to be +searching his memory for a name. + +"Mme. Mauperin, the mother of Mme. Davarande." + +"Oh, excuse me, madame, excuse me. Your family are not persons whom one +could forget. Do sit down, please--let me give you this arm-chair." + +And then, taking a seat himself with his back to the light, he +continued: + +"I like to think of that marriage, which gave me the opportunity of +making your acquaintance--the marriage of your daughter with M. +Davarande. You and I, madame, you, with the devotion of a mother, and +I--well, with just the feeble insight of a humble priest--brought about +a truly Christian marriage, a marriage which has satisfied the needs of +the dear child as regards her religion and her affection and which was +also in accordance with her social position. Mme. Davarande is one of my +model penitents; I am thoroughly satisfied with her. M. Davarande is an +excellent young man who shares the religious beliefs of his wife, and +that is a rare thing nowadays. One's mind is easy about such happy and +superior young couples, and I am quite convinced beforehand that you +have not come about either of these dear children----" + +"You are right. I am quite satisfied as regards them, and their +happiness is a great joy in my life. It is such a responsibility to get +one's children married. No, monsieur, it is not for them that I have +come; it is for myself." + +"For yourself--madame?" + +And the abbé glanced quickly at her with an expression which softened +just as quickly. + +"Ah, monsieur, time brings many changes. One has a hundred things to +think about before one reaches my age. There are the people one meets, +and society ties, and all that is very entertaining. We give ourselves +up to such things, enjoy them and count on them. We fancy we shall never +need anything beyond. Well, now, monsieur, I have reached the age when +one does need something beyond. You will understand me, I am sure. I +have begun to feel the emptiness of the world. Nothing interests me, and +I should like to come back to what I had given up. I know how indulgent +and charitable you are. I need your counsel and your hand to lead me +back to duties that I have neglected far too long, although I have +always remembered and respected them. You must know how wretched I am, +monsieur." + +While speaking thus, with that easy flow of words so natural to a woman, +and especially to a Parisian woman, and which in Parisian slang is known +as _bagou_, Mme. Mauperin, who had avoided meeting the priest's eyes, +which she had felt fixed on her, now glanced mechanically at a light +which was being stirred by the abbé's hands and which flamed up under a +ray of sunshine, shining brightly in the midst of this room--the +severe-looking, solemn, cold room of a man of business. This light came +from a casket containing some diamonds with which the abbé was idly +playing. + +"Ah, you are looking at this!" said the abbé, catching Mme. Mauperin's +eye and answering her thoughts instead of her phrases. "You are +surprised to see it, are you not? Yes, a jewel-case, a case of +diamonds--and just look at them--rather good ones, too." He passed her +the necklace. "It's odd for that to be here, isn't it? But what was I to +do? This is our modern society. We are obliged to see a little of all +sorts. Such a pitiful scene! I don't feel myself again yet, after +it--such sobs and tears! Perhaps you heard--a poor young wife throwing +herself down here at my feet--a mother of a family, madame! Alas! that's +how the world is--this is what the love of finery and the fondness of +admiration will lead to. People spend and spend, until finally they can +only pay the interest of what they owe at the shops. Yes, indeed, +madame, that happens constantly. I could mention the shops. People hope +to be able to pay the capital some day; they count on a son-in-law to +whom they can tell everything and who will only be too happy to pay his +mother-in-law's debts. But in the meantime the shops get impatient; and +at last they threaten to tell the husband everything. Then--oh, just +think of the anguish then! Do you know that this woman talked just now +of throwing herself into the river? I had to promise to find her twelve +hundred pounds. I beg your pardon, though--a thousand times. Here I am +talking of my own affairs. Let us go back to yours. You had another +daughter--a charming girl. I prepared her for confirmation. Let me see, +now, what was her name?" + +"Renée." + +"Oh, yes, of course, a very intelligent child, very quick--quite an +exceptional character. Tell me now, isn't she married?" + +"No, monsieur, and it's a great trouble to me. You've no idea what a +headstrong girl she is. She is nothing like her sister. It's very +unfortunate for a mother to have a daughter with a character like hers. +I would rather she were a little less intelligent. We have found most +suitable matches for her, and she refuses them in the most thoughtless, +foolish way. There was another one yesterday. And her father spoils her +so." + +"Ah, that's a pity. You have no idea what a maternal affection we have +for these dear children that we have led to Christ. But you don't say +anything about your son, a delightful young man, so good-looking--and +just the age to marry, it seems to me----" + +"Do you know him, monsieur?" + +"I had the pleasure of meeting him once at his sister's, at Mme. +Davarande's, when I went to see her during her illness; those are the +only visits we pay, you know--visits to the sick. Then, too, I have +heard all sorts of good reports about him. You are a fortunate mother, +madame. Your son goes to church, and at Easter he took communion with +the Jesuit Fathers. He has not told you, probably, but he was one of +those society men, true Christians, who waited nearly all night to get +to the confessional--there was such a crowd. Yes, people do not believe +it, but, thank God, it is quite true. Some of the young men waited until +five o'clock in the morning to confess. I need not tell you how deeply +the Church is touched by such zeal, how thankful she is to those who +give her this consolation and who pay her this homage in these sad times +of demoralization and incredulity. We are drawn towards young men who +set such a good example and who are so willing to do what is right, and +we are always ready to give them what help we can and to use any +influence that we may have in certain families in their favour." + +"Oh, monsieur, you are too good. And our gratitude--mine and my +son's--if only you would interest yourself on his behalf. What a happy +thought it was to come to you! You see I came to you as a woman, but as +a mother too. My son is angelic--and then, monsieur, you can do so +much." + +The abbé shook his head with a deprecatory smile of mingled modesty and +melancholy. + +"No, madame, you overestimate our power. We are far from all that you +say. We are able to do a little good sometimes, but it is with great +difficulty. If only you knew how little a priest can do in these days. +People are afraid of our influence; they do not care to meet us outside +the church, nor to speak to us except in the confessional. You yourself, +madame, would be surprised if your confessor ventured to speak to you +about your daily conduct. Thanks to the deplorable prejudices of people +with regard to us, every one's object is to keep us at a distance and to +stand on the defensive." + +"Oh, dear, why, it is one o'clock--and I saw that your table was laid +when I came. I'm quite ashamed of myself. May I come again in a few +days?" + +"My luncheon can always wait," said the Abbé Blampoix, and turning to a +desk covered with papers at his side, he made a sign to Mme. Mauperin to +sit down again. There was a moment's silence, broken only by the rustle +of papers which the abbé was turning over. Finally he drew out a +visiting-card, turned down at the corner, from under a pile of papers, +held it to the light, and read: + +"Twelve thousand pounds in deeds and preference shares. Six hundred +pounds a year from the day of marriage; father and mother dead. +Twenty-four thousand pounds on the death of some uncles and aunts who +will never marry. Young girl, nineteen, charming, much prettier than she +imagines herself to be. You see," said the abbé, putting the card back +among the papers. "Think it over. Anyhow, you will see. I have, too, at +this very moment a thousand pounds a year on her marriage--an +orphan--Ah, no, that would not do--her guardian wants to find some one +who is influential. He is sub-referendary judge on the Board of Finance +and he will only marry his ward to a son-in-law who can get him +promoted. Ah, wait a minute--this would do, perhaps," and he read aloud +from some notes: "Twenty-two years of age, not pretty, accomplished, +intelligent, dresses well, father sixty thousand pounds, three children, +substantial fortune. He owns the house in the Rue de Provence, where the +offices of the _Security_ are, an estate in the Orne, eight thousand +pounds in the Crédit Foncier. Rather an opinionated sort of man, of +Portuguese descent. The mother is a mere cipher in the house. There is +no family, and the father would be annoyed if you went to see his +relatives. I am not keeping anything back, as you see; a family dinner +party once a year and that is all. The father will give twelve thousand +pounds for the dowry; he wants his daughter to live in the same house. + +"Yes," continued the abbé, looking through his notes, "that's all I see +that would do for you just now. Will you talk it over with your son, +madame, and consult your husband? I am quite at your service. When I +have the pleasure of seeing you here again, will you bring with you just +a few figures, a little note that would give me an idea of your +intentions with regard to settling your son. And bring your daughter +with you. I should be delighted to see the dear child again." + +"Would you mind fixing some time when I should not disturb you quite so +much as I have done to-day, monsieur?" + +"Oh, madame, my time belongs to every one who has need of me, and I am +only too much honoured. The thing is that in a fortnight's time--if you +came then, I should be in the country, and I only come one day a week to +Paris, then. Yes, it's a sheer necessity, and so I have had to make up +my mind to it. By the end of the winter I get so worn out; I have so +much to attend to, and then these four flights of stairs kill me. But +what am I to do? I am obliged to pay in some way for the right of +having my chapel, for the precious privilege of being able to have mass +in my own home. No one could sleep over a chapel, you see. Ah, an idea +has just struck me: why should you not come to see me in the country--at +Colombes? It would be a little excursion. I have plenty of fruit, and I +take a landowner's pride in my fruit. I could offer you luncheon, a very +informal luncheon. Will you come, madame--and your daughter? Would your +son give me the pleasure of his company too?" + + + + +VII + + +A quarter of an hour later a footman in a red coat opened the door of a +flat on a first floor in the Rue Taitbout in answer to Mme. Mauperin's +ring. + +"Good-morning, Georges. Is my son in?" + +"Yes, madame, monsieur is there." + +Mme. Mauperin had smiled on her son's domestic, and as she walked along +she smiled on the rooms, on the furniture, and on everything she saw. +When she entered the study her son was writing and smoking at the same +time. + +"Well, I never!" he exclaimed, taking his cigar out of his mouth and +leaning his head against the back of his chair for his mother to kiss +him. "It's you, is it, mamma?" he went on, continuing to smoke. "You +didn't say a word about coming to Paris to-day. What brings you here?" + +"Oh, I had some shopping and some visits to pay--you know I am always +behind. How comfortable you are here!" + +"Ah, yes, to be sure, you hadn't seen my new arrangements." + +"Dear me, how well you do arrange everything! There's no one like you, +really. It isn't damp here is it, are you quite sure?" and Mme. Mauperin +put her hand against the wall. "Tell Georges to air the room always when +you are away, won't you?" + +"Yes, yes, mother," said Henri in a bored way, as one answers a child. + +"Oh, why do you have those? I don't like your having such things." Mme. +Mauperin had just caught sight of two swords above the bookcase. "The +very sight of them! When one thinks--" and Mme. Mauperin closed her eyes +for an instant and sat down. "You don't know how your dreadful bachelor +life makes us poor mothers tremble. If you were married, it seems to me +that I should not be so worried about you. I do wish you were married, +Henri!" + +"I do, too, I can assure you." + +"Really? Come, now--mothers, you know--well, secrets ought not to be +kept from them. I am so afraid, when I look at you, handsome as you are, +and so distinguished and clever and fascinating. You are just the sort +of man that any one would fall in love with, and I'm so afraid----" + +"Of what?" + +"Lest you should have some reason for not----" + +"For not marrying, you mean, don't you? A chain--is that what you +mean?" + +Mme. Mauperin nodded and Henri burst out laughing. + +"Oh, my dear mamma, if I had one, make your mind easy, it should be a +polished one. A man who has any respect for himself would not wear any +other." + +"Well, then, tell me about Mlle. Herbault. It was your fault that it all +came to nothing." + +"Mlle. Herbault? The introduction at the Opéra with father? Oh, no, it +wasn't that. Yes, yes, I remember, the dinner at Mme. Marquisat's, +wasn't it--the last one? That was a trap you laid for me. I must say you +are sweetly innocent! I was announced: '_Môssieu Henri Mauperin_,' in +that grand, important sort of way which being interpreted meant: +'_Behold the future husband!_' I found all the candles in the +drawing-room lighted up. The mistress of the house, whom I had seen just +twice in my life, overpowered me with her smiles; her son, whom I did +not know at all, shook hands with me. There was a lady with her daughter +in the room, they neither of them appeared to see me. My place at dinner +was next the young person, of course; a provincial family, their money +placed in farms, simple tastes, etc. I discovered all that before the +soup was finished. The mother, on the other side of the table, was +keeping watch over us; an impossible sort of mother, in such a get-up! I +asked the daughter whether she had seen the 'Prophet' at the Opéra. +'Yes, it was superb--and then there was that wonderful effect in the +third act. Oh, yes, that effect, that wonderful effect.' She hadn't seen +it any more than I had. A fibber to begin with. I entertained myself +with keeping her to the subject, and that made her crabby. We went back +to the drawing-room and then the hostess began: 'What a pretty dress!' +she said to me. 'Did you notice it? Would you believe that Emmeline has +had that dress five years. I can remember it. She is so careful--so +orderly!' 'All right,' I thought to myself, 'a lot of miserly wretches +who mean to take me in.'" + +"Do you really think so? And yet, from what we were told about them----" + +"A woman who makes her dresses last five years! That speaks for itself, +that's quite enough. I can picture the dowry hoarded up in a stocking. +The money would be in land at two and a half per cent; repairs, taxes, +lawsuits, farmers who don't pay their rent, a father-in-law who makes +over to you unsalable property. No, no, I'm not quite young enough. I +want to get married, but I mean to marry well. Leave me to manage it, +and you'll see. You can make your mind easy; I'm not the sort to be +taken in with: '_She has such beautiful hair and she is so devoted to +her mother!_' You see, mamma, I've thought a great deal about marriage, +although you may not imagine I have. The most difficult thing to get in +this world, the thing we pay the most dearly for, snatch from each +other, fight for, the thing we only obtain by force of genius or by +luck, by meanness, privations, by wild efforts, perseverance, +resolution, energy, audacity or work, is money--isn't that so? Now money +means happiness and the honour of being rich, it means enjoyment, and it +brings with it the respect and esteem of the million. Well, I have +discovered that there is a way of getting it, straightforwardly and +promptly, without any fatigue, without difficulty and without genius, +quite simply, naturally, quickly and honourably; and this way is by +marriage. Another thing I have discovered is that there is no need to be +remarkably handsome nor astonishingly intelligent in order to make a +rich marriage; the only thing necessary is to will it, to will it +coolly, calmly and with all one's force of will-power, to stake all +one's chances on that card; in fact to look upon getting married as +one's object in life, one's future career. I see that in playing that +game it is no more difficult to make an extraordinary marriage than an +ordinary one, to get a dowry of fifty thousand pounds than one of five +thousand; it is merely a question of cool-headedness and luck; the stake +is the same in both cases. In our times when a good tenor can marry an +income of thirty thousand pounds arithmetic becomes a thing of the past. +All this is what I have wanted to explain to you, and I am sure you will +understand me." + +Henri Mauperin took his mother's hand in his as he spoke. She was fairly +aghast with surprise, admiration, and a sentiment very near akin to +respect. + +"Don't you worry yourself," continued her son. "I shall marry +well--better even perhaps than you dream of." + +As soon as his mother had gone Henri took up his pen and, continuing the +article he had commenced for the _Revue économique_, wrote: "The +trajectory of humanity is a spiral and not a circle----" + + + + +VIII + + +Henri Mauperin's age, like that of so many present-day young men, could +not be reckoned by the years of his life; he was of the same age as the +times in which he lived. The coldness and absence of enthusiasm in the +younger generation, that distinguishing mark of the second half of the +nineteenth century, had set its seal on him entirely. He looked grave, +and one felt that he was icy cold. One recognised in him those elements, +so contrary to the French temperament, which constitute in French +history sects without ardour and political parties without enthusiasm, +such as the Jansenism of former days and the Doctrinarianism of to-day. + +Henri Mauperin was a young Doctrinaire. He had belonged to that +generation of children whom nothing astonishes and nothing amuses; who +go, without the slightest excitement, to see anything to which they are +taken and who come back again perfectly unmoved. When quite young he had +always been well behaved and thoughtful. At college it had never +happened to him in the midst of his lessons to go off in a dream, his +face buried in his hands, his elbows on a dictionary and his eyes +looking into the future. He had never been assailed by temptations with +regard to the unknown and by those first visions of life which at the +age of sixteen fill the minds of young men with trouble and delight, +shut up as they are between the four walls of a courtyard with grated +windows, against which their balls bounce and over and beyond which +their thoughts soar. In his class there were two or three boys who were +sons of eminent political men and with them he made friends. While +studying classics he was thinking of the club he should join later on. +On leaving college Henri's conduct was not like that of a young man of +twenty. He was considered very steady, and was never seen in places +where drinking and gambling went on and where his reputation might have +suffered. He was to be met with in staid drawing-rooms, where he was +always extremely attentive and polite to ladies who were no longer +young. All that would have gone against him elsewhere served him there +in good stead. His reserve was considered an attraction, his seriousness +was thought fascinating. + +There are fashions with regard to what finds favour in men. The reign of +Louis Philippe, with its great wealth of scholars, had just accustomed +the political and literary circles of Paris to value in a society man +that something which recalls the cap and gown, that a professor takes +about with him everywhere, even when he has become a minister. + +With women of the upper middle class the taste for gay, lively, +frivolous qualities of mind had been succeeded by a taste for +conversation which savoured of the lecture-room, for science direct from +the professor's chair, for a sort of learned amiability. A pedant did +not alarm them, even though he might be old; when young he was made much +of, and it was rumoured that Henri Mauperin was a great favourite. + +He had a practical mind. He set up for being a believer in all that was +useful, in mathematical truths, positive religions and the exact +sciences. He had a certain compassion for art, and maintained that Boule +furniture had never been made as well as at present. Political economy, +that science which leads on to all things, had appealed to him when he +went out into the world as a vocation and a career, consequently he had +decided to be an economist. He had brought to this dry study a +narrow-minded intelligence, but he had been patient and persevering, and +now, once a fortnight, he published in important reviews a long article +well padded with figures which the women skipped and the men said they +had read. + +By the interest which it takes in the poorer classes, by its care for +their welfare and the algebraic account it keeps of all their misery and +needs, political economy had, of course, given to Henri Mauperin a +colouring of Liberalism. It was not that he belonged to a very decided +Opposition: his opinions were merely a little ahead of Government +principles, and his convictions induced him to make overtures to +whatever was likely to succeed. He limited his war against the powers +that were to the shooting of an arrow or to a veiled allusion, the key +and meaning of which he would by means of his friends convey to the +various _salons_. As a matter of fact, he was carrying on a flirtation, +rather than hostilities, with the Government in power. Drawing-room +acquaintances, people whom he met in society, brought him within reach +of Government influence and into touch with Government patronage. He +would prepare the works and correct the proofs of some high official who +was always busy and who had scarcely time to do more than sign his +books. He had managed to get on good terms with his Prefect, hoping +through him to get into the Council and afterward into the Chamber. He +excelled in playing double parts, and was clever at compromises and +arrangements which kept him in touch with everything without quarrelling +with anybody or anything. Though a liberal and political economist, he +had found a way of turning aside the distrust of the Catholics and their +enmity against himself and his doctrines. He had won the indulgence and +sympathy of some of them, and had managed to make himself agreeable to +the clergy and to flatter the church by linking together material +progress and spiritual progress, the religion of political economy and +that of Catholicism: Quesnay and Saint Augustin, Bastiat and the Gospel, +statistics and God. Then besides this programme of his, the alliance of +Religion and Political Economy, he had a reserve stock of piety, and he +observed most regularly certain religious practices, which won for him +the affectionate regard of the Abbé Blampoix and brought him into secret +communion with believers and with those who observed their religious +duties. + +Henri Mauperin had taken his flat in the Rue Taitbout for the purpose of +entertaining his friends. These entertainments consisted of solemn +parties for young men, where the guests would gather round a table which +looked like a desk and talk about Natural Law, Public Charities, +Productive Forces, and the _Multiplicabilité_ of the Human Species. +Henri tried to turn these reunions into something approaching +conferences. He was selecting the men and looking for the elements he +would require for the famous _salon_ he hoped to have in Paris as soon +as he was married; he lured to his reunions the great authorities and +notabilities of economic science, and invited to a sort of honorary +presidency members of the Institute, whom he had pursued with his +politeness and his newspaper puffs and who, according to his plans, +would some day help him to take his seat among them in the moral and +political science section. + +It was, however, in turning associations to account that Henri had shown +his talent and all his skill. He had from the very first clung to that +great means of getting on peculiar to ciphers--that means by which a man +is no longer one alone, but a unit joined to a number. He had gained a +footing for himself in associations of every kind. He had joined the +d'Aguesseau Debating Society and had glided in and taken his place among +all those young men who were practising speech-making, educating +themselves for the platform, doing their apprenticeship as orators and +their probation as statesmen for future parliamentary struggles. Clubs, +college reunions and banquets of old boys, barriers' lectures, +historical and geographical societies, scientific and benevolent +societies, he had neglected nothing. Everywhere, in all centres which +give to the individual an opportunity of shining and which bring him any +profit by the collective influence of a group, he appeared and was here, +there and everywhere, making fresh acquaintances, forming new +connections, cultivating friendships and interests which might lead him +on to something, thus driving in the landmarks of his various ambitions, +marching ahead, from the committee of one society to the committee of +another society, to an importance, a sort of veiled notoriety and to +one of those names which, thanks to political influence, are suddenly +brought to the front when the right time comes. + +He certainly was well qualified for the part he was playing. Eloquent +and active, he could make all the noise and stir which lead a man on to +success in this century of ours. He was commonplace with plenty of show +about him. In society he rarely recited his own articles, but he usually +posed with one hand in his waistcoat, after the fashion of Guizot in +Delaroche's portrait. + + + + +IX + + +"Well!" exclaimed Renée, entering the dining-room at eleven o'clock, +breathless like a child who had been running, "I thought every one would +be down. Where is mamma?" + +"Gone to Paris--shopping," answered M. Mauperin. + +"Oh!--and where's Denoisel?" + +"He's gone to see the man with the sloping ground, who must have kept +him to luncheon. We'll begin luncheon." + +"Good-morning, papa!" And instead of taking her seat Renée went across +to her father and putting her arms round his neck began to kiss him. + +"There, there, that's enough--you silly child!" said M. Mauperin, +smiling as he endeavoured to free himself. + +"Let me kiss you _tong-fashion_--there--like that," and she pinched his +cheeks and kissed him again. + +"What a child you are, to be sure." + +"Now look at me. I want to see whether you care for me." + +And Renée, standing up after kissing him once more, moved back from her +father, still holding his head between her hands. They gazed at each +other lovingly and earnestly, looking into one another's eyes. The +French window was open and the light, the scents and the various noises +from the garden penetrated into the room. A beam of sunshine darted on +to the table, lighted on the china and made the glass glitter. It was +bright, cheerful weather and a faint breeze was stirring; the shadows of +the leaves trembled slightly on the floor. A vague sound of wings +fluttering in the trees and of birds sporting among the flowers could be +heard in the distance. + +"Only we two; how nice!" exclaimed Renée, unfolding her serviette. "Oh, +the table is too large; I am too far away," and taking her knife and +fork she went and sat next her father. "As I have my father all to +myself to-day I'm going to enjoy my father," and so saying she drew her +chair still nearer to him. + +"Ah, you remind me of the time when you always wanted to have your +dinner in my pocket. But you were eight years old then." + +Renée began to laugh. + +"I was scolded yesterday," said M. Mauperin, after a minute's silence, +putting his knife and fork down on his plate. + +"Oh!" remarked Renée, looking up at the ceiling in an innocent way and +then letting her eyes fall on her father with a sly look in them such as +one sees in the eyes of a cat. "Really, poor papa! Why were you scolded? +What had you done?" + +"Yes, I should advise _you_ to ask me that again; you know better than I +do myself why I was scolded. What do you mean, you dreadful child?" + +"Oh, if you are going to lecture me, papa, I shall get up and--I shall +kiss you." + +She half rose as she said this, but M. Mauperin interrupted her, +endeavouring to speak in a severe tone: + +"Sit down again, Renée, please. You must own, my dear child, that +yesterday----" + +"Oh, papa, are you going to talk to me like this on such a beautiful +day?" + +"Well, but will you explain?" persisted M. Mauperin, trying to remain +dignified in face of the rebellious expression, made up of smiles +mingled with defiance, in his daughter's eyes. "It was very evident that +you behaved in the way you did purposely." + +Renée winked mischievously and nodded her head two or three times +affirmatively. + +"I want to speak to you seriously, Renée." + +"But I am quite serious, I assure you. I have told you that I was like +that on purpose." + +"And why--will you tell me that?" + +"Why? Oh, yes, I'll tell you, but on condition that you won't be too +conceited. It was because--because----" + +"Because of what?" + +"Because I love you much more than that gentleman who was here +yesterday--there now--very much more--it's quite true!" + +"But, then, we ought not to have allowed him to come if you did not care +for this young man. We didn't force you into it. It was you yourself who +agreed that he should be invited. On the contrary, your mother and I +believed that this match----" + +"Excuse me, papa, but if I had refused M. Reverchon at first sight, +point-blank, you would have said I was unreasonable, mad, senseless. I +fancy I can hear mamma now on the subject. Whereas, as things were, what +is there to reproach me with? I saw M. Reverchon once, and I saw him +again, I had plenty of time to judge him and I knew that I disliked him. +It is very silly, perhaps, but it is nevertheless----" + +"But why did you not tell us? We could have found a hundred ways of +getting out of it." + +"You are very ungrateful, papa. I have saved you all that worry. The +young man is drawing out of it himself and it is not your fault at all; +I alone am responsible. And this is all the gratitude I get for my +self-sacrifice! Another time----" + +"Listen to me, my dear. If I speak to you like this it is because it is +a question of your marriage. Your marriage--ah, it took me a long time +to get reconciled to the idea that--to the idea of being separated from +you. Fathers are selfish, you see; they would like it better if you +never took to yourself wings. They have the greatest difficulty in +making up their minds to it all. They think they cannot be happy without +your smiles, and that the house will be very different when your dress +is not flitting about. But we have to submit to what must be, and now it +seems to me that I shall like my son-in-law. I am getting old, you know, +my dear little Renée," and M. Mauperin took his daughter's hands in his. +"Your father is sixty-eight, my child, he has only just time enough left +to see you settled and happy. Your future, if only you knew it, is my +one thought, my one torment. Your mother loves you dearly, too, I know, +but your character and hers are different; and then, if anything +happened to me. You know we must face things; and at my age. You see the +thought of leaving you without a husband--and children--without any love +which would make up to you for your old father's when he is no longer +with you----" + +M. Mauperin could not finish; his daughter had thrown her arms round +him, stifling down her sobs, and her tears were flowing freely on his +waistcoat. + +"Oh, it's dreadful of you, dreadful!" she said in a choking voice. "Why +do you talk about it? Never--never!" and with a gesture she waved back +the dark shadow called up by her imagination. + +M. Mauperin had taken her on his knee. He put his arms round her, kissed +her forehead and said, "Don't cry, Renée, don't cry!" + +"How dreadful! Never!" she repeated once more, as though she were just +rousing herself from some bad dream, and then, wiping her eyes with the +back of her hand, she said to her father: "I must go away and have my +cry out," and with that she escaped. + + * * * * * + +"That Dardouillet is certainly mad," remarked Denoisel, as he entered +the room. "Just fancy, I could not possibly get rid of him. Ah, you are +alone?" + +"Yes, my wife is in Paris, and Renée has just gone upstairs." + +"Why, what's the matter, M. Mauperin? You look----" + +"Oh, it's nothing--a little scene with Renée that I've just had--about +this marriage--this Reverchon. I was silly enough to tell her that I am +in a hurry to see my grandchildren, that fathers of my age are not +immortal, and thereupon--the child is so sensitive, you know. She is up +in her room now, crying. Don't go up; it will take her a little time to +recover. I'll go and look after my work people." + +Denoisel, left to himself, lighted a cigar, picked up a book and went +out to one of the garden seats to read. He had been there about two +hours when he saw Renée coming towards him. She had her hat on and her +animated face shone with joy and a sort of serene excitement. + +"Well, have you been out? Where have you come from?" + +"Where have I come from?" repeated Renée, unfastening her hat. "Well, +I'll tell you, as you are my friend," and she took her hat off and threw +her head back with that pretty gesture women have for shaking their hair +into place. "I've come from church, and if you want to know what I've +been doing there, why, I've been asking God to let me die before papa. I +was in front of a large statue of the Virgin--you are not to laugh--it +would make me unhappy if you laughed. Perhaps it was the sun or the +effect of gazing at her all the time, I don't know, but it seemed to me +all in a minute that she did like this--" and Renée nodded her head. +"Anyhow, I am very happy and my knees ache, too, I can tell you; for all +the time I was praying I was on my knees, and not on a chair or a +cushion either--but on the stone floor. Ah, I prayed in earnest; God +can't surely refuse me that!" + + + + +X + + +A few days after this M. and Mme. Mauperin, Henri, Renée, and Denoisel +were sitting together after dinner in the little garden which stretched +out at the back of the house, between the walls of the refinery and its +outbuildings. The largest tree in the garden was a fir, and the +rose-trees had been allowed to climb up to its lowest branches, so that +its green arms stirred the roses. Under the tree was a swing, and at the +back of it a sort of thicket of lilacs and witch-elms; there was a round +plot of grass, with a garden bench and a very small pool with a white +curbstone round it and a fountain that did not play. The pool was full +of aquatic plants and a few black newts were swimming in it. + +"You don't intend to have any theatricals, then, Renée?" Henri was +saying to his sister. "You've quite given up that idea?" + +"Given up--no; but what can I do? It isn't my fault, for I would act +anything--I'd stand on my head. But I can't find any one else, so that, +unless I give a monologue--Denoisel has refused, and as for you, a +sober man like you--well, I suppose it's no use asking." + +"I, why, I would act right enough," answered Henri. + +"You, Henri?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin in astonishment. + +"And then, too, we are not short of men," continued Renée, "there are +always men to act. It's for the women's parts. Ah, that's the +difficulty--to find ladies. I don't see who is to act with me." + +"Oh," said Henri, "if we look about among all the people we know, I'll +wager----" + +"Well, let's see: there's M. Durand's daughter. Why, yes--what do you +think? M. Durand's daughter? They are at Saint-Denis; that will be +convenient for the rehearsals. She's rather a simpleton, but I should +think for the rôle of Mme. de Chavigny----" + +"Ah," put in Denoisel, "you still want to act 'The Caprice'?" + +"Now for a lecture, I suppose? But as I'm going to act with my +brother----" + +"And the performance will be for the benefit of the poor, I hope?" +continued Denoisel. + +"Why?" + +"It would make the audience more disposed to be charitable." + +"We'll see about that, sir, we'll see about it. Well, Emma Durand--will +that do? What do you think, mamma?" + +"They are not our sort of people, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin +quickly; "they are all very well at a distance, people like that, but +every one knows where they sprang from--the Rue St. Honoré. Mme. Durand +used to go and receive the ladies at their carriage-door, and M. Durand +would slip out at the back and take the servant-men to have a glass at +the wine-shop round the corner. That's how the Durands made their +fortune." + +Although at bottom Mme. Mauperin was an excellent sort of woman she +rarely lost an opportunity of depreciating, in this way and with the +most superb contempt and disgust, the wealth, birth and position of all +the people she knew. It was not out of spite, nor was it for the +pleasure of slandering and backbiting, nor yet because she was envious. +She would refuse to believe in the respectability and uprightness of +people, or even in the wealth they were said to have, simply from a +prodigious _bourgeois_ pride, from a conviction that outside her own +family there could be no good blood, and no integrity; that, with the +exception of her own people, every one was an upstart; that nothing was +substantial except what she possessed, and that what she had not was not +worth having. + +"And to think that my wife has tales like that to tell about all the +people we know!" said M. Mauperin. + +"Come now, papa--shall we have the pretty little Remoli girl--shall we?" + +"Ask your mother. Say on, Mme. Mauperin." + +"The Remoli girl? But, my dear, you know--" + +"I know nothing." + +"Oh! do you mean to say that you don't know her father's history? A poor +Italian stucco worker. He came to Paris without a sou and bought a bit +of ground with a wretched little house at Montparnasse. I don't know +where he got the money from to buy it. Well, this land turned out to be +a regular Montfaucon! He sold thirty thousand pounds' worth of his +precious stuff--and then he's been mixed up with Stock Exchange affairs. +Disgusting!" + +"Oh, well," put in Henri, "I fancy you are going out of your way to find +folks. Why don't you ask Mlle. Bourjot? They happen to be at Sannois +now." + +"Mlle. Bourjot?" repeated Mme. Mauperin. + +"Noémi?" said Renée quickly, "I should just think I should like to ask +her. But this winter I thought her so distant with me. She has something +or other--I don't know----" + +"She has, or rather she will have, twelve thousand pounds a year," +interrupted Denoisel, "and mothers are apt to watch over their +daughters when such is the case. They will not allow them to get too +intimate with a sister who has a brother. They have made her understand +this; that's about the long and short of it." + +"Then, too, they are so high and mighty, those folks are; they might +have descended from--And yet," continued Mme. Mauperin, breaking off and +turning to her son, "they have always been very pleasant with you, +Henri, haven't they? Mme. Bourjot is always very nice to you?" + +"Yes, and she has complained several times of your not going to her +soirées; she says you don't take Renée often enough to see her +daughter." + +"Really?" exclaimed Renée, very delighted. + +"My dear," said Mme. Mauperin, "what do you think of what Henri +says--Mlle. Bourjot?" + +"What objection do you want me to make?" + +"Well, then," said Mme. Mauperin, "Henri's idea shall be carried out. +We'll go on Saturday, shall we, my dear? And you'll come with us, +Henri?" + +A few hours later every one was in bed with the exception of Henri +Mauperin. He was walking up and down in his room puffing on a cigar that +had gone out, and every now and then he appeared to be smiling at his +own thoughts. + + + + +XI + + +Renée often went during the day to paint in a little studio, built out +of an old green-house at the bottom of the garden. It was very +rustic-looking, half hidden with verdure and walled with ivy, something +between an old ruin and a nest. + +On a table covered with an Algerian cloth there were, on this particular +day in the little studio, a Japanese box with a blue design, a lemon, an +old red almanac with the French coat of arms, and two or three other +bright-coloured objects grouped together as naturally as possible to +make a picture, with the light from the glass roof falling on them. +Seated in front of the table, Renée was painting all this with brushes +as fine as pins on a canvas which already had something on the under +side. The skirt of her white piqué dress hung in ample folds on each +side of the stool on which she was seated. She had gathered a white rose +as she came through the garden and had fastened it in her loosely +arranged hair just above her ear. Her foot, visible below her dress, in +a low shoe which showed her white stocking, was resting on the +cross-bar of the easel. Denoisel was seated near her, watching her work +and making a bad sketch of her profile in an album he had picked up in +the studio. + +"Oh, you do pose well," he remarked, as he sharpened his pencil again; +"I would just as soon try to catch an omnibus as your expression. You +never cease. If you always move like that----" + +"Ah, now, Denoisel, no nonsense with your portrait. I hope you'll +flatter me a little." + +"No more than the sun does. I am as conscientious as a photograph." + +"Let me look," she said, leaning back towards Denoisel and holding her +maulstick and palette out in front of her. "Oh! I am not beautiful. +Truly, now," she continued, as she went on with her painting, "am I like +that?" + +"Something. Come, Renée--honestly now--what do you think you are like +yourself--beautiful?" + +"No." + +"Pretty?" + +"No--no----" + +"Ah, you took the trouble to think the matter over this time." + +"Yes, but I said it twice." + +"Good! If you think you are neither beautiful nor pretty, you don't +fancy either that you are----" + +"Ugly? No, that's quite true. It's very difficult to explain. Sometimes, +now, when I look at myself, I think--how am I to explain? Well, I like +my looks; it isn't my face, I know, it's just a sort of expression I +have at such times, a something that is within me and which I can feel +passing over my features. I don't know what it is--happiness, pleasure, +a sort of emotion or whatever you like to call it. I get moments like +that when it seems to me as though I am taking all my people in finely. +All the same, though, I should have liked to be beautiful." + +"Really!" + +"It must be very pleasant for one's own sake, it seems to me. Now, for +instance, I should have liked to be tall, with very black hair. It's +stupid to be almost blonde. It's the same with white skin; I should have +chosen a skin--well, like Mme. Stavelot, rather orange-coloured. I like +that, but it's a matter of taste. And then I should have enjoyed looking +in my glass. It's like when I get up in the morning and walk about the +carpet with bare feet. I should love to have feet like a statue I once +saw--it's just an idea!" + +"If that's how you feel you wouldn't care about being beautiful for the +sake of other people?" + +"Yes and no. Not for every one--only for those I care for. We ought to +be ugly for people about whom we are indifferent, for all the people we +don't love--don't you think so? They would have just what they deserved +then." + +Denoisel began sketching again. + +"How odd it is, your ideal, to wish to be dark!" he said, after a +moment's silence. + +"What should you like to be?" + +"If I were a woman? I should like to be small and neither very fair nor +very dark----" + +"Auburn then?" + +"And plump--Oh, as plump as a quail." + +"Plump? Ah, I can breathe again. Just for a moment I was afraid of a +declaration--If the light had not shown up your hair I should have +forgotten you were forty." + +"Oh, you don't make me out any older than I am, Renée; that is exactly +my age. But do you know what yours is for me?" + +"No----" + +"Twelve--and you will always be that age to me." + +"Thanks--I am very glad," said Renée. "If that's it I shall always be +able to tell you all the nonsense that comes into my head. Denoisel," +she continued, after a short silence, "have you ever been in love?" She +had drawn back slightly from her canvas and was looking at it sideways, +her head leaning over her shoulder to see the effect of the colour she +had just put on. + +"Oh, well! that's a good start," answered Denoisel. "What a question!" + +"What's the matter with my question? I'm asking you that just as I might +ask you anything else. I don't see anything in it. Would there be any +harm in asking such a thing in society? Come now, Denoisel! you say I am +twelve years old and I agree to be twelve; but I'm twenty all the same. +I'm a _young person_, that's true, but if you imagine that _young +persons_ of my age have never read any novels nor sung any +love-songs--why, it's all humbug--it's just posing as sweet innocents. +After all, just as you like. If you think I am not old enough I'll take +back my question. I thought we were to consider ourselves men when we +talked about things together." + +"Well, since you want to know, yes--I have been in love." + +"Ah! And what effect did it have on you--being in love?" + +"You have only to read over again the novels you have read, my dear, and +you will find the effect described on every page." + +"There, now, that's just what puzzles me; all the books one reads are +full of love--there's nothing but that! And then in real life one sees +nothing of it--at least I don't see anything of it; on the contrary, I +see every one doing without it, and quite easily, too. Sometimes I +wonder whether it is not just invented for books, whether it is not all +imagined by authors--really." + +Denoisel laughed at the young girl's words. + +"Tell me, Renée," he said, "since we are men for the time being, as you +just said and as we talk to each other of what we feel, quite frankly +like two old friends, I should like to ask you in my turn whether you +have ever--well, not been in love with any one, but whether you have +ever cared for any one?" + +"No, never," answered Renée, after a moment's reflection, "but then I am +not a fair example. I fancy that such things happen to people who have +an empty heart, no one to think about; people who are not taken up, +absorbed, possessed and, as it were, protected by one of those +affections which take hold of you wholly and entirely--the affection one +has for one's father, for instance." + +Denoisel did not answer. + +"You don't believe that that does preserve you?" said Renée. "Well, but +I can assure you I have tried in vain to remember. Oh, I'm examining my +conscience thoroughly, I promise you. Well, from my very childhood, I +cannot remember anything--no, nothing at all. And yet some of my little +friends, who were no older than I was, would kiss the inside of the caps +of the little boys who used to play with us; and they would collect the +peach-stones from the plates the little boys had used and put them into +a box and then take the box to bed with them. Yes, I remember all that. +Noémi, for instance, Mlle. Bourjot, was very great at all that. But as +for me, I simply went on with my games." + +"And later on when you were no longer a child?" + +"Later on? I have always been a child as regards all that. No, there is +nothing at all--I cannot remember a single impression. I mean--well, I'm +going to be quite frank with you--I had just a slight, a very slight +commencement of what you were talking about--just a sensation of that +feeling that I recognised later on in novels--and can you guess for +whom?" + +"No." + +"For you. Oh, it was only for an instant. I soon liked you in quite a +different way--and better, too. I respected you and was grateful to you. +I liked you for correcting my faults as a spoiled child, for enlarging +my mind, for teaching me to appreciate all that is beautiful, elevated +and noble; and all, too, in a joking way by making fun of everything +that is ugly and worthless and of everything that is dull or mean and +cowardly. You taught me how to play ball and how to endure being bored +to death with imbeciles. I have to thank you for much of what I think +about, for much of what I am and for a little of any good there is in +me. I wanted to pay my debt with a true and lasting friendship, and by +giving you cordially, as a comrade, some of the affection I have for +father." + +As Renée said these last words she raised her voice slightly and spoke +in a graver tone. + +"What in the world is that?" exclaimed M. Mauperin, who had just entered +and had caught sight of Denoisel's sketch. "Is that intended for my +daughter! Why, it's a frightful libel," and M. Mauperin picked up the +album and began to tear the page up. + +"Oh, papa!" exclaimed Renée, "and I wanted it--for a keepsake!" + + + + +XII + + +A light carriage, drawn by one horse, was conveying the Mauperin family +along the Sannois road. Renée had taken the reins and the whip from her +brother, who was seated at her side smoking. Animated by the drive, the +air, and the movement, M. Mauperin was joking about the people they met +and bowing gaily to any acquaintances they passed. Mme. Mauperin was +silent and absorbed. She was buried in herself, thinking out and +preparing her amiability for the approaching visit. + +"Why, mamma," remarked Renée, "you don't say a word. Are you not well?" + +"Oh, yes, very well, quite well," answered Mme. Mauperin; "but the fact +is I'm worrying rather about this visit--and if it had not been for +Henri--There's something so stiff and cold about Mme. Bourjot--they are +all so high and mighty. Oh, it isn't that they impress me at all--their +money indeed! I know too well where they had it from. They made their +money from some invention they bought from an unfortunate working-man +for a mere nothing--a few coppers." + +"Come, come, Mme. Mauperin," put in her husband, "they must have bought +more than----" + +"Well, anyhow, I don't feel at ease with these people." + +"You are very foolish to trouble yourself----" + +"We can tell them we don't care a hang for their fine airs!" said Mlle. +Mauperin, whipping up the horse so that her slang was lost in the sound +of the animal's gallop. + + * * * * * + +There was some reason for Mme. Mauperin's uneasiness. Her feeling of +constraint was certainly justified. Everything in the house to which she +was going was calculated to intimidate people, to set them down, crush +them, penetrate and overwhelm them with a sense of their own +inferiority. There was an ostentatious and studied show of money, a +clever display of wealth. Opulence aimed at the humiliation of less +fortunate beings, by all possible means of intimidation, by outrageous +or refined forms of luxury, by the height of the ceilings, by the +impertinent airs of the lackeys, by the footman with his silver chain, +stationed in the entrance-hall, by the silver plate on which everything +was served, by all kinds of princely ways and customs, such as the +strict observance of evening dress, even when mother and daughter were +dining alone, by an etiquette as rigid as that of a small German court. +The master and mistress were in harmony with and maintained the style +of their house. The spirit of their home and life was as it were +incarnate in them. + +The man, with all that he had copied from the English gentry, his +manners, his dress, his curled whiskers, his outward distinction; the +woman, with her grand manners, her supreme elegance, all the stiffness +and formality of the upper middle class, represented admirably the pride +of money. Their disdainful politeness, their haughty amiability, seemed +to come down to people. There was a kind of insolence which was visible +in their tastes even. M. Bourjot had neither any pictures nor any +objects of art; his collection was a collection of precious stones, +among which he pointed out a ruby worth a thousand pounds, one of the +finest in Europe. + +People had overlooked all this display of wealth, and the Bourjot's +_salon_ was now very much in vogue and conspicuous on account of its +pronounced tendencies in favour of the Opposition party. It had become, +in fact, one of the three or four important _salons_ of Paris. It had +been peopled after two or three winters which Mme. Bourjot had spent in +Nice under pretext of benefitting her health. She had converted her +house there into a kind of hotel on the road to Italy, open to all who +passed by provided they were great, wealthy, celebrated, or that they +had a name. At her musical evenings, when Mme. Bourjot gave every one +an opportunity for admiring her beautiful voice and her great musical +talent, the celebrities of Europe and Parisians of repute met in her +drawing-room. Scientists, great philosophers and æsthetes mingled with +politicians. The latter were represented by a compact group of +Orleanists and a band of Liberals not pledged to any party, in whose +ranks Henri Mauperin had figured most assiduously for the past year. A +few Legitimists whom the husband brought to his wife's _salon_ were also +to be seen, M. Bourjot himself being a Legitimist. + +Under the Restoration he had been a Carbonaro. He was the son of a +draper, and his birth and name of Bourjot had from his earliest +childhood exasperated him against the nobility, grand houses, and the +Bourbons. He had been in various conspiracies, and had met with M. +Mauperin at Carbonari reunions. He had figured in all the tumults, and +had been fond of quoting Berville, Saint-Just, and Dupin the elder. +After 1830 he had calmed down and had contented himself with sulking +with royalty for having cheated him of his republic. He read the +_National_, pitied the people of all lands, despised the Chambers, +railed at M. Guizot, and was eloquent about the Pritchard affair. + +The events of 1848 came upon him suddenly, and the landowner then woke +up alarmed and rose erect in the person of the Carbonaro of the +Restoration, the Liberal of Louis Philippe's reign. The fall in stocks, +the unproductiveness of houses, socialism, the proposed taxes, the +dangers to which State creditors were exposed, the eventful days of +June, and indeed everything which is calculated to strike terror to the +heart of a moneyed man during a revolution, disturbed M. Bourjot's +equanimity, and at the same time enlightened him. His ideas suddenly +underwent a change, and his political conscience veered completely +round. He hastened to adopt the doctrines of order, and turned to the +Church as he might have done to the police authorities, to the Divine +right as the supreme power and a providential security for his bills. + +Unfortunately, in M. Bourjot's brusque but sincere conversion, his +education, his youth, his past, his whole life rose in revolt. He had +returned to the Bourbons, but he had not been able to come back to Jesus +Christ, and, old man as he now was, he would make all kinds of slips and +give utterance to the attacks and refrains to which he had been +accustomed. One felt, the nearer one came to him, that he was still +quite a Voltairean on certain points, and Beranger was constantly taking +the place of de Maistre with him. + + * * * * * + +"Give the reins to your brother, Renée," said Mme. Mauperin. "I +shouldn't like them to see you driving." + +They were in front of a magnificent large gateway, opposite which were +two lamps that were always lighted and left burning all night. The +carriage turned up a drive, covered with red gravel and planted on each +side with huge clumps of rhododendrons, and drew up before a flight of +stone steps. Two footmen threw open the glass doors leading into a hall +paved with marble and with high windows nearly hidden by the verdure of +a wide screen of exotic shrubs. + +The Mauperins were then introduced into a drawing-room, the walls of +which were covered with crimson silk. A portrait of Mme. Bourjot in +evening dress, signed by Ingres, was the only picture in the room. +Through the open windows could be seen a pool of water, and near it a +stork, the only creature that M. Bourjot would tolerate in his park, and +that on account of its heraldic form. + +When the Mauperins entered the large drawing-room, Mme. Bourjot, seated +by herself on the divan, was listening to her daughter's governess who +was reading aloud. M. Bourjot was leaning against the chimney-piece +playing with his watch-chain. Mlle. Bourjot, near her governess, was +working at some tapestry on a frame. + +Mme. Bourjot, with her large, rather hard blue eyes, her arched +eye-brows, and the lines of her eye-lids, her haughty and pronounced +nose, the supercilious prominence of the lower part of the face, and her +imperious grace, reminded one of Georges, when young, in the rôle of +Agrippina. Mlle. Bourjot had strongly marked brown eye-brows. Between +her long, curly lashes could be seen two blue eyes with an intense, +profound, dreamy expression in them. A slight down almost white could be +seen when the light was full on her, just above her lip at the two +corners. The governess was one of those retiring creatures, one of those +elderly women who have been knocked about and worn out in the battle of +life, outwardly and inwardly, and who finally have no more effigy left +than an old copper coin. + +"Why, this is really charming!" said Mme. Bourjot, getting up and +advancing as far as a line of the polished floor in the centre of the +room. "What kind neighbours--and what a delightful surprise! It seems an +age since I had the pleasure of seeing you, dear madame, and if it were +not for your son, who is good enough not to forsake us, and who comes to +my Monday Evenings, we should not have known what had become of you--of +this charming girl--and her mamma----" + +As she spoke Mme. Bourjot shook hands with Henri. + +"Oh! you are very kind," began Mme. Mauperin, taking a seat at some +distance from Mme. Bourjot. + +"But please come over here," said Mme. Bourjot, making room at her side. + +"We have postponed our visit from day to day," continued Mme. Mauperin, +"as we wanted to come together." + +"Oh! well, it's very bad of you," continued Mme. Bourjot. "We are not a +hundred miles away; and it is cruel to keep these two children apart, +when they grew up together. Why, how's this, they haven't kissed each +other yet?" + +Noémi, who was still standing, presented her cheek coldly to Renée, who +kissed her as eagerly, as a child bites into fruit. + +"What a long time ago it seems," observed Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin, +as she looked at the two girls, "since we used to take them to the Rue +de la Chaussée d'Antin to those lectures, that bored us as much as they +did the poor children. I can see them now, playing together. Yours was +just like quicksilver, a regular little turk, and mine--Oh, they were +like night and day! But yours always led mine on. Oh, dear, what a rage +they had at one time for charades--do you remember? They used to carry +off all the towels in the house to dress up with." + +"Oh, yes," exclaimed Renée, laughing and turning to Noémi, "our finest +one was when we did _Marabout_; with _Marat_ in a bath that was too hot, +calling out, '_Je bous, je bous_!' Do you remember?" + +"Yes, indeed," answered Noémi, trying to keep back a smile, "but it was +your idea." + +"I am so glad, madame, to find you quite inclined beforehand for what I +wanted to ask you--for my visit is a selfish one. It was chiefly with +the idea of letting our daughters see something of each other that I +came. Renée wants to get up a play, and she naturally thought of her old +school-friend. If you would allow your daughter to take part in a piece +with my daughter--it would be just a little family affair--quite +informal." + +As Mme. Mauperin made this request, Noémi, who had been talking to Renée +and had put her hand in her friend's, drew it away again abruptly. + +"Thank you so much for the idea," answered Mme. Bourjot, "thanks, too, +to Renée. You could not have asked me anything that would have suited me +better and given me so much pleasure. I think it would be very good for +Noémi--the poor child is so shy that I am in despair! It would make her +talk and come out of herself. For her mind, too, it would be an +excellent stimulant----" + +"Oh! but, mother, you know very well--why, I've no memory. And then, +too--why, the very idea of acting frightens me. Oh, no--I can't act----" + +Mme. Bourjot glanced coldly at her daughter. + +"But, mother, if I could--No, I should spoil the whole play, I'm sure." + +"You will act--I wish you to do so." + +Noémi looked down, and Mme. Mauperin, slightly embarrassed and by way of +changing the subject, glanced at a Review that was lying open on a +work-table at her side. + +"Ah!" said Mme. Bourjot, turning to her again, "you've found something +you know there--that is your son's last article. And when do you intend +having this play?" + +"Oh, but I should be so sorry to be the cause--to oblige your +daughter----" + +"Oh! don't mention it. My daughter is always afraid of undertaking +anything." + +"Well, but if Noémi really dislikes it," put in M. Bourjot, who had been +talking to M. Mauperin and Henri on the other side of the room. + +"On the contrary she will be grateful to you," said Mme. Bourjot, +addressing Mme. Mauperin without answering M. Bourjot. "We are always +obliged to insist on her doing anything for her own enjoyment. Well, +when is this play?" + +"Renée, when do you think?" asked Mme. Mauperin. + +"Why, I should think about--well, we should want a month for the +rehearsals, with two a week. We could fix the days and the time that +would suit Noémi." + +Renée turned towards Noémi, who remained silent. + +"Very well, then," said Mme. Bourjot, "let us say Monday and Friday at +two o'clock, if that will suit you--shall we?" And turning to the +governess she continued: "Mlle. Gogois, you will accompany Noémi. M. +Bourjot--you hear--will you give orders for the horses and carriage and +the footman to take them to Briche? You can keep Terror for me, and +Jean. There, that's all settled. Now, then, you will stay and dine with +us, won't you?" + +"Oh! we should like to very much; but it is quite impossible. We have +some people coming to us to-day," answered Mme. Mauperin. + +"Oh, dear, how tiresome of them to come to-day! But I don't think you +have seen my husband's new conservatories. I'll make you a bouquet, +Renée. We have a flower--there are only two of them anywhere, and the +other is at Ferrières--it's a--it's very ugly anyhow--this way." + +"Suppose we were to go in here," said M. Bourjot, pointing to the +billiard-room, which could be seen through the glass door. "M. Henri, +we'll leave you with the ladies. We can smoke here," added M. Bourjot, +offering a _cabanas_ to M. Mauperin. "Shall we have cannoning?" + +"Yes," replied M. Mauperin. + +M. Bourjot closed the pockets of the billiard-table. + +"Twenty-four?" + +"Yes, twenty-four." + +"Have you billiards at home, M. Mauperin?" + +"No, I haven't. My son doesn't play." + +"Are you looking for the chalk?" + +"Thanks. And as my wife doesn't think it a suitable game for girls----" + +"It's your turn." + +"Oh! I'm quite out of practice--I always was a duffer at it though." + +"Well, but you are not giving me the game at all. There, it's all up +with my play--I was used to that cue," and M. Bourjot gave vent to his +feelings in an oath. "These rascals of workmen--they haven't any +conscience at all. There's no getting anything well made in these days. +Well, you _are_ scoring: three, I'll mark it. The fact is we are at +their service. The other day, now, I wanted some chandeliers put up. +Well, would you believe it, M. Mauperin, I couldn't get a man? It was a +holiday--I forget what holiday it was--and they would not come--they are +the lords of creation, nowadays. Do you imagine that they ever bring us +anything of what they shoot or fish? Oh, no, when they get anything +dainty they eat it themselves. I know what it is in Paris--four? Oh, +come now! Every penny they earn is spent at the wine-shop. On Sundays +they spend at least a sovereign. The locksmith here has a Lefaucheux gun +and takes out a shooting license. Ah, two for me at last! And the money +they ask now for their work! Why, they want four shillings a day for +mowing! I have vineyards in Burgundy, and they proposed to see to them +for me for three years, and then the third year they would be their own. +This is what we are coming to! Luckily for me I'm an old man, so that it +won't be in my time; but in a hundred years from now there will be no +such thing as being waited on--there'll be no servants. I often say to +my wife and daughter: 'You'll see--the day will come when you will have +to make your own beds. Five?--six?--- you _do_ know how to play. The +Revolution has done for us, you know." And M. Bourjot began to hum: + + "'Et zonzon, zonzon, zonzon, + Zonzon, zonzon---- '" + +"These were not exactly your ideas some thirty years ago, when we met +for the first time; do you remember?" said M. Mauperin with a smile. + +"That's true. I had some fine ideas in those days--too fine!" replied M. +Bourjot, resting his left hand on his cue. "Ah, we were young--I should +just think I do remember. It was at Lallemand's funeral.--By Jove! that +was the best blow I ever gave in my life--a regular knock-you-down. I +can see the nails in that police inspector's boots now, when I had +landed him on the ground so that I could cross the boulevards. At the +corner of the Rue Poissonnière I came upon a patrol--they set about me +with a vengeance. I was with Caminade--you knew Caminade, didn't you? He +was a lively one. He was the man who used to go and smoke his pipe at +the mission service belonging to the Church of the Petits-Pères. He went +with his meerschaum pipe that cost nearly sixty pounds, and he took a +girl from the Palais-Royal. He was lucky, for he managed to escape, but +they took me to the police station, belabouring me with the butt-end of +their guns. Fortunately Dulaurens caught sight of me----" + +"Ah--Dulaurens!" said M. Mauperin. "We were in the same Carbonari +society. He had a shawl shop, it seems to me." + +"Yes, and do you know what became of him?" + +"No. I lost sight of him." + +"Well, one fine day--it was after all this business--his partner went +off to Belgium, taking with him eight thousand pounds. They put the +police on his track, but they could hear nothing of him. Our friend +Dulaurens goes into a church and makes a vow to get converted if he +finds his money again. They find his money for him and now his piety is +simply sickening. I never see him now; but in the old days he was a +lively one, I can tell you. Well, when I saw him I gave him a look and +he understood. You see, I had twenty-five guns in my house and five +hundred cartridges. When the police went there to search he had cleared +them away. All the same I was kept three months shut up in the new +building, and two or three times was fetched up in the night to be +cross-examined, and I always went with a vague idea in my mind that I +was going to be shot. You've gone through it all, and you know what it +is.--And all that was for the sake of Socialism! And yet I heard a few +words that ought to have enlightened me. When I was free again one of my +prison friends came to see me at Sedan. 'Why, what's this,' he said, +'that I am told at the hotel? It seems that your father has land and +money, and yet you have joined us! Why, I thought you hadn't anything!' +Just fancy now, M. Mauperin--and when I think that even that did not +open my eyes! You see I was convinced in those days that all those with +whom I was in league wanted simply what I wanted: laws for rich and poor +alike, the abolition of privileges, the end of the Revolution of '89 +against the nobility--I thought we should stop there--eleven? Did I mark +your last? I don't think I did--let us say twelve. But, good heavens! +when I saw my republic I was disgusted with it, when I heard two men, +who had just come down from the barricades in February, say, 'We ought +not to have left them until we had made sure of two hundred a year!' And +then the system of taxes according to the income; it's an iniquity--the +hypocrisy of communism. But with taxes regulated by the income," +continued M. Bourjot, eloquently breaking off in the midst of his own +phrase, "I challenge them to find any one who will care to take the +trouble of making a large fortune--thirteen, fourteen, fifteen--very +good! Oh, you are too strong a player. All that has made me turn +round--you understand?" + +"Perfectly," replied M. Mauperin. + +"Where's my ball--there? Yes, it has made me turn completely round; it +has positively made a Legitimist of me. There--a bad cue again! But----" + +"But what?" + +"Well, there is one thing--Oh, on that subject, now, I have the same +opinions still. I don't mind telling you. Anything approaching a +parson--eighteen?--Oh, come, I'm done for! We invite the one here in +this place--he's a very decent fellow; but as to priests--when you've +known one as I have, who broke his leg getting over the college wall at +night--they are a pack of Jesuits, you know, M. Mauperin! + + "'Hommes noirs, d'où sortez-vous? + Nous sortons de dessous, terre.'" + +"Ah, that's my man! The god of simple folks! + + "'Mes amis, parlons plus bas: + Je vois Judas, je vois Judas!'" + +"Twenty-one! You've only three more. Now, at the place where my +iron-works are, there's a bishop who is very easy-going. Well, all the +bigots detest him. Now, if he pretended to be a bigot, if he were a +hypocrite and spent all his time at church----" + + * * * * * + +"I never saw Mme. Bourjot so amiable," remarked Mme. Mauperin, when she +and her family were all back in the carriage. + +"An odd chap, that Bourjot," observed M. Mauperin. "It isn't much good +having a billiard-table of his own either--I could have given him a +start of twelve." + +"I think Noémi is very strange," said Renée. "Did you see, Henri, how +she wanted to get out of acting?" + +Henri did not answer. + + + + +XIII + + +Noémi had just entered Mme. Mauperin's drawing-room followed by her +governess. She looked uncomfortable and ill at ease, almost shy, in +fact, but on glancing round she appeared to be somewhat reassured. She +advanced to speak to Mme. Mauperin, who kissed her. Renée then embraced +her, and, joking and laughing all the time, proceeded to take off her +friend's cape and hat. + +"Ah, I'm forgetting," she exclaimed, turning the dainty white hat +trimmed with pink flowers round on her hand, "let me introduce M. +Denoisel again. You have met him before in the old days--that sounds as +though we were quite aged, doesn't it?--and he is our theatrical +manager, our professor of elocution, our prompter--scene +shifter--everything." + +"I have not forgotten how kind M. Denoisel used to be to me when I was a +little girl," and Noémi, flushing with emotion as her thoughts went back +to her childhood, held out her hand somewhat awkwardly and with such +timidity that her fingers all clung together. + +"Oh, but what a pretty costume!" continued Renée, walking round her. +"You look sweet," and then patting her own taffeta dress, which was +rather the worse for wear, she held out her skirt and made a low +reverence. "You'll make a rather pretty Mathilde--I shall be jealous, +you know.--But look, mamma," she continued, drawing herself up to her +full height. "I told you so--she makes me quite small.--Now, then--you +see you are much taller than I am." As she spoke she placed herself side +by side with Noémi and, putting her arm round her waist, led her to the +glass and put her shoulder against her friend's. "There, now!" she +exclaimed. + +The governess was keeping in the background at the other end of the +_salon_. She was looking at some pictures in a book that she had only +dared to half open. + +"Come, my dears, shall we begin to read the play?" said Mme. Mauperin. +"It's no use waiting for Henri; he will only come to the last rehearsals +when the actresses are well on." + +"Oh, just now, mamma, let us talk first. Come and sit here, Noémi. +There--we have a lot of little secrets, so many things that have +happened since we last met to tell each other about--it is ages ago." + +And Renée began prattling and chirping away with Noémi. Their +conversation sounded like the fresh, clear, never-ending babbling of a +brook, breaking off now and again in a peal of laughter and dying away +in a whisper. Noémi, who was very guarded at first, soon gave herself up +to the delight of confiding in her friend and of listening to this voice +which brought back so many memories of the past. They asked each other, +as one does after a long absence, about all that had happened and what +they had each been doing. At the end of half an hour, to judge by their +conversation, one would have said they were two young women who had +suddenly become children again together. + +"I go in for painting," said Renée, "what do you do? You used to have a +beautiful voice." + +"Oh, don't mention that," said Noémi. "They make me sing. Mamma insists +on my singing at her big parties--and you've no idea how dreadful it is. +When I see every one looking at me, a shiver runs through me. Oh, I'm so +frightened--the first few times I burst out crying----" + +"Well, we'll have a little refreshment now. I've saved a green apple for +you that I was going to eat myself. I hope you still like green apples?" + +"No, thanks, Renée dear, I'm not hungry, really." + +"I say, Denoisel, what can you see that is so interesting--through that +window?" + +Denoisel was watching the Bourjot's footman in the garden. He had seen +him dust the bench with a fine cambric handkerchief, spread the +handkerchief over the green laths, sit down on it in a gingerly way in +his red velvet breeches, cross his legs, take a cigar out of his pocket +and light it. He was now looking at this man as he sat there smoking in +an insolent, majestic way, glancing round at this small estate with the +supercilious expression of a servant whose master lives in a mansion and +owns a park. + +"Why, nothing at all," said Denoisel, coming away from the window; "I +was afraid of intruding." + +"We have told each other all our secrets now; so you can come and talk +to us." + +"You know what time it is, Renée?" put in Mme. Mauperin. "If you want to +begin the rehearsal to-day----" + +"Oh, mamma, please--it's so warm to-day--and then, too, it's Friday." + +"And the year began on a 13th," remarked Denoisel gravely. + +"Ah!" said Noémi, looking at him with her trustful eyes. + +"Don't listen to him--he's taking you in. He plays jokes of that kind on +you all day long--Denoisel does. We'll rehearse next time you come, +shall we?--there's plenty of time." + +"As you like," answered Noémi. + +"Very well, then; we'll take a holiday. Denoisel, be funny--at once. And +if you are very funny--very, very funny--I'll give you a picture--one +of my own----" + +"Another?" + +"Oh, well, you are polite--I work myself to death----" + +"Mademoiselle," said Denoisel to Noémi, "you shall judge of the +situation. I have now a picture of a mad-apple and a parsnip, and then +to hang with that a slice of pumpkin and a piece of Brie cheese. There's +a great deal of feeling, I know, of course, in such subjects; but all +the same from the look of my room any one would take me for a private +fruiterer." + +"That's how men are, you see," said Renée gaily to Noémi. "They are all +ungrateful, my dear--and to think that some day we shall have to marry. +Do you know that we are quite old maids--what do you think of that? +Twenty years old--oh, how quickly time goes, to be sure! We think we +shall never be eighteen, and then, no sooner are we really eighteen than +it's all over and we can't stay at that age. Well, it can't be helped. +Oh, next time you come, bring some music with you and we'll play duets. +I don't know whether I could now." + +"And we shall rehearse--_quand_?" asked Denoisel. + +"In Normandy!" answered Renée, indulging in that kind of joke which for +the last few years has been in favour with society people, and which had +its origin in the workshop and the theatre. Noémi looked perplexed, as +though she had not caught the sense of the word she had just heard. + +"Yes," said Renée, "Caen is in Normandy. Ah, you don't go in for +word-endings? I used to have a mania for them some time ago. I was quite +unbearable with it--wasn't I, Denoisel? And so you go out a great deal. +Tell me about your balls." + +Noémi did as she was requested, speaking freely and getting gradually +more and more animated. She smiled as she spoke, and as her restraint +wore off her movements and gestures were graceful. It seemed as if she +had expanded under the influence of this air of liberty, here with Renée +in this gay, cheerful drawing-room. + +At four o'clock the governess rose as if moved by machinery. + +"It is time we started, mademoiselle," she said. "There is a +dinner-party, you know, at Sannois, and you will want time to dress." + + + + +XIV + + +"This time you must not expect to enjoy yourself; we are going to +rehearse in good earnest," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Noémi, come and sit +down there--that's it. We are ready now, are we not? One--two--three," +he continued, clapping his hands, "begin." + +"The fact is--the first scene," said Noémi, hesitatingly, "I am not +quite sure of it--I know the other better." + +"The second, then? We'll begin with the second--I'll take Henri's part: +'_Good evening, my dear_---- '" + +Denoisel was interrupted by a peal of laughter from Renée. + +"Oh, dear!" she said to Noémi, "how funnily you are sitting! You look +like a piece of sugar held in the sugar-tongs." + +"Do I?" said Noémi, quite confused and trying to find a better pose. + +"If only you would be kind enough not to interrupt the actors, Renée," +said Denoisel. "'_Good evening, my dear_,'" he repeated, continuing his +rôle, "'_do I disturb you_?'" + +"Oh! and where are the purses?" exclaimed Renée. + +"Why, I thought you were to see to them." + +"I?--not at all. You were to see to them. You are a nice one to count on +for the stage properties! I say, Noémi, if you were married, would it +ever dawn upon you to give your husband a purse? It's rather shoppy, +isn't it? Why not a smoking-cap, at once?" + +"Are we going to rehearse?" asked Denoisel. + +"Oh, Denoisel, you said that just like a man who really wants to go and +have a smoke!" + +"I always do want to smoke, Renée," answered Denoisel, "and especially +when I ought not to." + +"Why, it's quite a vice, then, with you." + +"I should just think it is; and so I keep it." + +"Well, but what pleasure can you find in smoking?" + +"The pleasure of a bad habit--that is the explanation of many passions. +'_Good evening, my dear_,'" he repeated, once more going back to M. de +Chavigny's arrival on the scene, "'_do I disturb you_?'" + +"_Disturb me, Henri--what a question!_" replied Noémi. + +And the rehearsal continued. + + + + +XV + + +"Three o'clock," said Renée, looking up at the time-piece from the +little woollen stocking she was knitting. "Really, I begin to think +Noémi will not come to-day. She'll spoil the rehearsal. We shall have to +fine her." + +"Noémi?" put in Mme. Mauperin, as though she had just woke up. "Why, she +isn't coming. Oh, I never told you! I don't know what's the matter with +me--I forget everything lately. She told me last time that very probably +she would not be able to come to-day. They are expecting some people--I +fancy--I forget----" + +"Well, that's pleasant! There is nothing more tiresome than that--to +expect people who don't come after all. And this morning when I woke I +said to myself, 'It's Noémi's day.' I was looking forward to having her. +Oh, it's quite certain she won't come now. It's funny how I miss her +now--Noémi, when she isn't here--ever since she began to take me on +again. I miss her just as though she were one of the family. I don't +think her amusing, she isn't lively, she isn't at all gay, and then as +regards intelligence, why, she's rather feeble--you can take her in so +easily. And yet--how is it now?--in spite of all that there is a +fascination about her. There is something so sweet, so very sweet about +her, and it seems to penetrate you. She calms your nerves, positively, +and then the effect she has on you--why, she seems to warm your heart +for you, and only by being there, near you. I've known lots of girls who +had really more in them, but they haven't what she has. I've always felt +as cold as steel with all of them." + +"Oh, well, it's very simple," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Bourjot is of a very +affectionate, loving disposition. There is a sort of current of +affection between such natures and others." + +"When she was quite little, I can remember, she was just the same--and +so sensitive. How she used to cry, and how fond she was of kissing me; +it was amazing--she did nothing else, in fact. And her face tells you +just what she is, doesn't it? Her beauty seems to be made up of all the +affection she feels, and of all that she has left of her childhood about +her. And above all it is her expression. You often feel rather wicked +and spiteful, but when she looks at you with that expression of hers it +is as though everything of that kind disappears--as though something is +melting away. Would you believe that I never ventured to play a single +trick on her, and yet I was a terrible tease in the old days!" + +"Nevertheless, it's very extraordinary to be as affectionate as all +that," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Oh, no, it's quite natural," answered Denoisel. "Imagine a girl, who is +born with the instinct of loving, just as we have the instinct of +breathing. She is repelled by the coldness of a mother, who feels +herself humiliated by her daughter, and who is ashamed of her; she is +repelled also by the selfishness of a father, who has no other pride, no +other love, and no other child but his wealth; well, a girl like this +would be just like Mlle. Bourjot, and in return for any trifling +interest you might take in her, she would repay you by the affection and +the effusions of which you speak. Her heart would simply overflow with +gratitude and love, and you would see in her eyes the expression Renée +has noticed, an expression which seems to shine out through tears." + + + + +XVI + + +The rehearsals had been going on a fortnight, when one day Mme. Bourjot +herself brought her daughter to the Mauperins. After the first greetings +she expressed her surprise at not seeing the chief actor. + +"Oh, Henri has such a wonderful memory," said Mme. Mauperin; "he will +only need a couple of rehearsals." + +"And how is it getting on?" asked Mme. Bourjot. "I must own that I +tremble for my poor Noémi. Is it going fairly well? I came to-day, in +the first place, to have the pleasure of seeing you, and then I thought +I should like to judge for myself----" + +"Oh, you can be quite at your ease," said Mme. Mauperin. "You will see +how perfectly natural your daughter is. She is quite charming." + +The actors went to their places and began the first scene of _The +Caprice_. + +"Oh, you flattered her," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin after the +first two or three scenes. "My dear child," she continued, turning to +her daughter, "you don't act as though you felt it; you are merely +reciting." + +"Oh, madame," exclaimed Renée, "you will frighten all the company. We +need plenty of indulgence." + +"You are not speaking for yourself," answered Mme. Bourjot. "If only my +poor child acted as you do." + +"Well, then," said Denoisel to Mme. Bourjot, "let us go on to the sixth +scene, mademoiselle. We'll hear what they have to say about that, for I +think you do it very well indeed; and as my vanity as professor is at +stake, Mme. Bourjot will perhaps allow me----" + +"Oh, monsieur," said Mme. Bourjot, "I do not think it has anything to do +with the professor in this case; you are not responsible at all." + +The scene was given and Mme. Bourjot continued, "Yes, oh yes, that +wasn't bad; that might pass. It's a namby-pamby sort of scene, and that +suits her. Then, too, she does her utmost; there's nothing to be said on +that score." + +"Oh, you are severe!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin. + +"You see, I'm her mother," murmured Mme. Bourjot, with a kind of sigh. +"And then you'll have a crowd of people here----" + +"Oh, you know one always gets more people than one wants on such +occasions," said Mme. Mauperin. "There is always a certain amount of +curiosity. I suppose there will be about a hundred and fifty people." + +"Suppose I were to make the list, mamma?" suggested Renée, who was +anxious to spare Noémi the rest of the rehearsal, as she saw how ill at +ease her friend was. "It would be a good way of introducing our guests +to Mme. Bourjot. You will make the acquaintance of our acquaintances, +madame." + +"I shall be very pleased," replied Mme. Bourjot. + +"It will be rather a mixed dish, I warn you. It always seems to me that +the people one visits are rather like folks one comes across in a +stage-coach." + +"Oh, that's a delightful idea--and so true too," said Mme. Bourjot. + +Renée took her seat at the table and began to write down with a pencil +the names of the people, talking herself all the time. + +"First comes the family--we'll leave that. Now, then, who is there? Mme. +and Mlle. Chanut, a girl with teeth like the pieces of broken glass +people put on their walls--you know what I mean. M. and Mme. de +Bélizard--people say that they feed their horses with visiting-cards." + +"Renée, Renée, come, what will every one think of you?" + +"Oh, my reputation's made. I needn't trouble any more about that. Then, +too, if you imagine that people don't say quite as much about me as I +say----" + +"Oh, let her alone, please, let her alone," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. +Mauperin, and turning to Renée she asked with a smile, "And who comes +next?" + +"Mme. Jobleau. Ah, she's such a bore with her story about her +introduction to Louis Philippe at the Tuileries. '_Yes, sire; yes, sire; +yes, sire;_' that was all she found to say. M. Harambourg, who can't +stand any dust--it makes him faint--every summer he leaves his +man-servant in Paris to get the dust from between the cracks of the +floors. Mlle. de la Boise, surnamed the Grammar Dragoon; she used to be +a governess, and she will correct you during a conversation if you make +a slip with the subjunctive mood. M. Loriot, President of the Society +for the Destruction of Vipers. The Cloquemins, father, mother, and +children, a family--well, like Pan's pipes. Ah! to be sure, the Vineux +are in Paris; but it's no use inviting them; they only go to see people +who live on the omnibus route. Why, I was forgetting the Méchin +trio--three sisters--the Three Graces of Batignolles. One of them is an +idiot, one----" + +Renée stopped short as she saw Noémi's scared eyes and horrified +expression. She looked like some poor, loving creature, who scarcely +understood, but who had suddenly been troubled and stirred to the depth +of her soul by all this backbiting. Getting up from her seat Renée ran +across and kissed her. "Silly girl!" she said gently, "why, these people +I am talking about are not people that I like." + + + + +XVII + + +Henri only came to the last rehearsals. He knew the play and was ready +with his part in a week. _The Caprice_ was a very short piece for the +_soirée_, and it was decided to finish up with something comic. Two or +three short plays given at the Palais Royal were tried, but given up as +there were not enough actors, and finally a very nonsensical thing was +chosen that was just then having a great run in one of the smaller +theatres, and which Henri had insisted on in spite of Mlle. Bourjot's +apparently groundless objection to it. Considering her usual timidity, +every one was surprised at her obstinacy on this point; but it seemed, +since Henri had been there, as if she were not quite herself. Renée +fancied at times that Noémi was not the same with her now, and that her +friendship had cooled. She was surprised to see a spirit of +contradiction in her which she had never known before, and she was quite +hurt at Noémi's manner to her brother. She was very cool with him, and +treated him with a shade of disdain which bordered on contempt. Henri +was always polite, attentive, and ready to oblige, but nothing more. In +all the scenes in which he and Noémi acted together he was so reserved, +so correct, and indeed so circumspect, that Renée, who feared that the +coldness of his acting would spoil the play, joked him about it. + +"Pooh!" he answered, "I'm like the great actors. I'm keeping my effects +for the first night." + + + + +XVIII + + +A small stage had been put up at the end of Mme. Mauperin's +drawing-room, and a leafy screen, made of branches of pine and flowering +shrubs, hid the footlights from view. Renée, with the help of her +drawing-master, had painted the drop-scene, which looked something like +the banks of the Seine. On each side of the stage was a hand-painted +poster which read as follows: + + BRICHE THEATRE + + TO-DAY + + THE CAPRICE + + AND + + PIERROT, BIGAMIST + + +The names of the actors were at the end of the bill. All the chairs in +the house were placed closely together in rows in front of the stage, +and the ladies, in evening dress, were seated, their skirts, their +laces, the flashing of their diamonds, and their white shoulders all +mingling together. The two doors at the other end of the room leading +into the dining-room and the small _salon_ had been taken off their +hinges, and the masculine part of the audience, in white neckties, were +grouped together there and standing on tip-toe. + +The curtain rose on the first scene of _The Caprice_. Renée was very +lively as Mme. de Léry; Henri, in the rôle of husband, proved himself a +talented amateur actor, as so many young men of a cold temperament, and +grave society men, often do. Noémi, well sustained by Henri, admirably +prompted by Denoisel, and slightly carried away by seeing the large +audience, played her touching part as the neglected wife very passably. +This was a great relief to Mme. Bourjot, who was seated in the front row +anxiously watching her daughter. Her vanity had been alarmed by the +thought of a fiasco. The curtain fell, and amid the applause were heard +shouts for "_All the actors!_" Her daughter had not made herself +ridiculous, and the mother was delighted with this great success and +gave herself up complacently to listening to that Babel of voices, +opinions, and criticisms, which at amateur dramatic performances +succeeds the applause and continues it, as it were, in a sort of murmur. +In the midst of it all she heard vaguely one phrase, spoken near her, +that came to her distinctly and seemed to rise above the general hubbub. + +"Yes, it's his sister, I know," some one was saying; "but for the rôle +he takes I don't think he is sufficiently in love with her; he is really +far too much in love with his wife--didn't you notice?" + +The lady who was speaking saw that Mme. Bourjot was listening, and, +leaning towards her neighbour, whispered something to her. This little +incident made Mme. Bourjot turn very serious. + +After an interval the curtain was once more raised, and Henri Mauperin +appeared as Pierrot, but not arrayed in the traditional calico blouse +and black cap. He was an Italian Pierrot, with a straight felt hat, and +was entirely clothed in satin from his coat to his slippers. There was a +movement among the ladies, which meant that they thought both the man +and the costume charming, and then the buffoonery began. + +It was the silly story of Pierrot married to one woman and wishing to +marry another; a farce mingled with passion, which had been discovered +by a vaudeville-writer, aided by a poet, among the stock-pieces of the +old Italian theatre. Renée took the part of the deserted wife, this +time, appearing in various disguises when her husband was love-making +elsewhere. Noémi was the woman with whom he was in love, and Henri +delighted the house in his love scenes with her. He acted well, putting +plenty of youthful ardour, enthusiasm, and warmth into his part. In the +scene where he confessed his love, there was something in his voice and +expression that seemed like a real declaration, which had escaped him, +and which he could not keep back. Noémi certainly had made up as the +prettiest Colombine imaginable. She looked perfectly adorable, dressed +as a bride in a Louis XVI costume copied exactly from the _Bride's +Minuet_, an engraving by Debucourt lent by M. Barousse. All around Mme. +Bourjot it seemed as if every one were bewitched, the sympathetic public +appeared to be helping and encouraging the handsome young couple to love +each other. The piece continued, and every now and then it was as though +Henri's eyes were seeking, beyond the footlights, the eyes of Mme. +Bourjot. Meanwhile Renée arrived, disguised as a village bailiff: there +was only the contract to be signed now, and Pierrot, taking the hand of +the girl he loved, began to speak of all the happiness he should have +with her. + +The lady who was seated next Mme. Bourjot felt her leaning slightly on +her shoulder. Henri finished his speech, the plot came to the climax, +and the piece ended. Mme. Bourjot's neighbour suddenly saw something +sink down at her side; it was Mme. Bourjot, who had fainted. + + + + +XIX + + +"Oh, do go in again, please," said Mme. Bourjot to the people who were +standing round her in the garden, to which she had been carried for air. +"It's all over; there's nothing the matter with me now; it was the +heat." She was very pale, but she smiled as she spoke. "I shall be quite +right again when I have had a little more air. M. Henri will perhaps +stay with me." + +Every one returned to the house, and the sound of the footsteps had +scarcely died away, when Mme. Bourjot seized Henri's arm in a firm grip +with her feverish fingers. + +"You love her!" she exclaimed. "You love her!" + +"Madame," said Henri. + +"Be quiet; you won't tell me the truth!" she exclaimed, pushing his arm +away. + +Henri merely bowed without attempting to speak. + +"I know all. I saw everything. Look at me!" she went on, and she gazed +into his eyes. He kept his head bent and was silent. "Say something, +anyhow--speak. Ah, you can only act comedy with her!" + +"The fact is I have nothing to say, Laure," replied Henri, speaking in +his gentlest and clearest voice. Mme. Bourjot drew back when he called +her Laure as if he had touched her. "I have been struggling against it +for the last year, madame," he continued. "I will not attempt to make +any excuse; but everything has drawn me to her. We have known each other +from childhood, and the fascination has increased lately day by day. I +am very sorry, madame, to have to tell you the truth; but it is quite +true that I love your daughter." + +"But you never can have talked to her, surely? Why, I blush for her when +we are out--you surely have not even looked at her. What in the world +possesses you men, tell me! Do you think she is beautiful? What +nonsense! why, I am better looking than she is. You are so foolish, all +of you. And then, I have spoiled you. You'll see whether she will pamper +your pride, let you revel in your vanity, and flatter and help you in +your ambitions. Oh, I know you thoroughly. Ah, M. Mauperin, all this is +only met with once in a lifetime. And women of my age--old women, you +understand--are the only ones who care about the future of those they +love. You were not my lover; you were like a dear son to me!" As she +said this, Mme. Bourjot's voice changed and she spoke with the deepest +feeling. "That's enough, though; we won't talk about that," she +continued in a different tone. "I tell you that you don't love my +daughter--it is not true--but she is rich----" + +"Oh, madame!" + +"Well, there are men like that--I have had them pointed out to me. +Sometimes it succeeds to begin with the mother in order to finish with +the dowry. And for the sake of a million, you know, one can put up with +being bored." + +"Speak more quietly, I beg you--for your own sake. They have just opened +one of the windows." + +"It's very fine to be so calm and collected, M. Mauperin, very +fine--very fine indeed," said Mme. Bourjot, and her low, hissing voice +sounded choked. + +Some clouds that were moving quickly along in the sky passed like the +wings of night-birds over the moon, and Mme. Bourjot gazed blankly into +the darkness in front of her. With her elbows resting on her knees and +supported by her high heels, she remained silent, tapping the gravel +path with her satin slippers. After a few minutes she sat up, moved her +arms about in an unconscious way as though she were scarcely awake, then +quickly, and in a jerky way, she put her hand between her dress and +waistband, pressing the back of her hand against the ribbon as though +she were going to burst it. Finally she rose and began to walk, followed +by Henri. + +"I count on our never seeing each other again, monsieur," she said, +without turning round. + +As she passed by the fountain she handed him her handkerchief, saying, +"Will you dip that in the water for me?" + +Henri obeyed, kneeling down on the curbstone. He handed her the damp +handkerchief, and she pressed it to her forehead and her eyes. + +"We will go in now," she said; "give me your arm." + +"Oh, madame, how courageous you are!" said Mme. Mauperin, advancing to +meet Mme. Bourjot when she entered the room. "It is not wise of you, +though, at all. I will have your carriage ordered." + +"No, please don't, thank you," replied Mme. Bourjot quickly. "I think I +promised you that I would sing; I am quite ready now," and she went +across to the piano, gracious and valiant once more, with that heroic +smile beneath which society actors conceal from the public the tears +they are weeping within themselves, and the wounds which discharge +themselves into their hearts. + + + + +XX + + +Mme. Bourjot had married in order that two important business houses +should be united; for the sake of amalgamating various interests she had +been wedded to a man whom she did not know, and at the end of a week of +married life she had felt all the contempt that a wife can possibly feel +for a husband. It was not that she had expected anything very ideal, nor +that she had looked on marriage as a romantic and imaginative girl so +often does. She was remarkably intelligent herself, and seriously +inclined, her mind had been formed and nurtured by reading, study, and +acquirements which were almost more suitable for a man. All that she +asked from the companion of her life was that he should be intellectual +and intelligent, a being in whom she could place all her ambitions and +her pride as a married woman, a man with a brilliant future before him, +capable of winning for himself one of those immense fortunes to which +money nowadays leads, and who should prove himself able to leap over the +gaps of modern society to a high place in the Ministry, the Public +Works, or the Exchequer. + +All her castles in the air crumbled away with this husband, whom she +found day by day more and more hopelessly shallow, more and more +incapable, devoid of all that should have been in him, and which was in +her instead, more narrow-minded, more mean and petty as time went on, +and all this mingled with and contradicted by all the violences and +weaknesses of a childish disposition. + +It was her pride that had preserved Mme. Bourjot from adultery, a pride +which, it may be said, was aided by circumstances. When she was young, +Mme. Bourjot, who was of a spare build and southern type, had features +which were too pronounced to be pleasing or beautiful. When she was +about thirty-four she began to get rather more plump, and it seemed then +that another woman had evolved from the one she had been. Her features, +though still strongly pronounced, became softer and more pleasing; the +hardness of her expression appeared to have melted away, and her whole +face smiled. It was one of those autumn beauties such as age brings to +certain women, making one wish to have seen them as they were at twenty; +a beauty which makes one imagine for them a youthfulness they never had. +As a matter of fact, then, so far Mme. Bourjot had not run any great +danger, nor had she known any very great temptations. The society, which +on account of her tastes she had chosen, her surroundings, the men who +frequented her _salon_ and whom she met elsewhere, had scarcely made it +necessary for her to stand seriously on the defensive. They were, for +the most part, academicians, savants, elderly literary men, and +politicians, all of them unassuming and calm, men who seemed old, some +of them from stirring up the past and the others the present. Satisfied +with very little, they were happy with a mere nothing--the presence of a +woman, a flattering speech, or the expression of eyes that were drinking +in their words. Accustomed to their academic adoration, Mme. Bourjot +had, without much risk, allowed it free scope and had treated it with +jests like an Egeria: it had been a flame which did not scorch, and with +which she had been able to play. + +But the time of maturity arrived for Mme. Bourjot. A great +transformation in her face and figure took place. Tormented, as it were, +by health which was too robust and an excess of vitality, she seemed to +lose the strength morally which she was gaining physically. She had a +great admiration for her past, and she felt now that she was less +strong-minded, and that there was less assurance in her pride than +formerly. + +It was just at this time that Henri Mauperin had made his appearance in +her drawing-room. He seemed to her young, intelligent, serious, and +thorough, equipped for the victories of life with all those +dispassionate and unwavering qualities that she had dreamed before her +marriage of finding in a husband. Henri had seized the situation at a +glance, and, divining his own chances, he made his plans and swooped +down on this woman as his prey. He began to make love to her, and this +woman, who had a husband and daughter, who had been a faithful wife for +twenty years, and who held a high position in Parisian society, scarcely +waited for him to tempt her. She yielded to him at their first +interview, conducting herself like a mere cocotte. Her love became a mad +passion with her, as it so frequently does with women of her age, and +Henri proved himself a genius in the art of attaching her to himself and +of chaining her, as it were, to her sin. He never betrayed himself, and +never for an instant allowed her to see a sign of the weariness, the +indifference, or the contempt that a man feels after a too easy +conquest, or of that sort of disgust with which certain situations of a +woman in love inspire him. He was always affectionate, and always +appeared to be deeply moved. He had for Mme. Bourjot those transports of +love and jealousy, all those scruples, little attentions, and +thoughtfulness which a woman, after a certain age, no longer expects +from her lover. He treated her as if she were a young girl, and begged +her to give him a ring which she always wore, and which had been one of +her confirmation presents. He put up with all the childishness and +coquetry which was so ridiculous in the passion of this mother of a +family, and he encouraged it all without a sign of impatience on his +face or a shade of mockery in his voice. At the same time he made +himself entirely master of her, accustoming her to be docile and +obedient to him, revealing to her such passionate love that Mme. Bourjot +was both grateful to him and proud of her victory over this apparently +cold and reserved young man. When he was thus completely master of her, +Henri worked her up still more by impressing her with the danger of +their meetings and the risks there were in their _liaison_, while by all +the emotions of a criminal passion he excited her imagination to such a +pitch of fear that her love increased with the very thought of all she +had to lose. + +She finally reached that stage when she only lived through him and for +him, by his presence, his thoughts, his future, his portrait, all that +remained to her of him after she had seen him. Before leaving him she +would stroke his hair with her hands and then put her gloves on quickly. +And all day afterward, when she was at home again with her husband and +her daughter, she would put the palms of her hands, which she had not +washed since, to her face and inhale the perfume of her lover's hair. + +This _soirée_, and this treason and rupture at the end of a year, +completely crushed Mme. Bourjot. She felt at first as if she had +received a blow, and her life seemed to be ebbing away through the +wound. She fancied she was really dying, and there was a certain +sweetness in this thought. The following day she hoped Henri would come. +She was vanquished and quite prepared to beg his pardon, to tell him +that she had been in the wrong, to beg him to forgive her, to entreat +him to be kind to her, and to allow her to gather up the crumbs of his +love. She waited a week, but Henri did not come. She asked him for an +interview that he might return her letters, and he sent them to her. She +wrote and begged to see him for the last time that she might bid him +farewell. Henri did not answer her letter, but, through his friends and +through the newspaper and society gossip, he contrived to let Mme. +Bourjot hear the rumour of an action that had been taken against him for +one of his articles on the misery of the poor. For a whole week he +managed to keep her mind occupied with the ideas of police and police +courts, prison, and all that the dramatic imagination of a woman +pictures to itself as the consequence of a lawsuit. + +When the Attorney-General assured Mme. Bourjot that the action would not +be taken, she felt quite a coward after all the terror she had gone +through, and weak and helpless from emotion, she could not endure any +more, and so wrote in desperation to Henri: + +"To-morrow at two o'clock. If you are not there I shall wait on the +staircase. I shall sit down on one of the stairs till you come." + + + + +XXI + + +Henri was ready, and had taken great pains to dress for the occasion in +an apparently careless style. He was wearing one of those morning suits +in which a young man nearly always looks well. + +At the time appointed in the letter there was a ring at the door. Henri +opened it and Mme. Bourjot entered. She passed by and walked on in front +of him as though she knew the way, until she reached the study. She took +a seat on the divan, and neither of them spoke a word. There was plenty +of room by her on the divan, but Henri drew up a smoking-chair, which he +turned round, and, sitting down astride on it, folded his arms over the +back. + +Mme. Bourjot lifted her double lace veil and turned it back over her +hat. Holding her head slightly aside, and with one hand pulling the +glove slowly off the other, she gazed at the things on the wall and on +the mantel-shelf. She gave a little sigh as if she were alone, and then, +glancing at Henri, she said: + +"There is some of my life here--something of me--in all that." She held +out her ungloved hand to him, and Henri kissed the tips of her fingers +respectfully. + +"Forgive me," she went on, "I did not intend speaking of myself; I have +not come here for that. Oh, you need not be afraid, I am quite sensible +to-day, I assure you. The first moment--well, the first moment was hard! +I won't deny that I had to pull myself together," she continued, with a +tearful smile, "but it's all over now. I scarcely suffer any more, and I +am quite myself again, I assure you. Of course everything cannot be +forgotten all in a minute, and I won't say that you are nothing to me +now--for you would not believe me. But this I can assure you, and you +must believe me, Henri, there is no more love for you in my heart. I am +no longer weak; the woman within me is dead--quite dead, and the +affection I have for you now is quite pure." + +The light seemed to annoy her as she spoke, as if it were some one +gazing at her. "Will you put the blind down, dear?" she said. "The +sun--my eyes have rather hurt me the last few days." + +While Henri was at the window she arranged her hat and let the cloak she +was wearing drop from her shoulders. When the light was not so strong in +the room she began again: + +"Yes, Henri, after struggling a long time, and enduring such anguish as +you will never know, after passing nights such as I hope you may never +have, and after crying and praying, I have conquered myself. I have won +the victory, and I can now think of my daughter's happiness without +being jealous, and of yours as the only happiness now left for me on +earth." + +"You are an angel, Laure," said Henri, getting up and walking up and +down the room as though he were greatly agitated. "But you must look at +things as they are. You were quite right the other day when you said +that we must separate forever--never see each other again. The idea of +our constantly meeting! You know we could not. It would take so little +to open wounds as slightly closed as ours are. Then, too, even if you +are sure of yourself, how do you know that I am as sure of myself? How +can I tell--if we were meeting at all times--with such constant +temptation--if I were always near you," he said, speaking very tenderly, +"why, some day, unexpectedly--how can I tell--and I am an honourable +man." + +"No, Henri," she answered, taking his hands in hers and drawing him to +the seat at her side, "I am not afraid of you, and I am not afraid of +myself. It is all over. How can I make you believe me? And you will not +refuse me? No, you cannot refuse me the only happiness which remains for +me--my only happiness. It is all I have left in the world now--it is to +see you, only to see you--" and throwing her arms round Henri's neck she +drew him to her closely. + +"Ah, no, it is quite impossible," said Henri, when the embrace had +lasted a few seconds. "Don't say any more about it," he continued, +brusquely, getting up as he spoke. + +"I will be brave," said Mme. Bourjot very seriously. + +When they had played out their comedy of renunciation they both felt +more at ease. + +"Now, then, listen to me," began Mme. Bourjot once more, "my husband +will give you his daughter." + +"How foolish you are, really, Laure." + +"Don't interrupt me--my husband will give you his daughter. I fancy he +intends asking his son-in-law to live in the same house. Of course you +would be quite free--your suite of rooms, your carriage, meals, and +everything quite apart--you know what our style of living is. Unless M. +Bourjot has changed his mind, she will have a dowry of forty thousand +pounds, and unless he should lose his money, which I do not think is +very probable, you will have, at our death, four or five times that +amount." + +"And how can you seriously imagine that Mlle. Bourjot, who has forty +thousand pounds, and who will have four or five times that much, would +marry----" + +"I am her mother," answered Mme. Bourjot in a decisive tone. "And +then--don't you love her? Why, it would merely be a kind of marriage of +expediency," and Mme. Bourjot smiled. "You provide her with happiness." + +"But what will the world say?" + +"The world? My dear boy, we should close the world's mouth with +truffles," and she gave her shoulders a little shrug. + +"And M. Bourjot?" + +"That's my part. He will like you very much before the end of two +months. The only thing is, as you know, he will want a title; he has +always intended his daughter to marry a count. All I can do is to get +him to consent to a name tacked on to yours. Nothing is simpler, +nowadays, than to get permission to add to one's name the name of some +estate, or forest, or even the name of a meadow, or a bit of land of any +sort. Didn't I hear some one talking to your mother about a farm called +Villacourt that you have in the Haute-Marne? _Mauperin de Villacourt_; +that would do very well. You know, as far as I am concerned, how little +I care about such things." + +"Oh, but it would be so ridiculous, with my principles, and a Liberal, +too, bound as I am. And then, you know----" + +"Oh, you can say it is a whim of your wife's. Every one goes about with +names like that now; it's a sort of cross people have to bear. Shall I +say a word for you to any one in authority?" + +"Oh, no; no, please don't! I didn't think I had said anything which +could make you imagine I should be inclined to accept. I don't really +know, frankly. You understand that I should have to think it over, I +should have to collect myself and consider what my duty is; to be more +myself, in fact, and less influenced by you, before I could give you an +answer." + +"I shall call on your mother this week," said Mme. Bourjot, getting up +and pressing his hand. "Good-bye," she said sadly; "life _is_ a +sacrifice!" + + + + +XXII + + +"Renée," said Mme. Mauperin one evening to her daughter, "shall we go +and see Lord Mansbury's collection of pictures to-morrow? It appears +that it is very curious; people say that one of the pictures would fetch +four thousand pounds. M. Barousse thought it would interest you, and he +has sent me the catalogue and an invitation. Should you like to go?" + +"Rather. I should just think I should like to go," replied Renée. + +The following morning she was very much surprised to see her mother come +into the room while she was dressing, busy herself with her toilette, +and insist on her putting on her newest hat. + +"There are always so many people at these exhibitions," said Mme. +Mauperin, arranging the bows on the hat, "and you must be dressed as +well as every one else." + +Although it was a private exhibition there were crowds of people in the +room on the first floor of the Auction Buildings, where Lord Mansbury's +collection was on view. The fame of the pictures, and the scandal of +such a sale, which it was said had been necessitated by Lord Mansbury's +folly in connection with a Palais Royal actress, had attracted all the +_habitués_ of the Hôtel Drouot; those people whom of late years the +fashion for collecting has brought there--all that immense crowd of +bric-à-brac buyers, art worshippers, amateurs of repute, and nearly all +the idlers of Paris. It had been found necessary to hang the three or +four valuable pictures for sale in the hall out of reach of the crowd. +In the room one could hear that muffled sound which one always hears at +wealthy peoples' sales, the murmur of prices going up, of whims and +fancies, of follies which lead on to further follies, of competitions +between bankers, and of all kinds of vanities connected with money +matters. Bidding, too, could be heard, being quietly carried on among +the groups. "The foam was rising," as the dealers say. + +When they entered the room, Mme. Mauperin and her daughter saw Barousse, +arm-in-arm with a young man of about thirty years of age. The young man +had large, soft eyes, which would have been handsome if they had had +more expression in them. His figure, which was slightly corpulent, was a +little puffy, and this gave him a rather common appearance. + +"At last, ladies!" said Barousse, addressing Mme. Mauperin; "allow me +to introduce my young friend, M. Lemeunier. He knows the collection +thoroughly, and if you want a guide he will take you to the best things. +I must ask to be excused, as I want to go and push something in No. 3 +room." + +M. Lemeunier took Mme. Mauperin and her daughter round the room, +stopping at the canvases signed by the most celebrated names. He merely +explained the subjects of the pictures, and did not talk art. Renée was +grateful to him for this from the bottom of her heart, without knowing +why. When they had seen everything, Mme. Mauperin thanked M. Lemeunier, +and they bowed and parted company. + +Renée wanted to see one of the side-rooms. The first thing she caught +sight of on entering was M. Barousse's back, the back of an amateur in +the very height of the excitement of the sale. He was seated on the +nearest chair to the auctioneer, next to a picture-dealing woman wearing +a cap. He was nudging her, knocking her knee, whispering eagerly his +bid, which he imagined he was concealing from the auctioneer and his +clerk, from the expert, and from all the room. + +"There, come, you have seen enough," said Mme. Mauperin, after a short +time. "It's your sister's 'At Home' day, and it is not too late. We have +not been once this year to it, and she will be delighted to see us." + +Renée's sister, Mme. Mauperin's elder daughter, Mme. Davarande, was the +type _par excellence_ of a society woman. Society filled her whole life +and her brain. As a child she had dreamed of it; from the time she had +been confirmed she had longed for it. She had married very young, and +had accepted the first "good-looking and suitable" man who had been +introduced to her, without any hesitation or trouble and entirely of her +own accord. It was not M. Davarande, but a position she had married. +Marriage for her meant a carriage and servants in livery, diamonds, +invitations, acquaintances, drives in the Bois. She had all that, did +very well without children, loved dress, and was happy. To go to three +balls in an evening, to leave forty cards before dinner, to run about +from one reception to another, and to have her own "At Home" day--she +could not conceive of any happiness beyond this. Devoting herself +entirely to society, Mme. Davarande borrowed everything from it herself, +its ideas, its opinions, its way of giving charity, its stock phrases in +affairs of the heart, and its sentiments. She had the same opinions as +the women whose hair was dressed by the famous coiffeur, Laure. She +thought exactly what it was correct to think, just as she wore exactly +what it was correct to wear. Everything, from her very gestures to the +furniture in her drawing-room, from the game she played to the alms she +gave away, from the newspaper she read to the dish she ordered from her +cook, aimed at being in good style--good style being her law and her +religion. She followed the fashion of the moment in everything and +everywhere, even to the theatre of the _Bouffes Parisiens_. She had, +when driving in the Bois, been told the names of certain women of +doubtful reputation, and could point them out to her friends, and that +made an effect. She spelt her name with a small "d," an apostrophe, and +a capital A, and this converted it into d'Avarande. Mme. Davarande was +pious. It seemed to her that God was _chic_. It would have seemed almost +as improper to her to have no parish as to have no gloves. She had +adopted one of those churches where grand marriages are celebrated, +where people with great names are to be met, where the chairs have +armorial bearings, where the beadle glitters with gold lace, where the +incense is perfumed with patchouli, and where the porch after high mass +on Sundays resembles the corridor of the Opera House when a great +artiste has been singing. + +She went to hear all the preachers that people were supposed to hear. +She confessed her sins, not in the confessional, but in a community. The +name and the individuality of the priest played an important part so far +as she was concerned in the sacraments of the Church: she would not +have felt that she was really married if any one but the Abbé Blampoix +had officiated at her wedding, and she would not have considered a +baptism valid if a ten-pound note had not been sent to the curé inside +the traditional box of sugar-plums. This woman, whose mind was always +fixed on worldly things, even when at church and during the benediction, +was naturally, thoroughly, and absolutely virtuous, but her virtue was +not the result of any effort, merit, or even consciousness. In the midst +of this whirlwind, this artificial air and warm atmosphere, exposed to +all the opportunities and temptations of society life, she had neither +the heart which a woman must have who is given to dreaming nor enough +intelligence to be bored by such an existence. She had neither the +curiosity nor the inclination which might have led her astray. Hers was +one of those happy, narrow-minded dispositions which have not enough in +them to go wrong. She had that unassailable virtue, common to many +Parisian women who are not even touched by the temptations which pass +over them: she was virtuous just in the same way as marble is cold. +Physically, even, as it happens sometimes with lymphatic and delicate +natures, the effect of society life on her had been to free her from all +other desires by using up her strength, her nervous activity, and the +movement of the little blood she had in her body, in the rushing about +on visits and shopping, the effort of making herself agreeable, the +fatigue of evening parties, resulting in utter weariness at night, and +enervation the next day. + +There are society women in Paris who, by the amount of vitality and +vigour they expend, and by the intense application of their energy and +grace, remind one of circus-riders and tight-rope dancers, whose +temperament suffers from the fatigue of their exercises. + + * * * * * + +Mme. Mauperin and her daughter met Mme. Davarande in her dining-room, +accompanying a smooth-faced gentleman with blue spectacles to the door. +She was extremely amiable to him, and when she had seen him out she +returned to her mother and sister. + +"Excuse my leaving you," she said, as she kissed them, "but it was M. +Lordonnot, the architect of the Sacred Heart Convent. I cultivate him +for the sake of my collections. Thanks to him I had forty-eight pounds +you know last time. That's very good: Mme. de Berthival has never +reached thirty-two pounds. I'm so glad to see you; it's very nice of you +to have come. We'll go into the other room--there's no one here to-day. +Mme. de Thésigny, Mme. de Champromard, and Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, and +then two young men, young de Lorsac--you know him I think, mamma, and +his friend de Maisoncelles? Wait a minute," she said to Renée, patting +her hair down a little, "your hair looks like a little dog's," and then +advancing and opening the drawing-room door, she announced her mother +and sister. + +Every one rose, shook hands, or bowed, and then sat down again and +looked at each other. Mme. Davarande's three lady friends were leaning +back in their easy chairs in that languid attitude due to cushioned +seats. They looked very dainty in their wide skirts, their lovely hats, +and gloves about large enough for the hands of a doll. They were dressed +perfectly, their gowns had evidently been cut by an artiste, their whole +toilette with the hundred little nothings which set it off, their +graceful attitudes, their bearing, their gestures, the movement of their +bodies, the _frou-frou_ of their silk skirts--everything was there which +goes to make the charm of the Parisian woman; and, although they were +not beautiful, they had discovered the secret of appearing almost +pretty, with just a smile, a glance, certain little details and +semblances, flashes of wit, animation, and a smart look generally. + +The two friends, Lorsac and Maisoncelles, in the prime of their twenty +years, with pink-and-white complexions, brilliant health, beardless +faces and curled hair, were delighted at being invited to a young +married lady's "At Home" day, and were sitting respectfully on the edge +of their chairs. They were young men who had been very well brought up. +They had just left a _pension_ kept by an abbé who gave little parties +every evening, at which his sister presided, and which finished up with +tea handed round in the billiard-room. + +"Henriette," said Mme. de Thésigny to Mme. Davarande, when the +conversation had commenced again, "are we going to see Mlle. de Bussan's +wedding to-morrow? I hear that every one will be there. It's made such a +stir, this marriage." + +"Will you call for me, then? What's the bride-groom like--does any one +know? Do you know him, Mme. de Saint-Sauveur?" + +"No, not at all." + +"Is she making a good match?" + +"An awful match!" put in Mme. de Champromard, "he hasn't anything--six +hundred pounds a year all told." + +"But," said Mme. Mauperin, "it seems to me, madame, that six +hundred----" + +"Oh, madame," continued Mme. de Champromard, "why, nowadays, that isn't +enough to pay for having one's jewellery reset." + +"M. de Lorsac, are you coming to this wedding?" asked Mme. Davarande. + +"I will come if you wish it." + +"Well then, I do wish it. Will you keep two chairs for us? One spoils +one's dress quite enough without that. I can wear pearl grey, can't I?" + +"Oh, certainly," answered Mme. de Thésigny, "it's a moiré antique +wedding. M. de Maisoncelles, will you keep two chairs for me? Don't +forget." + +De Maisoncelles bowed. + +"And if you are very good you shall be my cotillon partner on +Wednesday." + +De Lorsac blushed for de Maisoncelles. + +"You don't go out much, do you, mademoiselle?" said Mme. de Sauveur to +Renée, who was seated next her. + +"No, madame, I don't care about going out," answered Mlle. Mauperin +rather curtly. + +"Julia," said Mme. de Thésigny to Mme. de Champromard, "tell us again +about your famous bride's bed-room--Mme. Davarande wasn't there. Just +listen, my dear." + +"Oh, it was my sewing-woman who told me. Only fancy, the walls are +draped with white satin, finished with applications of lace, and ruches +of satin to outline the panels. The sheets--I've seen the pattern--they +are of cambric--spider-web. The mattresses are of white satin, caught +down with knots of pale blue silk that show through the sheet. And you +will be surprised to hear that all that is for a woman who is quite +_comme il faut_." + +"Oh, yes," said Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, "that is most astonishing, for +everything, nowadays, is for the other kind of women. What do you think +happened to me in the country--a most disagreeable affair! There is a +woman, who is not all she ought to be, living near us. We came across +her at church, for she has sittings there--just fancy! Well, ever since +she has arrived in our part of the world, everything has gone up in +price. We positively cannot get a sewing-girl now in the house for less +than seven-pence halfpenny an hour. Money is nothing to creatures of +that kind, of course. And then every one adores her--she is such a +schemer. She goes to see the peasants when they are ill, she finds +situations for their children, and she gives them money--a sovereign at +a time. Before she came we used to be able to do things for the poor +without much expense, but that isn't possible now. It's outrageous! I +told the curé so--it really is quite scandalous! And we owe all this to +one of your relatives, M. de Lorsac, to your cousin, M. d'Orambeau. My +compliments to him when you see him." + +The two young men threw themselves back on their chairs and laughed +heartily, and then both of them instinctively bit their canes with +delight. + +"Where have you just come from?" Mme. Davarande asked her mother and +sister. + +"From the auction-room," answered Mme. Mauperin. "M. Barousse persuaded +us to go to an exhibition of pictures." + +"Lord Mansbury's collection," put in Renée. + +"Ah, we must go to those auction-rooms, Henriette," said Mme. de +Thésigny; "we'll go and _rococoter_--it's great fun." + +"Have you seen Petrucci's pictures, my dear?" asked Mme. de +Saint-Sauveur. + +"Is she selling them?" asked Mme. de Thésigny. + +"I did so want to go," said Mme. Davarande. "If I had only known that +you were going----" + +"We were all there," interrupted Mme. de Saint-Sauveur. "It was so +curious. There was a glass-case of jewellery, a necklace of black pearls +among other things--if only you had seen it--three rows. There isn't a +husband in the world who could give you a thing like that; it would take +a national subscription." + +"Shall we not see your husband?" asked Mme. Mauperin, turning to Mme. +Davarande. + +"Oh, he's never here on my day--my husband--thank goodness!" Mme. +Davarande looked round as she heard some one coming in by the door +behind her chair. It was M. Barousse, followed by the young man who had +been with him at the auction-room. + +"Ah, we meet again," he said to Mme. Mauperin, as he put down on a chair +the little portfolio which never left him. + +Renée smiled and the chattering began again. + +"Have you read that novel--that novel?" + +"The one in the _Constitutional_?" + +"No." + +"By--I can't think of the name. It's called--wait a minute." + +"Every one's talking about it." + +"Do read it." + +"My husband will get it me from his club." + +"Is that play amusing?" + +"I only like dramas." + +"Shall we go?" + +"Let's take a box." + +"Friday?" + +"No, Saturday." + +"Shall we go to supper after?" + +"Yes--agreed." + +"It's at the _Provençaux_." + +"Will your husband come?" + +"Oh, he does what I want him to do, always." + +They were all talking and answering each other's questions without +really listening to anything, as every one was chattering at the same +time. Words, questions, and voices were all mingled together in the +Babel: it was like the chirping of so many birds in a cage. The door +opened, and a tall, thin woman dressed in black, entered. + +"Don't disturb yourselves, any of you; I have only just come in as I am +passing. I have only one minute." + +She bowed to the ladies and took up her position in front of the +chimney-piece, with her elbow on the marble and her hands in her muff. +She glanced at herself in the glass, and then, lifting her dress skirt, +held out the thin sole of her dainty little boot to the fire. + +"Henriette," she began, "I have come to ask you a favour--a great +favour. You absolutely must undertake the invitations for the ball that +the Brodmers are giving--you know, those Americans, who have just come; +they have a flat in the Rue de la Paix, and the rent is sixteen hundred +a year." + +"Oh, the Brodmers--yes," put in Mme. de Thésigny. + +"But, my dear," said Mme. Davarande, "it's a very delicate matter--I +don't know them. Have you any idea what these people are?" + +"Why, they are Americans. They've made their fortune out of cotton, +candles, indigo, or negroes--or--I don't know what; but what in the +world does that matter to us? Americans, you know, are accepted +nowadays. As far as I am concerned--with people who give balls, there's +only one thing I care about, and that is that they shouldn't belong to +the police and should give good suppers. It's all superb at their house, +it seems. The wife is astonishing. She talks the French of the +backwoods; and people say she was tattooed when she was a child. That's +why she can't wear low dresses. It's most amusing, and she is so +entertaining. They want to get plenty of people, you see. You _will_ do +it for me, won't you? I can assure you that if I were not in mourning I +should have had great pleasure in putting on the invitation cards, 'With +the Baronne de Lermont's compliments.' And then, too, they are people +who will do things properly. Oh, as to that I'm convinced of it. They +are sure to make you a present----" + +"Oh no, if I undertake the invitations I don't want a present for it." + +"How queer you are! Why, that sort of thing's done every day--it's the +custom. It would be like refusing a box of sweets from these gentlemen +here on New Year's day. And now I must go. I shall bring them to see you +to-morrow--my savages. Good-bye! Oh dear, I'm nearly dead!" and with +these words she disappeared. + +"Is it really true?" Renée asked her sister. + +"What?" + +"That guests are supplied for balls in this way?" + +"Well, didn't you know that?" + +"I was in the same state of ignorance," said the young man M. Barousse +had brought. + +"It's very convenient for foreigners," remarked Mme. Davarande. + +"Yes, but it seems to me that it's rather humiliating for Parisians. +Don't you think so, mademoiselle?" said the young man, turning to Mlle. +Mauperin. + +"Oh, it's an accepted thing, anyhow," said Mme. Davarande. + + + + +XXIII + + +Mme. Bourjot had just arrived with her daughter at the Mauperins'. She +kissed Renée and sat down by Mme. Mauperin on the sofa near the fire. + +"My dears," she said, turning to the two girls, who were chattering +together on the other side of the room, "suppose you were to let your +mothers have a little talk together. Will you take Noémi out in the +garden a little, Renée? I give her over to you." + +Renée put her arm round Noémi and pulled her along with her, skipping as +she went. In the hall she caught up a Pyrenees hood that was lying on a +chair and threw it over her head, put on some little overshoes, and ran +out into the garden, rushing along like a child, and keeping her arm +round her friend all the time. + +"There's a secret--a secret. Do you know what the secret is?" she +exclaimed, stopping suddenly short and quite out of breath. + +Noémi looked at her with her large, sad eyes and did not answer. + +"You silly girl!" said Renée, kissing her. "I've guessed it--I caught a +few words--mamma lets everything out. It's about his lordship, my +brother. There now!" + +"Let's sit down--shall we? I'm so tired." And Noémi took her seat on the +garden bench, just where her mother had sat on the night of the +theatricals. + +"Why, you are crying! What's the matter?" exclaimed Renée, sitting down +by her. Noémi let her head fall on her friend's shoulder and burst into +tears, that were quite hot as they fell on Renée's hand. + +"What is it, tell me--answer me--speak, Noémi--come now, Noémi dear!" + +"Oh, you don't know!" answered Noémi, in broken words, which seemed to +choke her. "I won't--no, I cannot tell you--if only you knew. Oh, do +help me!" and she flung her arms round Renée in despair. "I love you +dearly--you----" + +"Come, come, Noémi; I don't understand anything. Is it this marriage--is +it my brother? You must answer me--come!" + +"Ah, yes; you are his sister--I had forgotten that. Oh, dear, I wish I +could die----" + +"Die, but why?" + +"Why? Because your brother----" + +She stopped short, in horror at the thought of uttering the words she +was just going to say, and then, suddenly finishing her sentence in a +murmur in Renée's ear, she hid her face on her friend's shoulder to +conceal her blushing cheeks and the shame she felt in her inmost soul. + +"My brother! You say--no, it's a lie!" exclaimed Renée, pushing her away +and springing up with a bound in front of her. + +"Should _I_ tell a lie about it?" and Noémi looked up sadly at Renée, +who read the truth clearly in her eyes. + +Renée folded her arms and gazed at her friend. She stood there a few +minutes deep in thought, erect and silent, her whole attitude resolute +and energetic. She felt within herself the strength of a woman, and +something of the responsibility of a mother with this child. + +"But how can your father--" she began, "my brother has no name but +ours." + +"He is to take another one." + +"Ah, he is going to give our name up? And quite right that he should!" + + + + +XXIV + + +"Oh, it's you, is it; you are not in bed yet?" said Henri to Renée, as +she went into his room one evening. He was smoking, and it was that +blissful moment in a man's life when, with slippers on and his feet on +the marble of the chimney-piece, buried in an arm-chair, he gives +himself up to day-dreams, while puffing up languidly to the ceiling the +smoke of his last cigar. He was thinking of all that had happened during +the past few months, and congratulating himself on having manoeuvred so +well. He was turning everything over in his mind: that suggestion about +the theatricals, which he had thrown out with such apparent indifference +when they were all sitting in the garden; then his absence from the +first rehearsals, and the coolness with which he had treated Noémi in +order to reassure her, to take her off her guard, and to prevent her +refusing point-blank to act. He was thinking of that master-stroke, of +his love suddenly rousing the mother's jealousy in the midst of the +play, and it had all appeared to be so spontaneous, as though the rôle +he was filling had torn from him the secret of his soul. He thought of +all that had followed: how he had worked that other love up to the last +extremity of despair, then his behaviour in that last interview; all +this came back to him, and he felt a certain pride in recalling so many +circumstances that he had foreseen, planned, and arranged beforehand, +and which he had so skilfully introduced into the midst of the +love-affairs of a woman of forty. + +"No, I am not sleepy to-night," said Renée, drawing up a little stool to +the fire and sitting down. "I feel inclined for a little chat like we +used to have before you had your flat in Paris, do you remember? I got +used to cigars, and pipes, and everything here. Didn't we gossip when +every one had gone to bed! What nonsense we have talked by this fire! +And now, my respected brother is such a very serious sort of man." + +"Very serious indeed," put in Henri, smiling. "I'm going to be married." + +"Oh," she said, "but you are not married yet. Oh, please Henri!" and +throwing herself on her knees she took his hands in hers. "Come now, for +my sake. Oh, you won't do it--just for money--I'm begging you on my +knees! And then, too, it will bring bad luck to give up your father's +name. It has belonged to our family for generations--this name, Henri. +Think what a man father is. Oh, do give up this marriage--I beseech +you--if you love me--if you love us all! Oh, I beseech you, Henri!" + +"What's this all mean; have you gone mad? What are you making such a +scene about? Come, that's enough, thank you; get up." + +Renée rose to her feet, and looking straight into her brother's eyes she +said: + +"Noémi has told me everything!" + +The colour had mounted to her cheeks. Henri was as pale as if some one +had just spat in his face. + +"You cannot, anyhow, marry her daughter!" exclaimed Renée. + +"My dear girl," answered Henri coldly, in a voice that trembled, "it +seems to me that you are interfering in things that don't concern you. +And you will allow me to say that for a young girl----" + +"Ah, you mean this is dirt that I ought to know nothing of; that is +quite true, and I should never have known of it but for you." + +"Renée!" Henri approached his sister. He was in one of those white rages +which are terrible to witness, and Renée was alarmed and stepped back. +He took her by the arm and pointed to the door. "Go!" he said, and a +moment later he saw her in the corridor, putting her hand against the +wall for support. + + + + +XXV + + +"Go up, Henri," said M. Mauperin to his son, and then as Henri wanted +his father to pass first M. Mauperin repeated, "No, go on up." + +Half an hour later father and son were coming downstairs again from the +office of the Keeper of the Seals. + +"Well, you ought to be satisfied with me, Henri," observed M. Mauperin, +whose face was very red. "I have done as you and your mother wished. You +will have this name." + +"Father----" + +"All right, don't let us talk about it. Are you coming home with me?" he +asked, buttoning his frock-coat with that military gesture with which +old soldiers gird up their emotions. + +"No, father, I must ask you to let me leave you now. I have so many +things to do to-day. I'll come to dinner to-morrow." + +"Good-bye, then, till to-morrow. You'd better come; your sister is not +well." + +When the carriage had driven away with his father Henri drew himself +up, looked at his watch, and with the brisk, easy step of a man who +feels the wind of fortune behind him blowing him along, walked briskly +towards the Rue de la Paix. + +At the corner of the Chaussée d'Antin he went into the Café Bignon, +where some heavy-looking young men, suggestive of money and the +provinces, were waiting for him. During luncheon the conversation turned +on provincial cattle shows and competitions, and afterward, while +smoking their cigars on the boulevards, the questions of the varied +succession of crops, of drainage, and of liming were brought up, and +there was a discussion on elections, the opinions of the various +departments, and on the candidatures which had been planned, thought of, +or attempted at the agricultural meetings. + +At two o'clock Henri left these gentlemen, after promising one of them +an article on his model farm; he then went into his club, looked at the +papers, and wrote down something in his note-book which appeared to give +him a great deal of trouble to get to his mind. He next hurried off to +an insurance company to read a report, as he had managed to get on to +the committee, thanks to the commercial fame and high repute of his +father. At four o'clock he sprang into a carriage and paid a round of +visits to ladies who had either a _salon_ or any influence and +acquaintances at the service of a man with a career. He remembered, +too, that he had not paid his subscription to the "Society for the Right +Employment of the Sabbath among the Working Classes," and he called and +paid it. + +At seven o'clock, with cordial phrases on the tip of his tongue and +ready to shake hands with every one, he went upstairs at Lemardelay's, +where the "Friendly Association" of his old college friends held its +annual banquet. At dessert, when it was his turn to speak, he recited +the speech he had composed at his club, talked of this fraternal +love-feast, of coming back to his family, of the bonds between the past +and the future, of help to old comrades who had been afflicted with +undeserved misfortunes, etc. + +There were bursts of applause, but the orator had already gone. He put +in an appearance at the d'Aguesseau lecture, left there, pulled a white +necktie out of his pocket, put it on in the carriage, and showed up at +three or four society gatherings. + + + + +XXVI + + +The shock which Renée had had on leaving her brother's room, and which +had made her totter for a moment, had brought on palpitation of the +heart, and for a week afterward she had not been well. She had been kept +quiet and had taken medicines, but she did not recover her gaiety, and +time did not appear to bring it back to her. On seeing her ill, Henri +knew very well what was the matter, and he had done all in his power to +make things up with her again. He had been most affectionate, attentive, +and considerate, and had endeavoured to show his repentance. He had +tried to get into her good graces once more, to appease her conscience, +and to calm her indignation; but his efforts were all in vain. He was +always conscious of a certain coolness in her manner, of a repugnance +for him, and of a sort of quiet resolution which caused him a vague +dread. He understood perfectly well that she had only forgotten the +insult of his brutality; she had forgiven her brother, but she had not +forgiven him as a man. + +Her mother had arranged to take her to Paris one day for a little +change, and at the last moment had not felt well enough to go. Henri had +some business to do, and he offered to accompany his sister. They +started, and on reaching Paris drove to the Rue Richelieu. As they were +passing the library Henri told the cabman to draw up. + +"Will you wait here for me a moment?" he said to his sister, "I want to +ask one of the librarians a question. Why not come in with me, though," +he added as an after-thought. "You have always wanted to see the +manuscript scroll-work and that is in the same room. You would find it +interesting, and I could get my information at the same time." + +Renée went up with her brother to the manuscript-room, and Henri took +her to the end of a table, waited until the prayer-book he had asked for +was brought, and then went to speak to a librarian in one of the window +recesses. + +Renée turned over the leaves of her book slowly. Just behind her one of +the employees was warming himself at the hot-air grating. Presently he +was joined by another, who had just taken some volumes and some +title-deeds to the desk near which Henri was talking, and Renée heard +the following conversation just behind her: + +"I say, Chamerot, you see that little chap?" + +"Yes, at M. Reisard's desk." + +"Well, he can flatter himself that he's got hold of some information +which isn't quite correct. He's come to ask whether there used to be a +family named Villacourt, and whether the name has died out. They've told +him that it has. Now if he'd asked me, I could have told him that some +folks of that name must be living. I don't know whether it's the same +family; but there was one of them there before I left that part of the +world, and a strong, healthy fellow too--the eldest, M. Boisjorand--the +proof is that we had a fight once, and that he knew how to give hard +blows. Their place was quite near to where we lived. One of the turrets +of their house could be seen above Saint-Mihiel, and from a good +distance too; but it didn't belong to them in my time. They were a +spendthrift lot, that family. Oh, they were queer ones for nobility; +they lived with the charcoal-burners in the Croix-du-Soldat woods, at +Motte-Noire, like regular satyrs." + +Saint-Mihiel, the Croix-du-Soldat woods, and Motte-Noire--all these +names fixed themselves on Renée's memory and haunted her. + +"There, now I have what I wanted," said Henri, gaily, when he came back +to her to take her away. + + + + +XXVII + + +Denoisel had left Renée at her piano, and had gone out into the garden. +As he came back towards the house he was surprised to hear her playing +something that was not the piece she was learning; then all at once the +music broke off and all was silent. He went to the drawing-room, pushed +the door open, and discovered Renée seated on the music-stool, her face +buried in her hands, weeping bitterly. + +"Renée, good heavens! What in the world is the matter?" + +Two or three sobs prevented Renée's answering at first, and then, wiping +her eyes with the backs of her hands, as children do, she said in a +voice choked with tears: + +"It's--it's--too stupid. It's this thing of Chopin's, for his funeral, +you know--his funeral mass, that he composed. Papa always tells me not +to play it. As there was no one in the house to-day--I thought you were +at the bottom of the garden--oh, I knew very well what would happen, but +I wanted to make myself cry with it, and you see it has answered to my +heart's content. Isn't it silly of me--and for me, too, when I'm +naturally so fond of fun!" + +"Don't you feel well, Renée? Come, tell me; there's something the +matter. You wouldn't cry like that." + +"No, there's nothing the matter, I assure you. I'm as strong as a horse; +there's nothing at all the matter, really and truly. If there were +anything I should tell you, shouldn't I? It all came about through that +dreadful, stupid music. And to-day, too--to-day, when papa has promised +to take me to see _The Straw Hat_." + +A faint smile lighted up her wet eyes as she spoke, and she continued in +the same strain: + +"Only fancy, _The Straw Hat_--at the Palais Royal. It will be fun, I'm +sure; I only like pieces of that kind. As for the others, dramas and +sentimental things--well, I think we have enough to stir us up with our +own affairs; it isn't worth while going in search of trouble. Then, too, +crying with other people; why, it's like weeping into some one else's +handkerchief. We are going to take you with us, you know--a regular +bachelor's outing it's to be. Papa said we should dine at a restaurant; +and I promise you that I'll be as nonsensical, and laugh as I used to +when I was a little girl--when I had my English governess--you remember +her? She used to wear orange-coloured ribbons, and drink eau de Cologne +that she kept in a cupboard until it got in her head. She was a nice old +thing." + +And as she uttered these words her fingers flew over the keyboard, and +she attacked an arrangement with variations of the _Carnival of Venice_. + +"You've been to Venice, haven't you?" she said suddenly, stopping short. + +"Yes." + +"Isn't it odd that there should be a spot like that on earth, that I +don't know and yet that attracts me and makes me dream of it? For some +people it's one place, and for others it's another. Now, I've never +wanted to see any place except Venice. I'm going to say something +silly--Venice seems to me like a city where all the musicians should be +buried." + +She put her fingers on the notes again, but she only skimmed over them +without striking them at all, as if she were just caressing the silence +of the piano. Her hands then fell on her knees again, and in a pensive +manner, giving way to her thoughts, she half turned her head towards +Denoisel. + +"You see," she said, "it seems as though there is sadness in the very +air. I don't know how it is, but there are days when the sun is shining, +when I have nothing the matter with me, no worry and no troubles to +face; and yet I positively want to be sad, I try to get the blues, and +feel as though I _must_ cry. Many a time I've said I had a headache and +gone to bed, just simply for the sake of having a good cry, of burying +my face in the pillow; it did me ever so much good. And at such times I +haven't the energy to fight against it or to try to overcome it. It's +just the same when I am going off in a faint; there's a certain charm in +feeling all my courage leaving me----" + +"There, there, that's enough, Renée dear! I'll have your horse saddled +and we'll go for a ride." + +"Ah, that's a good idea! But I warn you I shall go like the wind, +to-day." + + + + +XXVIII + + +"What was he to do? poor Montbreton has four children, and none too much +money," said M. Mauperin with a sigh, as he folded up the newspaper in +which he had just been reading the official appointments and put it at +some distance from him on the table. + +"Yes, people always say that. As soon as any one ever does anything +mean, people always say 'He has children.' One would think that in +society people only had children for the sake of that--for the sake of +being able to beg, and to do a lot of mean things. It's just as though +the fact of being the father of a family gave you the right to be a +scoundrel." + +"Come, come, Renée," M. Mauperin began. + +"No, it's quite true. I only know two kinds of people: the +straightforward, honest ones; and then the others. Four children! But +that only ought to serve as an excuse for a father when he steals a +loaf. _Mère Gigogne_ would have had the right to poison hers according +to that, then. I'm sure Denoisel thinks as I do." + +"I? Not at all; indeed I don't! I vote for indulgence in favour of +married folks--fathers of families. I should like to see people more +charitable, too, towards any one who has a vice--a vice which may be +rather ruinous, but which one cannot give up. As to the others, those +who have nothing to use their money for, no vice, no wife, no children, +and who sell themselves, ruin themselves, bow down, humiliate, enrich, +and degrade themselves--ah! I'd give all such over to you willingly." + +"I'm not going to talk to you," said Renée in a piqued tone. "Anyhow, +papa," she went on, "I cannot understand how it is that it does not make +_you_ indignant, you who have always sacrificed everything to your +opinions. It's disgusting what he has done, and that's the long and +short of it." + +"I do not say that it isn't; but you get so excited, child, you get so +excited." + +"I should think so. Yes, I do get excited--and enough to make me, too. +Only fancy, a man who owed everything to the other government, and who +said everything bad he could about the present one; and now he joins +this one. Why, he's a wretch!--your friend, Montbreton--a wretch!" + +"Ah! my dear child, it's very easy to say that. When you have had a +little more experience of life you will be more indulgent. One has to be +more merciful. You are young." + +"No, it's something I've inherited, this is. I'm your daughter, and +there's too much of you in me, that's what it is. I shall never be able +to swallow things that disgust me. It's the way I'm made--how can I help +it? Every time I see any one I know--or even any one I don't know--fail +in what you men call points of honour, well, I can't help it at all, but +it has the same effect on me as the sight of a toad. I have such a +horror of it, and it disgusts me so, that I want to step on it. Come +now, do you call a man honourable because he takes care to only do +abominable things for which he can't be tried in the law courts? Do you +call a man honourable when he has done something for which he must blush +when he is alone? Is a man honourable when he has done things for which +no one can reproach him and for which he cannot be punished, but which +tarnish his conscience? I think there are things that are lower and +viler than cheating at the card-table; and the indulgence with which +society looks on makes me feel as though society is an accomplice, and I +think it is perfectly revolting. There are things that are so disloyal, +so dishonest, that when I think of them it makes me quite merciful +towards out-and-out scoundrels. You see they do risk something; their +life is at stake and their liberty. They go in for things prepared to +win or lose: they don't put gloves on to do their infamous deeds. I like +that better; it's not so cowardly, anyhow!" + +Renée was seated on a sofa at the far side of the drawing-room. Her arms +were folded, her hands feverish, and her whole body quivering with +emotion. She spoke in jerks, and her voice vibrated with the wrath she +felt in her very soul. Her eyes looked like fire lighting up her face, +which was in the shade. + +"And very interesting, too, he is," she continued, "your M. de +Montbreton. He has an income of six hundred or six hundred and fifty +pounds. If he did not pay quite such a high house-rent, and if his +daughters had not always had their dresses made by Mme. Carpentier----" + +"Ah, this requires consideration," put in Denoisel. "A man who has more +than two hundred a year, if a bachelor, and more than four hundred if +married, can perfectly well remain faithful to a government which is no +longer in power. His means allow him to regret----" + +"And he will expect you to esteem him, to shake hands with him, and +raise your hat to him as usual," continued Renée. "No, it is rather too +much! I hope when he comes here, papa--well, I shall promptly go +straight out of the room." + +"Will you have a glass of water, Renée?" asked M. Mauperin, smiling; +"you know orators always do. You were really fine just then. Such +eloquence--it flowed like a brook." + +"Yes, make fun of me by all means. You know I get carried away, as you +tell me. And your Montbreton--but how silly I am, to be sure. He doesn't +belong to us, this man, does he? Oh, if it were one of my family who had +done such a thing, such a dishonourable thing, such a----" + +She stopped short for a second, and then began again: + +"I think," she said, speaking with an effort, as though the tears were +coming into her eyes, "I think I could never love him again. Yes, it +seems to me as though my heart would be perfectly hard as far as he was +concerned." + +"Good! this is quite touching. We had the young orator just now, and at +present it is the little girl's turn. You'd do better to come and look +at this caricature album that Davarande has sent your mother." + +"Ah yes, let's look at that," said Renée, going quickly across to her +father and leaning on his shoulder as he turned over the leaves. She +glanced at two or three pages and then looked away. + +"There, I've had enough of them, thank you. Goodness, how can people +enjoy making things ugly--uglier than nature? What a queer idea. Now in +art, in books, and in everything, I'm for all that is beautiful, and not +for what is ugly. Then, too, I don't think caricatures are amusing. It's +the same with hunchbacks--it never makes me laugh to see a hunchback. +Do you like caricatures, Denoisel?" + +"Do I? No, they make me want to howl. Yes, it is a kind of comical thing +that hurts me," answered Denoisel, picking up a Review that was next the +album. "Caricatures are like petrified jokes to me. I can never see one +on a table without thinking of a lot of dismal things, such as the wit +of the Directory, Carle Vernet's drawings, and the gaiety of +middle-class society." + +"Thank you," said M. Mauperin laughing, "and in addition to that you are +cutting my _Revue des Deux Mondes_ with a match. How hopeless he is, to +be sure, Denoisel." + +"Do you want a knife, Denoisel?" asked Renée, plunging her hand into her +pockets and pulling out a whole collection of things, which she threw on +the table. + +"By Jove!" exclaimed Denoisel, "why, you have a regular museum in your +pockets. You'd have enough for a whole sale at the auction-rooms. What +in the world are all those things?" + +"Presents from a certain person, and they go about with me everywhere. +There's the knife for you," and Renée showed it to her father before +passing it to Denoisel. "Do you remember where you bought it for me?" +she asked. "It was at Langres once when we had stopped for a fresh +horse; oh, it's a very old one. This one," she continued, picking up +another, "you brought me from Nogent. It has a silver blade, if you +please; I gave you a halfpenny for it, do you remember?" + +"Ah, if we are to begin making inventories!" said M. Mauperin laughing. + +"And what's in that?" asked Denoisel, pointing to a little worn-out +pocket-book stuffed full of papers, the dirty crumpled edges of which +could be seen at each end. + +"That? Oh, those are my secrets," and, picking up all the things she had +thrown on the table, she put them quickly back in her pocket with the +little book. The next minute, with a burst of laughter and diving once +more into her pockets, she pulled the book out again, opened the flap, +and scattered all the little papers on the table in front of Denoisel, +and without opening them proceeded to explain what they were. "There, +this is a prescription that was given for papa when he was ill. That's a +song he composed for me two years ago for my birthday----" + +"There, that's enough! Pack up your relics; put all that out of sight," +said M. Mauperin, sweeping all the little papers from him just as the +door opened and M. Dardouillet entered. + +"Oh, you've mixed them all up for me!" exclaimed Renée, looking annoyed +as she put them back in her pocket-book. + + + + +XXIX + + +A month later, in the little studio, Renée said to Denoisel: "Am I +really romantic--do you think I am?" + +"Romantic--romantic? In the first place, what do you mean by romantic?" + +"Oh, you know what I mean; having ideas that are not like every one +else's, and fancying a lot of things that can never happen. For +instance, a girl is romantic when it would be a great trouble to her to +marry, as girls do marry, a man with nothing extraordinary about him, +who is introduced to her by papa and mamma, and who has not even so much +as saved her life by stopping a horse that has taken fright, or by +dragging her out of the water. You don't imagine I'm one of that sort, I +hope?" + +"No; at least I don't know at all. I'd wager that you yourself don't +know, either." + +"Nonsense. It may be, in the first place, because I have no imagination; +but it has always seemed to me so odd to have an ideal--to dream about +some imaginary man. It's just the same with the heroes in novels; +they've never turned my head. I always think they are too well-bred, too +handsome, too rotten, with all their accomplishments. I get so sick of +them in the end. But it isn't that. Tell me now, suppose they wanted to +make you live your whole life long with a creature--a creature who----" + +"A creature--what sort of a creature?" + +"Let me finish what I am saying. A man, then, who did not answer at all +to certain delicate little requirements of your nature, who did not +strike you as being poetical--there, that's what I mean--not a scrap +poetical, but who on the other hand made up for what was wanting in him, +in other ways, by such kindness--well, such kindness as one never meets +with----" + +"As much kindness as all that? Oh, I should not hesitate; I should take +the kindness blindfold. Dear me, yes, indeed I should. It's so rare." + +"You think kindness worth a great deal then?" + +"I do, Renée. I value it as one values what one has lost." + +"You? Why, you are always very kind." + +"I am not downright bad; but that's all. I might perhaps be envious if I +had more modesty and less pride. But as for always being kind, oh no, I +am not. Life cures you of that just as it cures you of being a child. +One gets over one's good-nature, Renée, just as one gets over +teething." + +"Then you think that a kindly disposition and a good heart----" + +"Yes, I mean the goodness that endures in spite of men and in spite of +experience--such goodness as I have met with in a primitive state in two +or three men in my life. I look upon it as the best and most divine +quality a man can have." + +"Yes, but if a man who is very good, as good as those you describe--this +is just a supposition, you know--suppose he had feet that looked like +lumps of cake in his boots. And then, suppose he were corpulent, this +good man, this very good man?" + +"Well, one need not look at his feet nor at his corpulency--that's all. +Oh, I beg your pardon, though, of course, I had completely forgotten." + +"What?" + +"Oh, nothing; except that you are a woman." + +"But that's very insulting to my sex--that remark of yours." + +Denoisel did not answer, and the conversation ceased for a few minutes. + +"Have you ever wished for wealth?" Renée began again. + +"Yes, several times; but absolutely for the sake of treating it as it +deserves to be treated--to be disrespectful to it." + +"How do you mean?" + +"Why, yes, I should like to be rich just to show the contempt I have +for money. I remember that two or three times I have fallen asleep with +the idea of going to Italy to get married." + +"To Italy?" + +"Yes, there are more Russian princesses there than anywhere else, and +Russian princesses are the only women left in this world who will marry +a man without a farthing. Then, too, I was prepared to be contented with +a princess who was not very well off. I was not at all exacting, and +would have come down without a murmur to thirty thousand pounds a year. +That was my very lowest figure though." + +"Indeed!" said Renée laughing. "And what should you have done with all +that money?" + +"I should just have poured it away in streams between my fingers; it +would have been something astounding to see; something that I have never +seen rich people do with their money. I think all the millionaires ought +to be ashamed of themselves. For instance, from the way in which a man +lives who has four thousand a year, and the way a man lives who has +forty thousand, could you tell their difference of fortune? Now with me +you would have known. For a whole year I should have flung away my money +in all kinds of caprices, fancies, and follies; I should have dazzled +and fairly humiliated Paris; I should have been like a sun-god showering +bank-notes down; I should have positively degraded my gold by all kinds +of prodigalities; and at the end of a year, day for day, I should have +left my wife." + +"Nonsense!" + +"Certainly; in order to prove to myself that I did not love money. If I +had not left her, I should have considered myself dishonoured." + +"Well, what extraordinary ideas! I must confess that I haven't arrived +at your philosophy yet. A large fortune and all that it gives you, all +kinds of enjoyment and luxuries, houses, carriages, and then the +pleasure of making the people you don't like envious--of annoying them. +Oh, I think it would be most delightful to be rich." + +"I told you just now, Renée, that you were a woman--merely a woman." + + + + +XXX + + +Denoisel had spoken as he really felt. If he had sometimes wished for +wealth, he had never envied people who had it. He had a sincere and +thorough contempt for money--the contempt of a man who is rich with very +little. + +Denoisel was a Parisian, or rather he was the true Parisian. Well up in +all the experiences of Paris, wonderfully skilled in the great art of +living, thanks to the habits and customs of Parisian life, he was the +very man for that life; he had all its instincts, its sentiments, and +its genius. He represented perfectly that very modern personage, the +civilized man, triumphing, day by day, like the inhabitants of a forest +of Bondy, over the price of things, over the costly life of capitals, as +the savage triumphs over nature in a virgin forest. He had all the show +and glitter of wealth. He lived among rich people, frequented their +restaurants and clubs, had their habits, and shared in their amusements. +He knew some of the wealthiest people, and all that money opened to them +was open to him. He was seen at the grand private balls of the +Provençaux, at the races, and at first nights at the theatres. In summer +he went to the watering-places, to the sea, and to the gambling resorts. +He dressed like a man who owns a carriage. + +And yet Denoisel only possessed between four and five thousand pounds. +Belonging to a family that had been steeped in the ideas of the past +with regard to property, attached and devoted to landed wealth, always +talking of bankruptcy, and as mistrustful of stocks and shares as +peasants formerly were of bank-notes, Denoisel had shaken himself free +of all the prejudices of his own people. Without troubling about the +advice, the remonstrances, the indignation, and the threats of old and +distant relatives, he had sold the small farms which his father and +mother had left him. It seemed to him that there was no longer any +proportion between the revenue of land and the expenses of modern life. +In his opinion landed estate might have been a means of wealth at the +time when Paul de Kock's novels said of a young man, "Paul was rich, he +had two hundred and fifty a year." But since that time it had, according +to him, become an anachronism, a kind of archaic property, a fancy fox +which was only permissible in very wealthy people. He therefore realized +his land and turned it into a small capital, which he placed, after +consulting with a friend of his who frequented the Stock Exchange, in +foreign bonds, in shares and securities, thus doubling and tripling his +revenue without any risk to his regular income. Having thus converted +his capital into a figure which meant nothing, except in the eyes of a +notary, and which no longer regulated his current means, Denoisel +arranged his life as he had done his money. He organized his expenses. +He knew exactly the cost in Paris of vanity, little extras, bargains, +and all such ruinous things. He was not ashamed to add up a bill himself +before paying it. Away from home he only smoked fourpenny cigars, but at +home he smoked pipes. He knew where to buy things, discovered the new +shops, which give such good value during the first three months. He knew +the wine-cellars at the various restaurants, ordered Chambertin a +certain distance up the boulevards, and only ordered it there. If he +gave a dinner, his _menu_ won the respect of the waiter. And with all +that, he knew how to order supper for four shillings at the Café +Anglais. + +All his expenses were regulated with the same skill. He went to one of +the first tailors in Paris, but a friend of his who was in the Foreign +Office procured for him from London all the suits he wanted between the +seasons. When he had a present to make, or any New Year's gifts to buy, +he always knew of a cargo of Indian or Chinese things that had just +arrived, or he remembered an old piece of Saxony or Sèvres china that +was lying hidden away in some shop in an unfrequented part of Paris, one +of those old curiosities, the price of which cannot be discovered by +the person for whom it is destined. All this with Denoisel was +spontaneous, natural, and instinctive. This never-ending victory of +Parisian intelligence over all the extravagance of life had nothing of +the meanness and pettiness of sordid calculation about it. It was the +happy discovery of a scheme of existence under satisfactory conditions, +and not a series of vulgar petty economies, and in the well-organized +expenditure of his six hundred pounds a year the man remained liberal +and high-minded: he avoided what was too expensive for him, and never +attempted to beat prices down. Denoisel had a flat of his own on the +first storey of a well-ordered house with a carpeted staircase. He had +only three rooms, but the Boulevard des Italiens was at his very door. +His little drawing-room, which he had furnished as a smoking-den, was +charming. It was one of those snug little rooms which Parisian +upholsterers are so clever in arranging. It was all draped and furnished +with chintz, and had divans as wide as beds. It had been Denoisel's own +wish that the absence of all objects of art should complete the cheerful +look of the room. He was waited on in the morning by his hall-porter, +who brought him a cup of chocolate and did all the necessary housework. +He dined at a club or restaurant or with friends. + +The low rent and the simplicity of his household and domestic +arrangements left Denoisel more of that money of which wealthy people +are so often short, that money for the little luxuries of life, which is +more necessary than any other in Paris, and which is known as +pocket-money. Occasionally, however, that _force majeure_, the +Unforeseen, would suddenly arrive in the midst of this regular existence +and disarrange its equilibrium and its budget. + +Denoisel would then disappear from Paris for a time. He would ruralize +at some little country inn, near a river, on half-a-crown a day, and he +would spend no other money than what was necessary for tobacco. Two or +three winters, finding himself quite out of funds, he had emigrated, +and, on discovering a city like Florence, where happiness costs nothing +and where the living is almost as inexpensive as that happiness, he had +stayed there six months, lodging in a room with a cupola, dining _à la +trattoria_ on truffles with Parmesan cheese, passing his evenings in the +boxes of society people, going to the Grand Duke's balls, fêted, invited +everywhere, with white camellias in his buttonhole--economizing in the +happiest way in the world. + +Denoisel spent no more for his love-affairs than for other things. It +was no longer a question of self-respect with him, so that he only paid +what he thought them worth. And yet such things had been his one +allurement as a young man. He had, however, always been cool and +methodical, even in his love-affairs. He had wanted, in a lordly way, to +test for himself what the love of the woman who was the most in vogue in +Paris was like. He allowed himself for this experiment about two +thousand pounds of the seven thousand he then possessed, and, during the +six months that he was the accepted lover of the celebrated Génicot, a +woman who would give a five-pound note as a tip to her postillion on +returning from the Marche, he lived in the same style as a man with five +thousand a year. When the six months were over he left her, and she, for +the first time in her life, was in love with a man who had paid for that +love. + +Tempered by this proof he had had several other experiences afterward, +until they had palled on him; and then there had suddenly come to him, +not a desire for further love adventures, but a great curiosity about +women. He set out to discover all that was unforeseen, unexpected, and +unknown to him in woman. All actresses seemed to him very much the same +kind of courtesan, and all courtesans very much the same kind of +actress. What attracted him now was the unclassed woman, the woman that +bewilders the observer and the oldest Parisian. He often went wandering +about at night, vaguely and irresistibly led on by one of those +creatures who are neither all vice nor all virtue, and who walk so +gracefully along in the mire. Sometimes he was dazzled by one of those +fine-looking girls, so often seen in Paris, who seem to brighten +everything as they pass along, and he would turn round to look at her +and stand there even after she had suddenly disappeared in the darkness +of some passage. His vocation was to discover tarnished stars. Now and +then in some faubourg he would come across one of these marvellous +daughters of the people and of Nature, and he would talk to her, watch +her, listen to her, and study her; then when she wearied him he would +let her go, and it would amuse him later on to raise his hat to her when +he met her again driving in a carriage. + +Denoisel's wealthy air won for him a welcome in social circles. He soon +established himself there and on a superior footing, thanks to his +geniality and wit, the services of every kind he was always ready to +render, and the need every one had of him. His large circle of +acquaintances among foreigners, artists, and theatrical people, his +knowledge of the ins and outs of things when small favours were +required, made him very valuable on hundreds of occasions. Every one +applied to him for a box at a theatre, permission to visit a prison or a +picture gallery, an entrance for a lady to the law courts at some trial, +or a foreign decoration for some man. In two or three duels in which he +had served as seconds, he had shown sound sense, decision, and a manly +regard for the honour as well as the life of the man for whom he was +answerable. People were under all kinds of obligations to him, and the +respect they had for him was not lessened by his reputation as a +first-rate swordsman. His character had won for him the esteem of all +with whom he came in contact, and he was even held in high consideration +by wealthy people, whose millions, nevertheless, were not always +respected by him. + + + + +XXXI + + +"My wife, for instance, wanted to have her portrait painted by Ingres. +You've seen it--it isn't like her--but it's by Ingres. Well, do you know +what he asked me for it? Four hundred pounds. I paid it him, but I +consider that taking advantage; it's the war against capital. Do you +mean to say that because a man's name is known he should make me pay +just what he likes? because he's an artist, he has no price, no fixed +rate, he has a right to fleece me? Why, according to that he might ask +me a million for it. It's like the doctors who make you pay according to +your fortune. To begin with, how does any one know what I have? I call +it an iniquity. Yes, four hundred pounds; what do you think of that?" + +M. Bourjot was standing by the chimney-piece talking to Denoisel. He put +the other foot, on which he had been standing, to the fire as he spoke. + +"Upon my word," said Denoisel, very seriously, "you are quite right: all +these folks take advantage of their reputation. You see there's only one +way to prevent it, and that would be to decree a legal maximum for +talent, a maximum for master-pieces. Why, yes! It would be very easy." + +"That's it; that would be the very thing!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, "and it +would be quite just, for you see----" + +The Bourjots had dined that evening alone with the Mauperins. The two +families had been talking of the wedding, and were only waiting to fix +the day, until the expiration of a year from the date of the first +insertion of the name of Villacourt in the _Monitor_. It was M. Bourjot +who had insisted on this delay. The ladies were talking about the +trousseau, jewellery, laces, and wedding-presents, and Mme. Mauperin, +who was seated by Mme. Bourjot, was contemplating her as though she were +a person who had performed a miracle. + +M. Mauperin's face beamed with joy. He had in the end yielded to the +fascination of money. This great, upright man, genuine, severe, rigid, +and incorruptible as he was, had gradually allowed the vast wealth of +the Bourjots to come into his thoughts and into his dreams, to appeal to +him and to his instincts as a practical man, as an old man, the father +of a family and a manufacturer. He had been won over and disarmed. Ever +since his son's success with regard to this marriage, he had felt that +respect for Henri which ability or the prospect of a large fortune +inspires in people, and, without being aware of it himself, he scarcely +blamed him now for having changed his name. Fathers are but men, after +all. + +Renée, who for some time past had been worried, thoughtful, and +low-spirited, was almost cheerful this evening. She was amusing herself +with blowing about the fluffy feathers which Noémi was wearing in her +hair. The latter, languid and absent-minded, with a dreamy look in her +eyes, was replying in monosyllables to Mme. Davarande's ceaseless +chatter. + +"Nowadays, everything is against money," began M. Bourjot again, +sententiously. "There's a league--now, for instance, I made a road for +the people at Sannois. Well, do you imagine that they even touch their +hats to us? Oh dear no, never. In 1848 we gave them bushels of corn; and +what do you think they said? Excuse me, ladies, if I repeat their words. +They said: 'That old beast must be afraid of us!' That was all the +gratitude I had. I started a model farm, and I applied to the Government +for a man to manage it; a red-hot radical was sent to me, a rascal who +had spent his life running down the rich. At present I have to do with a +Municipal Council with the most detestable opinions. I find work for +every one, don't I? Thanks to us, the country round is prosperous. Well, +if there were to be a revolution, now, I am convinced that they would +set fire to our place. They'd have no compunction about that. You've no +idea what enemies you get if you pay as much as three hundred and sixty +pounds for taxes. They'd simply burn us out of house and home--they'd +have no scruple about it. You see what happened in February. Oh, my +ideas with regard to the people have quite changed; and they are +preparing a nice future for us, you can count on that. We shall be +simply ruined by a lot of penniless wretches. I can see that beforehand. +I often think of all these things. If only it were not for one's +children--money, as far as I am concerned----" + +"What's that you are saying, neighbour?" asked M. Mauperin, approaching. + +"I'm saying that I'm afraid the day will come when our children will be +short of bread, M. Mauperin; that's what I'm saying." + +"You'll make them hesitate about this wedding if you talk like that," +said M. Mauperin. + +"Oh, if my husband begins with his gloomy ideas, if he's going to talk +about the end of the world--" put in Mme. Bourjot. + +"I congratulate you that you don't feel the anxiety I do," remarked M. +Bourjot, bowing to his wife; "but I can assure you that, without being +weak-minded, there is every reason for feeling very uneasy." + +"Certainly, certainly," said Denoisel. "I think that money is in danger, +in great danger, in very great danger indeed. In the first place, it is +threatened by that envy which is at the bottom of nearly all +revolutions; and then by progress, which baptizes the revolutions." + +"But, sir, such progress would be infamous. Take me, for instance: no +one could doubt me. I used to be a Liberal--I am now, in fact. I am a +soldier of Liberty, a born Republican; I am for progress of every kind. +But a revolution against wealth--why, it would be barbarous! We should +be going back to savage times. What we want is justice and common sense. +Can you imagine now a society without wealth?" + +"No, not any more than a greasy pole without a silver cup." + +"What," continued M. Bourjot, who in his excitement had not caught +Denoisel's words, "the money that I have earned with hard work, honestly +and with the greatest difficulty--the money that is mine, that I have +made, and which is for my children--why, there is nothing more sacred! I +even look upon the income-tax as a violation of property." + +"Why, yes," said Denoisel in the most perfectly good-natured tone, "I am +quite of your opinion. And I should be very sorry," he added wickedly, +"to make things seem blacker to you than they already do. But you see we +have had a revolution against the nobility; we shall have one against +wealth. Great names have been abolished by the guillotine, and great +fortunes will be done away with next. A man was considered guilty if his +name happened to be M. de Montmorency; it will be criminal to be M. Two +Thousand Pounds a Year. Things are certainly getting on. I can speak all +the more freely as I am absolutely disinterested, myself. I should not +have had anything to be guillotined for in the old days, and I haven't +enough to be ruined for nowadays. So, you see----" + +"Excuse me," put in M. Bourjot, solemnly, "but your comparison--no one +could deplore excesses more than I do, and the event of 1793 was a great +crime, sir. The nobility were treated abominably, and all honest people +must be of the same opinion as I am." + +M. Mauperin smiled as he thought of the Bourjot of 1822. + +"But then," continued M. Bourjot, "the situation is not the same at all. +Social conditions are entirely changed, the basis of society has been +restored. Everything is different. There were reasons--or pretexts, if +you prefer that--for this hatred of the nobility. The Revolution of '89 +was against privileges, which I am not criticising, but which existed. +That is quite different. The fact was people wanted equality. It was +more or less legitimate that they should have it, but at least there was +some reason in it. At present all that is altered; and where are the +privileges? One man is as good as another. Hasn't every man a vote? You +may say, 'What about money?' Well, every one can earn money; all trades +and professions are open to every one." + +"Except those that are not," put in Denoisel. + +"In short, all men can now arrive at anything and everything. The only +things necessary are hard work, intelligence----" + +"And circumstances," put in Denoisel, once more. + +"Circumstances must be made, sir, by each man himself. Just look at what +society is. We are all _parvenus_. My father was a cloth merchant--in a +wholesale way, certainly--and yet you see--now this is equality, sir, +the real and the right kind of equality. There is no such thing as caste +now. The upper class springs from the people, and the people rise to the +upper class. I could have found a count for my daughter, if I had wanted +to. But it is just simply a case of evil instincts, evil passions, and +these communist ideas--it is all this which is against wealth. We hear a +lot of rant about poverty and misery. Well, I can tell you this, there +has never been so much done for the people as at present. There is great +progress with regard to comfort and well-being in France. People who +never used to eat meat, now eat it twice a week. These are facts; and I +am sure that on that subject our young social economist, M. Henri, +could tell us----" + +"Yes, yes," said Henri, "that has been proved. In twenty-five years the +increase of cattle has been twelve per cent. By dividing the population +of France into twelve millions inhabiting the towns, and twenty-four to +twenty-five millions inhabiting the country districts, it is reckoned +that the former consume about sixty-five kilogrammes a head each year, +and the latter twenty kilogrammes twenty-six centigrammes. I can +guarantee the figures. What is quite sure is that the most conscientious +estimates prove that since 1789 there has been an increase in the +average length of life, and this progress is the surest sign of +prosperity for a nation. Statistics----" + +"Ah, statistics, the chief of the inexact sciences!" interrupted +Denoisel, who delighted in muddling M. Bourjot's brain with paradoxes. +"But I grant that," he went on. "I grant that the lives of the people +have been prolonged, and that they eat more meat than they have ever +eaten. Do you, on that account, believe in the immortality of the +present social constitution? There has been a revolution which has +brought about the reign of the middle class--that is to say, the reign +of money; and now you say: 'Everything is finished; there must be no +other; there can be no legitimate revolution now.' That is quite +natural; but, between ourselves, I don't know up to what point the +supremacy of the middle class can be considered as final. As far as you +are concerned, when once political equality is given to all, social +equality is complete: that is perhaps quite just; but the thing is to +convince people of it, whose interest it is _not_ to believe it. One man +is as good as another. Certainly he may be in the eyes of God. Every one +in this century of ours has a right to wear a black coat--provided he +can pay for it. Modern equality--shall I explain briefly what it is? It +is the same equality as our conscription; every man draws his number, +but if you can pay one hundred and twenty pounds, you have the right of +sending another man to be killed instead of you. You spoke of +privileges; there are no such things now, that's true. The Bastille was +destroyed; but it gave birth to others first. Let us take, for instance, +Justice, and I do acknowledge that a man's position, his name, and his +money weigh less and are made less of in courts of justice than anywhere +else. Well, commit a crime, and be, let us say, a peer of France; you +would be allowed poison instead of the scaffold. Take notice that I +think it should be so; I am only mentioning it to show you how +inequalities spring up again, and, indeed, when I see the ground that +they cover now I wonder where the others could have been. Hereditary +rights--something else that the Revolution thought it had buried. All +that was an abuse of the former Government, about which enough has been +said. Well, I should just like to know whether, at present, the son of a +politician does not inherit his father's name and all the privileges +connected with that name, his father's electors, his connection, his +place everywhere, and his chair at the Academy? We are simply overrun +with these sons. We come across them everywhere; they take all the good +berths and, thanks to these reversions, everything is barred for other +people. The fact is that old customs are terrible things for unmaking +laws. You are wealthy, and you say money is sacred. But why? Well, you +say 'We are not a caste.' No, but you are already an aristocracy, and +quite a new aristocracy, the insolence of which has already surpassed +all the impertinences of the oldest aristocracies on the globe. There is +no court now, you say. There never has been one, I should imagine, in +the whole history of the world where people have had to put up with such +contempt as in the private office of certain great bankers. You talk of +evil instincts and evil passions. Well, the power of the wealthy middle +class is not calculated to elevate the mind. When the higher ranks of +society are engaged in digesting and placing out money there are no +longer any ideas, nothing in fact but appetites, in the class below. +Formerly, when by the side of money there was something above it and +beyond it, during a revolution instead of asking bluntly for +money--clumsy rough coins with which to buy their happiness--the people +contented themselves with asking for the change of colours on a flag, or +with having a few words written over a guard-house, or even with +glorious victories that were quite hollow. But in our times--oh, we all +know where the heart of Paris is now. The bank would be besieged instead +of the Hôtel de ville. Ah, the _bourgeoisie_ has made a great mistake!" + +"And what is the mistake, pray?" asked M. Bourjot, astounded by +Denoisel's tirade. + +"That of not leaving Paradise in heaven--which was certainly its place. +The day when the poor could no longer comfort themselves with the +thought that the next life would make up to them for this, the day when +the people gave up counting on the happiness of the other world--oh, I +can tell you, Voltaire did a lot of harm to the wealthy classes----" + +"Ah, you are right there!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, impulsively. "That is +quite evident. All these wretches ought to go to church regularly----" + + + + +XXXII + + +There was a grand ball at the Bourjots' in honour of the approaching +marriage of their daughter with M. Mauperin de Villacourt. + +"You are going in for it to-day. How you are dancing!" said Renée to +Noémi, fanning her as she stood talking in a corner of the vast +drawing-room. + +"I have never danced so much, that's quite true," answered Noémi, taking +her friend's arm and leading her away into the small drawing-room. "No, +never," she continued, drawing Renée to her and kissing her. "Oh, how +lovely it is to be happy," and then kissing her again in a perfect fever +of joy, she said: "_She_ does not care for him now. Oh, I'm quite sure +she doesn't care for him. In the old days I could see she did by the +very way she got up when he came; by her eyes, her voice, the very +rustle of her dress, everything. Then when he wasn't there, I could tell +by her silence she was thinking of him. You are surprised at my +noticing, silly thing that I am; but there are some things that I +understand with this"--and she drew Renée's hand on to her white moiré +dress just where her heart was--"and this never deceives me." + +"And you love him now, do you?" asked Renée. + +Noémi stopped her saying any more by pressing her bouquet of roses +against her friend's lips. + +"Mademoiselle, you promised me the first redowa," and a young man took +Noémi away. She turned as she reached the door and threw a kiss to Renée +with the tips of her fingers. + +Noémi's confession had given Renée a thrill of joy, and she had revelled +in the smile on her friend's face. She herself felt immensely comforted +and relieved. In an instant everything had changed for her, and the +thought that Noémi loved her brother chased away all other ideas. She no +longer saw the shame and the crime which she had so long seen in this +marriage. She kept repeating to herself that Noémi loved him, that they +both loved each other. The rest all belonged to the past, and they would +each of them forget that past, Noémi by forgiving it, and Henri by +redeeming it. Suddenly the remembrance of something came back to her, +bringing with it an anxious thought and a vague dread. She was +determined, however, just then to see no dark clouds in the horizon and +nothing threatening in the future. Chasing all this from her mind, she +began to think of her brother and of Noémi once more. She pictured to +herself the wedding-day and their future home, and she recalled the +voices of some children she had once heard calling "Auntie! Auntie!" + +"Will mademoiselle do me the honour of dancing with me?" + +It was Denoisel who was bowing in front of her. + +"Do we dance together--you and I? We know each other too well. Sit down +there, and don't crease my dress. Well, what are you looking at?" + +Renée was wearing a dress of white tulle, trimmed with seven narrow +flounces and bunches of ivy leaves and red berries. In her bodice and +the tulle ruches of her sleeves she wore ivy and berries to match. A +long spray of the ivy was twisted round her hair with a few berries here +and there and the leaves hung down over her shoulders. She was leaning +her head back on the sofa, and her beautiful chestnut hair, which was +brought forward, fell slightly over her white forehead. There was a new +gleam, a soft intense light in her brown, dreamy eyes, the expression of +which could not be seen. A shadow played over her mouth at the corners, +and her lips, which were generally closed in a disdainful little pout, +were unsealed and half open, partially revealing the gladness which came +from her very soul. The light fell on her chin, and a ring of shadow +played round her neck each time that she moved her head. She looked +charming thus, the outline of her features indistinct under the full +light of the chandeliers, and her whole face beaming with childish joy. + +"You are very pretty this evening, Renée." + +"Ah--this evening?" + +"Well, to tell the truth, just lately you've looked so worried and so +sad. It suits you much better to enjoy yourself." + +"Do you think so? Do you waltz?" + +"As though I had just learnt and had been badly taught. But you have +only this very minute refused." + +"I, refused? What an idea! Why, I want to dance dreadfully. Well, +there's plenty of time--oh, don't look at your watch; I don't want to +know the time. And so you think I am gay, do you? Well, no, I don't feel +gay. I'm happy--I'm very happy--there, now! I say, Denoisel, when you +are strolling about in Paris, you know those old women who wear Lorraine +caps, and who stand in the doorways selling matches--well, you are to +give a sovereign each to the first five you meet; I'll give it you back. +I've saved some money--don't forget. Is that waltz still going on? Is it +really true that I refused to dance? Well, after this one I'm going to +dance everything, and I shall not be particular about my partners. They +can be as ugly as they like, they can wear shoes that have been resoled, +and talk to me about Royer-Collard if they like, they can be too tall +or too short, they can come up to my elbow or I can come up to their +waist--it won't matter to me even if their hands perspire--I'll dance +with any of them. That's how I feel to-night, and yet people say that I +am not charitable." + +Just at that moment a man entered the little drawing-room. It was M. +Davarande. + +"Invite me for this waltz, please," said Renée, and as she passed by +Denoisel she whispered: + +"You see I'm beginning with the family." + + + + +XXXIII + + +"What's the matter with your mother this evening?" Denoisel asked Renée. +They were alone, as Mme. Mauperin had just gone upstairs to bed, and M. +Mauperin to have a look round at the works, which were on late that +night. + +"What's the matter with her, she seems as----" + +"Surly as a bulldog--say it out." + +"Well, but what's it all about?" + +"Ah, that's just it," and Renée began to laugh. "The fact is I've just +lost a chance of being married--and so here I am still." + +"Another? But then that's your speciality!" + +"Oh, this is only the fourteenth. That's only an average number; and +it's all through you that I've lost this chance." + +"Through me? Well, I never! What do you mean?" + +Renée got up, put her hands in her pockets, and walked up and down the +room from one end to the other. Every now and then she stopped short, +turned round on one heel, and gave a sort of whistle. + +"Yes, through you!" she said, coming back to Denoisel. "What should you +think if I told you that I had refused eighty thousand pounds?" + +"They must have been astonished." + +"I can't say that I wasn't rather tempted. It's no good setting up for +being better than I am; and then, too, with you I don't make any +pretences. Well, I'll own that just for a minute I was very nearly +caught. It was M. Barousse who arranged it all--very nicely indeed. +Then, here at home, they worked me up to it; mamma and Henri besieged +me; I was bored to death about it all day long. And then, too, quite +exceptionally for me, I began to have fancies, too. Anyhow, it is quite +certain that I slept very badly two nights. These big fortunes do keep +you awake. Then, too, to be quite just, I must say that I thought a +great deal about papa in the midst of it all. Wouldn't he have been +proud--wouldn't he, now? Wouldn't he have revelled in my four thousand a +year? He has so much vanity always where I am concerned. Do you remember +his indignation and wrath that time? 'A son-in-law who would allow my +daughter to get in an omnibus!' He was superb, wasn't he? Then I began +to think of you--yes, of you--and your ideas, your paradoxes, your +theories, of all sorts of things you had said to me; I thought of your +contempt for money, and as I thought of it--well, I suppose it is +catching, for I felt the same contempt myself. And so all at once, one +fine morning, I just cut it all short. No, you influence me too much, my +dear boy, decidedly." + +"Well, but I'm--I'm an idiot, Renée. Oh, I'm so sorry. I--I thought that +sort of thing was not catching--indeed I did. Come, really now, was it +my fault?" + +"Yes, yours--in a great measure--and then just a little his fault, too." + +"Ah!" + +"Yes, it was just a little M. Lemeunier's. When I felt the money getting +into my head, when I was seriously thinking of marrying him, why, I just +looked at him. And you didn't know you were speaking so truly the other +day. I suddenly felt that I was a woman--oh, you've no idea what it was +like. Then on the other hand I saw how good he was. Oh, he really is +goodness itself. I tried him in every way, I turned him inside out, it +worried me to find him so perfect; but it was no use, there was no fault +to find in him. He is thoroughly good, that man is. Oh, he's quite +different from Reverchon and the others. Only fancy what he said to me: +'Mademoiselle,' he said, 'I know that you don't care for me, but will +you let me wait a little and see if you can dislike me less than you do +now?' It was quite pathetic. Sometimes I felt inclined to say to him: +'Suppose we were to sit down and cry a little together, shall we?' +Fortunately, when he made me feel inclined to cry, papa, on the other +hand, made me want to laugh. He looked so funny, my dear old father, +half gay and half sad. I never saw such a resigned kind of happiness. +The sadness of losing me, and the thought of seeing me make a good match +made him feel so mixed up. Well, it's all finished now, thank Heaven! He +makes great eyes at me as though he's angry--didn't you notice, when +mamma was looking at us? But he is not angry at all in reality. He's +very glad in his heart; I can see that." + + + + +XXXIV + + +Denoisel was at Henri Mauperin's. They were sitting by the fire talking +and smoking. Suddenly they heard a noise and a discussion in the hall, +and, almost at the same time, the room door was opened violently and a +man entered abruptly, pushing aside the domestic who was trying to keep +him back. + +"M. Mauperin de Villacourt?" he demanded. + +"That is my name, monsieur," said Henri, rising. + +"Well, my name is Boisjorand de Villacourt," and with the back of his +hand he gave Henri a blow which made his face bleed. Henri turned as +white as the silk scarf he was wearing as a necktie and, with the blood +trickling down his face, he bent forward to return the blow, and then, +just as suddenly, drew himself up and stretched his hand out towards +Denoisel, who stepped forward, folded his arms, and spoke in his calmest +tone: + +"I think I understand what you mean, sir," he said; "you consider that +there is a Villacourt too many. I think so too." + +The visitor was visibly embarrassed before the calmness of this man of +the world. He took off his hat, which he had kept on his head hitherto, +and began to stammer out a few words. + +"Will you kindly leave your address with my servant?" said Henri, +interrupting him; "I will send round to you to-morrow." + + * * * * * + +"A disagreeable affair," began Henri, when he was once more alone with +Denoisel. "Where can he have sprung from, this Villacourt? They told me +that there were none of them left. Ah, my face is bleeding," he said, +wiping it with his handkerchief. "He's a regular buffalo. Georges, bring +some water," he called out to his domestic. + +"You'll choose the sword, shall you not?" asked Denoisel. "Hand me a +stick. Now listen--you must be on guard from the first, and strike out +very little. That man's one of the bloodthirsty sort; he'll go straight +for you, and you must defend yourself with circular parries. When you +are hard pressed and he rushes headlong at you, move aside to the right +with the left foot, turn round on tip-toes on your right foot--like +that. He'll have nothing in front of him then, and you'll have him from +the side and can run him through like a frog." + +"No," said Henri, lifting his face from the basin, in which he was +sponging it, "not the sword." + +"But, my dear fellow, that man is evidently a sportsman; he'll be +accustomed to fire-arms." + +"My dear fellow, there are certain situations which are most awkward. +I've taken another name, and that's always ridiculous. Here's a man who +accuses me of having stolen it from him. I have enemies, and a good +number of them, too; they'll make a scandal with all this. I must kill +this fellow, that's very evident; it's the only way to make my position +good. I should put an end to everything by that, lawsuits, and all the +stories and gossip--everything. The sword would not serve my purpose. +With the sword you can kill a man who has been five years at it, who can +use it, and who keeps his body in the positions you have been accustomed +to. But a man who has had no sword practice, who jumps and dances about, +who flourishes it about like a stick; I should wound him, and that would +be all. Now with the pistol--I'm a good shot, you know. You must do me +the justice of admitting that I was wise in my choice of +accomplishments. And my idea is to put it there," he touched Denoisel as +he spoke just above the hip, "just there, you see. Higher up, it's no +good, the arm is there to ward it off; but here, why there are a lot of +very necessary organs; there's the bladder, for instance; now if you are +lucky enough to hit that, and if it should happen to be full, why it +would be a case of peritonitis. And you'll get the pistol for me. A +duel--without a fuss, you understand. I want it kept quite secret, so +that no one shall hear of it beforehand. Whom shall you take with you?" + +"Suppose I asked Dardouillet? He served in the National Guard, in the +cavalry; I shall have to appeal to his military instincts." + +"That's the very thing, good! Will you call in and see mother first. +Tell her that I cannot come before Thursday. It would be awkward if she +happened to drop in on us just the next day or two. I shall not go out; +I'll have a bath and get a little more presentable. This mark doesn't +show very much now, does it? I shall send out for dinner, and then spend +the evening writing two or three necessary letters. By-the-bye, if you +see the gentleman to-morrow morning, why not have it out in the +afternoon at four o'clock? It's just as well to get it over. To-morrow +you'll find me here all the day--or else I shall be at the shooting +gallery. Arrange things as you would for yourself, and thanks for all +your trouble, old man. Four o'clock, then--if possible." + + + + +XXXV + + +The name of the farm that Henri Mauperin had added to his surname to +make it sound more aristocratic happened, by a strange chance, such as +sometimes occurs, to be the name of an estate in Lorraine and of a +family, illustrious in former days, but at present so completely +forgotten that every one believed it had died out. + +The man who had just dealt Henri this blow was the last of those +Villacourts who took their name from the domain and château of +Villacourt, situated some three leagues from Saint-Mihiel, and owned by +them from time immemorial. + +In 1303 Ulrich de Villacourt was one of the three lords who set their +seal to the will of Ferry, Duke of Lorraine, by order of that prince. +Under Charles the Bold, Gantonnet de Villacourt, who had been taken +prisoner by the Messinians, only regained his liberty by giving his word +never to mount a battle-horse, nor to carry military weapons again. From +that time forth he rode a mule, arrayed himself in buffalo-skin, carried +a heavy iron bar, and returned to the fight bolder and more terrible +than ever. Maheu de Villacourt married Gigonne de Malain and afterward +Christine de Gliseneuve. His marble statue, between his two wives, was +to be seen before the Revolution in the Church of the Grey Friars at +Saint-Mihiel. Duke René allowed him to take eight hundred florins from +the town of Ligny for the ransom that he had had to pay after the +disastrous battle of Bulgnéville. + +Remacle de Villacourt, Maheu's son, was killed in 1476, in the battle +waged by Duke René before Nancy against Charles the Daring. Hubert de +Villacourt, Remacle's sons, Seneschal of Barrois and Bailiff of +Bassigny, followed Duke Antoine as standard-bearer in the Alsatian war, +while his brother Bonaventure, a monk of the strict order of +Saint-François, was made three times over the triennial Superior of his +order, and confessor of Antoine and François, Dukes of Lorraine; and one +of his sisters, Salmone, was appointed Abbess of Sainte Glossinde of +Metz. + +Jean-Marie de Villacourt served in the French army, and after the +Landrecies day, the king made him a knight and embraced him. He was +afterward captain of three hundred foot soldiers and Equerry of the +King's stables, and was then appointed to the captaincy of Vaucouleurs +and made Governor of Langres. He had married a sister of Jean de +Chaligny, the celebrated gun-founder of Lorraine, who cast the famous +culverin, twenty-two feet high. His brother Philibert was a cavalry +captain under Charles IX. His brother Gaston made himself famous by his +duels. It was he who killed Captain Chambrulard, with two sword-strokes, +before four thousand persons assembled at the back of the Chartreux in +Paris. Jean-Marie had another brother, Angus, who was Canon of Toul and +Archdeacon of Tonnerrois, and a sister, Archange, who was Abbess of +Saint-Maur, Verdun. + +Then came Guillaume de Villacourt, who fought against Louis XIII. He was +obliged to surrender with Charles de Lenoncourt, who was defending the +town of Saint-Mihiel, and he shared his four years' captivity in the +Bastille. His son, Mathias de Villacourt, married in 1656 Marie +Dieudonnée, a daughter of Claude de Jeandelincourt, who opened the salt +mine of Château-Salins. Mathias had fourteen children, ten of whom were +killed in the service of Louis XIV: Charles, captain of the regiment of +the Pont, killed in the siege of Philisbourg; Jean, killed in the battle +of Nerwinde; Antoine, captain of the regiment of Normandie, killed in +the siege of Fontarabie; Jacques, killed in the siege of Bellegarde, +where he had gone by permission of the king; Philippe, captain of the +grenadiers in the Dauphin's regiment, killed in the battle of Marsaille; +Thibaut, captain in the same regiment, killed in the battle of +Hochstett; Pierre-François, commander in the Lyonnais regiment, killed +in the battle of Fleurus; Claude-Marie, commander in the Périgord +regiment, killed in the passage of the Hogue; Edme, lieutenant in his +brother's company, killed at his side in the same affair, and Gerard, +Knight of the Order of Saint-Jean of Jerusalem, killed in 1700, in a +conflict between four galleys of Christians and a Turkish man-of-war. Of +the three daughters of Charles-Mathias, Lydie married the Seigneur de +Majastre, Governor of Epinal, and the other two, Berthe and Phoebé, died +unmarried. + +The eldest of the sons of Charles-Mathias, Louis-Aimé de Villacourt, who +served eighteen years and retired from service after the battle of +Malplaquet, died in 1702. His son left Villacourt, settled down in +Paris, threw himself into the life of the capital, and so got rid of the +remainder of a fortune which had already been encroached upon by the +loss of a lawsuit between his father and the d'Haraucourts. He +endeavoured to recover his losses at the gaming-table, got into debt, +and returned to Villacourt with a wife from Carrouge who had kept a +gambling house in Paris. He died in 1752, owning very little besides the +walls of the château, and leaving a name less famous and less honourable +than his father's had been. He had two children by his marriage, a +daughter and a son. The daughter became maid of honour to the +Empress-Queen, the son remained at Villacourt, leading a low, coarse +life as a country gentleman. On the abolition of privileges in 1790 he +gave up his rank and lived on a friendly and equal footing with the +peasants until he died in 1792. His son Jean, lieutenant in the regiment +of the Royal-Liégeois in 1787, was in the Nancy affair. He emigrated, +went through the campaigns of 1792 to 1801 in Mirabeau's legion, which +was then commanded by Roger de Damas, and in the Bourbon grenadiers in +Condé's army. On the thirteenth of August, 1796, he was wounded on the +head in the Oberkamlach battle. In 1802 he returned to France, bringing +with him a wife he had married in Germany, who died after bearing him +four children, four sons. He had become weak in intellect, almost +childish in fact, from the result of his wound, and after his wife's +death there was no one to regulate the household expenses. Disorder +gradually crept in, he kept open table and took to drinking, until at +last he was obliged to sell what little land he had round the château. +Finally the château itself began to crumble away. He could not have it +repaired, as he had no money to pay the workmen. The wind could be felt +through the cracks, and the rain came in. The family were obliged to +give up one room after another, taking refuge where the roof was still +sound. He himself was indifferent to all this; after drinking two or +three glasses of brandy he would take his seat in what used to be the +kitchen garden, on a stone bench near a meridian, the figures of which +had worn away, and there he would get quite cheerful in the sunshine, +calling to people over the hedge to come in and drink with him. Decay +and poverty, however, made rapid strides in the château. There was +nothing left of all the old silver but a salad-bowl, which was used for +the food of a horse called Brouska, that the exile had brought with him +from Germany, and which was now allowed to roam in liberty through the +rooms on the ground-floor. + +The four sons grew up as the château went to decay, accustomed to wind, +rain, and roughing it. They were entirely neglected and abandoned by +their father, and their only education consisted of a few lessons from +the parish priest. From living like the peasants, and mixing with them +in their work and games, they gradually became regular peasants +themselves, and the roughest and strongest in the country round. When +their father died the four brothers, by common consent, made over to a +land agent the remaining stones of their château in return for a few +pounds, with which to pay their most pressing debts, and an annuity of +twenty pounds, which was to be paid until the death of the last of the +four. They then took up their abode in the forest, which joined their +estate, and lived there with the wood-cutters and in the same way as +they did, making a regular den of their hut, and living there with +their sweethearts or wives, peopling the forest with a half-bred race, +in which the Villacourts were crossed with nature, noblemen mated with +children of the forest, whose language, even, was no longer French. Some +of Jean de Villacourt's old comrades in arms had tried, on his death, to +do something for his children. They were interested in this name, which +had been so great and had now fallen so low. In 1826 the youngest of the +boys, who was scarcely more than sixteen, was brought to Paris. The +little savage was clothed and presented to the Duchesse d'Angoulême: he +appeared three or four times in the _salons_ of the Minister of War, who +was related to his family, and who was very anxious to do something for +him; but at the end of a week, feeling stifled in these drawing-rooms, +and ill at ease in his clothes, he had escaped like a little wolf, gone +straight back to his hiding-place, and had not come out of it again for +years. + +Of these four Villacourts, he was the only one left at the end of twenty +years. His three brothers died one after the other, and all by violent +deaths; one from drunkenness, the second from illness, and the other +from blows he had received in a skirmish. All three had been struck down +suddenly, snatched as it were from the midst of life. Living among the +bastards they had left, this last of the Villacourts was looked up to in +the forest as the chieftain of a clan until 1854, when the game laws +came into force. All the regulations and the supervision, the trials, +fines, confiscations, and liabilities connected with the chase, which +had now become his very life, and the fear of giving way to his anger +some day and of putting a bullet into one of the keepers, disgusted him +with this part of the world, with France, and with this land which was +no longer his own. + +It occurred to him to go to America in order to be quite free, and to be +able to hunt in untrodden fields where no gun license was necessary. He +went to Paris to set sail from Havre, but he had not enough money for +the voyage. He then fell back on Africa, but there he found a second +France with laws, gendarmes, and forest-keepers. He tried working a +grant of land, and then a clearing, but that kind of labour did not suit +him. The country and the climate tried him, and the burning heat of the +sun and soil began to take effect on his robust health. At the end of +two years he returned to France. + +On going back to his log-hut at Motte-Noire he found a newspaper there, +the only thing which had come for him during his absence. It was a +number of the _Moniteur_ and was more than a year old. He tore it up to +light his pipe, and, just as he was twisting it, caught sight of a +red-pencil mark. He opened it out again and read the marked paragraph: + +"_M. Mauperin_ (_Alfred-Henri_), better known by the name of +_Villacourt_, is about to apply to the Keeper of the Seals for +permission to add to his name that of Villacourt, and will henceforth be +known as _Mauperin de Villacourt_." + +He got up, walked about, fumed, then sat down again, and slowly lighted +his pipe. + +Three days later he was in Paris. + +Just at first on reading the paper he had felt as though some one had +struck him across the face with a horsewhip. Then he had said to himself +that he was robbed of his name, but that was all, that his name was no +longer worth anything, as it was now the name of a beggar. This +philosophizing mood did not last long, the thought of the theft of his +name gradually came back to him, and it irritated and hurt him, and made +him feel bitter. After all he had nothing left but this name, and he +could not endure the idea of having it stolen from him, and so started +for Paris. + +On arriving he was as furious as a mad bull, and his one idea was to go +and knock this M. Mauperin down at once. When once he was in the +capital, though, with its streets and its crowds, face to face with its +people, its shops, its life, all the passers-by, and the noise, he felt +dazed, like some wild beast let loose in a huge circus, whose rage is +suddenly turned into fright and who stops short after its first leap. He +went straight to the law courts, and in the long hall accosted one of +those men in black, who are generally leaning against a pillar, and +told him what had happened. The man in black informed him that as the +year's delay had expired there was nothing to be done but appeal to the +high court against the decree authorizing the addition of the name, and +he gave him the address of a counsel of the higher court. M. de +Villacourt hurried to this counsel. He found a very cold, polite man, +wearing a white necktie, who, while leaning back in a green morocco +chair, listened with a fixed expression in his eyes all the time to his +case, his claims, his rights, his indignation, and to the sound of the +parchments he was turning over with a nervous hand. + +The expression of the counsel's face never changed, so that when M. de +Villacourt had finished he fancied that the other man had not +understood, and he began all over again. The lawyer stopped him with a +gesture, saying: "I think you will gain your case, monsieur." + +"You _think_ so? Do you mean to say you are not sure of it?" + +"A lawsuit is always a lawsuit, monsieur," answered the lawyer with a +faint smile, which was so sceptical that it chilled M. de Villacourt, +who was just prepared to burst out in a rage. "The chances are on your +side, though, and I am quite willing to undertake your case." + +"Here you are then," said M. de Villacourt, putting his roll of +title-deeds down on the desk. "Thank you, sir," he added, rising to take +his leave. + +"Excuse me," said the lawyer on seeing him walk towards the door, "but I +must call your attention to the fact that in business of this kind, in +an appeal to the higher court, we do not only act as the barrister but +as the lawyer of our client. There are certain expenses, for getting +information and examining deeds--If I take up your case I shall be +obliged to ask you to cover these expenses. Oh, it is only a matter of +from twenty to twenty-five pounds. Let us say twenty pounds." + +"Twenty to twenty-five pounds! Why, what do you mean!" exclaimed M. de +Villacourt, turning red with indignation. "Some one steals my name, and +because I have not seen the newspaper in which the man warns me that he +intends robbing me, I must pay twenty-five pounds to make this rascal +give up my name again. Twenty to twenty-five pounds! But I haven't the +money, sir," he said, lowering his head and letting his arms fall down +at his sides. + +"I am extremely sorry, monsieur, but this little formality is +indispensable. Oh, you must be able to find it. I feel sure that among +the relatives of the families into which your family has married--in +such questions as these, families are always ready to pull together." + +"I do not know any one--and the Count de Villacourt will never ask for +money. I had just twelve pounds when I arrived. I bought this coat for +about two pounds at the Palais Royal on the way here. This hat cost me +five and tenpence. I suppose my hotel bill will cost me about a +sovereign, and I shall want about a sovereign to get back home. Could +you do with what is left?" + +"I am very sorry, monsieur----" + +M. de Villacourt put his hat on and left the room. At the hall-door he +suddenly turned round, passed through the dining-room and opening the +office-door again, he said, in a smothered voice which he was doing his +utmost to control: + +"Can I have the address of M. Henri Mauperin--known as de +Villacourt--without paying for it?" + +"Certainly; he is a barrister. I shall find his address in this book. +Here it is; Rue Taitbout--14." + +It was after all this that M. de Villacourt had hurried away to Henri +Mauperin's. + + + + +XXXVI + + +When Denoisel entered the Mauperins' drawing-room that evening he found +every one more gay and cheerful than usual. There was a look of +happiness on all the faces; M. Mauperin's good-humour could be guessed +by the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. Mme. Mauperin was most gracious, +she positively beamed and looked blissfully happy. Renée was flitting +about the room, and her quick, girlish movements were so bird-like that +one could almost imagine the sound of a bird's wings. + +"Why, here's Denoisel!" exclaimed M. Mauperin. + +"Good-evening, m'sieu," said Renée, in a playful tone. + +"You haven't brought Henri with you?" asked Mme. Mauperin. + +"He couldn't come. He'll be here the day after to-morrow without fail." + +"How nice of you! Oh, isn't he a good boy to have come this evening," +said Renée, hovering round and trying to make him laugh as though he had +been a child. + +"Oh, he's a bad lot! Ah, my dear fellow--" and M. Mauperin shook hands +and winked at his wife. + +"Yes; just come here, Denoisel," said Mme. Mauperin. "Come and sit down +and confess your sins. It appears that you were seen the other day in +the Bois--driving----" + +She stopped a minute like a cat when it is drinking milk. + +"Ah, now your mother's wound up!" said M. Mauperin to Renée. "She's in +very good spirits to-day--my wife is. I warn you, Denoisel." + +Mme. Mauperin had lowered her voice. Leaning forward towards Denoisel +she was telling him a very lively story. The others could only catch a +word here and there between smothered bursts of laughter. + +"Mamma, it's not allowed; that sort of thing--laughing all to +yourselves. Give me back my Denoisel, or I'll tell stories like yours to +papa." + +"Oh, dear, wasn't it absurd!" said Mme. Mauperin, when she had finished +her bit of gossip, laughing heartily as old ladies do over a spicy tale. + +"How very lively you all are this evening!" exclaimed Denoisel, chilled +by all this gaiety. + +"Yes, we are as gay as Pinchon," said Renée, "that's how we all feel! +And we shall be like this to-morrow, and the day after, and always; +shall we not, papa?" and running across to her father she sat down on +his knees like a child. + +"My darling!" said M. Mauperin to his daughter. "Well, I never! Just +look, my dear, do you remember? This was her knee when she was a little +girl." + +"Yes," said Mme. Mauperin, "and Henri had the other one." + +"Yes, I can see them now," continued M. Mauperin; "Henri was the girl +and you were the boy, Renée. Just to fancy that all that was fifteen +years ago. It used to amuse you finely when I let you put your little +hands on the scars that my wounds had left. What rascals of children +they were! How they laughed!" Then turning to his wife he added, "What +work you had with them, my dear. It doesn't matter though, Denoisel; +it's a good thing to have a family. Instead of only having one heart, +it's as though you have several--upon my word it is!" + +"Ah, Denoisel, now that you are here, we shall not let you go again," +said Renée. "Your room has been waiting for you long enough." + +"I'm so sorry, Renée, but really I have some business to attend to this +evening in Paris; I have, really." + +"Oh, business! You? How important you must feel, to be sure!" + +"Do stay, Denoisel," said M. Mauperin. "My wife has a whole collection +of stories for you like the one she has just told you." + +"Oh yes, do, will you?" pleaded Renée. "We'll have such fun; you'll see. +I won't touch the piano at all, and I won't put too much vinegar in the +salad. We'll make puns on everything. Come now, Denoisel." + +"I accept your invitation for next week." + +"Horrid thing!" and Renée turned her back on him. + +"And Dardouillet," said Denoisel; "isn't he coming this evening?" + +"Oh, he'll come later on," said Mauperin. "By-the-bye, it's just +possible he won't come, though. He's very busy--in the very thick of +marking out his land. I fancy he's just busy transporting his mountain +into his lake and his lake on to the top of his mountain." + +"Well, but what about this evening?" + +"Oh, this evening--no one knows," said Renée. "He's full of mysteries, +M. Dardouillet. But how queer you look to-day, Denoisel!" + +"I do?" + +"Yes, you; you don't seem at all frolicsome; there's no sparkle about +you. What's been ruffling you?" + +"Denoisel, there's something the matter," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Nothing whatever, madame," answered Denoisel. "What could be the matter +with me? I'm not low-spirited in the least. I'm simply tired; I've had +to rush about so much this last week for Henri. He would have my opinion +about everything in connection with his furnishing." + +"Ah yes," said Mme. Mauperin, her face lighting up with joy; "it's true, +the twenty-second is getting near. Oh, if any one had told me this two +years ago! I'm afraid I shall be too happy to live on that day. Just +think of it, my dear," and she half closed her eyes and revelled in her +dreams of the future. + +"I shall be simply lovely for the occasion, I can tell you, Denoisel," +said Renée. "I have had my dress tried on to-day, and it fits me to +perfection. But, papa, what about a dress-coat?" + +"My old dress-coat is quite new." + +"Oh, but you must have one made, a newer one still, if I'm to take your +arm. Oh, how silly I am; you won't take me in, of course. Denoisel, +please keep a quadrille for me. We shall give a ball, of course, mamma?" + +"A ball and everything that we can give," said Mme. Mauperin. "I expect +people will think it is not quite the thing; but I can't help that. I +want it to be very festive--as it was for our wedding, do you remember, +my dear? We'll dance and eat and drink, and----" + +"Yes, that's what we'll do," said Renée, "and we'll let all our work +people drink till they are quite merry--Denoisel too. It will liven him +up a little to have too much to drink." + +"Well, with all this, I don't fancy Dardouillet's coming----" + +"What in the world makes you so anxious to see Dardouillet, this +evening?" asked M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, that's true," put in Renée. "That hasn't been explained. Please +explain, Denoisel." + +"How inquisitive you are, Renée. It's just a bit of nonsense--nothing +that matters. I want him to lend me his bulldog for a rat-fight at my +club to-morrow. I've made a bet that he'll kill a hundred in two +minutes. And with that I must depart. Good-night, all!" + +"Good-night!" + +"Then, my boy will be here the day after to-morrow, for sure?" said Mme. +Mauperin at the door to Denoisel. + +Denoisel nodded without answering. + + + + +XXXVII + + +On arriving at Dardouillet's little house at the other end of the +village, Denoisel rang the bell. An old woman opened the door. + +"Has M. Dardouillet gone to bed?" + +"Gone to bed? No, indeed! A nice life he leads!" answered the old +servant; "he's pottering about in the garden; you'll find him there," +and she opened the long window of the dining-room. + +The bright moonlight fell on a garden absolutely bare, as square as a +handkerchief, and with the soil all turned over like a field. In one +corner, standing motionless and with folded arms, on a hillock, was a +black figure which looked like a spectre in one of Biard's pictures. It +was M. Dardouillet, and he was so deeply absorbed that he did not see +his visitor until Denoisel was quite close to him. + +"Ah, it's you, M. Denoisel? I'm delighted to see you. Just look now," +and he pointed to the loose soil all round. "What do you think of that? +Plenty of lines there, I hope; and it's all quite soft and loose, you +know," and he put his hand out over the plan of his rising ground as +though he were stroking the brow of his ideal hill. + +"Excuse me, M. Dardouillet," said Denoisel. "I've come about an affair +that----" + +"Moonlight--remember that--if ever you have a garden--there's nothing +like moonlight for seeing what you have done--exactly as it is. By +daylight you can't see the embankments----" + +"M. Dardouillet, I want to appeal to a man who has worn a soldier's +uniform. You are a friend of the Mauperins. I have come to ask you if +you will act for Henri as----" + +"A duel?" And Dardouillet fastened up the black coat he wore, winter and +summer alike, with all that was left of the button. "Good heavens! Yes, +a service of that kind is a duty." + +"I shall take you back with me, then," said Denoisel, putting his arm +through Dardouillet's. "You can sleep at my place. It must be settled +quickly. It will be all over to-morrow, or the day after at the latest." + +"Good!" said Dardouillet, looking regretfully at a line of stakes that +had been commenced, the shadows of which the moon threw on the ground. + + + + +XXXVIII + + +On leaving Henri Mauperin's, M. de Villacourt had suddenly recollected +that he had no friends, no one at all whom he could ask to serve as +seconds. This had not occurred to him before. He remembered two or three +names which had been mixed up in his father's family history, and he +went along the streets trying to find the houses where he had been taken +when he had come to Paris in his boyhood. He rang at several doors, but +either the people were no longer living there or they were not at home +to him. + +At night he returned to his lodging-house. He had never before felt so +absolutely alone in the world. When he was taking the key of his +bed-room, the landlady asked him if he would not have a glass of beer +and, opening a door in a passage, showed him into a café which took up +the ground-floor of the house. + +Some swords were hanging from the hat-pegs, with cocked hats over them. +At the far end, through the tobacco smoke, he could see men dressed in +military uniform moving about round a billiard-table. A sickly looking +boy with a white apron on was running to and fro, scared and bewildered, +giving the _Army Monitor_ and the other papers a bath, each time that he +put a glass or cup on the table. + +Near the counter, a drum-major was playing at backgammon with the +landlord of the café in his shirt-sleeves. On every side voices could be +heard calling out and answering each other, with the rolling accent +peculiar to soldiers. + +"To-morrow I'm on duty at the theatre." + +"I take my week." + +"Gaberiau is beadle at Saint-Sulpice." + +"He was proposed and was to be examined." + +"Who's on service at the Bourdon ball?" + +"What an idea! to blow his brains out when he hadn't a single punishment +down on his book!" + +It was very evident that they were the Paris Guards from the barracks, +just near, waiting until nine o'clock for the roll-call. + +"Waiter, a bowl of punch and three glasses," said M. de Villacourt, +taking his place at a table where two of the Guards were seated. + +When the punch was brought he filled the three glasses, pushed one +before each of the Guards, and rose to his feet. + +"Your health, gentlemen!" he said, and then lifting his glass he +continued: "You are military men--I have to fight to-morrow, and I +haven't any one I can ask. I feel sure that you will act as seconds for +me." + +One of the Guards looked full at M. de Villacourt, and then turned to +his comrade. + +"We may as well, Gaillourdot; what do you say?" + +The other did not reply, but picking up his glass touched M. de +Villacourt's with it. + + * * * * * + +"Well then, to-morrow morning at ten o'clock. Room 27." + +"Right!" answered the Guards. + + * * * * * + +The following morning, just as Denoisel was starting with Dardouillet to +call on M. Boisjorand de Villacourt, his door-bell rang and the two +Guards entered. As their mission was to accept everything, terms, +weapons, and distances, the arrangements for the duel were soon made. +Pistols were decided upon at a distance of thirty-five paces, both +adversaries to be allowed to walk ten paces. Denoisel requested, in +Henri's name, that the affair should be got over as quickly as possible. +This was precisely what M. de Villacourt's seconds were about to ask, as +they were supposed to be going to the theatre that evening, and were +only free that day until midnight. A meeting was fixed for four o'clock +at the Ville-d'Avray Lake. Denoisel next went to one of his friends who +was a surgeon, and then to order a carriage for bringing home the +wounded man. He called to see Henri, who was out; then went on to the +shooting-gallery, where he found him, amusing himself with shooting at +small bundles of matches hanging from a piece of string, at which he +fired, setting the brimstone alight with the bullet. + +"Oh, that's nothing!" he said to Denoisel; "I fancy those matches get +set on fire with the wind from the bullet; but look here!" and he showed +him a cardboard target, in the first ring of which he had just put a +dozen bullets. + +"It's to be to-day at four, as you wished," said Denoisel. + +"Good!" said Henri, giving his pistol to the man. "Look here," he +continued, putting his fingers over two holes on the cardboard which +were rather far away from the others; "if it were not for these two +flukes this would be fit to frame. Oh, I'm glad it's arranged for +to-day." He lifted his arm with the gesture of a man accustomed to +shooting and just about to take aim, and then shook his hand about to +get the blood into it again. + +"Only imagine," he continued, "that it had quite an effect on me--the +idea of this affair--when I was in bed this morning. It's that deuced +horizontal position; I don't fancy it's good for one's courage." + +They all lunched together at Denoisel's and then proceeded to smoke. +Henri was cheerful and communicative, talking all the time. The surgeon +arrived at the hour appointed, and they all four got into the carriage +and drove off. + +They had been silent until they were about half way, when Henri suddenly +threw his cigar out of the window impatiently. + +"Give me a cigar, Denoisel, a good one. It's very important to have a +good cigar when you are going to shoot, you know. If you are to shoot +properly you mustn't be nervous; that's the principal thing. I took a +bath this morning. One must keep calm. Now, driving is the most +detestable thing; the reins saw your hand for you. I'd wager you +couldn't shoot straight after driving; your fingers would be stiff. +Novels are absurd with their duels, where the man arrives and flings his +reins to his groom. What should you think if I told you that one ought +to go in for a sort of training? It's quite true, though. I never knew +such a good shot as an Englishman I once met; he goes to bed at eight +o'clock; never drinks stimulants and takes a short walk every evening +like my father does. Every time that I have driven in a carriage without +springs to the shooting-gallery, my targets have shown it. By-the-bye, +this is a very decent carriage, Denoisel. Well, with a cigar it's the +same thing. Now a cigar that's difficult to smoke keeps you at work, you +have to keep lifting your hand to your mouth, and that makes your hand +unsteady; while a good cigar--you ask any good shot, and he'll tell you +the same thing--it's soothing, it puts your nerves in order. There's +nothing better than the gentle movement of the arm as you take the cigar +out of your mouth and put it in again. It's slow and regular." + + * * * * * + +On arriving, they found M. de Villacourt and his seconds waiting between +the two lakes. The ground was white with the snow that had fallen during +the morning. In the woods the trees stretched their bare branches +towards the sky, and in the distance the red sunset could be seen +between the rows of dark trees. They walked as far as the Montalet road. +The distances were measured, Denoisel's pistols loaded, and the +opponents then took their places opposite each other. Two +walking-sticks, laid on the snow, marked the limits of the ten paces +they were each allowed. Denoisel walked with Henri to the place which +had fallen to his lot, and as he was pushing down a corner of his collar +for him which covered his necktie, Henri said in a low voice: "Thanks, +old man; my heart's beating a trifle under my armpit, but you'll be +satisfied----" + +M. de Villacourt took off his frock-coat, tore off his necktie, and +threw them both some distance from him. His shirt was open at the neck, +showing his strong, broad, hairy chest. The opponents were armed, and +the seconds moved back and stood together on one side. + +"Ready!" cried a voice. + +At this word M. de Villacourt moved forward almost in a straight line. +Henri kept quite still and allowed him to walk five paces. At the sixth +he fired. + +M. de Villacourt fell to the ground, and the witnesses watched him lay +down his pistol and press his thumbs with all his strength on the double +hole which the bullet had made on entering his body. + +"Ah! I'm not done for--Ready, monsieur!" he called out in a loud voice +to Henri, who, thinking all was over, was moving away. + +M. de Villacourt picked up his pistol and proceeded to do his four +remaining paces as far as the walking-stick, dragging himself along on +his hands and knees and leaving a track of blood on the snow behind him. +On arriving at the stick he rested his elbow on the ground and took aim +slowly and steadily. + +"Fire! Fire!" called out Dardouillet. + +Henri, standing still and covering his face with his pistol, was +waiting. He was pale, and there was a proud, haughty look about him. The +shot was fired; he staggered a second, then fell flat, with his face on +the ground and with outstretched arms, his twitching fingers grasping +for a moment at the snow. + + + + +XXXIX + + +M. Mauperin had gone out into the garden as he usually did on coming +downstairs in the morning, when, to his surprise, he saw Denoisel +advancing to meet him. + +"You here, at this hour?" he said. "Why, where did you sleep?" + +"M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, pressing his hand as he spoke. + +"What is it? What's the matter?" asked M. Mauperin, feeling that +something had happened. + +"Henri is wounded." + +"Dangerously? Is it a duel?" + +Denoisel nodded. + +"Wounded? Ah, he is dead!" + +Denoisel took M. Mauperin's two hands in his for a second, without +uttering a word. + +"Dead!" repeated M. Mauperin mechanically, and he opened his hands as +though something had slipped from their grasp. "His poor mother, Henri!" +and the tears came with the words. "Oh, God--We don't know how much we +love them till this comes--and only thirty years old!" He sank down on +a garden-seat, choked with sobs. + +"Where is he?" he asked at last. + +"There," and Denoisel pointed to the window of Henri's room. + +From Ville-d'Avray he had taken the corpse straight to M. Dardouillet's, +and during the evening had found a pretext for sending for M. Bernard, +who had a key of the Mauperins' house. In the middle of the night, while +the family were asleep, the three men had taken off their shoes, carried +Henri's dead body upstairs, and laid it on the bed in his own room. + +"Thank you," said M. Mauperin, and making a sign to him that he could +not talk he got up. + +They walked round the garden four or five times in silence. The tears +came every now and then into M. Mauperin's eyes, but they did not fall. +Words, too, seemed to come to his lips and die away again. Finally, in a +deep, crushed voice, breaking the long silence by a desperate effort, +and not looking at Denoisel, M. Mauperin asked an abrupt question. + +"Was it an honourable death?" + +"He was your son," answered Denoisel. + +The father lifted his head at these words, as if strength had come to +him with which to fight against his grief. "Well, well; I must do my +duty now. You have done your part," and he drew Denoisel nearer to him, +his tears falling freely at last. + + + + +XL + + +"Murder is the name for affairs of this kind," M. Barousse was saying to +Denoisel as they followed the hearse to the cemetery. "Why didn't you +arrange matters between them?" + +"After that blow?" + +"After or before," said M. Barousse, peremptorily. + +"You'd better say that to his father!" + +"He's a soldier--but you, hang it all--you've never served in the army, +and you let him get killed! I consider you killed him." + +"Look here, I've had enough, M. Barousse." + +"You see, I reason things out; I've been a magistrate."--Barousse had +been a judge on the Board of Trade.--"You have the law courts and you +can demand justice. But duels are contrary to all laws, human or divine; +remember that. Why, just fancy--a scoundrel comes and gives me a blow in +the face; and he must needs kill me as well. Ah, I can promise you one +thing: if ever I'm on a jury, and there's a case of a duel--well, I look +upon it as murder. Duellists are assassins. In the first place it's a +cowardly thing----" + +"A cowardly thing that every one hasn't the courage to carry through, M. +Barousse; it's like suicide." + +"Ah, if you are going to uphold suicide," said Barousse, and leaving the +discussion he continued in a softened tone: "Such a fine fellow too, +poor Henri! And then Mauperin, and his wife, and his daughter--the whole +family plunged into this grief. No, it makes me wild when I think of it. +Why, I had known him all his life." Barousse pulled his watch half out +of his waistcoat-pocket as he spoke. "There!" he said, breaking off +suddenly; "I know it will be sold; I shall have missed _The Concert_, a +superb proof, earlier than the one with the dedication." + + * * * * * + +Denoisel returned to Briche with M. Mauperin, who, on arriving, went +straight upstairs to his wife. He found her in bed, with the blinds down +and the curtains drawn, overwhelmed and crushed by her terrible sorrow. + +Denoisel opened the drawing-room door and saw Renée, seated on an +ottoman, sobbing, with her handkerchief up to her mouth. + +"Renée," he said, going to her and taking her hands in his, "some one +killed him----" + +Renée looked at him and then lowered her eyes. + +"That man would never have known; he never read anything and he did not +see any one; he lived like a regular wolf; he didn't subscribe to the +_Moniteur_, of course. Do you understand?" + +"No," stammered Renée, trembling all over. + +"Well, it must have been an enemy who sent the paper to that man. Ah, +you can't understand such cowardly things; but that's how it all came +about, though. One of his seconds showed me the paper with the paragraph +marked----" + +Renée was standing up, her eyes wide open with terror; her lips moved +and she opened her mouth to speak--to cry out: "I sent it!" + +Then all at once she put her hand to her heart, as if she had just been +wounded there, and fell down unconscious and rigid on the carpet. + + + + +XLI + + +Denoisel came every day to Briche to inquire about Renée. When she was a +little better, he was surprised that she did not ask for him. He had +always been accustomed to seeing her when she was not well, even when +she was lying down, as though he had been one of the family. And +whenever she had been ill, he was always one of the first she had asked +for. She expected him to entertain and amuse her, to enliven her during +her convalescence and bring back her laughter. He was offended and kept +away for a day or two, and then when he came again he still could not +see her. One day he was told that she was too tired, another day that +the Abbé Blampoix was talking to her. Finally, at the end of a week, he +was allowed to see her. + +He expected an effusive welcome, such as invalids give their friends +when they see them again for the first time. He thought that after an +illness she would, in her impulsive way, be almost ready to embrace him. +Renée held out her hand to him and just let her fingers lie in his for a +second; she said a few words such as she might have said to any one, +and after about a quarter of an hour closed her eyes as though she were +sleepy. This coldness, which he could not understand in the least, +irritated Denoisel and made him feel bitter. He was deeply hurt and +humiliated, as his affection for Renée was pure and sincere and of such +long standing. He tried to imagine what she could possibly have against +him, and wondered whether M. Barousse had been instilling his ideas into +her. Was she blaming him, as a witness of the duel, for her brother's +death? Just about this time one of his friends who had a yacht at Cannes +invited him for a cruise in the Mediterranean, and he accepted the +invitation and went away at once. + +Renée was afraid of Denoisel. She only remembered the commencement of +the attack that she had had in his presence, that terrible moment which +had been followed by her fall and a fit of hysterics. She had had a +sensation of being suffocated by her brother's blood, and she knew that +a cry had come to her lips. She did not know whether she had spoken, +whether her secret had escaped her while she was unconscious. Had she +told Denoisel that she had killed Henri, that it was she who had sent +that newspaper? Had she confessed her crime? + +When Denoisel entered her room she imagined that he knew all. The +embarrassment which he felt and which was the effect of her manner to +him, his coldness, which was entirely due to her own, all this +confirmed her in her idea, in her certainty that she had spoken and that +it was a judge who was there with her. + +Before Denoisel's visit was over, her mother got up to go out of the +room a minute, but Renée clung to her with a look of terror and insisted +on her staying. It occurred to her that she might defend herself by +saying that it was a fatality; that by sending the newspaper she had +only meant to make the man put in his claim; that she had wanted to +prevent her brother from getting this name and to make him break off his +engagement; but then she would have been obliged to say why she had +wished to do this--why she had wished to ruin her brother's future and +prevent him from becoming a rich man. She would have had to confess all; +and the bare idea of defending herself in such a way, even in the eyes +of the man she respected more than any other, horrified and disgusted +her. It seemed to her that the least she could do would be to leave to +the one she had killed his fair fame and the silence of death. + +She breathed freely when she heard of Denoisel's departure, for it +seemed to her, then, as though her secret were her own once more. + + + + +XLII + + +Renée gradually recovered and in a few months' time seemed to be quite +well again. All the outward appearances of health came back to her, and +she had no suffering at all. She did not even feel anything of the +disturbance which illness leaves in the organs it has touched and in the +life it has just attacked. + +All at once the trouble began again. When she went upstairs or walked +uphill she suddenly felt suffocated. Palpitation became more frequent +and more violent, and then just as suddenly all this would stop again, +as it happens sometimes with these insidious diseases which at intervals +seem to entirely forget their victims. + +At the end of a few weeks the doctor from Saint-Denis, who was attending +Renée, took M. Mauperin aside. + +"I don't feel satisfied about your daughter," he said. "There is +something not quite clear to me. I should like to have a consultation +with a specialist. These heart affections are very treacherous +sometimes." + +"Yes, these heart affections--you are quite right," stammered M. +Mauperin. + +He could not find anything else to say. His former notions of medicine, +the desperate doctrines of the old school, Corvisart, the epigraph in +his famous book on the subject of heart affections: "_Hæret lateri +lethalis arundo_"; all these things came suddenly back to his mind, +clearly and distinctly. He could see the pages again of those books so +full of terror. + +"You see," the doctor went on, "the great danger of these diseases is +that they are so often of long standing. People send for us when the +disease has made great headway. There are symptoms that the patient has +not even noticed. Your daughter must have been very impressionable +always, from her very childhood, I should say; isn't that so? Torrents +of tears for the least blame, her face on fire for nothing at all, and +then her pulse beating a hundred a minute, a constant state of emotion +with her, very excitable, tempers like convulsions, always slightly +feverish. She would put a certain amount of passion into everything, I +should say, into her friendship, her games, her likes and dislikes; am I +not right? Oh yes, this is generally the way with children in whom this +organ predominates and who have an unfortunate predisposition to +hypertrophy. Tell me now, has she lately had any great emotion--any +great grief?" + +"Yes, oh yes; her brother's death." + +"Her brother's death. Ah yes, there was that," said the doctor, not +appearing to attach any great importance, nevertheless, to this +information. "I meant to ask you, though, whether she had been crossed +in love, for instance." + +"She? Crossed in love? Oh, good heavens!" and M. Mauperin shrugged his +shoulders, and half joining his hands looked up in the air. + +"Well, I'm only asking you that for the sake of having my conscience +clear. Accidents of this kind only develop the germ that is already +there and hasten on the disease. The physical influence of the passions +on the heart is a theory--It has been studied a great deal the last +twenty years; and quite right, too, in my opinion. The thesis that the +heart is lacerated in a burst of temper, in any great moral----" + +M. Mauperin interrupted him: + +"Then, a consultation--you fancy--you think--don't you?" + +"Yes, M. Mauperin, that will be quite the best thing. You see, it will +be more satisfactory for every one; for you, and for me. We should call +in M. Bouillaud, I suppose. He is considered the first authority." + +"Yes--M. Bouillaud," repeated M. Mauperin, mechanically nodding his head +in assent. + + + + +XLIII + + +It was just five minutes past twelve, and M. Mauperin was seated by +Renée's bed, holding her two hands in his. Renée glanced at the +time-piece. + +"He'll be here soon," said M. Mauperin. + +Renée answered by closing her eye-lids gently, and her breathing and the +beating of her heart could be heard like the ticking of a watch in the +silence of the room at night. + +Suddenly a peal of the door-bell rang out, clearly and imperiously, +vibrating through the house. It seemed to M. Mauperin as though it had +been rung within him, and a shudder passed through him to his very +finger-tips like a needle-prick. He went to the door and opened it. + +"It is some one who rang by mistake, sir," said the servant-man. + +"It's very warm," said M. Mauperin to his daughter as he took his seat +again, looking very pale. + +Five minutes later the servant knocked. The doctor was waiting in the +drawing-room. + +"Ah!" said M. Mauperin, getting up once more. + +"Go to him," murmured Renée, and then calling him back, she asked, +looking alarmed: "Is he going to examine me?" + +"I don't know; I don't think so. There'll be no need, perhaps," answered +M. Mauperin, playing with the knob of the door. + + * * * * * + +M. Mauperin had fetched the doctor and left him with his daughter. He +was in the drawing-room waiting the result. He had walked up and down, +taken a seat, and gazed mechanically at a flower on the carpet, and had +then gone to the window and was tapping with his fingers on the pane. + +It seemed to him as though everything within himself and all round had +suddenly stopped. He did not know whether he had been there an hour or a +minute. It was one of those moments in life for him, the measure and +duration of which cannot be calculated. He felt as though he were living +again through his whole existence, and as though all the emotions of a +lifetime were crowded into a moment that was eternal. + +He turned dizzy, like a man in a dream falling from a height and +enduring the anguish of falling. All kinds of indistinct ideas, of +confused anxieties and vague terrors, seemed to rise from the pit of his +stomach and buzz round his temples. Yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, the +doctor, his daughter, her illness, all this whirled round in his head, +perplexing him, mingled as it all was with a physical sensation of +uneasiness, anxiety, fear, and dread. Then all at once one idea became +distinct. He had one of those clear visions that cross the mind at such +times. He saw the doctor with his ear pressed against his daughter's +back and he listened with him. He thought he heard the bed creak as it +does when any one turns on it. It was over, they would be coming now; +but no one came. He began pacing up and down again, as he could not keep +still. He grew irritable with impatience and thought the doctor was a +very long time, but the next minute he said to himself that it was a +good sign, that a great specialist would not relish wasting his time, +and that if there had been nothing he could do, he would already have +been back. Fresh hope came to him with this thought: his daughter was +saved; when the doctor came in he should see by his face that his +daughter was saved. He watched the door, but no one came. Then he began +to say to himself that they would have to take precautions, that perhaps +she would always be delicate, that there were plenty of people who went +on living in spite of palpitation of the heart. Then the word, the +terrible word, _death_, came to him and haunted him. He tried to drive +it away by thinking over and over again the same thoughts about +convalescence, getting well, and good health. He went over in his mind +all the persons he had known, who had been ill a long time, and who were +not dead. And yet in spite of all his efforts the same question kept +coming back to him: "What would the doctor tell him?" + +He repeated this over and over again to himself. It seemed to him as +though this visit were never going to finish and never would finish. And +then at times he would shudder at the idea of seeing the door open. He +would have liked to remain as he was forever, and _never_ know. Finally +hope came back to him once more, just as the door opened. + +"Well?" said M. Mauperin to the doctor as he entered the room. + +"You must be brave," said the doctor. + +M. Mauperin looked up, glanced at the doctor, moved his lips without +uttering a word--his mouth was dry and parched. + +The doctor began to explain in full his daughter's disease, its gravity, +the complications that were to be feared: he then wrote out a long +prescription, saying to M. Mauperin at each item: + +"You understand?" + +"Perfectly!" answered M. Mauperin, looking stupefied. + + * * * * * + +"Ah, my dear little girl, you are going to get well!" + +These were M. Mauperin's words to his daughter when he went back to her +room. + +"Really?" she asked. + +"Kiss me." + +"What did he tell you?" + +"Well, you need only look at my face to know what he said," answered M. +Mauperin, smiling at her. He felt as though it would kill him, though, +that smile; and turning away under the pretence of looking for his hat, +he continued, "I must go to Paris to get the prescription made up." + + + + +XLIV + + +At the railway station M. Mauperin saw the doctor getting into the +train. He got into another compartment, as he did not feel as though he +had the strength to speak to him or even look at him. + +On arriving in Paris he went to a chemist's and was told that it would +take three hours to make up the prescription. "Three hours!" he +exclaimed, but at heart he was glad that it would be so long. It would +give him some time before returning to the house. When once he was in +the street he walked fast. He had no consecutive ideas, but a sort of +heavy, ceaseless throbbing in his head like the throb of neuralgia. His +sensations were blunted, as though he were in a stupor. He saw nothing +but the legs of people walking and the wheels of the carriages turning +round. His head felt heavy and at the same time empty. As he saw other +people walking, he walked too. The passers-by appeared to be taking him +with them, and the crowd to be carrying him along in its stream. +Everything looked faint, indistinct, and of a neutral tint, as things +do the day after any wild excitement or intoxication. The light and +noise of the streets he seemed to see and hear in a dream. He would not +have known there was any sun if it had not been for the white trousers +the policemen were wearing, which had caught his eye several times. + +It was all the same to him whether he went to the right or left. He +neither wanted anything nor had he the energy to do anything. He was +surprised to see the movement around him--people who were hurrying +along, walking quickly, on their way to something. He had had neither +aim nor object in life for the last few hours. It seemed to him as +though the world had come to an end, as though he were a dead man in the +midst of the life and activity of Paris. He tried to think of anything +in all that might happen to a man capable of moving him, of touching him +in any way, and he could not conceive of anything which could reach to +the depths of his despair. + +Sometimes, as though he were answering inquiries about his daughter, he +would say aloud, "Oh, yes, she is very ill!" and it was as though the +words he had uttered had been said by some one else at his side. Often a +work-girl without any hat, a pretty young girl with a round waist, gay +and healthy with the rude health of her class, would pass by him. He +would cross the street that he might not see her again. He was furious +just for a minute with all these people who passed him, with all these +useless lives. They were not beloved as his daughter was, and there was +no need for them to go on living. He went into one of the public gardens +and sat down. A child put some of its little sand-pies on to the tails +of his coat; other children getting bolder approached him with all the +daring of sparrows. Presently, feeling slightly embarrassed, they left +their little spades, stopped playing and stood round, looking shyly and +sympathetically, like so many men and women in miniature, at this tall +gentleman who was so sad. M. Mauperin rose and left the garden. + +His tongue was furred and his throat dry. He went into a café, and +opposite him was a little girl wearing a white jacket and a straw hat. +Her frock was short, showing her little firm, bare legs with their white +socks. She was moving about all the time, climbing and jumping on to her +father and standing straight up on his knees. She had a little cross +round her neck. Every few minutes her father begged her to keep still. + +M. Mauperin closed his eyes; he could see his own little daughter just +as she had been at six years old. Presently he opened a review, _The +Illustration_, and bent over it, trying to make himself look at the +pictures, and when he reached the last page he set himself to find out +one of the enigmas. + +When M. Mauperin lifted his head again he wiped his face with his +handkerchief. He had made out the enigma: _"Against death there is no +appeal."_ + + + + +XLV + + +The terrible existence of those who have given up hope, and who can only +wait, now commenced for M. Mauperin; that life of anguish, fear and +trembling, of despair and of constant shocks, when every one is +listening and on the watch for death; that life when one is afraid of +any noise in the house, and just as afraid of silence, afraid of every +movement in the next room, afraid of the sound of voices drawing near, +afraid to hear a door close, and afraid of seeing the face of the person +who opens the door when one enters the house, and of whom one asks +without speaking if the beloved one still lives. + +As people frequently do when nursing their sick friends, he began to +reproach himself bitterly. He made his sorrow still harder to bear by +making himself believe that it was partly his own fault, that everything +had not been done which ought to have been, that she might have been +saved if only there had been a consultation earlier, if at a certain +time, a certain month or day, he had only thought of something or other. + +At night his restlessness in bed seemed to make his grief more wild and +feverish. In the solitude, the darkness, and the silence, one thought, +one vision, was with him all the time--his daughter, always his +daughter. His anxiety worked on his imagination, his dread increased, +and his wakefulness had all the intensity of the terrible sensation of +nightmare. In the morning he was afraid to wake up, and just as a man, +when half-awake, will instinctively turn over from the light, so he +would do his utmost to fall asleep again, to drive away his first +thoughts, not to remember anything and so escape for a moment longer +from the full consciousness of the present. + +Then the day came again with all its torments, and the father was +obliged to control his feelings, to conquer himself, to be gay and +cheerful, to reply to the smiles of the suffering girl, to answer her +pitiful attempts to be gay, and to keep up her feeble illusions, her +clinging to the future, with some of those heart-rending words of +comfort with which dying people will delude themselves, asking as they +so often do for hope from those who are with them. + +She would say to him, sometimes, in that feeble, soft whisper peculiar +to invalids and which dies away to a whisper, "How nice it would be to +have no pain! I can tell you, I shall enjoy life as soon as I get quite +well." + +"Yes, indeed," he would answer, choking down his tears. + + + + +XLVI + + +Sick people are apt to believe that there are places where they would be +better, countries which would cure them. There are certain spots and +memories which come back to their mind and seem to fascinate them as an +exile is fascinated by his native land, and which lull them as a child +is lulled to rest in its cradle. Just as a child's fears are calmed in +the arms of its nurse, so their hopes fly to a country, a garden, or a +village where they were born and where surely they could not die. + +Renée began to think of Morimond. She kept saying to herself that if she +were once there she should get well. She felt sure, quite sure of it. +This Briche house had brought her bad luck. She had been so happy at +Morimond! And with this longing for change, the wish to move about which +invalids get, this fancy of hers grew, and became more and more +persistent. She spoke of it to her father and worried him about it. It +would not make any difference to any one, she pleaded, the refinery +would go along by itself, and M. Bernard, his manager, was trustworthy +and would see to everything, and then they could come back in the +autumn. + +"When shall we start, father dear?" she kept saying, getting more and +more impatient every day. + +M. Mauperin gave in at last. His daughter promised him so faithfully +that she would get well at Morimond that he began to believe it himself. +He imagined that this sick fancy was an inspiration. + +"Yes, the country will perhaps do her good," said the doctor, accustomed +to these whims of dying people, who fancy that by going farther away +they will succeed in throwing death off their track. + +M. Mauperin promptly arranged his business matters, and the family +started for Morimond. + +The pleasure of setting off, the excitement of the journey, the nervous +force that all this gives even to people who have no strength at all, +the breeze coming in by the open window of the railway carriage kept the +invalid up as far as Chaumont. She reached there without being +overfatigued. M. Mauperin let her rest a day, and the following morning +hired the best carriage he could get in the town and they all set out +once more for Morimond. The road was bad and the journey was +disagreeable and long. It began to get warm at nine o'clock, and by +eleven the sun scorched the leather of the carriage. The horses breathed +hard, perspired, and went along with difficulty. Mme. Mauperin was +leaning back against the front cushion and dozing. M. Mauperin, seated +next his daughter, held a pillow at her back, against which she fell +after every little jolt. Every now and then she asked the time, and when +she was told she would murmur, "No later than that!" + +Towards three o'clock they were getting quite near their destination; +the sky was cloudy, there was less dust, and it was cooler altogether. A +water-wagtail began to fly in front of the carriage about thirty paces +at a time, rising from the little heaps of stones. There were elm-trees +all along the road and some of the fields were fenced round. Renée +seemed to revive as one does in one's natal air. She sat up and, leaning +against the door with her chin on her hand as children do when in a +carriage, she looked out at everything. It was as though she were +breathing in all she saw. As the carriage rolled along, she said: + +"Ah, the big poplar-tree at the Hermitage is broken. The little boys +used to fish for leeches in this pool--oh, there are M. Richet's rooks!" + +In the little wood near the village her father had to get out and pluck +a flower for her, which he could not see and which she pointed out to +him growing on the edge of the ditch. + +The carriage passed by the little inn, the first houses, the grocer's, +the blacksmith's, the large walnut-tree, the church, the watchmaker's, +who was also a dealer in curiosities, and the Pigeau farm. The +villagers were out in the fields. Some children who were tormenting a +wet cat stopped to see the carriage drive past. An old man, seated on a +bench in front of his cottage door, with a woollen shawl wrapped round +him and shivering in spite of the sun, lifted his cap. Then the horses +stopped, the carriage door was opened, and a man who was waiting in +front of the lodge lifted Mlle. Mauperin up in his arms. + +"Oh, our poor young lady; she's no heavier than a feather!" he said. + +"How do you do, Chrétiennot--how do you do, comrade?" said M. Mauperin, +shaking hands with the old gardener, who had served under him in his +regiment. + + + + +XLVII + + +The next day and the days which followed, Renée had the most delicious +waking moments, when the light which was just breaking, the morning of +the earth and sky, mingled--in the dawn of her thoughts--with the +morning of her life. Her first memories came back to her with the first +songs outdoors. The young birds woke up in their nests, awakening her +childhood. + +Supported and indeed almost carried by her father, she insisted on +seeing everything again--the garden, the fruit-trees on the walls, the +meadow in front of the house, the shady canals, the pool with its wide +sheet of still water. She remembered all the trees and the garden paths +again, and they seemed to her like the things one gradually recalls of a +dream. Her feet found the way along paths which she used to know and +which were now grown over with trees. The ruins seemed as many years +older to her as she was older since she had last seen them. She +remembered certain places on the grass where she had seen the shadow of +her frock when as a child she had been running there. She found the +spot where she had buried a little dog. It was a white one, named +_Nicolas Bijou_. She had loved it dearly, and she could remember her +father carrying it about in the kitchen garden after it had been washed. + +There were hundreds of souvenirs, too, for her in the house. Certain +corners in the rooms had the same effect on her as toys that have been +stored away in a garret, and that one comes across years after. She +loved to hear the sound of the mournful old weather-cock on the +house-top, which had always soothed her fears and lulled her to sleep as +a child. + +She appeared to rouse up and to revive. The change, her natal air, and +these souvenirs seemed to do her good. This improvement lasted some +weeks. + +One morning, her father, who was with her in the garden, was watching +her. She was amusing herself with cutting away the old roses in a clump +of white rose-bushes. The sunshine made its way through the straw of her +large hat, and the brilliancy of the light and the softness of the shade +rested on her thin little face. She moved about gaily and briskly from +one rose-tree to another, and the thorns caught hold of her dress as +though they wanted to play with her. At every clip of her scissors, from +a branch covered with small, open roses, with pink hearts all full of +life, there fell a dead earth-coloured rose which looked to M. Mauperin +like the corpse of a flower. + +All at once, leaving everything, Renée flung herself into her father's +arms. + +"Oh, papa, how I do love you!" she said, bursting into tears. + + + + +XLVIII + + +From that day the improvement began to disappear again. She gradually +lost the healthy colour which life's last kiss had brought to her +cheeks. She no longer had that delightful restlessness of the +convalescent, that longing to move about which only a short time ago had +made her take her father's arm constantly for a stroll. No more gay +words sprang from her mind to her lips, as they had done at first when +she had forgotten for a time all suffering; there was no more of the +happy prattle which had been the result of returning hope. She was too +languid to talk or even to answer questions. + +"No, there's nothing the matter with me--I am all right;" but the words +fell from her lips with an accent of pain, sadness, and resignation. + +She suffered from tightness of breath now, and constantly felt a weight +on her chest, which her respiration had difficulty in lifting. A sort of +constraint and vague discomfort, caused by this, made itself felt +throughout her whole system, attacking her nerves, taking from her all +vital energy and all inclination to move about, keeping her crushed and +submissive, without any strength to fight against it or to do anything. + +Her father persuaded her to try the effect of a cupping-glass. + + + + +XLIX + + +She took off her shawl in that slow way peculiar to invalids, so slow +that it seems painful. Her trembling fingers felt about for the buttons +that she had to unfasten, her mother helped her to take off the flannel +and cotton-wool in which she was wrapped, leaving her poor thin neck and +arms bare. + +She looked at her father, at the lighted candle, the twisted paper and +the wine-glasses, with that dread that one feels on seeing the hot irons +or fire being prepared for torturing one's flesh. + +"Am I right like this?" she asked, trying to smile. + +"No, you want to be in this position," answered M. Mauperin, showing her +how to sit. + +She turned round on her arm-chair, put her two hands on the back of it +and her cheek down on her hand, pulled her legs up, crossed her feet, +and, half-kneeling and half-crouching, only showed the profile of her +frightened face and her bare shoulders. She looked ready for the coffin +with her bony angles. Her hair, which was very loose, glided with the +shadow down the hollow of her back. Her shoulder-blades projected, the +joints of her spine could be counted, and the point of a poor thin +little elbow appeared through the sleeves of her under-linen, which had +fallen to the bend of her arm. + +"Well, father?" + +He was standing there, riveted to the spot, and he did not even know of +what he was thinking. At the sound of his daughter's voice he picked up +a glass, which he remembered belonged to a set he had bought for a +dinner-party in honour of Renée's baptism. He lighted a piece of paper, +threw it into the glass, and closed his eyes as he turned the glass +over. Renée gave a little hiss of pain, a shudder ran through all the +bones down her back, and then she said: + +"Oh, well; I thought it would hurt me much more than that." + +M. Mauperin took his hand from the glass and it fell to the ground; the +cupping had not succeeded. + +"Give me another," he said to his wife. + +Mme. Mauperin handed it to him in a leisurely way. + +"Give it me," he said, almost snatching it from her. His forehead was +wet with perspiration, but he no longer trembled. This time the vacuum +was made: the skin puckered up all round the glass and rose inside as +though it were being drawn by the scrap of blackened paper. + +"Oh, father! don't bear on so," said Renée, who had been holding her +lips tightly together; "take your hand off." + +"Why, I'm not touching it--look," said M. Mauperin, showing her his +hands. + +Renée's delicate white skin rose higher and higher in the glass, turning +red, patchy, and violet. When once the cupping was done the glass had to +be taken away again, the skin drawn to the edge on one side of the +glass, and then the glass swayed backward and forward from the other +side. M. Mauperin was obliged to begin again, two or three times over, +and to press firmly on the skin, near as it was to the bones. + + + + +L + + +Disease does its work silently and makes secret ravages in the +constitution. Then come those terrible outward changes which gradually +destroy the beauty, efface the personality, and, with the first touches +of death, transform those we love into living corpses. + +Every day M. Mauperin sought for something in his daughter which he +could not find--something which was no longer there. Her eyes, her +smile, her gestures, her footstep, her very dress which used proudly to +tell of her twenty years, the girlish vivacity which seemed to hover +round her and light on others as it passed--everything about her was +changing and life itself gradually leaving her. She no longer seemed to +animate all that she touched. Her clothes fell loosely round her in +folds as they do on old people. Her step dragged along, and the sound of +her little heels was no longer heard. When she put her arms round her +father's neck, she joined her hands awkwardly, her caresses had lost +their pretty gracefulness. All her gestures were stiff, she moved about +like a person who feels cold or who is afraid of taking up too much +space. Her arms, which were generally hanging down, now looked like the +wet wings of a bird. She scarcely even resembled her old self. And when +she was walking in front of her father, with her bent back, her shrunken +figure, her arms hanging loosely at her sides, and her dress almost +falling off her, it seemed to M. Mauperin that this could not be his +daughter, and as he looked at her he thought of the Renée of former +days. + +There was a shadow round her mouth that seemed to go inside when she +smiled. The beauty spot on her hand, just by her little finger, had +grown larger, and was as black as though mortification had set in. + + + + +LI + + +"Mother, it's Henri's birthday to-day." + +"Yes, I know," said Mme. Mauperin without moving. + +"Suppose we were to go to church?" + +Mme. Mauperin rose and went out of the room, returning very soon with +her bonnet and cape on. Half an hour later M. Mauperin was helping his +daughter out of the carriage at the Maricourt church-door. Renée went to +the little side-chapel, where the marble altar stood on which was the +little miraculous black wooden Virgin to which she had prayed with great +awe as a child. She sat down on a bench which was always there and +murmured a prayer. Her mother stood near her, looking at the church and +not praying at all. Renée then got up and, without taking her father's +arm, walked with a step that scarcely faltered right through the church +to a little side door leading into the cemetery. + +"I wanted to see whether _that_ was still there," she said to her +father, pointing to an old bouquet of artificial flowers among the +crosses and wreaths which were hung on the tomb. + +"Come, my child," said M. Mauperin; "don't stand too long. Let us go +home again now." + +"Oh, there's plenty of time." + +There was a stone seat under the porch with a ray of sunshine falling on +it. + +"It's warm here," she said, laying her hand on the stone. "Put my shawl +there so that I can sit down a little. I shall have the sun on my +back--there." + +"It isn't wise," said M. Mauperin. + +"Oh, just to make me happy." When she was seated and leaning against +him, she murmured in a voice as soft as a sigh, "How gay it is here." + +The lime-trees, buzzing with bees, were stirring gently in the faint +wind. A few fowl in the thick grass were running about, pecking and +looking for food. At the foot of a wall, by the side of a plough and +cart, the wheels of which were white with dry mud, on the stumps of some +old trees with the bark peeled off, some little chickens were frolicking +about, and some ducks were asleep, looking like balls of feathers. There +seemed to be a murmur of hushed voices from the church, and the light +played on the blue of the stained-glass windows. Flights of pigeons kept +starting up and taking refuge in the niches of sculpture and in the +holes between the old grey stones. The river could be seen and its +splashing sound heard; a wild white colt bounded along to the water's +edge. + +"Ah!" said Renée after a few moments, "we ought to have been made of +something else. Why did God make us of flesh and blood? It's frightful!" + +Her eyes had fallen on some soil turned up in a corner of the cemetery, +half hidden by two barrel-hoops crossed over each other and up which +wild convolvulus was growing. + + + + +LII + + +Renée's complaint did not make her cross and capricious, nor did it +cause her any of that nervous irritability so common to invalids, and +which makes those who are nursing them share their suffering morally. +She gave herself entirely up to her fate. Her life was ebbing away +without any apparent effort on her part to hold it back or to stop it in +its course. She was still affectionate and gentle. Her wishes had none +of the unreasonableness of dying fancies. The darkness which was +gathering round her brought peace with it. She did not fight against +death, but let it come like a beautiful night closing over her white +soul. + +There were times, however, when Nature asserted itself within her, when +her mind faltered from sheer bodily weakness, and when she listened to +the stealthy progress of the disease which was gradually detaching her +from her hold on life. At such times she would maintain a profound +silence and would be terribly calm, remaining for a long time mute and +motionless almost like a dead person. She would pass half the day in +this way without even hearing the clock strike, gazing before her just +beyond her feet with a steady, fixed gaze and seeing nothing at all. Her +father could not even catch the expression of her eyes at such times. +Her long lashes would quiver two or three times, and she would hide her +eyes by letting the lids droop over them, and it seemed to him then as +though she were asleep with her eyes half open. He would talk to her, +search his brains for something that might interest her, and endeavour +to make jokes, so that she should hear him and feel that he was there; +but in the middle of his sentence his daughter's attention, her +thoughts, and her intelligent look would leave him. He no longer felt +the same warmth in her affection, and when he was with her he himself +felt chilled now. It seemed as if disease were robbing him day by day of +a little more of his daughter's heart. + + + + +LIII + + +Sometimes, too, Renée would let a few words slip, showing that she was +mourning her fate as sick people do, words which sink to the heart and +give one a chill like death itself. + +One day her father was reading the newspaper to her; she took it from +him to look at the marriage announcements. + +"Twenty-nine! How old she was, wasn't she?" she said, as though speaking +to herself. She had been glancing down the death column. M. Mauperin did +not answer; he paced up and down the room for a few minutes and then +went away. + +When Renée was alone she got up to close the door, which her father had +not pulled to, and which kept banging. She fancied she heard a groan in +the corridor and looked, but there was no one there; she listened a +minute; but as everything was silent again she was just going to close +the door, when she thought she heard the same sound again. She went out +into the corridor as far as her father's room. It was from there that it +came. The key was not in the lock, and Renée stooped down and, through +the keyhole, saw her father, who had flung himself on his bed, weeping +bitterly and shaken with sobs. His head was buried in the pillow, and he +was endeavouring to stifle down his tears and his despair. + + + + +LIV + + +Renée was determined that her father should weep no more on her account. + +"Listen to me, papa," she said, the following morning. "We are going to +leave here at the end of September; that's settled, isn't it? We are +going everywhere, a month to one place and a fortnight to another--just +as we fancy. Well, _I_ want you to take me now to all the places where +you fought. Do you know, I've heard that you fell in love with a +princess? Suppose we were to come across her again, what should you say +to that? Wasn't it at Pordenone that you got those great scars?" And, +taking her father's face in her two hands, she pressed her lips to the +white, hollow places which had been marked by the finger of Glory. + +"I want you to tell me all about everything," she continued; "it will be +ever so nice to go all through your campaigns again with your daughter. +If one winter will not be enough for it all, why, we'll just take two. +And when I'm quite myself again--we are quite rich enough surely, +Henriette and I; you've worked hard enough for us--well, we'll just +sell the refinery, and we'll all come here. We'll go to Paris for two +months of the year to enjoy ourselves; that will be quite enough, won't +it? Then as you always like to have something to do, you can take your +farm again from Têtevuide's son-in-law. We'll have some cows and a nice +farm-yard for mamma--do you hear, mamma? I shall be outdoors all day; +and the end of it will be that I shall get _too_ well--you'll see. And +then we'll have people to visit us all the time. In the country we can +allow ourselves that little luxury--that won't ruin us--and we shall be +as happy, as happy--you'll see." + +Travelling and plans of all kinds--she talked of nothing but the future +now. She spoke of it as of a promised thing, a certainty. It was she, +now, who made every one hopeful, and she concealed the fact that she was +dying so skilfully and pretended so well that she wanted to live, that +M. Mauperin on seeing her and listening to her dreams, gave himself up +to dreaming with her of years which they had before them and which would +be full of peace, tranquility, and happiness. Sometimes, even, the +illusions that the invalid had invented herself dazzled her too, for an +instant, and she would begin to believe in her own fiction, forget +herself for a moment and, quite deceived like the others, she would say +to herself, "Suppose, after all, that I should get well!" At other +times she would delight in going back to the past. She would tell about +things that had happened, about her own feelings, funny incidents that +she remembered, or she would talk about her childish pleasures. It was +as though she had risen from her death-bed to embrace her father for the +last time with all she could muster of her youth. + +"Oh, my first ball-dress," she said to him one day; "I can see it +now--it was a pink tulle one. The dressmaker didn't bring it--- it was +raining--and we couldn't get a cab. How you did hurry along! And how +queer you looked when you came back carrying a cardboard box! And you +were so wet when you kissed me! I remember it all so well." + +Renée had only herself and her own courage to depend on, in her task of +keeping her father up and herself too. Her mother was there, of course; +but ever since Henri's death she had been buried in a sort of silent +apathy. She was indifferent to all that went on, mute and absent-minded. +She was there with her daughter, night and day, without a murmur, +patient and always even-tempered, ready to do anything, as docile and +humble as a servant, but her affection seemed almost mechanical. The +soul had gone out of her caresses, and all her ministrations were for +the body rather than the heart; there was nothing of the mother about +her now except the hands. + + + + +LV + + +Renée could still drag along with her father to the first trees of the +little wood near the house. She would then sink down with her back +against the moss of an oak-tree on the boundary of the wood. The smell +of hay from the fields, an odour of grass and honey came to her there +with a delicious warmth from the sunshine, the fresh air from the wood, +damp from the cool springs and the unmade paths. + +In the midst of the deep silence, an immense, indistinct rustling could +be heard, and a hum and buzz of winged creatures, which filled the air +with a ceaseless sound like that of a bee-hive and the infinite murmur +of the sea. All around Renée, and near to her, there seemed to be a +great living peace, in which everything was being swayed--the gnat in +the air, the leaf on the branch, the shadows on the bark of the trees, +the tops of the trees against the sky, and the wild oats on each side of +the paths. Then from this murmur came the sighing sound of a deep +respiration, a breeze coming from afar which made the trees tremble as +it passed them, while the blue of the heavenly vault above the shaking +leaves seemed fixed and immovable. The boughs swayed slowly up and down, +a breath passed over Renée's temples and touched her neck, a puff of +wind kissed and cheered her. Gradually she began to lose all +consciousness of her physical being, the sensation and fatigue of +living; an exquisite languor took possession of her, and it seemed to +her as though she were partially freed from her material body and were +just ready to pass away in the divine sweetness of all these things. +Every now and then she nestled closer to her father like a child who is +afraid of being carried away by a gust of wind. + +There was a stone bench covered with moss in the garden. After dinner, +towards seven o'clock, Renée liked to sit there; she would put her feet +up, leaning her head against the back of the seat, and with a trail of +convolvulus tickling her ear she would stay there, looking up at the +sky. It was just at the time of those beautiful summer days which fade +away in silvery evenings. Imperceptibly her eyes and her thoughts were +fascinated by the infinite whiteness of the sky, just ready to die away. +As she watched she seemed to see more brilliancy and light coming from +this closing day, a more dazzling brightness and serenity seemed to fall +upon her. Gradually some great depths opened in the heavens, and she +fancied she could see millions of little starry flames as pale as the +light of tapers, trembling with the night breeze. And then, from time to +time, weary of gazing into that dazzling brightness which kept receding, +blinded by those myriads of suns, she would close her eyes for an +instant as though shrinking from that gulf which was hanging over her +and drawing her up above. + + + + +LVI + + +"Mother," she said, "don't you see how nice I look? Just see all the +trouble I've taken for you;" and joining her hands over her head, her +dress loose at the waist, she sank down on the pillows full length on +the sofa in a careless, languid attitude which was both graceful and sad +to see. Renée thought that the bed and the white sheets made her look +ill. She would not stay there, and gathered together all her remaining +strength to get up. She dressed slowly and heroically towards eleven +o'clock, taking a long time over it, stopping to get breath, resting her +arms over and over again, after holding them up to do her hair. She had +thrown a fichu of point-lace over her head, and was wearing a +dressing-gown of starched white piqué, with plenty of material in it, +falling in wide pleats. Her small feet were incased in low shoes, and +instead of rosettes she wore two little bunches of violets which +Chrétiennot brought her every morning. In order to look more alive, as +invalids do when they are up and dressed, she would stay there all day +in this white girlish toilette fragrant with violets. + +"Oh, how odd it is when one is ill!" she said, looking down at herself +and then all round the room. "I don't like anything that is not pretty +now, just fancy! I couldn't wear anything ugly. Do you know I've thought +of something I want. You remember the little silver-mounted jug--so +pretty it was--we saw it in a jeweller's shop in the Rue Saint Honoré +when we had just gone out of the theatre for the interval. If it isn't +sold--if he still has it, you might let him send it. Oh, I know I'm +getting the most ruinous tastes--I warn you of that. I want to arrange +things here. I'm getting very difficult to please; in everything I have +the most luxurious ideas. I used not to be at all elegant in my tastes; +and now I have eyes for everything I wear, and for everything all round +me--oh, such eyes! There are certain colours that positively pain +me--just fancy--and others that I had never noticed before. It is being +ill that makes me like this--it must be that. It's so ugly to be ill; +and so it makes you like everything that is beautiful all the more." + +With all this coquetry which the approach of death had brought to her, +these fancies and caprices, these little delicacies and elegancies, +other senses too seemed to come to Renée. She was becoming, and she felt +herself becoming, more of a woman. Under all the languor and indolence +caused by illness, her disposition, which had always been affectionate +but somewhat masculine and violent, grew gentler, more unbending, and +more calm. Gradually the ways, tastes, inclinations, and ideas--all the +signs of her sex, in fact--made their appearance to her. Her mind seemed +to undergo the same transformation. She gave up her impetuous way of +criticising and her daring speech. Occasionally she would use one of her +old expressions, and then she would say, smiling, "That is a bit of the +old Renée come back." She remembered speeches she had made, bold things +she had done, and her familiar manner with young men; she would no +longer dare to act and speak as in those old days. She was surprised, +and did not know herself in her new character. She had given up reading +serious or amusing books; she only cared now for works which set her +thinking, books with ideas. When her father talked to her about hunting +and the meets to which she had been and of those in store for her, it +gave her the sensation of being about to fall, and the very idea of +mounting a horse frightened her. All the emotions and weaknesses that +she felt were quite new to her. Flowers about which she had never +troubled much were now as dear to her as persons. She had never liked +needlework, and now that she had started to embroider a skirt, she +enjoyed doing it. She quite roused up and lived over again in the +memories of her early girlhood. She thought of the children with whom +she used to play, of the friends she had had, of different places to +which she had been, and of the faces of the girls in the same row with +her at her confirmation. + + + + +LVII + + +As she was looking out of the window one day, she saw a woman sit down +in the dust in the middle of the village street, between a stone and a +wheel-rut, and unswathe her little baby. The child lay face downward, +the upper part of its body in the shade, moving its little legs, +crossing its feet, and kicking about, and the sun caressed it lovingly +as it does the bare limbs of a child. A few rays that played over it +seemed to strew on its little feet some of the rose petals of a +Fête-Dieu procession. When the mother and child had gone away Renée +still went on gazing out of the window. + + + + +LVIII + + +"You see," she said to her father, "I never could fall in love; you made +me too hard to please. I always knew beforehand that no one could ever +love me as you did. I saw so many things come into your face when I was +there, such happiness! And when we went anywhere together, weren't you +proud of me! Oh! weren't you just proud to have me leaning on your arm! +It would have been all no good for any one else to have loved me; I +should never have found any one like my own father; you spoiled me too +much." + +"But all that won't prevent my dear little girl one of these fine days, +when she gets well, finding a handsome young man----" + +"Oh, your handsome young man is a long way off yet," said Renée, a smile +lighting up her eyes. "It seems strange to you," she went on, "doesn't +it, that I have never seemed anxious to marry. Well, I tell you, it is +your own fault. Oh, I'm not sorry in the least. What more did I want? +Why, I had everything; I could not imagine any other happiness. I never +even thought of such a thing. I didn't want any change. I was so well +off. What _could_ I have had, now, more than I already had? My life was +so happy with you; and I was so contented. Yes," she went on, after a +minute's silence, "if I had been like so many girls, if I had had +parents who were cold and a father not at all like you; oh yes, I should +certainly have done as other girls do, I should have wanted to be loved, +I should have thought about marriage as they do. Then, too, I may as +well tell you all, I should have had hard work to fall in love; it was +never much in my way, all that sort of thing, and it always made me +laugh. Do you remember before Henriette's marriage, when her husband was +making love to her? How I did tease them! _'Bad child!'_ do you +remember, that was what they used to call me. Oh, I've had my fancies, +like every one else; dreamy days when I used to go about building +castles in the air. One wouldn't be a woman without all that. But it was +only like a little music in my mind; it just gave me a little +excitement. It all came and went in my imagination; but I never had any +special man in my mind, oh never. And then, too, when once I came out of +my room, it was all over. As soon as ever any one was there, I only had +my eyes; I thought of nothing but watching everything so that I could +laugh afterward--and you know how your dreadful daughter could watch. +They would have had to----" + +"Monsieur," said Chrétiennot, opening the door, M. Magu is downstairs; +"he wants to know if he can see mademoiselle." + +"Oh, father," said Renée, beseechingly, "no doctor to-day, please. I +don't feel inclined. I'm very well. And then, too, he snorts so; why +does he snort like that, father?" + +M. Mauperin could not help laughing. + +"I'll tell you," she went on, "it's the effect of driving about in a gig +on his rounds in the winter. As both his hands are occupied, one with +the reins and the other with the whip, he's got into the way of not +using his handkerchief----" + + + + +LIX + + +"Is the sky blue all over, father? Look out and tell me, will you?" said +Renée, one afternoon, as she lay on the sofa. + +"Yes, my child," answered M. Mauperin from the window, "it is superb." + +"Oh!" + +"Why? Are you in pain?" + +"No, only it seemed to me that there must be clouds--as though the +weather were going to change. It's very odd when one is ill, it seems as +if the sky were much nearer. Oh, I'm a capital barometer now." And she +went on reading the book she had laid down while she spoke. + +"You tire yourself with reading, little girl; let us talk instead. Give +it me," and M. Mauperin held out his hand for the book, which she +slipped from her fingers into his. On opening it, M. Mauperin noticed +some pages that he had doubled down some years before, telling her not +to read them, and these forbidden pages were still doubled down. + +Renée appeared to be sleepy. The storm which was not yet in the sky had +already begun to weigh on her. She felt a most unbearable heaviness +which seemed to overwhelm her, and at the same time a nervous uneasiness +took possession of her. The electricity in the air was penetrating her +and working on her. + +A great silence had suddenly come over everything, as though it had been +chased from the horizon, and the breath of solemn calm passing over the +country filled her with immense anxiety. She looked at the clock, did +not speak again, but kept moving her hands about from place to place. + +"Ah, yes," said M. Mauperin, "there is a cloud, really, a big cloud over +Fresnoy. How it is moving along! Ah, it's coming over on to our +side--it's coming. Shall I shut everything up--the window and the +shutters, and light up? Like that my big girl won't be so frightened." + +"No," said Renée, quickly, "no lights in the daytime--no, no! And then, +too," she went on, "I'm not afraid of it now." + +"Oh, it is some distance off yet," said M. Mauperin, for the sake of +saying something. His daughter's words had called up a vision of lighted +tapers in this room. + +"Ah, there's the rain," said Renée, in a relieved tone. "It's like dew, +that rain is. It's as if we were drinking it, isn't it? Come here--near +me." + +Some large drops came down, one by one, at first. Then the water poured +from the sky, as it does from a vase that has been upset. The storm +broke over Morimond and the thunder rolled and burst in peals. The +country round was all fire and then all dark. And at every moment in the +gloomy room, lighted up with pale gleams, the flashes would suddenly +cover the reclining figure of the invalid from head to foot, throwing +over her whole body a shroud of light. + +There was one last peal of thunder, so loud and which burst so near, +that Renée threw her arms round her father's neck and hid her face +against him. + +"Foolish child, it's over now," said M. Mauperin; and like a bird which +lifts its head a little from under its wing, she looked up, keeping her +arms round him. + +"Ah, I thought we were all dead!" she said, with a smile in which there +was something of a regret. + + + + +LX + + +One morning on going to see Renée, who had had a bad night, M. Mauperin +found her in a doze. At the sound of his footstep she half opened her +eyes and turned slightly towards him. + +"Oh, it's you, papa," she said, and then she murmured something vaguely, +of which M. Mauperin only caught the word "journey." + +"What are you saying about a journey?" he asked. + +"Yes, it's as though I had just come back from far away--from very far +away--from countries I can't remember." And opening her eyes wide, with +her two hands flat out on the sheet, she seemed to be trying to recall +where she had been, and from whence she had just come. A confused +recollection, an indistinct memory remained to her of stretches and +spaces of country, of vague places, of those worlds and limbos to which +sick people go during those last nights which are detaching them from +earth, and from whence they return, surprised, with the dizziness and +stupor of the Infinite still upon them, as if in the dream they have +forgotten they had heard the first flapping of the wings of Death. + +"Oh, it's nothing," she said after a minute's silence, "it's just the +effect of the opium--they gave me some last night to make me sleep." And +moving as though to shake off her thoughts, she said to her father, +"Hold the little glass for me, will you, so that I can make myself look +nice? Higher up--oh, these men--how awkward they are, to be sure." + +She put her thin hands through her hair to fluff it up and pulled her +lace into its place again. + +"There now," she said, "talk to me. I want to be talked to," and she +half closed her eyes while her father talked. + +"You are tired, Renée; I'll leave you," said M. Mauperin, seeing that +she did not appear to be listening. + +"No, I have a touch of pain. Talk to me, though; it makes me forget it." + +"But you are not listening to me. Come now, what are you thinking about, +my dear little girl?" + +"I'm not thinking about anything. I was trying to remember. Dreams, you +know--it isn't really like that--it was--I don't remember. Ah!" + +She broke off suddenly, with a pang of sharp pain. + +"Does it hurt you, Renée?" + +She did not answer, and M. Mauperin could not help his lips moving, as +he looked up with an expression of revolt. + +"Poor father," said Renée, after a few minutes. "You see I'm resigned. +No, we ought not to be so angry with pain. It is sent to us for some +reason. We are not made to suffer simply for the sake of suffering." + +And in a broken voice, stopping continually to get breath, she began +talking to him of all the good sides of suffering, of the wells of +tenderness it opens up in us, of the delicacy of heart, and the +gentleness of character that it gives to those who accept its bitterness +without allowing themselves to get soured by it. + +She spoke to him of all the meannesses and the pettinesses that go away +from us when we suffer; of the tendency to sarcasm which leaves us, and +the unkind laughter which we restrain; of the way in which we give up +finding pleasure in other people's little miseries, and of the +indulgence that we have for every one. + +"If you only knew," she said, "what a stupid thing wit seems to me now." +And M. Mauperin heard her expressing her gratitude to suffering as a +proof of election. She spoke of selfishness and of all the materiality +in which robust health wraps us up; of that hardness of heart which is +the result of the well-being of the body; and she told him what ease and +deliverance come with sickness; how light she felt inwardly and what +aspirations it brings with it for something outside ourselves. + +She spoke, too, of suffering as an ill which takes our pride away, which +reminds us of our infirmity, which makes us humane, causes us to feel +with all those who suffer, and which instils charity into us. + +"And then, too," she added with a smile, "without it there would be +something wanting for us; we should never be sad, you know----" + + + + +LXI + + +"My dear fellow, we are very unhappy," said M. Mauperin, one evening, a +few days later, to Denoisel, who had just jumped down from a hired trap. +"I had a presentiment you would come to-day," he went on. "She is asleep +now; you'll see her to-morrow. Oh, you'll find her very much changed. +But you must be hungry," and he led the way to the dining-room, where +supper was being laid for him. + +"Oh, M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, "she is young. At her age something +can always be done." + +M. Mauperin put his elbows on the table and great tears rolled slowly +from his eyes. + +"Oh, come, come, M. Mauperin; the doctors haven't given her up; there's +hope yet." + +M. Mauperin shook his head and did not answer, but his tears continued +to flow. + +"They haven't given her up?" + +"Yes, they have," said M. Mauperin, who could not contain himself any +longer, "and I didn't want to have to tell you. One is afraid of +everything, you see, when it comes to this stage. It seems to me that +there are certain words which would bring the very thing about, and to +own this, why, I fancied it would kill my child. And then, too, there +might be a miracle. Why shouldn't there be? They spoke of miracles--the +doctors did. Oh, God! She still gets up, you know; it's a great thing, +that she can get up. The last two days there has been an improvement, I +think. And then to lose two in a year--it would be too terrible. Oh, +that would be too much! But there, eat, man, you are not eating +anything," and he put a large piece of meat on Denoisel's plate. "Well, +well, we must bear up and be men; that's all we can do. What's the +latest news in Paris?" + +"There isn't any; at least, I don't know any. I've come straight from +the Pyrenees. Mme. Davarande read me one of your letters; but she is far +from thinking her so ill." + +"Have you no news of Barousse?" + +"Oh, yes! I met him on the way to the station. I wanted to bring him +with me, but you know what Barousse is; nothing in the world would +induce him to leave Paris for a week. He must take his morning walk +along the quays. The idea of missing an engraving with its full +margin----" + +"And the Bourjots?" asked M. Mauperin with an effort. + +"They say that Mlle. Bourjot will never marry." + +"Poor child, she loved him." + +"As to the mother, it is the saddest thing--it appears it's an awful +ending--there are rumours of strange things--madness, in fact. There's +some talk of sending her to a private asylum." + + + + +LXII + + +"Renée," said M. Mauperin, on entering his daughter's room the following +day, "there is some one downstairs who wants to see you." + +"Some one?" And she looked searchingly at her father. "I know, it's +Denoisel. Did you write to him?" + +"Not at all. You did not ask to see him, so that I did not know whether +it would give you any pleasure. Do you mind?" + +"Mother, give me my little red shawl--there, in the drawer," she said, +without answering her father. "I mustn't frighten him, you know. Now +then, bring him here quickly," she added, as soon as her shawl was tied +at the neck like a scarf. + +Denoisel came into the room, which was impregnated with that odour +peculiar to the young when they are ill, and which reminds one of a +faded bouquet and of dying flowers. + +"It's very nice of you to have come," said Renée. "Look, I've put this +shawl on for your benefit; you used to like me in it." + +Denoisel stooped down, took her hands in his and kissed them. + +"It's Denoisel," said M. Mauperin to his wife, who was seated at the +other end of the room. + +Mme. Mauperin did not appear to have heard. A minute later she got up, +came across to Denoisel, kissed him in a lifeless sort of way, and then +went back to the dark corner where she had been sitting. + +"Well, how do you think I look? I haven't changed much, have I?" And +then without giving him time to answer, she went on: "I have a dreadful +father who will keep saying I don't look well, and who is most +obstinate. It's no good telling him I am better; he will have it that I +am not. When I am quite well again, you'll see--he'll insist on fancying +that I am still an invalid." + +Denoisel was looking at her wasted arm, just above the wrist. + +"Oh, I'm a little thinner," said Renée, quickly buttoning her sleeve, +"but that's nothing; I shall soon pick up again. Do you remember our +good story about that, papa? It made us laugh so. It was at a farmer's +house at Têtevuide's--that dinner, you remember, don't you? Only imagine +it, Denoisel, the good fellow had been keeping some shrimps for us for +two years. Just as we were sitting down to table, papa said, 'Oh, but +where's your daughter, Têtevuide? She must dine with us. Isn't she +here?' 'Oh, yes, sir.' 'Well, fetch her in, then, or I shall not touch +the soup.' Thereupon the father went into the next room, and we heard +talking and crying going on for the next quarter of an hour. He came +back alone, finally. 'She will not come in,' he said, 'she says she's +too thin.' But, papa," Renée went on, suddenly changing the subject, +"for the last two days mamma has never been out of this room. Now that I +have a new nurse, suppose you take her out for a stroll?" + + * * * * * + +"Ah, Renée dear," said Denoisel, when they were alone, "you don't know +how glad I am to see you like this--to find you so gay and cheerful. +That's a good sign, you know; you'll soon be better, I assure you. And +with that good father of yours, and your poor mother, and your stupid +old Denoisel to look after you--for I'm going to take up my abode here, +for a time, with your permission." + +"You, too, my dear boy? Now do just look at me!" + +And she held out her two hands for him to help her to turn over, so that +she could face him and have the daylight full on her. + +"Can you see me now?" + +The smile had left her eyes and her lips, and all animation had suddenly +dropped from her face like a mask. + +"Ah, yes," she said, lowering her voice, "it's all over, and I haven't +long to live now. Oh, I wish I could die to-morrow. I can't go on, you +know, doing as I am doing. I can't go on any longer cheering them all +up. I have no strength left. I've come to the end of it, and I want to +finish now. He doesn't see me as I am, does he? I can't kill him +beforehand, you know. When he sees me laugh, why it doesn't matter about +the doctors having given me up--he forgets that--he doesn't see +anything, and he doesn't remember anything--so, you see, I am obliged to +go on laughing. Ah, for people who can just pass away as they would like +to--finish peacefully, die calmly, in a quiet place, with their face to +the wall--why, that must be so easy. It's nothing to pass away like +that. Well, anyhow, the worst part is over. And now you are here; and +you'll help me to be brave. If I were to give way, you would be there to +second me. And when--when I go, I count on you--you'll stay with him the +first few months. Ah, don't cry," she said; "you'll make me cry, too." + +There was a moment's silence. + +"Six months already since Henri's funeral," she began again. "We've only +seen each other once since that day. What a fearful turn I had, do you +remember?" + +"Yes, indeed I do remember," said Denoisel. "I've gone through it all +again, often enough. I can see you now, my poor child, enduring the +most horrible suffering, and your lips moving as though you wanted to +cry out, to say something, and you could not utter a single word." + +"I could not utter a single word," said Renée, repeating Denoisel's last +words. + +She closed her eyes, and her lips moved for a second as though they were +murmuring a prayer. Then, with such an expression of happiness that +Denoisel was surprised, she said: + +"Ah, I am so glad to see you! Both of us together--you'll see how brave +we shall be. And we'll take them all in finely--poor things!" + + + + +LXIII + + +It was stiflingly hot. Renée's windows were left open all the evening, +and the lamp was not lighted, for fear of attracting the moths, which +made her so nervous. They were talking, until as the daylight gradually +faded, their words and thoughts were influenced by the solemnity of the +long hours of dreamy reverie, without light. + +They all three soon ceased speaking at all, and remained there mute, +breathing in the air and giving themselves up to the evening calm. M. +Mauperin was holding Renée's hand in his, and every now and then he +pressed it fondly. + +The gloom was gathering fast, and gradually the whole room grew quite +dark. Lying full length on the sofa, Renée herself disappeared in the +indistinct whiteness of her dressing-gown. Presently nothing at all +could be seen, and the room itself seemed all one with the sky. + +Renée began to talk then in a low, penetrating voice. She spoke gently +and very beautifully; her words were tender, solemn, and touching, +sometimes sounding like the chant of a pure conscience, and sometimes +falling on the hearts around her with angelic consolation. + +Her ideas became more and more elevated, excusing and pardoning all +things. At times the things she said fell on the ear as from a voice +that was far away from earth, higher than this life, and gradually a +sort of sacred awe born of the solemnity of darkness, silence, night, +and death, fell on the room where M. and Mme. Mauperin, and Denoisel +were listening eagerly to all which seemed to be already fluttering away +from the dying girl in this voice. + + + + +LXIV + + +On the wall-paper were bouquets of corn, cornflowers, and poppies, and +the ceiling was painted with clouds, fresh-looking and vapoury. Between +the door and window a carved wood praying-chair with a tapestry cushion +looked quite at home in its corner; above it, against the light, was a +holy-water vessel of brass-work, representing St. John baptizing Christ. +In the opposite corner, hanging on the wall with silk cords, was a small +bracket with some French books leaning against each other, and a few +English works in cloth bindings. In front of the window, which was +framed with creeping plants joining each other over the top and with the +leaves that hung over bathed in light, was a dressing-table, covered +with silk and guipure lace, with a blue velvet mirror and silver-mounted +toilet bottles. The shaped mantel-shelf surmounted with a carved panel, +had its glass framed with the same light shade of velvet as that on the +dressing-table. On each side of the glass were miniatures of Renée's +mother, one when quite young and wearing a string of pearls round her +neck, and a daguerrotype representing her much older. Above this was a +portrait of her father in his uniform, painted by herself, the frame of +which, leaning forward, caused the picture to dominate the whole room. +On a rosewood dinner-wagon, in front of the chimney-piece, were one or +two knick-knacks, the sick girl's latest fancies--the little jug and the +Saxony bowl that she had wanted. A little farther away, by the second +window, all the souvenirs that Renée had collected in her riding +days--her hunting and shooting relics, riding-canes, a Pyrenees whip, +and some stags' feet with a card tied with blue ribbon, telling the day +and place where the animal had been run to cover. Beyond the window was +a little writing-desk which had been her father's at the military +school, and on its shelf stood the boxes, baskets, and presents she had +received as New Year's gifts. The bed was entirely draped with muslin. +At the back of it, and as though under the shelter of its curtains, all +the prayer-books Renée had had since her childhood were arranged on an +Algerian bracket, from which some chaplets were hanging. Then came a +chest of drawers covered with a hundred little nothings: doll's-house +furniture, some glass ornaments, halfpenny jewellery, trifles won in +lotteries, even little animals made of bread-crumbs cooked in the stove +and with matches for legs, a regular museum of childish things, such as +young girls hoard up and treasure as reminiscences. The room was bright +and warm with the noonday sun. Near the bed was a little table arranged +as an altar, covered with a white cloth. Two candles were burning and +flickering in the golden daylight. + +Through the dead silence, broken only by sobs, could be heard the heavy +footsteps of a country priest going away. Then all was hushed, and the +tears which were falling round the dying girl suddenly stopped as though +by a miracle. In a few seconds all signs of disease and the anxious look +of pain had disappeared from Renée's thin face, and in their place an +ecstatic beauty, a look of supreme deliverance had come, at the sight of +which her father, her mother, and her friend instinctively fell on their +knees. A rapturous joy and peace had descended upon her. Her head sank +gently back on the pillow as though she were in a dream. Her eyes, which +were wide open and looking upward, seemed to be filled with the +infinite, and her expression gradually took the fixity of eternal +things. A holy aspiration seemed to rise from her whole face. All that +remained of life--one last breath, trembled on her silent lips, which +were half open and smiling. Her face had turned white. A silvery pallor +lent a dull splendour to her delicate skin and shapely forehead. It was +as though her whole face were looking upon another world than ours. +Death was drawing near her in the form of a great light. + +It was the transfiguration of those heart diseases which enshroud dying +girls in all the beauty of their soul and then carry away to Heaven the +young faces of their victims. + + + + +LXV + + +People who travel in far countries may have come across, in various +cities or among old ruins--one year in Russia, another perhaps in +Egypt--an elderly couple who seem to be always moving about, neither +seeing nor even looking at anything. They are the Mauperins, the poor +heart-broken father and mother, who are now quite alone in the world, +Renée's sister having died after the birth of her first child. + +They sold all they possessed and set out to wander round the world. They +no longer care for anything, and go about from one country to another, +from one hotel to the next, with no interest whatever in life. They are +like things which have been uprooted and flung to the four winds of +heaven. They wander about like exiles on earth, rushing away from their +tombs, but carrying their dead about with them everywhere, endeavouring +to weary out their grief with the fatigue of railway journeys, dragging +all that is left them of life to the very ends of the earth, in the hope +of wearing it out and so finishing with it. + + + + +THE PORTRAITS OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT + + + + + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +Drawn from life by Will Rothenstein, 1894.] + +Like Dickens, Théophile Gautier, Mérimée, and some other literary +celebrities, the brothers Goncourt tried their hands at drawing and +engraving before devoting themselves to letters. Sometimes in their +hours of leisure they further made essays in water-colour and pastel. +Thanks to Philippe Burty, Jules de Goncourt's "Etchings," collected in a +volume, and some of Edmond's sepia and washed drawings, allow us to +glean certain of the earliest of those records in which the faithful +Dioscuri endeavoured to portray each other with a care both affectionate +and touching. A very pretty "Portrait of Jules as a child, in the +costume of a Garde Française," a drawing heightened with pastel, is +described by Burty as one of Edmond's best works, but one, +unfortunately, which it was not possible to reproduce. "In the +swallow-tail coat of the French Guard," says Burty, "starting for a +fancy dress ball, the brilliance of his eyes heightened by the powder, +his hand on his sword-guard, at the age of ten, plump and spirited as +one of Fragonard's Cupids." Here we have the younger of the Goncourts, +delineated with all the subtlety of a delicate mannerism. Edmond was +eighteen at the time. Scarcely free of the ferule of his pedagogues, he +already looked at life with that air of keen astonishment which was +never to leave him, and which was to kindle in his eye the sort of +phosphorescent reflection that shone there to his last hour. It was the +elder and more observant of the two who first attempted to represent his +young brother, the one who was to be the greater artist of the pair, as +if the compact had already been entered upon, as if both by tacit +consent accepted the prolific life in common, then only at its dawn. A +great delight to the two brothers was their meeting with Gavarni, at the +offices of _L'Eclair_, a paper founded towards the end of 1851 by the +Comte de Villedeuil. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching by Jules de Goncourt, 1860.] + +[Illustration: JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a water-colour by Edmond de Goncourt, 1857.] + +From that first meeting dated the strong friendship between the trio, a +friendship that verged on worship on the side of the Goncourts, and on +tenderness on that of Gavarni. Two years later, on April 15, 1853, in +the series called _Messieurs du Feuilleton_ which he began in _Paris_, +the master draughtsman of the _lorette_ and the prodigal gave a +delicious sketch of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. In his _Masques et +Visages_, M. Alidor Delzant, a bibliophile very learned in the +iconography of the Goncourts, declares these to be the best and most +faithful of all the portraits of the two brothers. We give a +reproduction of this fine lithograph. Seated in a box at the theatre in +profile to the right, an eye-glass in his eye, Jules, apparently intent +on the play, leans forward from beside Edmond, who sits in a meditative +attitude, his hands on his knees. M. Delzant compares these portraits +to those of Alfred and Tony Johannot by Jean Gigoux. And do they not +also recall another group of two literary brothers, older, it is true, +the delicate faces of Paul and Alfred de Musset in the delicious frame +of the Musée Carnavalet? Gavarni's drawing is a perfect master-piece of +expression and subtlety. + +[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching from life by Jules de Goncourt, 1861.] + + +[Illustration: EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a lithograph by Gavarni, 1853.] + +Placed one against the other, like the antique medals on which Castor +and Pollux are graved in profile in the same circle, how admirably each +of these gentle faces, in which we note more than one analogy, completes +the other! And as we admire them, are we not tempted to exclaim: Here +indeed are the Frères Zemganno of letters! + +[Illustration: MEDALLION OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From an engraving by Bracquemond, 1875.] + +The reputation of the two brothers increased proportionately with their +works--works of the most intense and subtle psychological research. +Installed in that apartment of the Rue Saint Georges which they so soon +transformed into a veritable museum of prints and trinkets, Edmond and +Jules de Goncourt prepared those brilliant monographs of queens and +favourites, which have made them the rare and enchanting historians of +the most licentious and factious of centuries. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT + +In 1888. + +Portrait on wood in _La Vie Populaire_.] + +In 1857 Edmond made the water-colour drawing of "Jules smoking a Pipe," +which was afterward lithographed. His feet on the edge of the +mantel-piece in front of him, Jules, seated in an arm-chair, a small +pipe in his mouth, gives himself up to the delights of the _far niente_. +This contemplative attitude was a favourite one with him, and one in +which he was often discovered by visitors. By representing him thus, +Edmond gave an additional force to the living memory that all who knew +his brother have retained of him. + +Three years later (1860) Jules in his turn made a portrait of Edmond, +not in the same indolent attitude, but also in profile, and with a pipe +in his mouth. This print is one of the best in the Burty album. We know +of no further mutual representations by the brothers; with the exception +of Jules de Goncourt's etching of Edmond seated across a chair, smoking +a cigar, the design of which we reproduce. But there are several fine +portraits by other hands of the younger brother, the one who was the +first to go, perforce abandoning his sublime and suicidal task. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From a photograph by Nadar, 1892.] + +It was in 1870 that Jules de Goncourt died at the age of thirty-nine. +"It was impossible," wrote Paul de Saint-Victor in _La Liberté_, "to +know and not to love this young man, with his child's face, his +pleasant, ready laugh, his eyes sparkling with intellect and purpose.... +That blond young head was bent over his work for months at a time...." +It was the profile of this "blond young head" that Claudius Popelin +traced for the enamel that was set into the binding of the _Nécrologe_, +in which Edmond preserved all the articles, letters, and tokens of +sympathy called forth by the irreparable loss of his beloved companion +and fellow-labourer. This medallion, etched by Abot, was prefixed +afterward to the edition of Jules de Goncourt's _Letters_, published by +Charpentier. The profile, which is reproduced as the frontispiece to +this edition of _Renée Mauperin_, is infinitely gentle; the emaciated +contours, the extraordinary delicacy of the features, betray the +intellectual dreamer, his mind intent on literary questions, and we +understand M. Émile Zola's dictum: "Art killed him." + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching by Bracquemond, 1882. + +(The original drawing is in the Luxembourg Museum.)] + +Prince Gabrielli and Princesse Mathilde also made certain furtive +sketches of Jules which have since been photographed. Méaulle engraved a +portrait of him on wood, and Varin made an etching of him. Henceforth, +save in Bracquemond's double medallion, and in one or two papers in +which studies of him by different hands appeared, Edmond de Goncourt was +no longer represented in company with his gifted brother, but always +alone. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From a photograph by Nadar, 1893.] + +On March 15, 1885, the _Journal Illustré_ published two portraits of the +Goncourts drawn by Franc Lamy, and on November 20, 1886, the _Cri du +Peuple_ gave two others, in connection with the appearance of _Renée +Mauperin_ at the Odéon. We may also note that the medallion of the two +brothers drawn and engraved by Bracquemond for the title-page of the +first edition of _L'Art du XVIIIème Siècle_ appeared in 1875. A delicate +commemorative fancy caused the artist to surround the profile of Jules +with a wreath of laurel. + +[Illustration: PORTRAITS OF THE FRÈRES DE GONCOURT. + +Part of a design by Willette, in _Le Courrier Français_, 1895.] + +Utterly crushed at first by the sense of loneliness and desolation his +loss had created, Edmond de Goncourt was long entirely absorbed in +memories of the departed. The spiritual presence of Jules filled the +house with its mute and mournful sentiment. The heart-broken survivor +could find consolation and relief for his pain only in friendship. +Théophile Gautier, Paul de Saint-Victor, Jules Vallès, the painter De +Nittis, Burty, Flaubert, Renan, Taine, and Théodore de Banville +sustained him with their affection. A band of ardent, active, and +audacious young men, among whom M. Émile Zola was specially +distinguished by the research of his formulæ, began to link him with +Flaubert, offering them a common worship. Alphonse Daudet (we have now +come to the year 1879) sketched the most faithful portrait of him to +whom a whole generation was soon to give the respectful title of "the +Marshal of Letters": "Edmond de Goncourt looks about fifty. His hair is +gray, a light steel gray; his air is distinguished and genial; he has a +tall, straight figure, and the sharp nose of the sporting dog, like a +country gentleman keen for the chase, and, on his pale and energetic +face, a smile of perpetual sadness, a glance that sometimes kindles, +sharp as the graver's needle. What determination in that glance, what +pain in that smile!" Many artists attempted to fix that glance and that +smile with pencil or burin, but how few were successful! + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +By Eugène Carrière. + +Lithographed in 1895.] + +One of these few was the sculptor Alfred Lenoir, in a remarkable work +executed quite at the end of Edmond de Goncourt's life. His white +marble bust well expresses the patrician of letters, the collector, the +worshipper of all kinds of beauty. A voluptuous thrill seems to stir the +nostrils, a flash of sympathetic observation to gleam from the deep set +eyes. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +By Eugène Carrière. + +From the cover of a vellum-bound book.] + +The author of this bust, a work elaborated and modelled after the manner +of those executed by Pajou, Caffieri, and Falconnet in the eighteenth +century (see the reproduction at the beginning of this volume), may +congratulate himself on having given to Edmond de Goncourt's friends the +most exquisite semblance of their lost comrade. Carrière, on the other +hand, in his superb lithograph, where only the eyes are vivid, and Will +Rothenstein, in a sketch from nature which represents the master with a +high cravat round his throat, his chin resting on a hand of incomparable +form and distinction, have reproduced, with great intensity and +comprehension, Edmond de Goncourt grown old, but still robust, upright +and gallant, a soldier of art in whom the creative faculty is by no +means exhausted. Rothenstein's lithograph in particular, with the sort +of morbid languor that pervades it, the mournful fixity of the gaze, the +aristocratic slenderness of the hands and the features, surprises and +startles the spectator. "By nature and by education," says M. Paul +Bourget, "M. Ed. de Goncourt possesses an intelligence, the +overacuteness of which verges on disease in its comprehension of +infinitesimal gradations and of the infinitely subtle creature." Mr. +Rothenstein has made this intelligence flash from every line of his +drawing. + +Frédéric Régamey, Bracquemond (in the fine drawing at the Luxembourg), +De Nittis (in pastel), Raffaelli (in an oil painting), Desboutins (in an +etching), and finally M. Helleu (in dry point), have striven to +penetrate and preserve the subtle psychology of the master's grave, +proud, and gentle countenance. With these distinguished names the +iconography of the Goncourts concludes. Perhaps, as a light and graceful +monument of memory, we might add the fine drawing made by Willette on +the occasion of the Edmond de Goncourt banquet, which represents the +elder brother standing, leaning against the pedestal of his brother's +statue, while at his feet three creatures, symbolizing the principal +forms of their inspiration, are grouped, superb and mournful. Who are +they? No doubt _Madame de Pompadour_, the _Geisha_ of Japanese art, and +finally, bestial and degraded, _La Fille Élisa_--types that symbolize +the most salient aspects of that genius--historic, æsthetic, and +fictional--which will keep green the precious memory of Edmond and Jules +de Goncourt. + +OCTAVE UZANNE. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +Unpublished portrait from life, by Georges Jeanniot.] + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENéE MAUPERIN*** + + +******* This file should be named 24604-8.txt or 24604-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/24604-8.zip b/24604-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..57c3083 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-8.zip diff --git a/24604-h.zip b/24604-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..874f458 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h.zip diff --git a/24604-h/24604-h.htm b/24604-h/24604-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1d7a695 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/24604-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9655 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Renée Mauperin, by Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt, et al</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + p { /* all paragraphs unless overridden */ + margin-top: 1em; /* inter-paragraph space */ + margin-bottom: 1em; /* use only top-margin for spacing */ + line-height: 1.4em; /* interline spacing ("leading") */ + } + body > p { /* paras at <body> level - not in <div> or <table> */ + text-align: justify; + text-indent: 1em; /* first-line indent */ + } + + dd, li {margin-top: 0.33em; + line-height: 1.2em;} + + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + .center {text-align: center; text-indent: 0;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .lowercase {text-transform: lowercase;} + + .caption {margin-top: 0; + font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + + span.tocright {margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 50%; + text-indent: 0;} + + hr.full { width: 100%; + margin-top: 3em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + height: 4px; + border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ + border-style: solid; + border-color: #000000; + clear: both; } + pre {font-size: 85%;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Renée Mauperin, by Edmond de Goncourt and +Jules de Goncourt, et al, Translated by Alys Hallard</h1> +<pre> +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 <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Renée Mauperin</p> +<p>Author: Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt</p> +<p>Release Date: February 13, 2008 [eBook #24604]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENÉE MAUPERIN***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3>E-text prepared by Camille François, Suzanne Shell,<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (http://www.pgdp.net)</h3> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/pageserie.jpg" alt="Vignette"/> +</div> + +<p class="center"><big><b>The<br /> + +French Classical Romances</b></big><br /> + +Complete in Twenty Crown Octavo Volumes</p> + +<p class="center">Editor-in-Chief<br /> + +<big>EDMUND GOSSE, LL.D.</big></p> + +<p class="center">With Critical Introductions and Interpretative Essays by</p> + +<p class="center">HENRY JAMES PROF. RICHARD BURTON HENRY HARLAND<br /> + +ANDREW LANG PROF. F. C. DE SUMICHRAST<br /> + +THE EARL OF CREWE HIS EXCELLENCY M. CAMBON<br /> + +PROF. WM. P. TRENT ARTHUR SYMONS MAURICE HEWLETT<br /> + +DR. JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY RICHARD MANSFIELD<br /> + +BOOTH TARKINGTON DR. RICHARD GARNETT<br /> + +PROF. WILLIAM M. SLOANE JOHN OLIVER HOBBES</p> + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/frontjules.jpg" alt="J. de Goncourt" title="J. de Goncourt" /> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/pagetitre.jpg" alt=" +DE GONCOURT Renée Mauperin" +title="Page de titre" /> +</div> + +<h2>DE GONCOURT</h2> + +<h1>Renée Mauperin</h1> + +<p class="center">TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH<br /> +BY ALYS HALLARD</p> + +<p class="center">WITH A CRITICAL INTRODUCTION<br /> +BY JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY</p> + +<p class="center">A FRONTISPIECE AND NUMEROUS<br /> +OTHER PORTRAITS WITH<br /> +DESCRIPTIVE NOTES BY<br /> +OCTAVE UZANNE</p> + +<p class="center"><big>P. F. COLLIER & SON<br /> +NEW YORK</big> +</p> + + +<p class="center"> +<small>COPYRIGHT, 1902<br /> +BY D. APPLETON & COMPANY</small><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<h2><a name="intro" id="intro"></a>EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT</h2> + +<h3>I</h3> + + +<p>The partnership of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt is probably the most +curious and perfect example of collaboration recorded in literary +history. The brothers worked together for twenty-two years, and the +amalgam of their diverse talents was so complete that, were it not for +the information given by the survivor, it would be difficult to guess +what each brought to the work which bears their names. Even in the light +of these confidences, it is no easy matter to attempt to separate or +disengage their literary personalities. The two are practically one. +<i>Jamais âme pareille n'a été mise en deux corps.</i> This testimony is +their own, and their testimony is true. The result is the more +perplexing when we remember that these two brothers were, so to say, men +of different races. The elder was a German from Lorraine, the younger +was an inveterate Latin Parisian: "the most absolute difference of +temperaments, tastes, and characters—and absolutely the same ideas, the +same personal likes and dislikes, the same intellectual vision." There +may be, as there probably always will be, two opinions as to the value +of their writings; there can be no difference of view concerning their +intense devotion to literature, their unhesitating rejection of all that +might distract them from their vocation. They spent a small fortune in +collecting materials for works that were not to find two hundred +readers; they passed months, and more months, in tedious researches the +results of which were condensed into a single page; they resigned most +of life's pleasures and all its joys to dedicate themselves totally to +the office of their election. So they lived—toiling, endeavouring, +undismayed, confident in their integrity and genius, unrewarded by one +accepted triumph, uncheered by a single frank success or even by any +considerable recognition. The younger Goncourt died of his failure +before he was forty; the elder underwent almost the same monotony of +defeat during nearly thirty years of life that remained to him. But both +continued undaunted, and, if we consider what manner of men they were +and how dear fame was to them, the constancy of their ambition becomes +all the more admirable.</p> + +<div class="center"> +<img src="images/bustedm.jpg" alt="Edmond de Goncourt" title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">Edmond de Goncourt</p> +</div> + +<p>Despising, or affecting to despise, the general verdict of their +contemporaries, they loved to declare that they wrote for their own +personal pleasure, for an audience of a dozen friends, or for the +delight of a distant posterity; and, when the absence of all +appreciation momentarily weighed them down, they vainly imagined that +the acquisition of a new <i>bibelot</i> consoled them. No doubt the passion +of the collector was strong in them: so strong that Edmond half forgot +his grief for his brother and his terror of the Commune in the pursuit +of first editions: so strong that the chances of a Prussian bomb +shattering his storehouse of treasures—the <i>Maison d'un artiste</i>—at +Auteuil saddened him more than the dismemberment of France. But, even +so, the idea that the Goncourts could in any circumstances subordinate +literature to any other interest was the merest illusion. Nothing in the +world pleased them half so well as the sight of their own words in +print. The arrival of a set of proof-sheets on the 1st of January was to +them the best possible augury for the new year; the sight of their names +on the placards outside the theatres and the booksellers' shops +enraptured them; and Edmond, then well on in years, confesses that he +thrice stole downstairs, half-clad, in the March dawn, to make sure that +the opening chapters of <i>Chérie</i> were really inserted in the <i>Gaulois</i>. +These were their few rewards, their only victories. They were fain to be +content with such small things—<i>la petite monnaie de la gloire</i>. Still +they were persuaded that time was on their side, and, assured as they +were of their literary immortality, they chafed at the suggestion that +the most splendid renown must grow dim within a hundred thousand years. +Was so poor a laurel worth the struggle? This was the whole extent of +their misgiving.</p> + +<p>Baffled at every point, the Goncourts were unable to account for the +unbroken series of disasters which befell them; yet the explanation is +not far to seek. For one thing, they attempted so much, so continuously, +in so many directions, and in such quick succession, that their very +versatility and diligence laid them under suspicion. They were not +content to be historians, or philosophers, or novelists, or dramatists, +or art critics: they would be all and each of these at once. In every +branch of intellectual effort they asserted their claims to be regarded +as innovators, and therefore as leaders. Within a month they published +<i>Germinie Lacerteux</i> and an elaborate study on Fragonard; and, while +they plumed themselves (as they very well might) on their feat, the +average intelligent reader joined with the average intelligent critic in +concluding that such various accomplishment must needs be superficial. +It was not credible that one and the same pair—<i>par nobile +fratrum</i>—could be not only close observers of contemporary life, but +also authorities on Watteau and Outamaro, on Marie Antoinette and Mlle. +Clairon. To admit this would be to emphasize the limitations of all +other men of letters. Again, the uncanny element of chance which enters +into every enterprise was constantly hostile to the Goncourts. They not +only published incessantly: they somehow contrived to publish at +inopportune moments—at times when the public interest was turned from +letters to politics. Their first novel appeared on the very day of +Napoleon III's <i>Coup d'état</i>, and their publisher even refused to +advertise the book lest the new authorities should see in the title of +<i>En 18</i>—a covert allusion to the 18th Brumaire. It would have been a +pleasing stroke of irony had the Ministry of the 16th of May been +supported by the country as it was supported by Edmond de Goncourt, for +that Ministry intended to prosecute him as the author of <i>La Fille +Élisa</i>. <i>La Faustin</i> was issued on the morning of Gambetta's downfall; +and the seventh volume of the <i>Journal des Goncourt</i> had barely been +published a few hours when the news of Carnot's assassination reached +Paris. Lastly, the personal qualities of the brothers—their ostentation +of independence, their attitude of supercilious superiority, and, most +of all, their fatal gift of irony—raised up innumerable enemies and +alienated both actual and possible friends. They gave no quarter and +they received none. All this is extremely human and natural; but the +Goncourts, being nervous invalids as well as born fighters, suffered +acutely from what they regarded as the universal disloyalty of their +comrades.</p> + +<p>They could not realize that their writings contained much to displease +men of all parties, and, living at war with literary society, they +sullenly cultivated their morbid sensibility. The simplest trifle stung +them into frenzies of inconsistency and hallucination. To-day they +denounced the liberty of the press; to-morrow they raged at finding +themselves the victims of a Government prosecution. Withal their +ferocious wit, there was not a ray of sunshine in their humour, and, +instead of smiling at the discomfiture of a dull official, they brooded +till their imaginations magnified these petty police-court proceedings +into the tragedy of a supreme martyrdom. Years afterward they +continually return to the subject, noting with exasperated complacency +that the only four men in France who were seriously concerned with +letters and art—Baudelaire, Flaubert, and themselves—had been dragged +before the courts; and they ended by considering their little lawsuit as +one of the historic state trials of the world. Henceforth, in every +personal matter—and their art was intensely personal—they lost all +sense of proportion, believing that there was a vast Semitic plot to +stifle <i>Manette Salomon</i> and that the President had brought pressure on +the censor to forbid an adaptation of one of their novels being put upon +the boards. Monarchy, Empire, Republic, Right, Centre, Left—no shade of +political thought, no public man, no legislative measure, ever chanced +to please them. They sought for the causes of their failure in others: +it never occurred to them that the fault lay in themselves. Their minds +were twin whirlpools of chaotic opinions. Revolutionaries in arts and +letters as they claimed to be, they detested novelties in religion, +politics, medicine, science, abstract speculation. It never struck them +that it was incongruous, not to say absurd, to claim complete liberty +for themselves and to denounce ministers for attempting to extend the +far more restricted liberty of others. And as with the ordering of their +lives, so with their art and all that touched it. Unable to conciliate +or to compromise, they were conspicuously successful in stimulating the +general prejudice against themselves. They paraded their +self-contradictions with a childish pride of paradox. In one breath they +deplored the ignorance of a public too uncultivated to appreciate them; +in another breath they proclaimed that every government which strives to +diminish illiteracy is digging its own grave. Priding themselves on the +thoroughness of their own investigations, they belittled the results of +learning in others, mocked at the superficial labour of the +Benedictines, ridiculed the inartistic surroundings of Sainte-Beuve and +Renan, and protested that antiquity was nothing but an inept invention +to enable professors to earn their daily bread. Not content with +asserting the superiority of Diderot to Voltaire, they pronounced the +Abbé Trublet to be the acutest critic who flourished during that +eighteenth century which they had come to consider as their exclusive +property. Resolute conservatives in theory, piquing themselves on their +descent, their personal elegance, their tact and refinement, these +worshippers of Marie Antoinette admired the talent shown by Hébert in +his infamous <i>Père Duchêne</i>, and then went on to lament the influence of +socialism on literature. They were <i>papalini</i> who sympathized with +Garibaldi; they looked forward to a repetition of '93, and almost +welcomed it as a deliverance from the respectable uniformity of their +own time; they trusted to the working men—masons, house-painters, +carpenters, navvies—to regenerate an effete civilization and to save +society as the barbarians had saved it in earlier centuries. Whatever +the value of these views, they can scarcely have found favour among +those who rallied to the Second Empire and who imagined that the +Goncourts were a pair of firebrands: whereas, in fact, they were +petulant, impulsive men of talent, smarting under neglect.</p> + +<p>If we were so ingenuous as to take their statements seriously, we might +refuse to admit their right to find any place in French literature. For, +though it would be easy to quote passages in which they contemn the +cosmopolitan spirit, it would be no less easy to set against these their +assertions that they are ashamed of being French; that they are no more +French than the Abbé Galiani, the Prince de Ligne, or Heine; that they +will renounce their nationality, settle in Holland or Belgium, and there +found a journal in which they can speak their minds. These are wild, +whirling words: the politics of literary men are on a level with the +literature of politicians. On their own showing, it does not appear that +the Goncourts were in any way fettered. The sum of their achievement, as +they saw it, is recorded in a celebrated passage of the preface to +<i>Chérie</i>: "<i>La recherche du vrai en littérature, la résurrection de +l'art du XVIII<sup>e</sup> siècle, la victoire du japonisme.</i>" These words are the +words of Jules de Goncourt, but Edmond makes them his own. If the +brothers were entitled to claim—as they repeatedly claimed—to be held +for the leaders of these "three great literary and artistic movements of +the second half of the nineteenth century," it is clear that they were +justified in thinking that the future must reckon with them. It is +equally clear that, if their title proves good, their environment was +much less unfavourable than they assumed it to be.</p> + +<p>The conclusion is that their sublime egotism disabled them from forming +a judicial judgment on any question in which they were personally +concerned. They never attempted to reason, to compare, to balance; their +minds were filled with the vapour of tumultuous impressions which +condensed at different periods into dogmas, and were succeeded by fresh +condensations from the same source. But, amid all changes, their +self-esteem was constant. They had no hesitation in setting Dunant's +<i>Souvenir de Solférino</i> above the <i>Iliad</i>; but when Taine implied that +he was somewhat less interested in <i>Madame Gervaisais</i> than in the +writings of Santa Teresa, they were startled at his boldness. And, to +define their position more precisely, Edmond confidently declares (among +many other strange sayings) that the fifth act of <i>La Patrie en Danger</i> +contains scenes more dramatically poignant than anything in Shakespeare, +and that in <i>La Maison d'un Artiste au XIX<sup>e</sup> Siècle</i> he takes under his +control—though he candidly avows that none but himself suspects it—a +capital movement in the history of mankind. These are extremely high +pretensions, repeatedly renewed in one form or another—in prefaces, +manifestos, articles, letters, conversation, and, above all, in nine +invaluable volumes which consist of extracts from a diary covering a +period of over forty years. This extraordinary record incidentally +embodies the rough sketches of the Goncourts' finished work, but its +interest is far wider and more essentially characteristic. Other men +have written confessions, memoirs, reminiscences, by the score: mostly +books composed long after the events which they relate, recollections +revised, reviewed in the light of after events. The Goncourts are +perhaps alone in daring to unbosom themselves with an absolute sincerity +of their emotions, intentions, aims. If they come forth damaged from +such a trial, it is fair to remember that the test is unique, and that +no other writers have ever approached them in courage and in what they +most valued—truth: <i>la recherche du vrai en littérature</i>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>II</h2> + + +<p>A most authoritative critic, M. Brunetière, has laid it down that there +is more truth, more fidelity to the facts of actual life, in any single +romance by Ponson du Terrail or by Gaboriau than in all the works of the +Goncourts put together, and so long as we leave truth undefined, this +opinion may be as tenable as any other. But it may be well to observe at +the outset that the creative work of the Goncourts is not to be +condemned or praised <i>en bloc</i>, for the simple reason that it is not a +spontaneous, uniform product, but the resultant of diverse forces +varying in direction and intensity from time to time. They themselves +have recorded that there are three distinct stages in their intellectual +evolution. Beginning, under the influence of Heine and Poe, with purely +imaginative conceptions, they rebounded to the extremest point of +realism before determining on the intermediate method of presenting +realistic pictures in a poetic light. Pure imagination in the domain of +contemporary fiction seemed to them defective, inasmuch as its processes +are austerely logical, while life itself is compact of contradictions; +and their first reaction from it was entirely natural, on their own +principles. It remains to be seen what sense should be attached to the +formula—<i>la recherche du vrai en littérature</i>—in which they summarized +their position as regards their predecessors.</p> + +<p>Obviously we have to deal with a question of interpretation. The +Goncourts did not—could not—pretend that they were the first to +introduce truth into literature: they merely professed to have attained +it by a different route. The innovation for which they claimed credit is +a matter of method, of technique. Their deliberate purpose is to +surprise us by the fidelity of their studies, to captivate and convince +us by an accumulation of exact minutiæ: in a word, to prove that truth +is more interesting than fiction. So history should be written, and so +they wrote it. First and last, whatever form they chose, they remained +historians. Alleging the example set by Plutarch and Saint-Simon, they +make their histories of the eighteenth century a mine of anecdote, a +pageant of picturesque situations. State-papers, blue-books, ministerial +despatches, are in their view the conventional means used for +hoodwinking simpletons and forwarding the interests of a triumphant +faction. The most valuable historical material is, as they believed, to +be sought in the autograph letter. They held that the secret of the +craftiest intriguer will escape him, despite himself, in the expansion +of confidential correspondence. The research for such correspondence is +to be supplemented by the study of sculpture, paintings, engravings, +furniture, broadsides, bills—all of them indispensable for the +reconstruction of a past age and for the right understanding of its +psychology. But these means are simply complementary. The chief vehicle +of authentic truth is the autograph letter, and, though they professed +to hold the historical novel in abhorrence, they applied their +historical methods to their records of contemporary life. Thus we +inevitably arrive at the famous theory of the <i>document humain</i>—a +phrase received with much derision when first publicly used in the +preface to <i>La Faustin</i>, and a theory conscientiously adopted by many +later novelists. And here, again, it is important to realize the +restricted extent of the authors' claim.</p> + +<p>The Goncourts draw a broad, primary distinction between ancient and +modern literature: the first deals mainly with generalities, the second +with details. They then proceed to establish an analogous distinction +between novels written before and after Balzac's time, the modern novel +being based on <i>des documents racontés, ou relevés d'après nature</i>, +precisely as formal history is based on <i>des documents écrits</i>. But they +make no pretence of having initiated the revolution; their share was +limited to continuing Balzac's tradition, to enlarging the field of +observation, and especially to multiplying the instruments of research. +They declared that Gautier had, so to say, endowed literature with +vision; that Fromentin, in describing the silence of the desert, had +revealed the literary value of hearing; that with Zola, Loti—and they +might surely have added Maupassant—a fresh sense was brought into play: +<i>c'est le nez qui entre en scène</i>. Their personal contribution was their +nervous sensibility: <i>les premiers nous avons été les écrivains des +nerfs</i>. And they were prouder of this morbid quality than of their +talent. They were ever on the watch for fragments of talk caught up in +drawing-rooms, in restaurants, on omnibuses: ever ready to take notes at +death-beds, church, or taverns. Their life was one long pursuit of +<i>l'imprévu, le décousu, l'illogique du vrai</i>. These observations they +transcribed at night while the impression was still acute, and these +they utilized more or less deftly as they advanced towards what they +rightly thought to be the goal of art: the perfect adjustment of +proportion between the real and the imagined.</p> + +<p>It would seem that we are now in a position to judge the Goncourts by +their own standard. <i>Le dosage juste de la littérature et de la +vie</i>—this formula recurs in one shape or another as a leading +principle, and it is supplemented by other still more emphatic +indications which should serve to supply a test. Unhappily, with the +Goncourts these indications are unsystematic and even contradictory. The +elder brother has naturally no hesitation in saying that the highest +gift of any writer is his power of creating on paper real beings—<i>comme +des êtres créés par Dieu, et comme ayant eu une vraie vie sur la +terre</i>—and he is bold enough to add that Shakespeare himself has failed +to create more than two or three personages. He protests energetically +against the academic virtues, and insists on the importance of forming a +personal style which shall reproduce the vivacity, brio, and feverish +activity of the best talk. It is, then, all the more disconcerting to +learn from another passage in the <i>Journal</i> that the creation of +characters and the discovery of an original form of expression are +matters of secondary moment. The truth is that if the Goncourts had, as +they believed, something new to say, it was inevitable that they should +seek to invent a new manner of utterance. Renan was doubtless right in +thinking that they were absolutely without ideas on abstract subjects; +but they were exquisitely susceptible to every shade and tone of +concrete objects, and the endeavour to convey their innumerable +impressions taxed the resources of that French vocabulary on whose +relative poverty they so often insist. The reproaches brought against +them in the matter of verbal audacities by every prominent critic, from +Sainte-Beuve in one camp to Pontmartin in the other, are so many +testimonies to the fact that they were innovators—<i>apporteurs du +neuf</i>—and that their intrepidity cost them dear. Still their boldness +in this respect has been generally exaggerated. Setting out as imitators +of two such different models as Gautier and Jules Janin, they slowly +acquired an individual manner—the manner, say, of <i>Germinie Lacerteux</i> +or <i>Manette Salomon</i>—but they never attained the formula which they had +conceived as final. It was not given to them to realize their +ambition—to write novels which should not contain a single bookish +expression, plays which should reveal that hitherto undiscoverable +quantity—colloquial speech, raised to the level of consummate art. The +famous <i>écriture artiste</i> remained an unfulfilled ideal. The expression, +first used in the preface to <i>Les Frères Zemganno</i>, merely foreshadows a +possible development of style which shall come into being when realism +or naturalism, ceasing to describe the ignoble, shall occupy itself with +the attempt to render refinements, reticences, subtleties, and +half-tones of a more elusive order. It is an aspiration, a counsel of +perfection offered to a younger school by an artist in experiment, who +declares the quest to be beyond his powers. It is nothing more.</p> + +<p>Leaving on one side these questions of style and manner, it may safely +be said that in the novels of the Goncourts the characters are less +memorable, less interesting as individuals than as illustrations of an +epoch or types of a given social sphere. Charles Demailly, Madame +Gervaisais, Manette Salomon, Renée Mauperin, Sœur Philomène, are not so +much dramatic creations as figures around which is constituted the life +of a special <i>milieu</i>—the world of journalism, of Catholicism seen from +two opposite points of view, of artists, of the <i>bourgeoisie</i>, as the +case may be. There are in the best work of the Goncourts astonishingly +brilliant scenes; there is dialogue vivacious, witty, sparkling, to an +extraordinary degree. And this dialogue, as in <i>Charles Demailly</i>, is +not only supremely interesting, but intrinsically true to nature. It +could not well be otherwise, for the speeches assigned to Masson, +Lampérière, Remontville, Boisroger, and Montbaillard are, as often as +not, verbatim reports of paradoxes and epigrams thrown off a few hours +earlier by Théophile Gautier, Flaubert, Saint-Victor, Banville, and +Villemessant. But these flights, true and well worth preserving as they +are, fail to impress for the simple reason that they are mere exercises +in bravura delivered by men much less concerned with life than with +phrases, that they are allotted to subordinate characters, and that they +rather serve to diminish than to increase the interest in the central +figures. The Goncourts themselves are much less absorbed in life than in +writing about it: just as landscapes reminded them of pictures, so did +every other manifestation of existence present itself as a possible +subject for artistic treatment. They had been called the detectives of +history; they became detectives, inquisitors in real life, and, much as +they loathed the occupation, they never rested from their task of spying +and prying and "documentation." As with <i>Charles Demailly</i>, so with +their other books: each character is studied after nature with a grim, +revolting persistence. Their aunt, Mlle. de Courmont, is the model of +Mlle. de Varandeuil in <i>Germinie Lacerteux</i>; Germinie herself is drawn +from their old servant Rose, who had loved them, cheated them, blinded +them for half a lifetime; the Victor Chevassier who figures in <i>Quelques +créatures de ce temps</i> is sketched from their father's old political +ally, Colardez, at Breuvannes; the original of the Abbé Blampoix in +<i>Renée Mauperin</i> was the Abbé Caron; the painter Beaulieu and that +strange Bohemian Pouthier are both worked into <i>Manette Salomon</i>. And +the novel entitled <i>Madame Gervaisais</i> is an almost exact transcription +or record of the life of the authors' aunt, Mme. Nephthalie de Courmont: +a report so literal that in three hundred pages there are but two +trifling departures from the strictest historical truth.</p> + +<p>Mommsen himself has not excelled the Goncourts in conscientious +"documentation"; and yet, for all their care, their personages do not +abide in the memory as living beings. We do not see them as individuals, +but as types; and, strangely enough, the authors, despite the remarkable +skill with which they materialize many of their impressions, are +content to deliver their characters to us as so many illustrations of a +species. Thus Marthe Mance in <i>Charles Demailly</i> is <i>un type, +l'incarnation d'un âge, de son sexe et d'un rôle de son temps</i>; +Langibout is <i>le type pur de l'ancienne école</i>; Madame Gervaisais, too, +is <i>un exemple et un type</i> of the intellectual <i>bourgeoise</i> of +Louis-Philippe's time; Madame Mauperin is <i>le type</i> of the modern +<i>bourgeoise</i> mother; Renée is the type of the modern <i>bourgeoise</i> girl; +the Bourjots "represent" wealth; Denoisel is a Parisian—<i>ou plutôt +c'était le Parisien</i>. The Goncourts, in their endeavour to be more +precise, resort to odd combinations of conflicting elements. Within some +twenty pages Renée Mauperin is <i>une mélancolique tintamarresque</i>; the +adjectives <i>bourgeoise</i> and <i>diabolique</i> are used to characterize the +same thing; the Abbé Blampoix is at once "priest and lawyer, apostle and +diplomatist, Fénelon and M. de Foy." And the same types constantly +reappear. The physician Monterone in <i>Madame Gervaisais</i> is simply an +Italian version of Denoisel in <i>Renée Mauperin</i>; the Abbé Blampoix has +his counter-part in Father Giansanti; Honorine is Germinie, before the +fall; Nachette and Gautruche might be brothers. The procedure, too, is +almost invariable. The antecedents of each personage are given with +abundant detail. We have minute information as to the family history of +the Mauperins, the Villacourts, Germinie, Couturat, and the rest; and +the mention of Father Sibilla involves a brief account of the order of +Barefooted Trinitarians from January, 1198, to the spring of 1853! There +is a frequent repetition of the same idea with scarcely any verbal +change: <i>un dos d'amateur</i> in <i>Renée Mauperin</i> and <i>le dos du cocher</i> in +<i>Germinie Lacerteux</i>. And the possibilities of the human back were +evidently not exhausted, for at Christmas, 1882, Edmond de Goncourt +makes a careful note of the <i>dos de jeune fille du peuple</i>.</p> + +<p>It is by no means an accident that the most frequent theme of the +brothers is illness: the insanity of Demailly, the tortures of Germinie, +the consumption of Madame Gervaisais, the decay of Renée Mauperin, the +record of pain in <i>Sœur Philomène</i>, in <i>Les Frères Zemganno</i>, and in +other works of the Goncourts. Emotion in less tragic circumstances they +rarely convey; and when they attempt it they are prone to stumble into +an unimpressive sentimentalism. Their strength lay in pure observation, +not in the philosophic or psychological presentment of nature. For their +fine powers to have full play, it was necessary that they should deal +with things seen: in other words, that feeling should take a concrete +shape. Once this condition is fulfilled, they can focus their own +impressions and render them with unsurpassable skill. We shall find in +them nothing epic, nothing inventive on a grand scale: the +transfiguring, ennobling vision of the greatest creators was denied +them. But they remain consummate masters in their own restricted +province: delicate observers of externals, noting and remembering with +unmatched exactitude every detail of gesture, attitude, intonation, and +expression. The description of landscape—of the Bois de Vincennes in +<i>Germinie Lacerteux</i>, the Forest of Fontainebleau in <i>Manette Salomon</i>, +or of the Trastevere quarter in <i>Madame Gervaisais</i>—commonly affords +them an occasion for a triumph; but the description of prolonged malady +gives them a still greater opportunity. Nor is this due simply to the +fact that they, who had never known what it was to enjoy a day of +perfect health, spoke from an intimate knowledge of the subject. Each +landscape preserves at least its abstract idiosyncrasy; illness is an +essentially "typical" state in which individual characteristics diminish +till they finally disappear. And it is especially in the portraiture of +types, rather than of individuals, that the genius of the Goncourts +excels.</p> + +<p>In their own opinion, their initiative extended over a vast field and in +all directions. They seriously maintained that they were the first to +introduce the poor into French fiction, the first to awaken the +sentiment of pity for the wretched; they admitted the priority of +Dickens, but they apparently forgot that they had likewise been +anticipated by George Sand—that George Sand whose merits it took them +twenty years to recognise. They forgot, too, that compassion is +precisely the quality in which they were most lacking. Gavarni had +killed the sentiment of pity in them, and had communicated to them his +own mocking, sardonic spirit of inhumanity, his sinister delight in +every manifestation of cruelty, baseness, and pain. In their most candid +moods they confessed that they were all brain and no heart, that they +were without real affections; and their writings naturally suffer from +this unsympathetic attitude. But when every deduction is made, it is +impossible to deny their importance and significance. For they represent +a distinct stage in an organized movement—the reaction against +romanticism in the novel and lyrism in the theatre. And there is some +basis for their bold assertion that they led the way in every other +development of the modern French novel. They believed that they had +founded the naturalistic school in <i>Germinie Lacerteux</i>, the +psychological in <i>Madame Gervaisais</i>, the symbolic in <i>Les Frères +Zemganno</i>, and the satanic in <i>La Faustin</i>. It is unnecessary to +recognise all these claims in full: to discuss them at all, even if we +deny them, is to admit that the Goncourts were men of striking +intellectual force, of singular ambition, of exceptionally rich and +diverse gifts amounting, at times, to unquestionable genius. If they +were unsuccessful in their attempt to create an entire race of beings as +real as any on the planet, their superlative talent produced, in the +form of novels, invaluable studies of manners and customs, a brilliant +series of monographs on the social history of the nineteenth century. +And Daudet and M. Zola, and a dozen others whom it would be invidious to +name, may be accounted as in some sort their literary descendants.</p> + +<p>It is not unnatural that Edmond de Goncourt should have ended by +disliking the form of the novel, which he came to regard as an exhausted +convention. His pessimism was universal. Art was dying, literature was +perishing daily. The almost universal acceptance of Ibsen and of Tolstoi +was in itself a convincing symptom of degeneration, if the vogue of the +latter writer were not indeed the result of a cosmopolitan plot against +the native realistic school. It was some consolation to reflect that, +after all, there was more "philosophy" in Beaumarchais than in Ibsen; +that the name of Goncourt was held in honour by Scandinavians and Slavs. +Yet it could not be denied that, the world over, aristocracy of every +kind was breaking down. To the eyes of the surviving Goncourt all the +signs of a last great catastrophe grew visible. Mankind was ill, +half-mad, and on the road to become completely insane. There were +countless indications of intellectual and physical decadence. Sloping +shoulders were disappearing; the physique of the peasant was not what +it had been; good food was practically unattainable; in a hundred years +a man who had once tasted genuine meat would be pointed out as a +curiosity. The probability was, that within half a century there would +not be a man of letters in the world; the reporter, the interviewer, +would have taken possession. As it was, the younger generation of +readers no longer rallied to the Goncourts as it had rallied when +<i>Henriette Maréchal</i> was first replayed. The weary old man buried +himself in memoirs, biographies, books of travel; then turned to his +first loves—to Poe and Heine—and found that "we are all commercial +travellers compared to them." But, threatened as he was by blindness, +despairing as were his presentiments of what the future concealed, his +confidence in the durability of his fame and his brother's fame was +undimmed. There would always be the select few interested in two such +examples of the <i>littérateur bien né</i>. There would always be the +official historians of literature to take account of them as new, +perplexing, elemental forces. There would always be the curious who must +turn to the Goncourts for positive information. "Our romances," as the +brothers had noted forty years earlier, "will supply the greatest number +of facts and absolute truths to the moral history of this century." And +Edmond de Goncourt clung to the belief, ending, happily and +characteristically enough, by conceiving himself and his brother to be +"types," and the best of all types: <i>le type de l'honnête homme +littéraire, du persévérant dans ses convictions, et du contempteur de +l'argent</i>. The praise is deserved. It is a distinction of which greater +men might well be proud.</p> + +<p><span class="tocright"> +<span class="smcap">James Fitzmaurice-Kelly</span>.</span> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2><a name="BIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE" id="BIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE"></a>BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</h2> + + +<p><i>The Goncourts were the sons of a cavalry officer, commander of a +squadron in the Imperial army.</i> <span class="smcap">Edmond</span> <i>was born at Nancy, on the 26th +of May, 1822, and his brother</i> <span class="smcap">Jules</span> <i>in Paris, on the 17th of December, +1830. They were the grandsons of the deputy of the National Assembly of +1789, Huot de Goncourt. A very close friendship united the brothers from +their earliest youth, but it appears to have been in the younger that +the irresistible tendency to literature first displayed itself. They +were originally drawn almost exclusively to the study of the history of +art. They devoted themselves particularly to the close of the eighteenth +century, and in their earliest important volumes, "La Révolution dans +les Mœurs" (1854), "Histoire de la Société Française pendant la +Révolution" (1854), and "Pendant le Directoire" (1855), they invented a +new thing, the evolution of the history of an age from the objects and +articles of its social existence. They were encouraged to continue these +studies further, more definitely concentrating their observations around +individuals, and some very curious monographs—made up, as some one +said, of the detritus of history—were the result, "Une Voiture de +Masques," 1856; "Les Actrices (Armande)," 1856; "Sophie Arnauld," 1857. +The most ingenious efforts of the brothers in this direction were, +however, concentrated upon "Portraits Intimes du XVIII<sup>e</sup> Siècle," +1857-'58, and upon the "Histoire de Marie Antoinette," 1858.</i></p> + +<p><i>Towards 1860 the Goncourts closed their exclusively historical work, and +transferred their minute observation and excessively meticulous +treatment of small aspects of life to realistic romance. Their first +novel, "Les Hommes de Lettres," 1860 (now known as "Charles Demailly"), +showed some lack of ease in using the new medium, but it was followed by +"Sœur Philomène," 1861, one of the most finished of their fictions, and +this by "Renée Mauperin," 1864; "Germinie Lacerteux," 1864; "Manette +Salomon," 1867; and "Madame Gervaisais," 1869. Meanwhile, numerous +studies of the art of the bibelot appeared under the name of the two +Goncourts, and in particular their great work on "L'Art du XVIII<sup>e</sup> +Siècle," which began to be published in 1859, although not completed +until 1882. All this while, moreover, they were secretly composing their +splenetic "Journal." On the 20th of June, 1870, the fair companionship +was broken by the death of Jules de Goncourt, and for some years Edmond +did no more than complete and publish certain artistic works which had +been left unfinished. Of these, the most remarkable were, a monograph on +the life and work of Gavarni, 1873; a compilation called "L'Amour au +XVIII<sup>e</sup> Siècle," 1875; studies of the Du Barry, the Pompadour, and the +Duchess of Châteauroux, 1878-'79 (these three afterward united in one +volume as "Les Maîtresses de Louis XV"); and notes of a tour in Italy, +1894.</i></p> + +<p><i>Edmond de Goncourt, however, after several years of silence, returned +alone to the composition of prose romance. He published in 1877 "La +Fille Élisa," an ultra-realistic tragedy of low life. In 1878, in the +very curious story of two mountebanks, "Les Frères Zemganno," he +betrayed the secret of his own perennial sorrow. Two more novels, "La +Faustin," 1882, and "Chérie," the pathetic portrait of a spoiled child, +close the series of his works in fiction. He returned to a close +examination of the history of art, and published</i> catalogues raisonnés +<i>of the entire work of Watteau (1875) and of Prud'hon (1876). His latest +interests were centred around the classical Japanese designers, and he +published elaborate monographs on Outamaro (1891) and Hokousaï (1896). +In 1885 he collected the Letters of his brother Jules, and issued from +1887 to 1896, in nine volumes, as much as has hitherto been published of +the celebrated "Journal des Goncourts."</i></p> + +<p><i>Edmond de Goncourt died while on a visit to Alphonse Daudet, at +Champrosay, the country-house of the latter, on the 16th of July, 1896. +He left his considerable fortune, which included valuable collections of +bibelots, mainly for the purpose of endowing an Academy of Prose +Literature, in opposition to the French Academy. In spite of extreme +hostility from the members of his family, and innumerable legal +difficulties, this "Académie des Goncourts" was formed, on what seems to +be a secure basis, in 1901, and M. Joris Karl Huysmans was elected its +first president.</i></p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="Table of contents"> +<tr><td align='center'></td><td align='center'>PAGES</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Edmond and Jules de Goncourt</td><td align='right'><a href="#intro">v-xxix</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'><i>James Fitzmaurice-Kelly</i></td><td align='center'></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Lives of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt</td><td align='right'><a href="#BIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE">xxxi-xxxiii</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'><i>Edmund Gosse</i></td><td align='center'></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Renée Mauperin</td><td align='right'><a href="#RENEE_MAUPERIN">1-349</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>The Portraits of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt</td><td align='right'><a href="#THE_PORTRAITS_OF_EDMOND_AND_JULES_DE_GONCOURT">351-367</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'><i>Octave Uzanne</i></td><td align='center'></td></tr> +</table></div> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/vignette.png" alt="Putto holding a cup of wine" title="Vignette" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2><a name="RENEE_MAUPERIN" id="RENEE_MAUPERIN"></a>RENÉE MAUPERIN</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>I</h2> + + +<p>"You don't care about society, then, mademoiselle?"</p> + +<p>"You won't tell any one, will you?—but I always feel as though I've +swallowed my tongue when I go out. That's the effect society has on me. +Perhaps it is that I've had no luck. The young men I have met are all +very serious, they are my brother's friends—quotation young men, I call +them. As to the girls, one can only talk to them about the last sermon +they have heard, the last piece of music they have learned, or their +last new dress. Conversation with my contemporaries is somewhat +restricted."</p> + +<p>"And you live in the country all the year round, do you not?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but we are so near to Paris. Is the piece good they have just been +playing at the Opéra Comique? Have you seen it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's charming—the music is very fine. All Paris was at the first +night—I never go to the theatre except on first nights."</p> + +<p>"Just fancy, they never take me to any theatre except the Opéra Comique +and the Français, and only to the Français when there is a classical +piece on. I think they are terribly dull, classical pieces. Only to +think that they won't let me go to the Palais Royal! I read the pieces +though. I spent a long time learning 'The Mountebanks' by heart. You are +very lucky, for you can go anywhere. The other evening my sister and my +brother-in-law had a great discussion about the Opera Ball. Is it true +that it is quite impossible to go to it?"</p> + +<p>"Impossible? Well——"</p> + +<p>"I mean—for instance, if you were married, would you take your wife, +just once, to see it?"</p> + +<p>"If I were married I would not even take——"</p> + +<p>"Your mother-in-law. Is that what you were going to say? Is it so +dreadful—really?"</p> + +<p>"Well, in the first place, the company is——"</p> + +<p>"Variegated? I know what that's like. But then it's the same everywhere. +Every one goes to the Marche and the company is mixed enough there. One +sees ladies, who are rather queer, drinking champagne in their +carriages. Then, too, the Bois de Boulogne! How dull it is to be a +<i>young person</i>, don't you think so?"</p> + +<p>"What an idea! Why should it be? On the contrary, it seems to me——"</p> + +<p>"I should like to see you in my place. You would soon find out what a +bore it is to be always proper. We are allowed to dance, but do you +imagine that we can talk to our partner? We may say 'Yes,' 'No,' 'No,' +'Yes,' and that's all! We must always keep to monosyllables, as that is +considered proper. You see how delightful our existence is. And for +everything it is just the same. If we want to be very proper we have to +act like simpletons; and for my part I cannot do it. Then we are +supposed to stop and prattle to persons of our own sex. And if we go off +and leave them and are seen talking to men instead—oh, well, I've had +lectures enough from mamma about that! Reading is another thing that is +not at all proper. Until two years ago I was not allowed to read the +serials in the newspaper, and now I have to skip the crimes in the news +of the day, as they are not quite proper.</p> + +<p>"Then, too, with the accomplishments we are allowed to learn, we must +not go beyond a certain average. We may learn duets and pencil drawing, +but if we want anything more, why, it's affectation on our part. I go in +for oil-painting, for instance, and that is the despair of my family. I +ought only to paint roses and in water-colours. There's quite a current +here, though, isn't there? I can scarcely stand."</p> + +<p>This was said in an arm of the Seine just between Briche and the Île +Saint Denis. The girl and the young man who were conversing were in the +water. They had been swimming until they were tired, and now, carried +along by the current, they had caught hold of a rope which was fastened +to one of the large boats stationed along the banks of the island. The +force of the water rocked them both gently at the end of the tight, +quivering rope. They kept sinking and then rising again. The water was +beating against the young girl's breast; it filled out her woollen +bathing-dress right up to the neck, while from behind little waves kept +dashing over her which a moment later were nothing but dewdrops hanging +from her ears.</p> + +<p>She was rather higher up than the young man and had her arms out of the +water, her wrists turned round in order to hold the rope more firmly, +and her back against the black wood of the boat. Instinctively she kept +drawing back as the young man, swayed by the strong current, approached +her. Her whole attitude, as she shrank back, suspended from the rope, +reminded one of those sea goddesses which sculptors carve upon galleys. +A slight tremor, caused partly by the cold and partly by the movement of +the river, gave her something of the undulation of the water.</p> + +<p>"Ah, now this, for instance," she continued, "cannot be at all +proper—to be swimming here with you. If we were at the seaside it would +be quite different. We should have just the same bathing costumes as +these, and we should come out of a bathing-van just as we have come out +of the house. We should have walked across the beach just as we have +walked along the river bank, and we should be in the water to the same +depth, absolutely like this. The waves would roll us about as this +current does, but it would not be the same thing at all; simply because +the Seine water is not proper! Oh, dear! I'm getting so hungry—are +you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I fancy I shall do justice to dinner."</p> + +<p>"Ah! I warn you that I eat."</p> + +<p>"Really, mademoiselle?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, there is nothing poetical about me at meal-times. If you imagine +that I have no appetite you are quite mistaken. You are in the same club +as my brother-in-law, are you not?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I am in M. Davarande's club."</p> + +<p>"Are there many married men in it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, a great many."</p> + +<p>"How odd! I cannot understand why a man marries. If I had been a man it +seems to me that I should never have thought of marrying."</p> + +<p>"Fortunately you are a woman."</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes, that's another of our misfortunes, we women cannot stay +unmarried. But will you tell me why a man joins a club when he is +married?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, one has to be in a club—especially in Paris. Every man of any +standing—if only for the sake of going in there for a smoke."</p> + +<p>"What! do you mean to say that there are any wives nowadays without +smoking-rooms? Why, I would allow—yes, I would allow a halfpenny pipe!"</p> + +<p>"Have you any neighbours?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, we don't visit much. There are the Bourjots at Sannois, we go there +sometimes."</p> + +<p>"Ah, the Bourjots! But, here, there cannot be any one to visit."</p> + +<p>"Oh, there's the curé. Ha! ha! the first time he dined with us he drank +the water in his finger-bowl! Oh, I ought not to tell you that, it's too +bad of me—and he's so kind. He's always bringing me flowers."</p> + +<p>"You ride, don't you, mademoiselle? That must be a delightful recreation +for you."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I love riding. It is my one pleasure. It seems to me that I could +not do without that. What I like above everything is hunting. I was +brought up to that in the part of the world where papa used to live. I'm +desperately fond of it. I was seven hours one day in my saddle without +dismounting."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I know what it is—I go hunting every year in the Perche with M. de +Beaulieu's hounds. You've heard of his pack, perhaps; he had them over +from England. Last year we had three splendid runs. By-the-bye, you have +the Chantilly meets near here."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I go with papa, and we never miss one. When we were all together +at the last meet there were quite forty horses, and you know how it +excites them to be together. We started off at a gallop, and you can +imagine how delightful it was. It was the day we had such a magnificent +sunset in the pool. Oh, the fresh air, and the wind blowing through my +hair, and the dogs and the bugles and the trees flying along before +you—it makes you feel quite intoxicated! At such moments I'm so brave, +oh, so brave!"</p> + +<p>"Only at such moments, mademoiselle?"</p> + +<p>"Well—yes—only on horseback. On foot, I own, I am very frightened at +night; then, too, I don't like thunder at all—and—well, I'm very +delighted that we shall be three persons short for dinner this evening."</p> + +<p>"But why, mademoiselle?"</p> + +<p>"We should have been thirteen! I should have done the meanest things for +the sake of getting a fourteenth—as you would have seen. Ah, here comes +my brother with Denoisel; they'll bring us the boat. Do look how +beautiful it all is from here, just at this time!"</p> + +<p>She glanced round, as she spoke, at the Seine, the river banks on each +side, and the sky. Small clouds were sporting and rolling along in the +horizon. They were violet, gray, and silvery, just tipped with flashes +of white, which looked like the foam of the sea touching the lower part +of the sky.</p> + +<p>Above them rose the heavens infinite and blue, profound and clear, +magnificent and just turning paler as they do at the hour when the +stars are beginning to kindle behind the daylight. Higher up than all +hung two or three clouds stretching over the landscape, heavy-looking +and motionless.</p> + +<p>An immense light fell over the water, lying dormant here, flashing +there, making the silvery streaks in the shadow of the boats tremble, +touching up a mast or a rudder, or resting on the orange-coloured +handkerchief or pink jacket of a washerwoman. The country, the outskirts +of the town, and the suburbs all met together on both sides of the +river. There were rows of poplar trees to be seen between the houses, +which were few and far between, as at the extreme limit of a town.</p> + +<p>Then there were small, tumble-down cottages, inclosure's planked round, +gardens, green shutters, wine-trade signs painted in red letters, acacia +trees in front of the doors, old summer arbors giving way on one side, +bits of walls dazzlingly white, then some straight rows of +manufactories, brick buildings with tile and zinc-covered roofs, and +factory bells. Smoke from the various workshops mounted straight upward +and the shadow of it fell in the water like the shadows of so many +columns.</p> + +<p>On one stack was written "Tobacco," and on a plaster façade could be +read "Doremus Labiche, Boats for Hire."</p> + +<p>Over a canal which was blocked up with barges, a swing-bridge lifted +its two black arms in the air. Fishermen were throwing and drawing in +their lines. The sound of wheels could be heard, carts were coming and +going. Towing-ropes scraped along the road, which was hard, rough, +black, and dyed all colours by the unloading of coal, mineral refuse, +and chemicals.</p> + +<p>From the candle, glucose, and fecula manufactories and sugar-refining +works which were scattered along the quay, surrounded by patches of +verdure, there was a vague odour of tallow and sugar which was carried +away by the emanations from the water and the smell of tar. The noise +from the foundries and the whistle of steam engines kept breaking the +silence of the river.</p> + +<p>It was like Asnières, Saardam, and Puteaux combined, one of those +Parisian landscapes on the banks of the Seine such as Hervier paints, +foul and yet radiant, wretched yet gay, popular and full of life, where +Nature peeps out here and there between the buildings, the work and the +commerce, like a blade of grass held between a man's fingers.</p> + +<p>"Isn't it beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"Well, to tell the truth, I am not in raptures about it. It's +beautiful—in a certain degree."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, it is beautiful. I assure you that it is very beautiful +indeed. About two years ago at the Exhibition there was an effect of +this kind. I don't remember the picture exactly, but it was just this. +There are certain things that I feel——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you have an artistic temperament, mademoiselle."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed the young girl, with a comic intonation, plunging +forthwith into the water. When she appeared again she began to swim +towards the boat which was advancing to meet her. Her hair had come +down, and was all wet and floating behind her. She shook it, sprinkling +the drops of water all round.</p> + +<p>Evening was drawing near and rosy streaks were coming gradually into the +sky. A breath was stirring over the river, and at the tops of the trees +the leaves were quivering. A small windmill, which served for a sign +over the door of a tavern, began to turn round.</p> + +<p>"Well, Renée, how have you enjoyed the water?" asked one of the rowers +as the young girl reached the steps placed at the back of the boat.</p> + +<p>"Oh, very much, thanks, Denoisel," she answered.</p> + +<p>"You are a nice one," said the other man, "you swim out so far—I began +to get uneasy. And what about Reverchon? Ah, yes, here he is."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>II</h2> + + +<p>Charles Louis Mauperin was born in 1787. He was the son of a barrister +who was well known and highly respected throughout Lorraine and Barrois, +and at the age of sixteen he entered the military school at +Fontainebleau. He became sublieutenant in the Thirty-fifth Regiment of +infantry, and afterward, as lieutenant in the same corps, he signalized +himself in Italy by a courage which was proof against everything. At +Pordenone, although wounded, surrounded by a troop of the enemy's +cavalry and challenged to lay down arms, he replied to the challenge by +giving the command to charge the enemy, by killing with his own hand one +of the horsemen who was threatening him and opening a passage with his +men, until, overcome by numbers and wounded on the head by two more +sword-thrusts, he fell down covered with blood and was left on the field +for dead.</p> + +<p>After being captain in the Second Regiment of the Mediterranean, he +became captain aide-de-camp to General Roussel d'Hurbal, went through +the Russian campaign with him, and was shot through the right shoulder +the day after the battle of Moscow.</p> + +<p>In 1813, at the age of twenty-six, he was an officer of the Legion of +Honour and major in the army. He was looked upon as one of the +commanding officers with the most brilliant prospects, when the battle +of Waterloo broke his sword for him and dashed his hopes to the ground.</p> + +<p>He was put on half-pay, and, with Colonel Sauset and Colonel Maziau, he +entered into the Bonapartist conspiracy of the <i>Bazar français</i>.</p> + +<p>Condemned to death by default, as a member of the managing committee, by +the Chamber of Peers, constituted into a court of justice, he was +concealed by his friends and shipped off to America.</p> + +<p>On the voyage, not knowing how to occupy his active mind, he studied +medicine with one of his fellow-passengers who intended taking his +degree in America, and on arriving, Mauperin passed the necessary +examinations with him. After spending two years in the United States, +thanks to the friendship and influence of some of his former comrades, +who had been taken again into active service, he obtained pardon and was +allowed to return to France.</p> + +<p>He went back to the little town of Bourmont, to the old home where his +mother was still living. This mother was one of those excellent old +ladies so frequently met with in the provincial France of the eighteenth +century. She was gay, witty, and fond of her glass of wine. Her son +adored her, and on finding her ill and under doctor's orders to avoid +all stimulants, he at once gave up wine, liqueurs, and coffee for her +sake, thinking that it would be easier for her to abstain if he shared +her privations. It was in compliance with her request, and by way of +humouring her sick fancies, that he married a cousin for whom he had no +especial liking. His mother had selected this wife for her son on +account of a joint claim to certain land, fields which touched each +other, and all the various considerations which tend to unite families +and blend together fortunes in the provinces.</p> + +<p>After the death of his mother, the narrow life in the little town, which +had no further attraction for him, seemed irksome, and, as he was not +allowed to dwell in Paris, M. Mauperin sold his house and land in +Bourmont, with the exception of a farm at Villacourt, and went to live +with his young wife on a large estate which he bought in the heart of +Bassigny, at Morimond. There were the remains of a large abbey, a piece +of land worthy of the name which the monks had given +it—"<i>Mort-au-monde</i>"—a wild, magnificent bit of Nature with a pool of +some hundred acres or more and a forest of venerable oak trees; meadows +with canals of freestone where the spring-tide flowed along under bowers +of trees, a veritable wilderness where the vegetation had been left to +itself since the Revolution; springs babbling along in the shade; wild +flowers, cattle-tracks, the remains of a garden and the ruins of +buildings. Here and there a few stones had survived. The door was still +to be seen, and the benches were there on which the beggars used to sit +while taking their soup; here the apse of a roofless chapel and there +the seven foundations of walls <i>à la Montreuil</i>. The pavilion at the +entrance, built at the beginning of the last century, was all that was +still standing; it was complete and almost intact.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin took up his abode in this and lived there until 1830, +solitary and entirely absorbed in his studies. He gave himself up to +reading, educating himself on all subjects, and reaping knowledge in +every direction. He was familiar with all the great historians, +philosophers, and politicians, and was thoroughly master of the +industrial sciences. He only left his books when he felt the need of +fresh air, and then he would rest his brain and tire his body with long +walks of some fifteen miles across the fields and through the woods.</p> + +<p>Every one was accustomed to see him walk like this, and the country +people recognised him in the distance by his step, his long frock-coat, +all buttoned up, his officer's gait, his head always slightly bent, and +the stick, made from a vine-stalk, which he used as a cane. The only +break in his secluded and laborious life was at election time. M. +Mauperin then put in an appearance everywhere from one end of the +department to the other. He drove about the country in a trap, and his +soldierly voice could be heard rousing the electors to enthusiasm at all +their meetings; he gave the word of command for the charge on the +Government candidates, and to him all this was like war once more.</p> + +<p>When the election was over he left Chaumont and returned to his regular +routine and to the obscure tranquility of his studies.</p> + +<p>Two children had come to him—a boy in 1826 and a girl in 1827. After +the Revolution of 1830 he was elected deputy. When he took his seat in +the chamber, his American ideas and theories were very much like those +of Armand Carrel. His animated speeches—brusque, martial, and full of +feeling—made quite a sensation. He became one of the inspirers of the +<i>National</i> after being one of its first shareholders, and he suggested +articles attacking the budget and the finances.</p> + +<p>The Tuileries made advances to him; some of his former comrades, who +were now aides-de-camp under the new king, sounded him with the promise +of a high military position, a generalship in the army, or some honour +for which he was still young enough. He refused everything point-blank. +In 1832 he signed the protestation of the deputies of the Opposition +against the words "Subjects of the King," which had been pronounced by +M. de Montalivet, and he fought against this system until 1835.</p> + +<p>That year his wife presented him with a child, a little girl whose +arrival stirred him to the depths of his being. His other two children +had merely given him a calm joy, a happiness without any gaiety. +Something had always seemed wanting—just that something which brightens +a father's life and makes the home ring with laughter.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin loved his two children, but he did not adore them. The fond +father had hoped to delight in them, and he had been disappointed. +Instead of the son he had dreamed of—a regular boy, a mischievous +little urchin, one of those handsome little dare-devils with whom an old +soldier could live over again his own youth and hear once more, as it +were, the sound of gunpowder—M. Mauperin had to do with a most rational +sort of a child, a little boy who was always good, "quite a young lady," +as he said himself. This had been a great trouble to him, as he felt +almost ashamed to have, as his son and heir, this miniature man who did +not even break his toys.</p> + +<p>With his daughter, M. Mauperin had had the same disappointment. She was +one of those little girls who are women when they are born, and who play +with their parents merely to amuse them. She scarcely had any childhood, +and at the age of five, if a gentleman called to see her father, she +always ran away to wash her hands. She would be kissed on certain +spots, and she seemed to dread being ruffled or inconvenienced by a +father's caresses and love.</p> + +<p>Thus repelled, M. Mauperin's affection, so long hoarded up, went out to +the cradle of the little newcomer whom he had named Renée after his +mother. He spent whole days with his little baby-girl in divine +nonsense. He would keep taking off her little cap to look at her silky +hair, and he taught her to make grimaces which charmed him. He would lie +down beside her on the floor when she was rolling about half naked with +all a child's delightful unconsciousness. In the night he would get up +to look at her asleep, and would pass hours listening to this first +breath of life, so like the respiration of a flower. When she woke up he +would be there to have her first smile—that smile of little girl-babies +which comes from out of the night as though from Paradise. His happiness +kept changing into perfect bliss; it seemed to him that the child he +loved so much was a little angel from heaven.</p> + +<p>What joy he had with her at Morimond! He would wheel her all round the +house in a little carriage, and at every few steps turn round to look at +her screaming with laughter, with the sunshine playing on her cheeks, +and her little supple, pink foot curled up in her hand. Or he would take +her with him when he went for a walk, and would go as far as a village +and let the child throw kisses to the people who bowed to him, or he +would enter one of the farm-houses and show his daughter's teeth with +great pride. On the way, the child would often go to sleep in his arms, +as she did with her nurse. At other times he would take her into the +forest, and there, under the trees full of robin-redbreasts and +nightingales, towards the end of the day when there are voices overhead +in the woods, he would experience the most unutterable joy on hearing +the child, impressed by the noises around, try to imitate the sounds, +and to murmur and prattle as though she were answering the birds and +speaking to the singing heavens.</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin had not given this last daughter so hearty a welcome. She +was a good wife and mother, but Mme. Mauperin was eaten up with that +pride peculiar to the provinces—namely, the pride of money. She had +made all her arrangements for two children, but the third one was not +welcome, as it would interfere with the pecuniary affairs of the other +two, and, above all, would infringe on her son's share. The division of +land which was now one estate, the partition of wealth which had +accumulated, and in consequence the lowering of social position in the +future and of the importance of the family—all this was what the second +little daughter represented to her mother.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin very soon had no more peace. The mother was constantly +attacking the politician, and reminding the father that it was his duty +to sacrifice himself to the interests of his children. She endeavoured +to separate him from his friends and to make him forsake his party and +his fidelity to his ideas. She made fun of what she called his +tomfoolery, which prevented him from turning his position to account. +Every day there were fresh attacks and reproaches until he was fairly +haunted by them; it was the terrible battle of all that is most prosaic +against the conscience of a Deputy of the Opposition. Finally, M. +Mauperin asked his wife for two months' truce for reflection, as he, +too, would have liked his beloved Renée to be rich. At the end of the +two months he sent his resignation in to the Chamber and opened a +sugar-refinery at Briche.</p> + +<p>That had been twenty years ago. The children had grown up and the +business was thriving. M. Mauperin had done very well with his refinery. +His son was a barrister, his elder daughter married, and Renée's dowry +was waiting for her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>III</h2> + + +<p>Every one had gone into the house, and in a corner of the drawing-room, +with its chintz hangings gay with bunches of wild flowers, Henri +Mauperin, Denoisel, and Reverchon were talking. Near to the +chimney-piece, Mme. Mauperin, with great demonstrations of affection, +was greeting her son-in-law and daughter, M. and Mme. Davarande, who had +just arrived. She felt obliged on this occasion to make a display of +family feeling and to exhibit her motherly love.</p> + +<p>The greeting between Mme. Mauperin and Mme. Davarande was scarcely over +when a little old gentleman entered the drawing-room quietly, wished +Mme. Mauperin good-evening with his eyes as he passed, and walked +straight across to the group where Denoisel was.</p> + +<p>This little gentleman wore a dress-coat and had white whiskers. He was +carrying a portfolio under his arm.</p> + +<p>"Do you know that?" he asked Denoisel, taking him into a window recess +and half opening his folio.</p> + +<p>"That? I should just think I do. It's the 'Mysterious Swing,' an +engraving after Lavrience's."</p> + +<p>The little old gentleman smiled.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but look," he said, and he half opened his portfolio again, but in +such a way that Denoisel could only just see inside.</p> + +<p>"'Before letters.' It's a proof before letters! Can you see?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly."</p> + +<p>"And margins!—a gem, isn't it? They didn't give it me, I can tell you, +the thieves! It was run up—and by a woman, too!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, of course!"</p> + +<p>"A <i>cocotte</i>, who asked to see it every time I went any higher. The +rascal of an auctioneer kept saying, 'Pass it to the lady.' At last I +got it for five pounds eight. Oh, I wouldn't have paid one halfpenny +more."</p> + +<p>"I should think not! If I had only known—why, there's a proof like +that, exactly like it, at Spindler's, the artist's—and with larger +margins, too. He does not care about Louis Seize things, Spindler. If I +had only asked him!"</p> + +<p>"Good heavens!—and before letters, like mine? Are you quite sure?"</p> + +<p>"Before letters—before—Oh, yes, it's an earlier one than yours. It's +before—" and Denoisel whispered something to the old man which brought +a flush of pleasure to his face and a moisture to his lips.</p> + +<p>Just at this moment M. Mauperin entered the drawing-room with his +daughter. She was leaning on his arm, her head slightly thrown back in +an indolent way, rubbing her hair against the sleeve of her father's +coat as a child does when it is being carried.</p> + +<p>"How are you?" she said as she kissed her sister. She then held her +forehead to her mother's lips, shook hands with her brother-in-law, and +ran across to the little man with the portfolio.</p> + +<p>"Can I see, god-papa?"</p> + +<p>"No, little girl, you are not grown-up enough yet," he replied, patting +her cheek in an affectionate way.</p> + +<p>"Ah, it's always like that with the things you buy!" said Renée, turning +her back on the old man, who tied up the ribbon of his portfolio with +the special little bow so familiar to the fingers of print collectors.</p> + +<p>"Well, what's this I hear?" suddenly exclaimed Mme. Mauperin, turning to +her daughter.</p> + +<p>Reverchon was sitting next her, so near that her dress touched him every +time she moved.</p> + +<p>"You were both carried away by the current," she continued. "It was +dangerous, I am sure! Oh, that river! I really cannot understand how M. +Mauperin allows——"</p> + +<p>"Mme. Mauperin," replied her husband, who was by the table looking +through an album with his daughter, "I do not allow anything—I +tolerate——"</p> + +<p>"Coward!" whispered Renée to her father.</p> + +<p>"I assure you, mamma, there was no danger," put in Henri Mauperin. +"There was no danger at all. They were just slightly carried along by +the current, and they preferred holding on to a boat to going half a +mile or so lower down the river. That was all! You see——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you comfort me," said Mme. Mauperin, the serenity of her expression +gradually returning at her son's words. "I know you are so prudent, but, +you see, M. Reverchon, our dear Renée is so foolish that I am always +afraid. Oh, dear, there are drops of water on her hair now. Come here +and let me brush them off."</p> + +<p>"M. Dardouillet!" announced a servant.</p> + +<p>"A neighbour of ours," said Mme. Mauperin in a low voice to Reverchon.</p> + +<p>"Well, and where are you now?" asked M. Mauperin, as he shook hands with +the new arrival.</p> + +<p>"Oh, we are getting on—we are getting on—three hundred stakes done +to-day."</p> + +<p>"Three hundred?"</p> + +<p>"Three hundred—I fancy it won't be bad. From the green-house, you see, +I am going straight along as far as the water, on account of the view. +Fourteen or sixteen inches of slope—not more. If we were on the spot I +shouldn't have to explain. On the other side, you know, I shall raise +the path about three feet. When all that's done, M. Mauperin, do you +know that there won't be an inch of my land that will not have been +turned over?"</p> + +<p>"But when shall you plant anything, M. Dardouillet?" asked Mlle. +Mauperin. "For the last three years you have only had workmen in your +garden; sha'n't you have a few trees in some day?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, as to trees, mademoiselle, that's nothing. There's plenty of time +for all that. The most important thing is the plan of the ground, the +hills and slopes, and then afterward trees—if we want them."</p> + +<p>Some one had just come in by a door leading from another room. He had +bowed as he entered, but no one had seen him, and he was there now +without any one noticing him. He had an honest-looking face and a head +of hair like a pen-wiper. It was M. Mauperin's cashier, M. Bernard.</p> + +<p>"We are all here; has M. Bernard come down? Ah, that's right!" said M. +Mauperin on seeing him. "Suppose we have dinner, Mme. Mauperin, these +young people must be hungry."</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>The solemnity of the first few moments when the appetite is keen had +worn off, and the buzz of conversation could be heard in place of the +silence with which a dinner usually commences, and which is followed by +the noise of spoons in the soup plates.</p> + +<p>"M. Reverchon," began Mme. Mauperin. She had placed the young man by +her, in the seat of honour, and she was amiability itself, as far as he +was concerned. She was most attentive to him and most anxious to please. +Her smile covered her whole face, and even her voice was not her +every-day voice, but a high-pitched one which she assumed on state +occasions. She kept glancing from the young man to his plate and from +his plate to a servant. It was a case of a mother angling for a +son-in-law. "M. Reverchon, we met a lady just recently whom you +know—Mme. de Bonnières. She spoke so highly of you—oh, so highly!"</p> + +<p>"I had the honour of meeting Mme. de Bonnières in Italy—I was even +fortunate enough to be able to render her a little service."</p> + +<p>"Did you save her from brigands?" exclaimed Renée.</p> + +<p>"No, it was much less romantic than that. Mme. de Bonnières had some +difficulty about the bill at her hotel. She was alone and I prevented +her from being robbed."</p> + +<p>"It was a case of robbers, anyhow, then," said Renée.</p> + +<p>"One might write a play on the subject," put in Denoisel, "and it would +be quite a new plot—the reduction of a bill leading to a marriage. +What a good title, too, 'The Romance of an Awkward Moment, <i>à la</i> +Rabelais!'"</p> + +<p>"Mme. de Bonnières is a very nice woman," continued Mme. Mauperin. "I +like her face. Do you know her, M. Barousse?" she asked, turning to +Renée's godfather.</p> + +<p>"Yes, she is very pleasant."</p> + +<p>"Oh! why, god-papa, she's like a satyr!" exclaimed Renée.</p> + +<p>When the word was out some of the guests smiled, and the young girl, +turning red, hastened to add: "I only mean she has a face like one."</p> + +<p>"That's what I call mending matters!" said Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"Did you stay long in Italy, monsieur?" asked M. Mauperin, by way of +changing the subject.</p> + +<p>"Six months."</p> + +<p>"And what did you think of it?"</p> + +<p>"It's very interesting, but one has so much discomfort there. I never +could get used to drinking coffee out of glasses."</p> + +<p>"Italy is the most wretched place to go to; it is the least practical of +all places," said Henri Mauperin. "What a state agriculture is in +there—and trade, too! One day in Florence at a masked ball I asked the +waiter at a restaurant if they would be open all night. 'Oh, no, sir,' +he said, 'we should have too many people here.' That's a fact, I heard +it myself, and that shows you what the country is. When one thinks of +England, of that wonderful initiative power of individuals and of the +whole nation, too; when one has seen the business genius of the London +citizen and the produce of a Yorkshire farm—Oh, a fine nation that!"</p> + +<p>"I agree with Henri," said Mme. Davarande, "there is something so +distinguished about England. I like the politeness of the English +people, and I approve of their way of always introducing people. Then, +too, they wrap your change up in paper—and some of their dress +materials have quite a style of their own. My husband bought me a poplin +dress at the Exposition—Oh, mamma, I have quite decided about my cloak. +I was at Alberic's—it's most amusing. He lets one of the girls put a +cloak over your shoulders and then he walks round you and just marks +with an ebony ruler the places where it does not fit; he scarcely +touches you with it, but just gives little taps—like that—and the girl +marks each tap with chalk. Oh, he certainly has a lot of character, that +Alberic! And then he's the only one—there isn't another place—he has +such good style for cloaks. I recognised two of his yesterday at the +races. He is very expensive though."</p> + +<p>"Oh, those people get what they like to ask," said Reverchon. "My +tailor, Edouard, has just retired—he's made over a hundred thousand +pounds."</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, quite right," remarked M. Barousse. "I'm always very glad +when I see things like that. The workers get the money nowadays—that's +just what it is. It's the greatest revolution since the beginning of the +world."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Denoisel, "a revolution that makes one think of the words of +Chapon, the celebrated thief: 'Robbery, Monsieur le Président, is the +principal trade of the world!'"</p> + +<p>"Were the races good?" asked Renée.</p> + +<p>"Well, there were plenty of people," answered Mme. Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Very good, mademoiselle," said Reverchon. "The Diana prize especially +was very well run. Plume de coq, that they reckoned at thirty-five, was +beaten by Basilicate by two lengths. It was very exciting. The hacks was +a very good race, too, although the ground was rather hard."</p> + +<p>"Who is the Russian lady who drives four-in-hand, M. Reverchon?" asked +Mme. Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Mme. de Rissleff. She has some splendid horses, some thoroughbred +Orloffs."</p> + +<p>"You ought to join the Jockey Club, Jules, for the races," said Mme. +Davarande, turning to her husband. "I think it is so common to be with +everybody. Really if one has any respect for one's self—a woman I +mean—there is no place but the jockey stand."</p> + +<p>"Ah, a mushroom patty!" exclaimed M. Barousse. "Your cook is surpassing +herself, she really is a veritable <i>cordon-bleu</i>. I shall have to pay +her my compliments before leaving."</p> + +<p>"I thought you never eat that dish," said Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"I did not eat it in 1848—and I did not eat it up to the second of +December. Do you think the police had time then to inspect mushrooms? +But now that there is order again."</p> + +<p>"Henriette," said Mme. Mauperin to Mme. Davarande, "I must scold your +husband. He neglects us. We have not seen you for three weeks, M. +Davarande."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear mother, if you only knew all I have had to do! You know I +am on very good terms with Georges. His father has his time taken up at +the Chamber and the business falls on Georges as principal. There are +hundreds of things that he can only trust to people in whom he has +confidence—friends, in fact. There was that big affair—that <i>début</i> at +the Opéra. There was no end of interviews and parleyings and journeys +backward and forward. It would not have done to have had any strife +between the two ministries. Oh, we have been very busy lately. He is so +considerate that I could not——"</p> + +<p>"So considerate?" put in Denoisel. "He might pay your cab-fares at +least. It's more than two years since he promised you a +sub-prefectship."</p> + +<p>"My dear Denoisel, it's more difficult than you imagine. And then, too, +when one does not care about going too far from Paris. Besides, between +ourselves, I can tell you that it's almost arranged. In about a month +from now I have every reason to believe——"</p> + +<p>"What <i>début</i> were you speaking of?" asked Barousse.</p> + +<p>"Bradizzi's," answered Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Bradizzi! Isn't she astounding!" said Reverchon. "She has some runs +that are wonderfully light. The other day I was in the manager's box on +the stage and we couldn't hear her touch the ground when she was +dancing."</p> + +<p>"We expected to see you yesterday evening, Henri," said Mme. Davarande +to her brother.</p> + +<p>"Yesterday I was at my lecture," he answered.</p> + +<p>"Henri has been appointed reporter," said Mme. Mauperin proudly.</p> + +<p>"Ah," put in Denoisel, "the d'Aguesseau lecture? That's still going on +then, your speechifying affair? How many are there in it?"</p> + +<p>"Two hundred."</p> + +<p>"And all statesmen? It's quite alarming. What were you to report on?"</p> + +<p>"A law that was proposed with reference to the National Guard."</p> + +<p>"You go in for everything," said Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"I am sure you do not belong to the National Guard, Denoisel?" observed +M. Barousse.</p> + +<p>"No, indeed!"</p> + +<p>"And yet it is an institution."</p> + +<p>"The drums affirm that it is that, M. Barousse."</p> + +<p>"And you do not vote either, I would wager?"</p> + +<p>"I would not vote under any pretext."</p> + +<p>"Denoisel, I am sorry to say so, but you are a bad citizen. You were +born as you are, I am not blaming you, but the fact remains——"</p> + +<p>"A bad citizen—what do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you are always in opposition to the laws."</p> + +<p>"I am?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you are. Without going any farther back, take for instance the +money you came into from your Uncle Frédéric. You handed it over to his +illegitimate children——"</p> + +<p>"What of that?"</p> + +<p>"Well, that is what I call an illegal action, most deplorable and +blameworthy. What does the law mean? It is quite clear—the law means +that children not born in wedlock should not be able to inherit their +father's money. You were not ignorant of this, for I told you that it +was so; your lawyer told you and the code told you. What did you do? +Why, you let the children have the money. You ignored the code, the +spirit of the law, everything. To give up your uncle's fortune in that +way, Denoisel, was rendering homage to low morals. It was simply +encouraging——"</p> + +<p>"I know your principles in the matter, M. Barousse. But what was I to +do? When I saw those three poor lads I said to myself that I should +never enjoy the cigars I smoked with their bread-money. No one is +perfect——"</p> + +<p>"All that is not law. When there is a law there is some reason for it, +is there not? The law is against immorality. Suppose others imitated +you——"</p> + +<p>"You need not fear that, Barousse," said M. Mauperin, smiling.</p> + +<p>"We ought never to set a bad example," answered Barousse, sententiously. +"Do not misunderstand me," he continued, turning to Denoisel. "I do not +respect you any the less for it, on the contrary, I appreciate your +disinterestedness, but as to saying that you were right—no, I cannot +say that. It's the same with your way of living—that is not as it +should be. You ought to have your time occupied—hang it all! You ought +to do something, go in for something, take up some work, pay your debt +to your country. If you had begun in good time, with your intelligence, +you would perhaps have had a post bringing you in a thousand or +more——"</p> + +<p>"I have had a better thing than that offered me, M. Barousse."</p> + +<p>"More money?" asked Barousse.</p> + +<p>"More money," answered Denoisel tranquilly.</p> + +<p>Barousse looked at him in astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Seriously," continued Denoisel, "I had the most brilliant +prospects—just for five minutes. It was on the twenty-fourth of +February, 1848. I did not know what to do with myself, for when one has +done the Tuileries in the morning it rather unsettles one for the rest +of the day. It occurred to me that I would go and call on one of my +friends who has a Government appointment—a Government appointment, you +know, on the other side of the water. I arrived, and there was no one +there. I went upstairs into the minister's office where my friend +worked—no friend there. I lighted a cigarette, intending to wait for +him. A gentleman came in while I was smoking, and seeing me seated, +imagined I belonged to the place. He had no hat on, so that I thought he +also did. He asked me very politely to show him the way about the house. +I took him round and then we came back. He gave me something to write +down, just telling me the sense of it. I took my friend's pen and wrote. +He then read it and was delighted. We talked; he admired my orthography. +He shook hands with me and found I had gloves on. To cut it short, at +the end of a quarter of an hour he was pressing me to be his secretary. +It was the new minister."</p> + +<p>"And you did not accept?"</p> + +<p>"My friend arrived and I accepted for him. He is at present quite a high +functionary in the Council of State. It was lucky for him to be +supernumerary only half a day."</p> + +<p>They were having dessert, and M. Mauperin had pulled one of the dishes +nearer and was just helping himself in an absent-minded way.</p> + +<p>"M. Mauperin!" exclaimed his wife, looking steadily at him.</p> + +<p>"I beg pardon, my dear—symmetry—you are quite right. I wasn't +thinking," and he pushed the dish back to its place.</p> + +<p>"You always do disarrange things——"</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry, my dear, I'm very sorry. My wife is an excellent woman, you +know, gentlemen, but if you disarrange her symmetry for her—It's quite +a religion with my wife—symmetry is."</p> + +<p>"How ridiculous you are, M. Mauperin!" said Mme. Mauperin, blushing at +being convicted of the most flagrant provincialism; and then, turning +upon her daughter, she exclaimed, "Oh, dear, Renée, how you stoop! Do +sit up, my child——"</p> + +<p>"That's always the way," murmured the young girl, speaking to herself. +"Mamma avenges herself on me."</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen," said M. Mauperin, when they had returned to the +drawing-room, "you can smoke here, you know. We owe that liberty to my +son. He has been lucky enough to obtain his mother's——"</p> + +<p>"Coffee, god-papa?" asked Renée.</p> + +<p>"No," answered M. Barousse, "I shouldn't be able to go to sleep——"</p> + +<p>"Here," put in Renée, finishing his sentence for him.</p> + +<p>"M. Reverchon?"</p> + +<p>"I never take it, thank you very much."</p> + +<p>She went backward and forward, the steam from the cup of hot coffee she +was carrying rising to her face and flushing it.</p> + +<p>"Is every one served?" she asked, and without waiting for any reply she +sat down to the piano and struck the first notes of a polka.</p> + +<p>"Are we going to dance?" she asked, breaking off. "Let us dance—oh, do +let us dance!"</p> + +<p>"Let us smoke in peace!" said M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Yes, daddy," and going on with her polka she danced it herself on her +music-stool, only touching the floor with her tip-toes. She played +without looking at her notes, her face turned towards the drawing-room, +smiling and animated, her eyes lighted up and her cheeks flushed with +the excitement of the dance; like a little girl playing dance music for +other people and moving about herself as she watches them. She swung her +shoulders, her form swayed as though she were being guided along, while +her whole body marked the rhythm and her attitude seemed to indicate +the step she was dancing. Then she turned towards the piano again and +her eyes followed her hands over the black and white keys. Bending over +the music she was playing, she seemed to be striking the notes, then +caressing them, speaking to them, scolding them or smiling on them, and +then lulling them to sleep. She would sustain the loud parts, then +linger over the melody; there were movements that she would play with +tenderness and others with little bursts of passion. She bent over the +piano, then rose again, the light playing on the top of her +tortoise-shell comb one moment, while the next moment it could scarcely +be seen in her black hair. The two candles on the piano flickered to the +noise, throwing a light over her profile or sending their flame over her +forehead, her cheeks, and her chin. The shadow from her ear-rings—two +coral balls—trembled all the time on the delicate skin of her throat, +and her fingers ran so quickly over the keyboard that one could only see +something pink flying backward and forward.</p> + +<p>"And it's her own composition," said M. Mauperin to Reverchon.</p> + +<p>"She has had lessons from Quidant," added Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"There—I've finished!" exclaimed Renée, suddenly leaving the piano and +planting herself in front of Denoisel. "Tell me a story now, Denoisel, +to amuse me—anything you like."</p> + +<p>She was standing before him, her arms crossed and her head slightly +thrown back, the weight of her body supported on one leg, and a +mischievous, daring look on her face which lent additional grace to her +slightly masculine dress. She was wearing a high collar of piqué with a +cravat of black ribbon, and the revers of her white front turned back +over her jacket bodice of cloth. There were pockets on the front of her +skirt.</p> + +<p>"When shall you cut your wisdom teeth, Renée?" asked Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"Never!" she answered, laughing. "Well, what about my story?"</p> + +<p>Denoisel looked round to see that no one was listening, and then +lowering his voice began:</p> + +<p>"Once upon a time a papa and a mamma had a little daughter. The papa and +mamma wished her to marry, and they sent for some very nice-looking +gentlemen; but the little daughter, who was very nice-looking, too——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, how stupid you are!—I'll get my work, there—" and taking her work +out of a basket on the table she went and sat down by her mother.</p> + +<p>"Are we not going to have any whist to-night?" asked M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Yes, of course, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin. "The table is +ready—you see there are only the candles to light."</p> + +<p>"Going, going, gone!" called out Denoisel in M. Barousse's ear.</p> + +<p>The old gentleman was just beginning to doze in a corner by the +chimney-piece and his head was nodding like a passenger's in a +stage-coach. M. Barousse started up and Denoisel handed him a card:</p> + +<p>"The King of Spades! <i>before the letter!</i> You are wanted at whist."</p> + +<p>"You are not over-tired this evening, mademoiselle?" asked Reverchon, +approaching Renée.</p> + +<p>"I? I could dance all night. That's how I feel."</p> + +<p>"You are making something—very pretty——"</p> + +<p>"This?—oh, yes, very pretty! It is a stocking—I am knitting for my +little poor children. It's warm, that's all it is. I am not very clever +with my needle, you know. With embroidery and wool-work you have to +think about what you are doing, but with this, you see, your fingers go; +it just makes itself when once you start, and you can think about +anything—the Grand Turk if you like——"</p> + +<p>"I say, Renée," observed M. Mauperin, "it's odd; it's no good my losing, +I can't catch up again."</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's clever—I shall remember that for my collection," answered +Renée. "Denoisel, come here," she called out, suddenly, "come here a +minute—nearer—nearer still. Will you come here at once—there +now—kneel down——"</p> + +<p>"Are you mad, child?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Renée," said Denoisel, "I believe you have made up your mind to prevent +my getting married."</p> + +<p>"Come, come, Renée!" said M. Mauperin paternally from the card-table.</p> + +<p>"Well—what is it?" asked Renée threatening Denoisel playfully with a +pair of scissors. "Now if you move! Denoisel's head always looks +untidy—his hair is badly cut—he always has a great, ugly lock that +falls over his forehead. It makes people squint when they look at him. I +want to cut that lock. There—he's afraid. Why, I cut hair very +well—you ask papa," and forthwith she gave two or three clips with her +scissors, and then crossing over to the fireplace, shook the hair into +the grate. "If you fancy it was for the sake of getting a lock of your +hair—" she said, turning round as she spoke.</p> + +<p>She had paid no attention to the nudge her brother had given her as she +passed. Her mother, who an instant before was perfectly crimson, was now +pale, but Renée had not noticed that. Her father left the whist-table +and came across to her with an embarrassed expression, looking as though +he were vexed with her. She took the cigarette which he had lighted +from him, put it between her own lips, and drawing a puff of smoke, +blew it away again quickly, turning her head away, coughing and +blinking. "Ugh!—how horrid it is!"</p> + +<p>"Well, really, Renée!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin severely, and evidently +in great distress, "I really don't know—I have never seen you like +this——"</p> + +<p>"Bring the tea in," said M. Mauperin to a servant who had entered in +answer to his peal at the bell.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>IV</h2> + + +<p>"A quarter past ten already!" said Mme. Davarande. "We shall only just +have time to get to the station. Renée, tell them to bring me my hat."</p> + +<p>Every one rose. Barousse woke up from his nap with the noise, and the +little band of guests from Paris set out for Saint-Denis.</p> + +<p>"I'll come with you," said Denoisel. "I should like a breath of air."</p> + +<p>Barousse was in front, arm-in-arm with Reverchon. The Davarandes +followed, and Henri Mauperin and Denoisel brought up the rear.</p> + +<p>"Why don't you stay all night? You could go back to Paris to-morrow," +Denoisel began.</p> + +<p>"No," answered Henri, "I won't do that. I have some work to do to-morrow +morning. I should get to Paris late and my day would be wasted."</p> + +<p>They were silent, and every now and then a few words from Barousse to +Reverchon in praise of Renée came to them through the silence of the +night.</p> + +<p>"I say, Denoisel, I'm afraid it is all up with that, don't you think +so?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I think it is."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear! Will you tell me, my dear fellow, what made you humour Renée +in all the nonsense that came into her head this evening? You have a +great deal of influence over her and——"</p> + +<p>"My dear boy," answered Denoisel, puffing at his cigar, "you must let me +give you a social, philosophical, and historical parenthesis. We have +quite finished, have we not, and when I say we, I mean the majority of +the French people, with the pretty little young ladies who used to talk +like mechanical dolls. They could say 'papa' and 'mamma,' and when they +went to a dance they never lost sight of their parents. The little +childlike young lady who was always so timid and bashful and who used to +blush and stammer, brought up to be ignorant of everything, neither +knowing how to stand up on her legs nor how to sit down on a chair—all +that sort of thing's done with, old-fashioned, worn out. That was the +marriageable young lady of the days of the Gymnase Theatre. There is +nothing of that kind nowadays. The process of culture has changed; it +used to be a case of the fruit-wall, but at present the young person +grows in the open. We ask a girl now about her impressions and we expect +her to say what she thinks naturally and originally. She is allowed to +talk, and indeed is expected to talk, about everything, as that is the +accepted thing now. She need no longer act sweet simplicity, but native +intelligence. If only she can shine in society her parents are +delighted. Her mother takes her to classes. If she should have any +talent it is encouraged and cultivated. Instead of ordinary governesses +she must have good masters, professors from the Conservatoire, or +artists whose pictures have been hung. She goes in for being an artist +and every one is delighted. Come, now, isn't that the way girls are +being educated now in middle-class society?'</p> + +<p>"And the result?"</p> + +<p>"Now, then," continued Denoisel without answering the question, "in the +midst of this education, which I am not criticising, remember—in the +midst of all this, let us imagine a father who is an excellent sort of +man, goodness and kindness personified, encouraging his daughter in her +new freedom by his weakness and his worship of her. Let us suppose, for +instance, that this father has countenanced all the daring and all the +mischievousness of a boy in a woman, that he has allowed his daughter +little by little to cultivate manly accomplishments, which he sees with +pride and which are after his own heart——"</p> + +<p>"And you, my dear fellow, who know my sister so well and the way she has +been brought up, the style she has gone in for, authorized as she +considers herself (thanks to father's indulgence), you, knowing how +difficult it is to get her married, allowed her to do all kinds of +unseemly things this evening when you might have stopped her short with +just a few words such as you always find to say and which you alone can +say to her?"</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>The friend to whom Henri Mauperin was speaking, Denoisel, was the son of +a compatriot, and old school friend and brother-in-arms of M. Mauperin. +The two men had been in the same battles, they had shed their blood in +the same places, and during the retreat from Russia they had eaten the +same horse-flesh.</p> + +<p>A year after his return to France, M. Mauperin had lost this friend, who +on his death-bed had left him guardian to his son. The boy had found a +second father in his guardian. When at college, he had spent all his +holidays at Morimond, and he looked upon the Mauperins as his own +family.</p> + +<p>When M. Mauperin's children came it seemed to the young man that a +brother and sister had been just what he had wanted; he felt as though +he were their elder brother, and he became a child again in order to be +one with them.</p> + +<p>His favourite was, of course, Renée, who when quite little began to +adore him. She was very lively and self-willed and he alone could make +her listen to reason and obey. As she grew up he had been the moulder of +her character, the confessor of her intellect, and the director of her +tastes. His influence over the young girl had increased day by day as +they grew more and more familiar. A room was always kept ready for +Denoisel in the house, his place was always kept for him at table, and +he came whenever he liked to spend a week with the Mauperins.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"There are days," continued Henri, "when Renée's nonsense does not +matter, but this evening—before that man. It will be all off with that +marriage, I'm sure! It would have been an excellent match—he has such +good prospects. He's just the man in every respect—charming, too, and +distinguished."</p> + +<p>"Do you think so? For my part, I should have been afraid of him for your +sister. That is really the reason why I behaved as I did this evening. +That man has a sort of common distinction about him—a distinction made +up of the vulgarity of all kinds of elegancies. He's a fashion poster, a +tailor's model, morally and physically. There's nothing, absolutely +nothing, in a little fellow like that. A husband for your sister—that +man? Why, how in the world do you suppose he could ever understand her? +How is he ever to discover all the warmth of feeling and the elevation +and nobility of character hidden under her eccentricities? Can you +imagine them having a thought in common? Good heavens! if your sister +married, no matter whom, so long as the man were intelligent and had +some character and individuality, as long as there were something in him +that would either govern or appeal to a nature like hers—why, I would +say nothing. A man has often great faults which appeal to a woman's +heart. He may be a bad lot, and there is the chance that she will go on +loving him through sheer jealousy. With a busy, ambitious man like you +she would have all the thought and excitement and all the dreams about +his career to occupy her mind. But a dandy like that for life! Why, your +sister would be absolutely wretched; she would die of misery. She isn't +like other girls, you know, your sister—one must take that into +consideration. She is high-minded, untrammelled by conventionalities, +very fond of fun, and very affectionate. At bottom she is a +<i>mélancolique tintamarresque</i>."</p> + +<p>"A <i>mélancolique tintamarresque</i>? What does that mean?"</p> + +<p>"I'll explain. She——"</p> + +<p>"Henri, hurry up!" called out Davarande from the platform. "They are +getting into the train. I have your ticket."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>V</h2> + + +<p>M. and Mme. Mauperin were in their bed-room. The clock had just struck +midnight, gravely and slowly, as though to emphasize the solemnity of +that confidential and conjugal moment which is both the <i>tête-à-tête</i> of +wedded life and the secret council of the household—that moment of +transformation and magic which is both <i>bourgeois</i> and diabolic, and +which reminds one of that story of the woman metamorphosed into a cat. +The shadow of the bed falls mysteriously over the wife, and as she lies +down there is a sort of charm about her. Something of the bewitchments +of a mistress come to her at this instant. Her will seems to be roused +there by the side of the marital will which is dormant. She sits up, +scolds, sulks, teases, struggles. She has caresses and scratches for the +man. The pillow confers on her its force, her strength comes to her with +the night.</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin was putting her hair in papers in front of the glass, +which was lighted by a single candle. She was in her skirt and +dressing-jacket. Her stout figure, above which her little arms kept +moving as if she were crowning herself, threw on the wall a fantastic +outline of a woman of fifty in deshabille, and on the paper at the end +of the room could be seen wavering about one of those corpulent shadows +which one could imagine Hoffman and Daumier sketching from the back of +the beds of old married couples. M. Mauperin was already lying down.</p> + +<p>"Louis!" said Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Well?" answered M. Mauperin, with that accent of indifference, regret, +and weariness of a man who, with his eyes still open, is beginning to +enjoy the delight of the horizontal position.</p> + +<p>"Oh, if you are asleep——"</p> + +<p>"I am not asleep. What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing. I think Renée behaved most improperly this evening; that's +all. Did you notice?"</p> + +<p>"No, I wasn't paying any attention."</p> + +<p>"It's just a whim. There isn't the least reason in it. Hasn't she said +anything to you? Do you know anything? I'm nowhere—with all your +mysteries and secrets. I'm always the last to know about things. It's +quite different with you—you are told everything. It's very fortunate +that I was not born jealous, don't you think so?"</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin pulled the sheet up over his shoulder without answering.</p> + +<p>"You certainly are asleep," continued Mme. Mauperin in the sharp, +disappointed tone of a woman who is expecting a parry for her attack.</p> + +<p>"I told you I wasn't asleep."</p> + +<p>"Then you surely don't understand. Oh, these intelligent men—it's +curious. It concerns you though, too; it's your business quite as much +as mine. This is another marriage fallen through—do you understand? A +marriage that was most suitable—money—good family—everything. I know +what these hesitations mean. We may as well give up all idea of it. +Henri was talking to me about it this evening; the young man hadn't said +anything to him; of course, he's too well-bred for that. But Henri is +quite persuaded that he's drawing out of it. One can always tell in +matters of this kind; people have a way of——"</p> + +<p>"Well, let him draw out of it then; what do you want me to say?" M. +Mauperin sat straight up and put his two hands on his thighs. "Let him +go. There are plenty of young men like Reverchon; he is not unique, we +can find others; while girls like my daughter——"</p> + +<p>"Good heavens! Your daughter—your daughter!"</p> + +<p>"You don't do her justice, Thérèse."</p> + +<p>"I? Oh, yes, I do; but I see her as she is and not with your eyes. She +has her faults, and great faults, too, which you have encouraged—yes, +you. She is as heedless and full of freaks as a child of ten. If you +imagine that it doesn't worry me—her unreasonableness, her uncertain +moods, and so many other absurdities ever since we have been trying to +get her married! And then her way of criticising every one to whom we +introduce her. She is terrible at interviews of this kind. This makes +about the tenth man she has sent about his business."</p> + +<p>At Mme. Mauperin's last words a gleam of paternal vanity lighted up M. +Mauperin's face.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," he said, smiling at the remembrance, "the fact is she is +diabolically witty. Do you recollect her words about that poor Prefect: +'Oh, he's a regular old cock!' I remember how she said it directly she +saw him."</p> + +<p>"It really is very funny, and above all very fit and proper. Jokes of +this kind will help her to get married, take my word for it. Such things +will induce other men to come forward, don't you think so? I am quite +certain that Renée must have a reputation for being a terror. A little +more of her precious wit and you will see what proposals you will get +for your daughter! I married Henriette so easily! Renée is my cross."</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin had picked up his snuff-box from the table by the side of +the bed and appeared to be intent on turning it round between his thumb +and first finger.</p> + +<p>"Well," continued Mme. Mauperin, "it's her own lookout. When she is +thirty, when she has refused every one, and there is no one left who +wants her, in spite of all her wit, her good qualities and everything +else, she will have time to reflect a little—and you will, too."</p> + +<p>There was a pause. Mme. Mauperin gave M. Mauperin time enough to imagine +that she had finished, and then changing her tone she began again:</p> + +<p>"I want to speak to you, too, about your son——"</p> + +<p>Hereupon M. Mauperin, whose head had been bent while his wife was +talking, looked up, and there was a half smile of mischievous humour on +his face. In the upper as well as the lower middle class there is a +certain maternal love capable of rising to the height of passion and of +sinking to mere idolatry. There are mothers who in their affection and +love will fall down and worship their son. Theirs is not that maternal +love which veils its own weaknesses, which defends its rights, is +jealous of its duties, which is careful about the hierarchy and +discipline of the family, and which commands respect and consideration. +The child, brought near to his mother by all kinds of familiarity, +receives from her attentions which are more like homage, and caresses in +which there is a certain amount of servility. All the mother's dreams +are centred in him, for he is not only the heir but the whole future of +the family. Through him the family will reap the benefits of wealth, of +all the improvements and progressive rise of the <i>bourgeoisie</i> from one +generation to another. The mother revels in the thought of what he is +and what he will be. She loves him and is glorified herself in him. She +dedicates all her ambitions to him and worships him. This son appears to +her a superior being, and she is amazed that he should have been born of +her; she seems to feel the mingled pride and humility of the mother of a +god.</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin was a typical example of one of these mothers of modern +middle-class life. The merits, the features, the intellect of her son +were for her those of a divinity. His whole person, his accomplishments, +everything he said and everything he did, all was sacred to her. She +would spend her time in contemplation of him; she saw no one else when +he was there. It seemed to her as though the whole world began and ended +in her son. He was in her eyes perfection itself, the most intelligent, +the handsomest, and, above all, the most distinguished of men. He was +short-sighted and wore an eye-glass, but she would not even own that he +was near-sighted.</p> + +<p>When he was there she watched him talk, sit down or walk about, and she +would smile at him when his back was turned. She liked the very creases +of his coat. When he was not there she would lean back for a few minutes +in her arm-chair and some reminiscence of infinite sweetness would +gradually brighten and soften her face. It was as though light, +restfulness, and peace had suddenly come to her; her expression was +joyous at such times, her eyes were looking at something in the past, +her heart was living over again some happy moment, and if any one spoke +to her she seemed to wake up out of a dream.</p> + +<p>It was in a certain measure hereditary, this intense maternal love. Mme. +Mauperin came of a race which had always loved its sons with a warm, +violent, and almost frenzied love. The mothers in her family had been +mothers with a vengeance. There was a story told of her grandmother in +the Haute-Marne. It was said that she had disfigured a child with a +burning coal who had been considered handsomer than her own boy.</p> + +<p>At the time of her son's first ailments Mme. Mauperin had almost lost +her reason; she had hated all children who were well, and had hoped that +God would kill them if her son died. Once when he had been seriously ill +she had been forty-eight nights without going to bed, and her legs had +swelled with fatigue. When he was about again he had been allowed +anything and everything. If any one came to complain to her that he had +been fighting with the village children she would say feelingly: "Poor +little dear!" As the boy grew up his mother's spirit preceded him on +his walk through life, strewing his pathway with hope as he emerged into +manhood. She thought of all the heiresses in the neighbourhood whose age +would be suitable to his. She used to imagine him visiting at all the +country-houses, and she saw him on horseback, riding to the meet in a +red coat. She used to be fairly dazzled by all her dreams of the future.</p> + +<p>Then came the time when he went away to college, the time when she had +to separate from him. Mme. Mauperin struggled for three months to keep +her son, to have him educated at home by a tutor, but M. Mauperin was +resolute on this score. All that Mme. Mauperin could obtain from him was +the permission to select the college for her son. She chose one with the +mildest discipline possible, one of those colleges for the children of +wealthy parents, where there is no severity, where the boys are allowed +to eat pastry when they are taking their walks, and where the professors +believe in more theatrical rehearsals than punishments. During the seven +years he was there, Mme. Mauperin never missed a single day going from +Saint-Denis to see him during the recreation hour. Rain, cold, fatigue, +illness, nothing prevented her. In the parlour or in the courtyard the +other mothers pointed her out to each other. The boy would kiss her, +take the cakes she had brought him, and then, telling her he had a +lesson to finish learning, he would hurry back to his games. It was +quite enough for his mother, though, for she had seen him and he was +well. She was always thinking about his health. He was weighed down with +flannel, and in the holidays she fed him well with meat, giving him all +the gravy from underdone beef so that he should grow strong and tall. +She bought him a small mat to sit on at school because the forms were so +hard. There were separate bed-rooms for the pupils, and Mme. Mauperin +furnished her son's like a man's room. At twelve years of age he had a +rosewood dressing-table and chest of drawers of his own. The boy became +a young man, the young man left college, and Mme. Mauperin's passion for +him increased with all that satisfaction which a mother feels in a tall +son when his looks begin to change and his beard makes its first +appearance. Forgetting all about the tradespeople whose bills she had +paid, she was amazed at the style in which her son dressed, at his +boots, and the way in which he did his hair. There was a certain +elegance of taste in everything that he liked, in his luxurious habits, +in his ways, and in his whole life, to which she bowed down in +astonishment and delight, as though she herself were not the mainspring +of it all and his cashier. Her son's valet did not seem to her like an +ordinary domestic; his horse was not merely a horse, it was her son's +horse. When her son went out she gave orders that she should be told so +that she might have the satisfaction of seeing him get into the +carriage and drive away.</p> + +<p>Every day she was more and more taken up with this son. She had no +diversions, nothing to occupy her imagination; she did not read, and had +grown old living with a husband who had brought her no love and whom she +had always felt to be quite apart from her, engrossed as he had ever +been in his studies, politics, and business. She had no one left with +her but a daughter to whom she had never given her whole heart, and so +she had ended by devoting her life to Henri's interests and putting all +her vanity into his future. And her one thought—the thought which +occupied every hour of her days and nights, her fixed idea—was the +marriage of this adored son. She wanted him to marry well, to make a +match which should be rich enough and brilliant enough to make up to her +and repay her for all the dulness and obscurity of her own existence, +for her life of economy and solitude, for all her own privations as wife +and mother.</p> + +<p>"Do you even know your son's age, M. Mauperin?" continued Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Henri, why, my dear, Henri must be—He was born in 1826, wasn't he?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's just like a father to ask! Yes, 1826, the 12th of July, +1826."</p> + +<p>"Well, then, he is twenty-nine. Fancy that now, he is twenty-nine!"</p> + +<p>"And you fold your arms and take things easily! You don't trouble in the +least about his future! You say, 'Fancy that now, he's +twenty-nine'—just like that, quite calmly! Any other man would stir +himself and look round. Henri isn't like his sister, he wants to marry. +Have you ever thought of finding a suitable match for him—a wife? Oh, +dear, no, not any more than for the King of Prussia, of course not! It's +just the same as it was for your elder daughter. I should like to know +what you did towards that marriage? Whether she found any one or not, it +appeared to be all the same to you. How I did have to urge you on to do +anything in the matter! Oh, you can wipe your hands of that marriage; +your daughter's happiness can't weigh much on your conscience, I should +think! If I had not been there you would have found a husband like M. +Davarande, shouldn't you? A model husband, who adores Henriette—and +such a gentleman!"</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin blew out the candle and got into bed by the side of M. +Mauperin, who had turned over with his face towards the wall.</p> + +<p>"Yes," she went on, stretching herself out full length under the sheets, +"a model husband! Do you imagine that there are many sons-in-law who +would be so attentive to us? He would do anything to give us pleasure. +You invite him to dinner and give him meat on fasting-days and he never +says a word. Then, too, he is so obliging. I wanted to match some wools +for my tapestry-work the other day——"</p> + +<p>"My dear, what is it we were talking about? I must tell you that I +should like to get a bit of sleep to-night. You began with your +daughter, and now you've started the chapter of M. Davarande's +perfections. I know that chapter—there's enough to last till to-morrow +morning. Come now, you want your son to marry, don't you? That's it, +isn't it? Well, I'm quite willing—let's get him married."</p> + +<p>"Just as though I could count on you for getting him married! A lot of +trouble you'll go to about it; you are the right sort of man to +inconvenience yourself for anything."</p> + +<p>"Oh, come, come, my dear, that's unjust. It seems to me that about a +fortnight ago I showed you what I was capable of. To go and listen to +the dullest of operas, to eat ices at night, which is a thing I detest, +and to talk about the weather with a provincial man who shouted about +his daughter's dowry on the boulevards. If you don't call that +inconveniencing myself! I suppose you'll say it didn't come to anything? +Was it my fault, though, if the gentleman wanted '<i>a handsome, manly +husband</i>,' as he put it, for his daughter? Is it my fault and mine only +if our son has not the frame of a Hercules?"</p> + +<p>"M. Mauperin——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, it is, of course. I am to blame for everything, according to +you. You would make me pass everywhere for a selfish——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are like all men!"</p> + +<p>"Thank you on behalf of them all."</p> + +<p>"No, it's in your character—it's no good blaming you. It's only the +mothers who worry. Ah, if you were only like I am; if at every instant +you were thinking of what might happen to a young man. I know Henri is +sensible; but a young man's fancy is so quickly caught. It might be some +worthless creature—some bad lot—one never knows—such things happen +every day. I should go mad! What do you say to sounding Mme. Rosières? +Shall we?"</p> + +<p>There was no reply, and Mme. Mauperin was obliged to resign herself to +silence. She turned over and over, but could not sleep until daylight +appeared.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>VI</h2> + + +<p>"Ah, what's that mean? Where in the world are you going?" asked M. +Mauperin in the morning as Mme. Mauperin stood at the glass putting on a +black lace cape.</p> + +<p>"Where am I going?" said Mme. Mauperin, fastening the cape to her +shoulder with one of the two pins she was holding in her mouth. "Is my +cape too low down? Just look."</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Pull it a little."</p> + +<p>"How fine you are!" said M. Mauperin, stepping back and examining his +wife's dress.</p> + +<p>She was wearing a black dress of the most elegant style, in excellent +taste though somewhat severe looking.</p> + +<p>"I am going to Paris."</p> + +<p>"Oh! you are going to Paris? What are you going to do in Paris?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, how you do worry always with your questions: 'Where are you +going? What are you going to do?' You really want to know, do you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I was only asking you——"</p> + +<p>"My dear, I am going to confession," said Mme. Mauperin, looking down.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin was speechless. His wife in the early days of her married +life had gone regularly on Sundays to church. Later she had accompanied +her daughters to their catechism class, and these were all the religious +duties he had ever known her to accomplish. For the last ten years it +seemed to him that she had been as indifferent as he was about such +things—naturally and frankly indifferent. When the first moment of +stupefaction had passed, he opened his mouth to speak, looked at her, +said nothing, and, turning suddenly on his heels, went out of the room +humming a kind of air to which music and words were about all that were +missing.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>On arriving at a handsome, cheerful-looking house in the Rue de la +Madeleine, Mme. Mauperin went upstairs to the fourth story and rang at a +door where there was no attempt at any style. It was opened promptly.</p> + +<p>"M. l'Abbé Blampoix?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, madame," answered a servant-man in black livery.</p> + +<p>He spoke with a Belgian accent and bowed as he spoke. He took Mme. +Mauperin across the entrance-hall, where a faint odour was just dying +away, and through a dining-room flooded with sunshine, where the cloth +was simply laid for one person. Mme. Mauperin then found herself in a +drawing-room decorated and scented with flowers. Above a harmonium with +rich inlaid work was a copy of Correggio's "Night." On another panel, +framed in black, was the Communion of Marie Antoinette and of her +gendarmes at the Conciergerie, lithographed according to a story that +was told about her. Keepsakes, a hundred little things that might have +been New Year's gifts, filled the brackets. A small bronze statue of +Canova's "Madeleine" was on a table in the middle of the room.</p> + +<p>The tapestry chairs, each one of a different design and piously worked +by hand, were evidently presents which devoted women had done for the +abbé.</p> + +<p>There were men and women waiting there, and each by turn went into the +abbé's room, stayed a few minutes, then came out again and went away. +The last person waiting, a woman, stayed a long time, and when she came +out of the room Mme. Mauperin could not see her face through her double +veil.</p> + +<p>The abbé was standing by his chimney-piece when Mme. Mauperin entered. +He was holding apart the flaps of his cassock like the tails of a coat.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>The Abbé Blampoix had neither benefice nor parish. He had a large +connection and a specialty: he was the priest of society people, of the +fashionable world, and of the aristocracy. He confessed the frequenters +of drawing-rooms, he was the spiritual director of well-born +consciences, and he comforted those souls that were worth the trouble of +comforting. He brought Jesus Christ within reach of the wealthy. "Every +one has his work to do in the Lord's vineyard," he used often to say, +appearing to groan and bend beneath the burden of saving the Faubourg +Saint-Germain, the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, and the Chaussée-d'Antin.</p> + +<p>He was a man of common sense and intellect, an obliging sort of priest +who adapted everything to the precept, "<i>The letter killeth, and the +spirit maketh alive.</i>" He was tolerant and intelligent, could comprehend +things and could smile. He measured faith out according to the +temperament of the people and only gave it in small doses. He made the +penances light, he loosened the bonds of the cross and sprinkled the way +of salvation with sand. From the hard, unlovely, stern religion of the +poor he had evolved a pleasant religion for the rich; it was easy, +charming, elastic, adapting itself to things and to people, to all the +ways and manners of society, to its customs and habits, and even to its +prejudices. Of the idea of God he had made something quite comfortable +and elegant.</p> + +<p>The Abbé Blampoix had all the fascination of the priest who is well +educated, talented, and accomplished. He could talk well during +confession, and could put some wit into his exhortations and a certain +graciousness into his unction. He knew how to move and interest his +hearers. He was well versed in words that touch the heart and in +speeches that are flattering and pleasing to the ear. His voice was +musical and his style flowery. He called the devil "<i>the Prince of +evil</i>," and the eucharist "<i>the Divine aliment</i>"! He abounded in +periphrases as highly coloured as sacred pictures. He talked of Rossini, +quoted Racine, and spoke of "<i>the Bois</i>" for the Bois de Boulogne. He +talked of divine love in words which were somewhat disconcerting, of +present-day vices with piquant details, and of society in society +language. Occasionally, expressions which were in vogue and which had +only recently been invented, expressions only known among worldly +people, would slip into his spiritual consultations and had the same +effect as extracts from a newspaper in an ascetic book. There was a +pleasant odour of the century about him. His priestly robe seemed to be +impregnated with all the pretty little sins which had approached it. He +was very well up and always to the point with regard to subtle +temptations, admirably shrewd, keen, and tactful in his discussions on +sensuality. Women doted on him.</p> + +<p>His first step, his <i>début</i> in the ecclesiastical career, had been +distinguished by a veritable seduction and capturing of souls, by a +success which had been a perfect triumph and indeed almost a scandal. +After taking the catechism classes for a year in the parish of B——, +the archbishop had appointed him to other work, putting another priest +in his place. The result of this was a rebellion, as all the girls who +had attended the catechism classes refused to speak or listen to the +newcomer. They had lost their young hearts and heads, and there were +tears shed by all the flock, a regular riot of wailing and sorrow, which +before long changed into revolt. The elder girls, the chief members of +the society, kept up the struggle several months. They agreed together +not to go to the classes, and they went so far as to refuse to hand over +to the curé the cash-box which had been intrusted to them. It was with +the greatest difficulty that they were appeased.</p> + +<p>The success which all this augured to the Abbé Blampoix had not failed +him. His fame had quickly spread. That great force, Fashion, which in +Paris affects everything, even a priest's cassock, had taken him up and +launched him. People came to him from all parts. The ordinary, +commonplace confessions were heard by other priests; but all the choice +sins were brought to him. Around him was always to be heard a hubbub of +great names, of large fortunes, of pretty contritions, and the rustling +of beautiful dresses. Mothers consulted him about taking their +daughters out, and the daughters were instructed by him before going +into society. He was appealed to for permission to wear low-necked +dresses, and he was the man who regulated the modesty of ball costumes +and the propriety of reading certain books. He was also asked for titles +of novels and lists of moral plays. He prepared candidates for +confirmation and led them on to marriage. He baptized children and +listened to the confession of the adulterous in thought. Wives who +considered themselves slighted or misunderstood came to him to lament +over the materiality of their husbands, and he supplied them with a +little idealism to take back to their homes. All who were in trouble or +despair had recourse to him, and he ordered a trip to Italy for them, +with music and painting for diversions and a good confession in Rome.</p> + +<p>Wives who were separated from their husbands addressed themselves to him +when they wanted to return quietly to their home. His conciliations came +between the love of wives and the jealousy of mothers-in-law. He found +governesses for the mothers and lady's maids of forty years of age for +young wives. Newly married wives learned from him to secure their +happiness and to keep their husband's affection by their discreet and +dainty toilettes, by cleanliness and care, by the spotlessness and +elegance of their linen. "My dear child," he would say sometimes, "a +wife should have just a faint perfume of the <i>lorette</i> about her." His +experience intervened in questions of the hygiene of marriage. He was +consulted on such matters as maternity and pregnancy. He would decide +whether a wife should become a mother and whether a mother should suckle +her child.</p> + +<p>This vogue and rôle, the dealings that he had with women and the +possession of all their secrets, so many confidences and so much +knowledge on all subjects, his intercourse of all kinds with the +dignitaries and lady-treasurers of various societies, and the +acquaintance he had, thanks to the steps he was obliged to take in the +interests of charity, with all the important personages of Paris, all +the influence that, as a clever, discreet, and obliging priest, he had +succeeded in obtaining, had given to the Abbé Blampoix an immense power +and authority which radiated silently and unseen. Worldly interests and +social ambitions were confessed to him. Nearly all the marriageable +individuals in society were recommended to this priest, who professed no +political preferences, who mixed with every one, and who was admirably +placed for bringing families together, for uniting houses, arranging +matches of expediency or balancing social positions, pairing off money +with money, or joining an ancient title to a newly made fortune. It was +as though marriages in Paris had an occult Providence in the person of +this rare sort of man in whom were blended the priest and the lawyer, +the apostle and the diplomatist—Fénelon and M. de Foy. The Abbé +Blampoix had an income of sixteen hundred pounds, the half of which he +gave to the poor. He had refused a bishopric for the sake of remaining +what he was—a priest.</p> + +<p>"To whom have I the honour," began the abbé, who appeared to be +searching his memory for a name.</p> + +<p>"Mme. Mauperin, the mother of Mme. Davarande."</p> + +<p>"Oh, excuse me, madame, excuse me. Your family are not persons whom one +could forget. Do sit down, please—let me give you this arm-chair."</p> + +<p>And then, taking a seat himself with his back to the light, he +continued:</p> + +<p>"I like to think of that marriage, which gave me the opportunity of +making your acquaintance—the marriage of your daughter with M. +Davarande. You and I, madame, you, with the devotion of a mother, and +I—well, with just the feeble insight of a humble priest—brought about +a truly Christian marriage, a marriage which has satisfied the needs of +the dear child as regards her religion and her affection and which was +also in accordance with her social position. Mme. Davarande is one of my +model penitents; I am thoroughly satisfied with her. M. Davarande is an +excellent young man who shares the religious beliefs of his wife, and +that is a rare thing nowadays. One's mind is easy about such happy and +superior young couples, and I am quite convinced beforehand that you +have not come about either of these dear children——"</p> + +<p>"You are right. I am quite satisfied as regards them, and their +happiness is a great joy in my life. It is such a responsibility to get +one's children married. No, monsieur, it is not for them that I have +come; it is for myself."</p> + +<p>"For yourself—madame?"</p> + +<p>And the abbé glanced quickly at her with an expression which softened +just as quickly.</p> + +<p>"Ah, monsieur, time brings many changes. One has a hundred things to +think about before one reaches my age. There are the people one meets, +and society ties, and all that is very entertaining. We give ourselves +up to such things, enjoy them and count on them. We fancy we shall never +need anything beyond. Well, now, monsieur, I have reached the age when +one does need something beyond. You will understand me, I am sure. I +have begun to feel the emptiness of the world. Nothing interests me, and +I should like to come back to what I had given up. I know how indulgent +and charitable you are. I need your counsel and your hand to lead me +back to duties that I have neglected far too long, although I have +always remembered and respected them. You must know how wretched I am, +monsieur."</p> + +<p>While speaking thus, with that easy flow of words so natural to a woman, +and especially to a Parisian woman, and which in Parisian slang is known +as <i>bagou</i>, Mme. Mauperin, who had avoided meeting the priest's eyes, +which she had felt fixed on her, now glanced mechanically at a light +which was being stirred by the abbé's hands and which flamed up under a +ray of sunshine, shining brightly in the midst of this room—the +severe-looking, solemn, cold room of a man of business. This light came +from a casket containing some diamonds with which the abbé was idly +playing.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you are looking at this!" said the abbé, catching Mme. Mauperin's +eye and answering her thoughts instead of her phrases. "You are +surprised to see it, are you not? Yes, a jewel-case, a case of +diamonds—and just look at them—rather good ones, too." He passed her +the necklace. "It's odd for that to be here, isn't it? But what was I to +do? This is our modern society. We are obliged to see a little of all +sorts. Such a pitiful scene! I don't feel myself again yet, after +it—such sobs and tears! Perhaps you heard—a poor young wife throwing +herself down here at my feet—a mother of a family, madame! Alas! that's +how the world is—this is what the love of finery and the fondness of +admiration will lead to. People spend and spend, until finally they can +only pay the interest of what they owe at the shops. Yes, indeed, +madame, that happens constantly. I could mention the shops. People hope +to be able to pay the capital some day; they count on a son-in-law to +whom they can tell everything and who will only be too happy to pay his +mother-in-law's debts. But in the meantime the shops get impatient; and +at last they threaten to tell the husband everything. Then—oh, just +think of the anguish then! Do you know that this woman talked just now +of throwing herself into the river? I had to promise to find her twelve +hundred pounds. I beg your pardon, though—a thousand times. Here I am +talking of my own affairs. Let us go back to yours. You had another +daughter—a charming girl. I prepared her for confirmation. Let me see, +now, what was her name?"</p> + +<p>"Renée."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, of course, a very intelligent child, very quick—quite an +exceptional character. Tell me now, isn't she married?"</p> + +<p>"No, monsieur, and it's a great trouble to me. You've no idea what a +headstrong girl she is. She is nothing like her sister. It's very +unfortunate for a mother to have a daughter with a character like hers. +I would rather she were a little less intelligent. We have found most +suitable matches for her, and she refuses them in the most thoughtless, +foolish way. There was another one yesterday. And her father spoils her +so."</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's a pity. You have no idea what a maternal affection we have +for these dear children that we have led to Christ. But you don't say +anything about your son, a delightful young man, so good-looking—and +just the age to marry, it seems to me——"</p> + +<p>"Do you know him, monsieur?"</p> + +<p>"I had the pleasure of meeting him once at his sister's, at Mme. +Davarande's, when I went to see her during her illness; those are the +only visits we pay, you know—visits to the sick. Then, too, I have +heard all sorts of good reports about him. You are a fortunate mother, +madame. Your son goes to church, and at Easter he took communion with +the Jesuit Fathers. He has not told you, probably, but he was one of +those society men, true Christians, who waited nearly all night to get +to the confessional—there was such a crowd. Yes, people do not believe +it, but, thank God, it is quite true. Some of the young men waited until +five o'clock in the morning to confess. I need not tell you how deeply +the Church is touched by such zeal, how thankful she is to those who +give her this consolation and who pay her this homage in these sad times +of demoralization and incredulity. We are drawn towards young men who +set such a good example and who are so willing to do what is right, and +we are always ready to give them what help we can and to use any +influence that we may have in certain families in their favour."</p> + +<p>"Oh, monsieur, you are too good. And our gratitude—mine and my +son's—if only you would interest yourself on his behalf. What a happy +thought it was to come to you! You see I came to you as a woman, but as +a mother too. My son is angelic—and then, monsieur, you can do so +much."</p> + +<p>The abbé shook his head with a deprecatory smile of mingled modesty and +melancholy.</p> + +<p>"No, madame, you overestimate our power. We are far from all that you +say. We are able to do a little good sometimes, but it is with great +difficulty. If only you knew how little a priest can do in these days. +People are afraid of our influence; they do not care to meet us outside +the church, nor to speak to us except in the confessional. You yourself, +madame, would be surprised if your confessor ventured to speak to you +about your daily conduct. Thanks to the deplorable prejudices of people +with regard to us, every one's object is to keep us at a distance and to +stand on the defensive."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, why, it is one o'clock—and I saw that your table was laid +when I came. I'm quite ashamed of myself. May I come again in a few +days?"</p> + +<p>"My luncheon can always wait," said the Abbé Blampoix, and turning to a +desk covered with papers at his side, he made a sign to Mme. Mauperin to +sit down again. There was a moment's silence, broken only by the rustle +of papers which the abbé was turning over. Finally he drew out a +visiting-card, turned down at the corner, from under a pile of papers, +held it to the light, and read:</p> + +<p>"Twelve thousand pounds in deeds and preference shares. Six hundred +pounds a year from the day of marriage; father and mother dead. +Twenty-four thousand pounds on the death of some uncles and aunts who +will never marry. Young girl, nineteen, charming, much prettier than she +imagines herself to be. You see," said the abbé, putting the card back +among the papers. "Think it over. Anyhow, you will see. I have, too, at +this very moment a thousand pounds a year on her marriage—an +orphan—Ah, no, that would not do—her guardian wants to find some one +who is influential. He is sub-referendary judge on the Board of Finance +and he will only marry his ward to a son-in-law who can get him +promoted. Ah, wait a minute—this would do, perhaps," and he read aloud +from some notes: "Twenty-two years of age, not pretty, accomplished, +intelligent, dresses well, father sixty thousand pounds, three children, +substantial fortune. He owns the house in the Rue de Provence, where the +offices of the <i>Security</i> are, an estate in the Orne, eight thousand +pounds in the Crédit Foncier. Rather an opinionated sort of man, of +Portuguese descent. The mother is a mere cipher in the house. There is +no family, and the father would be annoyed if you went to see his +relatives. I am not keeping anything back, as you see; a family dinner +party once a year and that is all. The father will give twelve thousand +pounds for the dowry; he wants his daughter to live in the same house.</p> + +<p>"Yes," continued the abbé, looking through his notes, "that's all I see +that would do for you just now. Will you talk it over with your son, +madame, and consult your husband? I am quite at your service. When I +have the pleasure of seeing you here again, will you bring with you just +a few figures, a little note that would give me an idea of your +intentions with regard to settling your son. And bring your daughter +with you. I should be delighted to see the dear child again."</p> + +<p>"Would you mind fixing some time when I should not disturb you quite so +much as I have done to-day, monsieur?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, madame, my time belongs to every one who has need of me, and I am +only too much honoured. The thing is that in a fortnight's time—if you +came then, I should be in the country, and I only come one day a week to +Paris, then. Yes, it's a sheer necessity, and so I have had to make up +my mind to it. By the end of the winter I get so worn out; I have so +much to attend to, and then these four flights of stairs kill me. But +what am I to do? I am obliged to pay in some way for the right of +having my chapel, for the precious privilege of being able to have mass +in my own home. No one could sleep over a chapel, you see. Ah, an idea +has just struck me: why should you not come to see me in the country—at +Colombes? It would be a little excursion. I have plenty of fruit, and I +take a landowner's pride in my fruit. I could offer you luncheon, a very +informal luncheon. Will you come, madame—and your daughter? Would your +son give me the pleasure of his company too?"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>VII</h2> + + +<p>A quarter of an hour later a footman in a red coat opened the door of a +flat on a first floor in the Rue Taitbout in answer to Mme. Mauperin's +ring.</p> + +<p>"Good-morning, Georges. Is my son in?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, madame, monsieur is there."</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin had smiled on her son's domestic, and as she walked along +she smiled on the rooms, on the furniture, and on everything she saw. +When she entered the study her son was writing and smoking at the same +time.</p> + +<p>"Well, I never!" he exclaimed, taking his cigar out of his mouth and +leaning his head against the back of his chair for his mother to kiss +him. "It's you, is it, mamma?" he went on, continuing to smoke. "You +didn't say a word about coming to Paris to-day. What brings you here?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I had some shopping and some visits to pay—you know I am always +behind. How comfortable you are here!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes, to be sure, you hadn't seen my new arrangements."</p> + +<p>"Dear me, how well you do arrange everything! There's no one like you, +really. It isn't damp here is it, are you quite sure?" and Mme. Mauperin +put her hand against the wall. "Tell Georges to air the room always when +you are away, won't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, mother," said Henri in a bored way, as one answers a child.</p> + +<p>"Oh, why do you have those? I don't like your having such things." Mme. +Mauperin had just caught sight of two swords above the bookcase. "The +very sight of them! When one thinks—" and Mme. Mauperin closed her eyes +for an instant and sat down. "You don't know how your dreadful bachelor +life makes us poor mothers tremble. If you were married, it seems to me +that I should not be so worried about you. I do wish you were married, +Henri!"</p> + +<p>"I do, too, I can assure you."</p> + +<p>"Really? Come, now—mothers, you know—well, secrets ought not to be +kept from them. I am so afraid, when I look at you, handsome as you are, +and so distinguished and clever and fascinating. You are just the sort +of man that any one would fall in love with, and I'm so afraid——"</p> + +<p>"Of what?"</p> + +<p>"Lest you should have some reason for not——"</p> + +<p>"For not marrying, you mean, don't you? A chain—is that what you +mean?"</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin nodded and Henri burst out laughing.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear mamma, if I had one, make your mind easy, it should be a +polished one. A man who has any respect for himself would not wear any +other."</p> + +<p>"Well, then, tell me about Mlle. Herbault. It was your fault that it all +came to nothing."</p> + +<p>"Mlle. Herbault? The introduction at the Opéra with father? Oh, no, it +wasn't that. Yes, yes, I remember, the dinner at Mme. Marquisat's, +wasn't it—the last one? That was a trap you laid for me. I must say you +are sweetly innocent! I was announced: '<i>Môssieu Henri Mauperin</i>,' in +that grand, important sort of way which being interpreted meant: +'<i>Behold the future husband!</i>' I found all the candles in the +drawing-room lighted up. The mistress of the house, whom I had seen just +twice in my life, overpowered me with her smiles; her son, whom I did +not know at all, shook hands with me. There was a lady with her daughter +in the room, they neither of them appeared to see me. My place at dinner +was next the young person, of course; a provincial family, their money +placed in farms, simple tastes, etc. I discovered all that before the +soup was finished. The mother, on the other side of the table, was +keeping watch over us; an impossible sort of mother, in such a get-up! I +asked the daughter whether she had seen the 'Prophet' at the Opéra. +'Yes, it was superb—and then there was that wonderful effect in the +third act. Oh, yes, that effect, that wonderful effect.' She hadn't seen +it any more than I had. A fibber to begin with. I entertained myself +with keeping her to the subject, and that made her crabby. We went back +to the drawing-room and then the hostess began: 'What a pretty dress!' +she said to me. 'Did you notice it? Would you believe that Emmeline has +had that dress five years. I can remember it. She is so careful—so +orderly!' 'All right,' I thought to myself, 'a lot of miserly wretches +who mean to take me in.'"</p> + +<p>"Do you really think so? And yet, from what we were told about them——"</p> + +<p>"A woman who makes her dresses last five years! That speaks for itself, +that's quite enough. I can picture the dowry hoarded up in a stocking. +The money would be in land at two and a half per cent; repairs, taxes, +lawsuits, farmers who don't pay their rent, a father-in-law who makes +over to you unsalable property. No, no, I'm not quite young enough. I +want to get married, but I mean to marry well. Leave me to manage it, +and you'll see. You can make your mind easy; I'm not the sort to be +taken in with: '<i>She has such beautiful hair and she is so devoted to +her mother!</i>' You see, mamma, I've thought a great deal about marriage, +although you may not imagine I have. The most difficult thing to get in +this world, the thing we pay the most dearly for, snatch from each +other, fight for, the thing we only obtain by force of genius or by +luck, by meanness, privations, by wild efforts, perseverance, +resolution, energy, audacity or work, is money—isn't that so? Now money +means happiness and the honour of being rich, it means enjoyment, and it +brings with it the respect and esteem of the million. Well, I have +discovered that there is a way of getting it, straightforwardly and +promptly, without any fatigue, without difficulty and without genius, +quite simply, naturally, quickly and honourably; and this way is by +marriage. Another thing I have discovered is that there is no need to be +remarkably handsome nor astonishingly intelligent in order to make a +rich marriage; the only thing necessary is to will it, to will it +coolly, calmly and with all one's force of will-power, to stake all +one's chances on that card; in fact to look upon getting married as +one's object in life, one's future career. I see that in playing that +game it is no more difficult to make an extraordinary marriage than an +ordinary one, to get a dowry of fifty thousand pounds than one of five +thousand; it is merely a question of cool-headedness and luck; the stake +is the same in both cases. In our times when a good tenor can marry an +income of thirty thousand pounds arithmetic becomes a thing of the past. +All this is what I have wanted to explain to you, and I am sure you will +understand me."</p> + +<p>Henri Mauperin took his mother's hand in his as he spoke. She was fairly +aghast with surprise, admiration, and a sentiment very near akin to +respect.</p> + +<p>"Don't you worry yourself," continued her son. "I shall marry +well—better even perhaps than you dream of."</p> + +<p>As soon as his mother had gone Henri took up his pen and, continuing the +article he had commenced for the <i>Revue économique</i>, wrote: "The +trajectory of humanity is a spiral and not a circle——"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>VIII</h2> + + +<p>Henri Mauperin's age, like that of so many present-day young men, could +not be reckoned by the years of his life; he was of the same age as the +times in which he lived. The coldness and absence of enthusiasm in the +younger generation, that distinguishing mark of the second half of the +nineteenth century, had set its seal on him entirely. He looked grave, +and one felt that he was icy cold. One recognised in him those elements, +so contrary to the French temperament, which constitute in French +history sects without ardour and political parties without enthusiasm, +such as the Jansenism of former days and the Doctrinarianism of to-day.</p> + +<p>Henri Mauperin was a young Doctrinaire. He had belonged to that +generation of children whom nothing astonishes and nothing amuses; who +go, without the slightest excitement, to see anything to which they are +taken and who come back again perfectly unmoved. When quite young he had +always been well behaved and thoughtful. At college it had never +happened to him in the midst of his lessons to go off in a dream, his +face buried in his hands, his elbows on a dictionary and his eyes +looking into the future. He had never been assailed by temptations with +regard to the unknown and by those first visions of life which at the +age of sixteen fill the minds of young men with trouble and delight, +shut up as they are between the four walls of a courtyard with grated +windows, against which their balls bounce and over and beyond which +their thoughts soar. In his class there were two or three boys who were +sons of eminent political men and with them he made friends. While +studying classics he was thinking of the club he should join later on. +On leaving college Henri's conduct was not like that of a young man of +twenty. He was considered very steady, and was never seen in places +where drinking and gambling went on and where his reputation might have +suffered. He was to be met with in staid drawing-rooms, where he was +always extremely attentive and polite to ladies who were no longer +young. All that would have gone against him elsewhere served him there +in good stead. His reserve was considered an attraction, his seriousness +was thought fascinating.</p> + +<p>There are fashions with regard to what finds favour in men. The reign of +Louis Philippe, with its great wealth of scholars, had just accustomed +the political and literary circles of Paris to value in a society man +that something which recalls the cap and gown, that a professor takes +about with him everywhere, even when he has become a minister.</p> + +<p>With women of the upper middle class the taste for gay, lively, +frivolous qualities of mind had been succeeded by a taste for +conversation which savoured of the lecture-room, for science direct from +the professor's chair, for a sort of learned amiability. A pedant did +not alarm them, even though he might be old; when young he was made much +of, and it was rumoured that Henri Mauperin was a great favourite.</p> + +<p>He had a practical mind. He set up for being a believer in all that was +useful, in mathematical truths, positive religions and the exact +sciences. He had a certain compassion for art, and maintained that Boule +furniture had never been made as well as at present. Political economy, +that science which leads on to all things, had appealed to him when he +went out into the world as a vocation and a career, consequently he had +decided to be an economist. He had brought to this dry study a +narrow-minded intelligence, but he had been patient and persevering, and +now, once a fortnight, he published in important reviews a long article +well padded with figures which the women skipped and the men said they +had read.</p> + +<p>By the interest which it takes in the poorer classes, by its care for +their welfare and the algebraic account it keeps of all their misery and +needs, political economy had, of course, given to Henri Mauperin a +colouring of Liberalism. It was not that he belonged to a very decided +Opposition: his opinions were merely a little ahead of Government +principles, and his convictions induced him to make overtures to +whatever was likely to succeed. He limited his war against the powers +that were to the shooting of an arrow or to a veiled allusion, the key +and meaning of which he would by means of his friends convey to the +various <i>salons</i>. As a matter of fact, he was carrying on a flirtation, +rather than hostilities, with the Government in power. Drawing-room +acquaintances, people whom he met in society, brought him within reach +of Government influence and into touch with Government patronage. He +would prepare the works and correct the proofs of some high official who +was always busy and who had scarcely time to do more than sign his +books. He had managed to get on good terms with his Prefect, hoping +through him to get into the Council and afterward into the Chamber. He +excelled in playing double parts, and was clever at compromises and +arrangements which kept him in touch with everything without quarrelling +with anybody or anything. Though a liberal and political economist, he +had found a way of turning aside the distrust of the Catholics and their +enmity against himself and his doctrines. He had won the indulgence and +sympathy of some of them, and had managed to make himself agreeable to +the clergy and to flatter the church by linking together material +progress and spiritual progress, the religion of political economy and +that of Catholicism: Quesnay and Saint Augustin, Bastiat and the Gospel, +statistics and God. Then besides this programme of his, the alliance of +Religion and Political Economy, he had a reserve stock of piety, and he +observed most regularly certain religious practices, which won for him +the affectionate regard of the Abbé Blampoix and brought him into secret +communion with believers and with those who observed their religious +duties.</p> + +<p>Henri Mauperin had taken his flat in the Rue Taitbout for the purpose of +entertaining his friends. These entertainments consisted of solemn +parties for young men, where the guests would gather round a table which +looked like a desk and talk about Natural Law, Public Charities, +Productive Forces, and the <i>Multiplicabilité</i> of the Human Species. +Henri tried to turn these reunions into something approaching +conferences. He was selecting the men and looking for the elements he +would require for the famous <i>salon</i> he hoped to have in Paris as soon +as he was married; he lured to his reunions the great authorities and +notabilities of economic science, and invited to a sort of honorary +presidency members of the Institute, whom he had pursued with his +politeness and his newspaper puffs and who, according to his plans, +would some day help him to take his seat among them in the moral and +political science section.</p> + +<p>It was, however, in turning associations to account that Henri had shown +his talent and all his skill. He had from the very first clung to that +great means of getting on peculiar to ciphers—that means by which a man +is no longer one alone, but a unit joined to a number. He had gained a +footing for himself in associations of every kind. He had joined the +d'Aguesseau Debating Society and had glided in and taken his place among +all those young men who were practising speech-making, educating +themselves for the platform, doing their apprenticeship as orators and +their probation as statesmen for future parliamentary struggles. Clubs, +college reunions and banquets of old boys, barriers' lectures, +historical and geographical societies, scientific and benevolent +societies, he had neglected nothing. Everywhere, in all centres which +give to the individual an opportunity of shining and which bring him any +profit by the collective influence of a group, he appeared and was here, +there and everywhere, making fresh acquaintances, forming new +connections, cultivating friendships and interests which might lead him +on to something, thus driving in the landmarks of his various ambitions, +marching ahead, from the committee of one society to the committee of +another society, to an importance, a sort of veiled notoriety and to +one of those names which, thanks to political influence, are suddenly +brought to the front when the right time comes.</p> + +<p>He certainly was well qualified for the part he was playing. Eloquent +and active, he could make all the noise and stir which lead a man on to +success in this century of ours. He was commonplace with plenty of show +about him. In society he rarely recited his own articles, but he usually +posed with one hand in his waistcoat, after the fashion of Guizot in +Delaroche's portrait.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>IX</h2> + + +<p>"Well!" exclaimed Renée, entering the dining-room at eleven o'clock, +breathless like a child who had been running, "I thought every one would +be down. Where is mamma?"</p> + +<p>"Gone to Paris—shopping," answered M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh!—and where's Denoisel?"</p> + +<p>"He's gone to see the man with the sloping ground, who must have kept +him to luncheon. We'll begin luncheon."</p> + +<p>"Good-morning, papa!" And instead of taking her seat Renée went across +to her father and putting her arms round his neck began to kiss him.</p> + +<p>"There, there, that's enough—you silly child!" said M. Mauperin, +smiling as he endeavoured to free himself.</p> + +<p>"Let me kiss you <i>tong-fashion</i>—there—like that," and she pinched his +cheeks and kissed him again.</p> + +<p>"What a child you are, to be sure."</p> + +<p>"Now look at me. I want to see whether you care for me."</p> + +<p>And Renée, standing up after kissing him once more, moved back from her +father, still holding his head between her hands. They gazed at each +other lovingly and earnestly, looking into one another's eyes. The +French window was open and the light, the scents and the various noises +from the garden penetrated into the room. A beam of sunshine darted on +to the table, lighted on the china and made the glass glitter. It was +bright, cheerful weather and a faint breeze was stirring; the shadows of +the leaves trembled slightly on the floor. A vague sound of wings +fluttering in the trees and of birds sporting among the flowers could be +heard in the distance.</p> + +<p>"Only we two; how nice!" exclaimed Renée, unfolding her serviette. "Oh, +the table is too large; I am too far away," and taking her knife and +fork she went and sat next her father. "As I have my father all to +myself to-day I'm going to enjoy my father," and so saying she drew her +chair still nearer to him.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you remind me of the time when you always wanted to have your +dinner in my pocket. But you were eight years old then."</p> + +<p>Renée began to laugh.</p> + +<p>"I was scolded yesterday," said M. Mauperin, after a minute's silence, +putting his knife and fork down on his plate.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" remarked Renée, looking up at the ceiling in an innocent way and +then letting her eyes fall on her father with a sly look in them such as +one sees in the eyes of a cat. "Really, poor papa! Why were you scolded? +What had you done?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I should advise <i>you</i> to ask me that again; you know better than I +do myself why I was scolded. What do you mean, you dreadful child?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, if you are going to lecture me, papa, I shall get up and—I shall +kiss you."</p> + +<p>She half rose as she said this, but M. Mauperin interrupted her, +endeavouring to speak in a severe tone:</p> + +<p>"Sit down again, Renée, please. You must own, my dear child, that +yesterday——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, papa, are you going to talk to me like this on such a beautiful +day?"</p> + +<p>"Well, but will you explain?" persisted M. Mauperin, trying to remain +dignified in face of the rebellious expression, made up of smiles +mingled with defiance, in his daughter's eyes. "It was very evident that +you behaved in the way you did purposely."</p> + +<p>Renée winked mischievously and nodded her head two or three times +affirmatively.</p> + +<p>"I want to speak to you seriously, Renée."</p> + +<p>"But I am quite serious, I assure you. I have told you that I was like +that on purpose."</p> + +<p>"And why—will you tell me that?"</p> + +<p>"Why? Oh, yes, I'll tell you, but on condition that you won't be too +conceited. It was because—because——"</p> + +<p>"Because of what?"</p> + +<p>"Because I love you much more than that gentleman who was here +yesterday—there now—very much more—it's quite true!"</p> + +<p>"But, then, we ought not to have allowed him to come if you did not care +for this young man. We didn't force you into it. It was you yourself who +agreed that he should be invited. On the contrary, your mother and I +believed that this match——"</p> + +<p>"Excuse me, papa, but if I had refused M. Reverchon at first sight, +point-blank, you would have said I was unreasonable, mad, senseless. I +fancy I can hear mamma now on the subject. Whereas, as things were, what +is there to reproach me with? I saw M. Reverchon once, and I saw him +again, I had plenty of time to judge him and I knew that I disliked him. +It is very silly, perhaps, but it is nevertheless——"</p> + +<p>"But why did you not tell us? We could have found a hundred ways of +getting out of it."</p> + +<p>"You are very ungrateful, papa. I have saved you all that worry. The +young man is drawing out of it himself and it is not your fault at all; +I alone am responsible. And this is all the gratitude I get for my +self-sacrifice! Another time——"</p> + +<p>"Listen to me, my dear. If I speak to you like this it is because it is +a question of your marriage. Your marriage—ah, it took me a long time +to get reconciled to the idea that—to the idea of being separated from +you. Fathers are selfish, you see; they would like it better if you +never took to yourself wings. They have the greatest difficulty in +making up their minds to it all. They think they cannot be happy without +your smiles, and that the house will be very different when your dress +is not flitting about. But we have to submit to what must be, and now it +seems to me that I shall like my son-in-law. I am getting old, you know, +my dear little Renée," and M. Mauperin took his daughter's hands in his. +"Your father is sixty-eight, my child, he has only just time enough left +to see you settled and happy. Your future, if only you knew it, is my +one thought, my one torment. Your mother loves you dearly, too, I know, +but your character and hers are different; and then, if anything +happened to me. You know we must face things; and at my age. You see the +thought of leaving you without a husband—and children—without any love +which would make up to you for your old father's when he is no longer +with you——"</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin could not finish; his daughter had thrown her arms round +him, stifling down her sobs, and her tears were flowing freely on his +waistcoat.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's dreadful of you, dreadful!" she said in a choking voice. "Why +do you talk about it? Never—never!" and with a gesture she waved back +the dark shadow called up by her imagination.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin had taken her on his knee. He put his arms round her, kissed +her forehead and said, "Don't cry, Renée, don't cry!"</p> + +<p>"How dreadful! Never!" she repeated once more, as though she were just +rousing herself from some bad dream, and then, wiping her eyes with the +back of her hand, she said to her father: "I must go away and have my +cry out," and with that she escaped.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"That Dardouillet is certainly mad," remarked Denoisel, as he entered +the room. "Just fancy, I could not possibly get rid of him. Ah, you are +alone?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my wife is in Paris, and Renée has just gone upstairs."</p> + +<p>"Why, what's the matter, M. Mauperin? You look——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's nothing—a little scene with Renée that I've just had—about +this marriage—this Reverchon. I was silly enough to tell her that I am +in a hurry to see my grandchildren, that fathers of my age are not +immortal, and thereupon—the child is so sensitive, you know. She is up +in her room now, crying. Don't go up; it will take her a little time to +recover. I'll go and look after my work people."</p> + +<p>Denoisel, left to himself, lighted a cigar, picked up a book and went +out to one of the garden seats to read. He had been there about two +hours when he saw Renée coming towards him. She had her hat on and her +animated face shone with joy and a sort of serene excitement.</p> + +<p>"Well, have you been out? Where have you come from?"</p> + +<p>"Where have I come from?" repeated Renée, unfastening her hat. "Well, +I'll tell you, as you are my friend," and she took her hat off and threw +her head back with that pretty gesture women have for shaking their hair +into place. "I've come from church, and if you want to know what I've +been doing there, why, I've been asking God to let me die before papa. I +was in front of a large statue of the Virgin—you are not to laugh—it +would make me unhappy if you laughed. Perhaps it was the sun or the +effect of gazing at her all the time, I don't know, but it seemed to me +all in a minute that she did like this—" and Renée nodded her head. +"Anyhow, I am very happy and my knees ache, too, I can tell you; for all +the time I was praying I was on my knees, and not on a chair or a +cushion either—but on the stone floor. Ah, I prayed in earnest; God +can't surely refuse me that!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>X</h2> + + +<p>A few days after this M. and Mme. Mauperin, Henri, Renée, and Denoisel +were sitting together after dinner in the little garden which stretched +out at the back of the house, between the walls of the refinery and its +outbuildings. The largest tree in the garden was a fir, and the +rose-trees had been allowed to climb up to its lowest branches, so that +its green arms stirred the roses. Under the tree was a swing, and at the +back of it a sort of thicket of lilacs and witch-elms; there was a round +plot of grass, with a garden bench and a very small pool with a white +curbstone round it and a fountain that did not play. The pool was full +of aquatic plants and a few black newts were swimming in it.</p> + +<p>"You don't intend to have any theatricals, then, Renée?" Henri was +saying to his sister. "You've quite given up that idea?"</p> + +<p>"Given up—no; but what can I do? It isn't my fault, for I would act +anything—I'd stand on my head. But I can't find any one else, so that, +unless I give a monologue—Denoisel has refused, and as for you, a +sober man like you—well, I suppose it's no use asking."</p> + +<p>"I, why, I would act right enough," answered Henri.</p> + +<p>"You, Henri?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin in astonishment.</p> + +<p>"And then, too, we are not short of men," continued Renée, "there are +always men to act. It's for the women's parts. Ah, that's the +difficulty—to find ladies. I don't see who is to act with me."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Henri, "if we look about among all the people we know, I'll +wager——"</p> + +<p>"Well, let's see: there's M. Durand's daughter. Why, yes—what do you +think? M. Durand's daughter? They are at Saint-Denis; that will be +convenient for the rehearsals. She's rather a simpleton, but I should +think for the rôle of Mme. de Chavigny——"</p> + +<p>"Ah," put in Denoisel, "you still want to act 'The Caprice'?"</p> + +<p>"Now for a lecture, I suppose? But as I'm going to act with my +brother——"</p> + +<p>"And the performance will be for the benefit of the poor, I hope?" +continued Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"It would make the audience more disposed to be charitable."</p> + +<p>"We'll see about that, sir, we'll see about it. Well, Emma Durand—will +that do? What do you think, mamma?"</p> + +<p>"They are not our sort of people, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin +quickly; "they are all very well at a distance, people like that, but +every one knows where they sprang from—the Rue St. Honoré. Mme. Durand +used to go and receive the ladies at their carriage-door, and M. Durand +would slip out at the back and take the servant-men to have a glass at +the wine-shop round the corner. That's how the Durands made their +fortune."</p> + +<p>Although at bottom Mme. Mauperin was an excellent sort of woman she +rarely lost an opportunity of depreciating, in this way and with the +most superb contempt and disgust, the wealth, birth and position of all +the people she knew. It was not out of spite, nor was it for the +pleasure of slandering and backbiting, nor yet because she was envious. +She would refuse to believe in the respectability and uprightness of +people, or even in the wealth they were said to have, simply from a +prodigious <i>bourgeois</i> pride, from a conviction that outside her own +family there could be no good blood, and no integrity; that, with the +exception of her own people, every one was an upstart; that nothing was +substantial except what she possessed, and that what she had not was not +worth having.</p> + +<p>"And to think that my wife has tales like that to tell about all the +people we know!" said M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Come now, papa—shall we have the pretty little Remoli girl—shall we?"</p> + +<p>"Ask your mother. Say on, Mme. Mauperin."</p> + +<p>"The Remoli girl? But, my dear, you know—"</p> + +<p>"I know nothing."</p> + +<p>"Oh! do you mean to say that you don't know her father's history? A poor +Italian stucco worker. He came to Paris without a sou and bought a bit +of ground with a wretched little house at Montparnasse. I don't know +where he got the money from to buy it. Well, this land turned out to be +a regular Montfaucon! He sold thirty thousand pounds' worth of his +precious stuff—and then he's been mixed up with Stock Exchange affairs. +Disgusting!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, well," put in Henri, "I fancy you are going out of your way to find +folks. Why don't you ask Mlle. Bourjot? They happen to be at Sannois +now."</p> + +<p>"Mlle. Bourjot?" repeated Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Noémi?" said Renée quickly, "I should just think I should like to ask +her. But this winter I thought her so distant with me. She has something +or other—I don't know——"</p> + +<p>"She has, or rather she will have, twelve thousand pounds a year," +interrupted Denoisel, "and mothers are apt to watch over their +daughters when such is the case. They will not allow them to get too +intimate with a sister who has a brother. They have made her understand +this; that's about the long and short of it."</p> + +<p>"Then, too, they are so high and mighty, those folks are; they might +have descended from—And yet," continued Mme. Mauperin, breaking off and +turning to her son, "they have always been very pleasant with you, +Henri, haven't they? Mme. Bourjot is always very nice to you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and she has complained several times of your not going to her +soirées; she says you don't take Renée often enough to see her +daughter."</p> + +<p>"Really?" exclaimed Renée, very delighted.</p> + +<p>"My dear," said Mme. Mauperin, "what do you think of what Henri +says—Mlle. Bourjot?"</p> + +<p>"What objection do you want me to make?"</p> + +<p>"Well, then," said Mme. Mauperin, "Henri's idea shall be carried out. +We'll go on Saturday, shall we, my dear? And you'll come with us, +Henri?"</p> + +<p>A few hours later every one was in bed with the exception of Henri +Mauperin. He was walking up and down in his room puffing on a cigar that +had gone out, and every now and then he appeared to be smiling at his +own thoughts.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XI</h2> + + +<p>Renée often went during the day to paint in a little studio, built out +of an old green-house at the bottom of the garden. It was very +rustic-looking, half hidden with verdure and walled with ivy, something +between an old ruin and a nest.</p> + +<p>On a table covered with an Algerian cloth there were, on this particular +day in the little studio, a Japanese box with a blue design, a lemon, an +old red almanac with the French coat of arms, and two or three other +bright-coloured objects grouped together as naturally as possible to +make a picture, with the light from the glass roof falling on them. +Seated in front of the table, Renée was painting all this with brushes +as fine as pins on a canvas which already had something on the under +side. The skirt of her white piqué dress hung in ample folds on each +side of the stool on which she was seated. She had gathered a white rose +as she came through the garden and had fastened it in her loosely +arranged hair just above her ear. Her foot, visible below her dress, in +a low shoe which showed her white stocking, was resting on the +cross-bar of the easel. Denoisel was seated near her, watching her work +and making a bad sketch of her profile in an album he had picked up in +the studio.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you do pose well," he remarked, as he sharpened his pencil again; +"I would just as soon try to catch an omnibus as your expression. You +never cease. If you always move like that——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, now, Denoisel, no nonsense with your portrait. I hope you'll +flatter me a little."</p> + +<p>"No more than the sun does. I am as conscientious as a photograph."</p> + +<p>"Let me look," she said, leaning back towards Denoisel and holding her +maulstick and palette out in front of her. "Oh! I am not beautiful. +Truly, now," she continued, as she went on with her painting, "am I like +that?"</p> + +<p>"Something. Come, Renée—honestly now—what do you think you are like +yourself—beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Pretty?"</p> + +<p>"No—no——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you took the trouble to think the matter over this time."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I said it twice."</p> + +<p>"Good! If you think you are neither beautiful nor pretty, you don't +fancy either that you are——"</p> + +<p>"Ugly? No, that's quite true. It's very difficult to explain. Sometimes, +now, when I look at myself, I think—how am I to explain? Well, I like +my looks; it isn't my face, I know, it's just a sort of expression I +have at such times, a something that is within me and which I can feel +passing over my features. I don't know what it is—happiness, pleasure, +a sort of emotion or whatever you like to call it. I get moments like +that when it seems to me as though I am taking all my people in finely. +All the same, though, I should have liked to be beautiful."</p> + +<p>"Really!"</p> + +<p>"It must be very pleasant for one's own sake, it seems to me. Now, for +instance, I should have liked to be tall, with very black hair. It's +stupid to be almost blonde. It's the same with white skin; I should have +chosen a skin—well, like Mme. Stavelot, rather orange-coloured. I like +that, but it's a matter of taste. And then I should have enjoyed looking +in my glass. It's like when I get up in the morning and walk about the +carpet with bare feet. I should love to have feet like a statue I once +saw—it's just an idea!"</p> + +<p>"If that's how you feel you wouldn't care about being beautiful for the +sake of other people?"</p> + +<p>"Yes and no. Not for every one—only for those I care for. We ought to +be ugly for people about whom we are indifferent, for all the people we +don't love—don't you think so? They would have just what they deserved +then."</p> + +<p>Denoisel began sketching again.</p> + +<p>"How odd it is, your ideal, to wish to be dark!" he said, after a +moment's silence.</p> + +<p>"What should you like to be?"</p> + +<p>"If I were a woman? I should like to be small and neither very fair nor +very dark——"</p> + +<p>"Auburn then?"</p> + +<p>"And plump—Oh, as plump as a quail."</p> + +<p>"Plump? Ah, I can breathe again. Just for a moment I was afraid of a +declaration—If the light had not shown up your hair I should have +forgotten you were forty."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you don't make me out any older than I am, Renée; that is exactly +my age. But do you know what yours is for me?"</p> + +<p>"No——"</p> + +<p>"Twelve—and you will always be that age to me."</p> + +<p>"Thanks—I am very glad," said Renée. "If that's it I shall always be +able to tell you all the nonsense that comes into my head. Denoisel," +she continued, after a short silence, "have you ever been in love?" She +had drawn back slightly from her canvas and was looking at it sideways, +her head leaning over her shoulder to see the effect of the colour she +had just put on.</p> + +<p>"Oh, well! that's a good start," answered Denoisel. "What a question!"</p> + +<p>"What's the matter with my question? I'm asking you that just as I might +ask you anything else. I don't see anything in it. Would there be any +harm in asking such a thing in society? Come now, Denoisel! you say I am +twelve years old and I agree to be twelve; but I'm twenty all the same. +I'm a <i>young person</i>, that's true, but if you imagine that <i>young +persons</i> of my age have never read any novels nor sung any +love-songs—why, it's all humbug—it's just posing as sweet innocents. +After all, just as you like. If you think I am not old enough I'll take +back my question. I thought we were to consider ourselves men when we +talked about things together."</p> + +<p>"Well, since you want to know, yes—I have been in love."</p> + +<p>"Ah! And what effect did it have on you—being in love?"</p> + +<p>"You have only to read over again the novels you have read, my dear, and +you will find the effect described on every page."</p> + +<p>"There, now, that's just what puzzles me; all the books one reads are +full of love—there's nothing but that! And then in real life one sees +nothing of it—at least I don't see anything of it; on the contrary, I +see every one doing without it, and quite easily, too. Sometimes I +wonder whether it is not just invented for books, whether it is not all +imagined by authors—really."</p> + +<p>Denoisel laughed at the young girl's words.</p> + +<p>"Tell me, Renée," he said, "since we are men for the time being, as you +just said and as we talk to each other of what we feel, quite frankly +like two old friends, I should like to ask you in my turn whether you +have ever—well, not been in love with any one, but whether you have +ever cared for any one?"</p> + +<p>"No, never," answered Renée, after a moment's reflection, "but then I am +not a fair example. I fancy that such things happen to people who have +an empty heart, no one to think about; people who are not taken up, +absorbed, possessed and, as it were, protected by one of those +affections which take hold of you wholly and entirely—the affection one +has for one's father, for instance."</p> + +<p>Denoisel did not answer.</p> + +<p>"You don't believe that that does preserve you?" said Renée. "Well, but +I can assure you I have tried in vain to remember. Oh, I'm examining my +conscience thoroughly, I promise you. Well, from my very childhood, I +cannot remember anything—no, nothing at all. And yet some of my little +friends, who were no older than I was, would kiss the inside of the caps +of the little boys who used to play with us; and they would collect the +peach-stones from the plates the little boys had used and put them into +a box and then take the box to bed with them. Yes, I remember all that. +Noémi, for instance, Mlle. Bourjot, was very great at all that. But as +for me, I simply went on with my games."</p> + +<p>"And later on when you were no longer a child?"</p> + +<p>"Later on? I have always been a child as regards all that. No, there is +nothing at all—I cannot remember a single impression. I mean—well, I'm +going to be quite frank with you—I had just a slight, a very slight +commencement of what you were talking about—just a sensation of that +feeling that I recognised later on in novels—and can you guess for +whom?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"For you. Oh, it was only for an instant. I soon liked you in quite a +different way—and better, too. I respected you and was grateful to you. +I liked you for correcting my faults as a spoiled child, for enlarging +my mind, for teaching me to appreciate all that is beautiful, elevated +and noble; and all, too, in a joking way by making fun of everything +that is ugly and worthless and of everything that is dull or mean and +cowardly. You taught me how to play ball and how to endure being bored +to death with imbeciles. I have to thank you for much of what I think +about, for much of what I am and for a little of any good there is in +me. I wanted to pay my debt with a true and lasting friendship, and by +giving you cordially, as a comrade, some of the affection I have for +father."</p> + +<p>As Renée said these last words she raised her voice slightly and spoke +in a graver tone.</p> + +<p>"What in the world is that?" exclaimed M. Mauperin, who had just entered +and had caught sight of Denoisel's sketch. "Is that intended for my +daughter! Why, it's a frightful libel," and M. Mauperin picked up the +album and began to tear the page up.</p> + +<p>"Oh, papa!" exclaimed Renée, "and I wanted it—for a keepsake!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XII</h2> + + +<p>A light carriage, drawn by one horse, was conveying the Mauperin family +along the Sannois road. Renée had taken the reins and the whip from her +brother, who was seated at her side smoking. Animated by the drive, the +air, and the movement, M. Mauperin was joking about the people they met +and bowing gaily to any acquaintances they passed. Mme. Mauperin was +silent and absorbed. She was buried in herself, thinking out and +preparing her amiability for the approaching visit.</p> + +<p>"Why, mamma," remarked Renée, "you don't say a word. Are you not well?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, very well, quite well," answered Mme. Mauperin; "but the fact +is I'm worrying rather about this visit—and if it had not been for +Henri—There's something so stiff and cold about Mme. Bourjot—they are +all so high and mighty. Oh, it isn't that they impress me at all—their +money indeed! I know too well where they had it from. They made their +money from some invention they bought from an unfortunate working-man +for a mere nothing—a few coppers."</p> + +<p>"Come, come, Mme. Mauperin," put in her husband, "they must have bought +more than——"</p> + +<p>"Well, anyhow, I don't feel at ease with these people."</p> + +<p>"You are very foolish to trouble yourself——"</p> + +<p>"We can tell them we don't care a hang for their fine airs!" said Mlle. +Mauperin, whipping up the horse so that her slang was lost in the sound +of the animal's gallop.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>There was some reason for Mme. Mauperin's uneasiness. Her feeling of +constraint was certainly justified. Everything in the house to which she +was going was calculated to intimidate people, to set them down, crush +them, penetrate and overwhelm them with a sense of their own +inferiority. There was an ostentatious and studied show of money, a +clever display of wealth. Opulence aimed at the humiliation of less +fortunate beings, by all possible means of intimidation, by outrageous +or refined forms of luxury, by the height of the ceilings, by the +impertinent airs of the lackeys, by the footman with his silver chain, +stationed in the entrance-hall, by the silver plate on which everything +was served, by all kinds of princely ways and customs, such as the +strict observance of evening dress, even when mother and daughter were +dining alone, by an etiquette as rigid as that of a small German court. +The master and mistress were in harmony with and maintained the style +of their house. The spirit of their home and life was as it were +incarnate in them.</p> + +<p>The man, with all that he had copied from the English gentry, his +manners, his dress, his curled whiskers, his outward distinction; the +woman, with her grand manners, her supreme elegance, all the stiffness +and formality of the upper middle class, represented admirably the pride +of money. Their disdainful politeness, their haughty amiability, seemed +to come down to people. There was a kind of insolence which was visible +in their tastes even. M. Bourjot had neither any pictures nor any +objects of art; his collection was a collection of precious stones, +among which he pointed out a ruby worth a thousand pounds, one of the +finest in Europe.</p> + +<p>People had overlooked all this display of wealth, and the Bourjot's +<i>salon</i> was now very much in vogue and conspicuous on account of its +pronounced tendencies in favour of the Opposition party. It had become, +in fact, one of the three or four important <i>salons</i> of Paris. It had +been peopled after two or three winters which Mme. Bourjot had spent in +Nice under pretext of benefitting her health. She had converted her +house there into a kind of hotel on the road to Italy, open to all who +passed by provided they were great, wealthy, celebrated, or that they +had a name. At her musical evenings, when Mme. Bourjot gave every one +an opportunity for admiring her beautiful voice and her great musical +talent, the celebrities of Europe and Parisians of repute met in her +drawing-room. Scientists, great philosophers and æsthetes mingled with +politicians. The latter were represented by a compact group of +Orleanists and a band of Liberals not pledged to any party, in whose +ranks Henri Mauperin had figured most assiduously for the past year. A +few Legitimists whom the husband brought to his wife's <i>salon</i> were also +to be seen, M. Bourjot himself being a Legitimist.</p> + +<p>Under the Restoration he had been a Carbonaro. He was the son of a +draper, and his birth and name of Bourjot had from his earliest +childhood exasperated him against the nobility, grand houses, and the +Bourbons. He had been in various conspiracies, and had met with M. +Mauperin at Carbonari reunions. He had figured in all the tumults, and +had been fond of quoting Berville, Saint-Just, and Dupin the elder. +After 1830 he had calmed down and had contented himself with sulking +with royalty for having cheated him of his republic. He read the +<i>National</i>, pitied the people of all lands, despised the Chambers, +railed at M. Guizot, and was eloquent about the Pritchard affair.</p> + +<p>The events of 1848 came upon him suddenly, and the landowner then woke +up alarmed and rose erect in the person of the Carbonaro of the +Restoration, the Liberal of Louis Philippe's reign. The fall in stocks, +the unproductiveness of houses, socialism, the proposed taxes, the +dangers to which State creditors were exposed, the eventful days of +June, and indeed everything which is calculated to strike terror to the +heart of a moneyed man during a revolution, disturbed M. Bourjot's +equanimity, and at the same time enlightened him. His ideas suddenly +underwent a change, and his political conscience veered completely +round. He hastened to adopt the doctrines of order, and turned to the +Church as he might have done to the police authorities, to the Divine +right as the supreme power and a providential security for his bills.</p> + +<p>Unfortunately, in M. Bourjot's brusque but sincere conversion, his +education, his youth, his past, his whole life rose in revolt. He had +returned to the Bourbons, but he had not been able to come back to Jesus +Christ, and, old man as he now was, he would make all kinds of slips and +give utterance to the attacks and refrains to which he had been +accustomed. One felt, the nearer one came to him, that he was still +quite a Voltairean on certain points, and Beranger was constantly taking +the place of de Maistre with him.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"Give the reins to your brother, Renée," said Mme. Mauperin. "I +shouldn't like them to see you driving."</p> + +<p>They were in front of a magnificent large gateway, opposite which were +two lamps that were always lighted and left burning all night. The +carriage turned up a drive, covered with red gravel and planted on each +side with huge clumps of rhododendrons, and drew up before a flight of +stone steps. Two footmen threw open the glass doors leading into a hall +paved with marble and with high windows nearly hidden by the verdure of +a wide screen of exotic shrubs.</p> + +<p>The Mauperins were then introduced into a drawing-room, the walls of +which were covered with crimson silk. A portrait of Mme. Bourjot in +evening dress, signed by Ingres, was the only picture in the room. +Through the open windows could be seen a pool of water, and near it a +stork, the only creature that M. Bourjot would tolerate in his park, and +that on account of its heraldic form.</p> + +<p>When the Mauperins entered the large drawing-room, Mme. Bourjot, seated +by herself on the divan, was listening to her daughter's governess who +was reading aloud. M. Bourjot was leaning against the chimney-piece +playing with his watch-chain. Mlle. Bourjot, near her governess, was +working at some tapestry on a frame.</p> + +<p>Mme. Bourjot, with her large, rather hard blue eyes, her arched +eye-brows, and the lines of her eye-lids, her haughty and pronounced +nose, the supercilious prominence of the lower part of the face, and her +imperious grace, reminded one of Georges, when young, in the rôle of +Agrippina. Mlle. Bourjot had strongly marked brown eye-brows. Between +her long, curly lashes could be seen two blue eyes with an intense, +profound, dreamy expression in them. A slight down almost white could be +seen when the light was full on her, just above her lip at the two +corners. The governess was one of those retiring creatures, one of those +elderly women who have been knocked about and worn out in the battle of +life, outwardly and inwardly, and who finally have no more effigy left +than an old copper coin.</p> + +<p>"Why, this is really charming!" said Mme. Bourjot, getting up and +advancing as far as a line of the polished floor in the centre of the +room. "What kind neighbours—and what a delightful surprise! It seems an +age since I had the pleasure of seeing you, dear madame, and if it were +not for your son, who is good enough not to forsake us, and who comes to +my Monday Evenings, we should not have known what had become of you—of +this charming girl—and her mamma——"</p> + +<p>As she spoke Mme. Bourjot shook hands with Henri.</p> + +<p>"Oh! you are very kind," began Mme. Mauperin, taking a seat at some +distance from Mme. Bourjot.</p> + +<p>"But please come over here," said Mme. Bourjot, making room at her side.</p> + +<p>"We have postponed our visit from day to day," continued Mme. Mauperin, +"as we wanted to come together."</p> + +<p>"Oh! well, it's very bad of you," continued Mme. Bourjot. "We are not a +hundred miles away; and it is cruel to keep these two children apart, +when they grew up together. Why, how's this, they haven't kissed each +other yet?"</p> + +<p>Noémi, who was still standing, presented her cheek coldly to Renée, who +kissed her as eagerly, as a child bites into fruit.</p> + +<p>"What a long time ago it seems," observed Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin, +as she looked at the two girls, "since we used to take them to the Rue +de la Chaussée d'Antin to those lectures, that bored us as much as they +did the poor children. I can see them now, playing together. Yours was +just like quicksilver, a regular little turk, and mine—Oh, they were +like night and day! But yours always led mine on. Oh, dear, what a rage +they had at one time for charades—do you remember? They used to carry +off all the towels in the house to dress up with."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," exclaimed Renée, laughing and turning to Noémi, "our finest +one was when we did <i>Marabout</i>; with <i>Marat</i> in a bath that was too hot, +calling out, '<i>Je bous, je bous</i>!' Do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed," answered Noémi, trying to keep back a smile, "but it was +your idea."</p> + +<p>"I am so glad, madame, to find you quite inclined beforehand for what I +wanted to ask you—for my visit is a selfish one. It was chiefly with +the idea of letting our daughters see something of each other that I +came. Renée wants to get up a play, and she naturally thought of her old +school-friend. If you would allow your daughter to take part in a piece +with my daughter—it would be just a little family affair—quite +informal."</p> + +<p>As Mme. Mauperin made this request, Noémi, who had been talking to Renée +and had put her hand in her friend's, drew it away again abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Thank you so much for the idea," answered Mme. Bourjot, "thanks, too, +to Renée. You could not have asked me anything that would have suited me +better and given me so much pleasure. I think it would be very good for +Noémi—the poor child is so shy that I am in despair! It would make her +talk and come out of herself. For her mind, too, it would be an +excellent stimulant——"</p> + +<p>"Oh! but, mother, you know very well—why, I've no memory. And then, +too—why, the very idea of acting frightens me. Oh, no—I can't act——"</p> + +<p>Mme. Bourjot glanced coldly at her daughter.</p> + +<p>"But, mother, if I could—No, I should spoil the whole play, I'm sure."</p> + +<p>"You will act—I wish you to do so."</p> + +<p>Noémi looked down, and Mme. Mauperin, slightly embarrassed and by way of +changing the subject, glanced at a Review that was lying open on a +work-table at her side.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Mme. Bourjot, turning to her again, "you've found something +you know there—that is your son's last article. And when do you intend +having this play?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, but I should be so sorry to be the cause—to oblige your +daughter——"</p> + +<p>"Oh! don't mention it. My daughter is always afraid of undertaking +anything."</p> + +<p>"Well, but if Noémi really dislikes it," put in M. Bourjot, who had been +talking to M. Mauperin and Henri on the other side of the room.</p> + +<p>"On the contrary she will be grateful to you," said Mme. Bourjot, +addressing Mme. Mauperin without answering M. Bourjot. "We are always +obliged to insist on her doing anything for her own enjoyment. Well, +when is this play?"</p> + +<p>"Renée, when do you think?" asked Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Why, I should think about—well, we should want a month for the +rehearsals, with two a week. We could fix the days and the time that +would suit Noémi."</p> + +<p>Renée turned towards Noémi, who remained silent.</p> + +<p>"Very well, then," said Mme. Bourjot, "let us say Monday and Friday at +two o'clock, if that will suit you—shall we?" And turning to the +governess she continued: "Mlle. Gogois, you will accompany Noémi. M. +Bourjot—you hear—will you give orders for the horses and carriage and +the footman to take them to Briche? You can keep Terror for me, and +Jean. There, that's all settled. Now, then, you will stay and dine with +us, won't you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! we should like to very much; but it is quite impossible. We have +some people coming to us to-day," answered Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, how tiresome of them to come to-day! But I don't think you +have seen my husband's new conservatories. I'll make you a bouquet, +Renée. We have a flower—there are only two of them anywhere, and the +other is at Ferrières—it's a—it's very ugly anyhow—this way."</p> + +<p>"Suppose we were to go in here," said M. Bourjot, pointing to the +billiard-room, which could be seen through the glass door. "M. Henri, +we'll leave you with the ladies. We can smoke here," added M. Bourjot, +offering a <i>cabanas</i> to M. Mauperin. "Shall we have cannoning?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>M. Bourjot closed the pockets of the billiard-table.</p> + +<p>"Twenty-four?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, twenty-four."</p> + +<p>"Have you billiards at home, M. Mauperin?"</p> + +<p>"No, I haven't. My son doesn't play."</p> + +<p>"Are you looking for the chalk?"</p> + +<p>"Thanks. And as my wife doesn't think it a suitable game for girls——"</p> + +<p>"It's your turn."</p> + +<p>"Oh! I'm quite out of practice—I always was a duffer at it though."</p> + +<p>"Well, but you are not giving me the game at all. There, it's all up +with my play—I was used to that cue," and M. Bourjot gave vent to his +feelings in an oath. "These rascals of workmen—they haven't any +conscience at all. There's no getting anything well made in these days. +Well, you <i>are</i> scoring: three, I'll mark it. The fact is we are at +their service. The other day, now, I wanted some chandeliers put up. +Well, would you believe it, M. Mauperin, I couldn't get a man? It was a +holiday—I forget what holiday it was—and they would not come—they are +the lords of creation, nowadays. Do you imagine that they ever bring us +anything of what they shoot or fish? Oh, no, when they get anything +dainty they eat it themselves. I know what it is in Paris—four? Oh, +come now! Every penny they earn is spent at the wine-shop. On Sundays +they spend at least a sovereign. The locksmith here has a Lefaucheux gun +and takes out a shooting license. Ah, two for me at last! And the money +they ask now for their work! Why, they want four shillings a day for +mowing! I have vineyards in Burgundy, and they proposed to see to them +for me for three years, and then the third year they would be their own. +This is what we are coming to! Luckily for me I'm an old man, so that it +won't be in my time; but in a hundred years from now there will be no +such thing as being waited on—there'll be no servants. I often say to +my wife and daughter: 'You'll see—the day will come when you will have +to make your own beds. Five?—six?—- you <i>do</i> know how to play. The +Revolution has done for us, you know." And M. Bourjot began to hum:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Et zonzon, zonzon, zonzon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Zonzon, zonzon—— '"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"These were not exactly your ideas some thirty years ago, when we met +for the first time; do you remember?" said M. Mauperin with a smile.</p> + +<p>"That's true. I had some fine ideas in those days—too fine!" replied M. +Bourjot, resting his left hand on his cue. "Ah, we were young—I should +just think I do remember. It was at Lallemand's funeral.—By Jove! that +was the best blow I ever gave in my life—a regular knock-you-down. I +can see the nails in that police inspector's boots now, when I had +landed him on the ground so that I could cross the boulevards. At the +corner of the Rue Poissonnière I came upon a patrol—they set about me +with a vengeance. I was with Caminade—you knew Caminade, didn't you? He +was a lively one. He was the man who used to go and smoke his pipe at +the mission service belonging to the Church of the Petits-Pères. He went +with his meerschaum pipe that cost nearly sixty pounds, and he took a +girl from the Palais-Royal. He was lucky, for he managed to escape, but +they took me to the police station, belabouring me with the butt-end of +their guns. Fortunately Dulaurens caught sight of me——"</p> + +<p>"Ah—Dulaurens!" said M. Mauperin. "We were in the same Carbonari +society. He had a shawl shop, it seems to me."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and do you know what became of him?"</p> + +<p>"No. I lost sight of him."</p> + +<p>"Well, one fine day—it was after all this business—his partner went +off to Belgium, taking with him eight thousand pounds. They put the +police on his track, but they could hear nothing of him. Our friend +Dulaurens goes into a church and makes a vow to get converted if he +finds his money again. They find his money for him and now his piety is +simply sickening. I never see him now; but in the old days he was a +lively one, I can tell you. Well, when I saw him I gave him a look and +he understood. You see, I had twenty-five guns in my house and five +hundred cartridges. When the police went there to search he had cleared +them away. All the same I was kept three months shut up in the new +building, and two or three times was fetched up in the night to be +cross-examined, and I always went with a vague idea in my mind that I +was going to be shot. You've gone through it all, and you know what it +is.—And all that was for the sake of Socialism! And yet I heard a few +words that ought to have enlightened me. When I was free again one of my +prison friends came to see me at Sedan. 'Why, what's this,' he said, +'that I am told at the hotel? It seems that your father has land and +money, and yet you have joined us! Why, I thought you hadn't anything!' +Just fancy now, M. Mauperin—and when I think that even that did not +open my eyes! You see I was convinced in those days that all those with +whom I was in league wanted simply what I wanted: laws for rich and poor +alike, the abolition of privileges, the end of the Revolution of '89 +against the nobility—I thought we should stop there—eleven? Did I mark +your last? I don't think I did—let us say twelve. But, good heavens! +when I saw my republic I was disgusted with it, when I heard two men, +who had just come down from the barricades in February, say, 'We ought +not to have left them until we had made sure of two hundred a year!' And +then the system of taxes according to the income; it's an iniquity—the +hypocrisy of communism. But with taxes regulated by the income," +continued M. Bourjot, eloquently breaking off in the midst of his own +phrase, "I challenge them to find any one who will care to take the +trouble of making a large fortune—thirteen, fourteen, fifteen—very +good! Oh, you are too strong a player. All that has made me turn +round—you understand?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly," replied M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Where's my ball—there? Yes, it has made me turn completely round; it +has positively made a Legitimist of me. There—a bad cue again! But——"</p> + +<p>"But what?"</p> + +<p>"Well, there is one thing—Oh, on that subject, now, I have the same +opinions still. I don't mind telling you. Anything approaching a +parson—eighteen?—Oh, come, I'm done for! We invite the one here in +this place—he's a very decent fellow; but as to priests—when you've +known one as I have, who broke his leg getting over the college wall at +night—they are a pack of Jesuits, you know, M. Mauperin!</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Hommes noirs, d'où sortez-vous?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nous sortons de dessous, terre.'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"Ah, that's my man! The god of simple folks!</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Mes amis, parlons plus bas:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Je vois Judas, je vois Judas!'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"Twenty-one! You've only three more. Now, at the place where my +iron-works are, there's a bishop who is very easy-going. Well, all the +bigots detest him. Now, if he pretended to be a bigot, if he were a +hypocrite and spent all his time at church——"</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"I never saw Mme. Bourjot so amiable," remarked Mme. Mauperin, when she +and her family were all back in the carriage.</p> + +<p>"An odd chap, that Bourjot," observed M. Mauperin. "It isn't much good +having a billiard-table of his own either—I could have given him a +start of twelve."</p> + +<p>"I think Noémi is very strange," said Renée. "Did you see, Henri, how +she wanted to get out of acting?"</p> + +<p>Henri did not answer.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XIII</h2> + + +<p>Noémi had just entered Mme. Mauperin's drawing-room followed by her +governess. She looked uncomfortable and ill at ease, almost shy, in +fact, but on glancing round she appeared to be somewhat reassured. She +advanced to speak to Mme. Mauperin, who kissed her. Renée then embraced +her, and, joking and laughing all the time, proceeded to take off her +friend's cape and hat.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I'm forgetting," she exclaimed, turning the dainty white hat +trimmed with pink flowers round on her hand, "let me introduce M. +Denoisel again. You have met him before in the old days—that sounds as +though we were quite aged, doesn't it?—and he is our theatrical +manager, our professor of elocution, our prompter—scene +shifter—everything."</p> + +<p>"I have not forgotten how kind M. Denoisel used to be to me when I was a +little girl," and Noémi, flushing with emotion as her thoughts went back +to her childhood, held out her hand somewhat awkwardly and with such +timidity that her fingers all clung together.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but what a pretty costume!" continued Renée, walking round her. +"You look sweet," and then patting her own taffeta dress, which was +rather the worse for wear, she held out her skirt and made a low +reverence. "You'll make a rather pretty Mathilde—I shall be jealous, +you know.—But look, mamma," she continued, drawing herself up to her +full height. "I told you so—she makes me quite small.—Now, then—you +see you are much taller than I am." As she spoke she placed herself side +by side with Noémi and, putting her arm round her waist, led her to the +glass and put her shoulder against her friend's. "There, now!" she +exclaimed.</p> + +<p>The governess was keeping in the background at the other end of the +<i>salon</i>. She was looking at some pictures in a book that she had only +dared to half open.</p> + +<p>"Come, my dears, shall we begin to read the play?" said Mme. Mauperin. +"It's no use waiting for Henri; he will only come to the last rehearsals +when the actresses are well on."</p> + +<p>"Oh, just now, mamma, let us talk first. Come and sit here, Noémi. +There—we have a lot of little secrets, so many things that have +happened since we last met to tell each other about—it is ages ago."</p> + +<p>And Renée began prattling and chirping away with Noémi. Their +conversation sounded like the fresh, clear, never-ending babbling of a +brook, breaking off now and again in a peal of laughter and dying away +in a whisper. Noémi, who was very guarded at first, soon gave herself up +to the delight of confiding in her friend and of listening to this voice +which brought back so many memories of the past. They asked each other, +as one does after a long absence, about all that had happened and what +they had each been doing. At the end of half an hour, to judge by their +conversation, one would have said they were two young women who had +suddenly become children again together.</p> + +<p>"I go in for painting," said Renée, "what do you do? You used to have a +beautiful voice."</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't mention that," said Noémi. "They make me sing. Mamma insists +on my singing at her big parties—and you've no idea how dreadful it is. +When I see every one looking at me, a shiver runs through me. Oh, I'm so +frightened—the first few times I burst out crying——"</p> + +<p>"Well, we'll have a little refreshment now. I've saved a green apple for +you that I was going to eat myself. I hope you still like green apples?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks, Renée dear, I'm not hungry, really."</p> + +<p>"I say, Denoisel, what can you see that is so interesting—through that +window?"</p> + +<p>Denoisel was watching the Bourjot's footman in the garden. He had seen +him dust the bench with a fine cambric handkerchief, spread the +handkerchief over the green laths, sit down on it in a gingerly way in +his red velvet breeches, cross his legs, take a cigar out of his pocket +and light it. He was now looking at this man as he sat there smoking in +an insolent, majestic way, glancing round at this small estate with the +supercilious expression of a servant whose master lives in a mansion and +owns a park.</p> + +<p>"Why, nothing at all," said Denoisel, coming away from the window; "I +was afraid of intruding."</p> + +<p>"We have told each other all our secrets now; so you can come and talk +to us."</p> + +<p>"You know what time it is, Renée?" put in Mme. Mauperin. "If you want to +begin the rehearsal to-day——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, mamma, please—it's so warm to-day—and then, too, it's Friday."</p> + +<p>"And the year began on a 13th," remarked Denoisel gravely.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Noémi, looking at him with her trustful eyes.</p> + +<p>"Don't listen to him—he's taking you in. He plays jokes of that kind on +you all day long—Denoisel does. We'll rehearse next time you come, +shall we?—there's plenty of time."</p> + +<p>"As you like," answered Noémi.</p> + +<p>"Very well, then; we'll take a holiday. Denoisel, be funny—at once. And +if you are very funny—very, very funny—I'll give you a picture—one +of my own——"</p> + +<p>"Another?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, you are polite—I work myself to death——"</p> + +<p>"Mademoiselle," said Denoisel to Noémi, "you shall judge of the +situation. I have now a picture of a mad-apple and a parsnip, and then +to hang with that a slice of pumpkin and a piece of Brie cheese. There's +a great deal of feeling, I know, of course, in such subjects; but all +the same from the look of my room any one would take me for a private +fruiterer."</p> + +<p>"That's how men are, you see," said Renée gaily to Noémi. "They are all +ungrateful, my dear—and to think that some day we shall have to marry. +Do you know that we are quite old maids—what do you think of that? +Twenty years old—oh, how quickly time goes, to be sure! We think we +shall never be eighteen, and then, no sooner are we really eighteen than +it's all over and we can't stay at that age. Well, it can't be helped. +Oh, next time you come, bring some music with you and we'll play duets. +I don't know whether I could now."</p> + +<p>"And we shall rehearse—<i>quand</i>?" asked Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"In Normandy!" answered Renée, indulging in that kind of joke which for +the last few years has been in favour with society people, and which had +its origin in the workshop and the theatre. Noémi looked perplexed, as +though she had not caught the sense of the word she had just heard.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Renée, "Caen is in Normandy. Ah, you don't go in for +word-endings? I used to have a mania for them some time ago. I was quite +unbearable with it—wasn't I, Denoisel? And so you go out a great deal. +Tell me about your balls."</p> + +<p>Noémi did as she was requested, speaking freely and getting gradually +more and more animated. She smiled as she spoke, and as her restraint +wore off her movements and gestures were graceful. It seemed as if she +had expanded under the influence of this air of liberty, here with Renée +in this gay, cheerful drawing-room.</p> + +<p>At four o'clock the governess rose as if moved by machinery.</p> + +<p>"It is time we started, mademoiselle," she said. "There is a +dinner-party, you know, at Sannois, and you will want time to dress."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XIV</h2> + + +<p>"This time you must not expect to enjoy yourself; we are going to +rehearse in good earnest," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Noémi, come and sit +down there—that's it. We are ready now, are we not? One—two—three," +he continued, clapping his hands, "begin."</p> + +<p>"The fact is—the first scene," said Noémi, hesitatingly, "I am not +quite sure of it—I know the other better."</p> + +<p>"The second, then? We'll begin with the second—I'll take Henri's part: +'<i>Good evening, my dear</i>—— '"</p> + +<p>Denoisel was interrupted by a peal of laughter from Renée.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear!" she said to Noémi, "how funnily you are sitting! You look +like a piece of sugar held in the sugar-tongs."</p> + +<p>"Do I?" said Noémi, quite confused and trying to find a better pose.</p> + +<p>"If only you would be kind enough not to interrupt the actors, Renée," +said Denoisel. "'<i>Good evening, my dear</i>,'" he repeated, continuing his +rôle, "'<i>do I disturb you</i>?'"</p> + +<p>"Oh! and where are the purses?" exclaimed Renée.</p> + +<p>"Why, I thought you were to see to them."</p> + +<p>"I?—not at all. You were to see to them. You are a nice one to count on +for the stage properties! I say, Noémi, if you were married, would it +ever dawn upon you to give your husband a purse? It's rather shoppy, +isn't it? Why not a smoking-cap, at once?"</p> + +<p>"Are we going to rehearse?" asked Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Denoisel, you said that just like a man who really wants to go and +have a smoke!"</p> + +<p>"I always do want to smoke, Renée," answered Denoisel, "and especially +when I ought not to."</p> + +<p>"Why, it's quite a vice, then, with you."</p> + +<p>"I should just think it is; and so I keep it."</p> + +<p>"Well, but what pleasure can you find in smoking?"</p> + +<p>"The pleasure of a bad habit—that is the explanation of many passions. +'<i>Good evening, my dear</i>,'" he repeated, once more going back to M. de +Chavigny's arrival on the scene, "'<i>do I disturb you</i>?'"</p> + +<p>"<i>Disturb me, Henri—what a question!</i>" replied Noémi.</p> + +<p>And the rehearsal continued.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XV</h2> + + +<p>"Three o'clock," said Renée, looking up at the time-piece from the +little woollen stocking she was knitting. "Really, I begin to think +Noémi will not come to-day. She'll spoil the rehearsal. We shall have to +fine her."</p> + +<p>"Noémi?" put in Mme. Mauperin, as though she had just woke up. "Why, she +isn't coming. Oh, I never told you! I don't know what's the matter with +me—I forget everything lately. She told me last time that very probably +she would not be able to come to-day. They are expecting some people—I +fancy—I forget——"</p> + +<p>"Well, that's pleasant! There is nothing more tiresome than that—to +expect people who don't come after all. And this morning when I woke I +said to myself, 'It's Noémi's day.' I was looking forward to having her. +Oh, it's quite certain she won't come now. It's funny how I miss her +now—Noémi, when she isn't here—ever since she began to take me on +again. I miss her just as though she were one of the family. I don't +think her amusing, she isn't lively, she isn't at all gay, and then as +regards intelligence, why, she's rather feeble—you can take her in so +easily. And yet—how is it now?—in spite of all that there is a +fascination about her. There is something so sweet, so very sweet about +her, and it seems to penetrate you. She calms your nerves, positively, +and then the effect she has on you—why, she seems to warm your heart +for you, and only by being there, near you. I've known lots of girls who +had really more in them, but they haven't what she has. I've always felt +as cold as steel with all of them."</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, it's very simple," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Bourjot is of a very +affectionate, loving disposition. There is a sort of current of +affection between such natures and others."</p> + +<p>"When she was quite little, I can remember, she was just the same—and +so sensitive. How she used to cry, and how fond she was of kissing me; +it was amazing—she did nothing else, in fact. And her face tells you +just what she is, doesn't it? Her beauty seems to be made up of all the +affection she feels, and of all that she has left of her childhood about +her. And above all it is her expression. You often feel rather wicked +and spiteful, but when she looks at you with that expression of hers it +is as though everything of that kind disappears—as though something is +melting away. Would you believe that I never ventured to play a single +trick on her, and yet I was a terrible tease in the old days!"</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, it's very extraordinary to be as affectionate as all +that," said Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, it's quite natural," answered Denoisel. "Imagine a girl, who is +born with the instinct of loving, just as we have the instinct of +breathing. She is repelled by the coldness of a mother, who feels +herself humiliated by her daughter, and who is ashamed of her; she is +repelled also by the selfishness of a father, who has no other pride, no +other love, and no other child but his wealth; well, a girl like this +would be just like Mlle. Bourjot, and in return for any trifling +interest you might take in her, she would repay you by the affection and +the effusions of which you speak. Her heart would simply overflow with +gratitude and love, and you would see in her eyes the expression Renée +has noticed, an expression which seems to shine out through tears."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XVI</h2> + + +<p>The rehearsals had been going on a fortnight, when one day Mme. Bourjot +herself brought her daughter to the Mauperins. After the first greetings +she expressed her surprise at not seeing the chief actor.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Henri has such a wonderful memory," said Mme. Mauperin; "he will +only need a couple of rehearsals."</p> + +<p>"And how is it getting on?" asked Mme. Bourjot. "I must own that I +tremble for my poor Noémi. Is it going fairly well? I came to-day, in +the first place, to have the pleasure of seeing you, and then I thought +I should like to judge for myself——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you can be quite at your ease," said Mme. Mauperin. "You will see +how perfectly natural your daughter is. She is quite charming."</p> + +<p>The actors went to their places and began the first scene of <i>The +Caprice</i>.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you flattered her," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin after the +first two or three scenes. "My dear child," she continued, turning to +her daughter, "you don't act as though you felt it; you are merely +reciting."</p> + +<p>"Oh, madame," exclaimed Renée, "you will frighten all the company. We +need plenty of indulgence."</p> + +<p>"You are not speaking for yourself," answered Mme. Bourjot. "If only my +poor child acted as you do."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," said Denoisel to Mme. Bourjot, "let us go on to the sixth +scene, mademoiselle. We'll hear what they have to say about that, for I +think you do it very well indeed; and as my vanity as professor is at +stake, Mme. Bourjot will perhaps allow me——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, monsieur," said Mme. Bourjot, "I do not think it has anything to do +with the professor in this case; you are not responsible at all."</p> + +<p>The scene was given and Mme. Bourjot continued, "Yes, oh yes, that +wasn't bad; that might pass. It's a namby-pamby sort of scene, and that +suits her. Then, too, she does her utmost; there's nothing to be said on +that score."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are severe!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"You see, I'm her mother," murmured Mme. Bourjot, with a kind of sigh. +"And then you'll have a crowd of people here——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you know one always gets more people than one wants on such +occasions," said Mme. Mauperin. "There is always a certain amount of +curiosity. I suppose there will be about a hundred and fifty people."</p> + +<p>"Suppose I were to make the list, mamma?" suggested Renée, who was +anxious to spare Noémi the rest of the rehearsal, as she saw how ill at +ease her friend was. "It would be a good way of introducing our guests +to Mme. Bourjot. You will make the acquaintance of our acquaintances, +madame."</p> + +<p>"I shall be very pleased," replied Mme. Bourjot.</p> + +<p>"It will be rather a mixed dish, I warn you. It always seems to me that +the people one visits are rather like folks one comes across in a +stage-coach."</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's a delightful idea—and so true too," said Mme. Bourjot.</p> + +<p>Renée took her seat at the table and began to write down with a pencil +the names of the people, talking herself all the time.</p> + +<p>"First comes the family—we'll leave that. Now, then, who is there? Mme. +and Mlle. Chanut, a girl with teeth like the pieces of broken glass +people put on their walls—you know what I mean. M. and Mme. de +Bélizard—people say that they feed their horses with visiting-cards."</p> + +<p>"Renée, Renée, come, what will every one think of you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, my reputation's made. I needn't trouble any more about that. Then, +too, if you imagine that people don't say quite as much about me as I +say——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, let her alone, please, let her alone," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. +Mauperin, and turning to Renée she asked with a smile, "And who comes +next?"</p> + +<p>"Mme. Jobleau. Ah, she's such a bore with her story about her +introduction to Louis Philippe at the Tuileries. '<i>Yes, sire; yes, sire; +yes, sire;</i>' that was all she found to say. M. Harambourg, who can't +stand any dust—it makes him faint—every summer he leaves his +man-servant in Paris to get the dust from between the cracks of the +floors. Mlle. de la Boise, surnamed the Grammar Dragoon; she used to be +a governess, and she will correct you during a conversation if you make +a slip with the subjunctive mood. M. Loriot, President of the Society +for the Destruction of Vipers. The Cloquemins, father, mother, and +children, a family—well, like Pan's pipes. Ah! to be sure, the Vineux +are in Paris; but it's no use inviting them; they only go to see people +who live on the omnibus route. Why, I was forgetting the Méchin +trio—three sisters—the Three Graces of Batignolles. One of them is an +idiot, one——"</p> + +<p>Renée stopped short as she saw Noémi's scared eyes and horrified +expression. She looked like some poor, loving creature, who scarcely +understood, but who had suddenly been troubled and stirred to the depth +of her soul by all this backbiting. Getting up from her seat Renée ran +across and kissed her. "Silly girl!" she said gently, "why, these people +I am talking about are not people that I like."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XVII</h2> + + +<p>Henri only came to the last rehearsals. He knew the play and was ready +with his part in a week. <i>The Caprice</i> was a very short piece for the +<i>soirée</i>, and it was decided to finish up with something comic. Two or +three short plays given at the Palais Royal were tried, but given up as +there were not enough actors, and finally a very nonsensical thing was +chosen that was just then having a great run in one of the smaller +theatres, and which Henri had insisted on in spite of Mlle. Bourjot's +apparently groundless objection to it. Considering her usual timidity, +every one was surprised at her obstinacy on this point; but it seemed, +since Henri had been there, as if she were not quite herself. Renée +fancied at times that Noémi was not the same with her now, and that her +friendship had cooled. She was surprised to see a spirit of +contradiction in her which she had never known before, and she was quite +hurt at Noémi's manner to her brother. She was very cool with him, and +treated him with a shade of disdain which bordered on contempt. Henri +was always polite, attentive, and ready to oblige, but nothing more. In +all the scenes in which he and Noémi acted together he was so reserved, +so correct, and indeed so circumspect, that Renée, who feared that the +coldness of his acting would spoil the play, joked him about it.</p> + +<p>"Pooh!" he answered, "I'm like the great actors. I'm keeping my effects +for the first night."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XVIII</h2> + + +<p>A small stage had been put up at the end of Mme. Mauperin's +drawing-room, and a leafy screen, made of branches of pine and flowering +shrubs, hid the footlights from view. Renée, with the help of her +drawing-master, had painted the drop-scene, which looked something like +the banks of the Seine. On each side of the stage was a hand-painted +poster which read as follows:</p> + + +<p class="center"><big>BRICHE THEATRE</big><br /> + + TO-DAY<br /> + +<big>THE CAPRICE</big><br /> + + AND<br /> + +<big>PIERROT, BIGAMIST</big></p> + + +<p>The names of the actors were at the end of the bill. All the chairs in +the house were placed closely together in rows in front of the stage, +and the ladies, in evening dress, were seated, their skirts, their +laces, the flashing of their diamonds, and their white shoulders all +mingling together. The two doors at the other end of the room leading +into the dining-room and the small <i>salon</i> had been taken off their +hinges, and the masculine part of the audience, in white neckties, were +grouped together there and standing on tip-toe.</p> + +<p>The curtain rose on the first scene of <i>The Caprice</i>. Renée was very +lively as Mme. de Léry; Henri, in the rôle of husband, proved himself a +talented amateur actor, as so many young men of a cold temperament, and +grave society men, often do. Noémi, well sustained by Henri, admirably +prompted by Denoisel, and slightly carried away by seeing the large +audience, played her touching part as the neglected wife very passably. +This was a great relief to Mme. Bourjot, who was seated in the front row +anxiously watching her daughter. Her vanity had been alarmed by the +thought of a fiasco. The curtain fell, and amid the applause were heard +shouts for "<i>All the actors!</i>" Her daughter had not made herself +ridiculous, and the mother was delighted with this great success and +gave herself up complacently to listening to that Babel of voices, +opinions, and criticisms, which at amateur dramatic performances +succeeds the applause and continues it, as it were, in a sort of murmur. +In the midst of it all she heard vaguely one phrase, spoken near her, +that came to her distinctly and seemed to rise above the general hubbub.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's his sister, I know," some one was saying; "but for the rôle +he takes I don't think he is sufficiently in love with her; he is really +far too much in love with his wife—didn't you notice?"</p> + +<p>The lady who was speaking saw that Mme. Bourjot was listening, and, +leaning towards her neighbour, whispered something to her. This little +incident made Mme. Bourjot turn very serious.</p> + +<p>After an interval the curtain was once more raised, and Henri Mauperin +appeared as Pierrot, but not arrayed in the traditional calico blouse +and black cap. He was an Italian Pierrot, with a straight felt hat, and +was entirely clothed in satin from his coat to his slippers. There was a +movement among the ladies, which meant that they thought both the man +and the costume charming, and then the buffoonery began.</p> + +<p>It was the silly story of Pierrot married to one woman and wishing to +marry another; a farce mingled with passion, which had been discovered +by a vaudeville-writer, aided by a poet, among the stock-pieces of the +old Italian theatre. Renée took the part of the deserted wife, this +time, appearing in various disguises when her husband was love-making +elsewhere. Noémi was the woman with whom he was in love, and Henri +delighted the house in his love scenes with her. He acted well, putting +plenty of youthful ardour, enthusiasm, and warmth into his part. In the +scene where he confessed his love, there was something in his voice and +expression that seemed like a real declaration, which had escaped him, +and which he could not keep back. Noémi certainly had made up as the +prettiest Colombine imaginable. She looked perfectly adorable, dressed +as a bride in a Louis XVI costume copied exactly from the <i>Bride's +Minuet</i>, an engraving by Debucourt lent by M. Barousse. All around Mme. +Bourjot it seemed as if every one were bewitched, the sympathetic public +appeared to be helping and encouraging the handsome young couple to love +each other. The piece continued, and every now and then it was as though +Henri's eyes were seeking, beyond the footlights, the eyes of Mme. +Bourjot. Meanwhile Renée arrived, disguised as a village bailiff: there +was only the contract to be signed now, and Pierrot, taking the hand of +the girl he loved, began to speak of all the happiness he should have +with her.</p> + +<p>The lady who was seated next Mme. Bourjot felt her leaning slightly on +her shoulder. Henri finished his speech, the plot came to the climax, +and the piece ended. Mme. Bourjot's neighbour suddenly saw something +sink down at her side; it was Mme. Bourjot, who had fainted.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XIX</h2> + + +<p>"Oh, do go in again, please," said Mme. Bourjot to the people who were +standing round her in the garden, to which she had been carried for air. +"It's all over; there's nothing the matter with me now; it was the +heat." She was very pale, but she smiled as she spoke. "I shall be quite +right again when I have had a little more air. M. Henri will perhaps +stay with me."</p> + +<p>Every one returned to the house, and the sound of the footsteps had +scarcely died away, when Mme. Bourjot seized Henri's arm in a firm grip +with her feverish fingers.</p> + +<p>"You love her!" she exclaimed. "You love her!"</p> + +<p>"Madame," said Henri.</p> + +<p>"Be quiet; you won't tell me the truth!" she exclaimed, pushing his arm +away.</p> + +<p>Henri merely bowed without attempting to speak.</p> + +<p>"I know all. I saw everything. Look at me!" she went on, and she gazed +into his eyes. He kept his head bent and was silent. "Say something, +anyhow—speak. Ah, you can only act comedy with her!"</p> + +<p>"The fact is I have nothing to say, Laure," replied Henri, speaking in +his gentlest and clearest voice. Mme. Bourjot drew back when he called +her Laure as if he had touched her. "I have been struggling against it +for the last year, madame," he continued. "I will not attempt to make +any excuse; but everything has drawn me to her. We have known each other +from childhood, and the fascination has increased lately day by day. I +am very sorry, madame, to have to tell you the truth; but it is quite +true that I love your daughter."</p> + +<p>"But you never can have talked to her, surely? Why, I blush for her when +we are out—you surely have not even looked at her. What in the world +possesses you men, tell me! Do you think she is beautiful? What +nonsense! why, I am better looking than she is. You are so foolish, all +of you. And then, I have spoiled you. You'll see whether she will pamper +your pride, let you revel in your vanity, and flatter and help you in +your ambitions. Oh, I know you thoroughly. Ah, M. Mauperin, all this is +only met with once in a lifetime. And women of my age—old women, you +understand—are the only ones who care about the future of those they +love. You were not my lover; you were like a dear son to me!" As she +said this, Mme. Bourjot's voice changed and she spoke with the deepest +feeling. "That's enough, though; we won't talk about that," she +continued in a different tone. "I tell you that you don't love my +daughter—it is not true—but she is rich——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, madame!"</p> + +<p>"Well, there are men like that—I have had them pointed out to me. +Sometimes it succeeds to begin with the mother in order to finish with +the dowry. And for the sake of a million, you know, one can put up with +being bored."</p> + +<p>"Speak more quietly, I beg you—for your own sake. They have just opened +one of the windows."</p> + +<p>"It's very fine to be so calm and collected, M. Mauperin, very +fine—very fine indeed," said Mme. Bourjot, and her low, hissing voice +sounded choked.</p> + +<p>Some clouds that were moving quickly along in the sky passed like the +wings of night-birds over the moon, and Mme. Bourjot gazed blankly into +the darkness in front of her. With her elbows resting on her knees and +supported by her high heels, she remained silent, tapping the gravel +path with her satin slippers. After a few minutes she sat up, moved her +arms about in an unconscious way as though she were scarcely awake, then +quickly, and in a jerky way, she put her hand between her dress and +waistband, pressing the back of her hand against the ribbon as though +she were going to burst it. Finally she rose and began to walk, followed +by Henri.</p> + +<p>"I count on our never seeing each other again, monsieur," she said, +without turning round.</p> + +<p>As she passed by the fountain she handed him her handkerchief, saying, +"Will you dip that in the water for me?"</p> + +<p>Henri obeyed, kneeling down on the curbstone. He handed her the damp +handkerchief, and she pressed it to her forehead and her eyes.</p> + +<p>"We will go in now," she said; "give me your arm."</p> + +<p>"Oh, madame, how courageous you are!" said Mme. Mauperin, advancing to +meet Mme. Bourjot when she entered the room. "It is not wise of you, +though, at all. I will have your carriage ordered."</p> + +<p>"No, please don't, thank you," replied Mme. Bourjot quickly. "I think I +promised you that I would sing; I am quite ready now," and she went +across to the piano, gracious and valiant once more, with that heroic +smile beneath which society actors conceal from the public the tears +they are weeping within themselves, and the wounds which discharge +themselves into their hearts.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XX</h2> + + +<p>Mme. Bourjot had married in order that two important business houses +should be united; for the sake of amalgamating various interests she had +been wedded to a man whom she did not know, and at the end of a week of +married life she had felt all the contempt that a wife can possibly feel +for a husband. It was not that she had expected anything very ideal, nor +that she had looked on marriage as a romantic and imaginative girl so +often does. She was remarkably intelligent herself, and seriously +inclined, her mind had been formed and nurtured by reading, study, and +acquirements which were almost more suitable for a man. All that she +asked from the companion of her life was that he should be intellectual +and intelligent, a being in whom she could place all her ambitions and +her pride as a married woman, a man with a brilliant future before him, +capable of winning for himself one of those immense fortunes to which +money nowadays leads, and who should prove himself able to leap over the +gaps of modern society to a high place in the Ministry, the Public +Works, or the Exchequer.</p> + +<p>All her castles in the air crumbled away with this husband, whom she +found day by day more and more hopelessly shallow, more and more +incapable, devoid of all that should have been in him, and which was in +her instead, more narrow-minded, more mean and petty as time went on, +and all this mingled with and contradicted by all the violences and +weaknesses of a childish disposition.</p> + +<p>It was her pride that had preserved Mme. Bourjot from adultery, a pride +which, it may be said, was aided by circumstances. When she was young, +Mme. Bourjot, who was of a spare build and southern type, had features +which were too pronounced to be pleasing or beautiful. When she was +about thirty-four she began to get rather more plump, and it seemed then +that another woman had evolved from the one she had been. Her features, +though still strongly pronounced, became softer and more pleasing; the +hardness of her expression appeared to have melted away, and her whole +face smiled. It was one of those autumn beauties such as age brings to +certain women, making one wish to have seen them as they were at twenty; +a beauty which makes one imagine for them a youthfulness they never had. +As a matter of fact, then, so far Mme. Bourjot had not run any great +danger, nor had she known any very great temptations. The society, which +on account of her tastes she had chosen, her surroundings, the men who +frequented her <i>salon</i> and whom she met elsewhere, had scarcely made it +necessary for her to stand seriously on the defensive. They were, for +the most part, academicians, savants, elderly literary men, and +politicians, all of them unassuming and calm, men who seemed old, some +of them from stirring up the past and the others the present. Satisfied +with very little, they were happy with a mere nothing—the presence of a +woman, a flattering speech, or the expression of eyes that were drinking +in their words. Accustomed to their academic adoration, Mme. Bourjot +had, without much risk, allowed it free scope and had treated it with +jests like an Egeria: it had been a flame which did not scorch, and with +which she had been able to play.</p> + +<p>But the time of maturity arrived for Mme. Bourjot. A great +transformation in her face and figure took place. Tormented, as it were, +by health which was too robust and an excess of vitality, she seemed to +lose the strength morally which she was gaining physically. She had a +great admiration for her past, and she felt now that she was less +strong-minded, and that there was less assurance in her pride than +formerly.</p> + +<p>It was just at this time that Henri Mauperin had made his appearance in +her drawing-room. He seemed to her young, intelligent, serious, and +thorough, equipped for the victories of life with all those +dispassionate and unwavering qualities that she had dreamed before her +marriage of finding in a husband. Henri had seized the situation at a +glance, and, divining his own chances, he made his plans and swooped +down on this woman as his prey. He began to make love to her, and this +woman, who had a husband and daughter, who had been a faithful wife for +twenty years, and who held a high position in Parisian society, scarcely +waited for him to tempt her. She yielded to him at their first +interview, conducting herself like a mere cocotte. Her love became a mad +passion with her, as it so frequently does with women of her age, and +Henri proved himself a genius in the art of attaching her to himself and +of chaining her, as it were, to her sin. He never betrayed himself, and +never for an instant allowed her to see a sign of the weariness, the +indifference, or the contempt that a man feels after a too easy +conquest, or of that sort of disgust with which certain situations of a +woman in love inspire him. He was always affectionate, and always +appeared to be deeply moved. He had for Mme. Bourjot those transports of +love and jealousy, all those scruples, little attentions, and +thoughtfulness which a woman, after a certain age, no longer expects +from her lover. He treated her as if she were a young girl, and begged +her to give him a ring which she always wore, and which had been one of +her confirmation presents. He put up with all the childishness and +coquetry which was so ridiculous in the passion of this mother of a +family, and he encouraged it all without a sign of impatience on his +face or a shade of mockery in his voice. At the same time he made +himself entirely master of her, accustoming her to be docile and +obedient to him, revealing to her such passionate love that Mme. Bourjot +was both grateful to him and proud of her victory over this apparently +cold and reserved young man. When he was thus completely master of her, +Henri worked her up still more by impressing her with the danger of +their meetings and the risks there were in their <i>liaison</i>, while by all +the emotions of a criminal passion he excited her imagination to such a +pitch of fear that her love increased with the very thought of all she +had to lose.</p> + +<p>She finally reached that stage when she only lived through him and for +him, by his presence, his thoughts, his future, his portrait, all that +remained to her of him after she had seen him. Before leaving him she +would stroke his hair with her hands and then put her gloves on quickly. +And all day afterward, when she was at home again with her husband and +her daughter, she would put the palms of her hands, which she had not +washed since, to her face and inhale the perfume of her lover's hair.</p> + +<p>This <i>soirée</i>, and this treason and rupture at the end of a year, +completely crushed Mme. Bourjot. She felt at first as if she had +received a blow, and her life seemed to be ebbing away through the +wound. She fancied she was really dying, and there was a certain +sweetness in this thought. The following day she hoped Henri would come. +She was vanquished and quite prepared to beg his pardon, to tell him +that she had been in the wrong, to beg him to forgive her, to entreat +him to be kind to her, and to allow her to gather up the crumbs of his +love. She waited a week, but Henri did not come. She asked him for an +interview that he might return her letters, and he sent them to her. She +wrote and begged to see him for the last time that she might bid him +farewell. Henri did not answer her letter, but, through his friends and +through the newspaper and society gossip, he contrived to let Mme. +Bourjot hear the rumour of an action that had been taken against him for +one of his articles on the misery of the poor. For a whole week he +managed to keep her mind occupied with the ideas of police and police +courts, prison, and all that the dramatic imagination of a woman +pictures to itself as the consequence of a lawsuit.</p> + +<p>When the Attorney-General assured Mme. Bourjot that the action would not +be taken, she felt quite a coward after all the terror she had gone +through, and weak and helpless from emotion, she could not endure any +more, and so wrote in desperation to Henri:</p> + +<p>"To-morrow at two o'clock. If you are not there I shall wait on the +staircase. I shall sit down on one of the stairs till you come."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXI</h2> + + +<p>Henri was ready, and had taken great pains to dress for the occasion in +an apparently careless style. He was wearing one of those morning suits +in which a young man nearly always looks well.</p> + +<p>At the time appointed in the letter there was a ring at the door. Henri +opened it and Mme. Bourjot entered. She passed by and walked on in front +of him as though she knew the way, until she reached the study. She took +a seat on the divan, and neither of them spoke a word. There was plenty +of room by her on the divan, but Henri drew up a smoking-chair, which he +turned round, and, sitting down astride on it, folded his arms over the +back.</p> + +<p>Mme. Bourjot lifted her double lace veil and turned it back over her +hat. Holding her head slightly aside, and with one hand pulling the +glove slowly off the other, she gazed at the things on the wall and on +the mantel-shelf. She gave a little sigh as if she were alone, and then, +glancing at Henri, she said:</p> + +<p>"There is some of my life here—something of me—in all that." She held +out her ungloved hand to him, and Henri kissed the tips of her fingers +respectfully.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me," she went on, "I did not intend speaking of myself; I have +not come here for that. Oh, you need not be afraid, I am quite sensible +to-day, I assure you. The first moment—well, the first moment was hard! +I won't deny that I had to pull myself together," she continued, with a +tearful smile, "but it's all over now. I scarcely suffer any more, and I +am quite myself again, I assure you. Of course everything cannot be +forgotten all in a minute, and I won't say that you are nothing to me +now—for you would not believe me. But this I can assure you, and you +must believe me, Henri, there is no more love for you in my heart. I am +no longer weak; the woman within me is dead—quite dead, and the +affection I have for you now is quite pure."</p> + +<p>The light seemed to annoy her as she spoke, as if it were some one +gazing at her. "Will you put the blind down, dear?" she said. "The +sun—my eyes have rather hurt me the last few days."</p> + +<p>While Henri was at the window she arranged her hat and let the cloak she +was wearing drop from her shoulders. When the light was not so strong in +the room she began again:</p> + +<p>"Yes, Henri, after struggling a long time, and enduring such anguish as +you will never know, after passing nights such as I hope you may never +have, and after crying and praying, I have conquered myself. I have won +the victory, and I can now think of my daughter's happiness without +being jealous, and of yours as the only happiness now left for me on +earth."</p> + +<p>"You are an angel, Laure," said Henri, getting up and walking up and +down the room as though he were greatly agitated. "But you must look at +things as they are. You were quite right the other day when you said +that we must separate forever—never see each other again. The idea of +our constantly meeting! You know we could not. It would take so little +to open wounds as slightly closed as ours are. Then, too, even if you +are sure of yourself, how do you know that I am as sure of myself? How +can I tell—if we were meeting at all times—with such constant +temptation—if I were always near you," he said, speaking very tenderly, +"why, some day, unexpectedly—how can I tell—and I am an honourable +man."</p> + +<p>"No, Henri," she answered, taking his hands in hers and drawing him to +the seat at her side, "I am not afraid of you, and I am not afraid of +myself. It is all over. How can I make you believe me? And you will not +refuse me? No, you cannot refuse me the only happiness which remains for +me—my only happiness. It is all I have left in the world now—it is to +see you, only to see you—" and throwing her arms round Henri's neck she +drew him to her closely.</p> + +<p>"Ah, no, it is quite impossible," said Henri, when the embrace had +lasted a few seconds. "Don't say any more about it," he continued, +brusquely, getting up as he spoke.</p> + +<p>"I will be brave," said Mme. Bourjot very seriously.</p> + +<p>When they had played out their comedy of renunciation they both felt +more at ease.</p> + +<p>"Now, then, listen to me," began Mme. Bourjot once more, "my husband +will give you his daughter."</p> + +<p>"How foolish you are, really, Laure."</p> + +<p>"Don't interrupt me—my husband will give you his daughter. I fancy he +intends asking his son-in-law to live in the same house. Of course you +would be quite free—your suite of rooms, your carriage, meals, and +everything quite apart—you know what our style of living is. Unless M. +Bourjot has changed his mind, she will have a dowry of forty thousand +pounds, and unless he should lose his money, which I do not think is +very probable, you will have, at our death, four or five times that +amount."</p> + +<p>"And how can you seriously imagine that Mlle. Bourjot, who has forty +thousand pounds, and who will have four or five times that much, would +marry——"</p> + +<p>"I am her mother," answered Mme. Bourjot in a decisive tone. "And +then—don't you love her? Why, it would merely be a kind of marriage of +expediency," and Mme. Bourjot smiled. "You provide her with happiness."</p> + +<p>"But what will the world say?"</p> + +<p>"The world? My dear boy, we should close the world's mouth with +truffles," and she gave her shoulders a little shrug.</p> + +<p>"And M. Bourjot?"</p> + +<p>"That's my part. He will like you very much before the end of two +months. The only thing is, as you know, he will want a title; he has +always intended his daughter to marry a count. All I can do is to get +him to consent to a name tacked on to yours. Nothing is simpler, +nowadays, than to get permission to add to one's name the name of some +estate, or forest, or even the name of a meadow, or a bit of land of any +sort. Didn't I hear some one talking to your mother about a farm called +Villacourt that you have in the Haute-Marne? <i>Mauperin de Villacourt</i>; +that would do very well. You know, as far as I am concerned, how little +I care about such things."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but it would be so ridiculous, with my principles, and a Liberal, +too, bound as I am. And then, you know——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you can say it is a whim of your wife's. Every one goes about with +names like that now; it's a sort of cross people have to bear. Shall I +say a word for you to any one in authority?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; no, please don't! I didn't think I had said anything which +could make you imagine I should be inclined to accept. I don't really +know, frankly. You understand that I should have to think it over, I +should have to collect myself and consider what my duty is; to be more +myself, in fact, and less influenced by you, before I could give you an +answer."</p> + +<p>"I shall call on your mother this week," said Mme. Bourjot, getting up +and pressing his hand. "Good-bye," she said sadly; "life <i>is</i> a +sacrifice!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXII</h2> + + +<p>"Renée," said Mme. Mauperin one evening to her daughter, "shall we go +and see Lord Mansbury's collection of pictures to-morrow? It appears +that it is very curious; people say that one of the pictures would fetch +four thousand pounds. M. Barousse thought it would interest you, and he +has sent me the catalogue and an invitation. Should you like to go?"</p> + +<p>"Rather. I should just think I should like to go," replied Renée.</p> + +<p>The following morning she was very much surprised to see her mother come +into the room while she was dressing, busy herself with her toilette, +and insist on her putting on her newest hat.</p> + +<p>"There are always so many people at these exhibitions," said Mme. +Mauperin, arranging the bows on the hat, "and you must be dressed as +well as every one else."</p> + +<p>Although it was a private exhibition there were crowds of people in the +room on the first floor of the Auction Buildings, where Lord Mansbury's +collection was on view. The fame of the pictures, and the scandal of +such a sale, which it was said had been necessitated by Lord Mansbury's +folly in connection with a Palais Royal actress, had attracted all the +<i>habitués</i> of the Hôtel Drouot; those people whom of late years the +fashion for collecting has brought there—all that immense crowd of +bric-à-brac buyers, art worshippers, amateurs of repute, and nearly all +the idlers of Paris. It had been found necessary to hang the three or +four valuable pictures for sale in the hall out of reach of the crowd. +In the room one could hear that muffled sound which one always hears at +wealthy peoples' sales, the murmur of prices going up, of whims and +fancies, of follies which lead on to further follies, of competitions +between bankers, and of all kinds of vanities connected with money +matters. Bidding, too, could be heard, being quietly carried on among +the groups. "The foam was rising," as the dealers say.</p> + +<p>When they entered the room, Mme. Mauperin and her daughter saw Barousse, +arm-in-arm with a young man of about thirty years of age. The young man +had large, soft eyes, which would have been handsome if they had had +more expression in them. His figure, which was slightly corpulent, was a +little puffy, and this gave him a rather common appearance.</p> + +<p>"At last, ladies!" said Barousse, addressing Mme. Mauperin; "allow me +to introduce my young friend, M. Lemeunier. He knows the collection +thoroughly, and if you want a guide he will take you to the best things. +I must ask to be excused, as I want to go and push something in No. 3 +room."</p> + +<p>M. Lemeunier took Mme. Mauperin and her daughter round the room, +stopping at the canvases signed by the most celebrated names. He merely +explained the subjects of the pictures, and did not talk art. Renée was +grateful to him for this from the bottom of her heart, without knowing +why. When they had seen everything, Mme. Mauperin thanked M. Lemeunier, +and they bowed and parted company.</p> + +<p>Renée wanted to see one of the side-rooms. The first thing she caught +sight of on entering was M. Barousse's back, the back of an amateur in +the very height of the excitement of the sale. He was seated on the +nearest chair to the auctioneer, next to a picture-dealing woman wearing +a cap. He was nudging her, knocking her knee, whispering eagerly his +bid, which he imagined he was concealing from the auctioneer and his +clerk, from the expert, and from all the room.</p> + +<p>"There, come, you have seen enough," said Mme. Mauperin, after a short +time. "It's your sister's 'At Home' day, and it is not too late. We have +not been once this year to it, and she will be delighted to see us."</p> + +<p>Renée's sister, Mme. Mauperin's elder daughter, Mme. Davarande, was the +type <i>par excellence</i> of a society woman. Society filled her whole life +and her brain. As a child she had dreamed of it; from the time she had +been confirmed she had longed for it. She had married very young, and +had accepted the first "good-looking and suitable" man who had been +introduced to her, without any hesitation or trouble and entirely of her +own accord. It was not M. Davarande, but a position she had married. +Marriage for her meant a carriage and servants in livery, diamonds, +invitations, acquaintances, drives in the Bois. She had all that, did +very well without children, loved dress, and was happy. To go to three +balls in an evening, to leave forty cards before dinner, to run about +from one reception to another, and to have her own "At Home" day—she +could not conceive of any happiness beyond this. Devoting herself +entirely to society, Mme. Davarande borrowed everything from it herself, +its ideas, its opinions, its way of giving charity, its stock phrases in +affairs of the heart, and its sentiments. She had the same opinions as +the women whose hair was dressed by the famous coiffeur, Laure. She +thought exactly what it was correct to think, just as she wore exactly +what it was correct to wear. Everything, from her very gestures to the +furniture in her drawing-room, from the game she played to the alms she +gave away, from the newspaper she read to the dish she ordered from her +cook, aimed at being in good style—good style being her law and her +religion. She followed the fashion of the moment in everything and +everywhere, even to the theatre of the <i>Bouffes Parisiens</i>. She had, +when driving in the Bois, been told the names of certain women of +doubtful reputation, and could point them out to her friends, and that +made an effect. She spelt her name with a small "d," an apostrophe, and +a capital A, and this converted it into d'Avarande. Mme. Davarande was +pious. It seemed to her that God was <i>chic</i>. It would have seemed almost +as improper to her to have no parish as to have no gloves. She had +adopted one of those churches where grand marriages are celebrated, +where people with great names are to be met, where the chairs have +armorial bearings, where the beadle glitters with gold lace, where the +incense is perfumed with patchouli, and where the porch after high mass +on Sundays resembles the corridor of the Opera House when a great +artiste has been singing.</p> + +<p>She went to hear all the preachers that people were supposed to hear. +She confessed her sins, not in the confessional, but in a community. The +name and the individuality of the priest played an important part so far +as she was concerned in the sacraments of the Church: she would not +have felt that she was really married if any one but the Abbé Blampoix +had officiated at her wedding, and she would not have considered a +baptism valid if a ten-pound note had not been sent to the curé inside +the traditional box of sugar-plums. This woman, whose mind was always +fixed on worldly things, even when at church and during the benediction, +was naturally, thoroughly, and absolutely virtuous, but her virtue was +not the result of any effort, merit, or even consciousness. In the midst +of this whirlwind, this artificial air and warm atmosphere, exposed to +all the opportunities and temptations of society life, she had neither +the heart which a woman must have who is given to dreaming nor enough +intelligence to be bored by such an existence. She had neither the +curiosity nor the inclination which might have led her astray. Hers was +one of those happy, narrow-minded dispositions which have not enough in +them to go wrong. She had that unassailable virtue, common to many +Parisian women who are not even touched by the temptations which pass +over them: she was virtuous just in the same way as marble is cold. +Physically, even, as it happens sometimes with lymphatic and delicate +natures, the effect of society life on her had been to free her from all +other desires by using up her strength, her nervous activity, and the +movement of the little blood she had in her body, in the rushing about +on visits and shopping, the effort of making herself agreeable, the +fatigue of evening parties, resulting in utter weariness at night, and +enervation the next day.</p> + +<p>There are society women in Paris who, by the amount of vitality and +vigour they expend, and by the intense application of their energy and +grace, remind one of circus-riders and tight-rope dancers, whose +temperament suffers from the fatigue of their exercises.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin and her daughter met Mme. Davarande in her dining-room, +accompanying a smooth-faced gentleman with blue spectacles to the door. +She was extremely amiable to him, and when she had seen him out she +returned to her mother and sister.</p> + +<p>"Excuse my leaving you," she said, as she kissed them, "but it was M. +Lordonnot, the architect of the Sacred Heart Convent. I cultivate him +for the sake of my collections. Thanks to him I had forty-eight pounds +you know last time. That's very good: Mme. de Berthival has never +reached thirty-two pounds. I'm so glad to see you; it's very nice of you +to have come. We'll go into the other room—there's no one here to-day. +Mme. de Thésigny, Mme. de Champromard, and Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, and +then two young men, young de Lorsac—you know him I think, mamma, and +his friend de Maisoncelles? Wait a minute," she said to Renée, patting +her hair down a little, "your hair looks like a little dog's," and then +advancing and opening the drawing-room door, she announced her mother +and sister.</p> + +<p>Every one rose, shook hands, or bowed, and then sat down again and +looked at each other. Mme. Davarande's three lady friends were leaning +back in their easy chairs in that languid attitude due to cushioned +seats. They looked very dainty in their wide skirts, their lovely hats, +and gloves about large enough for the hands of a doll. They were dressed +perfectly, their gowns had evidently been cut by an artiste, their whole +toilette with the hundred little nothings which set it off, their +graceful attitudes, their bearing, their gestures, the movement of their +bodies, the <i>frou-frou</i> of their silk skirts—everything was there which +goes to make the charm of the Parisian woman; and, although they were +not beautiful, they had discovered the secret of appearing almost +pretty, with just a smile, a glance, certain little details and +semblances, flashes of wit, animation, and a smart look generally.</p> + +<p>The two friends, Lorsac and Maisoncelles, in the prime of their twenty +years, with pink-and-white complexions, brilliant health, beardless +faces and curled hair, were delighted at being invited to a young +married lady's "At Home" day, and were sitting respectfully on the edge +of their chairs. They were young men who had been very well brought up. +They had just left a <i>pension</i> kept by an abbé who gave little parties +every evening, at which his sister presided, and which finished up with +tea handed round in the billiard-room.</p> + +<p>"Henriette," said Mme. de Thésigny to Mme. Davarande, when the +conversation had commenced again, "are we going to see Mlle. de Bussan's +wedding to-morrow? I hear that every one will be there. It's made such a +stir, this marriage."</p> + +<p>"Will you call for me, then? What's the bride-groom like—does any one +know? Do you know him, Mme. de Saint-Sauveur?"</p> + +<p>"No, not at all."</p> + +<p>"Is she making a good match?"</p> + +<p>"An awful match!" put in Mme. de Champromard, "he hasn't anything—six +hundred pounds a year all told."</p> + +<p>"But," said Mme. Mauperin, "it seems to me, madame, that six +hundred——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, madame," continued Mme. de Champromard, "why, nowadays, that isn't +enough to pay for having one's jewellery reset."</p> + +<p>"M. de Lorsac, are you coming to this wedding?" asked Mme. Davarande.</p> + +<p>"I will come if you wish it."</p> + +<p>"Well then, I do wish it. Will you keep two chairs for us? One spoils +one's dress quite enough without that. I can wear pearl grey, can't I?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, certainly," answered Mme. de Thésigny, "it's a moiré antique +wedding. M. de Maisoncelles, will you keep two chairs for me? Don't +forget."</p> + +<p>De Maisoncelles bowed.</p> + +<p>"And if you are very good you shall be my cotillon partner on +Wednesday."</p> + +<p>De Lorsac blushed for de Maisoncelles.</p> + +<p>"You don't go out much, do you, mademoiselle?" said Mme. de Sauveur to +Renée, who was seated next her.</p> + +<p>"No, madame, I don't care about going out," answered Mlle. Mauperin +rather curtly.</p> + +<p>"Julia," said Mme. de Thésigny to Mme. de Champromard, "tell us again +about your famous bride's bed-room—Mme. Davarande wasn't there. Just +listen, my dear."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it was my sewing-woman who told me. Only fancy, the walls are +draped with white satin, finished with applications of lace, and ruches +of satin to outline the panels. The sheets—I've seen the pattern—they +are of cambric—spider-web. The mattresses are of white satin, caught +down with knots of pale blue silk that show through the sheet. And you +will be surprised to hear that all that is for a woman who is quite +<i>comme il faut</i>."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," said Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, "that is most astonishing, for +everything, nowadays, is for the other kind of women. What do you think +happened to me in the country—a most disagreeable affair! There is a +woman, who is not all she ought to be, living near us. We came across +her at church, for she has sittings there—just fancy! Well, ever since +she has arrived in our part of the world, everything has gone up in +price. We positively cannot get a sewing-girl now in the house for less +than seven-pence halfpenny an hour. Money is nothing to creatures of +that kind, of course. And then every one adores her—she is such a +schemer. She goes to see the peasants when they are ill, she finds +situations for their children, and she gives them money—a sovereign at +a time. Before she came we used to be able to do things for the poor +without much expense, but that isn't possible now. It's outrageous! I +told the curé so—it really is quite scandalous! And we owe all this to +one of your relatives, M. de Lorsac, to your cousin, M. d'Orambeau. My +compliments to him when you see him."</p> + +<p>The two young men threw themselves back on their chairs and laughed +heartily, and then both of them instinctively bit their canes with +delight.</p> + +<p>"Where have you just come from?" Mme. Davarande asked her mother and +sister.</p> + +<p>"From the auction-room," answered Mme. Mauperin. "M. Barousse persuaded +us to go to an exhibition of pictures."</p> + +<p>"Lord Mansbury's collection," put in Renée.</p> + +<p>"Ah, we must go to those auction-rooms, Henriette," said Mme. de +Thésigny; "we'll go and <i>rococoter</i>—it's great fun."</p> + +<p>"Have you seen Petrucci's pictures, my dear?" asked Mme. de +Saint-Sauveur.</p> + +<p>"Is she selling them?" asked Mme. de Thésigny.</p> + +<p>"I did so want to go," said Mme. Davarande. "If I had only known that +you were going——"</p> + +<p>"We were all there," interrupted Mme. de Saint-Sauveur. "It was so +curious. There was a glass-case of jewellery, a necklace of black pearls +among other things—if only you had seen it—three rows. There isn't a +husband in the world who could give you a thing like that; it would take +a national subscription."</p> + +<p>"Shall we not see your husband?" asked Mme. Mauperin, turning to Mme. +Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Oh, he's never here on my day—my husband—thank goodness!" Mme. +Davarande looked round as she heard some one coming in by the door +behind her chair. It was M. Barousse, followed by the young man who had +been with him at the auction-room.</p> + +<p>"Ah, we meet again," he said to Mme. Mauperin, as he put down on a chair +the little portfolio which never left him.</p> + +<p>Renée smiled and the chattering began again.</p> + +<p>"Have you read that novel—that novel?"</p> + +<p>"The one in the <i>Constitutional</i>?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"By—I can't think of the name. It's called—wait a minute."</p> + +<p>"Every one's talking about it."</p> + +<p>"Do read it."</p> + +<p>"My husband will get it me from his club."</p> + +<p>"Is that play amusing?"</p> + +<p>"I only like dramas."</p> + +<p>"Shall we go?"</p> + +<p>"Let's take a box."</p> + +<p>"Friday?"</p> + +<p>"No, Saturday."</p> + +<p>"Shall we go to supper after?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—agreed."</p> + +<p>"It's at the <i>Provençaux</i>."</p> + +<p>"Will your husband come?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, he does what I want him to do, always."</p> + +<p>They were all talking and answering each other's questions without +really listening to anything, as every one was chattering at the same +time. Words, questions, and voices were all mingled together in the +Babel: it was like the chirping of so many birds in a cage. The door +opened, and a tall, thin woman dressed in black, entered.</p> + +<p>"Don't disturb yourselves, any of you; I have only just come in as I am +passing. I have only one minute."</p> + +<p>She bowed to the ladies and took up her position in front of the +chimney-piece, with her elbow on the marble and her hands in her muff. +She glanced at herself in the glass, and then, lifting her dress skirt, +held out the thin sole of her dainty little boot to the fire.</p> + +<p>"Henriette," she began, "I have come to ask you a favour—a great +favour. You absolutely must undertake the invitations for the ball that +the Brodmers are giving—you know, those Americans, who have just come; +they have a flat in the Rue de la Paix, and the rent is sixteen hundred +a year."</p> + +<p>"Oh, the Brodmers—yes," put in Mme. de Thésigny.</p> + +<p>"But, my dear," said Mme. Davarande, "it's a very delicate matter—I +don't know them. Have you any idea what these people are?"</p> + +<p>"Why, they are Americans. They've made their fortune out of cotton, +candles, indigo, or negroes—or—I don't know what; but what in the +world does that matter to us? Americans, you know, are accepted +nowadays. As far as I am concerned—with people who give balls, there's +only one thing I care about, and that is that they shouldn't belong to +the police and should give good suppers. It's all superb at their house, +it seems. The wife is astonishing. She talks the French of the +backwoods; and people say she was tattooed when she was a child. That's +why she can't wear low dresses. It's most amusing, and she is so +entertaining. They want to get plenty of people, you see. You <i>will</i> do +it for me, won't you? I can assure you that if I were not in mourning I +should have had great pleasure in putting on the invitation cards, 'With +the Baronne de Lermont's compliments.' And then, too, they are people +who will do things properly. Oh, as to that I'm convinced of it. They +are sure to make you a present——"</p> + +<p>"Oh no, if I undertake the invitations I don't want a present for it."</p> + +<p>"How queer you are! Why, that sort of thing's done every day—it's the +custom. It would be like refusing a box of sweets from these gentlemen +here on New Year's day. And now I must go. I shall bring them to see you +to-morrow—my savages. Good-bye! Oh dear, I'm nearly dead!" and with +these words she disappeared.</p> + +<p>"Is it really true?" Renée asked her sister.</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"That guests are supplied for balls in this way?"</p> + +<p>"Well, didn't you know that?"</p> + +<p>"I was in the same state of ignorance," said the young man M. Barousse +had brought.</p> + +<p>"It's very convenient for foreigners," remarked Mme. Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it seems to me that it's rather humiliating for Parisians. +Don't you think so, mademoiselle?" said the young man, turning to Mlle. +Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's an accepted thing, anyhow," said Mme. Davarande.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXIII</h2> + + +<p>Mme. Bourjot had just arrived with her daughter at the Mauperins'. She +kissed Renée and sat down by Mme. Mauperin on the sofa near the fire.</p> + +<p>"My dears," she said, turning to the two girls, who were chattering +together on the other side of the room, "suppose you were to let your +mothers have a little talk together. Will you take Noémi out in the +garden a little, Renée? I give her over to you."</p> + +<p>Renée put her arm round Noémi and pulled her along with her, skipping as +she went. In the hall she caught up a Pyrenees hood that was lying on a +chair and threw it over her head, put on some little overshoes, and ran +out into the garden, rushing along like a child, and keeping her arm +round her friend all the time.</p> + +<p>"There's a secret—a secret. Do you know what the secret is?" she +exclaimed, stopping suddenly short and quite out of breath.</p> + +<p>Noémi looked at her with her large, sad eyes and did not answer.</p> + +<p>"You silly girl!" said Renée, kissing her. "I've guessed it—I caught a +few words—mamma lets everything out. It's about his lordship, my +brother. There now!"</p> + +<p>"Let's sit down—shall we? I'm so tired." And Noémi took her seat on the +garden bench, just where her mother had sat on the night of the +theatricals.</p> + +<p>"Why, you are crying! What's the matter?" exclaimed Renée, sitting down +by her. Noémi let her head fall on her friend's shoulder and burst into +tears, that were quite hot as they fell on Renée's hand.</p> + +<p>"What is it, tell me—answer me—speak, Noémi—come now, Noémi dear!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you don't know!" answered Noémi, in broken words, which seemed to +choke her. "I won't—no, I cannot tell you—if only you knew. Oh, do +help me!" and she flung her arms round Renée in despair. "I love you +dearly—you——"</p> + +<p>"Come, come, Noémi; I don't understand anything. Is it this marriage—is +it my brother? You must answer me—come!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes; you are his sister—I had forgotten that. Oh, dear, I wish I +could die——"</p> + +<p>"Die, but why?"</p> + +<p>"Why? Because your brother——"</p> + +<p>She stopped short, in horror at the thought of uttering the words she +was just going to say, and then, suddenly finishing her sentence in a +murmur in Renée's ear, she hid her face on her friend's shoulder to +conceal her blushing cheeks and the shame she felt in her inmost soul.</p> + +<p>"My brother! You say—no, it's a lie!" exclaimed Renée, pushing her away +and springing up with a bound in front of her.</p> + +<p>"Should <i>I</i> tell a lie about it?" and Noémi looked up sadly at Renée, +who read the truth clearly in her eyes.</p> + +<p>Renée folded her arms and gazed at her friend. She stood there a few +minutes deep in thought, erect and silent, her whole attitude resolute +and energetic. She felt within herself the strength of a woman, and +something of the responsibility of a mother with this child.</p> + +<p>"But how can your father—" she began, "my brother has no name but +ours."</p> + +<p>"He is to take another one."</p> + +<p>"Ah, he is going to give our name up? And quite right that he should!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXIV</h2> + + +<p>"Oh, it's you, is it; you are not in bed yet?" said Henri to Renée, as +she went into his room one evening. He was smoking, and it was that +blissful moment in a man's life when, with slippers on and his feet on +the marble of the chimney-piece, buried in an arm-chair, he gives +himself up to day-dreams, while puffing up languidly to the ceiling the +smoke of his last cigar. He was thinking of all that had happened during +the past few months, and congratulating himself on having manœuvred so +well. He was turning everything over in his mind: that suggestion about +the theatricals, which he had thrown out with such apparent indifference +when they were all sitting in the garden; then his absence from the +first rehearsals, and the coolness with which he had treated Noémi in +order to reassure her, to take her off her guard, and to prevent her +refusing point-blank to act. He was thinking of that master-stroke, of +his love suddenly rousing the mother's jealousy in the midst of the +play, and it had all appeared to be so spontaneous, as though the rôle +he was filling had torn from him the secret of his soul. He thought of +all that had followed: how he had worked that other love up to the last +extremity of despair, then his behaviour in that last interview; all +this came back to him, and he felt a certain pride in recalling so many +circumstances that he had foreseen, planned, and arranged beforehand, +and which he had so skilfully introduced into the midst of the +love-affairs of a woman of forty.</p> + +<p>"No, I am not sleepy to-night," said Renée, drawing up a little stool to +the fire and sitting down. "I feel inclined for a little chat like we +used to have before you had your flat in Paris, do you remember? I got +used to cigars, and pipes, and everything here. Didn't we gossip when +every one had gone to bed! What nonsense we have talked by this fire! +And now, my respected brother is such a very serious sort of man."</p> + +<p>"Very serious indeed," put in Henri, smiling. "I'm going to be married."</p> + +<p>"Oh," she said, "but you are not married yet. Oh, please Henri!" and +throwing herself on her knees she took his hands in hers. "Come now, for +my sake. Oh, you won't do it—just for money—I'm begging you on my +knees! And then, too, it will bring bad luck to give up your father's +name. It has belonged to our family for generations—this name, Henri. +Think what a man father is. Oh, do give up this marriage—I beseech +you—if you love me—if you love us all! Oh, I beseech you, Henri!"</p> + +<p>"What's this all mean; have you gone mad? What are you making such a +scene about? Come, that's enough, thank you; get up."</p> + +<p>Renée rose to her feet, and looking straight into her brother's eyes she +said:</p> + +<p>"Noémi has told me everything!"</p> + +<p>The colour had mounted to her cheeks. Henri was as pale as if some one +had just spat in his face.</p> + +<p>"You cannot, anyhow, marry her daughter!" exclaimed Renée.</p> + +<p>"My dear girl," answered Henri coldly, in a voice that trembled, "it +seems to me that you are interfering in things that don't concern you. +And you will allow me to say that for a young girl——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you mean this is dirt that I ought to know nothing of; that is +quite true, and I should never have known of it but for you."</p> + +<p>"Renée!" Henri approached his sister. He was in one of those white rages +which are terrible to witness, and Renée was alarmed and stepped back. +He took her by the arm and pointed to the door. "Go!" he said, and a +moment later he saw her in the corridor, putting her hand against the +wall for support.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXV</h2> + + +<p>"Go up, Henri," said M. Mauperin to his son, and then as Henri wanted +his father to pass first M. Mauperin repeated, "No, go on up."</p> + +<p>Half an hour later father and son were coming downstairs again from the +office of the Keeper of the Seals.</p> + +<p>"Well, you ought to be satisfied with me, Henri," observed M. Mauperin, +whose face was very red. "I have done as you and your mother wished. You +will have this name."</p> + +<p>"Father——"</p> + +<p>"All right, don't let us talk about it. Are you coming home with me?" he +asked, buttoning his frock-coat with that military gesture with which +old soldiers gird up their emotions.</p> + +<p>"No, father, I must ask you to let me leave you now. I have so many +things to do to-day. I'll come to dinner to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"Good-bye, then, till to-morrow. You'd better come; your sister is not +well."</p> + +<p>When the carriage had driven away with his father Henri drew himself +up, looked at his watch, and with the brisk, easy step of a man who +feels the wind of fortune behind him blowing him along, walked briskly +towards the Rue de la Paix.</p> + +<p>At the corner of the Chaussée d'Antin he went into the Café Bignon, +where some heavy-looking young men, suggestive of money and the +provinces, were waiting for him. During luncheon the conversation turned +on provincial cattle shows and competitions, and afterward, while +smoking their cigars on the boulevards, the questions of the varied +succession of crops, of drainage, and of liming were brought up, and +there was a discussion on elections, the opinions of the various +departments, and on the candidatures which had been planned, thought of, +or attempted at the agricultural meetings.</p> + +<p>At two o'clock Henri left these gentlemen, after promising one of them +an article on his model farm; he then went into his club, looked at the +papers, and wrote down something in his note-book which appeared to give +him a great deal of trouble to get to his mind. He next hurried off to +an insurance company to read a report, as he had managed to get on to +the committee, thanks to the commercial fame and high repute of his +father. At four o'clock he sprang into a carriage and paid a round of +visits to ladies who had either a <i>salon</i> or any influence and +acquaintances at the service of a man with a career. He remembered, +too, that he had not paid his subscription to the "Society for the Right +Employment of the Sabbath among the Working Classes," and he called and +paid it.</p> + +<p>At seven o'clock, with cordial phrases on the tip of his tongue and +ready to shake hands with every one, he went upstairs at Lemardelay's, +where the "Friendly Association" of his old college friends held its +annual banquet. At dessert, when it was his turn to speak, he recited +the speech he had composed at his club, talked of this fraternal +love-feast, of coming back to his family, of the bonds between the past +and the future, of help to old comrades who had been afflicted with +undeserved misfortunes, etc.</p> + +<p>There were bursts of applause, but the orator had already gone. He put +in an appearance at the d'Aguesseau lecture, left there, pulled a white +necktie out of his pocket, put it on in the carriage, and showed up at +three or four society gatherings.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXVI</h2> + + +<p>The shock which Renée had had on leaving her brother's room, and which +had made her totter for a moment, had brought on palpitation of the +heart, and for a week afterward she had not been well. She had been kept +quiet and had taken medicines, but she did not recover her gaiety, and +time did not appear to bring it back to her. On seeing her ill, Henri +knew very well what was the matter, and he had done all in his power to +make things up with her again. He had been most affectionate, attentive, +and considerate, and had endeavoured to show his repentance. He had +tried to get into her good graces once more, to appease her conscience, +and to calm her indignation; but his efforts were all in vain. He was +always conscious of a certain coolness in her manner, of a repugnance +for him, and of a sort of quiet resolution which caused him a vague +dread. He understood perfectly well that she had only forgotten the +insult of his brutality; she had forgiven her brother, but she had not +forgiven him as a man.</p> + +<p>Her mother had arranged to take her to Paris one day for a little +change, and at the last moment had not felt well enough to go. Henri had +some business to do, and he offered to accompany his sister. They +started, and on reaching Paris drove to the Rue Richelieu. As they were +passing the library Henri told the cabman to draw up.</p> + +<p>"Will you wait here for me a moment?" he said to his sister, "I want to +ask one of the librarians a question. Why not come in with me, though," +he added as an after-thought. "You have always wanted to see the +manuscript scroll-work and that is in the same room. You would find it +interesting, and I could get my information at the same time."</p> + +<p>Renée went up with her brother to the manuscript-room, and Henri took +her to the end of a table, waited until the prayer-book he had asked for +was brought, and then went to speak to a librarian in one of the window +recesses.</p> + +<p>Renée turned over the leaves of her book slowly. Just behind her one of +the employees was warming himself at the hot-air grating. Presently he +was joined by another, who had just taken some volumes and some +title-deeds to the desk near which Henri was talking, and Renée heard +the following conversation just behind her:</p> + +<p>"I say, Chamerot, you see that little chap?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, at M. Reisard's desk."</p> + +<p>"Well, he can flatter himself that he's got hold of some information +which isn't quite correct. He's come to ask whether there used to be a +family named Villacourt, and whether the name has died out. They've told +him that it has. Now if he'd asked me, I could have told him that some +folks of that name must be living. I don't know whether it's the same +family; but there was one of them there before I left that part of the +world, and a strong, healthy fellow too—the eldest, M. Boisjorand—the +proof is that we had a fight once, and that he knew how to give hard +blows. Their place was quite near to where we lived. One of the turrets +of their house could be seen above Saint-Mihiel, and from a good +distance too; but it didn't belong to them in my time. They were a +spendthrift lot, that family. Oh, they were queer ones for nobility; +they lived with the charcoal-burners in the Croix-du-Soldat woods, at +Motte-Noire, like regular satyrs."</p> + +<p>Saint-Mihiel, the Croix-du-Soldat woods, and Motte-Noire—all these +names fixed themselves on Renée's memory and haunted her.</p> + +<p>"There, now I have what I wanted," said Henri, gaily, when he came back +to her to take her away.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXVII</h2> + + +<p>Denoisel had left Renée at her piano, and had gone out into the garden. +As he came back towards the house he was surprised to hear her playing +something that was not the piece she was learning; then all at once the +music broke off and all was silent. He went to the drawing-room, pushed +the door open, and discovered Renée seated on the music-stool, her face +buried in her hands, weeping bitterly.</p> + +<p>"Renée, good heavens! What in the world is the matter?"</p> + +<p>Two or three sobs prevented Renée's answering at first, and then, wiping +her eyes with the backs of her hands, as children do, she said in a +voice choked with tears:</p> + +<p>"It's—it's—too stupid. It's this thing of Chopin's, for his funeral, +you know—his funeral mass, that he composed. Papa always tells me not +to play it. As there was no one in the house to-day—I thought you were +at the bottom of the garden—oh, I knew very well what would happen, but +I wanted to make myself cry with it, and you see it has answered to my +heart's content. Isn't it silly of me—and for me, too, when I'm +naturally so fond of fun!"</p> + +<p>"Don't you feel well, Renée? Come, tell me; there's something the +matter. You wouldn't cry like that."</p> + +<p>"No, there's nothing the matter, I assure you. I'm as strong as a horse; +there's nothing at all the matter, really and truly. If there were +anything I should tell you, shouldn't I? It all came about through that +dreadful, stupid music. And to-day, too—to-day, when papa has promised +to take me to see <i>The Straw Hat</i>."</p> + +<p>A faint smile lighted up her wet eyes as she spoke, and she continued in +the same strain:</p> + +<p>"Only fancy, <i>The Straw Hat</i>—at the Palais Royal. It will be fun, I'm +sure; I only like pieces of that kind. As for the others, dramas and +sentimental things—well, I think we have enough to stir us up with our +own affairs; it isn't worth while going in search of trouble. Then, too, +crying with other people; why, it's like weeping into some one else's +handkerchief. We are going to take you with us, you know—a regular +bachelor's outing it's to be. Papa said we should dine at a restaurant; +and I promise you that I'll be as nonsensical, and laugh as I used to +when I was a little girl—when I had my English governess—you remember +her? She used to wear orange-coloured ribbons, and drink eau de Cologne +that she kept in a cupboard until it got in her head. She was a nice old +thing."</p> + +<p>And as she uttered these words her fingers flew over the keyboard, and +she attacked an arrangement with variations of the <i>Carnival of Venice</i>.</p> + +<p>"You've been to Venice, haven't you?" she said suddenly, stopping short.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Isn't it odd that there should be a spot like that on earth, that I +don't know and yet that attracts me and makes me dream of it? For some +people it's one place, and for others it's another. Now, I've never +wanted to see any place except Venice. I'm going to say something +silly—Venice seems to me like a city where all the musicians should be +buried."</p> + +<p>She put her fingers on the notes again, but she only skimmed over them +without striking them at all, as if she were just caressing the silence +of the piano. Her hands then fell on her knees again, and in a pensive +manner, giving way to her thoughts, she half turned her head towards +Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"You see," she said, "it seems as though there is sadness in the very +air. I don't know how it is, but there are days when the sun is shining, +when I have nothing the matter with me, no worry and no troubles to +face; and yet I positively want to be sad, I try to get the blues, and +feel as though I <i>must</i> cry. Many a time I've said I had a headache and +gone to bed, just simply for the sake of having a good cry, of burying +my face in the pillow; it did me ever so much good. And at such times I +haven't the energy to fight against it or to try to overcome it. It's +just the same when I am going off in a faint; there's a certain charm in +feeling all my courage leaving me——"</p> + +<p>"There, there, that's enough, Renée dear! I'll have your horse saddled +and we'll go for a ride."</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's a good idea! But I warn you I shall go like the wind, +to-day."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXVIII</h2> + + +<p>"What was he to do? poor Montbreton has four children, and none too much +money," said M. Mauperin with a sigh, as he folded up the newspaper in +which he had just been reading the official appointments and put it at +some distance from him on the table.</p> + +<p>"Yes, people always say that. As soon as any one ever does anything +mean, people always say 'He has children.' One would think that in +society people only had children for the sake of that—for the sake of +being able to beg, and to do a lot of mean things. It's just as though +the fact of being the father of a family gave you the right to be a +scoundrel."</p> + +<p>"Come, come, Renée," M. Mauperin began.</p> + +<p>"No, it's quite true. I only know two kinds of people: the +straightforward, honest ones; and then the others. Four children! But +that only ought to serve as an excuse for a father when he steals a +loaf. <i>Mère Gigogne</i> would have had the right to poison hers according +to that, then. I'm sure Denoisel thinks as I do."</p> + +<p>"I? Not at all; indeed I don't! I vote for indulgence in favour of +married folks—fathers of families. I should like to see people more +charitable, too, towards any one who has a vice—a vice which may be +rather ruinous, but which one cannot give up. As to the others, those +who have nothing to use their money for, no vice, no wife, no children, +and who sell themselves, ruin themselves, bow down, humiliate, enrich, +and degrade themselves—ah! I'd give all such over to you willingly."</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to talk to you," said Renée in a piqued tone. "Anyhow, +papa," she went on, "I cannot understand how it is that it does not make +<i>you</i> indignant, you who have always sacrificed everything to your +opinions. It's disgusting what he has done, and that's the long and +short of it."</p> + +<p>"I do not say that it isn't; but you get so excited, child, you get so +excited."</p> + +<p>"I should think so. Yes, I do get excited—and enough to make me, too. +Only fancy, a man who owed everything to the other government, and who +said everything bad he could about the present one; and now he joins +this one. Why, he's a wretch!—your friend, Montbreton—a wretch!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! my dear child, it's very easy to say that. When you have had a +little more experience of life you will be more indulgent. One has to be +more merciful. You are young."</p> + +<p>"No, it's something I've inherited, this is. I'm your daughter, and +there's too much of you in me, that's what it is. I shall never be able +to swallow things that disgust me. It's the way I'm made—how can I help +it? Every time I see any one I know—or even any one I don't know—fail +in what you men call points of honour, well, I can't help it at all, but +it has the same effect on me as the sight of a toad. I have such a +horror of it, and it disgusts me so, that I want to step on it. Come +now, do you call a man honourable because he takes care to only do +abominable things for which he can't be tried in the law courts? Do you +call a man honourable when he has done something for which he must blush +when he is alone? Is a man honourable when he has done things for which +no one can reproach him and for which he cannot be punished, but which +tarnish his conscience? I think there are things that are lower and +viler than cheating at the card-table; and the indulgence with which +society looks on makes me feel as though society is an accomplice, and I +think it is perfectly revolting. There are things that are so disloyal, +so dishonest, that when I think of them it makes me quite merciful +towards out-and-out scoundrels. You see they do risk something; their +life is at stake and their liberty. They go in for things prepared to +win or lose: they don't put gloves on to do their infamous deeds. I like +that better; it's not so cowardly, anyhow!"</p> + +<p>Renée was seated on a sofa at the far side of the drawing-room. Her arms +were folded, her hands feverish, and her whole body quivering with +emotion. She spoke in jerks, and her voice vibrated with the wrath she +felt in her very soul. Her eyes looked like fire lighting up her face, +which was in the shade.</p> + +<p>"And very interesting, too, he is," she continued, "your M. de +Montbreton. He has an income of six hundred or six hundred and fifty +pounds. If he did not pay quite such a high house-rent, and if his +daughters had not always had their dresses made by Mme. Carpentier——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, this requires consideration," put in Denoisel. "A man who has more +than two hundred a year, if a bachelor, and more than four hundred if +married, can perfectly well remain faithful to a government which is no +longer in power. His means allow him to regret——"</p> + +<p>"And he will expect you to esteem him, to shake hands with him, and +raise your hat to him as usual," continued Renée. "No, it is rather too +much! I hope when he comes here, papa—well, I shall promptly go +straight out of the room."</p> + +<p>"Will you have a glass of water, Renée?" asked M. Mauperin, smiling; +"you know orators always do. You were really fine just then. Such +eloquence—it flowed like a brook."</p> + +<p>"Yes, make fun of me by all means. You know I get carried away, as you +tell me. And your Montbreton—but how silly I am, to be sure. He doesn't +belong to us, this man, does he? Oh, if it were one of my family who had +done such a thing, such a dishonourable thing, such a——"</p> + +<p>She stopped short for a second, and then began again:</p> + +<p>"I think," she said, speaking with an effort, as though the tears were +coming into her eyes, "I think I could never love him again. Yes, it +seems to me as though my heart would be perfectly hard as far as he was +concerned."</p> + +<p>"Good! this is quite touching. We had the young orator just now, and at +present it is the little girl's turn. You'd do better to come and look +at this caricature album that Davarande has sent your mother."</p> + +<p>"Ah yes, let's look at that," said Renée, going quickly across to her +father and leaning on his shoulder as he turned over the leaves. She +glanced at two or three pages and then looked away.</p> + +<p>"There, I've had enough of them, thank you. Goodness, how can people +enjoy making things ugly—uglier than nature? What a queer idea. Now in +art, in books, and in everything, I'm for all that is beautiful, and not +for what is ugly. Then, too, I don't think caricatures are amusing. It's +the same with hunchbacks—it never makes me laugh to see a hunchback. +Do you like caricatures, Denoisel?"</p> + +<p>"Do I? No, they make me want to howl. Yes, it is a kind of comical thing +that hurts me," answered Denoisel, picking up a Review that was next the +album. "Caricatures are like petrified jokes to me. I can never see one +on a table without thinking of a lot of dismal things, such as the wit +of the Directory, Carle Vernet's drawings, and the gaiety of +middle-class society."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said M. Mauperin laughing, "and in addition to that you are +cutting my <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i> with a match. How hopeless he is, to +be sure, Denoisel."</p> + +<p>"Do you want a knife, Denoisel?" asked Renée, plunging her hand into her +pockets and pulling out a whole collection of things, which she threw on +the table.</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" exclaimed Denoisel, "why, you have a regular museum in your +pockets. You'd have enough for a whole sale at the auction-rooms. What +in the world are all those things?"</p> + +<p>"Presents from a certain person, and they go about with me everywhere. +There's the knife for you," and Renée showed it to her father before +passing it to Denoisel. "Do you remember where you bought it for me?" +she asked. "It was at Langres once when we had stopped for a fresh +horse; oh, it's a very old one. This one," she continued, picking up +another, "you brought me from Nogent. It has a silver blade, if you +please; I gave you a halfpenny for it, do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, if we are to begin making inventories!" said M. Mauperin laughing.</p> + +<p>"And what's in that?" asked Denoisel, pointing to a little worn-out +pocket-book stuffed full of papers, the dirty crumpled edges of which +could be seen at each end.</p> + +<p>"That? Oh, those are my secrets," and, picking up all the things she had +thrown on the table, she put them quickly back in her pocket with the +little book. The next minute, with a burst of laughter and diving once +more into her pockets, she pulled the book out again, opened the flap, +and scattered all the little papers on the table in front of Denoisel, +and without opening them proceeded to explain what they were. "There, +this is a prescription that was given for papa when he was ill. That's a +song he composed for me two years ago for my birthday——"</p> + +<p>"There, that's enough! Pack up your relics; put all that out of sight," +said M. Mauperin, sweeping all the little papers from him just as the +door opened and M. Dardouillet entered.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you've mixed them all up for me!" exclaimed Renée, looking annoyed +as she put them back in her pocket-book.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXIX</h2> + + +<p>A month later, in the little studio, Renée said to Denoisel: "Am I +really romantic—do you think I am?"</p> + +<p>"Romantic—romantic? In the first place, what do you mean by romantic?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you know what I mean; having ideas that are not like every one +else's, and fancying a lot of things that can never happen. For +instance, a girl is romantic when it would be a great trouble to her to +marry, as girls do marry, a man with nothing extraordinary about him, +who is introduced to her by papa and mamma, and who has not even so much +as saved her life by stopping a horse that has taken fright, or by +dragging her out of the water. You don't imagine I'm one of that sort, I +hope?"</p> + +<p>"No; at least I don't know at all. I'd wager that you yourself don't +know, either."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense. It may be, in the first place, because I have no imagination; +but it has always seemed to me so odd to have an ideal—to dream about +some imaginary man. It's just the same with the heroes in novels; +they've never turned my head. I always think they are too well-bred, too +handsome, too rotten, with all their accomplishments. I get so sick of +them in the end. But it isn't that. Tell me now, suppose they wanted to +make you live your whole life long with a creature—a creature who——"</p> + +<p>"A creature—what sort of a creature?"</p> + +<p>"Let me finish what I am saying. A man, then, who did not answer at all +to certain delicate little requirements of your nature, who did not +strike you as being poetical—there, that's what I mean—not a scrap +poetical, but who on the other hand made up for what was wanting in him, +in other ways, by such kindness—well, such kindness as one never meets +with——"</p> + +<p>"As much kindness as all that? Oh, I should not hesitate; I should take +the kindness blindfold. Dear me, yes, indeed I should. It's so rare."</p> + +<p>"You think kindness worth a great deal then?"</p> + +<p>"I do, Renée. I value it as one values what one has lost."</p> + +<p>"You? Why, you are always very kind."</p> + +<p>"I am not downright bad; but that's all. I might perhaps be envious if I +had more modesty and less pride. But as for always being kind, oh no, I +am not. Life cures you of that just as it cures you of being a child. +One gets over one's good-nature, Renée, just as one gets over +teething."</p> + +<p>"Then you think that a kindly disposition and a good heart——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I mean the goodness that endures in spite of men and in spite of +experience—such goodness as I have met with in a primitive state in two +or three men in my life. I look upon it as the best and most divine +quality a man can have."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but if a man who is very good, as good as those you describe—this +is just a supposition, you know—suppose he had feet that looked like +lumps of cake in his boots. And then, suppose he were corpulent, this +good man, this very good man?"</p> + +<p>"Well, one need not look at his feet nor at his corpulency—that's all. +Oh, I beg your pardon, though, of course, I had completely forgotten."</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing; except that you are a woman."</p> + +<p>"But that's very insulting to my sex—that remark of yours."</p> + +<p>Denoisel did not answer, and the conversation ceased for a few minutes.</p> + +<p>"Have you ever wished for wealth?" Renée began again.</p> + +<p>"Yes, several times; but absolutely for the sake of treating it as it +deserves to be treated—to be disrespectful to it."</p> + +<p>"How do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, I should like to be rich just to show the contempt I have +for money. I remember that two or three times I have fallen asleep with +the idea of going to Italy to get married."</p> + +<p>"To Italy?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, there are more Russian princesses there than anywhere else, and +Russian princesses are the only women left in this world who will marry +a man without a farthing. Then, too, I was prepared to be contented with +a princess who was not very well off. I was not at all exacting, and +would have come down without a murmur to thirty thousand pounds a year. +That was my very lowest figure though."</p> + +<p>"Indeed!" said Renée laughing. "And what should you have done with all +that money?"</p> + +<p>"I should just have poured it away in streams between my fingers; it +would have been something astounding to see; something that I have never +seen rich people do with their money. I think all the millionaires ought +to be ashamed of themselves. For instance, from the way in which a man +lives who has four thousand a year, and the way a man lives who has +forty thousand, could you tell their difference of fortune? Now with me +you would have known. For a whole year I should have flung away my money +in all kinds of caprices, fancies, and follies; I should have dazzled +and fairly humiliated Paris; I should have been like a sun-god showering +bank-notes down; I should have positively degraded my gold by all kinds +of prodigalities; and at the end of a year, day for day, I should have +left my wife."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!"</p> + +<p>"Certainly; in order to prove to myself that I did not love money. If I +had not left her, I should have considered myself dishonoured."</p> + +<p>"Well, what extraordinary ideas! I must confess that I haven't arrived +at your philosophy yet. A large fortune and all that it gives you, all +kinds of enjoyment and luxuries, houses, carriages, and then the +pleasure of making the people you don't like envious—of annoying them. +Oh, I think it would be most delightful to be rich."</p> + +<p>"I told you just now, Renée, that you were a woman—merely a woman."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXX</h2> + + +<p>Denoisel had spoken as he really felt. If he had sometimes wished for +wealth, he had never envied people who had it. He had a sincere and +thorough contempt for money—the contempt of a man who is rich with very +little.</p> + +<p>Denoisel was a Parisian, or rather he was the true Parisian. Well up in +all the experiences of Paris, wonderfully skilled in the great art of +living, thanks to the habits and customs of Parisian life, he was the +very man for that life; he had all its instincts, its sentiments, and +its genius. He represented perfectly that very modern personage, the +civilized man, triumphing, day by day, like the inhabitants of a forest +of Bondy, over the price of things, over the costly life of capitals, as +the savage triumphs over nature in a virgin forest. He had all the show +and glitter of wealth. He lived among rich people, frequented their +restaurants and clubs, had their habits, and shared in their amusements. +He knew some of the wealthiest people, and all that money opened to them +was open to him. He was seen at the grand private balls of the +Provençaux, at the races, and at first nights at the theatres. In summer +he went to the watering-places, to the sea, and to the gambling resorts. +He dressed like a man who owns a carriage.</p> + +<p>And yet Denoisel only possessed between four and five thousand pounds. +Belonging to a family that had been steeped in the ideas of the past +with regard to property, attached and devoted to landed wealth, always +talking of bankruptcy, and as mistrustful of stocks and shares as +peasants formerly were of bank-notes, Denoisel had shaken himself free +of all the prejudices of his own people. Without troubling about the +advice, the remonstrances, the indignation, and the threats of old and +distant relatives, he had sold the small farms which his father and +mother had left him. It seemed to him that there was no longer any +proportion between the revenue of land and the expenses of modern life. +In his opinion landed estate might have been a means of wealth at the +time when Paul de Kock's novels said of a young man, "Paul was rich, he +had two hundred and fifty a year." But since that time it had, according +to him, become an anachronism, a kind of archaic property, a fancy fox +which was only permissible in very wealthy people. He therefore realized +his land and turned it into a small capital, which he placed, after +consulting with a friend of his who frequented the Stock Exchange, in +foreign bonds, in shares and securities, thus doubling and tripling his +revenue without any risk to his regular income. Having thus converted +his capital into a figure which meant nothing, except in the eyes of a +notary, and which no longer regulated his current means, Denoisel +arranged his life as he had done his money. He organized his expenses. +He knew exactly the cost in Paris of vanity, little extras, bargains, +and all such ruinous things. He was not ashamed to add up a bill himself +before paying it. Away from home he only smoked fourpenny cigars, but at +home he smoked pipes. He knew where to buy things, discovered the new +shops, which give such good value during the first three months. He knew +the wine-cellars at the various restaurants, ordered Chambertin a +certain distance up the boulevards, and only ordered it there. If he +gave a dinner, his <i>menu</i> won the respect of the waiter. And with all +that, he knew how to order supper for four shillings at the Café +Anglais.</p> + +<p>All his expenses were regulated with the same skill. He went to one of +the first tailors in Paris, but a friend of his who was in the Foreign +Office procured for him from London all the suits he wanted between the +seasons. When he had a present to make, or any New Year's gifts to buy, +he always knew of a cargo of Indian or Chinese things that had just +arrived, or he remembered an old piece of Saxony or Sèvres china that +was lying hidden away in some shop in an unfrequented part of Paris, one +of those old curiosities, the price of which cannot be discovered by +the person for whom it is destined. All this with Denoisel was +spontaneous, natural, and instinctive. This never-ending victory of +Parisian intelligence over all the extravagance of life had nothing of +the meanness and pettiness of sordid calculation about it. It was the +happy discovery of a scheme of existence under satisfactory conditions, +and not a series of vulgar petty economies, and in the well-organized +expenditure of his six hundred pounds a year the man remained liberal +and high-minded: he avoided what was too expensive for him, and never +attempted to beat prices down. Denoisel had a flat of his own on the +first storey of a well-ordered house with a carpeted staircase. He had +only three rooms, but the Boulevard des Italiens was at his very door. +His little drawing-room, which he had furnished as a smoking-den, was +charming. It was one of those snug little rooms which Parisian +upholsterers are so clever in arranging. It was all draped and furnished +with chintz, and had divans as wide as beds. It had been Denoisel's own +wish that the absence of all objects of art should complete the cheerful +look of the room. He was waited on in the morning by his hall-porter, +who brought him a cup of chocolate and did all the necessary housework. +He dined at a club or restaurant or with friends.</p> + +<p>The low rent and the simplicity of his household and domestic +arrangements left Denoisel more of that money of which wealthy people +are so often short, that money for the little luxuries of life, which is +more necessary than any other in Paris, and which is known as +pocket-money. Occasionally, however, that <i>force majeure</i>, the +Unforeseen, would suddenly arrive in the midst of this regular existence +and disarrange its equilibrium and its budget.</p> + +<p>Denoisel would then disappear from Paris for a time. He would ruralize +at some little country inn, near a river, on half-a-crown a day, and he +would spend no other money than what was necessary for tobacco. Two or +three winters, finding himself quite out of funds, he had emigrated, +and, on discovering a city like Florence, where happiness costs nothing +and where the living is almost as inexpensive as that happiness, he had +stayed there six months, lodging in a room with a cupola, dining <i>à la +trattoria</i> on truffles with Parmesan cheese, passing his evenings in the +boxes of society people, going to the Grand Duke's balls, fêted, invited +everywhere, with white camellias in his buttonhole—economizing in the +happiest way in the world.</p> + +<p>Denoisel spent no more for his love-affairs than for other things. It +was no longer a question of self-respect with him, so that he only paid +what he thought them worth. And yet such things had been his one +allurement as a young man. He had, however, always been cool and +methodical, even in his love-affairs. He had wanted, in a lordly way, to +test for himself what the love of the woman who was the most in vogue in +Paris was like. He allowed himself for this experiment about two +thousand pounds of the seven thousand he then possessed, and, during the +six months that he was the accepted lover of the celebrated Génicot, a +woman who would give a five-pound note as a tip to her postillion on +returning from the Marche, he lived in the same style as a man with five +thousand a year. When the six months were over he left her, and she, for +the first time in her life, was in love with a man who had paid for that +love.</p> + +<p>Tempered by this proof he had had several other experiences afterward, +until they had palled on him; and then there had suddenly come to him, +not a desire for further love adventures, but a great curiosity about +women. He set out to discover all that was unforeseen, unexpected, and +unknown to him in woman. All actresses seemed to him very much the same +kind of courtesan, and all courtesans very much the same kind of +actress. What attracted him now was the unclassed woman, the woman that +bewilders the observer and the oldest Parisian. He often went wandering +about at night, vaguely and irresistibly led on by one of those +creatures who are neither all vice nor all virtue, and who walk so +gracefully along in the mire. Sometimes he was dazzled by one of those +fine-looking girls, so often seen in Paris, who seem to brighten +everything as they pass along, and he would turn round to look at her +and stand there even after she had suddenly disappeared in the darkness +of some passage. His vocation was to discover tarnished stars. Now and +then in some faubourg he would come across one of these marvellous +daughters of the people and of Nature, and he would talk to her, watch +her, listen to her, and study her; then when she wearied him he would +let her go, and it would amuse him later on to raise his hat to her when +he met her again driving in a carriage.</p> + +<p>Denoisel's wealthy air won for him a welcome in social circles. He soon +established himself there and on a superior footing, thanks to his +geniality and wit, the services of every kind he was always ready to +render, and the need every one had of him. His large circle of +acquaintances among foreigners, artists, and theatrical people, his +knowledge of the ins and outs of things when small favours were +required, made him very valuable on hundreds of occasions. Every one +applied to him for a box at a theatre, permission to visit a prison or a +picture gallery, an entrance for a lady to the law courts at some trial, +or a foreign decoration for some man. In two or three duels in which he +had served as seconds, he had shown sound sense, decision, and a manly +regard for the honour as well as the life of the man for whom he was +answerable. People were under all kinds of obligations to him, and the +respect they had for him was not lessened by his reputation as a +first-rate swordsman. His character had won for him the esteem of all +with whom he came in contact, and he was even held in high consideration +by wealthy people, whose millions, nevertheless, were not always +respected by him.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXI</h2> + + +<p>"My wife, for instance, wanted to have her portrait painted by Ingres. +You've seen it—it isn't like her—but it's by Ingres. Well, do you know +what he asked me for it? Four hundred pounds. I paid it him, but I +consider that taking advantage; it's the war against capital. Do you +mean to say that because a man's name is known he should make me pay +just what he likes? because he's an artist, he has no price, no fixed +rate, he has a right to fleece me? Why, according to that he might ask +me a million for it. It's like the doctors who make you pay according to +your fortune. To begin with, how does any one know what I have? I call +it an iniquity. Yes, four hundred pounds; what do you think of that?"</p> + +<p>M. Bourjot was standing by the chimney-piece talking to Denoisel. He put +the other foot, on which he had been standing, to the fire as he spoke.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word," said Denoisel, very seriously, "you are quite right: all +these folks take advantage of their reputation. You see there's only one +way to prevent it, and that would be to decree a legal maximum for +talent, a maximum for master-pieces. Why, yes! It would be very easy."</p> + +<p>"That's it; that would be the very thing!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, "and it +would be quite just, for you see——"</p> + +<p>The Bourjots had dined that evening alone with the Mauperins. The two +families had been talking of the wedding, and were only waiting to fix +the day, until the expiration of a year from the date of the first +insertion of the name of Villacourt in the <i>Monitor</i>. It was M. Bourjot +who had insisted on this delay. The ladies were talking about the +trousseau, jewellery, laces, and wedding-presents, and Mme. Mauperin, +who was seated by Mme. Bourjot, was contemplating her as though she were +a person who had performed a miracle.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin's face beamed with joy. He had in the end yielded to the +fascination of money. This great, upright man, genuine, severe, rigid, +and incorruptible as he was, had gradually allowed the vast wealth of +the Bourjots to come into his thoughts and into his dreams, to appeal to +him and to his instincts as a practical man, as an old man, the father +of a family and a manufacturer. He had been won over and disarmed. Ever +since his son's success with regard to this marriage, he had felt that +respect for Henri which ability or the prospect of a large fortune +inspires in people, and, without being aware of it himself, he scarcely +blamed him now for having changed his name. Fathers are but men, after +all.</p> + +<p>Renée, who for some time past had been worried, thoughtful, and +low-spirited, was almost cheerful this evening. She was amusing herself +with blowing about the fluffy feathers which Noémi was wearing in her +hair. The latter, languid and absent-minded, with a dreamy look in her +eyes, was replying in monosyllables to Mme. Davarande's ceaseless +chatter.</p> + +<p>"Nowadays, everything is against money," began M. Bourjot again, +sententiously. "There's a league—now, for instance, I made a road for +the people at Sannois. Well, do you imagine that they even touch their +hats to us? Oh dear no, never. In 1848 we gave them bushels of corn; and +what do you think they said? Excuse me, ladies, if I repeat their words. +They said: 'That old beast must be afraid of us!' That was all the +gratitude I had. I started a model farm, and I applied to the Government +for a man to manage it; a red-hot radical was sent to me, a rascal who +had spent his life running down the rich. At present I have to do with a +Municipal Council with the most detestable opinions. I find work for +every one, don't I? Thanks to us, the country round is prosperous. Well, +if there were to be a revolution, now, I am convinced that they would +set fire to our place. They'd have no compunction about that. You've no +idea what enemies you get if you pay as much as three hundred and sixty +pounds for taxes. They'd simply burn us out of house and home—they'd +have no scruple about it. You see what happened in February. Oh, my +ideas with regard to the people have quite changed; and they are +preparing a nice future for us, you can count on that. We shall be +simply ruined by a lot of penniless wretches. I can see that beforehand. +I often think of all these things. If only it were not for one's +children—money, as far as I am concerned——"</p> + +<p>"What's that you are saying, neighbour?" asked M. Mauperin, approaching.</p> + +<p>"I'm saying that I'm afraid the day will come when our children will be +short of bread, M. Mauperin; that's what I'm saying."</p> + +<p>"You'll make them hesitate about this wedding if you talk like that," +said M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh, if my husband begins with his gloomy ideas, if he's going to talk +about the end of the world—" put in Mme. Bourjot.</p> + +<p>"I congratulate you that you don't feel the anxiety I do," remarked M. +Bourjot, bowing to his wife; "but I can assure you that, without being +weak-minded, there is every reason for feeling very uneasy."</p> + +<p>"Certainly, certainly," said Denoisel. "I think that money is in danger, +in great danger, in very great danger indeed. In the first place, it is +threatened by that envy which is at the bottom of nearly all +revolutions; and then by progress, which baptizes the revolutions."</p> + +<p>"But, sir, such progress would be infamous. Take me, for instance: no +one could doubt me. I used to be a Liberal—I am now, in fact. I am a +soldier of Liberty, a born Republican; I am for progress of every kind. +But a revolution against wealth—why, it would be barbarous! We should +be going back to savage times. What we want is justice and common sense. +Can you imagine now a society without wealth?"</p> + +<p>"No, not any more than a greasy pole without a silver cup."</p> + +<p>"What," continued M. Bourjot, who in his excitement had not caught +Denoisel's words, "the money that I have earned with hard work, honestly +and with the greatest difficulty—the money that is mine, that I have +made, and which is for my children—why, there is nothing more sacred! I +even look upon the income-tax as a violation of property."</p> + +<p>"Why, yes," said Denoisel in the most perfectly good-natured tone, "I am +quite of your opinion. And I should be very sorry," he added wickedly, +"to make things seem blacker to you than they already do. But you see we +have had a revolution against the nobility; we shall have one against +wealth. Great names have been abolished by the guillotine, and great +fortunes will be done away with next. A man was considered guilty if his +name happened to be M. de Montmorency; it will be criminal to be M. Two +Thousand Pounds a Year. Things are certainly getting on. I can speak all +the more freely as I am absolutely disinterested, myself. I should not +have had anything to be guillotined for in the old days, and I haven't +enough to be ruined for nowadays. So, you see——"</p> + +<p>"Excuse me," put in M. Bourjot, solemnly, "but your comparison—no one +could deplore excesses more than I do, and the event of 1793 was a great +crime, sir. The nobility were treated abominably, and all honest people +must be of the same opinion as I am."</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin smiled as he thought of the Bourjot of 1822.</p> + +<p>"But then," continued M. Bourjot, "the situation is not the same at all. +Social conditions are entirely changed, the basis of society has been +restored. Everything is different. There were reasons—or pretexts, if +you prefer that—for this hatred of the nobility. The Revolution of '89 +was against privileges, which I am not criticising, but which existed. +That is quite different. The fact was people wanted equality. It was +more or less legitimate that they should have it, but at least there was +some reason in it. At present all that is altered; and where are the +privileges? One man is as good as another. Hasn't every man a vote? You +may say, 'What about money?' Well, every one can earn money; all trades +and professions are open to every one."</p> + +<p>"Except those that are not," put in Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"In short, all men can now arrive at anything and everything. The only +things necessary are hard work, intelligence——"</p> + +<p>"And circumstances," put in Denoisel, once more.</p> + +<p>"Circumstances must be made, sir, by each man himself. Just look at what +society is. We are all <i>parvenus</i>. My father was a cloth merchant—in a +wholesale way, certainly—and yet you see—now this is equality, sir, +the real and the right kind of equality. There is no such thing as caste +now. The upper class springs from the people, and the people rise to the +upper class. I could have found a count for my daughter, if I had wanted +to. But it is just simply a case of evil instincts, evil passions, and +these communist ideas—it is all this which is against wealth. We hear a +lot of rant about poverty and misery. Well, I can tell you this, there +has never been so much done for the people as at present. There is great +progress with regard to comfort and well-being in France. People who +never used to eat meat, now eat it twice a week. These are facts; and I +am sure that on that subject our young social economist, M. Henri, +could tell us——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," said Henri, "that has been proved. In twenty-five years the +increase of cattle has been twelve per cent. By dividing the population +of France into twelve millions inhabiting the towns, and twenty-four to +twenty-five millions inhabiting the country districts, it is reckoned +that the former consume about sixty-five kilogrammes a head each year, +and the latter twenty kilogrammes twenty-six centigrammes. I can +guarantee the figures. What is quite sure is that the most conscientious +estimates prove that since 1789 there has been an increase in the +average length of life, and this progress is the surest sign of +prosperity for a nation. Statistics——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, statistics, the chief of the inexact sciences!" interrupted +Denoisel, who delighted in muddling M. Bourjot's brain with paradoxes. +"But I grant that," he went on. "I grant that the lives of the people +have been prolonged, and that they eat more meat than they have ever +eaten. Do you, on that account, believe in the immortality of the +present social constitution? There has been a revolution which has +brought about the reign of the middle class—that is to say, the reign +of money; and now you say: 'Everything is finished; there must be no +other; there can be no legitimate revolution now.' That is quite +natural; but, between ourselves, I don't know up to what point the +supremacy of the middle class can be considered as final. As far as you +are concerned, when once political equality is given to all, social +equality is complete: that is perhaps quite just; but the thing is to +convince people of it, whose interest it is <i>not</i> to believe it. One man +is as good as another. Certainly he may be in the eyes of God. Every one +in this century of ours has a right to wear a black coat—provided he +can pay for it. Modern equality—shall I explain briefly what it is? It +is the same equality as our conscription; every man draws his number, +but if you can pay one hundred and twenty pounds, you have the right of +sending another man to be killed instead of you. You spoke of +privileges; there are no such things now, that's true. The Bastille was +destroyed; but it gave birth to others first. Let us take, for instance, +Justice, and I do acknowledge that a man's position, his name, and his +money weigh less and are made less of in courts of justice than anywhere +else. Well, commit a crime, and be, let us say, a peer of France; you +would be allowed poison instead of the scaffold. Take notice that I +think it should be so; I am only mentioning it to show you how +inequalities spring up again, and, indeed, when I see the ground that +they cover now I wonder where the others could have been. Hereditary +rights—something else that the Revolution thought it had buried. All +that was an abuse of the former Government, about which enough has been +said. Well, I should just like to know whether, at present, the son of a +politician does not inherit his father's name and all the privileges +connected with that name, his father's electors, his connection, his +place everywhere, and his chair at the Academy? We are simply overrun +with these sons. We come across them everywhere; they take all the good +berths and, thanks to these reversions, everything is barred for other +people. The fact is that old customs are terrible things for unmaking +laws. You are wealthy, and you say money is sacred. But why? Well, you +say 'We are not a caste.' No, but you are already an aristocracy, and +quite a new aristocracy, the insolence of which has already surpassed +all the impertinences of the oldest aristocracies on the globe. There is +no court now, you say. There never has been one, I should imagine, in +the whole history of the world where people have had to put up with such +contempt as in the private office of certain great bankers. You talk of +evil instincts and evil passions. Well, the power of the wealthy middle +class is not calculated to elevate the mind. When the higher ranks of +society are engaged in digesting and placing out money there are no +longer any ideas, nothing in fact but appetites, in the class below. +Formerly, when by the side of money there was something above it and +beyond it, during a revolution instead of asking bluntly for +money—clumsy rough coins with which to buy their happiness—the people +contented themselves with asking for the change of colours on a flag, or +with having a few words written over a guard-house, or even with +glorious victories that were quite hollow. But in our times—oh, we all +know where the heart of Paris is now. The bank would be besieged instead +of the Hôtel de ville. Ah, the <i>bourgeoisie</i> has made a great mistake!"</p> + +<p>"And what is the mistake, pray?" asked M. Bourjot, astounded by +Denoisel's tirade.</p> + +<p>"That of not leaving Paradise in heaven—which was certainly its place. +The day when the poor could no longer comfort themselves with the +thought that the next life would make up to them for this, the day when +the people gave up counting on the happiness of the other world—oh, I +can tell you, Voltaire did a lot of harm to the wealthy classes——"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you are right there!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, impulsively. "That is +quite evident. All these wretches ought to go to church regularly——"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXII</h2> + + +<p>There was a grand ball at the Bourjots' in honour of the approaching +marriage of their daughter with M. Mauperin de Villacourt.</p> + +<p>"You are going in for it to-day. How you are dancing!" said Renée to +Noémi, fanning her as she stood talking in a corner of the vast +drawing-room.</p> + +<p>"I have never danced so much, that's quite true," answered Noémi, taking +her friend's arm and leading her away into the small drawing-room. "No, +never," she continued, drawing Renée to her and kissing her. "Oh, how +lovely it is to be happy," and then kissing her again in a perfect fever +of joy, she said: "<i>She</i> does not care for him now. Oh, I'm quite sure +she doesn't care for him. In the old days I could see she did by the +very way she got up when he came; by her eyes, her voice, the very +rustle of her dress, everything. Then when he wasn't there, I could tell +by her silence she was thinking of him. You are surprised at my +noticing, silly thing that I am; but there are some things that I +understand with this"—and she drew Renée's hand on to her white moiré +dress just where her heart was—"and this never deceives me."</p> + +<p>"And you love him now, do you?" asked Renée.</p> + +<p>Noémi stopped her saying any more by pressing her bouquet of roses +against her friend's lips.</p> + +<p>"Mademoiselle, you promised me the first redowa," and a young man took +Noémi away. She turned as she reached the door and threw a kiss to Renée +with the tips of her fingers.</p> + +<p>Noémi's confession had given Renée a thrill of joy, and she had revelled +in the smile on her friend's face. She herself felt immensely comforted +and relieved. In an instant everything had changed for her, and the +thought that Noémi loved her brother chased away all other ideas. She no +longer saw the shame and the crime which she had so long seen in this +marriage. She kept repeating to herself that Noémi loved him, that they +both loved each other. The rest all belonged to the past, and they would +each of them forget that past, Noémi by forgiving it, and Henri by +redeeming it. Suddenly the remembrance of something came back to her, +bringing with it an anxious thought and a vague dread. She was +determined, however, just then to see no dark clouds in the horizon and +nothing threatening in the future. Chasing all this from her mind, she +began to think of her brother and of Noémi once more. She pictured to +herself the wedding-day and their future home, and she recalled the +voices of some children she had once heard calling "Auntie! Auntie!"</p> + +<p>"Will mademoiselle do me the honour of dancing with me?"</p> + +<p>It was Denoisel who was bowing in front of her.</p> + +<p>"Do we dance together—you and I? We know each other too well. Sit down +there, and don't crease my dress. Well, what are you looking at?"</p> + +<p>Renée was wearing a dress of white tulle, trimmed with seven narrow +flounces and bunches of ivy leaves and red berries. In her bodice and +the tulle ruches of her sleeves she wore ivy and berries to match. A +long spray of the ivy was twisted round her hair with a few berries here +and there and the leaves hung down over her shoulders. She was leaning +her head back on the sofa, and her beautiful chestnut hair, which was +brought forward, fell slightly over her white forehead. There was a new +gleam, a soft intense light in her brown, dreamy eyes, the expression of +which could not be seen. A shadow played over her mouth at the corners, +and her lips, which were generally closed in a disdainful little pout, +were unsealed and half open, partially revealing the gladness which came +from her very soul. The light fell on her chin, and a ring of shadow +played round her neck each time that she moved her head. She looked +charming thus, the outline of her features indistinct under the full +light of the chandeliers, and her whole face beaming with childish joy.</p> + +<p>"You are very pretty this evening, Renée."</p> + +<p>"Ah—this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Well, to tell the truth, just lately you've looked so worried and so +sad. It suits you much better to enjoy yourself."</p> + +<p>"Do you think so? Do you waltz?"</p> + +<p>"As though I had just learnt and had been badly taught. But you have +only this very minute refused."</p> + +<p>"I, refused? What an idea! Why, I want to dance dreadfully. Well, +there's plenty of time—oh, don't look at your watch; I don't want to +know the time. And so you think I am gay, do you? Well, no, I don't feel +gay. I'm happy—I'm very happy—there, now! I say, Denoisel, when you +are strolling about in Paris, you know those old women who wear Lorraine +caps, and who stand in the doorways selling matches—well, you are to +give a sovereign each to the first five you meet; I'll give it you back. +I've saved some money—don't forget. Is that waltz still going on? Is it +really true that I refused to dance? Well, after this one I'm going to +dance everything, and I shall not be particular about my partners. They +can be as ugly as they like, they can wear shoes that have been resoled, +and talk to me about Royer-Collard if they like, they can be too tall +or too short, they can come up to my elbow or I can come up to their +waist—it won't matter to me even if their hands perspire—I'll dance +with any of them. That's how I feel to-night, and yet people say that I +am not charitable."</p> + +<p>Just at that moment a man entered the little drawing-room. It was M. +Davarande.</p> + +<p>"Invite me for this waltz, please," said Renée, and as she passed by +Denoisel she whispered:</p> + +<p>"You see I'm beginning with the family."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXIII</h2> + + +<p>"What's the matter with your mother this evening?" Denoisel asked Renée. +They were alone, as Mme. Mauperin had just gone upstairs to bed, and M. +Mauperin to have a look round at the works, which were on late that +night.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter with her, she seems as——"</p> + +<p>"Surly as a bulldog—say it out."</p> + +<p>"Well, but what's it all about?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's just it," and Renée began to laugh. "The fact is I've just +lost a chance of being married—and so here I am still."</p> + +<p>"Another? But then that's your speciality!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, this is only the fourteenth. That's only an average number; and +it's all through you that I've lost this chance."</p> + +<p>"Through me? Well, I never! What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>Renée got up, put her hands in her pockets, and walked up and down the +room from one end to the other. Every now and then she stopped short, +turned round on one heel, and gave a sort of whistle.</p> + +<p>"Yes, through you!" she said, coming back to Denoisel. "What should you +think if I told you that I had refused eighty thousand pounds?"</p> + +<p>"They must have been astonished."</p> + +<p>"I can't say that I wasn't rather tempted. It's no good setting up for +being better than I am; and then, too, with you I don't make any +pretences. Well, I'll own that just for a minute I was very nearly +caught. It was M. Barousse who arranged it all—very nicely indeed. +Then, here at home, they worked me up to it; mamma and Henri besieged +me; I was bored to death about it all day long. And then, too, quite +exceptionally for me, I began to have fancies, too. Anyhow, it is quite +certain that I slept very badly two nights. These big fortunes do keep +you awake. Then, too, to be quite just, I must say that I thought a +great deal about papa in the midst of it all. Wouldn't he have been +proud—wouldn't he, now? Wouldn't he have revelled in my four thousand a +year? He has so much vanity always where I am concerned. Do you remember +his indignation and wrath that time? 'A son-in-law who would allow my +daughter to get in an omnibus!' He was superb, wasn't he? Then I began +to think of you—yes, of you—and your ideas, your paradoxes, your +theories, of all sorts of things you had said to me; I thought of your +contempt for money, and as I thought of it—well, I suppose it is +catching, for I felt the same contempt myself. And so all at once, one +fine morning, I just cut it all short. No, you influence me too much, my +dear boy, decidedly."</p> + +<p>"Well, but I'm—I'm an idiot, Renée. Oh, I'm so sorry. I—I thought that +sort of thing was not catching—indeed I did. Come, really now, was it +my fault?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yours—in a great measure—and then just a little his fault, too."</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it was just a little M. Lemeunier's. When I felt the money getting +into my head, when I was seriously thinking of marrying him, why, I just +looked at him. And you didn't know you were speaking so truly the other +day. I suddenly felt that I was a woman—oh, you've no idea what it was +like. Then on the other hand I saw how good he was. Oh, he really is +goodness itself. I tried him in every way, I turned him inside out, it +worried me to find him so perfect; but it was no use, there was no fault +to find in him. He is thoroughly good, that man is. Oh, he's quite +different from Reverchon and the others. Only fancy what he said to me: +'Mademoiselle,' he said, 'I know that you don't care for me, but will +you let me wait a little and see if you can dislike me less than you do +now?' It was quite pathetic. Sometimes I felt inclined to say to him: +'Suppose we were to sit down and cry a little together, shall we?' +Fortunately, when he made me feel inclined to cry, papa, on the other +hand, made me want to laugh. He looked so funny, my dear old father, +half gay and half sad. I never saw such a resigned kind of happiness. +The sadness of losing me, and the thought of seeing me make a good match +made him feel so mixed up. Well, it's all finished now, thank Heaven! He +makes great eyes at me as though he's angry—didn't you notice, when +mamma was looking at us? But he is not angry at all in reality. He's +very glad in his heart; I can see that."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXIV</h2> + + +<p>Denoisel was at Henri Mauperin's. They were sitting by the fire talking +and smoking. Suddenly they heard a noise and a discussion in the hall, +and, almost at the same time, the room door was opened violently and a +man entered abruptly, pushing aside the domestic who was trying to keep +him back.</p> + +<p>"M. Mauperin de Villacourt?" he demanded.</p> + +<p>"That is my name, monsieur," said Henri, rising.</p> + +<p>"Well, my name is Boisjorand de Villacourt," and with the back of his +hand he gave Henri a blow which made his face bleed. Henri turned as +white as the silk scarf he was wearing as a necktie and, with the blood +trickling down his face, he bent forward to return the blow, and then, +just as suddenly, drew himself up and stretched his hand out towards +Denoisel, who stepped forward, folded his arms, and spoke in his calmest +tone:</p> + +<p>"I think I understand what you mean, sir," he said; "you consider that +there is a Villacourt too many. I think so too."</p> + +<p>The visitor was visibly embarrassed before the calmness of this man of +the world. He took off his hat, which he had kept on his head hitherto, +and began to stammer out a few words.</p> + +<p>"Will you kindly leave your address with my servant?" said Henri, +interrupting him; "I will send round to you to-morrow."</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"A disagreeable affair," began Henri, when he was once more alone with +Denoisel. "Where can he have sprung from, this Villacourt? They told me +that there were none of them left. Ah, my face is bleeding," he said, +wiping it with his handkerchief. "He's a regular buffalo. Georges, bring +some water," he called out to his domestic.</p> + +<p>"You'll choose the sword, shall you not?" asked Denoisel. "Hand me a +stick. Now listen—you must be on guard from the first, and strike out +very little. That man's one of the bloodthirsty sort; he'll go straight +for you, and you must defend yourself with circular parries. When you +are hard pressed and he rushes headlong at you, move aside to the right +with the left foot, turn round on tip-toes on your right foot—like +that. He'll have nothing in front of him then, and you'll have him from +the side and can run him through like a frog."</p> + +<p>"No," said Henri, lifting his face from the basin, in which he was +sponging it, "not the sword."</p> + +<p>"But, my dear fellow, that man is evidently a sportsman; he'll be +accustomed to fire-arms."</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, there are certain situations which are most awkward. +I've taken another name, and that's always ridiculous. Here's a man who +accuses me of having stolen it from him. I have enemies, and a good +number of them, too; they'll make a scandal with all this. I must kill +this fellow, that's very evident; it's the only way to make my position +good. I should put an end to everything by that, lawsuits, and all the +stories and gossip—everything. The sword would not serve my purpose. +With the sword you can kill a man who has been five years at it, who can +use it, and who keeps his body in the positions you have been accustomed +to. But a man who has had no sword practice, who jumps and dances about, +who flourishes it about like a stick; I should wound him, and that would +be all. Now with the pistol—I'm a good shot, you know. You must do me +the justice of admitting that I was wise in my choice of +accomplishments. And my idea is to put it there," he touched Denoisel as +he spoke just above the hip, "just there, you see. Higher up, it's no +good, the arm is there to ward it off; but here, why there are a lot of +very necessary organs; there's the bladder, for instance; now if you are +lucky enough to hit that, and if it should happen to be full, why it +would be a case of peritonitis. And you'll get the pistol for me. A +duel—without a fuss, you understand. I want it kept quite secret, so +that no one shall hear of it beforehand. Whom shall you take with you?"</p> + +<p>"Suppose I asked Dardouillet? He served in the National Guard, in the +cavalry; I shall have to appeal to his military instincts."</p> + +<p>"That's the very thing, good! Will you call in and see mother first. +Tell her that I cannot come before Thursday. It would be awkward if she +happened to drop in on us just the next day or two. I shall not go out; +I'll have a bath and get a little more presentable. This mark doesn't +show very much now, does it? I shall send out for dinner, and then spend +the evening writing two or three necessary letters. By-the-bye, if you +see the gentleman to-morrow morning, why not have it out in the +afternoon at four o'clock? It's just as well to get it over. To-morrow +you'll find me here all the day—or else I shall be at the shooting +gallery. Arrange things as you would for yourself, and thanks for all +your trouble, old man. Four o'clock, then—if possible."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXV</h2> + + +<p>The name of the farm that Henri Mauperin had added to his surname to +make it sound more aristocratic happened, by a strange chance, such as +sometimes occurs, to be the name of an estate in Lorraine and of a +family, illustrious in former days, but at present so completely +forgotten that every one believed it had died out.</p> + +<p>The man who had just dealt Henri this blow was the last of those +Villacourts who took their name from the domain and château of +Villacourt, situated some three leagues from Saint-Mihiel, and owned by +them from time immemorial.</p> + +<p>In 1303 Ulrich de Villacourt was one of the three lords who set their +seal to the will of Ferry, Duke of Lorraine, by order of that prince. +Under Charles the Bold, Gantonnet de Villacourt, who had been taken +prisoner by the Messinians, only regained his liberty by giving his word +never to mount a battle-horse, nor to carry military weapons again. From +that time forth he rode a mule, arrayed himself in buffalo-skin, carried +a heavy iron bar, and returned to the fight bolder and more terrible +than ever. Maheu de Villacourt married Gigonne de Malain and afterward +Christine de Gliseneuve. His marble statue, between his two wives, was +to be seen before the Revolution in the Church of the Grey Friars at +Saint-Mihiel. Duke René allowed him to take eight hundred florins from +the town of Ligny for the ransom that he had had to pay after the +disastrous battle of Bulgnéville.</p> + +<p>Remacle de Villacourt, Maheu's son, was killed in 1476, in the battle +waged by Duke René before Nancy against Charles the Daring. Hubert de +Villacourt, Remacle's sons, Seneschal of Barrois and Bailiff of +Bassigny, followed Duke Antoine as standard-bearer in the Alsatian war, +while his brother Bonaventure, a monk of the strict order of +Saint-François, was made three times over the triennial Superior of his +order, and confessor of Antoine and François, Dukes of Lorraine; and one +of his sisters, Salmone, was appointed Abbess of Sainte Glossinde of +Metz.</p> + +<p>Jean-Marie de Villacourt served in the French army, and after the +Landrecies day, the king made him a knight and embraced him. He was +afterward captain of three hundred foot soldiers and Equerry of the +King's stables, and was then appointed to the captaincy of Vaucouleurs +and made Governor of Langres. He had married a sister of Jean de +Chaligny, the celebrated gun-founder of Lorraine, who cast the famous +culverin, twenty-two feet high. His brother Philibert was a cavalry +captain under Charles IX. His brother Gaston made himself famous by his +duels. It was he who killed Captain Chambrulard, with two sword-strokes, +before four thousand persons assembled at the back of the Chartreux in +Paris. Jean-Marie had another brother, Angus, who was Canon of Toul and +Archdeacon of Tonnerrois, and a sister, Archange, who was Abbess of +Saint-Maur, Verdun.</p> + +<p>Then came Guillaume de Villacourt, who fought against Louis XIII. He was +obliged to surrender with Charles de Lenoncourt, who was defending the +town of Saint-Mihiel, and he shared his four years' captivity in the +Bastille. His son, Mathias de Villacourt, married in 1656 Marie +Dieudonnée, a daughter of Claude de Jeandelincourt, who opened the salt +mine of Château-Salins. Mathias had fourteen children, ten of whom were +killed in the service of Louis XIV: Charles, captain of the regiment of +the Pont, killed in the siege of Philisbourg; Jean, killed in the battle +of Nerwinde; Antoine, captain of the regiment of Normandie, killed in +the siege of Fontarabie; Jacques, killed in the siege of Bellegarde, +where he had gone by permission of the king; Philippe, captain of the +grenadiers in the Dauphin's regiment, killed in the battle of Marsaille; +Thibaut, captain in the same regiment, killed in the battle of +Hochstett; Pierre-François, commander in the Lyonnais regiment, killed +in the battle of Fleurus; Claude-Marie, commander in the Périgord +regiment, killed in the passage of the Hogue; Edme, lieutenant in his +brother's company, killed at his side in the same affair, and Gerard, +Knight of the Order of Saint-Jean of Jerusalem, killed in 1700, in a +conflict between four galleys of Christians and a Turkish man-of-war. Of +the three daughters of Charles-Mathias, Lydie married the Seigneur de +Majastre, Governor of Epinal, and the other two, Berthe and Phœbé, died +unmarried.</p> + +<p>The eldest of the sons of Charles-Mathias, Louis-Aimé de Villacourt, who +served eighteen years and retired from service after the battle of +Malplaquet, died in 1702. His son left Villacourt, settled down in +Paris, threw himself into the life of the capital, and so got rid of the +remainder of a fortune which had already been encroached upon by the +loss of a lawsuit between his father and the d'Haraucourts. He +endeavoured to recover his losses at the gaming-table, got into debt, +and returned to Villacourt with a wife from Carrouge who had kept a +gambling house in Paris. He died in 1752, owning very little besides the +walls of the château, and leaving a name less famous and less honourable +than his father's had been. He had two children by his marriage, a +daughter and a son. The daughter became maid of honour to the +Empress-Queen, the son remained at Villacourt, leading a low, coarse +life as a country gentleman. On the abolition of privileges in 1790 he +gave up his rank and lived on a friendly and equal footing with the +peasants until he died in 1792. His son Jean, lieutenant in the regiment +of the Royal-Liégeois in 1787, was in the Nancy affair. He emigrated, +went through the campaigns of 1792 to 1801 in Mirabeau's legion, which +was then commanded by Roger de Damas, and in the Bourbon grenadiers in +Condé's army. On the thirteenth of August, 1796, he was wounded on the +head in the Oberkamlach battle. In 1802 he returned to France, bringing +with him a wife he had married in Germany, who died after bearing him +four children, four sons. He had become weak in intellect, almost +childish in fact, from the result of his wound, and after his wife's +death there was no one to regulate the household expenses. Disorder +gradually crept in, he kept open table and took to drinking, until at +last he was obliged to sell what little land he had round the château. +Finally the château itself began to crumble away. He could not have it +repaired, as he had no money to pay the workmen. The wind could be felt +through the cracks, and the rain came in. The family were obliged to +give up one room after another, taking refuge where the roof was still +sound. He himself was indifferent to all this; after drinking two or +three glasses of brandy he would take his seat in what used to be the +kitchen garden, on a stone bench near a meridian, the figures of which +had worn away, and there he would get quite cheerful in the sunshine, +calling to people over the hedge to come in and drink with him. Decay +and poverty, however, made rapid strides in the château. There was +nothing left of all the old silver but a salad-bowl, which was used for +the food of a horse called Brouska, that the exile had brought with him +from Germany, and which was now allowed to roam in liberty through the +rooms on the ground-floor.</p> + +<p>The four sons grew up as the château went to decay, accustomed to wind, +rain, and roughing it. They were entirely neglected and abandoned by +their father, and their only education consisted of a few lessons from +the parish priest. From living like the peasants, and mixing with them +in their work and games, they gradually became regular peasants +themselves, and the roughest and strongest in the country round. When +their father died the four brothers, by common consent, made over to a +land agent the remaining stones of their château in return for a few +pounds, with which to pay their most pressing debts, and an annuity of +twenty pounds, which was to be paid until the death of the last of the +four. They then took up their abode in the forest, which joined their +estate, and lived there with the wood-cutters and in the same way as +they did, making a regular den of their hut, and living there with +their sweethearts or wives, peopling the forest with a half-bred race, +in which the Villacourts were crossed with nature, noblemen mated with +children of the forest, whose language, even, was no longer French. Some +of Jean de Villacourt's old comrades in arms had tried, on his death, to +do something for his children. They were interested in this name, which +had been so great and had now fallen so low. In 1826 the youngest of the +boys, who was scarcely more than sixteen, was brought to Paris. The +little savage was clothed and presented to the Duchesse d'Angoulême: he +appeared three or four times in the <i>salons</i> of the Minister of War, who +was related to his family, and who was very anxious to do something for +him; but at the end of a week, feeling stifled in these drawing-rooms, +and ill at ease in his clothes, he had escaped like a little wolf, gone +straight back to his hiding-place, and had not come out of it again for +years.</p> + +<p>Of these four Villacourts, he was the only one left at the end of twenty +years. His three brothers died one after the other, and all by violent +deaths; one from drunkenness, the second from illness, and the other +from blows he had received in a skirmish. All three had been struck down +suddenly, snatched as it were from the midst of life. Living among the +bastards they had left, this last of the Villacourts was looked up to in +the forest as the chieftain of a clan until 1854, when the game laws +came into force. All the regulations and the supervision, the trials, +fines, confiscations, and liabilities connected with the chase, which +had now become his very life, and the fear of giving way to his anger +some day and of putting a bullet into one of the keepers, disgusted him +with this part of the world, with France, and with this land which was +no longer his own.</p> + +<p>It occurred to him to go to America in order to be quite free, and to be +able to hunt in untrodden fields where no gun license was necessary. He +went to Paris to set sail from Havre, but he had not enough money for +the voyage. He then fell back on Africa, but there he found a second +France with laws, gendarmes, and forest-keepers. He tried working a +grant of land, and then a clearing, but that kind of labour did not suit +him. The country and the climate tried him, and the burning heat of the +sun and soil began to take effect on his robust health. At the end of +two years he returned to France.</p> + +<p>On going back to his log-hut at Motte-Noire he found a newspaper there, +the only thing which had come for him during his absence. It was a +number of the <i>Moniteur</i> and was more than a year old. He tore it up to +light his pipe, and, just as he was twisting it, caught sight of a +red-pencil mark. He opened it out again and read the marked paragraph:</p> + +<p>"<i>M. Mauperin</i> (<i>Alfred-Henri</i>), better known by the name of +<i>Villacourt</i>, is about to apply to the Keeper of the Seals for +permission to add to his name that of Villacourt, and will henceforth be +known as <i>Mauperin de Villacourt</i>."</p> + +<p>He got up, walked about, fumed, then sat down again, and slowly lighted +his pipe.</p> + +<p>Three days later he was in Paris.</p> + +<p>Just at first on reading the paper he had felt as though some one had +struck him across the face with a horsewhip. Then he had said to himself +that he was robbed of his name, but that was all, that his name was no +longer worth anything, as it was now the name of a beggar. This +philosophizing mood did not last long, the thought of the theft of his +name gradually came back to him, and it irritated and hurt him, and made +him feel bitter. After all he had nothing left but this name, and he +could not endure the idea of having it stolen from him, and so started +for Paris.</p> + +<p>On arriving he was as furious as a mad bull, and his one idea was to go +and knock this M. Mauperin down at once. When once he was in the +capital, though, with its streets and its crowds, face to face with its +people, its shops, its life, all the passers-by, and the noise, he felt +dazed, like some wild beast let loose in a huge circus, whose rage is +suddenly turned into fright and who stops short after its first leap. He +went straight to the law courts, and in the long hall accosted one of +those men in black, who are generally leaning against a pillar, and +told him what had happened. The man in black informed him that as the +year's delay had expired there was nothing to be done but appeal to the +high court against the decree authorizing the addition of the name, and +he gave him the address of a counsel of the higher court. M. de +Villacourt hurried to this counsel. He found a very cold, polite man, +wearing a white necktie, who, while leaning back in a green morocco +chair, listened with a fixed expression in his eyes all the time to his +case, his claims, his rights, his indignation, and to the sound of the +parchments he was turning over with a nervous hand.</p> + +<p>The expression of the counsel's face never changed, so that when M. de +Villacourt had finished he fancied that the other man had not +understood, and he began all over again. The lawyer stopped him with a +gesture, saying: "I think you will gain your case, monsieur."</p> + +<p>"You <i>think</i> so? Do you mean to say you are not sure of it?"</p> + +<p>"A lawsuit is always a lawsuit, monsieur," answered the lawyer with a +faint smile, which was so sceptical that it chilled M. de Villacourt, +who was just prepared to burst out in a rage. "The chances are on your +side, though, and I am quite willing to undertake your case."</p> + +<p>"Here you are then," said M. de Villacourt, putting his roll of +title-deeds down on the desk. "Thank you, sir," he added, rising to take +his leave.</p> + +<p>"Excuse me," said the lawyer on seeing him walk towards the door, "but I +must call your attention to the fact that in business of this kind, in +an appeal to the higher court, we do not only act as the barrister but +as the lawyer of our client. There are certain expenses, for getting +information and examining deeds—If I take up your case I shall be +obliged to ask you to cover these expenses. Oh, it is only a matter of +from twenty to twenty-five pounds. Let us say twenty pounds."</p> + +<p>"Twenty to twenty-five pounds! Why, what do you mean!" exclaimed M. de +Villacourt, turning red with indignation. "Some one steals my name, and +because I have not seen the newspaper in which the man warns me that he +intends robbing me, I must pay twenty-five pounds to make this rascal +give up my name again. Twenty to twenty-five pounds! But I haven't the +money, sir," he said, lowering his head and letting his arms fall down +at his sides.</p> + +<p>"I am extremely sorry, monsieur, but this little formality is +indispensable. Oh, you must be able to find it. I feel sure that among +the relatives of the families into which your family has married—in +such questions as these, families are always ready to pull together."</p> + +<p>"I do not know any one—and the Count de Villacourt will never ask for +money. I had just twelve pounds when I arrived. I bought this coat for +about two pounds at the Palais Royal on the way here. This hat cost me +five and tenpence. I suppose my hotel bill will cost me about a +sovereign, and I shall want about a sovereign to get back home. Could +you do with what is left?"</p> + +<p>"I am very sorry, monsieur——"</p> + +<p>M. de Villacourt put his hat on and left the room. At the hall-door he +suddenly turned round, passed through the dining-room and opening the +office-door again, he said, in a smothered voice which he was doing his +utmost to control:</p> + +<p>"Can I have the address of M. Henri Mauperin—known as de +Villacourt—without paying for it?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly; he is a barrister. I shall find his address in this book. +Here it is; Rue Taitbout—14."</p> + +<p>It was after all this that M. de Villacourt had hurried away to Henri +Mauperin's.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXVI</h2> + + +<p>When Denoisel entered the Mauperins' drawing-room that evening he found +every one more gay and cheerful than usual. There was a look of +happiness on all the faces; M. Mauperin's good-humour could be guessed +by the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. Mme. Mauperin was most gracious, +she positively beamed and looked blissfully happy. Renée was flitting +about the room, and her quick, girlish movements were so bird-like that +one could almost imagine the sound of a bird's wings.</p> + +<p>"Why, here's Denoisel!" exclaimed M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Good-evening, m'sieu," said Renée, in a playful tone.</p> + +<p>"You haven't brought Henri with you?" asked Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"He couldn't come. He'll be here the day after to-morrow without fail."</p> + +<p>"How nice of you! Oh, isn't he a good boy to have come this evening," +said Renée, hovering round and trying to make him laugh as though he had +been a child.</p> + +<p>"Oh, he's a bad lot! Ah, my dear fellow—" and M. Mauperin shook hands +and winked at his wife.</p> + +<p>"Yes; just come here, Denoisel," said Mme. Mauperin. "Come and sit down +and confess your sins. It appears that you were seen the other day in +the Bois—driving——"</p> + +<p>She stopped a minute like a cat when it is drinking milk.</p> + +<p>"Ah, now your mother's wound up!" said M. Mauperin to Renée. "She's in +very good spirits to-day—my wife is. I warn you, Denoisel."</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin had lowered her voice. Leaning forward towards Denoisel +she was telling him a very lively story. The others could only catch a +word here and there between smothered bursts of laughter.</p> + +<p>"Mamma, it's not allowed; that sort of thing—laughing all to +yourselves. Give me back my Denoisel, or I'll tell stories like yours to +papa."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, wasn't it absurd!" said Mme. Mauperin, when she had finished +her bit of gossip, laughing heartily as old ladies do over a spicy tale.</p> + +<p>"How very lively you all are this evening!" exclaimed Denoisel, chilled +by all this gaiety.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we are as gay as Pinchon," said Renée, "that's how we all feel! +And we shall be like this to-morrow, and the day after, and always; +shall we not, papa?" and running across to her father she sat down on +his knees like a child.</p> + +<p>"My darling!" said M. Mauperin to his daughter. "Well, I never! Just +look, my dear, do you remember? This was her knee when she was a little +girl."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Mme. Mauperin, "and Henri had the other one."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I can see them now," continued M. Mauperin; "Henri was the girl +and you were the boy, Renée. Just to fancy that all that was fifteen +years ago. It used to amuse you finely when I let you put your little +hands on the scars that my wounds had left. What rascals of children +they were! How they laughed!" Then turning to his wife he added, "What +work you had with them, my dear. It doesn't matter though, Denoisel; +it's a good thing to have a family. Instead of only having one heart, +it's as though you have several—upon my word it is!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, Denoisel, now that you are here, we shall not let you go again," +said Renée. "Your room has been waiting for you long enough."</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry, Renée, but really I have some business to attend to this +evening in Paris; I have, really."</p> + +<p>"Oh, business! You? How important you must feel, to be sure!"</p> + +<p>"Do stay, Denoisel," said M. Mauperin. "My wife has a whole collection +of stories for you like the one she has just told you."</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, do, will you?" pleaded Renée. "We'll have such fun; you'll see. +I won't touch the piano at all, and I won't put too much vinegar in the +salad. We'll make puns on everything. Come now, Denoisel."</p> + +<p>"I accept your invitation for next week."</p> + +<p>"Horrid thing!" and Renée turned her back on him.</p> + +<p>"And Dardouillet," said Denoisel; "isn't he coming this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, he'll come later on," said Mauperin. "By-the-bye, it's just +possible he won't come, though. He's very busy—in the very thick of +marking out his land. I fancy he's just busy transporting his mountain +into his lake and his lake on to the top of his mountain."</p> + +<p>"Well, but what about this evening?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, this evening—no one knows," said Renée. "He's full of mysteries, +M. Dardouillet. But how queer you look to-day, Denoisel!"</p> + +<p>"I do?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you; you don't seem at all frolicsome; there's no sparkle about +you. What's been ruffling you?"</p> + +<p>"Denoisel, there's something the matter," said Mme. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Nothing whatever, madame," answered Denoisel. "What could be the matter +with me? I'm not low-spirited in the least. I'm simply tired; I've had +to rush about so much this last week for Henri. He would have my opinion +about everything in connection with his furnishing."</p> + +<p>"Ah yes," said Mme. Mauperin, her face lighting up with joy; "it's true, +the twenty-second is getting near. Oh, if any one had told me this two +years ago! I'm afraid I shall be too happy to live on that day. Just +think of it, my dear," and she half closed her eyes and revelled in her +dreams of the future.</p> + +<p>"I shall be simply lovely for the occasion, I can tell you, Denoisel," +said Renée. "I have had my dress tried on to-day, and it fits me to +perfection. But, papa, what about a dress-coat?"</p> + +<p>"My old dress-coat is quite new."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you must have one made, a newer one still, if I'm to take your +arm. Oh, how silly I am; you won't take me in, of course. Denoisel, +please keep a quadrille for me. We shall give a ball, of course, mamma?"</p> + +<p>"A ball and everything that we can give," said Mme. Mauperin. "I expect +people will think it is not quite the thing; but I can't help that. I +want it to be very festive—as it was for our wedding, do you remember, +my dear? We'll dance and eat and drink, and——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's what we'll do," said Renée, "and we'll let all our work +people drink till they are quite merry—Denoisel too. It will liven him +up a little to have too much to drink."</p> + +<p>"Well, with all this, I don't fancy Dardouillet's coming——"</p> + +<p>"What in the world makes you so anxious to see Dardouillet, this +evening?" asked M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's true," put in Renée. "That hasn't been explained. Please +explain, Denoisel."</p> + +<p>"How inquisitive you are, Renée. It's just a bit of nonsense—nothing +that matters. I want him to lend me his bulldog for a rat-fight at my +club to-morrow. I've made a bet that he'll kill a hundred in two +minutes. And with that I must depart. Good-night, all!"</p> + +<p>"Good-night!"</p> + +<p>"Then, my boy will be here the day after to-morrow, for sure?" said Mme. +Mauperin at the door to Denoisel.</p> + +<p>Denoisel nodded without answering.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXVII</h2> + + +<p>On arriving at Dardouillet's little house at the other end of the +village, Denoisel rang the bell. An old woman opened the door.</p> + +<p>"Has M. Dardouillet gone to bed?"</p> + +<p>"Gone to bed? No, indeed! A nice life he leads!" answered the old +servant; "he's pottering about in the garden; you'll find him there," +and she opened the long window of the dining-room.</p> + +<p>The bright moonlight fell on a garden absolutely bare, as square as a +handkerchief, and with the soil all turned over like a field. In one +corner, standing motionless and with folded arms, on a hillock, was a +black figure which looked like a spectre in one of Biard's pictures. It +was M. Dardouillet, and he was so deeply absorbed that he did not see +his visitor until Denoisel was quite close to him.</p> + +<p>"Ah, it's you, M. Denoisel? I'm delighted to see you. Just look now," +and he pointed to the loose soil all round. "What do you think of that? +Plenty of lines there, I hope; and it's all quite soft and loose, you +know," and he put his hand out over the plan of his rising ground as +though he were stroking the brow of his ideal hill.</p> + +<p>"Excuse me, M. Dardouillet," said Denoisel. "I've come about an affair +that——"</p> + +<p>"Moonlight—remember that—if ever you have a garden—there's nothing +like moonlight for seeing what you have done—exactly as it is. By +daylight you can't see the embankments——"</p> + +<p>"M. Dardouillet, I want to appeal to a man who has worn a soldier's +uniform. You are a friend of the Mauperins. I have come to ask you if +you will act for Henri as——"</p> + +<p>"A duel?" And Dardouillet fastened up the black coat he wore, winter and +summer alike, with all that was left of the button. "Good heavens! Yes, +a service of that kind is a duty."</p> + +<p>"I shall take you back with me, then," said Denoisel, putting his arm +through Dardouillet's. "You can sleep at my place. It must be settled +quickly. It will be all over to-morrow, or the day after at the latest."</p> + +<p>"Good!" said Dardouillet, looking regretfully at a line of stakes that +had been commenced, the shadows of which the moon threw on the ground.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXVIII</h2> + + +<p>On leaving Henri Mauperin's, M. de Villacourt had suddenly recollected +that he had no friends, no one at all whom he could ask to serve as +seconds. This had not occurred to him before. He remembered two or three +names which had been mixed up in his father's family history, and he +went along the streets trying to find the houses where he had been taken +when he had come to Paris in his boyhood. He rang at several doors, but +either the people were no longer living there or they were not at home +to him.</p> + +<p>At night he returned to his lodging-house. He had never before felt so +absolutely alone in the world. When he was taking the key of his +bed-room, the landlady asked him if he would not have a glass of beer +and, opening a door in a passage, showed him into a café which took up +the ground-floor of the house.</p> + +<p>Some swords were hanging from the hat-pegs, with cocked hats over them. +At the far end, through the tobacco smoke, he could see men dressed in +military uniform moving about round a billiard-table. A sickly looking +boy with a white apron on was running to and fro, scared and bewildered, +giving the <i>Army Monitor</i> and the other papers a bath, each time that he +put a glass or cup on the table.</p> + +<p>Near the counter, a drum-major was playing at backgammon with the +landlord of the café in his shirt-sleeves. On every side voices could be +heard calling out and answering each other, with the rolling accent +peculiar to soldiers.</p> + +<p>"To-morrow I'm on duty at the theatre."</p> + +<p>"I take my week."</p> + +<p>"Gaberiau is beadle at Saint-Sulpice."</p> + +<p>"He was proposed and was to be examined."</p> + +<p>"Who's on service at the Bourdon ball?"</p> + +<p>"What an idea! to blow his brains out when he hadn't a single punishment +down on his book!"</p> + +<p>It was very evident that they were the Paris Guards from the barracks, +just near, waiting until nine o'clock for the roll-call.</p> + +<p>"Waiter, a bowl of punch and three glasses," said M. de Villacourt, +taking his place at a table where two of the Guards were seated.</p> + +<p>When the punch was brought he filled the three glasses, pushed one +before each of the Guards, and rose to his feet.</p> + +<p>"Your health, gentlemen!" he said, and then lifting his glass he +continued: "You are military men—I have to fight to-morrow, and I +haven't any one I can ask. I feel sure that you will act as seconds for +me."</p> + +<p>One of the Guards looked full at M. de Villacourt, and then turned to +his comrade.</p> + +<p>"We may as well, Gaillourdot; what do you say?"</p> + +<p>The other did not reply, but picking up his glass touched M. de +Villacourt's with it.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"Well then, to-morrow morning at ten o'clock. Room 27."</p> + +<p>"Right!" answered the Guards.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>The following morning, just as Denoisel was starting with Dardouillet to +call on M. Boisjorand de Villacourt, his door-bell rang and the two +Guards entered. As their mission was to accept everything, terms, +weapons, and distances, the arrangements for the duel were soon made. +Pistols were decided upon at a distance of thirty-five paces, both +adversaries to be allowed to walk ten paces. Denoisel requested, in +Henri's name, that the affair should be got over as quickly as possible. +This was precisely what M. de Villacourt's seconds were about to ask, as +they were supposed to be going to the theatre that evening, and were +only free that day until midnight. A meeting was fixed for four o'clock +at the Ville-d'Avray Lake. Denoisel next went to one of his friends who +was a surgeon, and then to order a carriage for bringing home the +wounded man. He called to see Henri, who was out; then went on to the +shooting-gallery, where he found him, amusing himself with shooting at +small bundles of matches hanging from a piece of string, at which he +fired, setting the brimstone alight with the bullet.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's nothing!" he said to Denoisel; "I fancy those matches get +set on fire with the wind from the bullet; but look here!" and he showed +him a cardboard target, in the first ring of which he had just put a +dozen bullets.</p> + +<p>"It's to be to-day at four, as you wished," said Denoisel.</p> + +<p>"Good!" said Henri, giving his pistol to the man. "Look here," he +continued, putting his fingers over two holes on the cardboard which +were rather far away from the others; "if it were not for these two +flukes this would be fit to frame. Oh, I'm glad it's arranged for +to-day." He lifted his arm with the gesture of a man accustomed to +shooting and just about to take aim, and then shook his hand about to +get the blood into it again.</p> + +<p>"Only imagine," he continued, "that it had quite an effect on me—the +idea of this affair—when I was in bed this morning. It's that deuced +horizontal position; I don't fancy it's good for one's courage."</p> + +<p>They all lunched together at Denoisel's and then proceeded to smoke. +Henri was cheerful and communicative, talking all the time. The surgeon +arrived at the hour appointed, and they all four got into the carriage +and drove off.</p> + +<p>They had been silent until they were about half way, when Henri suddenly +threw his cigar out of the window impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Give me a cigar, Denoisel, a good one. It's very important to have a +good cigar when you are going to shoot, you know. If you are to shoot +properly you mustn't be nervous; that's the principal thing. I took a +bath this morning. One must keep calm. Now, driving is the most +detestable thing; the reins saw your hand for you. I'd wager you +couldn't shoot straight after driving; your fingers would be stiff. +Novels are absurd with their duels, where the man arrives and flings his +reins to his groom. What should you think if I told you that one ought +to go in for a sort of training? It's quite true, though. I never knew +such a good shot as an Englishman I once met; he goes to bed at eight +o'clock; never drinks stimulants and takes a short walk every evening +like my father does. Every time that I have driven in a carriage without +springs to the shooting-gallery, my targets have shown it. By-the-bye, +this is a very decent carriage, Denoisel. Well, with a cigar it's the +same thing. Now a cigar that's difficult to smoke keeps you at work, you +have to keep lifting your hand to your mouth, and that makes your hand +unsteady; while a good cigar—you ask any good shot, and he'll tell you +the same thing—it's soothing, it puts your nerves in order. There's +nothing better than the gentle movement of the arm as you take the cigar +out of your mouth and put it in again. It's slow and regular."</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>On arriving, they found M. de Villacourt and his seconds waiting between +the two lakes. The ground was white with the snow that had fallen during +the morning. In the woods the trees stretched their bare branches +towards the sky, and in the distance the red sunset could be seen +between the rows of dark trees. They walked as far as the Montalet road. +The distances were measured, Denoisel's pistols loaded, and the +opponents then took their places opposite each other. Two +walking-sticks, laid on the snow, marked the limits of the ten paces +they were each allowed. Denoisel walked with Henri to the place which +had fallen to his lot, and as he was pushing down a corner of his collar +for him which covered his necktie, Henri said in a low voice: "Thanks, +old man; my heart's beating a trifle under my armpit, but you'll be +satisfied——"</p> + +<p>M. de Villacourt took off his frock-coat, tore off his necktie, and +threw them both some distance from him. His shirt was open at the neck, +showing his strong, broad, hairy chest. The opponents were armed, and +the seconds moved back and stood together on one side.</p> + +<p>"Ready!" cried a voice.</p> + +<p>At this word M. de Villacourt moved forward almost in a straight line. +Henri kept quite still and allowed him to walk five paces. At the sixth +he fired.</p> + +<p>M. de Villacourt fell to the ground, and the witnesses watched him lay +down his pistol and press his thumbs with all his strength on the double +hole which the bullet had made on entering his body.</p> + +<p>"Ah! I'm not done for—Ready, monsieur!" he called out in a loud voice +to Henri, who, thinking all was over, was moving away.</p> + +<p>M. de Villacourt picked up his pistol and proceeded to do his four +remaining paces as far as the walking-stick, dragging himself along on +his hands and knees and leaving a track of blood on the snow behind him. +On arriving at the stick he rested his elbow on the ground and took aim +slowly and steadily.</p> + +<p>"Fire! Fire!" called out Dardouillet.</p> + +<p>Henri, standing still and covering his face with his pistol, was +waiting. He was pale, and there was a proud, haughty look about him. The +shot was fired; he staggered a second, then fell flat, with his face on +the ground and with outstretched arms, his twitching fingers grasping +for a moment at the snow.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XXXIX</h2> + + +<p>M. Mauperin had gone out into the garden as he usually did on coming +downstairs in the morning, when, to his surprise, he saw Denoisel +advancing to meet him.</p> + +<p>"You here, at this hour?" he said. "Why, where did you sleep?"</p> + +<p>"M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, pressing his hand as he spoke.</p> + +<p>"What is it? What's the matter?" asked M. Mauperin, feeling that +something had happened.</p> + +<p>"Henri is wounded."</p> + +<p>"Dangerously? Is it a duel?"</p> + +<p>Denoisel nodded.</p> + +<p>"Wounded? Ah, he is dead!"</p> + +<p>Denoisel took M. Mauperin's two hands in his for a second, without +uttering a word.</p> + +<p>"Dead!" repeated M. Mauperin mechanically, and he opened his hands as +though something had slipped from their grasp. "His poor mother, Henri!" +and the tears came with the words. "Oh, God—We don't know how much we +love them till this comes—and only thirty years old!" He sank down on +a garden-seat, choked with sobs.</p> + +<p>"Where is he?" he asked at last.</p> + +<p>"There," and Denoisel pointed to the window of Henri's room.</p> + +<p>From Ville-d'Avray he had taken the corpse straight to M. Dardouillet's, +and during the evening had found a pretext for sending for M. Bernard, +who had a key of the Mauperins' house. In the middle of the night, while +the family were asleep, the three men had taken off their shoes, carried +Henri's dead body upstairs, and laid it on the bed in his own room.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said M. Mauperin, and making a sign to him that he could +not talk he got up.</p> + +<p>They walked round the garden four or five times in silence. The tears +came every now and then into M. Mauperin's eyes, but they did not fall. +Words, too, seemed to come to his lips and die away again. Finally, in a +deep, crushed voice, breaking the long silence by a desperate effort, +and not looking at Denoisel, M. Mauperin asked an abrupt question.</p> + +<p>"Was it an honourable death?"</p> + +<p>"He was your son," answered Denoisel.</p> + +<p>The father lifted his head at these words, as if strength had come to +him with which to fight against his grief. "Well, well; I must do my +duty now. You have done your part," and he drew Denoisel nearer to him, +his tears falling freely at last.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XL</h2> + + +<p>"Murder is the name for affairs of this kind," M. Barousse was saying to +Denoisel as they followed the hearse to the cemetery. "Why didn't you +arrange matters between them?"</p> + +<p>"After that blow?"</p> + +<p>"After or before," said M. Barousse, peremptorily.</p> + +<p>"You'd better say that to his father!"</p> + +<p>"He's a soldier—but you, hang it all—you've never served in the army, +and you let him get killed! I consider you killed him."</p> + +<p>"Look here, I've had enough, M. Barousse."</p> + +<p>"You see, I reason things out; I've been a magistrate."—Barousse had +been a judge on the Board of Trade.—"You have the law courts and you +can demand justice. But duels are contrary to all laws, human or divine; +remember that. Why, just fancy—a scoundrel comes and gives me a blow in +the face; and he must needs kill me as well. Ah, I can promise you one +thing: if ever I'm on a jury, and there's a case of a duel—well, I look +upon it as murder. Duellists are assassins. In the first place it's a +cowardly thing——"</p> + +<p>"A cowardly thing that every one hasn't the courage to carry through, M. +Barousse; it's like suicide."</p> + +<p>"Ah, if you are going to uphold suicide," said Barousse, and leaving the +discussion he continued in a softened tone: "Such a fine fellow too, +poor Henri! And then Mauperin, and his wife, and his daughter—the whole +family plunged into this grief. No, it makes me wild when I think of it. +Why, I had known him all his life." Barousse pulled his watch half out +of his waistcoat-pocket as he spoke. "There!" he said, breaking off +suddenly; "I know it will be sold; I shall have missed <i>The Concert</i>, a +superb proof, earlier than the one with the dedication."</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>Denoisel returned to Briche with M. Mauperin, who, on arriving, went +straight upstairs to his wife. He found her in bed, with the blinds down +and the curtains drawn, overwhelmed and crushed by her terrible sorrow.</p> + +<p>Denoisel opened the drawing-room door and saw Renée, seated on an +ottoman, sobbing, with her handkerchief up to her mouth.</p> + +<p>"Renée," he said, going to her and taking her hands in his, "some one +killed him——"</p> + +<p>Renée looked at him and then lowered her eyes.</p> + +<p>"That man would never have known; he never read anything and he did not +see any one; he lived like a regular wolf; he didn't subscribe to the +<i>Moniteur</i>, of course. Do you understand?"</p> + +<p>"No," stammered Renée, trembling all over.</p> + +<p>"Well, it must have been an enemy who sent the paper to that man. Ah, +you can't understand such cowardly things; but that's how it all came +about, though. One of his seconds showed me the paper with the paragraph +marked——"</p> + +<p>Renée was standing up, her eyes wide open with terror; her lips moved +and she opened her mouth to speak—to cry out: "I sent it!"</p> + +<p>Then all at once she put her hand to her heart, as if she had just been +wounded there, and fell down unconscious and rigid on the carpet.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLI</h2> + + +<p>Denoisel came every day to Briche to inquire about Renée. When she was a +little better, he was surprised that she did not ask for him. He had +always been accustomed to seeing her when she was not well, even when +she was lying down, as though he had been one of the family. And +whenever she had been ill, he was always one of the first she had asked +for. She expected him to entertain and amuse her, to enliven her during +her convalescence and bring back her laughter. He was offended and kept +away for a day or two, and then when he came again he still could not +see her. One day he was told that she was too tired, another day that +the Abbé Blampoix was talking to her. Finally, at the end of a week, he +was allowed to see her.</p> + +<p>He expected an effusive welcome, such as invalids give their friends +when they see them again for the first time. He thought that after an +illness she would, in her impulsive way, be almost ready to embrace him. +Renée held out her hand to him and just let her fingers lie in his for a +second; she said a few words such as she might have said to any one, +and after about a quarter of an hour closed her eyes as though she were +sleepy. This coldness, which he could not understand in the least, +irritated Denoisel and made him feel bitter. He was deeply hurt and +humiliated, as his affection for Renée was pure and sincere and of such +long standing. He tried to imagine what she could possibly have against +him, and wondered whether M. Barousse had been instilling his ideas into +her. Was she blaming him, as a witness of the duel, for her brother's +death? Just about this time one of his friends who had a yacht at Cannes +invited him for a cruise in the Mediterranean, and he accepted the +invitation and went away at once.</p> + +<p>Renée was afraid of Denoisel. She only remembered the commencement of +the attack that she had had in his presence, that terrible moment which +had been followed by her fall and a fit of hysterics. She had had a +sensation of being suffocated by her brother's blood, and she knew that +a cry had come to her lips. She did not know whether she had spoken, +whether her secret had escaped her while she was unconscious. Had she +told Denoisel that she had killed Henri, that it was she who had sent +that newspaper? Had she confessed her crime?</p> + +<p>When Denoisel entered her room she imagined that he knew all. The +embarrassment which he felt and which was the effect of her manner to +him, his coldness, which was entirely due to her own, all this +confirmed her in her idea, in her certainty that she had spoken and that +it was a judge who was there with her.</p> + +<p>Before Denoisel's visit was over, her mother got up to go out of the +room a minute, but Renée clung to her with a look of terror and insisted +on her staying. It occurred to her that she might defend herself by +saying that it was a fatality; that by sending the newspaper she had +only meant to make the man put in his claim; that she had wanted to +prevent her brother from getting this name and to make him break off his +engagement; but then she would have been obliged to say why she had +wished to do this—why she had wished to ruin her brother's future and +prevent him from becoming a rich man. She would have had to confess all; +and the bare idea of defending herself in such a way, even in the eyes +of the man she respected more than any other, horrified and disgusted +her. It seemed to her that the least she could do would be to leave to +the one she had killed his fair fame and the silence of death.</p> + +<p>She breathed freely when she heard of Denoisel's departure, for it +seemed to her, then, as though her secret were her own once more.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLII</h2> + + +<p>Renée gradually recovered and in a few months' time seemed to be quite +well again. All the outward appearances of health came back to her, and +she had no suffering at all. She did not even feel anything of the +disturbance which illness leaves in the organs it has touched and in the +life it has just attacked.</p> + +<p>All at once the trouble began again. When she went upstairs or walked +uphill she suddenly felt suffocated. Palpitation became more frequent +and more violent, and then just as suddenly all this would stop again, +as it happens sometimes with these insidious diseases which at intervals +seem to entirely forget their victims.</p> + +<p>At the end of a few weeks the doctor from Saint-Denis, who was attending +Renée, took M. Mauperin aside.</p> + +<p>"I don't feel satisfied about your daughter," he said. "There is +something not quite clear to me. I should like to have a consultation +with a specialist. These heart affections are very treacherous +sometimes."</p> + +<p>"Yes, these heart affections—you are quite right," stammered M. +Mauperin.</p> + +<p>He could not find anything else to say. His former notions of medicine, +the desperate doctrines of the old school, Corvisart, the epigraph in +his famous book on the subject of heart affections: "<i>Hæret lateri +lethalis arundo</i>"; all these things came suddenly back to his mind, +clearly and distinctly. He could see the pages again of those books so +full of terror.</p> + +<p>"You see," the doctor went on, "the great danger of these diseases is +that they are so often of long standing. People send for us when the +disease has made great headway. There are symptoms that the patient has +not even noticed. Your daughter must have been very impressionable +always, from her very childhood, I should say; isn't that so? Torrents +of tears for the least blame, her face on fire for nothing at all, and +then her pulse beating a hundred a minute, a constant state of emotion +with her, very excitable, tempers like convulsions, always slightly +feverish. She would put a certain amount of passion into everything, I +should say, into her friendship, her games, her likes and dislikes; am I +not right? Oh yes, this is generally the way with children in whom this +organ predominates and who have an unfortunate predisposition to +hypertrophy. Tell me now, has she lately had any great emotion—any +great grief?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, oh yes; her brother's death."</p> + +<p>"Her brother's death. Ah yes, there was that," said the doctor, not +appearing to attach any great importance, nevertheless, to this +information. "I meant to ask you, though, whether she had been crossed +in love, for instance."</p> + +<p>"She? Crossed in love? Oh, good heavens!" and M. Mauperin shrugged his +shoulders, and half joining his hands looked up in the air.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm only asking you that for the sake of having my conscience +clear. Accidents of this kind only develop the germ that is already +there and hasten on the disease. The physical influence of the passions +on the heart is a theory—It has been studied a great deal the last +twenty years; and quite right, too, in my opinion. The thesis that the +heart is lacerated in a burst of temper, in any great moral——"</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin interrupted him:</p> + +<p>"Then, a consultation—you fancy—you think—don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, M. Mauperin, that will be quite the best thing. You see, it will +be more satisfactory for every one; for you, and for me. We should call +in M. Bouillaud, I suppose. He is considered the first authority."</p> + +<p>"Yes—M. Bouillaud," repeated M. Mauperin, mechanically nodding his head +in assent.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLIII</h2> + + +<p>It was just five minutes past twelve, and M. Mauperin was seated by +Renée's bed, holding her two hands in his. Renée glanced at the +time-piece.</p> + +<p>"He'll be here soon," said M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>Renée answered by closing her eye-lids gently, and her breathing and the +beating of her heart could be heard like the ticking of a watch in the +silence of the room at night.</p> + +<p>Suddenly a peal of the door-bell rang out, clearly and imperiously, +vibrating through the house. It seemed to M. Mauperin as though it had +been rung within him, and a shudder passed through him to his very +finger-tips like a needle-prick. He went to the door and opened it.</p> + +<p>"It is some one who rang by mistake, sir," said the servant-man.</p> + +<p>"It's very warm," said M. Mauperin to his daughter as he took his seat +again, looking very pale.</p> + +<p>Five minutes later the servant knocked. The doctor was waiting in the +drawing-room.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said M. Mauperin, getting up once more.</p> + +<p>"Go to him," murmured Renée, and then calling him back, she asked, +looking alarmed: "Is he going to examine me?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know; I don't think so. There'll be no need, perhaps," answered +M. Mauperin, playing with the knob of the door.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>M. Mauperin had fetched the doctor and left him with his daughter. He +was in the drawing-room waiting the result. He had walked up and down, +taken a seat, and gazed mechanically at a flower on the carpet, and had +then gone to the window and was tapping with his fingers on the pane.</p> + +<p>It seemed to him as though everything within himself and all round had +suddenly stopped. He did not know whether he had been there an hour or a +minute. It was one of those moments in life for him, the measure and +duration of which cannot be calculated. He felt as though he were living +again through his whole existence, and as though all the emotions of a +lifetime were crowded into a moment that was eternal.</p> + +<p>He turned dizzy, like a man in a dream falling from a height and +enduring the anguish of falling. All kinds of indistinct ideas, of +confused anxieties and vague terrors, seemed to rise from the pit of his +stomach and buzz round his temples. Yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, the +doctor, his daughter, her illness, all this whirled round in his head, +perplexing him, mingled as it all was with a physical sensation of +uneasiness, anxiety, fear, and dread. Then all at once one idea became +distinct. He had one of those clear visions that cross the mind at such +times. He saw the doctor with his ear pressed against his daughter's +back and he listened with him. He thought he heard the bed creak as it +does when any one turns on it. It was over, they would be coming now; +but no one came. He began pacing up and down again, as he could not keep +still. He grew irritable with impatience and thought the doctor was a +very long time, but the next minute he said to himself that it was a +good sign, that a great specialist would not relish wasting his time, +and that if there had been nothing he could do, he would already have +been back. Fresh hope came to him with this thought: his daughter was +saved; when the doctor came in he should see by his face that his +daughter was saved. He watched the door, but no one came. Then he began +to say to himself that they would have to take precautions, that perhaps +she would always be delicate, that there were plenty of people who went +on living in spite of palpitation of the heart. Then the word, the +terrible word, <i>death</i>, came to him and haunted him. He tried to drive +it away by thinking over and over again the same thoughts about +convalescence, getting well, and good health. He went over in his mind +all the persons he had known, who had been ill a long time, and who were +not dead. And yet in spite of all his efforts the same question kept +coming back to him: "What would the doctor tell him?"</p> + +<p>He repeated this over and over again to himself. It seemed to him as +though this visit were never going to finish and never would finish. And +then at times he would shudder at the idea of seeing the door open. He +would have liked to remain as he was forever, and <i>never</i> know. Finally +hope came back to him once more, just as the door opened.</p> + +<p>"Well?" said M. Mauperin to the doctor as he entered the room.</p> + +<p>"You must be brave," said the doctor.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin looked up, glanced at the doctor, moved his lips without +uttering a word—his mouth was dry and parched.</p> + +<p>The doctor began to explain in full his daughter's disease, its gravity, +the complications that were to be feared: he then wrote out a long +prescription, saying to M. Mauperin at each item:</p> + +<p>"You understand?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly!" answered M. Mauperin, looking stupefied.</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"Ah, my dear little girl, you are going to get well!"</p> + +<p>These were M. Mauperin's words to his daughter when he went back to her +room.</p> + +<p>"Really?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Kiss me."</p> + +<p>"What did he tell you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you need only look at my face to know what he said," answered M. +Mauperin, smiling at her. He felt as though it would kill him, though, +that smile; and turning away under the pretence of looking for his hat, +he continued, "I must go to Paris to get the prescription made up."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLIV</h2> + + +<p>At the railway station M. Mauperin saw the doctor getting into the +train. He got into another compartment, as he did not feel as though he +had the strength to speak to him or even look at him.</p> + +<p>On arriving in Paris he went to a chemist's and was told that it would +take three hours to make up the prescription. "Three hours!" he +exclaimed, but at heart he was glad that it would be so long. It would +give him some time before returning to the house. When once he was in +the street he walked fast. He had no consecutive ideas, but a sort of +heavy, ceaseless throbbing in his head like the throb of neuralgia. His +sensations were blunted, as though he were in a stupor. He saw nothing +but the legs of people walking and the wheels of the carriages turning +round. His head felt heavy and at the same time empty. As he saw other +people walking, he walked too. The passers-by appeared to be taking him +with them, and the crowd to be carrying him along in its stream. +Everything looked faint, indistinct, and of a neutral tint, as things +do the day after any wild excitement or intoxication. The light and +noise of the streets he seemed to see and hear in a dream. He would not +have known there was any sun if it had not been for the white trousers +the policemen were wearing, which had caught his eye several times.</p> + +<p>It was all the same to him whether he went to the right or left. He +neither wanted anything nor had he the energy to do anything. He was +surprised to see the movement around him—people who were hurrying +along, walking quickly, on their way to something. He had had neither +aim nor object in life for the last few hours. It seemed to him as +though the world had come to an end, as though he were a dead man in the +midst of the life and activity of Paris. He tried to think of anything +in all that might happen to a man capable of moving him, of touching him +in any way, and he could not conceive of anything which could reach to +the depths of his despair.</p> + +<p>Sometimes, as though he were answering inquiries about his daughter, he +would say aloud, "Oh, yes, she is very ill!" and it was as though the +words he had uttered had been said by some one else at his side. Often a +work-girl without any hat, a pretty young girl with a round waist, gay +and healthy with the rude health of her class, would pass by him. He +would cross the street that he might not see her again. He was furious +just for a minute with all these people who passed him, with all these +useless lives. They were not beloved as his daughter was, and there was +no need for them to go on living. He went into one of the public gardens +and sat down. A child put some of its little sand-pies on to the tails +of his coat; other children getting bolder approached him with all the +daring of sparrows. Presently, feeling slightly embarrassed, they left +their little spades, stopped playing and stood round, looking shyly and +sympathetically, like so many men and women in miniature, at this tall +gentleman who was so sad. M. Mauperin rose and left the garden.</p> + +<p>His tongue was furred and his throat dry. He went into a café, and +opposite him was a little girl wearing a white jacket and a straw hat. +Her frock was short, showing her little firm, bare legs with their white +socks. She was moving about all the time, climbing and jumping on to her +father and standing straight up on his knees. She had a little cross +round her neck. Every few minutes her father begged her to keep still.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin closed his eyes; he could see his own little daughter just +as she had been at six years old. Presently he opened a review, <i>The +Illustration</i>, and bent over it, trying to make himself look at the +pictures, and when he reached the last page he set himself to find out +one of the enigmas.</p> + +<p>When M. Mauperin lifted his head again he wiped his face with his +handkerchief. He had made out the enigma: <i>"Against death there is no +appeal."</i></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLV</h2> + + +<p>The terrible existence of those who have given up hope, and who can only +wait, now commenced for M. Mauperin; that life of anguish, fear and +trembling, of despair and of constant shocks, when every one is +listening and on the watch for death; that life when one is afraid of +any noise in the house, and just as afraid of silence, afraid of every +movement in the next room, afraid of the sound of voices drawing near, +afraid to hear a door close, and afraid of seeing the face of the person +who opens the door when one enters the house, and of whom one asks +without speaking if the beloved one still lives.</p> + +<p>As people frequently do when nursing their sick friends, he began to +reproach himself bitterly. He made his sorrow still harder to bear by +making himself believe that it was partly his own fault, that everything +had not been done which ought to have been, that she might have been +saved if only there had been a consultation earlier, if at a certain +time, a certain month or day, he had only thought of something or other.</p> + +<p>At night his restlessness in bed seemed to make his grief more wild and +feverish. In the solitude, the darkness, and the silence, one thought, +one vision, was with him all the time—his daughter, always his +daughter. His anxiety worked on his imagination, his dread increased, +and his wakefulness had all the intensity of the terrible sensation of +nightmare. In the morning he was afraid to wake up, and just as a man, +when half-awake, will instinctively turn over from the light, so he +would do his utmost to fall asleep again, to drive away his first +thoughts, not to remember anything and so escape for a moment longer +from the full consciousness of the present.</p> + +<p>Then the day came again with all its torments, and the father was +obliged to control his feelings, to conquer himself, to be gay and +cheerful, to reply to the smiles of the suffering girl, to answer her +pitiful attempts to be gay, and to keep up her feeble illusions, her +clinging to the future, with some of those heart-rending words of +comfort with which dying people will delude themselves, asking as they +so often do for hope from those who are with them.</p> + +<p>She would say to him, sometimes, in that feeble, soft whisper peculiar +to invalids and which dies away to a whisper, "How nice it would be to +have no pain! I can tell you, I shall enjoy life as soon as I get quite +well."</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed," he would answer, choking down his tears.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLVI</h2> + + +<p>Sick people are apt to believe that there are places where they would be +better, countries which would cure them. There are certain spots and +memories which come back to their mind and seem to fascinate them as an +exile is fascinated by his native land, and which lull them as a child +is lulled to rest in its cradle. Just as a child's fears are calmed in +the arms of its nurse, so their hopes fly to a country, a garden, or a +village where they were born and where surely they could not die.</p> + +<p>Renée began to think of Morimond. She kept saying to herself that if she +were once there she should get well. She felt sure, quite sure of it. +This Briche house had brought her bad luck. She had been so happy at +Morimond! And with this longing for change, the wish to move about which +invalids get, this fancy of hers grew, and became more and more +persistent. She spoke of it to her father and worried him about it. It +would not make any difference to any one, she pleaded, the refinery +would go along by itself, and M. Bernard, his manager, was trustworthy +and would see to everything, and then they could come back in the +autumn.</p> + +<p>"When shall we start, father dear?" she kept saying, getting more and +more impatient every day.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin gave in at last. His daughter promised him so faithfully +that she would get well at Morimond that he began to believe it himself. +He imagined that this sick fancy was an inspiration.</p> + +<p>"Yes, the country will perhaps do her good," said the doctor, accustomed +to these whims of dying people, who fancy that by going farther away +they will succeed in throwing death off their track.</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin promptly arranged his business matters, and the family +started for Morimond.</p> + +<p>The pleasure of setting off, the excitement of the journey, the nervous +force that all this gives even to people who have no strength at all, +the breeze coming in by the open window of the railway carriage kept the +invalid up as far as Chaumont. She reached there without being +overfatigued. M. Mauperin let her rest a day, and the following morning +hired the best carriage he could get in the town and they all set out +once more for Morimond. The road was bad and the journey was +disagreeable and long. It began to get warm at nine o'clock, and by +eleven the sun scorched the leather of the carriage. The horses breathed +hard, perspired, and went along with difficulty. Mme. Mauperin was +leaning back against the front cushion and dozing. M. Mauperin, seated +next his daughter, held a pillow at her back, against which she fell +after every little jolt. Every now and then she asked the time, and when +she was told she would murmur, "No later than that!"</p> + +<p>Towards three o'clock they were getting quite near their destination; +the sky was cloudy, there was less dust, and it was cooler altogether. A +water-wagtail began to fly in front of the carriage about thirty paces +at a time, rising from the little heaps of stones. There were elm-trees +all along the road and some of the fields were fenced round. Renée +seemed to revive as one does in one's natal air. She sat up and, leaning +against the door with her chin on her hand as children do when in a +carriage, she looked out at everything. It was as though she were +breathing in all she saw. As the carriage rolled along, she said:</p> + +<p>"Ah, the big poplar-tree at the Hermitage is broken. The little boys +used to fish for leeches in this pool—oh, there are M. Richet's rooks!"</p> + +<p>In the little wood near the village her father had to get out and pluck +a flower for her, which he could not see and which she pointed out to +him growing on the edge of the ditch.</p> + +<p>The carriage passed by the little inn, the first houses, the grocer's, +the blacksmith's, the large walnut-tree, the church, the watchmaker's, +who was also a dealer in curiosities, and the Pigeau farm. The +villagers were out in the fields. Some children who were tormenting a +wet cat stopped to see the carriage drive past. An old man, seated on a +bench in front of his cottage door, with a woollen shawl wrapped round +him and shivering in spite of the sun, lifted his cap. Then the horses +stopped, the carriage door was opened, and a man who was waiting in +front of the lodge lifted Mlle. Mauperin up in his arms.</p> + +<p>"Oh, our poor young lady; she's no heavier than a feather!" he said.</p> + +<p>"How do you do, Chrétiennot—how do you do, comrade?" said M. Mauperin, +shaking hands with the old gardener, who had served under him in his +regiment.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLVII</h2> + + +<p>The next day and the days which followed, Renée had the most delicious +waking moments, when the light which was just breaking, the morning of +the earth and sky, mingled—in the dawn of her thoughts—with the +morning of her life. Her first memories came back to her with the first +songs outdoors. The young birds woke up in their nests, awakening her +childhood.</p> + +<p>Supported and indeed almost carried by her father, she insisted on +seeing everything again—the garden, the fruit-trees on the walls, the +meadow in front of the house, the shady canals, the pool with its wide +sheet of still water. She remembered all the trees and the garden paths +again, and they seemed to her like the things one gradually recalls of a +dream. Her feet found the way along paths which she used to know and +which were now grown over with trees. The ruins seemed as many years +older to her as she was older since she had last seen them. She +remembered certain places on the grass where she had seen the shadow of +her frock when as a child she had been running there. She found the +spot where she had buried a little dog. It was a white one, named +<i>Nicolas Bijou</i>. She had loved it dearly, and she could remember her +father carrying it about in the kitchen garden after it had been washed.</p> + +<p>There were hundreds of souvenirs, too, for her in the house. Certain +corners in the rooms had the same effect on her as toys that have been +stored away in a garret, and that one comes across years after. She +loved to hear the sound of the mournful old weather-cock on the +house-top, which had always soothed her fears and lulled her to sleep as +a child.</p> + +<p>She appeared to rouse up and to revive. The change, her natal air, and +these souvenirs seemed to do her good. This improvement lasted some +weeks.</p> + +<p>One morning, her father, who was with her in the garden, was watching +her. She was amusing herself with cutting away the old roses in a clump +of white rose-bushes. The sunshine made its way through the straw of her +large hat, and the brilliancy of the light and the softness of the shade +rested on her thin little face. She moved about gaily and briskly from +one rose-tree to another, and the thorns caught hold of her dress as +though they wanted to play with her. At every clip of her scissors, from +a branch covered with small, open roses, with pink hearts all full of +life, there fell a dead earth-coloured rose which looked to M. Mauperin +like the corpse of a flower.</p> + +<p>All at once, leaving everything, Renée flung herself into her father's +arms.</p> + +<p>"Oh, papa, how I do love you!" she said, bursting into tears.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLVIII</h2> + + +<p>From that day the improvement began to disappear again. She gradually +lost the healthy colour which life's last kiss had brought to her +cheeks. She no longer had that delightful restlessness of the +convalescent, that longing to move about which only a short time ago had +made her take her father's arm constantly for a stroll. No more gay +words sprang from her mind to her lips, as they had done at first when +she had forgotten for a time all suffering; there was no more of the +happy prattle which had been the result of returning hope. She was too +languid to talk or even to answer questions.</p> + +<p>"No, there's nothing the matter with me—I am all right;" but the words +fell from her lips with an accent of pain, sadness, and resignation.</p> + +<p>She suffered from tightness of breath now, and constantly felt a weight +on her chest, which her respiration had difficulty in lifting. A sort of +constraint and vague discomfort, caused by this, made itself felt +throughout her whole system, attacking her nerves, taking from her all +vital energy and all inclination to move about, keeping her crushed and +submissive, without any strength to fight against it or to do anything.</p> + +<p>Her father persuaded her to try the effect of a cupping-glass.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>XLIX</h2> + + +<p>She took off her shawl in that slow way peculiar to invalids, so slow +that it seems painful. Her trembling fingers felt about for the buttons +that she had to unfasten, her mother helped her to take off the flannel +and cotton-wool in which she was wrapped, leaving her poor thin neck and +arms bare.</p> + +<p>She looked at her father, at the lighted candle, the twisted paper and +the wine-glasses, with that dread that one feels on seeing the hot irons +or fire being prepared for torturing one's flesh.</p> + +<p>"Am I right like this?" she asked, trying to smile.</p> + +<p>"No, you want to be in this position," answered M. Mauperin, showing her +how to sit.</p> + +<p>She turned round on her arm-chair, put her two hands on the back of it +and her cheek down on her hand, pulled her legs up, crossed her feet, +and, half-kneeling and half-crouching, only showed the profile of her +frightened face and her bare shoulders. She looked ready for the coffin +with her bony angles. Her hair, which was very loose, glided with the +shadow down the hollow of her back. Her shoulder-blades projected, the +joints of her spine could be counted, and the point of a poor thin +little elbow appeared through the sleeves of her under-linen, which had +fallen to the bend of her arm.</p> + +<p>"Well, father?"</p> + +<p>He was standing there, riveted to the spot, and he did not even know of +what he was thinking. At the sound of his daughter's voice he picked up +a glass, which he remembered belonged to a set he had bought for a +dinner-party in honour of Renée's baptism. He lighted a piece of paper, +threw it into the glass, and closed his eyes as he turned the glass +over. Renée gave a little hiss of pain, a shudder ran through all the +bones down her back, and then she said:</p> + +<p>"Oh, well; I thought it would hurt me much more than that."</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin took his hand from the glass and it fell to the ground; the +cupping had not succeeded.</p> + +<p>"Give me another," he said to his wife.</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin handed it to him in a leisurely way.</p> + +<p>"Give it me," he said, almost snatching it from her. His forehead was +wet with perspiration, but he no longer trembled. This time the vacuum +was made: the skin puckered up all round the glass and rose inside as +though it were being drawn by the scrap of blackened paper.</p> + +<p>"Oh, father! don't bear on so," said Renée, who had been holding her +lips tightly together; "take your hand off."</p> + +<p>"Why, I'm not touching it—look," said M. Mauperin, showing her his +hands.</p> + +<p>Renée's delicate white skin rose higher and higher in the glass, turning +red, patchy, and violet. When once the cupping was done the glass had to +be taken away again, the skin drawn to the edge on one side of the +glass, and then the glass swayed backward and forward from the other +side. M. Mauperin was obliged to begin again, two or three times over, +and to press firmly on the skin, near as it was to the bones.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>L</h2> + + +<p>Disease does its work silently and makes secret ravages in the +constitution. Then come those terrible outward changes which gradually +destroy the beauty, efface the personality, and, with the first touches +of death, transform those we love into living corpses.</p> + +<p>Every day M. Mauperin sought for something in his daughter which he +could not find—something which was no longer there. Her eyes, her +smile, her gestures, her footstep, her very dress which used proudly to +tell of her twenty years, the girlish vivacity which seemed to hover +round her and light on others as it passed—everything about her was +changing and life itself gradually leaving her. She no longer seemed to +animate all that she touched. Her clothes fell loosely round her in +folds as they do on old people. Her step dragged along, and the sound of +her little heels was no longer heard. When she put her arms round her +father's neck, she joined her hands awkwardly, her caresses had lost +their pretty gracefulness. All her gestures were stiff, she moved about +like a person who feels cold or who is afraid of taking up too much +space. Her arms, which were generally hanging down, now looked like the +wet wings of a bird. She scarcely even resembled her old self. And when +she was walking in front of her father, with her bent back, her shrunken +figure, her arms hanging loosely at her sides, and her dress almost +falling off her, it seemed to M. Mauperin that this could not be his +daughter, and as he looked at her he thought of the Renée of former +days.</p> + +<p>There was a shadow round her mouth that seemed to go inside when she +smiled. The beauty spot on her hand, just by her little finger, had +grown larger, and was as black as though mortification had set in.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LI</h2> + + +<p>"Mother, it's Henri's birthday to-day."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know," said Mme. Mauperin without moving.</p> + +<p>"Suppose we were to go to church?"</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin rose and went out of the room, returning very soon with +her bonnet and cape on. Half an hour later M. Mauperin was helping his +daughter out of the carriage at the Maricourt church-door. Renée went to +the little side-chapel, where the marble altar stood on which was the +little miraculous black wooden Virgin to which she had prayed with great +awe as a child. She sat down on a bench which was always there and +murmured a prayer. Her mother stood near her, looking at the church and +not praying at all. Renée then got up and, without taking her father's +arm, walked with a step that scarcely faltered right through the church +to a little side door leading into the cemetery.</p> + +<p>"I wanted to see whether <i>that</i> was still there," she said to her +father, pointing to an old bouquet of artificial flowers among the +crosses and wreaths which were hung on the tomb.</p> + +<p>"Come, my child," said M. Mauperin; "don't stand too long. Let us go +home again now."</p> + +<p>"Oh, there's plenty of time."</p> + +<p>There was a stone seat under the porch with a ray of sunshine falling on +it.</p> + +<p>"It's warm here," she said, laying her hand on the stone. "Put my shawl +there so that I can sit down a little. I shall have the sun on my +back—there."</p> + +<p>"It isn't wise," said M. Mauperin.</p> + +<p>"Oh, just to make me happy." When she was seated and leaning against +him, she murmured in a voice as soft as a sigh, "How gay it is here."</p> + +<p>The lime-trees, buzzing with bees, were stirring gently in the faint +wind. A few fowl in the thick grass were running about, pecking and +looking for food. At the foot of a wall, by the side of a plough and +cart, the wheels of which were white with dry mud, on the stumps of some +old trees with the bark peeled off, some little chickens were frolicking +about, and some ducks were asleep, looking like balls of feathers. There +seemed to be a murmur of hushed voices from the church, and the light +played on the blue of the stained-glass windows. Flights of pigeons kept +starting up and taking refuge in the niches of sculpture and in the +holes between the old grey stones. The river could be seen and its +splashing sound heard; a wild white colt bounded along to the water's +edge.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Renée after a few moments, "we ought to have been made of +something else. Why did God make us of flesh and blood? It's frightful!"</p> + +<p>Her eyes had fallen on some soil turned up in a corner of the cemetery, +half hidden by two barrel-hoops crossed over each other and up which +wild convolvulus was growing.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LII</h2> + + +<p>Renée's complaint did not make her cross and capricious, nor did it +cause her any of that nervous irritability so common to invalids, and +which makes those who are nursing them share their suffering morally. +She gave herself entirely up to her fate. Her life was ebbing away +without any apparent effort on her part to hold it back or to stop it in +its course. She was still affectionate and gentle. Her wishes had none +of the unreasonableness of dying fancies. The darkness which was +gathering round her brought peace with it. She did not fight against +death, but let it come like a beautiful night closing over her white +soul.</p> + +<p>There were times, however, when Nature asserted itself within her, when +her mind faltered from sheer bodily weakness, and when she listened to +the stealthy progress of the disease which was gradually detaching her +from her hold on life. At such times she would maintain a profound +silence and would be terribly calm, remaining for a long time mute and +motionless almost like a dead person. She would pass half the day in +this way without even hearing the clock strike, gazing before her just +beyond her feet with a steady, fixed gaze and seeing nothing at all. Her +father could not even catch the expression of her eyes at such times. +Her long lashes would quiver two or three times, and she would hide her +eyes by letting the lids droop over them, and it seemed to him then as +though she were asleep with her eyes half open. He would talk to her, +search his brains for something that might interest her, and endeavour +to make jokes, so that she should hear him and feel that he was there; +but in the middle of his sentence his daughter's attention, her +thoughts, and her intelligent look would leave him. He no longer felt +the same warmth in her affection, and when he was with her he himself +felt chilled now. It seemed as if disease were robbing him day by day of +a little more of his daughter's heart.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LIII</h2> + + +<p>Sometimes, too, Renée would let a few words slip, showing that she was +mourning her fate as sick people do, words which sink to the heart and +give one a chill like death itself.</p> + +<p>One day her father was reading the newspaper to her; she took it from +him to look at the marriage announcements.</p> + +<p>"Twenty-nine! How old she was, wasn't she?" she said, as though speaking +to herself. She had been glancing down the death column. M. Mauperin did +not answer; he paced up and down the room for a few minutes and then +went away.</p> + +<p>When Renée was alone she got up to close the door, which her father had +not pulled to, and which kept banging. She fancied she heard a groan in +the corridor and looked, but there was no one there; she listened a +minute; but as everything was silent again she was just going to close +the door, when she thought she heard the same sound again. She went out +into the corridor as far as her father's room. It was from there that it +came. The key was not in the lock, and Renée stooped down and, through +the keyhole, saw her father, who had flung himself on his bed, weeping +bitterly and shaken with sobs. His head was buried in the pillow, and he +was endeavouring to stifle down his tears and his despair.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LIV</h2> + + +<p>Renée was determined that her father should weep no more on her account.</p> + +<p>"Listen to me, papa," she said, the following morning. "We are going to +leave here at the end of September; that's settled, isn't it? We are +going everywhere, a month to one place and a fortnight to another—just +as we fancy. Well, <i>I</i> want you to take me now to all the places where +you fought. Do you know, I've heard that you fell in love with a +princess? Suppose we were to come across her again, what should you say +to that? Wasn't it at Pordenone that you got those great scars?" And, +taking her father's face in her two hands, she pressed her lips to the +white, hollow places which had been marked by the finger of Glory.</p> + +<p>"I want you to tell me all about everything," she continued; "it will be +ever so nice to go all through your campaigns again with your daughter. +If one winter will not be enough for it all, why, we'll just take two. +And when I'm quite myself again—we are quite rich enough surely, +Henriette and I; you've worked hard enough for us—well, we'll just +sell the refinery, and we'll all come here. We'll go to Paris for two +months of the year to enjoy ourselves; that will be quite enough, won't +it? Then as you always like to have something to do, you can take your +farm again from Têtevuide's son-in-law. We'll have some cows and a nice +farm-yard for mamma—do you hear, mamma? I shall be outdoors all day; +and the end of it will be that I shall get <i>too</i> well—you'll see. And +then we'll have people to visit us all the time. In the country we can +allow ourselves that little luxury—that won't ruin us—and we shall be +as happy, as happy—you'll see."</p> + +<p>Travelling and plans of all kinds—she talked of nothing but the future +now. She spoke of it as of a promised thing, a certainty. It was she, +now, who made every one hopeful, and she concealed the fact that she was +dying so skilfully and pretended so well that she wanted to live, that +M. Mauperin on seeing her and listening to her dreams, gave himself up +to dreaming with her of years which they had before them and which would +be full of peace, tranquility, and happiness. Sometimes, even, the +illusions that the invalid had invented herself dazzled her too, for an +instant, and she would begin to believe in her own fiction, forget +herself for a moment and, quite deceived like the others, she would say +to herself, "Suppose, after all, that I should get well!" At other +times she would delight in going back to the past. She would tell about +things that had happened, about her own feelings, funny incidents that +she remembered, or she would talk about her childish pleasures. It was +as though she had risen from her death-bed to embrace her father for the +last time with all she could muster of her youth.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my first ball-dress," she said to him one day; "I can see it +now—it was a pink tulle one. The dressmaker didn't bring it—- it was +raining—and we couldn't get a cab. How you did hurry along! And how +queer you looked when you came back carrying a cardboard box! And you +were so wet when you kissed me! I remember it all so well."</p> + +<p>Renée had only herself and her own courage to depend on, in her task of +keeping her father up and herself too. Her mother was there, of course; +but ever since Henri's death she had been buried in a sort of silent +apathy. She was indifferent to all that went on, mute and absent-minded. +She was there with her daughter, night and day, without a murmur, +patient and always even-tempered, ready to do anything, as docile and +humble as a servant, but her affection seemed almost mechanical. The +soul had gone out of her caresses, and all her ministrations were for +the body rather than the heart; there was nothing of the mother about +her now except the hands.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LV</h2> + + +<p>Renée could still drag along with her father to the first trees of the +little wood near the house. She would then sink down with her back +against the moss of an oak-tree on the boundary of the wood. The smell +of hay from the fields, an odour of grass and honey came to her there +with a delicious warmth from the sunshine, the fresh air from the wood, +damp from the cool springs and the unmade paths.</p> + +<p>In the midst of the deep silence, an immense, indistinct rustling could +be heard, and a hum and buzz of winged creatures, which filled the air +with a ceaseless sound like that of a bee-hive and the infinite murmur +of the sea. All around Renée, and near to her, there seemed to be a +great living peace, in which everything was being swayed—the gnat in +the air, the leaf on the branch, the shadows on the bark of the trees, +the tops of the trees against the sky, and the wild oats on each side of +the paths. Then from this murmur came the sighing sound of a deep +respiration, a breeze coming from afar which made the trees tremble as +it passed them, while the blue of the heavenly vault above the shaking +leaves seemed fixed and immovable. The boughs swayed slowly up and down, +a breath passed over Renée's temples and touched her neck, a puff of +wind kissed and cheered her. Gradually she began to lose all +consciousness of her physical being, the sensation and fatigue of +living; an exquisite languor took possession of her, and it seemed to +her as though she were partially freed from her material body and were +just ready to pass away in the divine sweetness of all these things. +Every now and then she nestled closer to her father like a child who is +afraid of being carried away by a gust of wind.</p> + +<p>There was a stone bench covered with moss in the garden. After dinner, +towards seven o'clock, Renée liked to sit there; she would put her feet +up, leaning her head against the back of the seat, and with a trail of +convolvulus tickling her ear she would stay there, looking up at the +sky. It was just at the time of those beautiful summer days which fade +away in silvery evenings. Imperceptibly her eyes and her thoughts were +fascinated by the infinite whiteness of the sky, just ready to die away. +As she watched she seemed to see more brilliancy and light coming from +this closing day, a more dazzling brightness and serenity seemed to fall +upon her. Gradually some great depths opened in the heavens, and she +fancied she could see millions of little starry flames as pale as the +light of tapers, trembling with the night breeze. And then, from time to +time, weary of gazing into that dazzling brightness which kept receding, +blinded by those myriads of suns, she would close her eyes for an +instant as though shrinking from that gulf which was hanging over her +and drawing her up above.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LVI</h2> + + +<p>"Mother," she said, "don't you see how nice I look? Just see all the +trouble I've taken for you;" and joining her hands over her head, her +dress loose at the waist, she sank down on the pillows full length on +the sofa in a careless, languid attitude which was both graceful and sad +to see. Renée thought that the bed and the white sheets made her look +ill. She would not stay there, and gathered together all her remaining +strength to get up. She dressed slowly and heroically towards eleven +o'clock, taking a long time over it, stopping to get breath, resting her +arms over and over again, after holding them up to do her hair. She had +thrown a fichu of point-lace over her head, and was wearing a +dressing-gown of starched white piqué, with plenty of material in it, +falling in wide pleats. Her small feet were incased in low shoes, and +instead of rosettes she wore two little bunches of violets which +Chrétiennot brought her every morning. In order to look more alive, as +invalids do when they are up and dressed, she would stay there all day +in this white girlish toilette fragrant with violets.</p> + +<p>"Oh, how odd it is when one is ill!" she said, looking down at herself +and then all round the room. "I don't like anything that is not pretty +now, just fancy! I couldn't wear anything ugly. Do you know I've thought +of something I want. You remember the little silver-mounted jug—so +pretty it was—we saw it in a jeweller's shop in the Rue Saint Honoré +when we had just gone out of the theatre for the interval. If it isn't +sold—if he still has it, you might let him send it. Oh, I know I'm +getting the most ruinous tastes—I warn you of that. I want to arrange +things here. I'm getting very difficult to please; in everything I have +the most luxurious ideas. I used not to be at all elegant in my tastes; +and now I have eyes for everything I wear, and for everything all round +me—oh, such eyes! There are certain colours that positively pain +me—just fancy—and others that I had never noticed before. It is being +ill that makes me like this—it must be that. It's so ugly to be ill; +and so it makes you like everything that is beautiful all the more."</p> + +<p>With all this coquetry which the approach of death had brought to her, +these fancies and caprices, these little delicacies and elegancies, +other senses too seemed to come to Renée. She was becoming, and she felt +herself becoming, more of a woman. Under all the languor and indolence +caused by illness, her disposition, which had always been affectionate +but somewhat masculine and violent, grew gentler, more unbending, and +more calm. Gradually the ways, tastes, inclinations, and ideas—all the +signs of her sex, in fact—made their appearance to her. Her mind seemed +to undergo the same transformation. She gave up her impetuous way of +criticising and her daring speech. Occasionally she would use one of her +old expressions, and then she would say, smiling, "That is a bit of the +old Renée come back." She remembered speeches she had made, bold things +she had done, and her familiar manner with young men; she would no +longer dare to act and speak as in those old days. She was surprised, +and did not know herself in her new character. She had given up reading +serious or amusing books; she only cared now for works which set her +thinking, books with ideas. When her father talked to her about hunting +and the meets to which she had been and of those in store for her, it +gave her the sensation of being about to fall, and the very idea of +mounting a horse frightened her. All the emotions and weaknesses that +she felt were quite new to her. Flowers about which she had never +troubled much were now as dear to her as persons. She had never liked +needlework, and now that she had started to embroider a skirt, she +enjoyed doing it. She quite roused up and lived over again in the +memories of her early girlhood. She thought of the children with whom +she used to play, of the friends she had had, of different places to +which she had been, and of the faces of the girls in the same row with +her at her confirmation.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LVII</h2> + + +<p>As she was looking out of the window one day, she saw a woman sit down +in the dust in the middle of the village street, between a stone and a +wheel-rut, and unswathe her little baby. The child lay face downward, +the upper part of its body in the shade, moving its little legs, +crossing its feet, and kicking about, and the sun caressed it lovingly +as it does the bare limbs of a child. A few rays that played over it +seemed to strew on its little feet some of the rose petals of a +Fête-Dieu procession. When the mother and child had gone away Renée +still went on gazing out of the window.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LVIII</h2> + + +<p>"You see," she said to her father, "I never could fall in love; you made +me too hard to please. I always knew beforehand that no one could ever +love me as you did. I saw so many things come into your face when I was +there, such happiness! And when we went anywhere together, weren't you +proud of me! Oh! weren't you just proud to have me leaning on your arm! +It would have been all no good for any one else to have loved me; I +should never have found any one like my own father; you spoiled me too +much."</p> + +<p>"But all that won't prevent my dear little girl one of these fine days, +when she gets well, finding a handsome young man——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, your handsome young man is a long way off yet," said Renée, a smile +lighting up her eyes. "It seems strange to you," she went on, "doesn't +it, that I have never seemed anxious to marry. Well, I tell you, it is +your own fault. Oh, I'm not sorry in the least. What more did I want? +Why, I had everything; I could not imagine any other happiness. I never +even thought of such a thing. I didn't want any change. I was so well +off. What <i>could</i> I have had, now, more than I already had? My life was +so happy with you; and I was so contented. Yes," she went on, after a +minute's silence, "if I had been like so many girls, if I had had +parents who were cold and a father not at all like you; oh yes, I should +certainly have done as other girls do, I should have wanted to be loved, +I should have thought about marriage as they do. Then, too, I may as +well tell you all, I should have had hard work to fall in love; it was +never much in my way, all that sort of thing, and it always made me +laugh. Do you remember before Henriette's marriage, when her husband was +making love to her? How I did tease them! <i>'Bad child!'</i> do you +remember, that was what they used to call me. Oh, I've had my fancies, +like every one else; dreamy days when I used to go about building +castles in the air. One wouldn't be a woman without all that. But it was +only like a little music in my mind; it just gave me a little +excitement. It all came and went in my imagination; but I never had any +special man in my mind, oh never. And then, too, when once I came out of +my room, it was all over. As soon as ever any one was there, I only had +my eyes; I thought of nothing but watching everything so that I could +laugh afterward—and you know how your dreadful daughter could watch. +They would have had to——"</p> + +<p>"Monsieur," said Chrétiennot, opening the door, M. Magu is downstairs; +"he wants to know if he can see mademoiselle."</p> + +<p>"Oh, father," said Renée, beseechingly, "no doctor to-day, please. I +don't feel inclined. I'm very well. And then, too, he snorts so; why +does he snort like that, father?"</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin could not help laughing.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you," she went on, "it's the effect of driving about in a gig +on his rounds in the winter. As both his hands are occupied, one with +the reins and the other with the whip, he's got into the way of not +using his handkerchief——"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LIX</h2> + + +<p>"Is the sky blue all over, father? Look out and tell me, will you?" said +Renée, one afternoon, as she lay on the sofa.</p> + +<p>"Yes, my child," answered M. Mauperin from the window, "it is superb."</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"Why? Are you in pain?"</p> + +<p>"No, only it seemed to me that there must be clouds—as though the +weather were going to change. It's very odd when one is ill, it seems as +if the sky were much nearer. Oh, I'm a capital barometer now." And she +went on reading the book she had laid down while she spoke.</p> + +<p>"You tire yourself with reading, little girl; let us talk instead. Give +it me," and M. Mauperin held out his hand for the book, which she +slipped from her fingers into his. On opening it, M. Mauperin noticed +some pages that he had doubled down some years before, telling her not +to read them, and these forbidden pages were still doubled down.</p> + +<p>Renée appeared to be sleepy. The storm which was not yet in the sky had +already begun to weigh on her. She felt a most unbearable heaviness +which seemed to overwhelm her, and at the same time a nervous uneasiness +took possession of her. The electricity in the air was penetrating her +and working on her.</p> + +<p>A great silence had suddenly come over everything, as though it had been +chased from the horizon, and the breath of solemn calm passing over the +country filled her with immense anxiety. She looked at the clock, did +not speak again, but kept moving her hands about from place to place.</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes," said M. Mauperin, "there is a cloud, really, a big cloud over +Fresnoy. How it is moving along! Ah, it's coming over on to our +side—it's coming. Shall I shut everything up—the window and the +shutters, and light up? Like that my big girl won't be so frightened."</p> + +<p>"No," said Renée, quickly, "no lights in the daytime—no, no! And then, +too," she went on, "I'm not afraid of it now."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it is some distance off yet," said M. Mauperin, for the sake of +saying something. His daughter's words had called up a vision of lighted +tapers in this room.</p> + +<p>"Ah, there's the rain," said Renée, in a relieved tone. "It's like dew, +that rain is. It's as if we were drinking it, isn't it? Come here—near +me."</p> + +<p>Some large drops came down, one by one, at first. Then the water poured +from the sky, as it does from a vase that has been upset. The storm +broke over Morimond and the thunder rolled and burst in peals. The +country round was all fire and then all dark. And at every moment in the +gloomy room, lighted up with pale gleams, the flashes would suddenly +cover the reclining figure of the invalid from head to foot, throwing +over her whole body a shroud of light.</p> + +<p>There was one last peal of thunder, so loud and which burst so near, +that Renée threw her arms round her father's neck and hid her face +against him.</p> + +<p>"Foolish child, it's over now," said M. Mauperin; and like a bird which +lifts its head a little from under its wing, she looked up, keeping her +arms round him.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I thought we were all dead!" she said, with a smile in which there +was something of a regret.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LX</h2> + + +<p>One morning on going to see Renée, who had had a bad night, M. Mauperin +found her in a doze. At the sound of his footstep she half opened her +eyes and turned slightly towards him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's you, papa," she said, and then she murmured something vaguely, +of which M. Mauperin only caught the word "journey."</p> + +<p>"What are you saying about a journey?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's as though I had just come back from far away—from very far +away—from countries I can't remember." And opening her eyes wide, with +her two hands flat out on the sheet, she seemed to be trying to recall +where she had been, and from whence she had just come. A confused +recollection, an indistinct memory remained to her of stretches and +spaces of country, of vague places, of those worlds and limbos to which +sick people go during those last nights which are detaching them from +earth, and from whence they return, surprised, with the dizziness and +stupor of the Infinite still upon them, as if in the dream they have +forgotten they had heard the first flapping of the wings of Death.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's nothing," she said after a minute's silence, "it's just the +effect of the opium—they gave me some last night to make me sleep." And +moving as though to shake off her thoughts, she said to her father, +"Hold the little glass for me, will you, so that I can make myself look +nice? Higher up—oh, these men—how awkward they are, to be sure."</p> + +<p>She put her thin hands through her hair to fluff it up and pulled her +lace into its place again.</p> + +<p>"There now," she said, "talk to me. I want to be talked to," and she +half closed her eyes while her father talked.</p> + +<p>"You are tired, Renée; I'll leave you," said M. Mauperin, seeing that +she did not appear to be listening.</p> + +<p>"No, I have a touch of pain. Talk to me, though; it makes me forget it."</p> + +<p>"But you are not listening to me. Come now, what are you thinking about, +my dear little girl?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not thinking about anything. I was trying to remember. Dreams, you +know—it isn't really like that—it was—I don't remember. Ah!"</p> + +<p>She broke off suddenly, with a pang of sharp pain.</p> + +<p>"Does it hurt you, Renée?"</p> + +<p>She did not answer, and M. Mauperin could not help his lips moving, as +he looked up with an expression of revolt.</p> + +<p>"Poor father," said Renée, after a few minutes. "You see I'm resigned. +No, we ought not to be so angry with pain. It is sent to us for some +reason. We are not made to suffer simply for the sake of suffering."</p> + +<p>And in a broken voice, stopping continually to get breath, she began +talking to him of all the good sides of suffering, of the wells of +tenderness it opens up in us, of the delicacy of heart, and the +gentleness of character that it gives to those who accept its bitterness +without allowing themselves to get soured by it.</p> + +<p>She spoke to him of all the meannesses and the pettinesses that go away +from us when we suffer; of the tendency to sarcasm which leaves us, and +the unkind laughter which we restrain; of the way in which we give up +finding pleasure in other people's little miseries, and of the +indulgence that we have for every one.</p> + +<p>"If you only knew," she said, "what a stupid thing wit seems to me now." +And M. Mauperin heard her expressing her gratitude to suffering as a +proof of election. She spoke of selfishness and of all the materiality +in which robust health wraps us up; of that hardness of heart which is +the result of the well-being of the body; and she told him what ease and +deliverance come with sickness; how light she felt inwardly and what +aspirations it brings with it for something outside ourselves.</p> + +<p>She spoke, too, of suffering as an ill which takes our pride away, which +reminds us of our infirmity, which makes us humane, causes us to feel +with all those who suffer, and which instils charity into us.</p> + +<p>"And then, too," she added with a smile, "without it there would be +something wanting for us; we should never be sad, you know——"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LXI</h2> + + +<p>"My dear fellow, we are very unhappy," said M. Mauperin, one evening, a +few days later, to Denoisel, who had just jumped down from a hired trap. +"I had a presentiment you would come to-day," he went on. "She is asleep +now; you'll see her to-morrow. Oh, you'll find her very much changed. +But you must be hungry," and he led the way to the dining-room, where +supper was being laid for him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, "she is young. At her age something +can always be done."</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin put his elbows on the table and great tears rolled slowly +from his eyes.</p> + +<p>"Oh, come, come, M. Mauperin; the doctors haven't given her up; there's +hope yet."</p> + +<p>M. Mauperin shook his head and did not answer, but his tears continued +to flow.</p> + +<p>"They haven't given her up?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, they have," said M. Mauperin, who could not contain himself any +longer, "and I didn't want to have to tell you. One is afraid of +everything, you see, when it comes to this stage. It seems to me that +there are certain words which would bring the very thing about, and to +own this, why, I fancied it would kill my child. And then, too, there +might be a miracle. Why shouldn't there be? They spoke of miracles—the +doctors did. Oh, God! She still gets up, you know; it's a great thing, +that she can get up. The last two days there has been an improvement, I +think. And then to lose two in a year—it would be too terrible. Oh, +that would be too much! But there, eat, man, you are not eating +anything," and he put a large piece of meat on Denoisel's plate. "Well, +well, we must bear up and be men; that's all we can do. What's the +latest news in Paris?"</p> + +<p>"There isn't any; at least, I don't know any. I've come straight from +the Pyrenees. Mme. Davarande read me one of your letters; but she is far +from thinking her so ill."</p> + +<p>"Have you no news of Barousse?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes! I met him on the way to the station. I wanted to bring him +with me, but you know what Barousse is; nothing in the world would +induce him to leave Paris for a week. He must take his morning walk +along the quays. The idea of missing an engraving with its full +margin——"</p> + +<p>"And the Bourjots?" asked M. Mauperin with an effort.</p> + +<p>"They say that Mlle. Bourjot will never marry."</p> + +<p>"Poor child, she loved him."</p> + +<p>"As to the mother, it is the saddest thing—it appears it's an awful +ending—there are rumours of strange things—madness, in fact. There's +some talk of sending her to a private asylum."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LXII</h2> + + +<p>"Renée," said M. Mauperin, on entering his daughter's room the following +day, "there is some one downstairs who wants to see you."</p> + +<p>"Some one?" And she looked searchingly at her father. "I know, it's +Denoisel. Did you write to him?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all. You did not ask to see him, so that I did not know whether +it would give you any pleasure. Do you mind?"</p> + +<p>"Mother, give me my little red shawl—there, in the drawer," she said, +without answering her father. "I mustn't frighten him, you know. Now +then, bring him here quickly," she added, as soon as her shawl was tied +at the neck like a scarf.</p> + +<p>Denoisel came into the room, which was impregnated with that odour +peculiar to the young when they are ill, and which reminds one of a +faded bouquet and of dying flowers.</p> + +<p>"It's very nice of you to have come," said Renée. "Look, I've put this +shawl on for your benefit; you used to like me in it."</p> + +<p>Denoisel stooped down, took her hands in his and kissed them.</p> + +<p>"It's Denoisel," said M. Mauperin to his wife, who was seated at the +other end of the room.</p> + +<p>Mme. Mauperin did not appear to have heard. A minute later she got up, +came across to Denoisel, kissed him in a lifeless sort of way, and then +went back to the dark corner where she had been sitting.</p> + +<p>"Well, how do you think I look? I haven't changed much, have I?" And +then without giving him time to answer, she went on: "I have a dreadful +father who will keep saying I don't look well, and who is most +obstinate. It's no good telling him I am better; he will have it that I +am not. When I am quite well again, you'll see—he'll insist on fancying +that I am still an invalid."</p> + +<p>Denoisel was looking at her wasted arm, just above the wrist.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I'm a little thinner," said Renée, quickly buttoning her sleeve, +"but that's nothing; I shall soon pick up again. Do you remember our +good story about that, papa? It made us laugh so. It was at a farmer's +house at Têtevuide's—that dinner, you remember, don't you? Only imagine +it, Denoisel, the good fellow had been keeping some shrimps for us for +two years. Just as we were sitting down to table, papa said, 'Oh, but +where's your daughter, Têtevuide? She must dine with us. Isn't she +here?' 'Oh, yes, sir.' 'Well, fetch her in, then, or I shall not touch +the soup.' Thereupon the father went into the next room, and we heard +talking and crying going on for the next quarter of an hour. He came +back alone, finally. 'She will not come in,' he said, 'she says she's +too thin.' But, papa," Renée went on, suddenly changing the subject, +"for the last two days mamma has never been out of this room. Now that I +have a new nurse, suppose you take her out for a stroll?"</p> + +<hr style='width: 15%;' /> + +<p>"Ah, Renée dear," said Denoisel, when they were alone, "you don't know +how glad I am to see you like this—to find you so gay and cheerful. +That's a good sign, you know; you'll soon be better, I assure you. And +with that good father of yours, and your poor mother, and your stupid +old Denoisel to look after you—for I'm going to take up my abode here, +for a time, with your permission."</p> + +<p>"You, too, my dear boy? Now do just look at me!"</p> + +<p>And she held out her two hands for him to help her to turn over, so that +she could face him and have the daylight full on her.</p> + +<p>"Can you see me now?"</p> + +<p>The smile had left her eyes and her lips, and all animation had suddenly +dropped from her face like a mask.</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes," she said, lowering her voice, "it's all over, and I haven't +long to live now. Oh, I wish I could die to-morrow. I can't go on, you +know, doing as I am doing. I can't go on any longer cheering them all +up. I have no strength left. I've come to the end of it, and I want to +finish now. He doesn't see me as I am, does he? I can't kill him +beforehand, you know. When he sees me laugh, why it doesn't matter about +the doctors having given me up—he forgets that—he doesn't see +anything, and he doesn't remember anything—so, you see, I am obliged to +go on laughing. Ah, for people who can just pass away as they would like +to—finish peacefully, die calmly, in a quiet place, with their face to +the wall—why, that must be so easy. It's nothing to pass away like +that. Well, anyhow, the worst part is over. And now you are here; and +you'll help me to be brave. If I were to give way, you would be there to +second me. And when—when I go, I count on you—you'll stay with him the +first few months. Ah, don't cry," she said; "you'll make me cry, too."</p> + +<p>There was a moment's silence.</p> + +<p>"Six months already since Henri's funeral," she began again. "We've only +seen each other once since that day. What a fearful turn I had, do you +remember?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed I do remember," said Denoisel. "I've gone through it all +again, often enough. I can see you now, my poor child, enduring the +most horrible suffering, and your lips moving as though you wanted to +cry out, to say something, and you could not utter a single word."</p> + +<p>"I could not utter a single word," said Renée, repeating Denoisel's last +words.</p> + +<p>She closed her eyes, and her lips moved for a second as though they were +murmuring a prayer. Then, with such an expression of happiness that +Denoisel was surprised, she said:</p> + +<p>"Ah, I am so glad to see you! Both of us together—you'll see how brave +we shall be. And we'll take them all in finely—poor things!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LXIII</h2> + + +<p>It was stiflingly hot. Renée's windows were left open all the evening, +and the lamp was not lighted, for fear of attracting the moths, which +made her so nervous. They were talking, until as the daylight gradually +faded, their words and thoughts were influenced by the solemnity of the +long hours of dreamy reverie, without light.</p> + +<p>They all three soon ceased speaking at all, and remained there mute, +breathing in the air and giving themselves up to the evening calm. M. +Mauperin was holding Renée's hand in his, and every now and then he +pressed it fondly.</p> + +<p>The gloom was gathering fast, and gradually the whole room grew quite +dark. Lying full length on the sofa, Renée herself disappeared in the +indistinct whiteness of her dressing-gown. Presently nothing at all +could be seen, and the room itself seemed all one with the sky.</p> + +<p>Renée began to talk then in a low, penetrating voice. She spoke gently +and very beautifully; her words were tender, solemn, and touching, +sometimes sounding like the chant of a pure conscience, and sometimes +falling on the hearts around her with angelic consolation.</p> + +<p>Her ideas became more and more elevated, excusing and pardoning all +things. At times the things she said fell on the ear as from a voice +that was far away from earth, higher than this life, and gradually a +sort of sacred awe born of the solemnity of darkness, silence, night, +and death, fell on the room where M. and Mme. Mauperin, and Denoisel +were listening eagerly to all which seemed to be already fluttering away +from the dying girl in this voice.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LXIV</h2> + + +<p>On the wall-paper were bouquets of corn, cornflowers, and poppies, and +the ceiling was painted with clouds, fresh-looking and vapoury. Between +the door and window a carved wood praying-chair with a tapestry cushion +looked quite at home in its corner; above it, against the light, was a +holy-water vessel of brass-work, representing St. John baptizing Christ. +In the opposite corner, hanging on the wall with silk cords, was a small +bracket with some French books leaning against each other, and a few +English works in cloth bindings. In front of the window, which was +framed with creeping plants joining each other over the top and with the +leaves that hung over bathed in light, was a dressing-table, covered +with silk and guipure lace, with a blue velvet mirror and silver-mounted +toilet bottles. The shaped mantel-shelf surmounted with a carved panel, +had its glass framed with the same light shade of velvet as that on the +dressing-table. On each side of the glass were miniatures of Renée's +mother, one when quite young and wearing a string of pearls round her +neck, and a daguerrotype representing her much older. Above this was a +portrait of her father in his uniform, painted by herself, the frame of +which, leaning forward, caused the picture to dominate the whole room. +On a rosewood dinner-wagon, in front of the chimney-piece, were one or +two knick-knacks, the sick girl's latest fancies—the little jug and the +Saxony bowl that she had wanted. A little farther away, by the second +window, all the souvenirs that Renée had collected in her riding +days—her hunting and shooting relics, riding-canes, a Pyrenees whip, +and some stags' feet with a card tied with blue ribbon, telling the day +and place where the animal had been run to cover. Beyond the window was +a little writing-desk which had been her father's at the military +school, and on its shelf stood the boxes, baskets, and presents she had +received as New Year's gifts. The bed was entirely draped with muslin. +At the back of it, and as though under the shelter of its curtains, all +the prayer-books Renée had had since her childhood were arranged on an +Algerian bracket, from which some chaplets were hanging. Then came a +chest of drawers covered with a hundred little nothings: doll's-house +furniture, some glass ornaments, halfpenny jewellery, trifles won in +lotteries, even little animals made of bread-crumbs cooked in the stove +and with matches for legs, a regular museum of childish things, such as +young girls hoard up and treasure as reminiscences. The room was bright +and warm with the noonday sun. Near the bed was a little table arranged +as an altar, covered with a white cloth. Two candles were burning and +flickering in the golden daylight.</p> + +<p>Through the dead silence, broken only by sobs, could be heard the heavy +footsteps of a country priest going away. Then all was hushed, and the +tears which were falling round the dying girl suddenly stopped as though +by a miracle. In a few seconds all signs of disease and the anxious look +of pain had disappeared from Renée's thin face, and in their place an +ecstatic beauty, a look of supreme deliverance had come, at the sight of +which her father, her mother, and her friend instinctively fell on their +knees. A rapturous joy and peace had descended upon her. Her head sank +gently back on the pillow as though she were in a dream. Her eyes, which +were wide open and looking upward, seemed to be filled with the +infinite, and her expression gradually took the fixity of eternal +things. A holy aspiration seemed to rise from her whole face. All that +remained of life—one last breath, trembled on her silent lips, which +were half open and smiling. Her face had turned white. A silvery pallor +lent a dull splendour to her delicate skin and shapely forehead. It was +as though her whole face were looking upon another world than ours. +Death was drawing near her in the form of a great light.</p> + +<p>It was the transfiguration of those heart diseases which enshroud dying +girls in all the beauty of their soul and then carry away to Heaven the +young faces of their victims.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h2>LXV</h2> + + +<p>People who travel in far countries may have come across, in various +cities or among old ruins—one year in Russia, another perhaps in +Egypt—an elderly couple who seem to be always moving about, neither +seeing nor even looking at anything. They are the Mauperins, the poor +heart-broken father and mother, who are now quite alone in the world, +Renée's sister having died after the birth of her first child.</p> + +<p>They sold all they possessed and set out to wander round the world. They +no longer care for anything, and go about from one country to another, +from one hotel to the next, with no interest whatever in life. They are +like things which have been uprooted and flung to the four winds of +heaven. They wander about like exiles on earth, rushing away from their +tombs, but carrying their dead about with them everywhere, endeavouring +to weary out their grief with the fatigue of railway journeys, dragging +all that is left them of life to the very ends of the earth, in the hope +of wearing it out and so finishing with it.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_PORTRAITS_OF_EDMOND_AND_JULES_DE_GONCOURT" id="THE_PORTRAITS_OF_EDMOND_AND_JULES_DE_GONCOURT"></a>THE PORTRAITS OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT</h2> + + + + + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/dessed1.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +Drawn from life by Will Rothenstein, 1894. +</p> +</div> + + + +<p>Like Dickens, Théophile Gautier, Mérimée, and some other literary +celebrities, the brothers Goncourt tried their hands at drawing and +engraving before devoting themselves to letters. Sometimes in their +hours of leisure they further made essays in water-colour and pastel. +Thanks to Philippe Burty, Jules de Goncourt's "Etchings," collected in a +volume, and some of Edmond's sepia and washed drawings, allow us to +glean certain of the earliest of those records in which the faithful +Dioscuri endeavoured to portray each other with a care both affectionate +and touching. A very pretty "Portrait of Jules as a child, in the +costume of a Garde Française," a drawing heightened with pastel, is +described by Burty as one of Edmond's best works, but one, +unfortunately, which it was not possible to reproduce. "In the +swallow-tail coat of the French Guard," says Burty, "starting for a +fancy dress ball, the brilliance of his eyes heightened by the powder, +his hand on his sword-guard, at the age of ten, plump and spirited as +one of Fragonard's Cupids." Here we have the younger of the Goncourts, +delineated with all the subtlety of a delicate mannerism. Edmond was +eighteen at the time. Scarcely free of the ferule of his pedagogues, he +already looked at life with that air of keen astonishment which was +never to leave him, and which was to kindle in his eye the sort of +phosphorescent reflection that shone there to his last hour. It was the +elder and more observant of the two who first attempted to represent his +young brother, the one who was to be the greater artist of the pair, as +if the compact had already been entered upon, as if both by tacit +consent accepted the prolific life in common, then only at its dawn. A +great delight to the two brothers was their meeting with Gavarni, at the +offices of <i>L'Eclair</i>, a paper founded towards the end of 1851 by the +Comte de Villedeuil.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 378px;"> +<img src="images/etched1.jpg" width="378" height="400" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching by Jules de Goncourt, 1860." title="Edmond de Goncourt." /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From an etching by Jules de Goncourt, 1860.</p> +</div> + + + +<p>From that first meeting dated the strong friendship between the trio, a +friendship that verged on worship on the side of the Goncourts, and on +tenderness on that of Gavarni. Two years later, on April 15, 1853, in +the series called <i>Messieurs du Feuilleton</i> which he began in <i>Paris</i>, +the master draughtsman of the <i>lorette</i> and the prodigal gave a +delicious sketch of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. In his <i>Masques et +Visages</i>, M. Alidor Delzant, a bibliophile very learned in the +iconography of the Goncourts, declares these to be the best and most +faithful of all the portraits of the two brothers. We give a +reproduction of this fine lithograph. Seated in a box at the theatre in +profile to the right, an eye-glass in his eye, Jules, apparently intent +on the play, leans forward from beside Edmond, who sits in a meditative +attitude, his hands on his knees. M. Delzant compares these portraits +to those of Alfred and Tony Johannot by Jean Gigoux. And do they not +also recall another group of two literary brothers, older, it is true, +the delicate faces of Paul and Alfred de Musset in the delicious frame +of the Musée Carnavalet? Gavarni's drawing is a perfect master-piece of +expression and subtlety.</p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/litofreres.jpg" alt="EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a lithograph by Gavarni, 1853." title="Edmond and Jules de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From a lithograph by Gavarni, 1853.</p> +</div> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/etched2.png" alt="PORTRAIT OF EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching from life by Jules de Goncourt, 1861." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">PORTRAIT OF EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From an etching from life by Jules de Goncourt, 1861.</p> +</div> + +<p>Placed one against the other, like the antique medals on which Castor +and Pollux are graved in profile in the same circle, how admirably each +of these gentle faces, in which we note more than one analogy, completes +the other! And as we admire them, are we not tempted to exclaim: Here +indeed are the Frères Zemganno of letters!</p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/medall.jpg" alt="MEDALLION OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From an engraving by Bracquemond, 1875." title="Medallion of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">MEDALLION OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From an engraving by Bracquemond, 1875.</p> +</div> + +<p>The reputation of the two brothers increased proportionately with their +works—works of the most intense and subtle psychological research. +Installed in that apartment of the Rue Saint Georges which they so soon +transformed into a veritable museum of prints and trinkets, Edmond and +Jules de Goncourt prepared those brilliant monographs of queens and +favourites, which have made them the rare and enchanting historians of +the most licentious and factious of centuries.</p> + +<div class="figright"> +<img src="images/boised.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT +In 1888. +Portrait on wood in La Vie Populaire." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +In 1888.<br /> +Portrait on wood in <i>La Vie Populaire</i>.</p> +</div> + +<p>In 1857 Edmond made the water-colour drawing of "Jules smoking a Pipe," +which was afterward lithographed. His feet on the edge of the +mantel-piece in front of him, Jules, seated in an arm-chair, a small +pipe in his mouth, gives himself up to the delights of the <i>far niente</i>. +This contemplative attitude was a favourite one with him, and one in +which he was often discovered by visitors. By representing him thus, +Edmond gave an additional force to the living memory that all who knew +his brother have retained of him.</p> + +<p>Three years later (1860) Jules in his turn made a portrait of Edmond, +not in the same indolent attitude, but also in profile, and with a pipe +in his mouth. This print is one of the best in the Burty album. We know +of no further mutual representations by the brothers; with the exception +of Jules de Goncourt's etching of Edmond seated across a chair, smoking +a cigar, the design of which we reproduce. But there are several fine +portraits by other hands of the younger brother, the one who was the +first to go, perforce abandoning his sublime and suicidal task.</p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/aquajules.png" alt="JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a water-colour by Edmond de Goncourt, 1857." title="Jules de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">JULES DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From a water-colour by Edmond de Goncourt, 1857.</p> +</div> + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/photed.png" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From a photograph by Nadar, 1892." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From a photograph by Nadar, 1892.</p> +</div> + +<p>It was in 1870 that Jules de Goncourt died at the age of thirty-nine. +"It was impossible," wrote Paul de Saint-Victor in <i>La Liberté</i>, "to +know and not to love this young man, with his child's face, his +pleasant, ready laugh, his eyes sparkling with intellect and purpose.... +That blond young head was bent over his work for months at a time...." +It was the profile of this "blond young head" that Claudius Popelin +traced for the enamel that was set into the binding of the <i>Nécrologe</i>, +in which Edmond preserved all the articles, letters, and tokens of +sympathy called forth by the irreparable loss of his beloved companion +and fellow-labourer. This medallion, etched by Abot, was prefixed +afterward to the edition of Jules de Goncourt's <i>Letters</i>, published by +Charpentier. The profile, which is reproduced as the frontispiece to +this edition of <i>Renée Mauperin</i>, is infinitely gentle; the emaciated +contours, the extraordinary delicacy of the features, betray the +intellectual dreamer, his mind intent on literary questions, and we +understand M. Émile Zola's dictum: "Art killed him."</p> + +<div class="figright"> +<img src="images/etched3.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. +From an etching by Bracquemond, 1882. +(The original drawing is in the Luxembourg Museum.)" title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From an etching by Bracquemond, 1882.<br /> +(The original drawing is in the Luxembourg Museum.)</p> +</div> + +<p>Prince Gabrielli and Princesse Mathilde also made certain furtive +sketches of Jules which have since been photographed. Méaulle engraved a +portrait of him on wood, and Varin made an etching of him. Henceforth, +save in Bracquemond's double medallion, and in one or two papers in +which studies of him by different hands appeared, Edmond de Goncourt was +no longer represented in company with his gifted brother, but always +alone.</p> + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/photed2.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. +From a photograph by Nadar, 1893." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +From a photograph by Nadar, 1893.</p> +</div> + +<p>On March 15, 1885, the <i>Journal Illustré</i> published two portraits of the +Goncourts drawn by Franc Lamy, and on November 20, 1886, the <i>Cri du +Peuple</i> gave two others, in connection with the appearance of <i>Renée +Mauperin</i> at the Odéon. We may also note that the medallion of the two +brothers drawn and engraved by Bracquemond for the title-page of the +first edition of <i>L'Art du XVIIIème Siècle</i> appeared in 1875. A delicate +commemorative fancy caused the artist to surround the profile of Jules +with a wreath of laurel.</p> + +<div class="figcenter"><br /> +<img src="images/portrfreres.jpg" alt="PORTRAITS OF THE FRÈRES DE GONCOURT. + +Part of a design by Willette, in Le Courrier Français, 1895." title="" /> +<p class="caption">PORTRAITS OF THE FRÈRES DE GONCOURT.<br /> +Part of a design by Willette, in <i>Le Courrier Français</i>, 1895.</p> +</div> + +<p>Utterly crushed at first by the sense of loneliness and desolation his +loss had created, Edmond de Goncourt was long entirely absorbed in +memories of the departed. The spiritual presence of Jules filled the +house with its mute and mournful sentiment. The heart-broken survivor +could find consolation and relief for his pain only in friendship. +Théophile Gautier, Paul de Saint-Victor, Jules Vallès, the painter De +Nittis, Burty, Flaubert, Renan, Taine, and Théodore de Banville +sustained him with their affection. A band of ardent, active, and +audacious young men, among whom M. Émile Zola was specially +distinguished by the research of his formulæ, began to link him with +Flaubert, offering them a common worship. Alphonse Daudet (we have now +come to the year 1879) sketched the most faithful portrait of him to +whom a whole generation was soon to give the respectful title of "the +Marshal of Letters": "Edmond de Goncourt looks about fifty. His hair is +gray, a light steel gray; his air is distinguished and genial; he has a +tall, straight figure, and the sharp nose of the sporting dog, like a +country gentleman keen for the chase, and, on his pale and energetic +face, a smile of perpetual sadness, a glance that sometimes kindles, +sharp as the graver's needle. What determination in that glance, what +pain in that smile!" Many artists attempted to fix that glance and that +smile with pencil or burin, but how few were successful!</p> + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/litoed.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. +By Eugène Carrière. +Lithographed in 1895." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +By Eugène Carrière.<br /> +Lithographed in 1895.</p> +</div> + +<p>One of these few was the sculptor Alfred Lenoir, in a remarkable work +executed quite at the end of Edmond de Goncourt's life. His white +marble bust well expresses the patrician of letters, the collector, the +worshipper of all kinds of beauty. A voluptuous thrill seems to stir the +nostrils, a flash of sympathetic observation to gleam from the deep set +eyes.</p> + +<div class="figright"> +<img src="images/covered.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. +By Eugène Carrière. +From the cover of a vellum-bound book." title="Edmond de Goncourt" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +By Eugène Carrière.<br /> +From the cover of a vellum-bound book.</p> +</div> + +<p>The author of this bust, a work elaborated and modelled after the manner +of those executed by Pajou, Caffieri, and Falconnet in the eighteenth +century (see the reproduction at the beginning of this volume), may +congratulate himself on having given to Edmond de Goncourt's friends the +most exquisite semblance of their lost comrade. Carrière, on the other +hand, in his superb lithograph, where only the eyes are vivid, and Will +Rothenstein, in a sketch from nature which represents the master with a +high cravat round his throat, his chin resting on a hand of incomparable +form and distinction, have reproduced, with great intensity and +comprehension, Edmond de Goncourt grown old, but still robust, upright +and gallant, a soldier of art in whom the creative faculty is by no +means exhausted. Rothenstein's lithograph in particular, with the sort +of morbid languor that pervades it, the mournful fixity of the gaze, the +aristocratic slenderness of the hands and the features, surprises and +startles the spectator. "By nature and by education," says M. Paul +Bourget, "M. Ed. de Goncourt possesses an intelligence, the +overacuteness of which verges on disease in its comprehension of +infinitesimal gradations and of the infinitely subtle creature." Mr. +Rothenstein has made this intelligence flash from every line of his +drawing.</p> + +<p>Frédéric Régamey, Bracquemond (in the fine drawing at the Luxembourg), +De Nittis (in pastel), Raffaelli (in an oil painting), Desboutins (in an +etching), and finally M. Helleu (in dry point), have striven to +penetrate and preserve the subtle psychology of the master's grave, +proud, and gentle countenance. With these distinguished names the +iconography of the Goncourts concludes. Perhaps, as a light and graceful +monument of memory, we might add the fine drawing made by Willette on +the occasion of the Edmond de Goncourt banquet, which represents the +elder brother standing, leaning against the pedestal of his brother's +statue, while at his feet three creatures, symbolizing the principal +forms of their inspiration, are grouped, superb and mournful. Who are +they? No doubt <i>Madame de Pompadour</i>, the <i>Geisha</i> of Japanese art, and +finally, bestial and degraded, <i>La Fille Élisa</i>—types that symbolize +the most salient aspects of that genius—historic, æsthetic, and +fictional—which will keep green the precious memory of Edmond and Jules +de Goncourt.</p> + +<p><span class="tocright"> +OCTAVE UZANNE.</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/portred.jpg" alt="EDMOND DE GONCOURT. +Unpublished portrait from life, by Georges Jeanniot." title="" /> +<p class="caption">EDMOND DE GONCOURT.<br /> +Unpublished portrait from life, by Georges Jeanniot.</p> +</div> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENÉE MAUPERIN***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 24604-h.txt or 24604-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604">http://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/0/24604</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution.</p> + + + +<pre> +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/license">http://www.gutenberg.org/license)</a>. + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS,' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's +eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII, +compressed (zipped), HTML and others. + +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over +the old filename and etext number. The replaced older file is renamed. +VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving +new filenames and etext numbers. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org">http://www.gutenberg.org</a> + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000, +are filed in directories based on their release date. If you want to +download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular +search system you may utilize the following addresses and just +download by the etext year. + +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext06/">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext06/</a> + + (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99, + 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90) + +EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are +filed in a different way. The year of a release date is no longer part +of the directory path. The path is based on the etext number (which is +identical to the filename). The path to the file is made up of single +digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename. For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/24604-h/images/aquajules.png b/24604-h/images/aquajules.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1503cbb --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/aquajules.png diff --git a/24604-h/images/boised.jpg b/24604-h/images/boised.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..98dc4ae --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/boised.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/bustedm.jpg b/24604-h/images/bustedm.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ab446a3 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/bustedm.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/covered.jpg b/24604-h/images/covered.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7c9d321 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/covered.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/dessed1.jpg b/24604-h/images/dessed1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..942f1ce --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/dessed1.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/etched1.jpg b/24604-h/images/etched1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..285e57f --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/etched1.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/etched2.png b/24604-h/images/etched2.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1801c3c --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/etched2.png diff --git a/24604-h/images/etched3.jpg b/24604-h/images/etched3.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5ba8a24 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/etched3.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/frontjules.jpg b/24604-h/images/frontjules.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cb3f2bc --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/frontjules.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/litoed.jpg b/24604-h/images/litoed.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ebbd70e --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/litoed.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/litofreres.jpg b/24604-h/images/litofreres.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2db0c02 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/litofreres.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/medall.jpg b/24604-h/images/medall.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..73d519f --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/medall.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/pageserie.jpg b/24604-h/images/pageserie.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6f0852a --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/pageserie.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/pagetitre.jpg b/24604-h/images/pagetitre.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c609b45 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/pagetitre.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/photed.png b/24604-h/images/photed.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..81d7e35 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/photed.png diff --git a/24604-h/images/photed2.jpg b/24604-h/images/photed2.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..39c946f --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/photed2.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/portred.jpg b/24604-h/images/portred.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4eb3802 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/portred.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/portrfreres.jpg b/24604-h/images/portrfreres.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5690a50 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/portrfreres.jpg diff --git a/24604-h/images/vignette.png b/24604-h/images/vignette.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..8568864 --- /dev/null +++ b/24604-h/images/vignette.png diff --git a/24604.txt b/24604.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e9016cf --- /dev/null +++ b/24604.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9480 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Renée Mauperin, by Edmond de Goncourt and +Jules de Goncourt, et al, Translated by Alys Hallard + + +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: Renée Mauperin + + +Author: Edmond de Goncourt and Jules de Goncourt + + + +Release Date: February 13, 2008 [eBook #24604] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENéE MAUPERIN*** + + +E-text prepared by Camille François, Suzanne Shell, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 24604-h.htm or 24604-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604/24604-h/24604-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604/24604-h.zip) + + + + + +The French Classical Romances +Complete in Twenty Crown Octavo Volumes + +Editor-in-Chief + +EDMUND GOSSE, LL.D. + +With Critical Introductions and Interpretative Essays by + +HENRY JAMES PROF. RICHARD BURTON HENRY HARLAND + +ANDREW LANG PROF. F. C. DE SUMICHRAST + +THE EARL OF CREWE HIS EXCELLENCY M. CAMBON + +PROF. WM. P. TRENT ARTHUR SYMONS MAURICE HEWLETT + +DR. JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY RICHARD MANSFIELD + +BOOTH TARKINGTON DR. RICHARD GARNETT + +PROF. WILLIAM M. SLOANE JOHN OLIVER HOBBES + +[Illustration: (signed) J. de Goncourt] + + + + +DE GONCOURT + +RENEE MAUPERIN + +Translated from the French by Alys Hallard + +With a Critical Introduction by James Fitzmaurice-Kelly + +A Frontispiece and Numerous Other Portraits with Descriptive +Notes by Octave Uzanne + + + + + + + +P. F. Collier & Son +New York + +Copyright, 1902 +by D. Appleton & Company + + + + +EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT + +I + + +The partnership of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt is probably the most +curious and perfect example of collaboration recorded in literary +history. The brothers worked together for twenty-two years, and the +amalgam of their diverse talents was so complete that, were it not for +the information given by the survivor, it would be difficult to guess +what each brought to the work which bears their names. Even in the light +of these confidences, it is no easy matter to attempt to separate or +disengage their literary personalities. The two are practically one. +_Jamais ame pareille n'a ete mise en deux corps._ This testimony is +their own, and their testimony is true. The result is the more +perplexing when we remember that these two brothers were, so to say, men +of different races. The elder was a German from Lorraine, the younger +was an inveterate Latin Parisian: "the most absolute difference of +temperaments, tastes, and characters--and absolutely the same ideas, the +same personal likes and dislikes, the same intellectual vision." There +may be, as there probably always will be, two opinions as to the value +of their writings; there can be no difference of view concerning their +intense devotion to literature, their unhesitating rejection of all that +might distract them from their vocation. They spent a small fortune in +collecting materials for works that were not to find two hundred +readers; they passed months, and more months, in tedious researches the +results of which were condensed into a single page; they resigned most +of life's pleasures and all its joys to dedicate themselves totally to +the office of their election. So they lived--toiling, endeavouring, +undismayed, confident in their integrity and genius, unrewarded by one +accepted triumph, uncheered by a single frank success or even by any +considerable recognition. The younger Goncourt died of his failure +before he was forty; the elder underwent almost the same monotony of +defeat during nearly thirty years of life that remained to him. But both +continued undaunted, and, if we consider what manner of men they were +and how dear fame was to them, the constancy of their ambition becomes +all the more admirable. + +[Illustration: Edmond de Goncourt] + +Despising, or affecting to despise, the general verdict of their +contemporaries, they loved to declare that they wrote for their own +personal pleasure, for an audience of a dozen friends, or for the +delight of a distant posterity; and, when the absence of all +appreciation momentarily weighed them down, they vainly imagined that +the acquisition of a new _bibelot_ consoled them. No doubt the passion +of the collector was strong in them: so strong that Edmond half forgot +his grief for his brother and his terror of the Commune in the pursuit +of first editions: so strong that the chances of a Prussian bomb +shattering his storehouse of treasures--the _Maison d'un artiste_--at +Auteuil saddened him more than the dismemberment of France. But, even +so, the idea that the Goncourts could in any circumstances subordinate +literature to any other interest was the merest illusion. Nothing in the +world pleased them half so well as the sight of their own words in +print. The arrival of a set of proof-sheets on the 1st of January was to +them the best possible augury for the new year; the sight of their names +on the placards outside the theatres and the booksellers' shops +enraptured them; and Edmond, then well on in years, confesses that he +thrice stole downstairs, half-clad, in the March dawn, to make sure that +the opening chapters of _Cherie_ were really inserted in the _Gaulois_. +These were their few rewards, their only victories. They were fain to be +content with such small things--_la petite monnaie de la gloire_. Still +they were persuaded that time was on their side, and, assured as they +were of their literary immortality, they chafed at the suggestion that +the most splendid renown must grow dim within a hundred thousand years. +Was so poor a laurel worth the struggle? This was the whole extent of +their misgiving. + +Baffled at every point, the Goncourts were unable to account for the +unbroken series of disasters which befell them; yet the explanation is +not far to seek. For one thing, they attempted so much, so continuously, +in so many directions, and in such quick succession, that their very +versatility and diligence laid them under suspicion. They were not +content to be historians, or philosophers, or novelists, or dramatists, +or art critics: they would be all and each of these at once. In every +branch of intellectual effort they asserted their claims to be regarded +as innovators, and therefore as leaders. Within a month they published +_Germinie Lacerteux_ and an elaborate study on Fragonard; and, while +they plumed themselves (as they very well might) on their feat, the +average intelligent reader joined with the average intelligent critic in +concluding that such various accomplishment must needs be superficial. +It was not credible that one and the same pair--_par nobile +fratrum_--could be not only close observers of contemporary life, but +also authorities on Watteau and Outamaro, on Marie Antoinette and Mlle. +Clairon. To admit this would be to emphasize the limitations of all +other men of letters. Again, the uncanny element of chance which enters +into every enterprise was constantly hostile to the Goncourts. They not +only published incessantly: they somehow contrived to publish at +inopportune moments--at times when the public interest was turned from +letters to politics. Their first novel appeared on the very day of +Napoleon III's _Coup d'etat_, and their publisher even refused to +advertise the book lest the new authorities should see in the title of +_En 18_--a covert allusion to the 18th Brumaire. It would have been a +pleasing stroke of irony had the Ministry of the 16th of May been +supported by the country as it was supported by Edmond de Goncourt, for +that Ministry intended to prosecute him as the author of _La Fille +Elisa_. _La Faustin_ was issued on the morning of Gambetta's downfall; +and the seventh volume of the _Journal des Goncourt_ had barely been +published a few hours when the news of Carnot's assassination reached +Paris. Lastly, the personal qualities of the brothers--their ostentation +of independence, their attitude of supercilious superiority, and, most +of all, their fatal gift of irony--raised up innumerable enemies and +alienated both actual and possible friends. They gave no quarter and +they received none. All this is extremely human and natural; but the +Goncourts, being nervous invalids as well as born fighters, suffered +acutely from what they regarded as the universal disloyalty of their +comrades. + +They could not realize that their writings contained much to displease +men of all parties, and, living at war with literary society, they +sullenly cultivated their morbid sensibility. The simplest trifle stung +them into frenzies of inconsistency and hallucination. To-day they +denounced the liberty of the press; to-morrow they raged at finding +themselves the victims of a Government prosecution. Withal their +ferocious wit, there was not a ray of sunshine in their humour, and, +instead of smiling at the discomfiture of a dull official, they brooded +till their imaginations magnified these petty police-court proceedings +into the tragedy of a supreme martyrdom. Years afterward they +continually return to the subject, noting with exasperated complacency +that the only four men in France who were seriously concerned with +letters and art--Baudelaire, Flaubert, and themselves--had been dragged +before the courts; and they ended by considering their little lawsuit as +one of the historic state trials of the world. Henceforth, in every +personal matter--and their art was intensely personal--they lost all +sense of proportion, believing that there was a vast Semitic plot to +stifle _Manette Salomon_ and that the President had brought pressure on +the censor to forbid an adaptation of one of their novels being put upon +the boards. Monarchy, Empire, Republic, Right, Centre, Left--no shade of +political thought, no public man, no legislative measure, ever chanced +to please them. They sought for the causes of their failure in others: +it never occurred to them that the fault lay in themselves. Their minds +were twin whirlpools of chaotic opinions. Revolutionaries in arts and +letters as they claimed to be, they detested novelties in religion, +politics, medicine, science, abstract speculation. It never struck them +that it was incongruous, not to say absurd, to claim complete liberty +for themselves and to denounce ministers for attempting to extend the +far more restricted liberty of others. And as with the ordering of their +lives, so with their art and all that touched it. Unable to conciliate +or to compromise, they were conspicuously successful in stimulating the +general prejudice against themselves. They paraded their +self-contradictions with a childish pride of paradox. In one breath they +deplored the ignorance of a public too uncultivated to appreciate them; +in another breath they proclaimed that every government which strives to +diminish illiteracy is digging its own grave. Priding themselves on the +thoroughness of their own investigations, they belittled the results of +learning in others, mocked at the superficial labour of the +Benedictines, ridiculed the inartistic surroundings of Sainte-Beuve and +Renan, and protested that antiquity was nothing but an inept invention +to enable professors to earn their daily bread. Not content with +asserting the superiority of Diderot to Voltaire, they pronounced the +Abbe Trublet to be the acutest critic who flourished during that +eighteenth century which they had come to consider as their exclusive +property. Resolute conservatives in theory, piquing themselves on their +descent, their personal elegance, their tact and refinement, these +worshippers of Marie Antoinette admired the talent shown by Hebert in +his infamous _Pere Duchene_, and then went on to lament the influence of +socialism on literature. They were _papalini_ who sympathized with +Garibaldi; they looked forward to a repetition of '93, and almost +welcomed it as a deliverance from the respectable uniformity of their +own time; they trusted to the working men--masons, house-painters, +carpenters, navvies--to regenerate an effete civilization and to save +society as the barbarians had saved it in earlier centuries. Whatever +the value of these views, they can scarcely have found favour among +those who rallied to the Second Empire and who imagined that the +Goncourts were a pair of firebrands: whereas, in fact, they were +petulant, impulsive men of talent, smarting under neglect. + +If we were so ingenuous as to take their statements seriously, we might +refuse to admit their right to find any place in French literature. For, +though it would be easy to quote passages in which they contemn the +cosmopolitan spirit, it would be no less easy to set against these their +assertions that they are ashamed of being French; that they are no more +French than the Abbe Galiani, the Prince de Ligne, or Heine; that they +will renounce their nationality, settle in Holland or Belgium, and there +found a journal in which they can speak their minds. These are wild, +whirling words: the politics of literary men are on a level with the +literature of politicians. On their own showing, it does not appear that +the Goncourts were in any way fettered. The sum of their achievement, as +they saw it, is recorded in a celebrated passage of the preface to +_Cherie_: "_La recherche du vrai en litterature, la resurrection de +l'art du XVIIIe siecle, la victoire du japonisme._" These words are the +words of Jules de Goncourt, but Edmond makes them his own. If the +brothers were entitled to claim--as they repeatedly claimed--to be held +for the leaders of these "three great literary and artistic movements of +the second half of the nineteenth century," it is clear that they were +justified in thinking that the future must reckon with them. It is +equally clear that, if their title proves good, their environment was +much less unfavourable than they assumed it to be. + +The conclusion is that their sublime egotism disabled them from forming +a judicial judgment on any question in which they were personally +concerned. They never attempted to reason, to compare, to balance; their +minds were filled with the vapour of tumultuous impressions which +condensed at different periods into dogmas, and were succeeded by fresh +condensations from the same source. But, amid all changes, their +self-esteem was constant. They had no hesitation in setting Dunant's +_Souvenir de Solferino_ above the _Iliad_; but when Taine implied that +he was somewhat less interested in _Madame Gervaisais_ than in the +writings of Santa Teresa, they were startled at his boldness. And, to +define their position more precisely, Edmond confidently declares (among +many other strange sayings) that the fifth act of _La Patrie en Danger_ +contains scenes more dramatically poignant than anything in Shakespeare, +and that in _La Maison d'un Artiste au XIXe Siecle_ he takes under his +control--though he candidly avows that none but himself suspects it--a +capital movement in the history of mankind. These are extremely high +pretensions, repeatedly renewed in one form or another--in prefaces, +manifestos, articles, letters, conversation, and, above all, in nine +invaluable volumes which consist of extracts from a diary covering a +period of over forty years. This extraordinary record incidentally +embodies the rough sketches of the Goncourts' finished work, but its +interest is far wider and more essentially characteristic. Other men +have written confessions, memoirs, reminiscences, by the score: mostly +books composed long after the events which they relate, recollections +revised, reviewed in the light of after events. The Goncourts are +perhaps alone in daring to unbosom themselves with an absolute sincerity +of their emotions, intentions, aims. If they come forth damaged from +such a trial, it is fair to remember that the test is unique, and that +no other writers have ever approached them in courage and in what they +most valued--truth: _la recherche du vrai en litterature_. + + + + +II + + +A most authoritative critic, M. Brunetiere, has laid it down that there +is more truth, more fidelity to the facts of actual life, in any single +romance by Ponson du Terrail or by Gaboriau than in all the works of the +Goncourts put together, and so long as we leave truth undefined, this +opinion may be as tenable as any other. But it may be well to observe at +the outset that the creative work of the Goncourts is not to be +condemned or praised _en bloc_, for the simple reason that it is not a +spontaneous, uniform product, but the resultant of diverse forces +varying in direction and intensity from time to time. They themselves +have recorded that there are three distinct stages in their intellectual +evolution. Beginning, under the influence of Heine and Poe, with purely +imaginative conceptions, they rebounded to the extremest point of +realism before determining on the intermediate method of presenting +realistic pictures in a poetic light. Pure imagination in the domain of +contemporary fiction seemed to them defective, inasmuch as its processes +are austerely logical, while life itself is compact of contradictions; +and their first reaction from it was entirely natural, on their own +principles. It remains to be seen what sense should be attached to the +formula--_la recherche du vrai en litterature_--in which they summarized +their position as regards their predecessors. + +Obviously we have to deal with a question of interpretation. The +Goncourts did not--could not--pretend that they were the first to +introduce truth into literature: they merely professed to have attained +it by a different route. The innovation for which they claimed credit is +a matter of method, of technique. Their deliberate purpose is to +surprise us by the fidelity of their studies, to captivate and convince +us by an accumulation of exact minutiae: in a word, to prove that truth +is more interesting than fiction. So history should be written, and so +they wrote it. First and last, whatever form they chose, they remained +historians. Alleging the example set by Plutarch and Saint-Simon, they +make their histories of the eighteenth century a mine of anecdote, a +pageant of picturesque situations. State-papers, blue-books, ministerial +despatches, are in their view the conventional means used for +hoodwinking simpletons and forwarding the interests of a triumphant +faction. The most valuable historical material is, as they believed, to +be sought in the autograph letter. They held that the secret of the +craftiest intriguer will escape him, despite himself, in the expansion +of confidential correspondence. The research for such correspondence is +to be supplemented by the study of sculpture, paintings, engravings, +furniture, broadsides, bills--all of them indispensable for the +reconstruction of a past age and for the right understanding of its +psychology. But these means are simply complementary. The chief vehicle +of authentic truth is the autograph letter, and, though they professed +to hold the historical novel in abhorrence, they applied their +historical methods to their records of contemporary life. Thus we +inevitably arrive at the famous theory of the _document humain_--a +phrase received with much derision when first publicly used in the +preface to _La Faustin_, and a theory conscientiously adopted by many +later novelists. And here, again, it is important to realize the +restricted extent of the authors' claim. + +The Goncourts draw a broad, primary distinction between ancient and +modern literature: the first deals mainly with generalities, the second +with details. They then proceed to establish an analogous distinction +between novels written before and after Balzac's time, the modern novel +being based on _des documents racontes, ou releves d'apres nature_, +precisely as formal history is based on _des documents ecrits_. But they +make no pretence of having initiated the revolution; their share was +limited to continuing Balzac's tradition, to enlarging the field of +observation, and especially to multiplying the instruments of research. +They declared that Gautier had, so to say, endowed literature with +vision; that Fromentin, in describing the silence of the desert, had +revealed the literary value of hearing; that with Zola, Loti--and they +might surely have added Maupassant--a fresh sense was brought into play: +_c'est le nez qui entre en scene_. Their personal contribution was their +nervous sensibility: _les premiers nous avons ete les ecrivains des +nerfs_. And they were prouder of this morbid quality than of their +talent. They were ever on the watch for fragments of talk caught up in +drawing-rooms, in restaurants, on omnibuses: ever ready to take notes at +death-beds, church, or taverns. Their life was one long pursuit of +_l'imprevu, le decousu, l'illogique du vrai_. These observations they +transcribed at night while the impression was still acute, and these +they utilized more or less deftly as they advanced towards what they +rightly thought to be the goal of art: the perfect adjustment of +proportion between the real and the imagined. + +It would seem that we are now in a position to judge the Goncourts by +their own standard. _Le dosage juste de la litterature et de la +vie_--this formula recurs in one shape or another as a leading +principle, and it is supplemented by other still more emphatic +indications which should serve to supply a test. Unhappily, with the +Goncourts these indications are unsystematic and even contradictory. The +elder brother has naturally no hesitation in saying that the highest +gift of any writer is his power of creating on paper real beings--_comme +des etres crees par Dieu, et comme ayant eu une vraie vie sur la +terre_--and he is bold enough to add that Shakespeare himself has failed +to create more than two or three personages. He protests energetically +against the academic virtues, and insists on the importance of forming a +personal style which shall reproduce the vivacity, brio, and feverish +activity of the best talk. It is, then, all the more disconcerting to +learn from another passage in the _Journal_ that the creation of +characters and the discovery of an original form of expression are +matters of secondary moment. The truth is that if the Goncourts had, as +they believed, something new to say, it was inevitable that they should +seek to invent a new manner of utterance. Renan was doubtless right in +thinking that they were absolutely without ideas on abstract subjects; +but they were exquisitely susceptible to every shade and tone of +concrete objects, and the endeavour to convey their innumerable +impressions taxed the resources of that French vocabulary on whose +relative poverty they so often insist. The reproaches brought against +them in the matter of verbal audacities by every prominent critic, from +Sainte-Beuve in one camp to Pontmartin in the other, are so many +testimonies to the fact that they were innovators--_apporteurs du +neuf_--and that their intrepidity cost them dear. Still their boldness +in this respect has been generally exaggerated. Setting out as imitators +of two such different models as Gautier and Jules Janin, they slowly +acquired an individual manner--the manner, say, of _Germinie Lacerteux_ +or _Manette Salomon_--but they never attained the formula which they had +conceived as final. It was not given to them to realize their +ambition--to write novels which should not contain a single bookish +expression, plays which should reveal that hitherto undiscoverable +quantity--colloquial speech, raised to the level of consummate art. The +famous _ecriture artiste_ remained an unfulfilled ideal. The expression, +first used in the preface to _Les Freres Zemganno_, merely foreshadows a +possible development of style which shall come into being when realism +or naturalism, ceasing to describe the ignoble, shall occupy itself with +the attempt to render refinements, reticences, subtleties, and +half-tones of a more elusive order. It is an aspiration, a counsel of +perfection offered to a younger school by an artist in experiment, who +declares the quest to be beyond his powers. It is nothing more. + +Leaving on one side these questions of style and manner, it may safely +be said that in the novels of the Goncourts the characters are less +memorable, less interesting as individuals than as illustrations of an +epoch or types of a given social sphere. Charles Demailly, Madame +Gervaisais, Manette Salomon, Renee Mauperin, Soeur Philomene, are not so +much dramatic creations as figures around which is constituted the life +of a special _milieu_--the world of journalism, of Catholicism seen from +two opposite points of view, of artists, of the _bourgeoisie_, as the +case may be. There are in the best work of the Goncourts astonishingly +brilliant scenes; there is dialogue vivacious, witty, sparkling, to an +extraordinary degree. And this dialogue, as in _Charles Demailly_, is +not only supremely interesting, but intrinsically true to nature. It +could not well be otherwise, for the speeches assigned to Masson, +Lamperiere, Remontville, Boisroger, and Montbaillard are, as often as +not, verbatim reports of paradoxes and epigrams thrown off a few hours +earlier by Theophile Gautier, Flaubert, Saint-Victor, Banville, and +Villemessant. But these flights, true and well worth preserving as they +are, fail to impress for the simple reason that they are mere exercises +in bravura delivered by men much less concerned with life than with +phrases, that they are allotted to subordinate characters, and that they +rather serve to diminish than to increase the interest in the central +figures. The Goncourts themselves are much less absorbed in life than in +writing about it: just as landscapes reminded them of pictures, so did +every other manifestation of existence present itself as a possible +subject for artistic treatment. They had been called the detectives of +history; they became detectives, inquisitors in real life, and, much as +they loathed the occupation, they never rested from their task of spying +and prying and "documentation." As with _Charles Demailly_, so with +their other books: each character is studied after nature with a grim, +revolting persistence. Their aunt, Mlle. de Courmont, is the model of +Mlle. de Varandeuil in _Germinie Lacerteux_; Germinie herself is drawn +from their old servant Rose, who had loved them, cheated them, blinded +them for half a lifetime; the Victor Chevassier who figures in _Quelques +creatures de ce temps_ is sketched from their father's old political +ally, Colardez, at Breuvannes; the original of the Abbe Blampoix in +_Renee Mauperin_ was the Abbe Caron; the painter Beaulieu and that +strange Bohemian Pouthier are both worked into _Manette Salomon_. And +the novel entitled _Madame Gervaisais_ is an almost exact transcription +or record of the life of the authors' aunt, Mme. Nephthalie de Courmont: +a report so literal that in three hundred pages there are but two +trifling departures from the strictest historical truth. + +Mommsen himself has not excelled the Goncourts in conscientious +"documentation"; and yet, for all their care, their personages do not +abide in the memory as living beings. We do not see them as individuals, +but as types; and, strangely enough, the authors, despite the remarkable +skill with which they materialize many of their impressions, are +content to deliver their characters to us as so many illustrations of a +species. Thus Marthe Mance in _Charles Demailly_ is _un type, +l'incarnation d'un age, de son sexe et d'un role de son temps_; +Langibout is _le type pur de l'ancienne ecole_; Madame Gervaisais, too, +is _un exemple et un type_ of the intellectual _bourgeoise_ of +Louis-Philippe's time; Madame Mauperin is _le type_ of the modern +_bourgeoise_ mother; Renee is the type of the modern _bourgeoise_ girl; +the Bourjots "represent" wealth; Denoisel is a Parisian--_ou plutot +c'etait le Parisien_. The Goncourts, in their endeavour to be more +precise, resort to odd combinations of conflicting elements. Within some +twenty pages Renee Mauperin is _une melancolique tintamarresque_; the +adjectives _bourgeoise_ and _diabolique_ are used to characterize the +same thing; the Abbe Blampoix is at once "priest and lawyer, apostle and +diplomatist, Fenelon and M. de Foy." And the same types constantly +reappear. The physician Monterone in _Madame Gervaisais_ is simply an +Italian version of Denoisel in _Renee Mauperin_; the Abbe Blampoix has +his counter-part in Father Giansanti; Honorine is Germinie, before the +fall; Nachette and Gautruche might be brothers. The procedure, too, is +almost invariable. The antecedents of each personage are given with +abundant detail. We have minute information as to the family history of +the Mauperins, the Villacourts, Germinie, Couturat, and the rest; and +the mention of Father Sibilla involves a brief account of the order of +Barefooted Trinitarians from January, 1198, to the spring of 1853! There +is a frequent repetition of the same idea with scarcely any verbal +change: _un dos d'amateur_ in _Renee Mauperin_ and _le dos du cocher_ in +_Germinie Lacerteux_. And the possibilities of the human back were +evidently not exhausted, for at Christmas, 1882, Edmond de Goncourt +makes a careful note of the _dos de jeune fille du peuple_. + +It is by no means an accident that the most frequent theme of the +brothers is illness: the insanity of Demailly, the tortures of Germinie, +the consumption of Madame Gervaisais, the decay of Renee Mauperin, the +record of pain in _Soeur Philomene_, in _Les Freres Zemganno_, and in +other works of the Goncourts. Emotion in less tragic circumstances they +rarely convey; and when they attempt it they are prone to stumble into +an unimpressive sentimentalism. Their strength lay in pure observation, +not in the philosophic or psychological presentment of nature. For their +fine powers to have full play, it was necessary that they should deal +with things seen: in other words, that feeling should take a concrete +shape. Once this condition is fulfilled, they can focus their own +impressions and render them with unsurpassable skill. We shall find in +them nothing epic, nothing inventive on a grand scale: the +transfiguring, ennobling vision of the greatest creators was denied +them. But they remain consummate masters in their own restricted +province: delicate observers of externals, noting and remembering with +unmatched exactitude every detail of gesture, attitude, intonation, and +expression. The description of landscape--of the Bois de Vincennes in +_Germinie Lacerteux_, the Forest of Fontainebleau in _Manette Salomon_, +or of the Trastevere quarter in _Madame Gervaisais_--commonly affords +them an occasion for a triumph; but the description of prolonged malady +gives them a still greater opportunity. Nor is this due simply to the +fact that they, who had never known what it was to enjoy a day of +perfect health, spoke from an intimate knowledge of the subject. Each +landscape preserves at least its abstract idiosyncrasy; illness is an +essentially "typical" state in which individual characteristics diminish +till they finally disappear. And it is especially in the portraiture of +types, rather than of individuals, that the genius of the Goncourts +excels. + +In their own opinion, their initiative extended over a vast field and in +all directions. They seriously maintained that they were the first to +introduce the poor into French fiction, the first to awaken the +sentiment of pity for the wretched; they admitted the priority of +Dickens, but they apparently forgot that they had likewise been +anticipated by George Sand--that George Sand whose merits it took them +twenty years to recognise. They forgot, too, that compassion is +precisely the quality in which they were most lacking. Gavarni had +killed the sentiment of pity in them, and had communicated to them his +own mocking, sardonic spirit of inhumanity, his sinister delight in +every manifestation of cruelty, baseness, and pain. In their most candid +moods they confessed that they were all brain and no heart, that they +were without real affections; and their writings naturally suffer from +this unsympathetic attitude. But when every deduction is made, it is +impossible to deny their importance and significance. For they represent +a distinct stage in an organized movement--the reaction against +romanticism in the novel and lyrism in the theatre. And there is some +basis for their bold assertion that they led the way in every other +development of the modern French novel. They believed that they had +founded the naturalistic school in _Germinie Lacerteux_, the +psychological in _Madame Gervaisais_, the symbolic in _Les Freres +Zemganno_, and the satanic in _La Faustin_. It is unnecessary to +recognise all these claims in full: to discuss them at all, even if we +deny them, is to admit that the Goncourts were men of striking +intellectual force, of singular ambition, of exceptionally rich and +diverse gifts amounting, at times, to unquestionable genius. If they +were unsuccessful in their attempt to create an entire race of beings as +real as any on the planet, their superlative talent produced, in the +form of novels, invaluable studies of manners and customs, a brilliant +series of monographs on the social history of the nineteenth century. +And Daudet and M. Zola, and a dozen others whom it would be invidious to +name, may be accounted as in some sort their literary descendants. + +It is not unnatural that Edmond de Goncourt should have ended by +disliking the form of the novel, which he came to regard as an exhausted +convention. His pessimism was universal. Art was dying, literature was +perishing daily. The almost universal acceptance of Ibsen and of Tolstoi +was in itself a convincing symptom of degeneration, if the vogue of the +latter writer were not indeed the result of a cosmopolitan plot against +the native realistic school. It was some consolation to reflect that, +after all, there was more "philosophy" in Beaumarchais than in Ibsen; +that the name of Goncourt was held in honour by Scandinavians and Slavs. +Yet it could not be denied that, the world over, aristocracy of every +kind was breaking down. To the eyes of the surviving Goncourt all the +signs of a last great catastrophe grew visible. Mankind was ill, +half-mad, and on the road to become completely insane. There were +countless indications of intellectual and physical decadence. Sloping +shoulders were disappearing; the physique of the peasant was not what +it had been; good food was practically unattainable; in a hundred years +a man who had once tasted genuine meat would be pointed out as a +curiosity. The probability was, that within half a century there would +not be a man of letters in the world; the reporter, the interviewer, +would have taken possession. As it was, the younger generation of +readers no longer rallied to the Goncourts as it had rallied when +_Henriette Marechal_ was first replayed. The weary old man buried +himself in memoirs, biographies, books of travel; then turned to his +first loves--to Poe and Heine--and found that "we are all commercial +travellers compared to them." But, threatened as he was by blindness, +despairing as were his presentiments of what the future concealed, his +confidence in the durability of his fame and his brother's fame was +undimmed. There would always be the select few interested in two such +examples of the _litterateur bien ne_. There would always be the +official historians of literature to take account of them as new, +perplexing, elemental forces. There would always be the curious who must +turn to the Goncourts for positive information. "Our romances," as the +brothers had noted forty years earlier, "will supply the greatest number +of facts and absolute truths to the moral history of this century." And +Edmond de Goncourt clung to the belief, ending, happily and +characteristically enough, by conceiving himself and his brother to be +"types," and the best of all types: _le type de l'honnete homme +litteraire, du perseverant dans ses convictions, et du contempteur de +l'argent_. The praise is deserved. It is a distinction of which greater +men might well be proud. + +JAMES FITZMAURICE-KELLY. + + + + +BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + + +_The Goncourts were the sons of a cavalry officer, commander of a +squadron in the Imperial army._ EDMOND _was born at Nancy, on the 26th +of May, 1822, and his brother_ JULES _in Paris, on the 17th of December, +1830. They were the grandsons of the deputy of the National Assembly of +1789, Huot de Goncourt. A very close friendship united the brothers from +their earliest youth, but it appears to have been in the younger that +the irresistible tendency to literature first displayed itself. They +were originally drawn almost exclusively to the study of the history of +art. They devoted themselves particularly to the close of the eighteenth +century, and in their earliest important volumes, "La Revolution dans +les Moeurs" (1854), "Histoire de la Societe Francaise pendant la +Revolution" (1854), and "Pendant le Directoire" (1855), they invented a +new thing, the evolution of the history of an age from the objects and +articles of its social existence. They were encouraged to continue these +studies further, more definitely concentrating their observations around +individuals, and some very curious monographs--made up, as some one +said, of the detritus of history--were the result, "Une Voiture de +Masques," 1856; "Les Actrices (Armande)," 1856; "Sophie Arnauld," 1857. +The most ingenious efforts of the brothers in this direction were, +however, concentrated upon "Portraits Intimes du XVIIIe Siecle," +1857-'58, and upon the "Histoire de Marie Antoinette," 1858. + +Towards 1860 the Goncourts closed their exclusively historical work, and +transferred their minute observation and excessively meticulous +treatment of small aspects of life to realistic romance. Their first +novel, "Les Hommes de Lettres," 1860 (now known as "Charles Demailly"), +showed some lack of ease in using the new medium, but it was followed by +"Soeur Philomene," 1861, one of the most finished of their fictions, and +this by "Renee Mauperin," 1864; "Germinie Lacerteux," 1864; "Manette +Salomon," 1867; and "Madame Gervaisais," 1869. Meanwhile, numerous +studies of the art of the bibelot appeared under the name of the two +Goncourts, and in particular their great work on "L'Art du XVIIIe +Siecle," which began to be published in 1859, although not completed +until 1882. All this while, moreover, they were secretly composing their +splenetic "Journal." On the 20th of June, 1870, the fair companionship +was broken by the death of Jules de Goncourt, and for some years Edmond +did no more than complete and publish certain artistic works which had +been left unfinished. Of these, the most remarkable were, a monograph on +the life and work of Gavarni, 1873; a compilation called "L'Amour au +XVIIIe Siecle," 1875; studies of the Du Barry, the Pompadour, and the +Duchess of Chateauroux, 1878-'79 (these three afterward united in one +volume as "Les Maitresses de Louis XV"); and notes of a tour in Italy, +1894. + +Edmond de Goncourt, however, after several years of silence, returned +alone to the composition of prose romance. He published in 1877 "La +Fille Elisa," an ultra-realistic tragedy of low life. In 1878, in the +very curious story of two mountebanks, "Les Freres Zemganno," he +betrayed the secret of his own perennial sorrow. Two more novels, "La +Faustin," 1882, and "Cherie," the pathetic portrait of a spoiled child, +close the series of his works in fiction. He returned to a close +examination of the history of art, and published_ catalogues raisonnes +_of the entire work of Watteau (1875) and of Prud'hon (1876). His latest +interests were centred around the classical Japanese designers, and he +published elaborate monographs on Outamaro (1891) and Hokousai (1896). +In 1885 he collected the Letters of his brother Jules, and issued from +1887 to 1896, in nine volumes, as much as has hitherto been published of +the celebrated "Journal des Goncourts." + +Edmond de Goncourt died while on a visit to Alphonse Daudet, at +Champrosay, the country-house of the latter, on the 16th of July, 1896. +He left his considerable fortune, which included valuable collections of +bibelots, mainly for the purpose of endowing an Academy of Prose +Literature, in opposition to the French Academy. In spite of extreme +hostility from the members of his family, and innumerable legal +difficulties, this "Academie des Goncourts" was formed, on what seems to +be a secure basis, in 1901, and M. Joris Karl Huysmans was elected its +first president._ + +E. G. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGES + + Edmond and Jules de Goncourt v-xxix + _James Fitzmaurice-Kelly_ + + Lives of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt xxxi-xxxiii + _Edmund Gosse_ + + Renee Mauperin 1-349 + + The Portraits of Edmond and Jules de + Goncourt 351-367 + _Octave Uzanne_ + + + + + + + +RENEE MAUPERIN + + + + +I + + +"You don't care about society, then, mademoiselle?" + +"You won't tell any one, will you?--but I always feel as though I've +swallowed my tongue when I go out. That's the effect society has on me. +Perhaps it is that I've had no luck. The young men I have met are all +very serious, they are my brother's friends--quotation young men, I call +them. As to the girls, one can only talk to them about the last sermon +they have heard, the last piece of music they have learned, or their +last new dress. Conversation with my contemporaries is somewhat +restricted." + +"And you live in the country all the year round, do you not?" + +"Yes, but we are so near to Paris. Is the piece good they have just been +playing at the Opera Comique? Have you seen it?" + +"Yes, it's charming--the music is very fine. All Paris was at the first +night--I never go to the theatre except on first nights." + +"Just fancy, they never take me to any theatre except the Opera Comique +and the Francais, and only to the Francais when there is a classical +piece on. I think they are terribly dull, classical pieces. Only to +think that they won't let me go to the Palais Royal! I read the pieces +though. I spent a long time learning 'The Mountebanks' by heart. You are +very lucky, for you can go anywhere. The other evening my sister and my +brother-in-law had a great discussion about the Opera Ball. Is it true +that it is quite impossible to go to it?" + +"Impossible? Well----" + +"I mean--for instance, if you were married, would you take your wife, +just once, to see it?" + +"If I were married I would not even take----" + +"Your mother-in-law. Is that what you were going to say? Is it so +dreadful--really?" + +"Well, in the first place, the company is----" + +"Variegated? I know what that's like. But then it's the same everywhere. +Every one goes to the Marche and the company is mixed enough there. One +sees ladies, who are rather queer, drinking champagne in their +carriages. Then, too, the Bois de Boulogne! How dull it is to be a +_young person_, don't you think so?" + +"What an idea! Why should it be? On the contrary, it seems to me----" + +"I should like to see you in my place. You would soon find out what a +bore it is to be always proper. We are allowed to dance, but do you +imagine that we can talk to our partner? We may say 'Yes,' 'No,' 'No,' +'Yes,' and that's all! We must always keep to monosyllables, as that is +considered proper. You see how delightful our existence is. And for +everything it is just the same. If we want to be very proper we have to +act like simpletons; and for my part I cannot do it. Then we are +supposed to stop and prattle to persons of our own sex. And if we go off +and leave them and are seen talking to men instead--oh, well, I've had +lectures enough from mamma about that! Reading is another thing that is +not at all proper. Until two years ago I was not allowed to read the +serials in the newspaper, and now I have to skip the crimes in the news +of the day, as they are not quite proper. + +"Then, too, with the accomplishments we are allowed to learn, we must +not go beyond a certain average. We may learn duets and pencil drawing, +but if we want anything more, why, it's affectation on our part. I go in +for oil-painting, for instance, and that is the despair of my family. I +ought only to paint roses and in water-colours. There's quite a current +here, though, isn't there? I can scarcely stand." + +This was said in an arm of the Seine just between Briche and the Ile +Saint Denis. The girl and the young man who were conversing were in the +water. They had been swimming until they were tired, and now, carried +along by the current, they had caught hold of a rope which was fastened +to one of the large boats stationed along the banks of the island. The +force of the water rocked them both gently at the end of the tight, +quivering rope. They kept sinking and then rising again. The water was +beating against the young girl's breast; it filled out her woollen +bathing-dress right up to the neck, while from behind little waves kept +dashing over her which a moment later were nothing but dewdrops hanging +from her ears. + +She was rather higher up than the young man and had her arms out of the +water, her wrists turned round in order to hold the rope more firmly, +and her back against the black wood of the boat. Instinctively she kept +drawing back as the young man, swayed by the strong current, approached +her. Her whole attitude, as she shrank back, suspended from the rope, +reminded one of those sea goddesses which sculptors carve upon galleys. +A slight tremor, caused partly by the cold and partly by the movement of +the river, gave her something of the undulation of the water. + +"Ah, now this, for instance," she continued, "cannot be at all +proper--to be swimming here with you. If we were at the seaside it would +be quite different. We should have just the same bathing costumes as +these, and we should come out of a bathing-van just as we have come out +of the house. We should have walked across the beach just as we have +walked along the river bank, and we should be in the water to the same +depth, absolutely like this. The waves would roll us about as this +current does, but it would not be the same thing at all; simply because +the Seine water is not proper! Oh, dear! I'm getting so hungry--are +you?" + +"Well, I fancy I shall do justice to dinner." + +"Ah! I warn you that I eat." + +"Really, mademoiselle?" + +"Yes, there is nothing poetical about me at meal-times. If you imagine +that I have no appetite you are quite mistaken. You are in the same club +as my brother-in-law, are you not?" + +"Yes, I am in M. Davarande's club." + +"Are there many married men in it?" + +"Yes, a great many." + +"How odd! I cannot understand why a man marries. If I had been a man it +seems to me that I should never have thought of marrying." + +"Fortunately you are a woman." + +"Ah, yes, that's another of our misfortunes, we women cannot stay +unmarried. But will you tell me why a man joins a club when he is +married?" + +"Oh, one has to be in a club--especially in Paris. Every man of any +standing--if only for the sake of going in there for a smoke." + +"What! do you mean to say that there are any wives nowadays without +smoking-rooms? Why, I would allow--yes, I would allow a halfpenny pipe!" + +"Have you any neighbours?" + +"Oh, we don't visit much. There are the Bourjots at Sannois, we go there +sometimes." + +"Ah, the Bourjots! But, here, there cannot be any one to visit." + +"Oh, there's the cure. Ha! ha! the first time he dined with us he drank +the water in his finger-bowl! Oh, I ought not to tell you that, it's too +bad of me--and he's so kind. He's always bringing me flowers." + +"You ride, don't you, mademoiselle? That must be a delightful recreation +for you." + +"Yes, I love riding. It is my one pleasure. It seems to me that I could +not do without that. What I like above everything is hunting. I was +brought up to that in the part of the world where papa used to live. I'm +desperately fond of it. I was seven hours one day in my saddle without +dismounting." + +"Oh, I know what it is--I go hunting every year in the Perche with M. de +Beaulieu's hounds. You've heard of his pack, perhaps; he had them over +from England. Last year we had three splendid runs. By-the-bye, you have +the Chantilly meets near here." + +"Yes, I go with papa, and we never miss one. When we were all together +at the last meet there were quite forty horses, and you know how it +excites them to be together. We started off at a gallop, and you can +imagine how delightful it was. It was the day we had such a magnificent +sunset in the pool. Oh, the fresh air, and the wind blowing through my +hair, and the dogs and the bugles and the trees flying along before +you--it makes you feel quite intoxicated! At such moments I'm so brave, +oh, so brave!" + +"Only at such moments, mademoiselle?" + +"Well--yes--only on horseback. On foot, I own, I am very frightened at +night; then, too, I don't like thunder at all--and--well, I'm very +delighted that we shall be three persons short for dinner this evening." + +"But why, mademoiselle?" + +"We should have been thirteen! I should have done the meanest things for +the sake of getting a fourteenth--as you would have seen. Ah, here comes +my brother with Denoisel; they'll bring us the boat. Do look how +beautiful it all is from here, just at this time!" + +She glanced round, as she spoke, at the Seine, the river banks on each +side, and the sky. Small clouds were sporting and rolling along in the +horizon. They were violet, gray, and silvery, just tipped with flashes +of white, which looked like the foam of the sea touching the lower part +of the sky. + +Above them rose the heavens infinite and blue, profound and clear, +magnificent and just turning paler as they do at the hour when the +stars are beginning to kindle behind the daylight. Higher up than all +hung two or three clouds stretching over the landscape, heavy-looking +and motionless. + +An immense light fell over the water, lying dormant here, flashing +there, making the silvery streaks in the shadow of the boats tremble, +touching up a mast or a rudder, or resting on the orange-coloured +handkerchief or pink jacket of a washerwoman. The country, the outskirts +of the town, and the suburbs all met together on both sides of the +river. There were rows of poplar trees to be seen between the houses, +which were few and far between, as at the extreme limit of a town. + +Then there were small, tumble-down cottages, inclosure's planked round, +gardens, green shutters, wine-trade signs painted in red letters, acacia +trees in front of the doors, old summer arbors giving way on one side, +bits of walls dazzlingly white, then some straight rows of +manufactories, brick buildings with tile and zinc-covered roofs, and +factory bells. Smoke from the various workshops mounted straight upward +and the shadow of it fell in the water like the shadows of so many +columns. + +On one stack was written "Tobacco," and on a plaster facade could be +read "Doremus Labiche, Boats for Hire." + +Over a canal which was blocked up with barges, a swing-bridge lifted +its two black arms in the air. Fishermen were throwing and drawing in +their lines. The sound of wheels could be heard, carts were coming and +going. Towing-ropes scraped along the road, which was hard, rough, +black, and dyed all colours by the unloading of coal, mineral refuse, +and chemicals. + +From the candle, glucose, and fecula manufactories and sugar-refining +works which were scattered along the quay, surrounded by patches of +verdure, there was a vague odour of tallow and sugar which was carried +away by the emanations from the water and the smell of tar. The noise +from the foundries and the whistle of steam engines kept breaking the +silence of the river. + +It was like Asnieres, Saardam, and Puteaux combined, one of those +Parisian landscapes on the banks of the Seine such as Hervier paints, +foul and yet radiant, wretched yet gay, popular and full of life, where +Nature peeps out here and there between the buildings, the work and the +commerce, like a blade of grass held between a man's fingers. + +"Isn't it beautiful?" + +"Well, to tell the truth, I am not in raptures about it. It's +beautiful--in a certain degree." + +"Oh, yes, it is beautiful. I assure you that it is very beautiful +indeed. About two years ago at the Exhibition there was an effect of +this kind. I don't remember the picture exactly, but it was just this. +There are certain things that I feel----" + +"Ah, you have an artistic temperament, mademoiselle." + +"Oh!" exclaimed the young girl, with a comic intonation, plunging +forthwith into the water. When she appeared again she began to swim +towards the boat which was advancing to meet her. Her hair had come +down, and was all wet and floating behind her. She shook it, sprinkling +the drops of water all round. + +Evening was drawing near and rosy streaks were coming gradually into the +sky. A breath was stirring over the river, and at the tops of the trees +the leaves were quivering. A small windmill, which served for a sign +over the door of a tavern, began to turn round. + +"Well, Renee, how have you enjoyed the water?" asked one of the rowers +as the young girl reached the steps placed at the back of the boat. + +"Oh, very much, thanks, Denoisel," she answered. + +"You are a nice one," said the other man, "you swim out so far--I began +to get uneasy. And what about Reverchon? Ah, yes, here he is." + + + + +II + + +Charles Louis Mauperin was born in 1787. He was the son of a barrister +who was well known and highly respected throughout Lorraine and Barrois, +and at the age of sixteen he entered the military school at +Fontainebleau. He became sublieutenant in the Thirty-fifth Regiment of +infantry, and afterward, as lieutenant in the same corps, he signalized +himself in Italy by a courage which was proof against everything. At +Pordenone, although wounded, surrounded by a troop of the enemy's +cavalry and challenged to lay down arms, he replied to the challenge by +giving the command to charge the enemy, by killing with his own hand one +of the horsemen who was threatening him and opening a passage with his +men, until, overcome by numbers and wounded on the head by two more +sword-thrusts, he fell down covered with blood and was left on the field +for dead. + +After being captain in the Second Regiment of the Mediterranean, he +became captain aide-de-camp to General Roussel d'Hurbal, went through +the Russian campaign with him, and was shot through the right shoulder +the day after the battle of Moscow. + +In 1813, at the age of twenty-six, he was an officer of the Legion of +Honour and major in the army. He was looked upon as one of the +commanding officers with the most brilliant prospects, when the battle +of Waterloo broke his sword for him and dashed his hopes to the ground. + +He was put on half-pay, and, with Colonel Sauset and Colonel Maziau, he +entered into the Bonapartist conspiracy of the _Bazar francais_. + +Condemned to death by default, as a member of the managing committee, by +the Chamber of Peers, constituted into a court of justice, he was +concealed by his friends and shipped off to America. + +On the voyage, not knowing how to occupy his active mind, he studied +medicine with one of his fellow-passengers who intended taking his +degree in America, and on arriving, Mauperin passed the necessary +examinations with him. After spending two years in the United States, +thanks to the friendship and influence of some of his former comrades, +who had been taken again into active service, he obtained pardon and was +allowed to return to France. + +He went back to the little town of Bourmont, to the old home where his +mother was still living. This mother was one of those excellent old +ladies so frequently met with in the provincial France of the eighteenth +century. She was gay, witty, and fond of her glass of wine. Her son +adored her, and on finding her ill and under doctor's orders to avoid +all stimulants, he at once gave up wine, liqueurs, and coffee for her +sake, thinking that it would be easier for her to abstain if he shared +her privations. It was in compliance with her request, and by way of +humouring her sick fancies, that he married a cousin for whom he had no +especial liking. His mother had selected this wife for her son on +account of a joint claim to certain land, fields which touched each +other, and all the various considerations which tend to unite families +and blend together fortunes in the provinces. + +After the death of his mother, the narrow life in the little town, which +had no further attraction for him, seemed irksome, and, as he was not +allowed to dwell in Paris, M. Mauperin sold his house and land in Bourmont, +with the exception of a farm at Villacourt, and went to live with his young +wife on a large estate which he bought in the heart of Bassigny, at +Morimond. There were the remains of a large abbey, a piece of land +worthy of the name which the monks had given it--"_Mort-au-monde_"--a +wild, magnificent bit of Nature with a pool of some hundred acres or +more and a forest of venerable oak trees; meadows with canals of +freestone where the spring-tide flowed along under bowers of trees, a +veritable wilderness where the vegetation had been left to itself since +the Revolution; springs babbling along in the shade; wild flowers, +cattle-tracks, the remains of a garden and the ruins of buildings. Here +and there a few stones had survived. The door was still to be seen, and +the benches were there on which the beggars used to sit while taking +their soup; here the apse of a roofless chapel and there the seven +foundations of walls _a la Montreuil_. The pavilion at the entrance, +built at the beginning of the last century, was all that was still +standing; it was complete and almost intact. + +M. Mauperin took up his abode in this and lived there until 1830, +solitary and entirely absorbed in his studies. He gave himself up to +reading, educating himself on all subjects, and reaping knowledge in +every direction. He was familiar with all the great historians, +philosophers, and politicians, and was thoroughly master of the +industrial sciences. He only left his books when he felt the need of +fresh air, and then he would rest his brain and tire his body with long +walks of some fifteen miles across the fields and through the woods. + +Every one was accustomed to see him walk like this, and the country +people recognised him in the distance by his step, his long frock-coat, +all buttoned up, his officer's gait, his head always slightly bent, and +the stick, made from a vine-stalk, which he used as a cane. The only +break in his secluded and laborious life was at election time. M. +Mauperin then put in an appearance everywhere from one end of the +department to the other. He drove about the country in a trap, and his +soldierly voice could be heard rousing the electors to enthusiasm at all +their meetings; he gave the word of command for the charge on the +Government candidates, and to him all this was like war once more. + +When the election was over he left Chaumont and returned to his regular +routine and to the obscure tranquility of his studies. + +Two children had come to him--a boy in 1826 and a girl in 1827. After +the Revolution of 1830 he was elected deputy. When he took his seat in +the chamber, his American ideas and theories were very much like those +of Armand Carrel. His animated speeches--brusque, martial, and full of +feeling--made quite a sensation. He became one of the inspirers of the +_National_ after being one of its first shareholders, and he suggested +articles attacking the budget and the finances. + +The Tuileries made advances to him; some of his former comrades, who +were now aides-de-camp under the new king, sounded him with the promise +of a high military position, a generalship in the army, or some honour +for which he was still young enough. He refused everything point-blank. +In 1832 he signed the protestation of the deputies of the Opposition +against the words "Subjects of the King," which had been pronounced by +M. de Montalivet, and he fought against this system until 1835. + +That year his wife presented him with a child, a little girl whose +arrival stirred him to the depths of his being. His other two children +had merely given him a calm joy, a happiness without any gaiety. +Something had always seemed wanting--just that something which brightens +a father's life and makes the home ring with laughter. + +M. Mauperin loved his two children, but he did not adore them. The fond +father had hoped to delight in them, and he had been disappointed. +Instead of the son he had dreamed of--a regular boy, a mischievous +little urchin, one of those handsome little dare-devils with whom an old +soldier could live over again his own youth and hear once more, as it +were, the sound of gunpowder--M. Mauperin had to do with a most rational +sort of a child, a little boy who was always good, "quite a young lady," +as he said himself. This had been a great trouble to him, as he felt +almost ashamed to have, as his son and heir, this miniature man who did +not even break his toys. + +With his daughter, M. Mauperin had had the same disappointment. She was +one of those little girls who are women when they are born, and who play +with their parents merely to amuse them. She scarcely had any childhood, +and at the age of five, if a gentleman called to see her father, she +always ran away to wash her hands. She would be kissed on certain +spots, and she seemed to dread being ruffled or inconvenienced by a +father's caresses and love. + +Thus repelled, M. Mauperin's affection, so long hoarded up, went out to +the cradle of the little newcomer whom he had named Renee after his +mother. He spent whole days with his little baby-girl in divine +nonsense. He would keep taking off her little cap to look at her silky +hair, and he taught her to make grimaces which charmed him. He would lie +down beside her on the floor when she was rolling about half naked with +all a child's delightful unconsciousness. In the night he would get up +to look at her asleep, and would pass hours listening to this first +breath of life, so like the respiration of a flower. When she woke up he +would be there to have her first smile--that smile of little girl-babies +which comes from out of the night as though from Paradise. His happiness +kept changing into perfect bliss; it seemed to him that the child he +loved so much was a little angel from heaven. + +What joy he had with her at Morimond! He would wheel her all round the +house in a little carriage, and at every few steps turn round to look at +her screaming with laughter, with the sunshine playing on her cheeks, +and her little supple, pink foot curled up in her hand. Or he would take +her with him when he went for a walk, and would go as far as a village +and let the child throw kisses to the people who bowed to him, or he +would enter one of the farm-houses and show his daughter's teeth with +great pride. On the way, the child would often go to sleep in his arms, +as she did with her nurse. At other times he would take her into the +forest, and there, under the trees full of robin-redbreasts and +nightingales, towards the end of the day when there are voices overhead +in the woods, he would experience the most unutterable joy on hearing +the child, impressed by the noises around, try to imitate the sounds, +and to murmur and prattle as though she were answering the birds and +speaking to the singing heavens. + +Mme. Mauperin had not given this last daughter so hearty a welcome. She +was a good wife and mother, but Mme. Mauperin was eaten up with that +pride peculiar to the provinces--namely, the pride of money. She had +made all her arrangements for two children, but the third one was not +welcome, as it would interfere with the pecuniary affairs of the other +two, and, above all, would infringe on her son's share. The division of +land which was now one estate, the partition of wealth which had +accumulated, and in consequence the lowering of social position in the +future and of the importance of the family--all this was what the second +little daughter represented to her mother. + +M. Mauperin very soon had no more peace. The mother was constantly +attacking the politician, and reminding the father that it was his duty +to sacrifice himself to the interests of his children. She endeavoured +to separate him from his friends and to make him forsake his party and +his fidelity to his ideas. She made fun of what she called his +tomfoolery, which prevented him from turning his position to account. +Every day there were fresh attacks and reproaches until he was fairly +haunted by them; it was the terrible battle of all that is most prosaic +against the conscience of a Deputy of the Opposition. Finally, M. +Mauperin asked his wife for two months' truce for reflection, as he, +too, would have liked his beloved Renee to be rich. At the end of the +two months he sent his resignation in to the Chamber and opened a +sugar-refinery at Briche. + +That had been twenty years ago. The children had grown up and the +business was thriving. M. Mauperin had done very well with his refinery. +His son was a barrister, his elder daughter married, and Renee's dowry +was waiting for her. + + + + +III + + +Every one had gone into the house, and in a corner of the drawing-room, +with its chintz hangings gay with bunches of wild flowers, Henri +Mauperin, Denoisel, and Reverchon were talking. Near to the +chimney-piece, Mme. Mauperin, with great demonstrations of affection, +was greeting her son-in-law and daughter, M. and Mme. Davarande, who had +just arrived. She felt obliged on this occasion to make a display of +family feeling and to exhibit her motherly love. + +The greeting between Mme. Mauperin and Mme. Davarande was scarcely over +when a little old gentleman entered the drawing-room quietly, wished +Mme. Mauperin good-evening with his eyes as he passed, and walked +straight across to the group where Denoisel was. + +This little gentleman wore a dress-coat and had white whiskers. He was +carrying a portfolio under his arm. + +"Do you know that?" he asked Denoisel, taking him into a window recess +and half opening his folio. + +"That? I should just think I do. It's the 'Mysterious Swing,' an +engraving after Lavrience's." + +The little old gentleman smiled. + +"Yes, but look," he said, and he half opened his portfolio again, but in +such a way that Denoisel could only just see inside. + +"'Before letters.' It's a proof before letters! Can you see?" + +"Perfectly." + +"And margins!--a gem, isn't it? They didn't give it me, I can tell you, +the thieves! It was run up--and by a woman, too!" + +"Oh, of course!" + +"A _cocotte_, who asked to see it every time I went any higher. The +rascal of an auctioneer kept saying, 'Pass it to the lady.' At last I +got it for five pounds eight. Oh, I wouldn't have paid one halfpenny +more." + +"I should think not! If I had only known--why, there's a proof like +that, exactly like it, at Spindler's, the artist's--and with larger +margins, too. He does not care about Louis Seize things, Spindler. If I +had only asked him!" + +"Good heavens!--and before letters, like mine? Are you quite sure?" + +"Before letters--before--Oh, yes, it's an earlier one than yours. It's +before--" and Denoisel whispered something to the old man which brought +a flush of pleasure to his face and a moisture to his lips. + +Just at this moment M. Mauperin entered the drawing-room with his +daughter. She was leaning on his arm, her head slightly thrown back in +an indolent way, rubbing her hair against the sleeve of her father's +coat as a child does when it is being carried. + +"How are you?" she said as she kissed her sister. She then held her +forehead to her mother's lips, shook hands with her brother-in-law, and +ran across to the little man with the portfolio. + +"Can I see, god-papa?" + +"No, little girl, you are not grown-up enough yet," he replied, patting +her cheek in an affectionate way. + +"Ah, it's always like that with the things you buy!" said Renee, turning +her back on the old man, who tied up the ribbon of his portfolio with +the special little bow so familiar to the fingers of print collectors. + +"Well, what's this I hear?" suddenly exclaimed Mme. Mauperin, turning to +her daughter. + +Reverchon was sitting next her, so near that her dress touched him every +time she moved. + +"You were both carried away by the current," she continued. "It was +dangerous, I am sure! Oh, that river! I really cannot understand how M. +Mauperin allows----" + +"Mme. Mauperin," replied her husband, who was by the table looking +through an album with his daughter, "I do not allow anything--I +tolerate----" + +"Coward!" whispered Renee to her father. + +"I assure you, mamma, there was no danger," put in Henri Mauperin. +"There was no danger at all. They were just slightly carried along by +the current, and they preferred holding on to a boat to going half a +mile or so lower down the river. That was all! You see----" + +"Ah, you comfort me," said Mme. Mauperin, the serenity of her expression +gradually returning at her son's words. "I know you are so prudent, but, +you see, M. Reverchon, our dear Renee is so foolish that I am always +afraid. Oh, dear, there are drops of water on her hair now. Come here +and let me brush them off." + +"M. Dardouillet!" announced a servant. + +"A neighbour of ours," said Mme. Mauperin in a low voice to Reverchon. + +"Well, and where are you now?" asked M. Mauperin, as he shook hands with +the new arrival. + +"Oh, we are getting on--we are getting on--three hundred stakes done +to-day." + +"Three hundred?" + +"Three hundred--I fancy it won't be bad. From the green-house, you see, +I am going straight along as far as the water, on account of the view. +Fourteen or sixteen inches of slope--not more. If we were on the spot I +shouldn't have to explain. On the other side, you know, I shall raise +the path about three feet. When all that's done, M. Mauperin, do you +know that there won't be an inch of my land that will not have been +turned over?" + +"But when shall you plant anything, M. Dardouillet?" asked Mlle. +Mauperin. "For the last three years you have only had workmen in your +garden; sha'n't you have a few trees in some day?" + +"Oh, as to trees, mademoiselle, that's nothing. There's plenty of time +for all that. The most important thing is the plan of the ground, the +hills and slopes, and then afterward trees--if we want them." + +Some one had just come in by a door leading from another room. He had +bowed as he entered, but no one had seen him, and he was there now +without any one noticing him. He had an honest-looking face and a head +of hair like a pen-wiper. It was M. Mauperin's cashier, M. Bernard. + +"We are all here; has M. Bernard come down? Ah, that's right!" said M. +Mauperin on seeing him. "Suppose we have dinner, Mme. Mauperin, these +young people must be hungry." + + * * * * * + +The solemnity of the first few moments when the appetite is keen had +worn off, and the buzz of conversation could be heard in place of the +silence with which a dinner usually commences, and which is followed by +the noise of spoons in the soup plates. + +"M. Reverchon," began Mme. Mauperin. She had placed the young man by +her, in the seat of honour, and she was amiability itself, as far as he +was concerned. She was most attentive to him and most anxious to please. +Her smile covered her whole face, and even her voice was not her +every-day voice, but a high-pitched one which she assumed on state +occasions. She kept glancing from the young man to his plate and from +his plate to a servant. It was a case of a mother angling for a +son-in-law. "M. Reverchon, we met a lady just recently whom you +know--Mme. de Bonnieres. She spoke so highly of you--oh, so highly!" + +"I had the honour of meeting Mme. de Bonnieres in Italy--I was even +fortunate enough to be able to render her a little service." + +"Did you save her from brigands?" exclaimed Renee. + +"No, it was much less romantic than that. Mme. de Bonnieres had some +difficulty about the bill at her hotel. She was alone and I prevented +her from being robbed." + +"It was a case of robbers, anyhow, then," said Renee. + +"One might write a play on the subject," put in Denoisel, "and it would +be quite a new plot--the reduction of a bill leading to a marriage. +What a good title, too, 'The Romance of an Awkward Moment, _a la_ +Rabelais!'" + +"Mme. de Bonnieres is a very nice woman," continued Mme. Mauperin. "I +like her face. Do you know her, M. Barousse?" she asked, turning to +Renee's godfather. + +"Yes, she is very pleasant." + +"Oh! why, god-papa, she's like a satyr!" exclaimed Renee. + +When the word was out some of the guests smiled, and the young girl, +turning red, hastened to add: "I only mean she has a face like one." + +"That's what I call mending matters!" said Denoisel. + +"Did you stay long in Italy, monsieur?" asked M. Mauperin, by way of +changing the subject. + +"Six months." + +"And what did you think of it?" + +"It's very interesting, but one has so much discomfort there. I never +could get used to drinking coffee out of glasses." + +"Italy is the most wretched place to go to; it is the least practical of +all places," said Henri Mauperin. "What a state agriculture is in +there--and trade, too! One day in Florence at a masked ball I asked the +waiter at a restaurant if they would be open all night. 'Oh, no, sir,' +he said, 'we should have too many people here.' That's a fact, I heard +it myself, and that shows you what the country is. When one thinks of +England, of that wonderful initiative power of individuals and of the +whole nation, too; when one has seen the business genius of the London +citizen and the produce of a Yorkshire farm--Oh, a fine nation that!" + +"I agree with Henri," said Mme. Davarande, "there is something so +distinguished about England. I like the politeness of the English +people, and I approve of their way of always introducing people. Then, +too, they wrap your change up in paper--and some of their dress +materials have quite a style of their own. My husband bought me a poplin +dress at the Exposition--Oh, mamma, I have quite decided about my cloak. +I was at Alberic's--it's most amusing. He lets one of the girls put a +cloak over your shoulders and then he walks round you and just marks +with an ebony ruler the places where it does not fit; he scarcely +touches you with it, but just gives little taps--like that--and the girl +marks each tap with chalk. Oh, he certainly has a lot of character, that +Alberic! And then he's the only one--there isn't another place--he has +such good style for cloaks. I recognised two of his yesterday at the +races. He is very expensive though." + +"Oh, those people get what they like to ask," said Reverchon. "My +tailor, Edouard, has just retired--he's made over a hundred thousand +pounds." + +"Oh, well, quite right," remarked M. Barousse. "I'm always very glad +when I see things like that. The workers get the money nowadays--that's +just what it is. It's the greatest revolution since the beginning of the +world." + +"Yes," said Denoisel, "a revolution that makes one think of the words of +Chapon, the celebrated thief: 'Robbery, Monsieur le President, is the +principal trade of the world!'" + +"Were the races good?" asked Renee. + +"Well, there were plenty of people," answered Mme. Davarande. + +"Very good, mademoiselle," said Reverchon. "The Diana prize especially +was very well run. Plume de coq, that they reckoned at thirty-five, was +beaten by Basilicate by two lengths. It was very exciting. The hacks was +a very good race, too, although the ground was rather hard." + +"Who is the Russian lady who drives four-in-hand, M. Reverchon?" asked +Mme. Davarande. + +"Mme. de Rissleff. She has some splendid horses, some thoroughbred +Orloffs." + +"You ought to join the Jockey Club, Jules, for the races," said Mme. +Davarande, turning to her husband. "I think it is so common to be with +everybody. Really if one has any respect for one's self--a woman I +mean--there is no place but the jockey stand." + +"Ah, a mushroom patty!" exclaimed M. Barousse. "Your cook is surpassing +herself, she really is a veritable _cordon-bleu_. I shall have to pay +her my compliments before leaving." + +"I thought you never eat that dish," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"I did not eat it in 1848--and I did not eat it up to the second of +December. Do you think the police had time then to inspect mushrooms? +But now that there is order again." + +"Henriette," said Mme. Mauperin to Mme. Davarande, "I must scold your +husband. He neglects us. We have not seen you for three weeks, M. +Davarande." + +"Oh, my dear mother, if you only knew all I have had to do! You know I +am on very good terms with Georges. His father has his time taken up at +the Chamber and the business falls on Georges as principal. There are +hundreds of things that he can only trust to people in whom he has +confidence--friends, in fact. There was that big affair--that _debut_ at +the Opera. There was no end of interviews and parleyings and journeys +backward and forward. It would not have done to have had any strife +between the two ministries. Oh, we have been very busy lately. He is so +considerate that I could not----" + +"So considerate?" put in Denoisel. "He might pay your cab-fares at +least. It's more than two years since he promised you a +sub-prefectship." + +"My dear Denoisel, it's more difficult than you imagine. And then, too, +when one does not care about going too far from Paris. Besides, between +ourselves, I can tell you that it's almost arranged. In about a month +from now I have every reason to believe----" + +"What _debut_ were you speaking of?" asked Barousse. + +"Bradizzi's," answered Davarande. + +"Ah, Bradizzi! Isn't she astounding!" said Reverchon. "She has some runs +that are wonderfully light. The other day I was in the manager's box on +the stage and we couldn't hear her touch the ground when she was +dancing." + +"We expected to see you yesterday evening, Henri," said Mme. Davarande +to her brother. + +"Yesterday I was at my lecture," he answered. + +"Henri has been appointed reporter," said Mme. Mauperin proudly. + +"Ah," put in Denoisel, "the d'Aguesseau lecture? That's still going on +then, your speechifying affair? How many are there in it?" + +"Two hundred." + +"And all statesmen? It's quite alarming. What were you to report on?" + +"A law that was proposed with reference to the National Guard." + +"You go in for everything," said Denoisel. + +"I am sure you do not belong to the National Guard, Denoisel?" observed +M. Barousse. + +"No, indeed!" + +"And yet it is an institution." + +"The drums affirm that it is that, M. Barousse." + +"And you do not vote either, I would wager?" + +"I would not vote under any pretext." + +"Denoisel, I am sorry to say so, but you are a bad citizen. You were +born as you are, I am not blaming you, but the fact remains----" + +"A bad citizen--what do you mean?" + +"Well, you are always in opposition to the laws." + +"I am?" + +"Yes, you are. Without going any farther back, take for instance the +money you came into from your Uncle Frederic. You handed it over to his +illegitimate children----" + +"What of that?" + +"Well, that is what I call an illegal action, most deplorable and +blameworthy. What does the law mean? It is quite clear--the law means +that children not born in wedlock should not be able to inherit their +father's money. You were not ignorant of this, for I told you that it +was so; your lawyer told you and the code told you. What did you do? +Why, you let the children have the money. You ignored the code, the +spirit of the law, everything. To give up your uncle's fortune in that +way, Denoisel, was rendering homage to low morals. It was simply +encouraging----" + +"I know your principles in the matter, M. Barousse. But what was I to +do? When I saw those three poor lads I said to myself that I should +never enjoy the cigars I smoked with their bread-money. No one is +perfect----" + +"All that is not law. When there is a law there is some reason for it, +is there not? The law is against immorality. Suppose others imitated +you----" + +"You need not fear that, Barousse," said M. Mauperin, smiling. + +"We ought never to set a bad example," answered Barousse, sententiously. +"Do not misunderstand me," he continued, turning to Denoisel. "I do not +respect you any the less for it, on the contrary, I appreciate your +disinterestedness, but as to saying that you were right--no, I cannot +say that. It's the same with your way of living--that is not as it +should be. You ought to have your time occupied--hang it all! You ought +to do something, go in for something, take up some work, pay your debt +to your country. If you had begun in good time, with your intelligence, +you would perhaps have had a post bringing you in a thousand or +more----" + +"I have had a better thing than that offered me, M. Barousse." + +"More money?" asked Barousse. + +"More money," answered Denoisel tranquilly. + +Barousse looked at him in astonishment. + +"Seriously," continued Denoisel, "I had the most brilliant +prospects--just for five minutes. It was on the twenty-fourth of +February, 1848. I did not know what to do with myself, for when one has +done the Tuileries in the morning it rather unsettles one for the rest +of the day. It occurred to me that I would go and call on one of my +friends who has a Government appointment--a Government appointment, you +know, on the other side of the water. I arrived, and there was no one +there. I went upstairs into the minister's office where my friend +worked--no friend there. I lighted a cigarette, intending to wait for +him. A gentleman came in while I was smoking, and seeing me seated, +imagined I belonged to the place. He had no hat on, so that I thought he +also did. He asked me very politely to show him the way about the house. +I took him round and then we came back. He gave me something to write +down, just telling me the sense of it. I took my friend's pen and wrote. +He then read it and was delighted. We talked; he admired my orthography. +He shook hands with me and found I had gloves on. To cut it short, at +the end of a quarter of an hour he was pressing me to be his secretary. +It was the new minister." + +"And you did not accept?" + +"My friend arrived and I accepted for him. He is at present quite a high +functionary in the Council of State. It was lucky for him to be +supernumerary only half a day." + +They were having dessert, and M. Mauperin had pulled one of the dishes +nearer and was just helping himself in an absent-minded way. + +"M. Mauperin!" exclaimed his wife, looking steadily at him. + +"I beg pardon, my dear--symmetry--you are quite right. I wasn't +thinking," and he pushed the dish back to its place. + +"You always do disarrange things----" + +"I'm sorry, my dear, I'm very sorry. My wife is an excellent woman, you +know, gentlemen, but if you disarrange her symmetry for her--It's quite +a religion with my wife--symmetry is." + +"How ridiculous you are, M. Mauperin!" said Mme. Mauperin, blushing at +being convicted of the most flagrant provincialism; and then, turning +upon her daughter, she exclaimed, "Oh, dear, Renee, how you stoop! Do +sit up, my child----" + +"That's always the way," murmured the young girl, speaking to herself. +"Mamma avenges herself on me." + +"Gentlemen," said M. Mauperin, when they had returned to the +drawing-room, "you can smoke here, you know. We owe that liberty to my +son. He has been lucky enough to obtain his mother's----" + +"Coffee, god-papa?" asked Renee. + +"No," answered M. Barousse, "I shouldn't be able to go to sleep----" + +"Here," put in Renee, finishing his sentence for him. + +"M. Reverchon?" + +"I never take it, thank you very much." + +She went backward and forward, the steam from the cup of hot coffee she +was carrying rising to her face and flushing it. + +"Is every one served?" she asked, and without waiting for any reply she +sat down to the piano and struck the first notes of a polka. + +"Are we going to dance?" she asked, breaking off. "Let us dance--oh, do +let us dance!" + +"Let us smoke in peace!" said M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, daddy," and going on with her polka she danced it herself on her +music-stool, only touching the floor with her tip-toes. She played +without looking at her notes, her face turned towards the drawing-room, +smiling and animated, her eyes lighted up and her cheeks flushed with +the excitement of the dance; like a little girl playing dance music for +other people and moving about herself as she watches them. She swung her +shoulders, her form swayed as though she were being guided along, while +her whole body marked the rhythm and her attitude seemed to indicate +the step she was dancing. Then she turned towards the piano again and +her eyes followed her hands over the black and white keys. Bending over +the music she was playing, she seemed to be striking the notes, then +caressing them, speaking to them, scolding them or smiling on them, and +then lulling them to sleep. She would sustain the loud parts, then +linger over the melody; there were movements that she would play with +tenderness and others with little bursts of passion. She bent over the +piano, then rose again, the light playing on the top of her +tortoise-shell comb one moment, while the next moment it could scarcely +be seen in her black hair. The two candles on the piano flickered to the +noise, throwing a light over her profile or sending their flame over her +forehead, her cheeks, and her chin. The shadow from her ear-rings--two +coral balls--trembled all the time on the delicate skin of her throat, +and her fingers ran so quickly over the keyboard that one could only see +something pink flying backward and forward. + +"And it's her own composition," said M. Mauperin to Reverchon. + +"She has had lessons from Quidant," added Mme. Mauperin. + +"There--I've finished!" exclaimed Renee, suddenly leaving the piano and +planting herself in front of Denoisel. "Tell me a story now, Denoisel, +to amuse me--anything you like." + +She was standing before him, her arms crossed and her head slightly +thrown back, the weight of her body supported on one leg, and a +mischievous, daring look on her face which lent additional grace to her +slightly masculine dress. She was wearing a high collar of pique with a +cravat of black ribbon, and the revers of her white front turned back +over her jacket bodice of cloth. There were pockets on the front of her +skirt. + +"When shall you cut your wisdom teeth, Renee?" asked Denoisel. + +"Never!" she answered, laughing. "Well, what about my story?" + +Denoisel looked round to see that no one was listening, and then +lowering his voice began: + +"Once upon a time a papa and a mamma had a little daughter. The papa and +mamma wished her to marry, and they sent for some very nice-looking +gentlemen; but the little daughter, who was very nice-looking, too----" + +"Oh, how stupid you are!--I'll get my work, there--" and taking her work +out of a basket on the table she went and sat down by her mother. + +"Are we not going to have any whist to-night?" asked M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, of course, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin. "The table is +ready--you see there are only the candles to light." + +"Going, going, gone!" called out Denoisel in M. Barousse's ear. + +The old gentleman was just beginning to doze in a corner by the +chimney-piece and his head was nodding like a passenger's in a +stage-coach. M. Barousse started up and Denoisel handed him a card: + +"The King of Spades! _before the letter!_ You are wanted at whist." + +"You are not over-tired this evening, mademoiselle?" asked Reverchon, +approaching Renee. + +"I? I could dance all night. That's how I feel." + +"You are making something--very pretty----" + +"This?--oh, yes, very pretty! It is a stocking--I am knitting for my +little poor children. It's warm, that's all it is. I am not very clever +with my needle, you know. With embroidery and wool-work you have to +think about what you are doing, but with this, you see, your fingers go; +it just makes itself when once you start, and you can think about +anything--the Grand Turk if you like----" + +"I say, Renee," observed M. Mauperin, "it's odd; it's no good my losing, +I can't catch up again." + +"Oh, that's clever--I shall remember that for my collection," answered +Renee. "Denoisel, come here," she called out, suddenly, "come here a +minute--nearer--nearer still. Will you come here at once--there +now--kneel down----" + +"Are you mad, child?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin. + +"Renee," said Denoisel, "I believe you have made up your mind to prevent +my getting married." + +"Come, come, Renee!" said M. Mauperin paternally from the card-table. + +"Well--what is it?" asked Renee threatening Denoisel playfully with a +pair of scissors. "Now if you move! Denoisel's head always looks +untidy--his hair is badly cut--he always has a great, ugly lock that +falls over his forehead. It makes people squint when they look at him. I +want to cut that lock. There--he's afraid. Why, I cut hair very +well--you ask papa," and forthwith she gave two or three clips with her +scissors, and then crossing over to the fireplace, shook the hair into +the grate. "If you fancy it was for the sake of getting a lock of your +hair--" she said, turning round as she spoke. + +She had paid no attention to the nudge her brother had given her as she +passed. Her mother, who an instant before was perfectly crimson, was now +pale, but Renee had not noticed that. Her father left the whist-table +and came across to her with an embarrassed expression, looking as though +he were vexed with her. She took the cigarette which he had lighted +from him, put it between her own lips, and drawing a puff of smoke, +blew it away again quickly, turning her head away, coughing and +blinking. "Ugh!--how horrid it is!" + +"Well, really, Renee!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin severely, and evidently +in great distress, "I really don't know--I have never seen you like +this----" + +"Bring the tea in," said M. Mauperin to a servant who had entered in +answer to his peal at the bell. + + + + +IV + + +"A quarter past ten already!" said Mme. Davarande. "We shall only just +have time to get to the station. Renee, tell them to bring me my hat." + +Every one rose. Barousse woke up from his nap with the noise, and the +little band of guests from Paris set out for Saint-Denis. + +"I'll come with you," said Denoisel. "I should like a breath of air." + +Barousse was in front, arm-in-arm with Reverchon. The Davarandes +followed, and Henri Mauperin and Denoisel brought up the rear. + +"Why don't you stay all night? You could go back to Paris to-morrow," +Denoisel began. + +"No," answered Henri, "I won't do that. I have some work to do to-morrow +morning. I should get to Paris late and my day would be wasted." + +They were silent, and every now and then a few words from Barousse to +Reverchon in praise of Renee came to them through the silence of the +night. + +"I say, Denoisel, I'm afraid it is all up with that, don't you think +so?" + +"Yes, I think it is." + +"Oh, dear! Will you tell me, my dear fellow, what made you humour Renee +in all the nonsense that came into her head this evening? You have a +great deal of influence over her and----" + +"My dear boy," answered Denoisel, puffing at his cigar, "you must let me +give you a social, philosophical, and historical parenthesis. We have +quite finished, have we not, and when I say we, I mean the majority of +the French people, with the pretty little young ladies who used to talk +like mechanical dolls. They could say 'papa' and 'mamma,' and when they +went to a dance they never lost sight of their parents. The little +childlike young lady who was always so timid and bashful and who used to +blush and stammer, brought up to be ignorant of everything, neither +knowing how to stand up on her legs nor how to sit down on a chair--all +that sort of thing's done with, old-fashioned, worn out. That was the +marriageable young lady of the days of the Gymnase Theatre. There is +nothing of that kind nowadays. The process of culture has changed; it +used to be a case of the fruit-wall, but at present the young person +grows in the open. We ask a girl now about her impressions and we expect +her to say what she thinks naturally and originally. She is allowed to +talk, and indeed is expected to talk, about everything, as that is the +accepted thing now. She need no longer act sweet simplicity, but native +intelligence. If only she can shine in society her parents are +delighted. Her mother takes her to classes. If she should have any +talent it is encouraged and cultivated. Instead of ordinary governesses +she must have good masters, professors from the Conservatoire, or +artists whose pictures have been hung. She goes in for being an artist +and every one is delighted. Come, now, isn't that the way girls are +being educated now in middle-class society?' + +"And the result?" + +"Now, then," continued Denoisel without answering the question, "in the +midst of this education, which I am not criticising, remember--in the +midst of all this, let us imagine a father who is an excellent sort of +man, goodness and kindness personified, encouraging his daughter in her +new freedom by his weakness and his worship of her. Let us suppose, for +instance, that this father has countenanced all the daring and all the +mischievousness of a boy in a woman, that he has allowed his daughter +little by little to cultivate manly accomplishments, which he sees with +pride and which are after his own heart----" + +"And you, my dear fellow, who know my sister so well and the way she has +been brought up, the style she has gone in for, authorized as she +considers herself (thanks to father's indulgence), you, knowing how +difficult it is to get her married, allowed her to do all kinds of +unseemly things this evening when you might have stopped her short with +just a few words such as you always find to say and which you alone can +say to her?" + + * * * * * + +The friend to whom Henri Mauperin was speaking, Denoisel, was the son of +a compatriot, and old school friend and brother-in-arms of M. Mauperin. +The two men had been in the same battles, they had shed their blood in +the same places, and during the retreat from Russia they had eaten the +same horse-flesh. + +A year after his return to France, M. Mauperin had lost this friend, who +on his death-bed had left him guardian to his son. The boy had found a +second father in his guardian. When at college, he had spent all his +holidays at Morimond, and he looked upon the Mauperins as his own +family. + +When M. Mauperin's children came it seemed to the young man that a +brother and sister had been just what he had wanted; he felt as though +he were their elder brother, and he became a child again in order to be +one with them. + +His favourite was, of course, Renee, who when quite little began to +adore him. She was very lively and self-willed and he alone could make +her listen to reason and obey. As she grew up he had been the moulder of +her character, the confessor of her intellect, and the director of her +tastes. His influence over the young girl had increased day by day as +they grew more and more familiar. A room was always kept ready for +Denoisel in the house, his place was always kept for him at table, and +he came whenever he liked to spend a week with the Mauperins. + + * * * * * + +"There are days," continued Henri, "when Renee's nonsense does not +matter, but this evening--before that man. It will be all off with that +marriage, I'm sure! It would have been an excellent match--he has such +good prospects. He's just the man in every respect--charming, too, and +distinguished." + +"Do you think so? For my part, I should have been afraid of him for your +sister. That is really the reason why I behaved as I did this evening. +That man has a sort of common distinction about him--a distinction made +up of the vulgarity of all kinds of elegancies. He's a fashion poster, a +tailor's model, morally and physically. There's nothing, absolutely +nothing, in a little fellow like that. A husband for your sister--that +man? Why, how in the world do you suppose he could ever understand her? +How is he ever to discover all the warmth of feeling and the elevation +and nobility of character hidden under her eccentricities? Can you +imagine them having a thought in common? Good heavens! if your sister +married, no matter whom, so long as the man were intelligent and had +some character and individuality, as long as there were something in him +that would either govern or appeal to a nature like hers--why, I would +say nothing. A man has often great faults which appeal to a woman's +heart. He may be a bad lot, and there is the chance that she will go on +loving him through sheer jealousy. With a busy, ambitious man like you +she would have all the thought and excitement and all the dreams about +his career to occupy her mind. But a dandy like that for life! Why, your +sister would be absolutely wretched; she would die of misery. She isn't +like other girls, you know, your sister--one must take that into +consideration. She is high-minded, untrammelled by conventionalities, +very fond of fun, and very affectionate. At bottom she is a +_melancolique tintamarresque_." + +"A _melancolique tintamarresque_? What does that mean?" + +"I'll explain. She----" + +"Henri, hurry up!" called out Davarande from the platform. "They are +getting into the train. I have your ticket." + + + + +V + + +M. and Mme. Mauperin were in their bed-room. The clock had just struck +midnight, gravely and slowly, as though to emphasize the solemnity of +that confidential and conjugal moment which is both the _tete-a-tete_ of +wedded life and the secret council of the household--that moment of +transformation and magic which is both _bourgeois_ and diabolic, and +which reminds one of that story of the woman metamorphosed into a cat. +The shadow of the bed falls mysteriously over the wife, and as she lies +down there is a sort of charm about her. Something of the bewitchments +of a mistress come to her at this instant. Her will seems to be roused +there by the side of the marital will which is dormant. She sits up, +scolds, sulks, teases, struggles. She has caresses and scratches for the +man. The pillow confers on her its force, her strength comes to her with +the night. + +Mme. Mauperin was putting her hair in papers in front of the glass, +which was lighted by a single candle. She was in her skirt and +dressing-jacket. Her stout figure, above which her little arms kept +moving as if she were crowning herself, threw on the wall a fantastic +outline of a woman of fifty in deshabille, and on the paper at the end +of the room could be seen wavering about one of those corpulent shadows +which one could imagine Hoffman and Daumier sketching from the back of +the beds of old married couples. M. Mauperin was already lying down. + +"Louis!" said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Well?" answered M. Mauperin, with that accent of indifference, regret, +and weariness of a man who, with his eyes still open, is beginning to +enjoy the delight of the horizontal position. + +"Oh, if you are asleep----" + +"I am not asleep. What is it?" + +"Oh, nothing. I think Renee behaved most improperly this evening; that's +all. Did you notice?" + +"No, I wasn't paying any attention." + +"It's just a whim. There isn't the least reason in it. Hasn't she said +anything to you? Do you know anything? I'm nowhere--with all your +mysteries and secrets. I'm always the last to know about things. It's +quite different with you--you are told everything. It's very fortunate +that I was not born jealous, don't you think so?" + +M. Mauperin pulled the sheet up over his shoulder without answering. + +"You certainly are asleep," continued Mme. Mauperin in the sharp, +disappointed tone of a woman who is expecting a parry for her attack. + +"I told you I wasn't asleep." + +"Then you surely don't understand. Oh, these intelligent men--it's +curious. It concerns you though, too; it's your business quite as much +as mine. This is another marriage fallen through--do you understand? A +marriage that was most suitable--money--good family--everything. I know +what these hesitations mean. We may as well give up all idea of it. +Henri was talking to me about it this evening; the young man hadn't said +anything to him; of course, he's too well-bred for that. But Henri is +quite persuaded that he's drawing out of it. One can always tell in +matters of this kind; people have a way of----" + +"Well, let him draw out of it then; what do you want me to say?" M. +Mauperin sat straight up and put his two hands on his thighs. "Let him +go. There are plenty of young men like Reverchon; he is not unique, we +can find others; while girls like my daughter----" + +"Good heavens! Your daughter--your daughter!" + +"You don't do her justice, Therese." + +"I? Oh, yes, I do; but I see her as she is and not with your eyes. She +has her faults, and great faults, too, which you have encouraged--yes, +you. She is as heedless and full of freaks as a child of ten. If you +imagine that it doesn't worry me--her unreasonableness, her uncertain +moods, and so many other absurdities ever since we have been trying to +get her married! And then her way of criticising every one to whom we +introduce her. She is terrible at interviews of this kind. This makes +about the tenth man she has sent about his business." + +At Mme. Mauperin's last words a gleam of paternal vanity lighted up M. +Mauperin's face. + +"Yes, yes," he said, smiling at the remembrance, "the fact is she is +diabolically witty. Do you recollect her words about that poor Prefect: +'Oh, he's a regular old cock!' I remember how she said it directly she +saw him." + +"It really is very funny, and above all very fit and proper. Jokes of +this kind will help her to get married, take my word for it. Such things +will induce other men to come forward, don't you think so? I am quite +certain that Renee must have a reputation for being a terror. A little +more of her precious wit and you will see what proposals you will get +for your daughter! I married Henriette so easily! Renee is my cross." + +M. Mauperin had picked up his snuff-box from the table by the side of +the bed and appeared to be intent on turning it round between his thumb +and first finger. + +"Well," continued Mme. Mauperin, "it's her own lookout. When she is +thirty, when she has refused every one, and there is no one left who +wants her, in spite of all her wit, her good qualities and everything +else, she will have time to reflect a little--and you will, too." + +There was a pause. Mme. Mauperin gave M. Mauperin time enough to imagine +that she had finished, and then changing her tone she began again: + +"I want to speak to you, too, about your son----" + +Hereupon M. Mauperin, whose head had been bent while his wife was +talking, looked up, and there was a half smile of mischievous humour on +his face. In the upper as well as the lower middle class there is a +certain maternal love capable of rising to the height of passion and of +sinking to mere idolatry. There are mothers who in their affection and +love will fall down and worship their son. Theirs is not that maternal +love which veils its own weaknesses, which defends its rights, is +jealous of its duties, which is careful about the hierarchy and +discipline of the family, and which commands respect and consideration. +The child, brought near to his mother by all kinds of familiarity, +receives from her attentions which are more like homage, and caresses in +which there is a certain amount of servility. All the mother's dreams +are centred in him, for he is not only the heir but the whole future of +the family. Through him the family will reap the benefits of wealth, of +all the improvements and progressive rise of the _bourgeoisie_ from one +generation to another. The mother revels in the thought of what he is +and what he will be. She loves him and is glorified herself in him. She +dedicates all her ambitions to him and worships him. This son appears to +her a superior being, and she is amazed that he should have been born of +her; she seems to feel the mingled pride and humility of the mother of a +god. + +Mme. Mauperin was a typical example of one of these mothers of modern +middle-class life. The merits, the features, the intellect of her son +were for her those of a divinity. His whole person, his accomplishments, +everything he said and everything he did, all was sacred to her. She +would spend her time in contemplation of him; she saw no one else when +he was there. It seemed to her as though the whole world began and ended +in her son. He was in her eyes perfection itself, the most intelligent, +the handsomest, and, above all, the most distinguished of men. He was +short-sighted and wore an eye-glass, but she would not even own that he +was near-sighted. + +When he was there she watched him talk, sit down or walk about, and she +would smile at him when his back was turned. She liked the very creases +of his coat. When he was not there she would lean back for a few minutes +in her arm-chair and some reminiscence of infinite sweetness would +gradually brighten and soften her face. It was as though light, +restfulness, and peace had suddenly come to her; her expression was +joyous at such times, her eyes were looking at something in the past, +her heart was living over again some happy moment, and if any one spoke +to her she seemed to wake up out of a dream. + +It was in a certain measure hereditary, this intense maternal love. Mme. +Mauperin came of a race which had always loved its sons with a warm, +violent, and almost frenzied love. The mothers in her family had been +mothers with a vengeance. There was a story told of her grandmother in +the Haute-Marne. It was said that she had disfigured a child with a +burning coal who had been considered handsomer than her own boy. + +At the time of her son's first ailments Mme. Mauperin had almost lost +her reason; she had hated all children who were well, and had hoped that +God would kill them if her son died. Once when he had been seriously ill +she had been forty-eight nights without going to bed, and her legs had +swelled with fatigue. When he was about again he had been allowed +anything and everything. If any one came to complain to her that he had +been fighting with the village children she would say feelingly: "Poor +little dear!" As the boy grew up his mother's spirit preceded him on +his walk through life, strewing his pathway with hope as he emerged into +manhood. She thought of all the heiresses in the neighbourhood whose age +would be suitable to his. She used to imagine him visiting at all the +country-houses, and she saw him on horseback, riding to the meet in a +red coat. She used to be fairly dazzled by all her dreams of the future. + +Then came the time when he went away to college, the time when she had +to separate from him. Mme. Mauperin struggled for three months to keep +her son, to have him educated at home by a tutor, but M. Mauperin was +resolute on this score. All that Mme. Mauperin could obtain from him was +the permission to select the college for her son. She chose one with the +mildest discipline possible, one of those colleges for the children of +wealthy parents, where there is no severity, where the boys are allowed +to eat pastry when they are taking their walks, and where the professors +believe in more theatrical rehearsals than punishments. During the seven +years he was there, Mme. Mauperin never missed a single day going from +Saint-Denis to see him during the recreation hour. Rain, cold, fatigue, +illness, nothing prevented her. In the parlour or in the courtyard the +other mothers pointed her out to each other. The boy would kiss her, +take the cakes she had brought him, and then, telling her he had a +lesson to finish learning, he would hurry back to his games. It was +quite enough for his mother, though, for she had seen him and he was +well. She was always thinking about his health. He was weighed down with +flannel, and in the holidays she fed him well with meat, giving him all +the gravy from underdone beef so that he should grow strong and tall. +She bought him a small mat to sit on at school because the forms were so +hard. There were separate bed-rooms for the pupils, and Mme. Mauperin +furnished her son's like a man's room. At twelve years of age he had a +rosewood dressing-table and chest of drawers of his own. The boy became +a young man, the young man left college, and Mme. Mauperin's passion for +him increased with all that satisfaction which a mother feels in a tall +son when his looks begin to change and his beard makes its first +appearance. Forgetting all about the tradespeople whose bills she had +paid, she was amazed at the style in which her son dressed, at his +boots, and the way in which he did his hair. There was a certain +elegance of taste in everything that he liked, in his luxurious habits, +in his ways, and in his whole life, to which she bowed down in +astonishment and delight, as though she herself were not the mainspring +of it all and his cashier. Her son's valet did not seem to her like an +ordinary domestic; his horse was not merely a horse, it was her son's +horse. When her son went out she gave orders that she should be told so +that she might have the satisfaction of seeing him get into the +carriage and drive away. + +Every day she was more and more taken up with this son. She had no +diversions, nothing to occupy her imagination; she did not read, and had +grown old living with a husband who had brought her no love and whom she +had always felt to be quite apart from her, engrossed as he had ever +been in his studies, politics, and business. She had no one left with +her but a daughter to whom she had never given her whole heart, and so +she had ended by devoting her life to Henri's interests and putting all +her vanity into his future. And her one thought--the thought which +occupied every hour of her days and nights, her fixed idea--was the +marriage of this adored son. She wanted him to marry well, to make a +match which should be rich enough and brilliant enough to make up to her +and repay her for all the dulness and obscurity of her own existence, +for her life of economy and solitude, for all her own privations as wife +and mother. + +"Do you even know your son's age, M. Mauperin?" continued Mme. Mauperin. + +"Henri, why, my dear, Henri must be--He was born in 1826, wasn't he?" + +"Oh, that's just like a father to ask! Yes, 1826, the 12th of July, +1826." + +"Well, then, he is twenty-nine. Fancy that now, he is twenty-nine!" + +"And you fold your arms and take things easily! You don't trouble in the +least about his future! You say, 'Fancy that now, he's twenty-nine'--just +like that, quite calmly! Any other man would stir himself and look +round. Henri isn't like his sister, he wants to marry. Have you ever +thought of finding a suitable match for him--a wife? Oh, dear, no, not +any more than for the King of Prussia, of course not! It's just the same +as it was for your elder daughter. I should like to know what you did +towards that marriage? Whether she found any one or not, it appeared to +be all the same to you. How I did have to urge you on to do anything in +the matter! Oh, you can wipe your hands of that marriage; your +daughter's happiness can't weigh much on your conscience, I should +think! If I had not been there you would have found a husband like M. +Davarande, shouldn't you? A model husband, who adores Henriette--and +such a gentleman!" + +Mme. Mauperin blew out the candle and got into bed by the side of M. +Mauperin, who had turned over with his face towards the wall. + +"Yes," she went on, stretching herself out full length under the sheets, +"a model husband! Do you imagine that there are many sons-in-law who +would be so attentive to us? He would do anything to give us pleasure. +You invite him to dinner and give him meat on fasting-days and he never +says a word. Then, too, he is so obliging. I wanted to match some wools +for my tapestry-work the other day----" + +"My dear, what is it we were talking about? I must tell you that I +should like to get a bit of sleep to-night. You began with your +daughter, and now you've started the chapter of M. Davarande's +perfections. I know that chapter--there's enough to last till to-morrow +morning. Come now, you want your son to marry, don't you? That's it, +isn't it? Well, I'm quite willing--let's get him married." + +"Just as though I could count on you for getting him married! A lot of +trouble you'll go to about it; you are the right sort of man to +inconvenience yourself for anything." + +"Oh, come, come, my dear, that's unjust. It seems to me that about a +fortnight ago I showed you what I was capable of. To go and listen to +the dullest of operas, to eat ices at night, which is a thing I detest, +and to talk about the weather with a provincial man who shouted about +his daughter's dowry on the boulevards. If you don't call that +inconveniencing myself! I suppose you'll say it didn't come to anything? +Was it my fault, though, if the gentleman wanted '_a handsome, manly +husband_,' as he put it, for his daughter? Is it my fault and mine only +if our son has not the frame of a Hercules?" + +"M. Mauperin----" + +"Oh, yes, it is, of course. I am to blame for everything, according to +you. You would make me pass everywhere for a selfish----" + +"Oh, you are like all men!" + +"Thank you on behalf of them all." + +"No, it's in your character--it's no good blaming you. It's only the +mothers who worry. Ah, if you were only like I am; if at every instant +you were thinking of what might happen to a young man. I know Henri is +sensible; but a young man's fancy is so quickly caught. It might be some +worthless creature--some bad lot--one never knows--such things happen +every day. I should go mad! What do you say to sounding Mme. Rosieres? +Shall we?" + +There was no reply, and Mme. Mauperin was obliged to resign herself to +silence. She turned over and over, but could not sleep until daylight +appeared. + + + + +VI + + +"Ah, what's that mean? Where in the world are you going?" asked M. +Mauperin in the morning as Mme. Mauperin stood at the glass putting on a +black lace cape. + +"Where am I going?" said Mme. Mauperin, fastening the cape to her +shoulder with one of the two pins she was holding in her mouth. "Is my +cape too low down? Just look." + +"No." + +"Pull it a little." + +"How fine you are!" said M. Mauperin, stepping back and examining his +wife's dress. + +She was wearing a black dress of the most elegant style, in excellent +taste though somewhat severe looking. + +"I am going to Paris." + +"Oh! you are going to Paris? What are you going to do in Paris?" + +"Oh, dear, how you do worry always with your questions: 'Where are you +going? What are you going to do?' You really want to know, do you?" + +"Well, I was only asking you----" + +"My dear, I am going to confession," said Mme. Mauperin, looking down. + +M. Mauperin was speechless. His wife in the early days of her married +life had gone regularly on Sundays to church. Later she had accompanied +her daughters to their catechism class, and these were all the religious +duties he had ever known her to accomplish. For the last ten years it +seemed to him that she had been as indifferent as he was about such +things--naturally and frankly indifferent. When the first moment of +stupefaction had passed, he opened his mouth to speak, looked at her, +said nothing, and, turning suddenly on his heels, went out of the room +humming a kind of air to which music and words were about all that were +missing. + + * * * * * + +On arriving at a handsome, cheerful-looking house in the Rue de la +Madeleine, Mme. Mauperin went upstairs to the fourth story and rang at a +door where there was no attempt at any style. It was opened promptly. + +"M. l'Abbe Blampoix?" + +"Yes, madame," answered a servant-man in black livery. + +He spoke with a Belgian accent and bowed as he spoke. He took Mme. +Mauperin across the entrance-hall, where a faint odour was just dying +away, and through a dining-room flooded with sunshine, where the cloth +was simply laid for one person. Mme. Mauperin then found herself in a +drawing-room decorated and scented with flowers. Above a harmonium with +rich inlaid work was a copy of Correggio's "Night." On another panel, +framed in black, was the Communion of Marie Antoinette and of her +gendarmes at the Conciergerie, lithographed according to a story that +was told about her. Keepsakes, a hundred little things that might have +been New Year's gifts, filled the brackets. A small bronze statue of +Canova's "Madeleine" was on a table in the middle of the room. + +The tapestry chairs, each one of a different design and piously worked +by hand, were evidently presents which devoted women had done for the +abbe. + +There were men and women waiting there, and each by turn went into the +abbe's room, stayed a few minutes, then came out again and went away. +The last person waiting, a woman, stayed a long time, and when she came +out of the room Mme. Mauperin could not see her face through her double +veil. + +The abbe was standing by his chimney-piece when Mme. Mauperin entered. +He was holding apart the flaps of his cassock like the tails of a coat. + + * * * * * + +The Abbe Blampoix had neither benefice nor parish. He had a large +connection and a specialty: he was the priest of society people, of the +fashionable world, and of the aristocracy. He confessed the frequenters +of drawing-rooms, he was the spiritual director of well-born +consciences, and he comforted those souls that were worth the trouble of +comforting. He brought Jesus Christ within reach of the wealthy. "Every +one has his work to do in the Lord's vineyard," he used often to say, +appearing to groan and bend beneath the burden of saving the Faubourg +Saint-Germain, the Faubourg Saint-Honore, and the Chaussee-d'Antin. + +He was a man of common sense and intellect, an obliging sort of priest +who adapted everything to the precept, "_The letter killeth, and the +spirit maketh alive._" He was tolerant and intelligent, could comprehend +things and could smile. He measured faith out according to the +temperament of the people and only gave it in small doses. He made the +penances light, he loosened the bonds of the cross and sprinkled the way +of salvation with sand. From the hard, unlovely, stern religion of the +poor he had evolved a pleasant religion for the rich; it was easy, +charming, elastic, adapting itself to things and to people, to all the +ways and manners of society, to its customs and habits, and even to its +prejudices. Of the idea of God he had made something quite comfortable +and elegant. + +The Abbe Blampoix had all the fascination of the priest who is well +educated, talented, and accomplished. He could talk well during +confession, and could put some wit into his exhortations and a certain +graciousness into his unction. He knew how to move and interest his +hearers. He was well versed in words that touch the heart and in +speeches that are flattering and pleasing to the ear. His voice was +musical and his style flowery. He called the devil "_the Prince of +evil_," and the eucharist "_the Divine aliment_"! He abounded in +periphrases as highly coloured as sacred pictures. He talked of Rossini, +quoted Racine, and spoke of "_the Bois_" for the Bois de Boulogne. He +talked of divine love in words which were somewhat disconcerting, of +present-day vices with piquant details, and of society in society +language. Occasionally, expressions which were in vogue and which had +only recently been invented, expressions only known among worldly +people, would slip into his spiritual consultations and had the same +effect as extracts from a newspaper in an ascetic book. There was a +pleasant odour of the century about him. His priestly robe seemed to be +impregnated with all the pretty little sins which had approached it. He +was very well up and always to the point with regard to subtle +temptations, admirably shrewd, keen, and tactful in his discussions on +sensuality. Women doted on him. + +His first step, his _debut_ in the ecclesiastical career, had been +distinguished by a veritable seduction and capturing of souls, by a +success which had been a perfect triumph and indeed almost a scandal. +After taking the catechism classes for a year in the parish of B----, +the archbishop had appointed him to other work, putting another priest +in his place. The result of this was a rebellion, as all the girls who +had attended the catechism classes refused to speak or listen to the +newcomer. They had lost their young hearts and heads, and there were +tears shed by all the flock, a regular riot of wailing and sorrow, which +before long changed into revolt. The elder girls, the chief members of +the society, kept up the struggle several months. They agreed together +not to go to the classes, and they went so far as to refuse to hand over +to the cure the cash-box which had been intrusted to them. It was with +the greatest difficulty that they were appeased. + +The success which all this augured to the Abbe Blampoix had not failed +him. His fame had quickly spread. That great force, Fashion, which in +Paris affects everything, even a priest's cassock, had taken him up and +launched him. People came to him from all parts. The ordinary, +commonplace confessions were heard by other priests; but all the choice +sins were brought to him. Around him was always to be heard a hubbub of +great names, of large fortunes, of pretty contritions, and the rustling +of beautiful dresses. Mothers consulted him about taking their +daughters out, and the daughters were instructed by him before going +into society. He was appealed to for permission to wear low-necked +dresses, and he was the man who regulated the modesty of ball costumes +and the propriety of reading certain books. He was also asked for titles +of novels and lists of moral plays. He prepared candidates for +confirmation and led them on to marriage. He baptized children and +listened to the confession of the adulterous in thought. Wives who +considered themselves slighted or misunderstood came to him to lament +over the materiality of their husbands, and he supplied them with a +little idealism to take back to their homes. All who were in trouble or +despair had recourse to him, and he ordered a trip to Italy for them, +with music and painting for diversions and a good confession in Rome. + +Wives who were separated from their husbands addressed themselves to him +when they wanted to return quietly to their home. His conciliations came +between the love of wives and the jealousy of mothers-in-law. He found +governesses for the mothers and lady's maids of forty years of age for +young wives. Newly married wives learned from him to secure their +happiness and to keep their husband's affection by their discreet and +dainty toilettes, by cleanliness and care, by the spotlessness and +elegance of their linen. "My dear child," he would say sometimes, "a +wife should have just a faint perfume of the _lorette_ about her." His +experience intervened in questions of the hygiene of marriage. He was +consulted on such matters as maternity and pregnancy. He would decide +whether a wife should become a mother and whether a mother should suckle +her child. + +This vogue and role, the dealings that he had with women and the +possession of all their secrets, so many confidences and so much +knowledge on all subjects, his intercourse of all kinds with the +dignitaries and lady-treasurers of various societies, and the +acquaintance he had, thanks to the steps he was obliged to take in the +interests of charity, with all the important personages of Paris, all +the influence that, as a clever, discreet, and obliging priest, he had +succeeded in obtaining, had given to the Abbe Blampoix an immense power +and authority which radiated silently and unseen. Worldly interests and +social ambitions were confessed to him. Nearly all the marriageable +individuals in society were recommended to this priest, who professed no +political preferences, who mixed with every one, and who was admirably +placed for bringing families together, for uniting houses, arranging +matches of expediency or balancing social positions, pairing off money +with money, or joining an ancient title to a newly made fortune. It was +as though marriages in Paris had an occult Providence in the person of +this rare sort of man in whom were blended the priest and the lawyer, +the apostle and the diplomatist--Fenelon and M. de Foy. The Abbe +Blampoix had an income of sixteen hundred pounds, the half of which he +gave to the poor. He had refused a bishopric for the sake of remaining +what he was--a priest. + +"To whom have I the honour," began the abbe, who appeared to be +searching his memory for a name. + +"Mme. Mauperin, the mother of Mme. Davarande." + +"Oh, excuse me, madame, excuse me. Your family are not persons whom one +could forget. Do sit down, please--let me give you this arm-chair." + +And then, taking a seat himself with his back to the light, he +continued: + +"I like to think of that marriage, which gave me the opportunity of +making your acquaintance--the marriage of your daughter with M. +Davarande. You and I, madame, you, with the devotion of a mother, and +I--well, with just the feeble insight of a humble priest--brought about +a truly Christian marriage, a marriage which has satisfied the needs of +the dear child as regards her religion and her affection and which was +also in accordance with her social position. Mme. Davarande is one of my +model penitents; I am thoroughly satisfied with her. M. Davarande is an +excellent young man who shares the religious beliefs of his wife, and +that is a rare thing nowadays. One's mind is easy about such happy and +superior young couples, and I am quite convinced beforehand that you +have not come about either of these dear children----" + +"You are right. I am quite satisfied as regards them, and their +happiness is a great joy in my life. It is such a responsibility to get +one's children married. No, monsieur, it is not for them that I have +come; it is for myself." + +"For yourself--madame?" + +And the abbe glanced quickly at her with an expression which softened +just as quickly. + +"Ah, monsieur, time brings many changes. One has a hundred things to +think about before one reaches my age. There are the people one meets, +and society ties, and all that is very entertaining. We give ourselves +up to such things, enjoy them and count on them. We fancy we shall never +need anything beyond. Well, now, monsieur, I have reached the age when +one does need something beyond. You will understand me, I am sure. I +have begun to feel the emptiness of the world. Nothing interests me, and +I should like to come back to what I had given up. I know how indulgent +and charitable you are. I need your counsel and your hand to lead me +back to duties that I have neglected far too long, although I have +always remembered and respected them. You must know how wretched I am, +monsieur." + +While speaking thus, with that easy flow of words so natural to a woman, +and especially to a Parisian woman, and which in Parisian slang is known +as _bagou_, Mme. Mauperin, who had avoided meeting the priest's eyes, +which she had felt fixed on her, now glanced mechanically at a light +which was being stirred by the abbe's hands and which flamed up under a +ray of sunshine, shining brightly in the midst of this room--the +severe-looking, solemn, cold room of a man of business. This light came +from a casket containing some diamonds with which the abbe was idly +playing. + +"Ah, you are looking at this!" said the abbe, catching Mme. Mauperin's +eye and answering her thoughts instead of her phrases. "You are +surprised to see it, are you not? Yes, a jewel-case, a case of +diamonds--and just look at them--rather good ones, too." He passed her +the necklace. "It's odd for that to be here, isn't it? But what was I to +do? This is our modern society. We are obliged to see a little of all +sorts. Such a pitiful scene! I don't feel myself again yet, after +it--such sobs and tears! Perhaps you heard--a poor young wife throwing +herself down here at my feet--a mother of a family, madame! Alas! that's +how the world is--this is what the love of finery and the fondness of +admiration will lead to. People spend and spend, until finally they can +only pay the interest of what they owe at the shops. Yes, indeed, +madame, that happens constantly. I could mention the shops. People hope +to be able to pay the capital some day; they count on a son-in-law to +whom they can tell everything and who will only be too happy to pay his +mother-in-law's debts. But in the meantime the shops get impatient; and +at last they threaten to tell the husband everything. Then--oh, just +think of the anguish then! Do you know that this woman talked just now +of throwing herself into the river? I had to promise to find her twelve +hundred pounds. I beg your pardon, though--a thousand times. Here I am +talking of my own affairs. Let us go back to yours. You had another +daughter--a charming girl. I prepared her for confirmation. Let me see, +now, what was her name?" + +"Renee." + +"Oh, yes, of course, a very intelligent child, very quick--quite an +exceptional character. Tell me now, isn't she married?" + +"No, monsieur, and it's a great trouble to me. You've no idea what a +headstrong girl she is. She is nothing like her sister. It's very +unfortunate for a mother to have a daughter with a character like hers. +I would rather she were a little less intelligent. We have found most +suitable matches for her, and she refuses them in the most thoughtless, +foolish way. There was another one yesterday. And her father spoils her +so." + +"Ah, that's a pity. You have no idea what a maternal affection we have +for these dear children that we have led to Christ. But you don't say +anything about your son, a delightful young man, so good-looking--and +just the age to marry, it seems to me----" + +"Do you know him, monsieur?" + +"I had the pleasure of meeting him once at his sister's, at Mme. +Davarande's, when I went to see her during her illness; those are the +only visits we pay, you know--visits to the sick. Then, too, I have +heard all sorts of good reports about him. You are a fortunate mother, +madame. Your son goes to church, and at Easter he took communion with +the Jesuit Fathers. He has not told you, probably, but he was one of +those society men, true Christians, who waited nearly all night to get +to the confessional--there was such a crowd. Yes, people do not believe +it, but, thank God, it is quite true. Some of the young men waited until +five o'clock in the morning to confess. I need not tell you how deeply +the Church is touched by such zeal, how thankful she is to those who +give her this consolation and who pay her this homage in these sad times +of demoralization and incredulity. We are drawn towards young men who +set such a good example and who are so willing to do what is right, and +we are always ready to give them what help we can and to use any +influence that we may have in certain families in their favour." + +"Oh, monsieur, you are too good. And our gratitude--mine and my +son's--if only you would interest yourself on his behalf. What a happy +thought it was to come to you! You see I came to you as a woman, but as +a mother too. My son is angelic--and then, monsieur, you can do so +much." + +The abbe shook his head with a deprecatory smile of mingled modesty and +melancholy. + +"No, madame, you overestimate our power. We are far from all that you +say. We are able to do a little good sometimes, but it is with great +difficulty. If only you knew how little a priest can do in these days. +People are afraid of our influence; they do not care to meet us outside +the church, nor to speak to us except in the confessional. You yourself, +madame, would be surprised if your confessor ventured to speak to you +about your daily conduct. Thanks to the deplorable prejudices of people +with regard to us, every one's object is to keep us at a distance and to +stand on the defensive." + +"Oh, dear, why, it is one o'clock--and I saw that your table was laid +when I came. I'm quite ashamed of myself. May I come again in a few +days?" + +"My luncheon can always wait," said the Abbe Blampoix, and turning to a +desk covered with papers at his side, he made a sign to Mme. Mauperin to +sit down again. There was a moment's silence, broken only by the rustle +of papers which the abbe was turning over. Finally he drew out a +visiting-card, turned down at the corner, from under a pile of papers, +held it to the light, and read: + +"Twelve thousand pounds in deeds and preference shares. Six hundred +pounds a year from the day of marriage; father and mother dead. +Twenty-four thousand pounds on the death of some uncles and aunts who +will never marry. Young girl, nineteen, charming, much prettier than she +imagines herself to be. You see," said the abbe, putting the card back +among the papers. "Think it over. Anyhow, you will see. I have, too, at +this very moment a thousand pounds a year on her marriage--an +orphan--Ah, no, that would not do--her guardian wants to find some one +who is influential. He is sub-referendary judge on the Board of Finance +and he will only marry his ward to a son-in-law who can get him +promoted. Ah, wait a minute--this would do, perhaps," and he read aloud +from some notes: "Twenty-two years of age, not pretty, accomplished, +intelligent, dresses well, father sixty thousand pounds, three children, +substantial fortune. He owns the house in the Rue de Provence, where the +offices of the _Security_ are, an estate in the Orne, eight thousand +pounds in the Credit Foncier. Rather an opinionated sort of man, of +Portuguese descent. The mother is a mere cipher in the house. There is +no family, and the father would be annoyed if you went to see his +relatives. I am not keeping anything back, as you see; a family dinner +party once a year and that is all. The father will give twelve thousand +pounds for the dowry; he wants his daughter to live in the same house. + +"Yes," continued the abbe, looking through his notes, "that's all I see +that would do for you just now. Will you talk it over with your son, +madame, and consult your husband? I am quite at your service. When I +have the pleasure of seeing you here again, will you bring with you just +a few figures, a little note that would give me an idea of your +intentions with regard to settling your son. And bring your daughter +with you. I should be delighted to see the dear child again." + +"Would you mind fixing some time when I should not disturb you quite so +much as I have done to-day, monsieur?" + +"Oh, madame, my time belongs to every one who has need of me, and I am +only too much honoured. The thing is that in a fortnight's time--if you +came then, I should be in the country, and I only come one day a week to +Paris, then. Yes, it's a sheer necessity, and so I have had to make up +my mind to it. By the end of the winter I get so worn out; I have so +much to attend to, and then these four flights of stairs kill me. But +what am I to do? I am obliged to pay in some way for the right of +having my chapel, for the precious privilege of being able to have mass +in my own home. No one could sleep over a chapel, you see. Ah, an idea +has just struck me: why should you not come to see me in the country--at +Colombes? It would be a little excursion. I have plenty of fruit, and I +take a landowner's pride in my fruit. I could offer you luncheon, a very +informal luncheon. Will you come, madame--and your daughter? Would your +son give me the pleasure of his company too?" + + + + +VII + + +A quarter of an hour later a footman in a red coat opened the door of a +flat on a first floor in the Rue Taitbout in answer to Mme. Mauperin's +ring. + +"Good-morning, Georges. Is my son in?" + +"Yes, madame, monsieur is there." + +Mme. Mauperin had smiled on her son's domestic, and as she walked along +she smiled on the rooms, on the furniture, and on everything she saw. +When she entered the study her son was writing and smoking at the same +time. + +"Well, I never!" he exclaimed, taking his cigar out of his mouth and +leaning his head against the back of his chair for his mother to kiss +him. "It's you, is it, mamma?" he went on, continuing to smoke. "You +didn't say a word about coming to Paris to-day. What brings you here?" + +"Oh, I had some shopping and some visits to pay--you know I am always +behind. How comfortable you are here!" + +"Ah, yes, to be sure, you hadn't seen my new arrangements." + +"Dear me, how well you do arrange everything! There's no one like you, +really. It isn't damp here is it, are you quite sure?" and Mme. Mauperin +put her hand against the wall. "Tell Georges to air the room always when +you are away, won't you?" + +"Yes, yes, mother," said Henri in a bored way, as one answers a child. + +"Oh, why do you have those? I don't like your having such things." Mme. +Mauperin had just caught sight of two swords above the bookcase. "The +very sight of them! When one thinks--" and Mme. Mauperin closed her eyes +for an instant and sat down. "You don't know how your dreadful bachelor +life makes us poor mothers tremble. If you were married, it seems to me +that I should not be so worried about you. I do wish you were married, +Henri!" + +"I do, too, I can assure you." + +"Really? Come, now--mothers, you know--well, secrets ought not to be +kept from them. I am so afraid, when I look at you, handsome as you are, +and so distinguished and clever and fascinating. You are just the sort +of man that any one would fall in love with, and I'm so afraid----" + +"Of what?" + +"Lest you should have some reason for not----" + +"For not marrying, you mean, don't you? A chain--is that what you +mean?" + +Mme. Mauperin nodded and Henri burst out laughing. + +"Oh, my dear mamma, if I had one, make your mind easy, it should be a +polished one. A man who has any respect for himself would not wear any +other." + +"Well, then, tell me about Mlle. Herbault. It was your fault that it all +came to nothing." + +"Mlle. Herbault? The introduction at the Opera with father? Oh, no, it +wasn't that. Yes, yes, I remember, the dinner at Mme. Marquisat's, +wasn't it--the last one? That was a trap you laid for me. I must say you +are sweetly innocent! I was announced: '_Mossieu Henri Mauperin_,' in +that grand, important sort of way which being interpreted meant: +'_Behold the future husband!_' I found all the candles in the +drawing-room lighted up. The mistress of the house, whom I had seen just +twice in my life, overpowered me with her smiles; her son, whom I did +not know at all, shook hands with me. There was a lady with her daughter +in the room, they neither of them appeared to see me. My place at dinner +was next the young person, of course; a provincial family, their money +placed in farms, simple tastes, etc. I discovered all that before the +soup was finished. The mother, on the other side of the table, was +keeping watch over us; an impossible sort of mother, in such a get-up! I +asked the daughter whether she had seen the 'Prophet' at the Opera. +'Yes, it was superb--and then there was that wonderful effect in the +third act. Oh, yes, that effect, that wonderful effect.' She hadn't seen +it any more than I had. A fibber to begin with. I entertained myself +with keeping her to the subject, and that made her crabby. We went back +to the drawing-room and then the hostess began: 'What a pretty dress!' +she said to me. 'Did you notice it? Would you believe that Emmeline has +had that dress five years. I can remember it. She is so careful--so +orderly!' 'All right,' I thought to myself, 'a lot of miserly wretches +who mean to take me in.'" + +"Do you really think so? And yet, from what we were told about them----" + +"A woman who makes her dresses last five years! That speaks for itself, +that's quite enough. I can picture the dowry hoarded up in a stocking. +The money would be in land at two and a half per cent; repairs, taxes, +lawsuits, farmers who don't pay their rent, a father-in-law who makes +over to you unsalable property. No, no, I'm not quite young enough. I +want to get married, but I mean to marry well. Leave me to manage it, +and you'll see. You can make your mind easy; I'm not the sort to be +taken in with: '_She has such beautiful hair and she is so devoted to +her mother!_' You see, mamma, I've thought a great deal about marriage, +although you may not imagine I have. The most difficult thing to get in +this world, the thing we pay the most dearly for, snatch from each +other, fight for, the thing we only obtain by force of genius or by +luck, by meanness, privations, by wild efforts, perseverance, +resolution, energy, audacity or work, is money--isn't that so? Now money +means happiness and the honour of being rich, it means enjoyment, and it +brings with it the respect and esteem of the million. Well, I have +discovered that there is a way of getting it, straightforwardly and +promptly, without any fatigue, without difficulty and without genius, +quite simply, naturally, quickly and honourably; and this way is by +marriage. Another thing I have discovered is that there is no need to be +remarkably handsome nor astonishingly intelligent in order to make a +rich marriage; the only thing necessary is to will it, to will it +coolly, calmly and with all one's force of will-power, to stake all +one's chances on that card; in fact to look upon getting married as +one's object in life, one's future career. I see that in playing that +game it is no more difficult to make an extraordinary marriage than an +ordinary one, to get a dowry of fifty thousand pounds than one of five +thousand; it is merely a question of cool-headedness and luck; the stake +is the same in both cases. In our times when a good tenor can marry an +income of thirty thousand pounds arithmetic becomes a thing of the past. +All this is what I have wanted to explain to you, and I am sure you will +understand me." + +Henri Mauperin took his mother's hand in his as he spoke. She was fairly +aghast with surprise, admiration, and a sentiment very near akin to +respect. + +"Don't you worry yourself," continued her son. "I shall marry +well--better even perhaps than you dream of." + +As soon as his mother had gone Henri took up his pen and, continuing the +article he had commenced for the _Revue economique_, wrote: "The +trajectory of humanity is a spiral and not a circle----" + + + + +VIII + + +Henri Mauperin's age, like that of so many present-day young men, could +not be reckoned by the years of his life; he was of the same age as the +times in which he lived. The coldness and absence of enthusiasm in the +younger generation, that distinguishing mark of the second half of the +nineteenth century, had set its seal on him entirely. He looked grave, +and one felt that he was icy cold. One recognised in him those elements, +so contrary to the French temperament, which constitute in French +history sects without ardour and political parties without enthusiasm, +such as the Jansenism of former days and the Doctrinarianism of to-day. + +Henri Mauperin was a young Doctrinaire. He had belonged to that +generation of children whom nothing astonishes and nothing amuses; who +go, without the slightest excitement, to see anything to which they are +taken and who come back again perfectly unmoved. When quite young he had +always been well behaved and thoughtful. At college it had never +happened to him in the midst of his lessons to go off in a dream, his +face buried in his hands, his elbows on a dictionary and his eyes +looking into the future. He had never been assailed by temptations with +regard to the unknown and by those first visions of life which at the +age of sixteen fill the minds of young men with trouble and delight, +shut up as they are between the four walls of a courtyard with grated +windows, against which their balls bounce and over and beyond which +their thoughts soar. In his class there were two or three boys who were +sons of eminent political men and with them he made friends. While +studying classics he was thinking of the club he should join later on. +On leaving college Henri's conduct was not like that of a young man of +twenty. He was considered very steady, and was never seen in places +where drinking and gambling went on and where his reputation might have +suffered. He was to be met with in staid drawing-rooms, where he was +always extremely attentive and polite to ladies who were no longer +young. All that would have gone against him elsewhere served him there +in good stead. His reserve was considered an attraction, his seriousness +was thought fascinating. + +There are fashions with regard to what finds favour in men. The reign of +Louis Philippe, with its great wealth of scholars, had just accustomed +the political and literary circles of Paris to value in a society man +that something which recalls the cap and gown, that a professor takes +about with him everywhere, even when he has become a minister. + +With women of the upper middle class the taste for gay, lively, +frivolous qualities of mind had been succeeded by a taste for +conversation which savoured of the lecture-room, for science direct from +the professor's chair, for a sort of learned amiability. A pedant did +not alarm them, even though he might be old; when young he was made much +of, and it was rumoured that Henri Mauperin was a great favourite. + +He had a practical mind. He set up for being a believer in all that was +useful, in mathematical truths, positive religions and the exact +sciences. He had a certain compassion for art, and maintained that Boule +furniture had never been made as well as at present. Political economy, +that science which leads on to all things, had appealed to him when he +went out into the world as a vocation and a career, consequently he had +decided to be an economist. He had brought to this dry study a +narrow-minded intelligence, but he had been patient and persevering, and +now, once a fortnight, he published in important reviews a long article +well padded with figures which the women skipped and the men said they +had read. + +By the interest which it takes in the poorer classes, by its care for +their welfare and the algebraic account it keeps of all their misery and +needs, political economy had, of course, given to Henri Mauperin a +colouring of Liberalism. It was not that he belonged to a very decided +Opposition: his opinions were merely a little ahead of Government +principles, and his convictions induced him to make overtures to +whatever was likely to succeed. He limited his war against the powers +that were to the shooting of an arrow or to a veiled allusion, the key +and meaning of which he would by means of his friends convey to the +various _salons_. As a matter of fact, he was carrying on a flirtation, +rather than hostilities, with the Government in power. Drawing-room +acquaintances, people whom he met in society, brought him within reach +of Government influence and into touch with Government patronage. He +would prepare the works and correct the proofs of some high official who +was always busy and who had scarcely time to do more than sign his +books. He had managed to get on good terms with his Prefect, hoping +through him to get into the Council and afterward into the Chamber. He +excelled in playing double parts, and was clever at compromises and +arrangements which kept him in touch with everything without quarrelling +with anybody or anything. Though a liberal and political economist, he +had found a way of turning aside the distrust of the Catholics and their +enmity against himself and his doctrines. He had won the indulgence and +sympathy of some of them, and had managed to make himself agreeable to +the clergy and to flatter the church by linking together material +progress and spiritual progress, the religion of political economy and +that of Catholicism: Quesnay and Saint Augustin, Bastiat and the Gospel, +statistics and God. Then besides this programme of his, the alliance of +Religion and Political Economy, he had a reserve stock of piety, and he +observed most regularly certain religious practices, which won for him +the affectionate regard of the Abbe Blampoix and brought him into secret +communion with believers and with those who observed their religious +duties. + +Henri Mauperin had taken his flat in the Rue Taitbout for the purpose of +entertaining his friends. These entertainments consisted of solemn +parties for young men, where the guests would gather round a table which +looked like a desk and talk about Natural Law, Public Charities, +Productive Forces, and the _Multiplicabilite_ of the Human Species. +Henri tried to turn these reunions into something approaching +conferences. He was selecting the men and looking for the elements he +would require for the famous _salon_ he hoped to have in Paris as soon +as he was married; he lured to his reunions the great authorities and +notabilities of economic science, and invited to a sort of honorary +presidency members of the Institute, whom he had pursued with his +politeness and his newspaper puffs and who, according to his plans, +would some day help him to take his seat among them in the moral and +political science section. + +It was, however, in turning associations to account that Henri had shown +his talent and all his skill. He had from the very first clung to that +great means of getting on peculiar to ciphers--that means by which a man +is no longer one alone, but a unit joined to a number. He had gained a +footing for himself in associations of every kind. He had joined the +d'Aguesseau Debating Society and had glided in and taken his place among +all those young men who were practising speech-making, educating +themselves for the platform, doing their apprenticeship as orators and +their probation as statesmen for future parliamentary struggles. Clubs, +college reunions and banquets of old boys, barriers' lectures, +historical and geographical societies, scientific and benevolent +societies, he had neglected nothing. Everywhere, in all centres which +give to the individual an opportunity of shining and which bring him any +profit by the collective influence of a group, he appeared and was here, +there and everywhere, making fresh acquaintances, forming new +connections, cultivating friendships and interests which might lead him +on to something, thus driving in the landmarks of his various ambitions, +marching ahead, from the committee of one society to the committee of +another society, to an importance, a sort of veiled notoriety and to +one of those names which, thanks to political influence, are suddenly +brought to the front when the right time comes. + +He certainly was well qualified for the part he was playing. Eloquent +and active, he could make all the noise and stir which lead a man on to +success in this century of ours. He was commonplace with plenty of show +about him. In society he rarely recited his own articles, but he usually +posed with one hand in his waistcoat, after the fashion of Guizot in +Delaroche's portrait. + + + + +IX + + +"Well!" exclaimed Renee, entering the dining-room at eleven o'clock, +breathless like a child who had been running, "I thought every one would +be down. Where is mamma?" + +"Gone to Paris--shopping," answered M. Mauperin. + +"Oh!--and where's Denoisel?" + +"He's gone to see the man with the sloping ground, who must have kept +him to luncheon. We'll begin luncheon." + +"Good-morning, papa!" And instead of taking her seat Renee went across +to her father and putting her arms round his neck began to kiss him. + +"There, there, that's enough--you silly child!" said M. Mauperin, +smiling as he endeavoured to free himself. + +"Let me kiss you _tong-fashion_--there--like that," and she pinched his +cheeks and kissed him again. + +"What a child you are, to be sure." + +"Now look at me. I want to see whether you care for me." + +And Renee, standing up after kissing him once more, moved back from her +father, still holding his head between her hands. They gazed at each +other lovingly and earnestly, looking into one another's eyes. The +French window was open and the light, the scents and the various noises +from the garden penetrated into the room. A beam of sunshine darted on +to the table, lighted on the china and made the glass glitter. It was +bright, cheerful weather and a faint breeze was stirring; the shadows of +the leaves trembled slightly on the floor. A vague sound of wings +fluttering in the trees and of birds sporting among the flowers could be +heard in the distance. + +"Only we two; how nice!" exclaimed Renee, unfolding her serviette. "Oh, +the table is too large; I am too far away," and taking her knife and +fork she went and sat next her father. "As I have my father all to +myself to-day I'm going to enjoy my father," and so saying she drew her +chair still nearer to him. + +"Ah, you remind me of the time when you always wanted to have your +dinner in my pocket. But you were eight years old then." + +Renee began to laugh. + +"I was scolded yesterday," said M. Mauperin, after a minute's silence, +putting his knife and fork down on his plate. + +"Oh!" remarked Renee, looking up at the ceiling in an innocent way and +then letting her eyes fall on her father with a sly look in them such as +one sees in the eyes of a cat. "Really, poor papa! Why were you scolded? +What had you done?" + +"Yes, I should advise _you_ to ask me that again; you know better than I +do myself why I was scolded. What do you mean, you dreadful child?" + +"Oh, if you are going to lecture me, papa, I shall get up and--I shall +kiss you." + +She half rose as she said this, but M. Mauperin interrupted her, +endeavouring to speak in a severe tone: + +"Sit down again, Renee, please. You must own, my dear child, that +yesterday----" + +"Oh, papa, are you going to talk to me like this on such a beautiful +day?" + +"Well, but will you explain?" persisted M. Mauperin, trying to remain +dignified in face of the rebellious expression, made up of smiles +mingled with defiance, in his daughter's eyes. "It was very evident that +you behaved in the way you did purposely." + +Renee winked mischievously and nodded her head two or three times +affirmatively. + +"I want to speak to you seriously, Renee." + +"But I am quite serious, I assure you. I have told you that I was like +that on purpose." + +"And why--will you tell me that?" + +"Why? Oh, yes, I'll tell you, but on condition that you won't be too +conceited. It was because--because----" + +"Because of what?" + +"Because I love you much more than that gentleman who was here +yesterday--there now--very much more--it's quite true!" + +"But, then, we ought not to have allowed him to come if you did not care +for this young man. We didn't force you into it. It was you yourself who +agreed that he should be invited. On the contrary, your mother and I +believed that this match----" + +"Excuse me, papa, but if I had refused M. Reverchon at first sight, +point-blank, you would have said I was unreasonable, mad, senseless. I +fancy I can hear mamma now on the subject. Whereas, as things were, what +is there to reproach me with? I saw M. Reverchon once, and I saw him +again, I had plenty of time to judge him and I knew that I disliked him. +It is very silly, perhaps, but it is nevertheless----" + +"But why did you not tell us? We could have found a hundred ways of +getting out of it." + +"You are very ungrateful, papa. I have saved you all that worry. The +young man is drawing out of it himself and it is not your fault at all; +I alone am responsible. And this is all the gratitude I get for my +self-sacrifice! Another time----" + +"Listen to me, my dear. If I speak to you like this it is because it is +a question of your marriage. Your marriage--ah, it took me a long time +to get reconciled to the idea that--to the idea of being separated from +you. Fathers are selfish, you see; they would like it better if you +never took to yourself wings. They have the greatest difficulty in +making up their minds to it all. They think they cannot be happy without +your smiles, and that the house will be very different when your dress +is not flitting about. But we have to submit to what must be, and now it +seems to me that I shall like my son-in-law. I am getting old, you know, +my dear little Renee," and M. Mauperin took his daughter's hands in his. +"Your father is sixty-eight, my child, he has only just time enough left +to see you settled and happy. Your future, if only you knew it, is my +one thought, my one torment. Your mother loves you dearly, too, I know, +but your character and hers are different; and then, if anything +happened to me. You know we must face things; and at my age. You see the +thought of leaving you without a husband--and children--without any love +which would make up to you for your old father's when he is no longer +with you----" + +M. Mauperin could not finish; his daughter had thrown her arms round +him, stifling down her sobs, and her tears were flowing freely on his +waistcoat. + +"Oh, it's dreadful of you, dreadful!" she said in a choking voice. "Why +do you talk about it? Never--never!" and with a gesture she waved back +the dark shadow called up by her imagination. + +M. Mauperin had taken her on his knee. He put his arms round her, kissed +her forehead and said, "Don't cry, Renee, don't cry!" + +"How dreadful! Never!" she repeated once more, as though she were just +rousing herself from some bad dream, and then, wiping her eyes with the +back of her hand, she said to her father: "I must go away and have my +cry out," and with that she escaped. + + * * * * * + +"That Dardouillet is certainly mad," remarked Denoisel, as he entered +the room. "Just fancy, I could not possibly get rid of him. Ah, you are +alone?" + +"Yes, my wife is in Paris, and Renee has just gone upstairs." + +"Why, what's the matter, M. Mauperin? You look----" + +"Oh, it's nothing--a little scene with Renee that I've just had--about +this marriage--this Reverchon. I was silly enough to tell her that I am +in a hurry to see my grandchildren, that fathers of my age are not +immortal, and thereupon--the child is so sensitive, you know. She is up +in her room now, crying. Don't go up; it will take her a little time to +recover. I'll go and look after my work people." + +Denoisel, left to himself, lighted a cigar, picked up a book and went +out to one of the garden seats to read. He had been there about two +hours when he saw Renee coming towards him. She had her hat on and her +animated face shone with joy and a sort of serene excitement. + +"Well, have you been out? Where have you come from?" + +"Where have I come from?" repeated Renee, unfastening her hat. "Well, +I'll tell you, as you are my friend," and she took her hat off and threw +her head back with that pretty gesture women have for shaking their hair +into place. "I've come from church, and if you want to know what I've +been doing there, why, I've been asking God to let me die before papa. I +was in front of a large statue of the Virgin--you are not to laugh--it +would make me unhappy if you laughed. Perhaps it was the sun or the +effect of gazing at her all the time, I don't know, but it seemed to me +all in a minute that she did like this--" and Renee nodded her head. +"Anyhow, I am very happy and my knees ache, too, I can tell you; for all +the time I was praying I was on my knees, and not on a chair or a +cushion either--but on the stone floor. Ah, I prayed in earnest; God +can't surely refuse me that!" + + + + +X + + +A few days after this M. and Mme. Mauperin, Henri, Renee, and Denoisel +were sitting together after dinner in the little garden which stretched +out at the back of the house, between the walls of the refinery and its +outbuildings. The largest tree in the garden was a fir, and the +rose-trees had been allowed to climb up to its lowest branches, so that +its green arms stirred the roses. Under the tree was a swing, and at the +back of it a sort of thicket of lilacs and witch-elms; there was a round +plot of grass, with a garden bench and a very small pool with a white +curbstone round it and a fountain that did not play. The pool was full +of aquatic plants and a few black newts were swimming in it. + +"You don't intend to have any theatricals, then, Renee?" Henri was +saying to his sister. "You've quite given up that idea?" + +"Given up--no; but what can I do? It isn't my fault, for I would act +anything--I'd stand on my head. But I can't find any one else, so that, +unless I give a monologue--Denoisel has refused, and as for you, a +sober man like you--well, I suppose it's no use asking." + +"I, why, I would act right enough," answered Henri. + +"You, Henri?" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin in astonishment. + +"And then, too, we are not short of men," continued Renee, "there are +always men to act. It's for the women's parts. Ah, that's the +difficulty--to find ladies. I don't see who is to act with me." + +"Oh," said Henri, "if we look about among all the people we know, I'll +wager----" + +"Well, let's see: there's M. Durand's daughter. Why, yes--what do you +think? M. Durand's daughter? They are at Saint-Denis; that will be +convenient for the rehearsals. She's rather a simpleton, but I should +think for the role of Mme. de Chavigny----" + +"Ah," put in Denoisel, "you still want to act 'The Caprice'?" + +"Now for a lecture, I suppose? But as I'm going to act with my +brother----" + +"And the performance will be for the benefit of the poor, I hope?" +continued Denoisel. + +"Why?" + +"It would make the audience more disposed to be charitable." + +"We'll see about that, sir, we'll see about it. Well, Emma Durand--will +that do? What do you think, mamma?" + +"They are not our sort of people, my dear," answered Mme. Mauperin +quickly; "they are all very well at a distance, people like that, but +every one knows where they sprang from--the Rue St. Honore. Mme. Durand +used to go and receive the ladies at their carriage-door, and M. Durand +would slip out at the back and take the servant-men to have a glass at +the wine-shop round the corner. That's how the Durands made their +fortune." + +Although at bottom Mme. Mauperin was an excellent sort of woman she +rarely lost an opportunity of depreciating, in this way and with the +most superb contempt and disgust, the wealth, birth and position of all +the people she knew. It was not out of spite, nor was it for the +pleasure of slandering and backbiting, nor yet because she was envious. +She would refuse to believe in the respectability and uprightness of +people, or even in the wealth they were said to have, simply from a +prodigious _bourgeois_ pride, from a conviction that outside her own +family there could be no good blood, and no integrity; that, with the +exception of her own people, every one was an upstart; that nothing was +substantial except what she possessed, and that what she had not was not +worth having. + +"And to think that my wife has tales like that to tell about all the +people we know!" said M. Mauperin. + +"Come now, papa--shall we have the pretty little Remoli girl--shall we?" + +"Ask your mother. Say on, Mme. Mauperin." + +"The Remoli girl? But, my dear, you know--" + +"I know nothing." + +"Oh! do you mean to say that you don't know her father's history? A poor +Italian stucco worker. He came to Paris without a sou and bought a bit +of ground with a wretched little house at Montparnasse. I don't know +where he got the money from to buy it. Well, this land turned out to be +a regular Montfaucon! He sold thirty thousand pounds' worth of his +precious stuff--and then he's been mixed up with Stock Exchange affairs. +Disgusting!" + +"Oh, well," put in Henri, "I fancy you are going out of your way to find +folks. Why don't you ask Mlle. Bourjot? They happen to be at Sannois +now." + +"Mlle. Bourjot?" repeated Mme. Mauperin. + +"Noemi?" said Renee quickly, "I should just think I should like to ask +her. But this winter I thought her so distant with me. She has something +or other--I don't know----" + +"She has, or rather she will have, twelve thousand pounds a year," +interrupted Denoisel, "and mothers are apt to watch over their +daughters when such is the case. They will not allow them to get too +intimate with a sister who has a brother. They have made her understand +this; that's about the long and short of it." + +"Then, too, they are so high and mighty, those folks are; they might +have descended from--And yet," continued Mme. Mauperin, breaking off and +turning to her son, "they have always been very pleasant with you, +Henri, haven't they? Mme. Bourjot is always very nice to you?" + +"Yes, and she has complained several times of your not going to her +soirees; she says you don't take Renee often enough to see her +daughter." + +"Really?" exclaimed Renee, very delighted. + +"My dear," said Mme. Mauperin, "what do you think of what Henri +says--Mlle. Bourjot?" + +"What objection do you want me to make?" + +"Well, then," said Mme. Mauperin, "Henri's idea shall be carried out. +We'll go on Saturday, shall we, my dear? And you'll come with us, +Henri?" + +A few hours later every one was in bed with the exception of Henri +Mauperin. He was walking up and down in his room puffing on a cigar that +had gone out, and every now and then he appeared to be smiling at his +own thoughts. + + + + +XI + + +Renee often went during the day to paint in a little studio, built out +of an old green-house at the bottom of the garden. It was very +rustic-looking, half hidden with verdure and walled with ivy, something +between an old ruin and a nest. + +On a table covered with an Algerian cloth there were, on this particular +day in the little studio, a Japanese box with a blue design, a lemon, an +old red almanac with the French coat of arms, and two or three other +bright-coloured objects grouped together as naturally as possible to +make a picture, with the light from the glass roof falling on them. +Seated in front of the table, Renee was painting all this with brushes +as fine as pins on a canvas which already had something on the under +side. The skirt of her white pique dress hung in ample folds on each +side of the stool on which she was seated. She had gathered a white rose +as she came through the garden and had fastened it in her loosely +arranged hair just above her ear. Her foot, visible below her dress, in +a low shoe which showed her white stocking, was resting on the +cross-bar of the easel. Denoisel was seated near her, watching her work +and making a bad sketch of her profile in an album he had picked up in +the studio. + +"Oh, you do pose well," he remarked, as he sharpened his pencil again; +"I would just as soon try to catch an omnibus as your expression. You +never cease. If you always move like that----" + +"Ah, now, Denoisel, no nonsense with your portrait. I hope you'll +flatter me a little." + +"No more than the sun does. I am as conscientious as a photograph." + +"Let me look," she said, leaning back towards Denoisel and holding her +maulstick and palette out in front of her. "Oh! I am not beautiful. +Truly, now," she continued, as she went on with her painting, "am I like +that?" + +"Something. Come, Renee--honestly now--what do you think you are like +yourself--beautiful?" + +"No." + +"Pretty?" + +"No--no----" + +"Ah, you took the trouble to think the matter over this time." + +"Yes, but I said it twice." + +"Good! If you think you are neither beautiful nor pretty, you don't +fancy either that you are----" + +"Ugly? No, that's quite true. It's very difficult to explain. Sometimes, +now, when I look at myself, I think--how am I to explain? Well, I like +my looks; it isn't my face, I know, it's just a sort of expression I +have at such times, a something that is within me and which I can feel +passing over my features. I don't know what it is--happiness, pleasure, +a sort of emotion or whatever you like to call it. I get moments like +that when it seems to me as though I am taking all my people in finely. +All the same, though, I should have liked to be beautiful." + +"Really!" + +"It must be very pleasant for one's own sake, it seems to me. Now, for +instance, I should have liked to be tall, with very black hair. It's +stupid to be almost blonde. It's the same with white skin; I should have +chosen a skin--well, like Mme. Stavelot, rather orange-coloured. I like +that, but it's a matter of taste. And then I should have enjoyed looking +in my glass. It's like when I get up in the morning and walk about the +carpet with bare feet. I should love to have feet like a statue I once +saw--it's just an idea!" + +"If that's how you feel you wouldn't care about being beautiful for the +sake of other people?" + +"Yes and no. Not for every one--only for those I care for. We ought to +be ugly for people about whom we are indifferent, for all the people we +don't love--don't you think so? They would have just what they deserved +then." + +Denoisel began sketching again. + +"How odd it is, your ideal, to wish to be dark!" he said, after a +moment's silence. + +"What should you like to be?" + +"If I were a woman? I should like to be small and neither very fair nor +very dark----" + +"Auburn then?" + +"And plump--Oh, as plump as a quail." + +"Plump? Ah, I can breathe again. Just for a moment I was afraid of a +declaration--If the light had not shown up your hair I should have +forgotten you were forty." + +"Oh, you don't make me out any older than I am, Renee; that is exactly +my age. But do you know what yours is for me?" + +"No----" + +"Twelve--and you will always be that age to me." + +"Thanks--I am very glad," said Renee. "If that's it I shall always be +able to tell you all the nonsense that comes into my head. Denoisel," +she continued, after a short silence, "have you ever been in love?" She +had drawn back slightly from her canvas and was looking at it sideways, +her head leaning over her shoulder to see the effect of the colour she +had just put on. + +"Oh, well! that's a good start," answered Denoisel. "What a question!" + +"What's the matter with my question? I'm asking you that just as I might +ask you anything else. I don't see anything in it. Would there be any +harm in asking such a thing in society? Come now, Denoisel! you say I am +twelve years old and I agree to be twelve; but I'm twenty all the same. +I'm a _young person_, that's true, but if you imagine that _young +persons_ of my age have never read any novels nor sung any +love-songs--why, it's all humbug--it's just posing as sweet innocents. +After all, just as you like. If you think I am not old enough I'll take +back my question. I thought we were to consider ourselves men when we +talked about things together." + +"Well, since you want to know, yes--I have been in love." + +"Ah! And what effect did it have on you--being in love?" + +"You have only to read over again the novels you have read, my dear, and +you will find the effect described on every page." + +"There, now, that's just what puzzles me; all the books one reads are +full of love--there's nothing but that! And then in real life one sees +nothing of it--at least I don't see anything of it; on the contrary, I +see every one doing without it, and quite easily, too. Sometimes I +wonder whether it is not just invented for books, whether it is not all +imagined by authors--really." + +Denoisel laughed at the young girl's words. + +"Tell me, Renee," he said, "since we are men for the time being, as you +just said and as we talk to each other of what we feel, quite frankly +like two old friends, I should like to ask you in my turn whether you +have ever--well, not been in love with any one, but whether you have +ever cared for any one?" + +"No, never," answered Renee, after a moment's reflection, "but then I am +not a fair example. I fancy that such things happen to people who have +an empty heart, no one to think about; people who are not taken up, +absorbed, possessed and, as it were, protected by one of those +affections which take hold of you wholly and entirely--the affection one +has for one's father, for instance." + +Denoisel did not answer. + +"You don't believe that that does preserve you?" said Renee. "Well, but +I can assure you I have tried in vain to remember. Oh, I'm examining my +conscience thoroughly, I promise you. Well, from my very childhood, I +cannot remember anything--no, nothing at all. And yet some of my little +friends, who were no older than I was, would kiss the inside of the caps +of the little boys who used to play with us; and they would collect the +peach-stones from the plates the little boys had used and put them into +a box and then take the box to bed with them. Yes, I remember all that. +Noemi, for instance, Mlle. Bourjot, was very great at all that. But as +for me, I simply went on with my games." + +"And later on when you were no longer a child?" + +"Later on? I have always been a child as regards all that. No, there is +nothing at all--I cannot remember a single impression. I mean--well, I'm +going to be quite frank with you--I had just a slight, a very slight +commencement of what you were talking about--just a sensation of that +feeling that I recognised later on in novels--and can you guess for +whom?" + +"No." + +"For you. Oh, it was only for an instant. I soon liked you in quite a +different way--and better, too. I respected you and was grateful to you. +I liked you for correcting my faults as a spoiled child, for enlarging +my mind, for teaching me to appreciate all that is beautiful, elevated +and noble; and all, too, in a joking way by making fun of everything +that is ugly and worthless and of everything that is dull or mean and +cowardly. You taught me how to play ball and how to endure being bored +to death with imbeciles. I have to thank you for much of what I think +about, for much of what I am and for a little of any good there is in +me. I wanted to pay my debt with a true and lasting friendship, and by +giving you cordially, as a comrade, some of the affection I have for +father." + +As Renee said these last words she raised her voice slightly and spoke +in a graver tone. + +"What in the world is that?" exclaimed M. Mauperin, who had just entered +and had caught sight of Denoisel's sketch. "Is that intended for my +daughter! Why, it's a frightful libel," and M. Mauperin picked up the +album and began to tear the page up. + +"Oh, papa!" exclaimed Renee, "and I wanted it--for a keepsake!" + + + + +XII + + +A light carriage, drawn by one horse, was conveying the Mauperin family +along the Sannois road. Renee had taken the reins and the whip from her +brother, who was seated at her side smoking. Animated by the drive, the +air, and the movement, M. Mauperin was joking about the people they met +and bowing gaily to any acquaintances they passed. Mme. Mauperin was +silent and absorbed. She was buried in herself, thinking out and +preparing her amiability for the approaching visit. + +"Why, mamma," remarked Renee, "you don't say a word. Are you not well?" + +"Oh, yes, very well, quite well," answered Mme. Mauperin; "but the fact +is I'm worrying rather about this visit--and if it had not been for +Henri--There's something so stiff and cold about Mme. Bourjot--they are +all so high and mighty. Oh, it isn't that they impress me at all--their +money indeed! I know too well where they had it from. They made their +money from some invention they bought from an unfortunate working-man +for a mere nothing--a few coppers." + +"Come, come, Mme. Mauperin," put in her husband, "they must have bought +more than----" + +"Well, anyhow, I don't feel at ease with these people." + +"You are very foolish to trouble yourself----" + +"We can tell them we don't care a hang for their fine airs!" said Mlle. +Mauperin, whipping up the horse so that her slang was lost in the sound +of the animal's gallop. + + * * * * * + +There was some reason for Mme. Mauperin's uneasiness. Her feeling of +constraint was certainly justified. Everything in the house to which she +was going was calculated to intimidate people, to set them down, crush +them, penetrate and overwhelm them with a sense of their own +inferiority. There was an ostentatious and studied show of money, a +clever display of wealth. Opulence aimed at the humiliation of less +fortunate beings, by all possible means of intimidation, by outrageous +or refined forms of luxury, by the height of the ceilings, by the +impertinent airs of the lackeys, by the footman with his silver chain, +stationed in the entrance-hall, by the silver plate on which everything +was served, by all kinds of princely ways and customs, such as the +strict observance of evening dress, even when mother and daughter were +dining alone, by an etiquette as rigid as that of a small German court. +The master and mistress were in harmony with and maintained the style +of their house. The spirit of their home and life was as it were +incarnate in them. + +The man, with all that he had copied from the English gentry, his +manners, his dress, his curled whiskers, his outward distinction; the +woman, with her grand manners, her supreme elegance, all the stiffness +and formality of the upper middle class, represented admirably the pride +of money. Their disdainful politeness, their haughty amiability, seemed +to come down to people. There was a kind of insolence which was visible +in their tastes even. M. Bourjot had neither any pictures nor any +objects of art; his collection was a collection of precious stones, +among which he pointed out a ruby worth a thousand pounds, one of the +finest in Europe. + +People had overlooked all this display of wealth, and the Bourjot's +_salon_ was now very much in vogue and conspicuous on account of its +pronounced tendencies in favour of the Opposition party. It had become, +in fact, one of the three or four important _salons_ of Paris. It had +been peopled after two or three winters which Mme. Bourjot had spent in +Nice under pretext of benefitting her health. She had converted her +house there into a kind of hotel on the road to Italy, open to all who +passed by provided they were great, wealthy, celebrated, or that they +had a name. At her musical evenings, when Mme. Bourjot gave every one +an opportunity for admiring her beautiful voice and her great musical +talent, the celebrities of Europe and Parisians of repute met in her +drawing-room. Scientists, great philosophers and aesthetes mingled with +politicians. The latter were represented by a compact group of +Orleanists and a band of Liberals not pledged to any party, in whose +ranks Henri Mauperin had figured most assiduously for the past year. A +few Legitimists whom the husband brought to his wife's _salon_ were also +to be seen, M. Bourjot himself being a Legitimist. + +Under the Restoration he had been a Carbonaro. He was the son of a +draper, and his birth and name of Bourjot had from his earliest +childhood exasperated him against the nobility, grand houses, and the +Bourbons. He had been in various conspiracies, and had met with M. +Mauperin at Carbonari reunions. He had figured in all the tumults, and +had been fond of quoting Berville, Saint-Just, and Dupin the elder. +After 1830 he had calmed down and had contented himself with sulking +with royalty for having cheated him of his republic. He read the +_National_, pitied the people of all lands, despised the Chambers, +railed at M. Guizot, and was eloquent about the Pritchard affair. + +The events of 1848 came upon him suddenly, and the landowner then woke +up alarmed and rose erect in the person of the Carbonaro of the +Restoration, the Liberal of Louis Philippe's reign. The fall in stocks, +the unproductiveness of houses, socialism, the proposed taxes, the +dangers to which State creditors were exposed, the eventful days of +June, and indeed everything which is calculated to strike terror to the +heart of a moneyed man during a revolution, disturbed M. Bourjot's +equanimity, and at the same time enlightened him. His ideas suddenly +underwent a change, and his political conscience veered completely +round. He hastened to adopt the doctrines of order, and turned to the +Church as he might have done to the police authorities, to the Divine +right as the supreme power and a providential security for his bills. + +Unfortunately, in M. Bourjot's brusque but sincere conversion, his +education, his youth, his past, his whole life rose in revolt. He had +returned to the Bourbons, but he had not been able to come back to Jesus +Christ, and, old man as he now was, he would make all kinds of slips and +give utterance to the attacks and refrains to which he had been +accustomed. One felt, the nearer one came to him, that he was still +quite a Voltairean on certain points, and Beranger was constantly taking +the place of de Maistre with him. + + * * * * * + +"Give the reins to your brother, Renee," said Mme. Mauperin. "I +shouldn't like them to see you driving." + +They were in front of a magnificent large gateway, opposite which were +two lamps that were always lighted and left burning all night. The +carriage turned up a drive, covered with red gravel and planted on each +side with huge clumps of rhododendrons, and drew up before a flight of +stone steps. Two footmen threw open the glass doors leading into a hall +paved with marble and with high windows nearly hidden by the verdure of +a wide screen of exotic shrubs. + +The Mauperins were then introduced into a drawing-room, the walls of +which were covered with crimson silk. A portrait of Mme. Bourjot in +evening dress, signed by Ingres, was the only picture in the room. +Through the open windows could be seen a pool of water, and near it a +stork, the only creature that M. Bourjot would tolerate in his park, and +that on account of its heraldic form. + +When the Mauperins entered the large drawing-room, Mme. Bourjot, seated +by herself on the divan, was listening to her daughter's governess who +was reading aloud. M. Bourjot was leaning against the chimney-piece +playing with his watch-chain. Mlle. Bourjot, near her governess, was +working at some tapestry on a frame. + +Mme. Bourjot, with her large, rather hard blue eyes, her arched +eye-brows, and the lines of her eye-lids, her haughty and pronounced +nose, the supercilious prominence of the lower part of the face, and her +imperious grace, reminded one of Georges, when young, in the role of +Agrippina. Mlle. Bourjot had strongly marked brown eye-brows. Between +her long, curly lashes could be seen two blue eyes with an intense, +profound, dreamy expression in them. A slight down almost white could be +seen when the light was full on her, just above her lip at the two +corners. The governess was one of those retiring creatures, one of those +elderly women who have been knocked about and worn out in the battle of +life, outwardly and inwardly, and who finally have no more effigy left +than an old copper coin. + +"Why, this is really charming!" said Mme. Bourjot, getting up and +advancing as far as a line of the polished floor in the centre of the +room. "What kind neighbours--and what a delightful surprise! It seems an +age since I had the pleasure of seeing you, dear madame, and if it were +not for your son, who is good enough not to forsake us, and who comes to +my Monday Evenings, we should not have known what had become of you--of +this charming girl--and her mamma----" + +As she spoke Mme. Bourjot shook hands with Henri. + +"Oh! you are very kind," began Mme. Mauperin, taking a seat at some +distance from Mme. Bourjot. + +"But please come over here," said Mme. Bourjot, making room at her side. + +"We have postponed our visit from day to day," continued Mme. Mauperin, +"as we wanted to come together." + +"Oh! well, it's very bad of you," continued Mme. Bourjot. "We are not a +hundred miles away; and it is cruel to keep these two children apart, +when they grew up together. Why, how's this, they haven't kissed each +other yet?" + +Noemi, who was still standing, presented her cheek coldly to Renee, who +kissed her as eagerly, as a child bites into fruit. + +"What a long time ago it seems," observed Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin, +as she looked at the two girls, "since we used to take them to the Rue +de la Chaussee d'Antin to those lectures, that bored us as much as they +did the poor children. I can see them now, playing together. Yours was +just like quicksilver, a regular little turk, and mine--Oh, they were +like night and day! But yours always led mine on. Oh, dear, what a rage +they had at one time for charades--do you remember? They used to carry +off all the towels in the house to dress up with." + +"Oh, yes," exclaimed Renee, laughing and turning to Noemi, "our finest +one was when we did _Marabout_; with _Marat_ in a bath that was too hot, +calling out, '_Je bous, je bous_!' Do you remember?" + +"Yes, indeed," answered Noemi, trying to keep back a smile, "but it was +your idea." + +"I am so glad, madame, to find you quite inclined beforehand for what I +wanted to ask you--for my visit is a selfish one. It was chiefly with +the idea of letting our daughters see something of each other that I +came. Renee wants to get up a play, and she naturally thought of her old +school-friend. If you would allow your daughter to take part in a piece +with my daughter--it would be just a little family affair--quite +informal." + +As Mme. Mauperin made this request, Noemi, who had been talking to Renee +and had put her hand in her friend's, drew it away again abruptly. + +"Thank you so much for the idea," answered Mme. Bourjot, "thanks, too, +to Renee. You could not have asked me anything that would have suited me +better and given me so much pleasure. I think it would be very good for +Noemi--the poor child is so shy that I am in despair! It would make her +talk and come out of herself. For her mind, too, it would be an +excellent stimulant----" + +"Oh! but, mother, you know very well--why, I've no memory. And then, +too--why, the very idea of acting frightens me. Oh, no--I can't act----" + +Mme. Bourjot glanced coldly at her daughter. + +"But, mother, if I could--No, I should spoil the whole play, I'm sure." + +"You will act--I wish you to do so." + +Noemi looked down, and Mme. Mauperin, slightly embarrassed and by way of +changing the subject, glanced at a Review that was lying open on a +work-table at her side. + +"Ah!" said Mme. Bourjot, turning to her again, "you've found something +you know there--that is your son's last article. And when do you intend +having this play?" + +"Oh, but I should be so sorry to be the cause--to oblige your +daughter----" + +"Oh! don't mention it. My daughter is always afraid of undertaking +anything." + +"Well, but if Noemi really dislikes it," put in M. Bourjot, who had been +talking to M. Mauperin and Henri on the other side of the room. + +"On the contrary she will be grateful to you," said Mme. Bourjot, +addressing Mme. Mauperin without answering M. Bourjot. "We are always +obliged to insist on her doing anything for her own enjoyment. Well, +when is this play?" + +"Renee, when do you think?" asked Mme. Mauperin. + +"Why, I should think about--well, we should want a month for the +rehearsals, with two a week. We could fix the days and the time that +would suit Noemi." + +Renee turned towards Noemi, who remained silent. + +"Very well, then," said Mme. Bourjot, "let us say Monday and Friday at +two o'clock, if that will suit you--shall we?" And turning to the +governess she continued: "Mlle. Gogois, you will accompany Noemi. M. +Bourjot--you hear--will you give orders for the horses and carriage and +the footman to take them to Briche? You can keep Terror for me, and +Jean. There, that's all settled. Now, then, you will stay and dine with +us, won't you?" + +"Oh! we should like to very much; but it is quite impossible. We have +some people coming to us to-day," answered Mme. Mauperin. + +"Oh, dear, how tiresome of them to come to-day! But I don't think you +have seen my husband's new conservatories. I'll make you a bouquet, +Renee. We have a flower--there are only two of them anywhere, and the +other is at Ferrieres--it's a--it's very ugly anyhow--this way." + +"Suppose we were to go in here," said M. Bourjot, pointing to the +billiard-room, which could be seen through the glass door. "M. Henri, +we'll leave you with the ladies. We can smoke here," added M. Bourjot, +offering a _cabanas_ to M. Mauperin. "Shall we have cannoning?" + +"Yes," replied M. Mauperin. + +M. Bourjot closed the pockets of the billiard-table. + +"Twenty-four?" + +"Yes, twenty-four." + +"Have you billiards at home, M. Mauperin?" + +"No, I haven't. My son doesn't play." + +"Are you looking for the chalk?" + +"Thanks. And as my wife doesn't think it a suitable game for girls----" + +"It's your turn." + +"Oh! I'm quite out of practice--I always was a duffer at it though." + +"Well, but you are not giving me the game at all. There, it's all up +with my play--I was used to that cue," and M. Bourjot gave vent to his +feelings in an oath. "These rascals of workmen--they haven't any +conscience at all. There's no getting anything well made in these days. +Well, you _are_ scoring: three, I'll mark it. The fact is we are at +their service. The other day, now, I wanted some chandeliers put up. +Well, would you believe it, M. Mauperin, I couldn't get a man? It was a +holiday--I forget what holiday it was--and they would not come--they are +the lords of creation, nowadays. Do you imagine that they ever bring us +anything of what they shoot or fish? Oh, no, when they get anything +dainty they eat it themselves. I know what it is in Paris--four? Oh, +come now! Every penny they earn is spent at the wine-shop. On Sundays +they spend at least a sovereign. The locksmith here has a Lefaucheux gun +and takes out a shooting license. Ah, two for me at last! And the money +they ask now for their work! Why, they want four shillings a day for +mowing! I have vineyards in Burgundy, and they proposed to see to them +for me for three years, and then the third year they would be their own. +This is what we are coming to! Luckily for me I'm an old man, so that it +won't be in my time; but in a hundred years from now there will be no +such thing as being waited on--there'll be no servants. I often say to +my wife and daughter: 'You'll see--the day will come when you will have +to make your own beds. Five?--six?--- you _do_ know how to play. The +Revolution has done for us, you know." And M. Bourjot began to hum: + + "'Et zonzon, zonzon, zonzon, + Zonzon, zonzon---- '" + +"These were not exactly your ideas some thirty years ago, when we met +for the first time; do you remember?" said M. Mauperin with a smile. + +"That's true. I had some fine ideas in those days--too fine!" replied M. +Bourjot, resting his left hand on his cue. "Ah, we were young--I should +just think I do remember. It was at Lallemand's funeral.--By Jove! that +was the best blow I ever gave in my life--a regular knock-you-down. I +can see the nails in that police inspector's boots now, when I had +landed him on the ground so that I could cross the boulevards. At the +corner of the Rue Poissonniere I came upon a patrol--they set about me +with a vengeance. I was with Caminade--you knew Caminade, didn't you? He +was a lively one. He was the man who used to go and smoke his pipe at +the mission service belonging to the Church of the Petits-Peres. He went +with his meerschaum pipe that cost nearly sixty pounds, and he took a +girl from the Palais-Royal. He was lucky, for he managed to escape, but +they took me to the police station, belabouring me with the butt-end of +their guns. Fortunately Dulaurens caught sight of me----" + +"Ah--Dulaurens!" said M. Mauperin. "We were in the same Carbonari +society. He had a shawl shop, it seems to me." + +"Yes, and do you know what became of him?" + +"No. I lost sight of him." + +"Well, one fine day--it was after all this business--his partner went +off to Belgium, taking with him eight thousand pounds. They put the +police on his track, but they could hear nothing of him. Our friend +Dulaurens goes into a church and makes a vow to get converted if he +finds his money again. They find his money for him and now his piety is +simply sickening. I never see him now; but in the old days he was a +lively one, I can tell you. Well, when I saw him I gave him a look and +he understood. You see, I had twenty-five guns in my house and five +hundred cartridges. When the police went there to search he had cleared +them away. All the same I was kept three months shut up in the new +building, and two or three times was fetched up in the night to be +cross-examined, and I always went with a vague idea in my mind that I +was going to be shot. You've gone through it all, and you know what it +is.--And all that was for the sake of Socialism! And yet I heard a few +words that ought to have enlightened me. When I was free again one of my +prison friends came to see me at Sedan. 'Why, what's this,' he said, +'that I am told at the hotel? It seems that your father has land and +money, and yet you have joined us! Why, I thought you hadn't anything!' +Just fancy now, M. Mauperin--and when I think that even that did not +open my eyes! You see I was convinced in those days that all those with +whom I was in league wanted simply what I wanted: laws for rich and poor +alike, the abolition of privileges, the end of the Revolution of '89 +against the nobility--I thought we should stop there--eleven? Did I mark +your last? I don't think I did--let us say twelve. But, good heavens! +when I saw my republic I was disgusted with it, when I heard two men, +who had just come down from the barricades in February, say, 'We ought +not to have left them until we had made sure of two hundred a year!' And +then the system of taxes according to the income; it's an iniquity--the +hypocrisy of communism. But with taxes regulated by the income," +continued M. Bourjot, eloquently breaking off in the midst of his own +phrase, "I challenge them to find any one who will care to take the +trouble of making a large fortune--thirteen, fourteen, fifteen--very +good! Oh, you are too strong a player. All that has made me turn +round--you understand?" + +"Perfectly," replied M. Mauperin. + +"Where's my ball--there? Yes, it has made me turn completely round; it +has positively made a Legitimist of me. There--a bad cue again! But----" + +"But what?" + +"Well, there is one thing--Oh, on that subject, now, I have the same +opinions still. I don't mind telling you. Anything approaching a +parson--eighteen?--Oh, come, I'm done for! We invite the one here in +this place--he's a very decent fellow; but as to priests--when you've +known one as I have, who broke his leg getting over the college wall at +night--they are a pack of Jesuits, you know, M. Mauperin! + + "'Hommes noirs, d'ou sortez-vous? + Nous sortons de dessous, terre.'" + +"Ah, that's my man! The god of simple folks! + + "'Mes amis, parlons plus bas: + Je vois Judas, je vois Judas!'" + +"Twenty-one! You've only three more. Now, at the place where my +iron-works are, there's a bishop who is very easy-going. Well, all the +bigots detest him. Now, if he pretended to be a bigot, if he were a +hypocrite and spent all his time at church----" + + * * * * * + +"I never saw Mme. Bourjot so amiable," remarked Mme. Mauperin, when she +and her family were all back in the carriage. + +"An odd chap, that Bourjot," observed M. Mauperin. "It isn't much good +having a billiard-table of his own either--I could have given him a +start of twelve." + +"I think Noemi is very strange," said Renee. "Did you see, Henri, how +she wanted to get out of acting?" + +Henri did not answer. + + + + +XIII + + +Noemi had just entered Mme. Mauperin's drawing-room followed by her +governess. She looked uncomfortable and ill at ease, almost shy, in +fact, but on glancing round she appeared to be somewhat reassured. She +advanced to speak to Mme. Mauperin, who kissed her. Renee then embraced +her, and, joking and laughing all the time, proceeded to take off her +friend's cape and hat. + +"Ah, I'm forgetting," she exclaimed, turning the dainty white hat +trimmed with pink flowers round on her hand, "let me introduce M. +Denoisel again. You have met him before in the old days--that sounds as +though we were quite aged, doesn't it?--and he is our theatrical +manager, our professor of elocution, our prompter--scene +shifter--everything." + +"I have not forgotten how kind M. Denoisel used to be to me when I was a +little girl," and Noemi, flushing with emotion as her thoughts went back +to her childhood, held out her hand somewhat awkwardly and with such +timidity that her fingers all clung together. + +"Oh, but what a pretty costume!" continued Renee, walking round her. +"You look sweet," and then patting her own taffeta dress, which was +rather the worse for wear, she held out her skirt and made a low +reverence. "You'll make a rather pretty Mathilde--I shall be jealous, +you know.--But look, mamma," she continued, drawing herself up to her +full height. "I told you so--she makes me quite small.--Now, then--you +see you are much taller than I am." As she spoke she placed herself side +by side with Noemi and, putting her arm round her waist, led her to the +glass and put her shoulder against her friend's. "There, now!" she +exclaimed. + +The governess was keeping in the background at the other end of the +_salon_. She was looking at some pictures in a book that she had only +dared to half open. + +"Come, my dears, shall we begin to read the play?" said Mme. Mauperin. +"It's no use waiting for Henri; he will only come to the last rehearsals +when the actresses are well on." + +"Oh, just now, mamma, let us talk first. Come and sit here, Noemi. +There--we have a lot of little secrets, so many things that have +happened since we last met to tell each other about--it is ages ago." + +And Renee began prattling and chirping away with Noemi. Their +conversation sounded like the fresh, clear, never-ending babbling of a +brook, breaking off now and again in a peal of laughter and dying away +in a whisper. Noemi, who was very guarded at first, soon gave herself up +to the delight of confiding in her friend and of listening to this voice +which brought back so many memories of the past. They asked each other, +as one does after a long absence, about all that had happened and what +they had each been doing. At the end of half an hour, to judge by their +conversation, one would have said they were two young women who had +suddenly become children again together. + +"I go in for painting," said Renee, "what do you do? You used to have a +beautiful voice." + +"Oh, don't mention that," said Noemi. "They make me sing. Mamma insists +on my singing at her big parties--and you've no idea how dreadful it is. +When I see every one looking at me, a shiver runs through me. Oh, I'm so +frightened--the first few times I burst out crying----" + +"Well, we'll have a little refreshment now. I've saved a green apple for +you that I was going to eat myself. I hope you still like green apples?" + +"No, thanks, Renee dear, I'm not hungry, really." + +"I say, Denoisel, what can you see that is so interesting--through that +window?" + +Denoisel was watching the Bourjot's footman in the garden. He had seen +him dust the bench with a fine cambric handkerchief, spread the +handkerchief over the green laths, sit down on it in a gingerly way in +his red velvet breeches, cross his legs, take a cigar out of his pocket +and light it. He was now looking at this man as he sat there smoking in +an insolent, majestic way, glancing round at this small estate with the +supercilious expression of a servant whose master lives in a mansion and +owns a park. + +"Why, nothing at all," said Denoisel, coming away from the window; "I +was afraid of intruding." + +"We have told each other all our secrets now; so you can come and talk +to us." + +"You know what time it is, Renee?" put in Mme. Mauperin. "If you want to +begin the rehearsal to-day----" + +"Oh, mamma, please--it's so warm to-day--and then, too, it's Friday." + +"And the year began on a 13th," remarked Denoisel gravely. + +"Ah!" said Noemi, looking at him with her trustful eyes. + +"Don't listen to him--he's taking you in. He plays jokes of that kind on +you all day long--Denoisel does. We'll rehearse next time you come, +shall we?--there's plenty of time." + +"As you like," answered Noemi. + +"Very well, then; we'll take a holiday. Denoisel, be funny--at once. And +if you are very funny--very, very funny--I'll give you a picture--one +of my own----" + +"Another?" + +"Oh, well, you are polite--I work myself to death----" + +"Mademoiselle," said Denoisel to Noemi, "you shall judge of the +situation. I have now a picture of a mad-apple and a parsnip, and then +to hang with that a slice of pumpkin and a piece of Brie cheese. There's +a great deal of feeling, I know, of course, in such subjects; but all +the same from the look of my room any one would take me for a private +fruiterer." + +"That's how men are, you see," said Renee gaily to Noemi. "They are all +ungrateful, my dear--and to think that some day we shall have to marry. +Do you know that we are quite old maids--what do you think of that? +Twenty years old--oh, how quickly time goes, to be sure! We think we +shall never be eighteen, and then, no sooner are we really eighteen than +it's all over and we can't stay at that age. Well, it can't be helped. +Oh, next time you come, bring some music with you and we'll play duets. +I don't know whether I could now." + +"And we shall rehearse--_quand_?" asked Denoisel. + +"In Normandy!" answered Renee, indulging in that kind of joke which for +the last few years has been in favour with society people, and which had +its origin in the workshop and the theatre. Noemi looked perplexed, as +though she had not caught the sense of the word she had just heard. + +"Yes," said Renee, "Caen is in Normandy. Ah, you don't go in for +word-endings? I used to have a mania for them some time ago. I was quite +unbearable with it--wasn't I, Denoisel? And so you go out a great deal. +Tell me about your balls." + +Noemi did as she was requested, speaking freely and getting gradually +more and more animated. She smiled as she spoke, and as her restraint +wore off her movements and gestures were graceful. It seemed as if she +had expanded under the influence of this air of liberty, here with Renee +in this gay, cheerful drawing-room. + +At four o'clock the governess rose as if moved by machinery. + +"It is time we started, mademoiselle," she said. "There is a +dinner-party, you know, at Sannois, and you will want time to dress." + + + + +XIV + + +"This time you must not expect to enjoy yourself; we are going to +rehearse in good earnest," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Noemi, come and sit +down there--that's it. We are ready now, are we not? One--two--three," +he continued, clapping his hands, "begin." + +"The fact is--the first scene," said Noemi, hesitatingly, "I am not +quite sure of it--I know the other better." + +"The second, then? We'll begin with the second--I'll take Henri's part: +'_Good evening, my dear_---- '" + +Denoisel was interrupted by a peal of laughter from Renee. + +"Oh, dear!" she said to Noemi, "how funnily you are sitting! You look +like a piece of sugar held in the sugar-tongs." + +"Do I?" said Noemi, quite confused and trying to find a better pose. + +"If only you would be kind enough not to interrupt the actors, Renee," +said Denoisel. "'_Good evening, my dear_,'" he repeated, continuing his +role, "'_do I disturb you_?'" + +"Oh! and where are the purses?" exclaimed Renee. + +"Why, I thought you were to see to them." + +"I?--not at all. You were to see to them. You are a nice one to count on +for the stage properties! I say, Noemi, if you were married, would it +ever dawn upon you to give your husband a purse? It's rather shoppy, +isn't it? Why not a smoking-cap, at once?" + +"Are we going to rehearse?" asked Denoisel. + +"Oh, Denoisel, you said that just like a man who really wants to go and +have a smoke!" + +"I always do want to smoke, Renee," answered Denoisel, "and especially +when I ought not to." + +"Why, it's quite a vice, then, with you." + +"I should just think it is; and so I keep it." + +"Well, but what pleasure can you find in smoking?" + +"The pleasure of a bad habit--that is the explanation of many passions. +'_Good evening, my dear_,'" he repeated, once more going back to M. de +Chavigny's arrival on the scene, "'_do I disturb you_?'" + +"_Disturb me, Henri--what a question!_" replied Noemi. + +And the rehearsal continued. + + + + +XV + + +"Three o'clock," said Renee, looking up at the time-piece from the +little woollen stocking she was knitting. "Really, I begin to think +Noemi will not come to-day. She'll spoil the rehearsal. We shall have to +fine her." + +"Noemi?" put in Mme. Mauperin, as though she had just woke up. "Why, she +isn't coming. Oh, I never told you! I don't know what's the matter with +me--I forget everything lately. She told me last time that very probably +she would not be able to come to-day. They are expecting some people--I +fancy--I forget----" + +"Well, that's pleasant! There is nothing more tiresome than that--to +expect people who don't come after all. And this morning when I woke I +said to myself, 'It's Noemi's day.' I was looking forward to having her. +Oh, it's quite certain she won't come now. It's funny how I miss her +now--Noemi, when she isn't here--ever since she began to take me on +again. I miss her just as though she were one of the family. I don't +think her amusing, she isn't lively, she isn't at all gay, and then as +regards intelligence, why, she's rather feeble--you can take her in so +easily. And yet--how is it now?--in spite of all that there is a +fascination about her. There is something so sweet, so very sweet about +her, and it seems to penetrate you. She calms your nerves, positively, +and then the effect she has on you--why, she seems to warm your heart +for you, and only by being there, near you. I've known lots of girls who +had really more in them, but they haven't what she has. I've always felt +as cold as steel with all of them." + +"Oh, well, it's very simple," said Denoisel. "Mlle. Bourjot is of a very +affectionate, loving disposition. There is a sort of current of +affection between such natures and others." + +"When she was quite little, I can remember, she was just the same--and +so sensitive. How she used to cry, and how fond she was of kissing me; +it was amazing--she did nothing else, in fact. And her face tells you +just what she is, doesn't it? Her beauty seems to be made up of all the +affection she feels, and of all that she has left of her childhood about +her. And above all it is her expression. You often feel rather wicked +and spiteful, but when she looks at you with that expression of hers it +is as though everything of that kind disappears--as though something is +melting away. Would you believe that I never ventured to play a single +trick on her, and yet I was a terrible tease in the old days!" + +"Nevertheless, it's very extraordinary to be as affectionate as all +that," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Oh, no, it's quite natural," answered Denoisel. "Imagine a girl, who is +born with the instinct of loving, just as we have the instinct of +breathing. She is repelled by the coldness of a mother, who feels +herself humiliated by her daughter, and who is ashamed of her; she is +repelled also by the selfishness of a father, who has no other pride, no +other love, and no other child but his wealth; well, a girl like this +would be just like Mlle. Bourjot, and in return for any trifling +interest you might take in her, she would repay you by the affection and +the effusions of which you speak. Her heart would simply overflow with +gratitude and love, and you would see in her eyes the expression Renee +has noticed, an expression which seems to shine out through tears." + + + + +XVI + + +The rehearsals had been going on a fortnight, when one day Mme. Bourjot +herself brought her daughter to the Mauperins. After the first greetings +she expressed her surprise at not seeing the chief actor. + +"Oh, Henri has such a wonderful memory," said Mme. Mauperin; "he will +only need a couple of rehearsals." + +"And how is it getting on?" asked Mme. Bourjot. "I must own that I +tremble for my poor Noemi. Is it going fairly well? I came to-day, in +the first place, to have the pleasure of seeing you, and then I thought +I should like to judge for myself----" + +"Oh, you can be quite at your ease," said Mme. Mauperin. "You will see +how perfectly natural your daughter is. She is quite charming." + +The actors went to their places and began the first scene of _The +Caprice_. + +"Oh, you flattered her," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. Mauperin after the +first two or three scenes. "My dear child," she continued, turning to +her daughter, "you don't act as though you felt it; you are merely +reciting." + +"Oh, madame," exclaimed Renee, "you will frighten all the company. We +need plenty of indulgence." + +"You are not speaking for yourself," answered Mme. Bourjot. "If only my +poor child acted as you do." + +"Well, then," said Denoisel to Mme. Bourjot, "let us go on to the sixth +scene, mademoiselle. We'll hear what they have to say about that, for I +think you do it very well indeed; and as my vanity as professor is at +stake, Mme. Bourjot will perhaps allow me----" + +"Oh, monsieur," said Mme. Bourjot, "I do not think it has anything to do +with the professor in this case; you are not responsible at all." + +The scene was given and Mme. Bourjot continued, "Yes, oh yes, that +wasn't bad; that might pass. It's a namby-pamby sort of scene, and that +suits her. Then, too, she does her utmost; there's nothing to be said on +that score." + +"Oh, you are severe!" exclaimed Mme. Mauperin. + +"You see, I'm her mother," murmured Mme. Bourjot, with a kind of sigh. +"And then you'll have a crowd of people here----" + +"Oh, you know one always gets more people than one wants on such +occasions," said Mme. Mauperin. "There is always a certain amount of +curiosity. I suppose there will be about a hundred and fifty people." + +"Suppose I were to make the list, mamma?" suggested Renee, who was +anxious to spare Noemi the rest of the rehearsal, as she saw how ill at +ease her friend was. "It would be a good way of introducing our guests +to Mme. Bourjot. You will make the acquaintance of our acquaintances, +madame." + +"I shall be very pleased," replied Mme. Bourjot. + +"It will be rather a mixed dish, I warn you. It always seems to me that +the people one visits are rather like folks one comes across in a +stage-coach." + +"Oh, that's a delightful idea--and so true too," said Mme. Bourjot. + +Renee took her seat at the table and began to write down with a pencil +the names of the people, talking herself all the time. + +"First comes the family--we'll leave that. Now, then, who is there? Mme. +and Mlle. Chanut, a girl with teeth like the pieces of broken glass +people put on their walls--you know what I mean. M. and Mme. de +Belizard--people say that they feed their horses with visiting-cards." + +"Renee, Renee, come, what will every one think of you?" + +"Oh, my reputation's made. I needn't trouble any more about that. Then, +too, if you imagine that people don't say quite as much about me as I +say----" + +"Oh, let her alone, please, let her alone," said Mme. Bourjot to Mme. +Mauperin, and turning to Renee she asked with a smile, "And who comes +next?" + +"Mme. Jobleau. Ah, she's such a bore with her story about her +introduction to Louis Philippe at the Tuileries. '_Yes, sire; yes, sire; +yes, sire;_' that was all she found to say. M. Harambourg, who can't +stand any dust--it makes him faint--every summer he leaves his +man-servant in Paris to get the dust from between the cracks of the +floors. Mlle. de la Boise, surnamed the Grammar Dragoon; she used to be +a governess, and she will correct you during a conversation if you make +a slip with the subjunctive mood. M. Loriot, President of the Society +for the Destruction of Vipers. The Cloquemins, father, mother, and +children, a family--well, like Pan's pipes. Ah! to be sure, the Vineux +are in Paris; but it's no use inviting them; they only go to see people +who live on the omnibus route. Why, I was forgetting the Mechin +trio--three sisters--the Three Graces of Batignolles. One of them is an +idiot, one----" + +Renee stopped short as she saw Noemi's scared eyes and horrified +expression. She looked like some poor, loving creature, who scarcely +understood, but who had suddenly been troubled and stirred to the depth +of her soul by all this backbiting. Getting up from her seat Renee ran +across and kissed her. "Silly girl!" she said gently, "why, these people +I am talking about are not people that I like." + + + + +XVII + + +Henri only came to the last rehearsals. He knew the play and was ready +with his part in a week. _The Caprice_ was a very short piece for the +_soiree_, and it was decided to finish up with something comic. Two or +three short plays given at the Palais Royal were tried, but given up as +there were not enough actors, and finally a very nonsensical thing was +chosen that was just then having a great run in one of the smaller +theatres, and which Henri had insisted on in spite of Mlle. Bourjot's +apparently groundless objection to it. Considering her usual timidity, +every one was surprised at her obstinacy on this point; but it seemed, +since Henri had been there, as if she were not quite herself. Renee +fancied at times that Noemi was not the same with her now, and that her +friendship had cooled. She was surprised to see a spirit of +contradiction in her which she had never known before, and she was quite +hurt at Noemi's manner to her brother. She was very cool with him, and +treated him with a shade of disdain which bordered on contempt. Henri +was always polite, attentive, and ready to oblige, but nothing more. In +all the scenes in which he and Noemi acted together he was so reserved, +so correct, and indeed so circumspect, that Renee, who feared that the +coldness of his acting would spoil the play, joked him about it. + +"Pooh!" he answered, "I'm like the great actors. I'm keeping my effects +for the first night." + + + + +XVIII + + +A small stage had been put up at the end of Mme. Mauperin's +drawing-room, and a leafy screen, made of branches of pine and flowering +shrubs, hid the footlights from view. Renee, with the help of her +drawing-master, had painted the drop-scene, which looked something like +the banks of the Seine. On each side of the stage was a hand-painted +poster which read as follows: + + BRICHE THEATRE + + TO-DAY + + THE CAPRICE + + AND + + PIERROT, BIGAMIST + + +The names of the actors were at the end of the bill. All the chairs in +the house were placed closely together in rows in front of the stage, +and the ladies, in evening dress, were seated, their skirts, their +laces, the flashing of their diamonds, and their white shoulders all +mingling together. The two doors at the other end of the room leading +into the dining-room and the small _salon_ had been taken off their +hinges, and the masculine part of the audience, in white neckties, were +grouped together there and standing on tip-toe. + +The curtain rose on the first scene of _The Caprice_. Renee was very +lively as Mme. de Lery; Henri, in the role of husband, proved himself a +talented amateur actor, as so many young men of a cold temperament, and +grave society men, often do. Noemi, well sustained by Henri, admirably +prompted by Denoisel, and slightly carried away by seeing the large +audience, played her touching part as the neglected wife very passably. +This was a great relief to Mme. Bourjot, who was seated in the front row +anxiously watching her daughter. Her vanity had been alarmed by the +thought of a fiasco. The curtain fell, and amid the applause were heard +shouts for "_All the actors!_" Her daughter had not made herself +ridiculous, and the mother was delighted with this great success and +gave herself up complacently to listening to that Babel of voices, +opinions, and criticisms, which at amateur dramatic performances +succeeds the applause and continues it, as it were, in a sort of murmur. +In the midst of it all she heard vaguely one phrase, spoken near her, +that came to her distinctly and seemed to rise above the general hubbub. + +"Yes, it's his sister, I know," some one was saying; "but for the role +he takes I don't think he is sufficiently in love with her; he is really +far too much in love with his wife--didn't you notice?" + +The lady who was speaking saw that Mme. Bourjot was listening, and, +leaning towards her neighbour, whispered something to her. This little +incident made Mme. Bourjot turn very serious. + +After an interval the curtain was once more raised, and Henri Mauperin +appeared as Pierrot, but not arrayed in the traditional calico blouse +and black cap. He was an Italian Pierrot, with a straight felt hat, and +was entirely clothed in satin from his coat to his slippers. There was a +movement among the ladies, which meant that they thought both the man +and the costume charming, and then the buffoonery began. + +It was the silly story of Pierrot married to one woman and wishing to +marry another; a farce mingled with passion, which had been discovered +by a vaudeville-writer, aided by a poet, among the stock-pieces of the +old Italian theatre. Renee took the part of the deserted wife, this +time, appearing in various disguises when her husband was love-making +elsewhere. Noemi was the woman with whom he was in love, and Henri +delighted the house in his love scenes with her. He acted well, putting +plenty of youthful ardour, enthusiasm, and warmth into his part. In the +scene where he confessed his love, there was something in his voice and +expression that seemed like a real declaration, which had escaped him, +and which he could not keep back. Noemi certainly had made up as the +prettiest Colombine imaginable. She looked perfectly adorable, dressed +as a bride in a Louis XVI costume copied exactly from the _Bride's +Minuet_, an engraving by Debucourt lent by M. Barousse. All around Mme. +Bourjot it seemed as if every one were bewitched, the sympathetic public +appeared to be helping and encouraging the handsome young couple to love +each other. The piece continued, and every now and then it was as though +Henri's eyes were seeking, beyond the footlights, the eyes of Mme. +Bourjot. Meanwhile Renee arrived, disguised as a village bailiff: there +was only the contract to be signed now, and Pierrot, taking the hand of +the girl he loved, began to speak of all the happiness he should have +with her. + +The lady who was seated next Mme. Bourjot felt her leaning slightly on +her shoulder. Henri finished his speech, the plot came to the climax, +and the piece ended. Mme. Bourjot's neighbour suddenly saw something +sink down at her side; it was Mme. Bourjot, who had fainted. + + + + +XIX + + +"Oh, do go in again, please," said Mme. Bourjot to the people who were +standing round her in the garden, to which she had been carried for air. +"It's all over; there's nothing the matter with me now; it was the +heat." She was very pale, but she smiled as she spoke. "I shall be quite +right again when I have had a little more air. M. Henri will perhaps +stay with me." + +Every one returned to the house, and the sound of the footsteps had +scarcely died away, when Mme. Bourjot seized Henri's arm in a firm grip +with her feverish fingers. + +"You love her!" she exclaimed. "You love her!" + +"Madame," said Henri. + +"Be quiet; you won't tell me the truth!" she exclaimed, pushing his arm +away. + +Henri merely bowed without attempting to speak. + +"I know all. I saw everything. Look at me!" she went on, and she gazed +into his eyes. He kept his head bent and was silent. "Say something, +anyhow--speak. Ah, you can only act comedy with her!" + +"The fact is I have nothing to say, Laure," replied Henri, speaking in +his gentlest and clearest voice. Mme. Bourjot drew back when he called +her Laure as if he had touched her. "I have been struggling against it +for the last year, madame," he continued. "I will not attempt to make +any excuse; but everything has drawn me to her. We have known each other +from childhood, and the fascination has increased lately day by day. I +am very sorry, madame, to have to tell you the truth; but it is quite +true that I love your daughter." + +"But you never can have talked to her, surely? Why, I blush for her when +we are out--you surely have not even looked at her. What in the world +possesses you men, tell me! Do you think she is beautiful? What +nonsense! why, I am better looking than she is. You are so foolish, all +of you. And then, I have spoiled you. You'll see whether she will pamper +your pride, let you revel in your vanity, and flatter and help you in +your ambitions. Oh, I know you thoroughly. Ah, M. Mauperin, all this is +only met with once in a lifetime. And women of my age--old women, you +understand--are the only ones who care about the future of those they +love. You were not my lover; you were like a dear son to me!" As she +said this, Mme. Bourjot's voice changed and she spoke with the deepest +feeling. "That's enough, though; we won't talk about that," she +continued in a different tone. "I tell you that you don't love my +daughter--it is not true--but she is rich----" + +"Oh, madame!" + +"Well, there are men like that--I have had them pointed out to me. +Sometimes it succeeds to begin with the mother in order to finish with +the dowry. And for the sake of a million, you know, one can put up with +being bored." + +"Speak more quietly, I beg you--for your own sake. They have just opened +one of the windows." + +"It's very fine to be so calm and collected, M. Mauperin, very +fine--very fine indeed," said Mme. Bourjot, and her low, hissing voice +sounded choked. + +Some clouds that were moving quickly along in the sky passed like the +wings of night-birds over the moon, and Mme. Bourjot gazed blankly into +the darkness in front of her. With her elbows resting on her knees and +supported by her high heels, she remained silent, tapping the gravel +path with her satin slippers. After a few minutes she sat up, moved her +arms about in an unconscious way as though she were scarcely awake, then +quickly, and in a jerky way, she put her hand between her dress and +waistband, pressing the back of her hand against the ribbon as though +she were going to burst it. Finally she rose and began to walk, followed +by Henri. + +"I count on our never seeing each other again, monsieur," she said, +without turning round. + +As she passed by the fountain she handed him her handkerchief, saying, +"Will you dip that in the water for me?" + +Henri obeyed, kneeling down on the curbstone. He handed her the damp +handkerchief, and she pressed it to her forehead and her eyes. + +"We will go in now," she said; "give me your arm." + +"Oh, madame, how courageous you are!" said Mme. Mauperin, advancing to +meet Mme. Bourjot when she entered the room. "It is not wise of you, +though, at all. I will have your carriage ordered." + +"No, please don't, thank you," replied Mme. Bourjot quickly. "I think I +promised you that I would sing; I am quite ready now," and she went +across to the piano, gracious and valiant once more, with that heroic +smile beneath which society actors conceal from the public the tears +they are weeping within themselves, and the wounds which discharge +themselves into their hearts. + + + + +XX + + +Mme. Bourjot had married in order that two important business houses +should be united; for the sake of amalgamating various interests she had +been wedded to a man whom she did not know, and at the end of a week of +married life she had felt all the contempt that a wife can possibly feel +for a husband. It was not that she had expected anything very ideal, nor +that she had looked on marriage as a romantic and imaginative girl so +often does. She was remarkably intelligent herself, and seriously +inclined, her mind had been formed and nurtured by reading, study, and +acquirements which were almost more suitable for a man. All that she +asked from the companion of her life was that he should be intellectual +and intelligent, a being in whom she could place all her ambitions and +her pride as a married woman, a man with a brilliant future before him, +capable of winning for himself one of those immense fortunes to which +money nowadays leads, and who should prove himself able to leap over the +gaps of modern society to a high place in the Ministry, the Public +Works, or the Exchequer. + +All her castles in the air crumbled away with this husband, whom she +found day by day more and more hopelessly shallow, more and more +incapable, devoid of all that should have been in him, and which was in +her instead, more narrow-minded, more mean and petty as time went on, +and all this mingled with and contradicted by all the violences and +weaknesses of a childish disposition. + +It was her pride that had preserved Mme. Bourjot from adultery, a pride +which, it may be said, was aided by circumstances. When she was young, +Mme. Bourjot, who was of a spare build and southern type, had features +which were too pronounced to be pleasing or beautiful. When she was +about thirty-four she began to get rather more plump, and it seemed then +that another woman had evolved from the one she had been. Her features, +though still strongly pronounced, became softer and more pleasing; the +hardness of her expression appeared to have melted away, and her whole +face smiled. It was one of those autumn beauties such as age brings to +certain women, making one wish to have seen them as they were at twenty; +a beauty which makes one imagine for them a youthfulness they never had. +As a matter of fact, then, so far Mme. Bourjot had not run any great +danger, nor had she known any very great temptations. The society, which +on account of her tastes she had chosen, her surroundings, the men who +frequented her _salon_ and whom she met elsewhere, had scarcely made it +necessary for her to stand seriously on the defensive. They were, for +the most part, academicians, savants, elderly literary men, and +politicians, all of them unassuming and calm, men who seemed old, some +of them from stirring up the past and the others the present. Satisfied +with very little, they were happy with a mere nothing--the presence of a +woman, a flattering speech, or the expression of eyes that were drinking +in their words. Accustomed to their academic adoration, Mme. Bourjot +had, without much risk, allowed it free scope and had treated it with +jests like an Egeria: it had been a flame which did not scorch, and with +which she had been able to play. + +But the time of maturity arrived for Mme. Bourjot. A great +transformation in her face and figure took place. Tormented, as it were, +by health which was too robust and an excess of vitality, she seemed to +lose the strength morally which she was gaining physically. She had a +great admiration for her past, and she felt now that she was less +strong-minded, and that there was less assurance in her pride than +formerly. + +It was just at this time that Henri Mauperin had made his appearance in +her drawing-room. He seemed to her young, intelligent, serious, and +thorough, equipped for the victories of life with all those +dispassionate and unwavering qualities that she had dreamed before her +marriage of finding in a husband. Henri had seized the situation at a +glance, and, divining his own chances, he made his plans and swooped +down on this woman as his prey. He began to make love to her, and this +woman, who had a husband and daughter, who had been a faithful wife for +twenty years, and who held a high position in Parisian society, scarcely +waited for him to tempt her. She yielded to him at their first +interview, conducting herself like a mere cocotte. Her love became a mad +passion with her, as it so frequently does with women of her age, and +Henri proved himself a genius in the art of attaching her to himself and +of chaining her, as it were, to her sin. He never betrayed himself, and +never for an instant allowed her to see a sign of the weariness, the +indifference, or the contempt that a man feels after a too easy +conquest, or of that sort of disgust with which certain situations of a +woman in love inspire him. He was always affectionate, and always +appeared to be deeply moved. He had for Mme. Bourjot those transports of +love and jealousy, all those scruples, little attentions, and +thoughtfulness which a woman, after a certain age, no longer expects +from her lover. He treated her as if she were a young girl, and begged +her to give him a ring which she always wore, and which had been one of +her confirmation presents. He put up with all the childishness and +coquetry which was so ridiculous in the passion of this mother of a +family, and he encouraged it all without a sign of impatience on his +face or a shade of mockery in his voice. At the same time he made +himself entirely master of her, accustoming her to be docile and +obedient to him, revealing to her such passionate love that Mme. Bourjot +was both grateful to him and proud of her victory over this apparently +cold and reserved young man. When he was thus completely master of her, +Henri worked her up still more by impressing her with the danger of +their meetings and the risks there were in their _liaison_, while by all +the emotions of a criminal passion he excited her imagination to such a +pitch of fear that her love increased with the very thought of all she +had to lose. + +She finally reached that stage when she only lived through him and for +him, by his presence, his thoughts, his future, his portrait, all that +remained to her of him after she had seen him. Before leaving him she +would stroke his hair with her hands and then put her gloves on quickly. +And all day afterward, when she was at home again with her husband and +her daughter, she would put the palms of her hands, which she had not +washed since, to her face and inhale the perfume of her lover's hair. + +This _soiree_, and this treason and rupture at the end of a year, +completely crushed Mme. Bourjot. She felt at first as if she had +received a blow, and her life seemed to be ebbing away through the +wound. She fancied she was really dying, and there was a certain +sweetness in this thought. The following day she hoped Henri would come. +She was vanquished and quite prepared to beg his pardon, to tell him +that she had been in the wrong, to beg him to forgive her, to entreat +him to be kind to her, and to allow her to gather up the crumbs of his +love. She waited a week, but Henri did not come. She asked him for an +interview that he might return her letters, and he sent them to her. She +wrote and begged to see him for the last time that she might bid him +farewell. Henri did not answer her letter, but, through his friends and +through the newspaper and society gossip, he contrived to let Mme. +Bourjot hear the rumour of an action that had been taken against him for +one of his articles on the misery of the poor. For a whole week he +managed to keep her mind occupied with the ideas of police and police +courts, prison, and all that the dramatic imagination of a woman +pictures to itself as the consequence of a lawsuit. + +When the Attorney-General assured Mme. Bourjot that the action would not +be taken, she felt quite a coward after all the terror she had gone +through, and weak and helpless from emotion, she could not endure any +more, and so wrote in desperation to Henri: + +"To-morrow at two o'clock. If you are not there I shall wait on the +staircase. I shall sit down on one of the stairs till you come." + + + + +XXI + + +Henri was ready, and had taken great pains to dress for the occasion in +an apparently careless style. He was wearing one of those morning suits +in which a young man nearly always looks well. + +At the time appointed in the letter there was a ring at the door. Henri +opened it and Mme. Bourjot entered. She passed by and walked on in front +of him as though she knew the way, until she reached the study. She took +a seat on the divan, and neither of them spoke a word. There was plenty +of room by her on the divan, but Henri drew up a smoking-chair, which he +turned round, and, sitting down astride on it, folded his arms over the +back. + +Mme. Bourjot lifted her double lace veil and turned it back over her +hat. Holding her head slightly aside, and with one hand pulling the +glove slowly off the other, she gazed at the things on the wall and on +the mantel-shelf. She gave a little sigh as if she were alone, and then, +glancing at Henri, she said: + +"There is some of my life here--something of me--in all that." She held +out her ungloved hand to him, and Henri kissed the tips of her fingers +respectfully. + +"Forgive me," she went on, "I did not intend speaking of myself; I have +not come here for that. Oh, you need not be afraid, I am quite sensible +to-day, I assure you. The first moment--well, the first moment was hard! +I won't deny that I had to pull myself together," she continued, with a +tearful smile, "but it's all over now. I scarcely suffer any more, and I +am quite myself again, I assure you. Of course everything cannot be +forgotten all in a minute, and I won't say that you are nothing to me +now--for you would not believe me. But this I can assure you, and you +must believe me, Henri, there is no more love for you in my heart. I am +no longer weak; the woman within me is dead--quite dead, and the +affection I have for you now is quite pure." + +The light seemed to annoy her as she spoke, as if it were some one +gazing at her. "Will you put the blind down, dear?" she said. "The +sun--my eyes have rather hurt me the last few days." + +While Henri was at the window she arranged her hat and let the cloak she +was wearing drop from her shoulders. When the light was not so strong in +the room she began again: + +"Yes, Henri, after struggling a long time, and enduring such anguish as +you will never know, after passing nights such as I hope you may never +have, and after crying and praying, I have conquered myself. I have won +the victory, and I can now think of my daughter's happiness without +being jealous, and of yours as the only happiness now left for me on +earth." + +"You are an angel, Laure," said Henri, getting up and walking up and +down the room as though he were greatly agitated. "But you must look at +things as they are. You were quite right the other day when you said +that we must separate forever--never see each other again. The idea of +our constantly meeting! You know we could not. It would take so little +to open wounds as slightly closed as ours are. Then, too, even if you +are sure of yourself, how do you know that I am as sure of myself? How +can I tell--if we were meeting at all times--with such constant +temptation--if I were always near you," he said, speaking very tenderly, +"why, some day, unexpectedly--how can I tell--and I am an honourable +man." + +"No, Henri," she answered, taking his hands in hers and drawing him to +the seat at her side, "I am not afraid of you, and I am not afraid of +myself. It is all over. How can I make you believe me? And you will not +refuse me? No, you cannot refuse me the only happiness which remains for +me--my only happiness. It is all I have left in the world now--it is to +see you, only to see you--" and throwing her arms round Henri's neck she +drew him to her closely. + +"Ah, no, it is quite impossible," said Henri, when the embrace had +lasted a few seconds. "Don't say any more about it," he continued, +brusquely, getting up as he spoke. + +"I will be brave," said Mme. Bourjot very seriously. + +When they had played out their comedy of renunciation they both felt +more at ease. + +"Now, then, listen to me," began Mme. Bourjot once more, "my husband +will give you his daughter." + +"How foolish you are, really, Laure." + +"Don't interrupt me--my husband will give you his daughter. I fancy he +intends asking his son-in-law to live in the same house. Of course you +would be quite free--your suite of rooms, your carriage, meals, and +everything quite apart--you know what our style of living is. Unless M. +Bourjot has changed his mind, she will have a dowry of forty thousand +pounds, and unless he should lose his money, which I do not think is +very probable, you will have, at our death, four or five times that +amount." + +"And how can you seriously imagine that Mlle. Bourjot, who has forty +thousand pounds, and who will have four or five times that much, would +marry----" + +"I am her mother," answered Mme. Bourjot in a decisive tone. "And +then--don't you love her? Why, it would merely be a kind of marriage of +expediency," and Mme. Bourjot smiled. "You provide her with happiness." + +"But what will the world say?" + +"The world? My dear boy, we should close the world's mouth with +truffles," and she gave her shoulders a little shrug. + +"And M. Bourjot?" + +"That's my part. He will like you very much before the end of two +months. The only thing is, as you know, he will want a title; he has +always intended his daughter to marry a count. All I can do is to get +him to consent to a name tacked on to yours. Nothing is simpler, +nowadays, than to get permission to add to one's name the name of some +estate, or forest, or even the name of a meadow, or a bit of land of any +sort. Didn't I hear some one talking to your mother about a farm called +Villacourt that you have in the Haute-Marne? _Mauperin de Villacourt_; +that would do very well. You know, as far as I am concerned, how little +I care about such things." + +"Oh, but it would be so ridiculous, with my principles, and a Liberal, +too, bound as I am. And then, you know----" + +"Oh, you can say it is a whim of your wife's. Every one goes about with +names like that now; it's a sort of cross people have to bear. Shall I +say a word for you to any one in authority?" + +"Oh, no; no, please don't! I didn't think I had said anything which +could make you imagine I should be inclined to accept. I don't really +know, frankly. You understand that I should have to think it over, I +should have to collect myself and consider what my duty is; to be more +myself, in fact, and less influenced by you, before I could give you an +answer." + +"I shall call on your mother this week," said Mme. Bourjot, getting up +and pressing his hand. "Good-bye," she said sadly; "life _is_ a +sacrifice!" + + + + +XXII + + +"Renee," said Mme. Mauperin one evening to her daughter, "shall we go +and see Lord Mansbury's collection of pictures to-morrow? It appears +that it is very curious; people say that one of the pictures would fetch +four thousand pounds. M. Barousse thought it would interest you, and he +has sent me the catalogue and an invitation. Should you like to go?" + +"Rather. I should just think I should like to go," replied Renee. + +The following morning she was very much surprised to see her mother come +into the room while she was dressing, busy herself with her toilette, +and insist on her putting on her newest hat. + +"There are always so many people at these exhibitions," said Mme. +Mauperin, arranging the bows on the hat, "and you must be dressed as +well as every one else." + +Although it was a private exhibition there were crowds of people in the +room on the first floor of the Auction Buildings, where Lord Mansbury's +collection was on view. The fame of the pictures, and the scandal of +such a sale, which it was said had been necessitated by Lord Mansbury's +folly in connection with a Palais Royal actress, had attracted all the +_habitues_ of the Hotel Drouot; those people whom of late years the +fashion for collecting has brought there--all that immense crowd of +bric-a-brac buyers, art worshippers, amateurs of repute, and nearly all +the idlers of Paris. It had been found necessary to hang the three or +four valuable pictures for sale in the hall out of reach of the crowd. +In the room one could hear that muffled sound which one always hears at +wealthy peoples' sales, the murmur of prices going up, of whims and +fancies, of follies which lead on to further follies, of competitions +between bankers, and of all kinds of vanities connected with money +matters. Bidding, too, could be heard, being quietly carried on among +the groups. "The foam was rising," as the dealers say. + +When they entered the room, Mme. Mauperin and her daughter saw Barousse, +arm-in-arm with a young man of about thirty years of age. The young man +had large, soft eyes, which would have been handsome if they had had +more expression in them. His figure, which was slightly corpulent, was a +little puffy, and this gave him a rather common appearance. + +"At last, ladies!" said Barousse, addressing Mme. Mauperin; "allow me +to introduce my young friend, M. Lemeunier. He knows the collection +thoroughly, and if you want a guide he will take you to the best things. +I must ask to be excused, as I want to go and push something in No. 3 +room." + +M. Lemeunier took Mme. Mauperin and her daughter round the room, +stopping at the canvases signed by the most celebrated names. He merely +explained the subjects of the pictures, and did not talk art. Renee was +grateful to him for this from the bottom of her heart, without knowing +why. When they had seen everything, Mme. Mauperin thanked M. Lemeunier, +and they bowed and parted company. + +Renee wanted to see one of the side-rooms. The first thing she caught +sight of on entering was M. Barousse's back, the back of an amateur in +the very height of the excitement of the sale. He was seated on the +nearest chair to the auctioneer, next to a picture-dealing woman wearing +a cap. He was nudging her, knocking her knee, whispering eagerly his +bid, which he imagined he was concealing from the auctioneer and his +clerk, from the expert, and from all the room. + +"There, come, you have seen enough," said Mme. Mauperin, after a short +time. "It's your sister's 'At Home' day, and it is not too late. We have +not been once this year to it, and she will be delighted to see us." + +Renee's sister, Mme. Mauperin's elder daughter, Mme. Davarande, was the +type _par excellence_ of a society woman. Society filled her whole life +and her brain. As a child she had dreamed of it; from the time she had +been confirmed she had longed for it. She had married very young, and +had accepted the first "good-looking and suitable" man who had been +introduced to her, without any hesitation or trouble and entirely of her +own accord. It was not M. Davarande, but a position she had married. +Marriage for her meant a carriage and servants in livery, diamonds, +invitations, acquaintances, drives in the Bois. She had all that, did +very well without children, loved dress, and was happy. To go to three +balls in an evening, to leave forty cards before dinner, to run about +from one reception to another, and to have her own "At Home" day--she +could not conceive of any happiness beyond this. Devoting herself +entirely to society, Mme. Davarande borrowed everything from it herself, +its ideas, its opinions, its way of giving charity, its stock phrases in +affairs of the heart, and its sentiments. She had the same opinions as +the women whose hair was dressed by the famous coiffeur, Laure. She +thought exactly what it was correct to think, just as she wore exactly +what it was correct to wear. Everything, from her very gestures to the +furniture in her drawing-room, from the game she played to the alms she +gave away, from the newspaper she read to the dish she ordered from her +cook, aimed at being in good style--good style being her law and her +religion. She followed the fashion of the moment in everything and +everywhere, even to the theatre of the _Bouffes Parisiens_. She had, +when driving in the Bois, been told the names of certain women of +doubtful reputation, and could point them out to her friends, and that +made an effect. She spelt her name with a small "d," an apostrophe, and +a capital A, and this converted it into d'Avarande. Mme. Davarande was +pious. It seemed to her that God was _chic_. It would have seemed almost +as improper to her to have no parish as to have no gloves. She had +adopted one of those churches where grand marriages are celebrated, +where people with great names are to be met, where the chairs have +armorial bearings, where the beadle glitters with gold lace, where the +incense is perfumed with patchouli, and where the porch after high mass +on Sundays resembles the corridor of the Opera House when a great +artiste has been singing. + +She went to hear all the preachers that people were supposed to hear. +She confessed her sins, not in the confessional, but in a community. The +name and the individuality of the priest played an important part so far +as she was concerned in the sacraments of the Church: she would not +have felt that she was really married if any one but the Abbe Blampoix +had officiated at her wedding, and she would not have considered a +baptism valid if a ten-pound note had not been sent to the cure inside +the traditional box of sugar-plums. This woman, whose mind was always +fixed on worldly things, even when at church and during the benediction, +was naturally, thoroughly, and absolutely virtuous, but her virtue was +not the result of any effort, merit, or even consciousness. In the midst +of this whirlwind, this artificial air and warm atmosphere, exposed to +all the opportunities and temptations of society life, she had neither +the heart which a woman must have who is given to dreaming nor enough +intelligence to be bored by such an existence. She had neither the +curiosity nor the inclination which might have led her astray. Hers was +one of those happy, narrow-minded dispositions which have not enough in +them to go wrong. She had that unassailable virtue, common to many +Parisian women who are not even touched by the temptations which pass +over them: she was virtuous just in the same way as marble is cold. +Physically, even, as it happens sometimes with lymphatic and delicate +natures, the effect of society life on her had been to free her from all +other desires by using up her strength, her nervous activity, and the +movement of the little blood she had in her body, in the rushing about +on visits and shopping, the effort of making herself agreeable, the +fatigue of evening parties, resulting in utter weariness at night, and +enervation the next day. + +There are society women in Paris who, by the amount of vitality and +vigour they expend, and by the intense application of their energy and +grace, remind one of circus-riders and tight-rope dancers, whose +temperament suffers from the fatigue of their exercises. + + * * * * * + +Mme. Mauperin and her daughter met Mme. Davarande in her dining-room, +accompanying a smooth-faced gentleman with blue spectacles to the door. +She was extremely amiable to him, and when she had seen him out she +returned to her mother and sister. + +"Excuse my leaving you," she said, as she kissed them, "but it was M. +Lordonnot, the architect of the Sacred Heart Convent. I cultivate him +for the sake of my collections. Thanks to him I had forty-eight pounds +you know last time. That's very good: Mme. de Berthival has never +reached thirty-two pounds. I'm so glad to see you; it's very nice of you +to have come. We'll go into the other room--there's no one here to-day. +Mme. de Thesigny, Mme. de Champromard, and Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, and +then two young men, young de Lorsac--you know him I think, mamma, and +his friend de Maisoncelles? Wait a minute," she said to Renee, patting +her hair down a little, "your hair looks like a little dog's," and then +advancing and opening the drawing-room door, she announced her mother +and sister. + +Every one rose, shook hands, or bowed, and then sat down again and +looked at each other. Mme. Davarande's three lady friends were leaning +back in their easy chairs in that languid attitude due to cushioned +seats. They looked very dainty in their wide skirts, their lovely hats, +and gloves about large enough for the hands of a doll. They were dressed +perfectly, their gowns had evidently been cut by an artiste, their whole +toilette with the hundred little nothings which set it off, their +graceful attitudes, their bearing, their gestures, the movement of their +bodies, the _frou-frou_ of their silk skirts--everything was there which +goes to make the charm of the Parisian woman; and, although they were +not beautiful, they had discovered the secret of appearing almost +pretty, with just a smile, a glance, certain little details and +semblances, flashes of wit, animation, and a smart look generally. + +The two friends, Lorsac and Maisoncelles, in the prime of their twenty +years, with pink-and-white complexions, brilliant health, beardless +faces and curled hair, were delighted at being invited to a young +married lady's "At Home" day, and were sitting respectfully on the edge +of their chairs. They were young men who had been very well brought up. +They had just left a _pension_ kept by an abbe who gave little parties +every evening, at which his sister presided, and which finished up with +tea handed round in the billiard-room. + +"Henriette," said Mme. de Thesigny to Mme. Davarande, when the +conversation had commenced again, "are we going to see Mlle. de Bussan's +wedding to-morrow? I hear that every one will be there. It's made such a +stir, this marriage." + +"Will you call for me, then? What's the bride-groom like--does any one +know? Do you know him, Mme. de Saint-Sauveur?" + +"No, not at all." + +"Is she making a good match?" + +"An awful match!" put in Mme. de Champromard, "he hasn't anything--six +hundred pounds a year all told." + +"But," said Mme. Mauperin, "it seems to me, madame, that six +hundred----" + +"Oh, madame," continued Mme. de Champromard, "why, nowadays, that isn't +enough to pay for having one's jewellery reset." + +"M. de Lorsac, are you coming to this wedding?" asked Mme. Davarande. + +"I will come if you wish it." + +"Well then, I do wish it. Will you keep two chairs for us? One spoils +one's dress quite enough without that. I can wear pearl grey, can't I?" + +"Oh, certainly," answered Mme. de Thesigny, "it's a moire antique +wedding. M. de Maisoncelles, will you keep two chairs for me? Don't +forget." + +De Maisoncelles bowed. + +"And if you are very good you shall be my cotillon partner on +Wednesday." + +De Lorsac blushed for de Maisoncelles. + +"You don't go out much, do you, mademoiselle?" said Mme. de Sauveur to +Renee, who was seated next her. + +"No, madame, I don't care about going out," answered Mlle. Mauperin +rather curtly. + +"Julia," said Mme. de Thesigny to Mme. de Champromard, "tell us again +about your famous bride's bed-room--Mme. Davarande wasn't there. Just +listen, my dear." + +"Oh, it was my sewing-woman who told me. Only fancy, the walls are +draped with white satin, finished with applications of lace, and ruches +of satin to outline the panels. The sheets--I've seen the pattern--they +are of cambric--spider-web. The mattresses are of white satin, caught +down with knots of pale blue silk that show through the sheet. And you +will be surprised to hear that all that is for a woman who is quite +_comme il faut_." + +"Oh, yes," said Mme. de Saint-Sauveur, "that is most astonishing, for +everything, nowadays, is for the other kind of women. What do you think +happened to me in the country--a most disagreeable affair! There is a +woman, who is not all she ought to be, living near us. We came across +her at church, for she has sittings there--just fancy! Well, ever since +she has arrived in our part of the world, everything has gone up in +price. We positively cannot get a sewing-girl now in the house for less +than seven-pence halfpenny an hour. Money is nothing to creatures of +that kind, of course. And then every one adores her--she is such a +schemer. She goes to see the peasants when they are ill, she finds +situations for their children, and she gives them money--a sovereign at +a time. Before she came we used to be able to do things for the poor +without much expense, but that isn't possible now. It's outrageous! I +told the cure so--it really is quite scandalous! And we owe all this to +one of your relatives, M. de Lorsac, to your cousin, M. d'Orambeau. My +compliments to him when you see him." + +The two young men threw themselves back on their chairs and laughed +heartily, and then both of them instinctively bit their canes with +delight. + +"Where have you just come from?" Mme. Davarande asked her mother and +sister. + +"From the auction-room," answered Mme. Mauperin. "M. Barousse persuaded +us to go to an exhibition of pictures." + +"Lord Mansbury's collection," put in Renee. + +"Ah, we must go to those auction-rooms, Henriette," said Mme. de +Thesigny; "we'll go and _rococoter_--it's great fun." + +"Have you seen Petrucci's pictures, my dear?" asked Mme. de +Saint-Sauveur. + +"Is she selling them?" asked Mme. de Thesigny. + +"I did so want to go," said Mme. Davarande. "If I had only known that +you were going----" + +"We were all there," interrupted Mme. de Saint-Sauveur. "It was so +curious. There was a glass-case of jewellery, a necklace of black pearls +among other things--if only you had seen it--three rows. There isn't a +husband in the world who could give you a thing like that; it would take +a national subscription." + +"Shall we not see your husband?" asked Mme. Mauperin, turning to Mme. +Davarande. + +"Oh, he's never here on my day--my husband--thank goodness!" Mme. +Davarande looked round as she heard some one coming in by the door +behind her chair. It was M. Barousse, followed by the young man who had +been with him at the auction-room. + +"Ah, we meet again," he said to Mme. Mauperin, as he put down on a chair +the little portfolio which never left him. + +Renee smiled and the chattering began again. + +"Have you read that novel--that novel?" + +"The one in the _Constitutional_?" + +"No." + +"By--I can't think of the name. It's called--wait a minute." + +"Every one's talking about it." + +"Do read it." + +"My husband will get it me from his club." + +"Is that play amusing?" + +"I only like dramas." + +"Shall we go?" + +"Let's take a box." + +"Friday?" + +"No, Saturday." + +"Shall we go to supper after?" + +"Yes--agreed." + +"It's at the _Provencaux_." + +"Will your husband come?" + +"Oh, he does what I want him to do, always." + +They were all talking and answering each other's questions without +really listening to anything, as every one was chattering at the same +time. Words, questions, and voices were all mingled together in the +Babel: it was like the chirping of so many birds in a cage. The door +opened, and a tall, thin woman dressed in black, entered. + +"Don't disturb yourselves, any of you; I have only just come in as I am +passing. I have only one minute." + +She bowed to the ladies and took up her position in front of the +chimney-piece, with her elbow on the marble and her hands in her muff. +She glanced at herself in the glass, and then, lifting her dress skirt, +held out the thin sole of her dainty little boot to the fire. + +"Henriette," she began, "I have come to ask you a favour--a great +favour. You absolutely must undertake the invitations for the ball that +the Brodmers are giving--you know, those Americans, who have just come; +they have a flat in the Rue de la Paix, and the rent is sixteen hundred +a year." + +"Oh, the Brodmers--yes," put in Mme. de Thesigny. + +"But, my dear," said Mme. Davarande, "it's a very delicate matter--I +don't know them. Have you any idea what these people are?" + +"Why, they are Americans. They've made their fortune out of cotton, +candles, indigo, or negroes--or--I don't know what; but what in the +world does that matter to us? Americans, you know, are accepted +nowadays. As far as I am concerned--with people who give balls, there's +only one thing I care about, and that is that they shouldn't belong to +the police and should give good suppers. It's all superb at their house, +it seems. The wife is astonishing. She talks the French of the +backwoods; and people say she was tattooed when she was a child. That's +why she can't wear low dresses. It's most amusing, and she is so +entertaining. They want to get plenty of people, you see. You _will_ do +it for me, won't you? I can assure you that if I were not in mourning I +should have had great pleasure in putting on the invitation cards, 'With +the Baronne de Lermont's compliments.' And then, too, they are people +who will do things properly. Oh, as to that I'm convinced of it. They +are sure to make you a present----" + +"Oh no, if I undertake the invitations I don't want a present for it." + +"How queer you are! Why, that sort of thing's done every day--it's the +custom. It would be like refusing a box of sweets from these gentlemen +here on New Year's day. And now I must go. I shall bring them to see you +to-morrow--my savages. Good-bye! Oh dear, I'm nearly dead!" and with +these words she disappeared. + +"Is it really true?" Renee asked her sister. + +"What?" + +"That guests are supplied for balls in this way?" + +"Well, didn't you know that?" + +"I was in the same state of ignorance," said the young man M. Barousse +had brought. + +"It's very convenient for foreigners," remarked Mme. Davarande. + +"Yes, but it seems to me that it's rather humiliating for Parisians. +Don't you think so, mademoiselle?" said the young man, turning to Mlle. +Mauperin. + +"Oh, it's an accepted thing, anyhow," said Mme. Davarande. + + + + +XXIII + + +Mme. Bourjot had just arrived with her daughter at the Mauperins'. She +kissed Renee and sat down by Mme. Mauperin on the sofa near the fire. + +"My dears," she said, turning to the two girls, who were chattering +together on the other side of the room, "suppose you were to let your +mothers have a little talk together. Will you take Noemi out in the +garden a little, Renee? I give her over to you." + +Renee put her arm round Noemi and pulled her along with her, skipping as +she went. In the hall she caught up a Pyrenees hood that was lying on a +chair and threw it over her head, put on some little overshoes, and ran +out into the garden, rushing along like a child, and keeping her arm +round her friend all the time. + +"There's a secret--a secret. Do you know what the secret is?" she +exclaimed, stopping suddenly short and quite out of breath. + +Noemi looked at her with her large, sad eyes and did not answer. + +"You silly girl!" said Renee, kissing her. "I've guessed it--I caught a +few words--mamma lets everything out. It's about his lordship, my +brother. There now!" + +"Let's sit down--shall we? I'm so tired." And Noemi took her seat on the +garden bench, just where her mother had sat on the night of the +theatricals. + +"Why, you are crying! What's the matter?" exclaimed Renee, sitting down +by her. Noemi let her head fall on her friend's shoulder and burst into +tears, that were quite hot as they fell on Renee's hand. + +"What is it, tell me--answer me--speak, Noemi--come now, Noemi dear!" + +"Oh, you don't know!" answered Noemi, in broken words, which seemed to +choke her. "I won't--no, I cannot tell you--if only you knew. Oh, do +help me!" and she flung her arms round Renee in despair. "I love you +dearly--you----" + +"Come, come, Noemi; I don't understand anything. Is it this marriage--is +it my brother? You must answer me--come!" + +"Ah, yes; you are his sister--I had forgotten that. Oh, dear, I wish I +could die----" + +"Die, but why?" + +"Why? Because your brother----" + +She stopped short, in horror at the thought of uttering the words she +was just going to say, and then, suddenly finishing her sentence in a +murmur in Renee's ear, she hid her face on her friend's shoulder to +conceal her blushing cheeks and the shame she felt in her inmost soul. + +"My brother! You say--no, it's a lie!" exclaimed Renee, pushing her away +and springing up with a bound in front of her. + +"Should _I_ tell a lie about it?" and Noemi looked up sadly at Renee, +who read the truth clearly in her eyes. + +Renee folded her arms and gazed at her friend. She stood there a few +minutes deep in thought, erect and silent, her whole attitude resolute +and energetic. She felt within herself the strength of a woman, and +something of the responsibility of a mother with this child. + +"But how can your father--" she began, "my brother has no name but +ours." + +"He is to take another one." + +"Ah, he is going to give our name up? And quite right that he should!" + + + + +XXIV + + +"Oh, it's you, is it; you are not in bed yet?" said Henri to Renee, as +she went into his room one evening. He was smoking, and it was that +blissful moment in a man's life when, with slippers on and his feet on +the marble of the chimney-piece, buried in an arm-chair, he gives +himself up to day-dreams, while puffing up languidly to the ceiling the +smoke of his last cigar. He was thinking of all that had happened during +the past few months, and congratulating himself on having manoeuvred so +well. He was turning everything over in his mind: that suggestion about +the theatricals, which he had thrown out with such apparent indifference +when they were all sitting in the garden; then his absence from the +first rehearsals, and the coolness with which he had treated Noemi in +order to reassure her, to take her off her guard, and to prevent her +refusing point-blank to act. He was thinking of that master-stroke, of +his love suddenly rousing the mother's jealousy in the midst of the +play, and it had all appeared to be so spontaneous, as though the role +he was filling had torn from him the secret of his soul. He thought of +all that had followed: how he had worked that other love up to the last +extremity of despair, then his behaviour in that last interview; all +this came back to him, and he felt a certain pride in recalling so many +circumstances that he had foreseen, planned, and arranged beforehand, +and which he had so skilfully introduced into the midst of the +love-affairs of a woman of forty. + +"No, I am not sleepy to-night," said Renee, drawing up a little stool to +the fire and sitting down. "I feel inclined for a little chat like we +used to have before you had your flat in Paris, do you remember? I got +used to cigars, and pipes, and everything here. Didn't we gossip when +every one had gone to bed! What nonsense we have talked by this fire! +And now, my respected brother is such a very serious sort of man." + +"Very serious indeed," put in Henri, smiling. "I'm going to be married." + +"Oh," she said, "but you are not married yet. Oh, please Henri!" and +throwing herself on her knees she took his hands in hers. "Come now, for +my sake. Oh, you won't do it--just for money--I'm begging you on my +knees! And then, too, it will bring bad luck to give up your father's +name. It has belonged to our family for generations--this name, Henri. +Think what a man father is. Oh, do give up this marriage--I beseech +you--if you love me--if you love us all! Oh, I beseech you, Henri!" + +"What's this all mean; have you gone mad? What are you making such a +scene about? Come, that's enough, thank you; get up." + +Renee rose to her feet, and looking straight into her brother's eyes she +said: + +"Noemi has told me everything!" + +The colour had mounted to her cheeks. Henri was as pale as if some one +had just spat in his face. + +"You cannot, anyhow, marry her daughter!" exclaimed Renee. + +"My dear girl," answered Henri coldly, in a voice that trembled, "it +seems to me that you are interfering in things that don't concern you. +And you will allow me to say that for a young girl----" + +"Ah, you mean this is dirt that I ought to know nothing of; that is +quite true, and I should never have known of it but for you." + +"Renee!" Henri approached his sister. He was in one of those white rages +which are terrible to witness, and Renee was alarmed and stepped back. +He took her by the arm and pointed to the door. "Go!" he said, and a +moment later he saw her in the corridor, putting her hand against the +wall for support. + + + + +XXV + + +"Go up, Henri," said M. Mauperin to his son, and then as Henri wanted +his father to pass first M. Mauperin repeated, "No, go on up." + +Half an hour later father and son were coming downstairs again from the +office of the Keeper of the Seals. + +"Well, you ought to be satisfied with me, Henri," observed M. Mauperin, +whose face was very red. "I have done as you and your mother wished. You +will have this name." + +"Father----" + +"All right, don't let us talk about it. Are you coming home with me?" he +asked, buttoning his frock-coat with that military gesture with which +old soldiers gird up their emotions. + +"No, father, I must ask you to let me leave you now. I have so many +things to do to-day. I'll come to dinner to-morrow." + +"Good-bye, then, till to-morrow. You'd better come; your sister is not +well." + +When the carriage had driven away with his father Henri drew himself +up, looked at his watch, and with the brisk, easy step of a man who +feels the wind of fortune behind him blowing him along, walked briskly +towards the Rue de la Paix. + +At the corner of the Chaussee d'Antin he went into the Cafe Bignon, +where some heavy-looking young men, suggestive of money and the +provinces, were waiting for him. During luncheon the conversation turned +on provincial cattle shows and competitions, and afterward, while +smoking their cigars on the boulevards, the questions of the varied +succession of crops, of drainage, and of liming were brought up, and +there was a discussion on elections, the opinions of the various +departments, and on the candidatures which had been planned, thought of, +or attempted at the agricultural meetings. + +At two o'clock Henri left these gentlemen, after promising one of them +an article on his model farm; he then went into his club, looked at the +papers, and wrote down something in his note-book which appeared to give +him a great deal of trouble to get to his mind. He next hurried off to +an insurance company to read a report, as he had managed to get on to +the committee, thanks to the commercial fame and high repute of his +father. At four o'clock he sprang into a carriage and paid a round of +visits to ladies who had either a _salon_ or any influence and +acquaintances at the service of a man with a career. He remembered, +too, that he had not paid his subscription to the "Society for the Right +Employment of the Sabbath among the Working Classes," and he called and +paid it. + +At seven o'clock, with cordial phrases on the tip of his tongue and +ready to shake hands with every one, he went upstairs at Lemardelay's, +where the "Friendly Association" of his old college friends held its +annual banquet. At dessert, when it was his turn to speak, he recited +the speech he had composed at his club, talked of this fraternal +love-feast, of coming back to his family, of the bonds between the past +and the future, of help to old comrades who had been afflicted with +undeserved misfortunes, etc. + +There were bursts of applause, but the orator had already gone. He put +in an appearance at the d'Aguesseau lecture, left there, pulled a white +necktie out of his pocket, put it on in the carriage, and showed up at +three or four society gatherings. + + + + +XXVI + + +The shock which Renee had had on leaving her brother's room, and which +had made her totter for a moment, had brought on palpitation of the +heart, and for a week afterward she had not been well. She had been kept +quiet and had taken medicines, but she did not recover her gaiety, and +time did not appear to bring it back to her. On seeing her ill, Henri +knew very well what was the matter, and he had done all in his power to +make things up with her again. He had been most affectionate, attentive, +and considerate, and had endeavoured to show his repentance. He had +tried to get into her good graces once more, to appease her conscience, +and to calm her indignation; but his efforts were all in vain. He was +always conscious of a certain coolness in her manner, of a repugnance +for him, and of a sort of quiet resolution which caused him a vague +dread. He understood perfectly well that she had only forgotten the +insult of his brutality; she had forgiven her brother, but she had not +forgiven him as a man. + +Her mother had arranged to take her to Paris one day for a little +change, and at the last moment had not felt well enough to go. Henri had +some business to do, and he offered to accompany his sister. They +started, and on reaching Paris drove to the Rue Richelieu. As they were +passing the library Henri told the cabman to draw up. + +"Will you wait here for me a moment?" he said to his sister, "I want to +ask one of the librarians a question. Why not come in with me, though," +he added as an after-thought. "You have always wanted to see the +manuscript scroll-work and that is in the same room. You would find it +interesting, and I could get my information at the same time." + +Renee went up with her brother to the manuscript-room, and Henri took +her to the end of a table, waited until the prayer-book he had asked for +was brought, and then went to speak to a librarian in one of the window +recesses. + +Renee turned over the leaves of her book slowly. Just behind her one of +the employees was warming himself at the hot-air grating. Presently he +was joined by another, who had just taken some volumes and some +title-deeds to the desk near which Henri was talking, and Renee heard +the following conversation just behind her: + +"I say, Chamerot, you see that little chap?" + +"Yes, at M. Reisard's desk." + +"Well, he can flatter himself that he's got hold of some information +which isn't quite correct. He's come to ask whether there used to be a +family named Villacourt, and whether the name has died out. They've told +him that it has. Now if he'd asked me, I could have told him that some +folks of that name must be living. I don't know whether it's the same +family; but there was one of them there before I left that part of the +world, and a strong, healthy fellow too--the eldest, M. Boisjorand--the +proof is that we had a fight once, and that he knew how to give hard +blows. Their place was quite near to where we lived. One of the turrets +of their house could be seen above Saint-Mihiel, and from a good +distance too; but it didn't belong to them in my time. They were a +spendthrift lot, that family. Oh, they were queer ones for nobility; +they lived with the charcoal-burners in the Croix-du-Soldat woods, at +Motte-Noire, like regular satyrs." + +Saint-Mihiel, the Croix-du-Soldat woods, and Motte-Noire--all these +names fixed themselves on Renee's memory and haunted her. + +"There, now I have what I wanted," said Henri, gaily, when he came back +to her to take her away. + + + + +XXVII + + +Denoisel had left Renee at her piano, and had gone out into the garden. +As he came back towards the house he was surprised to hear her playing +something that was not the piece she was learning; then all at once the +music broke off and all was silent. He went to the drawing-room, pushed +the door open, and discovered Renee seated on the music-stool, her face +buried in her hands, weeping bitterly. + +"Renee, good heavens! What in the world is the matter?" + +Two or three sobs prevented Renee's answering at first, and then, wiping +her eyes with the backs of her hands, as children do, she said in a +voice choked with tears: + +"It's--it's--too stupid. It's this thing of Chopin's, for his funeral, +you know--his funeral mass, that he composed. Papa always tells me not +to play it. As there was no one in the house to-day--I thought you were +at the bottom of the garden--oh, I knew very well what would happen, but +I wanted to make myself cry with it, and you see it has answered to my +heart's content. Isn't it silly of me--and for me, too, when I'm +naturally so fond of fun!" + +"Don't you feel well, Renee? Come, tell me; there's something the +matter. You wouldn't cry like that." + +"No, there's nothing the matter, I assure you. I'm as strong as a horse; +there's nothing at all the matter, really and truly. If there were +anything I should tell you, shouldn't I? It all came about through that +dreadful, stupid music. And to-day, too--to-day, when papa has promised +to take me to see _The Straw Hat_." + +A faint smile lighted up her wet eyes as she spoke, and she continued in +the same strain: + +"Only fancy, _The Straw Hat_--at the Palais Royal. It will be fun, I'm +sure; I only like pieces of that kind. As for the others, dramas and +sentimental things--well, I think we have enough to stir us up with our +own affairs; it isn't worth while going in search of trouble. Then, too, +crying with other people; why, it's like weeping into some one else's +handkerchief. We are going to take you with us, you know--a regular +bachelor's outing it's to be. Papa said we should dine at a restaurant; +and I promise you that I'll be as nonsensical, and laugh as I used to +when I was a little girl--when I had my English governess--you remember +her? She used to wear orange-coloured ribbons, and drink eau de Cologne +that she kept in a cupboard until it got in her head. She was a nice old +thing." + +And as she uttered these words her fingers flew over the keyboard, and +she attacked an arrangement with variations of the _Carnival of Venice_. + +"You've been to Venice, haven't you?" she said suddenly, stopping short. + +"Yes." + +"Isn't it odd that there should be a spot like that on earth, that I +don't know and yet that attracts me and makes me dream of it? For some +people it's one place, and for others it's another. Now, I've never +wanted to see any place except Venice. I'm going to say something +silly--Venice seems to me like a city where all the musicians should be +buried." + +She put her fingers on the notes again, but she only skimmed over them +without striking them at all, as if she were just caressing the silence +of the piano. Her hands then fell on her knees again, and in a pensive +manner, giving way to her thoughts, she half turned her head towards +Denoisel. + +"You see," she said, "it seems as though there is sadness in the very +air. I don't know how it is, but there are days when the sun is shining, +when I have nothing the matter with me, no worry and no troubles to +face; and yet I positively want to be sad, I try to get the blues, and +feel as though I _must_ cry. Many a time I've said I had a headache and +gone to bed, just simply for the sake of having a good cry, of burying +my face in the pillow; it did me ever so much good. And at such times I +haven't the energy to fight against it or to try to overcome it. It's +just the same when I am going off in a faint; there's a certain charm in +feeling all my courage leaving me----" + +"There, there, that's enough, Renee dear! I'll have your horse saddled +and we'll go for a ride." + +"Ah, that's a good idea! But I warn you I shall go like the wind, +to-day." + + + + +XXVIII + + +"What was he to do? poor Montbreton has four children, and none too much +money," said M. Mauperin with a sigh, as he folded up the newspaper in +which he had just been reading the official appointments and put it at +some distance from him on the table. + +"Yes, people always say that. As soon as any one ever does anything +mean, people always say 'He has children.' One would think that in +society people only had children for the sake of that--for the sake of +being able to beg, and to do a lot of mean things. It's just as though +the fact of being the father of a family gave you the right to be a +scoundrel." + +"Come, come, Renee," M. Mauperin began. + +"No, it's quite true. I only know two kinds of people: the +straightforward, honest ones; and then the others. Four children! But +that only ought to serve as an excuse for a father when he steals a +loaf. _Mere Gigogne_ would have had the right to poison hers according +to that, then. I'm sure Denoisel thinks as I do." + +"I? Not at all; indeed I don't! I vote for indulgence in favour of +married folks--fathers of families. I should like to see people more +charitable, too, towards any one who has a vice--a vice which may be +rather ruinous, but which one cannot give up. As to the others, those +who have nothing to use their money for, no vice, no wife, no children, +and who sell themselves, ruin themselves, bow down, humiliate, enrich, +and degrade themselves--ah! I'd give all such over to you willingly." + +"I'm not going to talk to you," said Renee in a piqued tone. "Anyhow, +papa," she went on, "I cannot understand how it is that it does not make +_you_ indignant, you who have always sacrificed everything to your +opinions. It's disgusting what he has done, and that's the long and +short of it." + +"I do not say that it isn't; but you get so excited, child, you get so +excited." + +"I should think so. Yes, I do get excited--and enough to make me, too. +Only fancy, a man who owed everything to the other government, and who +said everything bad he could about the present one; and now he joins +this one. Why, he's a wretch!--your friend, Montbreton--a wretch!" + +"Ah! my dear child, it's very easy to say that. When you have had a +little more experience of life you will be more indulgent. One has to be +more merciful. You are young." + +"No, it's something I've inherited, this is. I'm your daughter, and +there's too much of you in me, that's what it is. I shall never be able +to swallow things that disgust me. It's the way I'm made--how can I help +it? Every time I see any one I know--or even any one I don't know--fail +in what you men call points of honour, well, I can't help it at all, but +it has the same effect on me as the sight of a toad. I have such a +horror of it, and it disgusts me so, that I want to step on it. Come +now, do you call a man honourable because he takes care to only do +abominable things for which he can't be tried in the law courts? Do you +call a man honourable when he has done something for which he must blush +when he is alone? Is a man honourable when he has done things for which +no one can reproach him and for which he cannot be punished, but which +tarnish his conscience? I think there are things that are lower and +viler than cheating at the card-table; and the indulgence with which +society looks on makes me feel as though society is an accomplice, and I +think it is perfectly revolting. There are things that are so disloyal, +so dishonest, that when I think of them it makes me quite merciful +towards out-and-out scoundrels. You see they do risk something; their +life is at stake and their liberty. They go in for things prepared to +win or lose: they don't put gloves on to do their infamous deeds. I like +that better; it's not so cowardly, anyhow!" + +Renee was seated on a sofa at the far side of the drawing-room. Her arms +were folded, her hands feverish, and her whole body quivering with +emotion. She spoke in jerks, and her voice vibrated with the wrath she +felt in her very soul. Her eyes looked like fire lighting up her face, +which was in the shade. + +"And very interesting, too, he is," she continued, "your M. de +Montbreton. He has an income of six hundred or six hundred and fifty +pounds. If he did not pay quite such a high house-rent, and if his +daughters had not always had their dresses made by Mme. Carpentier----" + +"Ah, this requires consideration," put in Denoisel. "A man who has more +than two hundred a year, if a bachelor, and more than four hundred if +married, can perfectly well remain faithful to a government which is no +longer in power. His means allow him to regret----" + +"And he will expect you to esteem him, to shake hands with him, and +raise your hat to him as usual," continued Renee. "No, it is rather too +much! I hope when he comes here, papa--well, I shall promptly go +straight out of the room." + +"Will you have a glass of water, Renee?" asked M. Mauperin, smiling; +"you know orators always do. You were really fine just then. Such +eloquence--it flowed like a brook." + +"Yes, make fun of me by all means. You know I get carried away, as you +tell me. And your Montbreton--but how silly I am, to be sure. He doesn't +belong to us, this man, does he? Oh, if it were one of my family who had +done such a thing, such a dishonourable thing, such a----" + +She stopped short for a second, and then began again: + +"I think," she said, speaking with an effort, as though the tears were +coming into her eyes, "I think I could never love him again. Yes, it +seems to me as though my heart would be perfectly hard as far as he was +concerned." + +"Good! this is quite touching. We had the young orator just now, and at +present it is the little girl's turn. You'd do better to come and look +at this caricature album that Davarande has sent your mother." + +"Ah yes, let's look at that," said Renee, going quickly across to her +father and leaning on his shoulder as he turned over the leaves. She +glanced at two or three pages and then looked away. + +"There, I've had enough of them, thank you. Goodness, how can people +enjoy making things ugly--uglier than nature? What a queer idea. Now in +art, in books, and in everything, I'm for all that is beautiful, and not +for what is ugly. Then, too, I don't think caricatures are amusing. It's +the same with hunchbacks--it never makes me laugh to see a hunchback. +Do you like caricatures, Denoisel?" + +"Do I? No, they make me want to howl. Yes, it is a kind of comical thing +that hurts me," answered Denoisel, picking up a Review that was next the +album. "Caricatures are like petrified jokes to me. I can never see one +on a table without thinking of a lot of dismal things, such as the wit +of the Directory, Carle Vernet's drawings, and the gaiety of +middle-class society." + +"Thank you," said M. Mauperin laughing, "and in addition to that you are +cutting my _Revue des Deux Mondes_ with a match. How hopeless he is, to +be sure, Denoisel." + +"Do you want a knife, Denoisel?" asked Renee, plunging her hand into her +pockets and pulling out a whole collection of things, which she threw on +the table. + +"By Jove!" exclaimed Denoisel, "why, you have a regular museum in your +pockets. You'd have enough for a whole sale at the auction-rooms. What +in the world are all those things?" + +"Presents from a certain person, and they go about with me everywhere. +There's the knife for you," and Renee showed it to her father before +passing it to Denoisel. "Do you remember where you bought it for me?" +she asked. "It was at Langres once when we had stopped for a fresh +horse; oh, it's a very old one. This one," she continued, picking up +another, "you brought me from Nogent. It has a silver blade, if you +please; I gave you a halfpenny for it, do you remember?" + +"Ah, if we are to begin making inventories!" said M. Mauperin laughing. + +"And what's in that?" asked Denoisel, pointing to a little worn-out +pocket-book stuffed full of papers, the dirty crumpled edges of which +could be seen at each end. + +"That? Oh, those are my secrets," and, picking up all the things she had +thrown on the table, she put them quickly back in her pocket with the +little book. The next minute, with a burst of laughter and diving once +more into her pockets, she pulled the book out again, opened the flap, +and scattered all the little papers on the table in front of Denoisel, +and without opening them proceeded to explain what they were. "There, +this is a prescription that was given for papa when he was ill. That's a +song he composed for me two years ago for my birthday----" + +"There, that's enough! Pack up your relics; put all that out of sight," +said M. Mauperin, sweeping all the little papers from him just as the +door opened and M. Dardouillet entered. + +"Oh, you've mixed them all up for me!" exclaimed Renee, looking annoyed +as she put them back in her pocket-book. + + + + +XXIX + + +A month later, in the little studio, Renee said to Denoisel: "Am I +really romantic--do you think I am?" + +"Romantic--romantic? In the first place, what do you mean by romantic?" + +"Oh, you know what I mean; having ideas that are not like every one +else's, and fancying a lot of things that can never happen. For +instance, a girl is romantic when it would be a great trouble to her to +marry, as girls do marry, a man with nothing extraordinary about him, +who is introduced to her by papa and mamma, and who has not even so much +as saved her life by stopping a horse that has taken fright, or by +dragging her out of the water. You don't imagine I'm one of that sort, I +hope?" + +"No; at least I don't know at all. I'd wager that you yourself don't +know, either." + +"Nonsense. It may be, in the first place, because I have no imagination; +but it has always seemed to me so odd to have an ideal--to dream about +some imaginary man. It's just the same with the heroes in novels; +they've never turned my head. I always think they are too well-bred, too +handsome, too rotten, with all their accomplishments. I get so sick of +them in the end. But it isn't that. Tell me now, suppose they wanted to +make you live your whole life long with a creature--a creature who----" + +"A creature--what sort of a creature?" + +"Let me finish what I am saying. A man, then, who did not answer at all +to certain delicate little requirements of your nature, who did not +strike you as being poetical--there, that's what I mean--not a scrap +poetical, but who on the other hand made up for what was wanting in him, +in other ways, by such kindness--well, such kindness as one never meets +with----" + +"As much kindness as all that? Oh, I should not hesitate; I should take +the kindness blindfold. Dear me, yes, indeed I should. It's so rare." + +"You think kindness worth a great deal then?" + +"I do, Renee. I value it as one values what one has lost." + +"You? Why, you are always very kind." + +"I am not downright bad; but that's all. I might perhaps be envious if I +had more modesty and less pride. But as for always being kind, oh no, I +am not. Life cures you of that just as it cures you of being a child. +One gets over one's good-nature, Renee, just as one gets over +teething." + +"Then you think that a kindly disposition and a good heart----" + +"Yes, I mean the goodness that endures in spite of men and in spite of +experience--such goodness as I have met with in a primitive state in two +or three men in my life. I look upon it as the best and most divine +quality a man can have." + +"Yes, but if a man who is very good, as good as those you describe--this +is just a supposition, you know--suppose he had feet that looked like +lumps of cake in his boots. And then, suppose he were corpulent, this +good man, this very good man?" + +"Well, one need not look at his feet nor at his corpulency--that's all. +Oh, I beg your pardon, though, of course, I had completely forgotten." + +"What?" + +"Oh, nothing; except that you are a woman." + +"But that's very insulting to my sex--that remark of yours." + +Denoisel did not answer, and the conversation ceased for a few minutes. + +"Have you ever wished for wealth?" Renee began again. + +"Yes, several times; but absolutely for the sake of treating it as it +deserves to be treated--to be disrespectful to it." + +"How do you mean?" + +"Why, yes, I should like to be rich just to show the contempt I have +for money. I remember that two or three times I have fallen asleep with +the idea of going to Italy to get married." + +"To Italy?" + +"Yes, there are more Russian princesses there than anywhere else, and +Russian princesses are the only women left in this world who will marry +a man without a farthing. Then, too, I was prepared to be contented with +a princess who was not very well off. I was not at all exacting, and +would have come down without a murmur to thirty thousand pounds a year. +That was my very lowest figure though." + +"Indeed!" said Renee laughing. "And what should you have done with all +that money?" + +"I should just have poured it away in streams between my fingers; it +would have been something astounding to see; something that I have never +seen rich people do with their money. I think all the millionaires ought +to be ashamed of themselves. For instance, from the way in which a man +lives who has four thousand a year, and the way a man lives who has +forty thousand, could you tell their difference of fortune? Now with me +you would have known. For a whole year I should have flung away my money +in all kinds of caprices, fancies, and follies; I should have dazzled +and fairly humiliated Paris; I should have been like a sun-god showering +bank-notes down; I should have positively degraded my gold by all kinds +of prodigalities; and at the end of a year, day for day, I should have +left my wife." + +"Nonsense!" + +"Certainly; in order to prove to myself that I did not love money. If I +had not left her, I should have considered myself dishonoured." + +"Well, what extraordinary ideas! I must confess that I haven't arrived +at your philosophy yet. A large fortune and all that it gives you, all +kinds of enjoyment and luxuries, houses, carriages, and then the +pleasure of making the people you don't like envious--of annoying them. +Oh, I think it would be most delightful to be rich." + +"I told you just now, Renee, that you were a woman--merely a woman." + + + + +XXX + + +Denoisel had spoken as he really felt. If he had sometimes wished for +wealth, he had never envied people who had it. He had a sincere and +thorough contempt for money--the contempt of a man who is rich with very +little. + +Denoisel was a Parisian, or rather he was the true Parisian. Well up in +all the experiences of Paris, wonderfully skilled in the great art of +living, thanks to the habits and customs of Parisian life, he was the +very man for that life; he had all its instincts, its sentiments, and +its genius. He represented perfectly that very modern personage, the +civilized man, triumphing, day by day, like the inhabitants of a forest +of Bondy, over the price of things, over the costly life of capitals, as +the savage triumphs over nature in a virgin forest. He had all the show +and glitter of wealth. He lived among rich people, frequented their +restaurants and clubs, had their habits, and shared in their amusements. +He knew some of the wealthiest people, and all that money opened to them +was open to him. He was seen at the grand private balls of the +Provencaux, at the races, and at first nights at the theatres. In summer +he went to the watering-places, to the sea, and to the gambling resorts. +He dressed like a man who owns a carriage. + +And yet Denoisel only possessed between four and five thousand pounds. +Belonging to a family that had been steeped in the ideas of the past +with regard to property, attached and devoted to landed wealth, always +talking of bankruptcy, and as mistrustful of stocks and shares as +peasants formerly were of bank-notes, Denoisel had shaken himself free +of all the prejudices of his own people. Without troubling about the +advice, the remonstrances, the indignation, and the threats of old and +distant relatives, he had sold the small farms which his father and +mother had left him. It seemed to him that there was no longer any +proportion between the revenue of land and the expenses of modern life. +In his opinion landed estate might have been a means of wealth at the +time when Paul de Kock's novels said of a young man, "Paul was rich, he +had two hundred and fifty a year." But since that time it had, according +to him, become an anachronism, a kind of archaic property, a fancy fox +which was only permissible in very wealthy people. He therefore realized +his land and turned it into a small capital, which he placed, after +consulting with a friend of his who frequented the Stock Exchange, in +foreign bonds, in shares and securities, thus doubling and tripling his +revenue without any risk to his regular income. Having thus converted +his capital into a figure which meant nothing, except in the eyes of a +notary, and which no longer regulated his current means, Denoisel +arranged his life as he had done his money. He organized his expenses. +He knew exactly the cost in Paris of vanity, little extras, bargains, +and all such ruinous things. He was not ashamed to add up a bill himself +before paying it. Away from home he only smoked fourpenny cigars, but at +home he smoked pipes. He knew where to buy things, discovered the new +shops, which give such good value during the first three months. He knew +the wine-cellars at the various restaurants, ordered Chambertin a +certain distance up the boulevards, and only ordered it there. If he +gave a dinner, his _menu_ won the respect of the waiter. And with all +that, he knew how to order supper for four shillings at the Cafe +Anglais. + +All his expenses were regulated with the same skill. He went to one of +the first tailors in Paris, but a friend of his who was in the Foreign +Office procured for him from London all the suits he wanted between the +seasons. When he had a present to make, or any New Year's gifts to buy, +he always knew of a cargo of Indian or Chinese things that had just +arrived, or he remembered an old piece of Saxony or Sevres china that +was lying hidden away in some shop in an unfrequented part of Paris, one +of those old curiosities, the price of which cannot be discovered by +the person for whom it is destined. All this with Denoisel was +spontaneous, natural, and instinctive. This never-ending victory of +Parisian intelligence over all the extravagance of life had nothing of +the meanness and pettiness of sordid calculation about it. It was the +happy discovery of a scheme of existence under satisfactory conditions, +and not a series of vulgar petty economies, and in the well-organized +expenditure of his six hundred pounds a year the man remained liberal +and high-minded: he avoided what was too expensive for him, and never +attempted to beat prices down. Denoisel had a flat of his own on the +first storey of a well-ordered house with a carpeted staircase. He had +only three rooms, but the Boulevard des Italiens was at his very door. +His little drawing-room, which he had furnished as a smoking-den, was +charming. It was one of those snug little rooms which Parisian +upholsterers are so clever in arranging. It was all draped and furnished +with chintz, and had divans as wide as beds. It had been Denoisel's own +wish that the absence of all objects of art should complete the cheerful +look of the room. He was waited on in the morning by his hall-porter, +who brought him a cup of chocolate and did all the necessary housework. +He dined at a club or restaurant or with friends. + +The low rent and the simplicity of his household and domestic +arrangements left Denoisel more of that money of which wealthy people +are so often short, that money for the little luxuries of life, which is +more necessary than any other in Paris, and which is known as +pocket-money. Occasionally, however, that _force majeure_, the +Unforeseen, would suddenly arrive in the midst of this regular existence +and disarrange its equilibrium and its budget. + +Denoisel would then disappear from Paris for a time. He would ruralize +at some little country inn, near a river, on half-a-crown a day, and he +would spend no other money than what was necessary for tobacco. Two or +three winters, finding himself quite out of funds, he had emigrated, +and, on discovering a city like Florence, where happiness costs nothing +and where the living is almost as inexpensive as that happiness, he had +stayed there six months, lodging in a room with a cupola, dining _a la +trattoria_ on truffles with Parmesan cheese, passing his evenings in the +boxes of society people, going to the Grand Duke's balls, feted, invited +everywhere, with white camellias in his buttonhole--economizing in the +happiest way in the world. + +Denoisel spent no more for his love-affairs than for other things. It +was no longer a question of self-respect with him, so that he only paid +what he thought them worth. And yet such things had been his one +allurement as a young man. He had, however, always been cool and +methodical, even in his love-affairs. He had wanted, in a lordly way, to +test for himself what the love of the woman who was the most in vogue in +Paris was like. He allowed himself for this experiment about two +thousand pounds of the seven thousand he then possessed, and, during the +six months that he was the accepted lover of the celebrated Genicot, a +woman who would give a five-pound note as a tip to her postillion on +returning from the Marche, he lived in the same style as a man with five +thousand a year. When the six months were over he left her, and she, for +the first time in her life, was in love with a man who had paid for that +love. + +Tempered by this proof he had had several other experiences afterward, +until they had palled on him; and then there had suddenly come to him, +not a desire for further love adventures, but a great curiosity about +women. He set out to discover all that was unforeseen, unexpected, and +unknown to him in woman. All actresses seemed to him very much the same +kind of courtesan, and all courtesans very much the same kind of +actress. What attracted him now was the unclassed woman, the woman that +bewilders the observer and the oldest Parisian. He often went wandering +about at night, vaguely and irresistibly led on by one of those +creatures who are neither all vice nor all virtue, and who walk so +gracefully along in the mire. Sometimes he was dazzled by one of those +fine-looking girls, so often seen in Paris, who seem to brighten +everything as they pass along, and he would turn round to look at her +and stand there even after she had suddenly disappeared in the darkness +of some passage. His vocation was to discover tarnished stars. Now and +then in some faubourg he would come across one of these marvellous +daughters of the people and of Nature, and he would talk to her, watch +her, listen to her, and study her; then when she wearied him he would +let her go, and it would amuse him later on to raise his hat to her when +he met her again driving in a carriage. + +Denoisel's wealthy air won for him a welcome in social circles. He soon +established himself there and on a superior footing, thanks to his +geniality and wit, the services of every kind he was always ready to +render, and the need every one had of him. His large circle of +acquaintances among foreigners, artists, and theatrical people, his +knowledge of the ins and outs of things when small favours were +required, made him very valuable on hundreds of occasions. Every one +applied to him for a box at a theatre, permission to visit a prison or a +picture gallery, an entrance for a lady to the law courts at some trial, +or a foreign decoration for some man. In two or three duels in which he +had served as seconds, he had shown sound sense, decision, and a manly +regard for the honour as well as the life of the man for whom he was +answerable. People were under all kinds of obligations to him, and the +respect they had for him was not lessened by his reputation as a +first-rate swordsman. His character had won for him the esteem of all +with whom he came in contact, and he was even held in high consideration +by wealthy people, whose millions, nevertheless, were not always +respected by him. + + + + +XXXI + + +"My wife, for instance, wanted to have her portrait painted by Ingres. +You've seen it--it isn't like her--but it's by Ingres. Well, do you know +what he asked me for it? Four hundred pounds. I paid it him, but I +consider that taking advantage; it's the war against capital. Do you +mean to say that because a man's name is known he should make me pay +just what he likes? because he's an artist, he has no price, no fixed +rate, he has a right to fleece me? Why, according to that he might ask +me a million for it. It's like the doctors who make you pay according to +your fortune. To begin with, how does any one know what I have? I call +it an iniquity. Yes, four hundred pounds; what do you think of that?" + +M. Bourjot was standing by the chimney-piece talking to Denoisel. He put +the other foot, on which he had been standing, to the fire as he spoke. + +"Upon my word," said Denoisel, very seriously, "you are quite right: all +these folks take advantage of their reputation. You see there's only one +way to prevent it, and that would be to decree a legal maximum for +talent, a maximum for master-pieces. Why, yes! It would be very easy." + +"That's it; that would be the very thing!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, "and it +would be quite just, for you see----" + +The Bourjots had dined that evening alone with the Mauperins. The two +families had been talking of the wedding, and were only waiting to fix +the day, until the expiration of a year from the date of the first +insertion of the name of Villacourt in the _Monitor_. It was M. Bourjot +who had insisted on this delay. The ladies were talking about the +trousseau, jewellery, laces, and wedding-presents, and Mme. Mauperin, +who was seated by Mme. Bourjot, was contemplating her as though she were +a person who had performed a miracle. + +M. Mauperin's face beamed with joy. He had in the end yielded to the +fascination of money. This great, upright man, genuine, severe, rigid, +and incorruptible as he was, had gradually allowed the vast wealth of +the Bourjots to come into his thoughts and into his dreams, to appeal to +him and to his instincts as a practical man, as an old man, the father +of a family and a manufacturer. He had been won over and disarmed. Ever +since his son's success with regard to this marriage, he had felt that +respect for Henri which ability or the prospect of a large fortune +inspires in people, and, without being aware of it himself, he scarcely +blamed him now for having changed his name. Fathers are but men, after +all. + +Renee, who for some time past had been worried, thoughtful, and +low-spirited, was almost cheerful this evening. She was amusing herself +with blowing about the fluffy feathers which Noemi was wearing in her +hair. The latter, languid and absent-minded, with a dreamy look in her +eyes, was replying in monosyllables to Mme. Davarande's ceaseless +chatter. + +"Nowadays, everything is against money," began M. Bourjot again, +sententiously. "There's a league--now, for instance, I made a road for +the people at Sannois. Well, do you imagine that they even touch their +hats to us? Oh dear no, never. In 1848 we gave them bushels of corn; and +what do you think they said? Excuse me, ladies, if I repeat their words. +They said: 'That old beast must be afraid of us!' That was all the +gratitude I had. I started a model farm, and I applied to the Government +for a man to manage it; a red-hot radical was sent to me, a rascal who +had spent his life running down the rich. At present I have to do with a +Municipal Council with the most detestable opinions. I find work for +every one, don't I? Thanks to us, the country round is prosperous. Well, +if there were to be a revolution, now, I am convinced that they would +set fire to our place. They'd have no compunction about that. You've no +idea what enemies you get if you pay as much as three hundred and sixty +pounds for taxes. They'd simply burn us out of house and home--they'd +have no scruple about it. You see what happened in February. Oh, my +ideas with regard to the people have quite changed; and they are +preparing a nice future for us, you can count on that. We shall be +simply ruined by a lot of penniless wretches. I can see that beforehand. +I often think of all these things. If only it were not for one's +children--money, as far as I am concerned----" + +"What's that you are saying, neighbour?" asked M. Mauperin, approaching. + +"I'm saying that I'm afraid the day will come when our children will be +short of bread, M. Mauperin; that's what I'm saying." + +"You'll make them hesitate about this wedding if you talk like that," +said M. Mauperin. + +"Oh, if my husband begins with his gloomy ideas, if he's going to talk +about the end of the world--" put in Mme. Bourjot. + +"I congratulate you that you don't feel the anxiety I do," remarked M. +Bourjot, bowing to his wife; "but I can assure you that, without being +weak-minded, there is every reason for feeling very uneasy." + +"Certainly, certainly," said Denoisel. "I think that money is in danger, +in great danger, in very great danger indeed. In the first place, it is +threatened by that envy which is at the bottom of nearly all +revolutions; and then by progress, which baptizes the revolutions." + +"But, sir, such progress would be infamous. Take me, for instance: no +one could doubt me. I used to be a Liberal--I am now, in fact. I am a +soldier of Liberty, a born Republican; I am for progress of every kind. +But a revolution against wealth--why, it would be barbarous! We should +be going back to savage times. What we want is justice and common sense. +Can you imagine now a society without wealth?" + +"No, not any more than a greasy pole without a silver cup." + +"What," continued M. Bourjot, who in his excitement had not caught +Denoisel's words, "the money that I have earned with hard work, honestly +and with the greatest difficulty--the money that is mine, that I have +made, and which is for my children--why, there is nothing more sacred! I +even look upon the income-tax as a violation of property." + +"Why, yes," said Denoisel in the most perfectly good-natured tone, "I am +quite of your opinion. And I should be very sorry," he added wickedly, +"to make things seem blacker to you than they already do. But you see we +have had a revolution against the nobility; we shall have one against +wealth. Great names have been abolished by the guillotine, and great +fortunes will be done away with next. A man was considered guilty if his +name happened to be M. de Montmorency; it will be criminal to be M. Two +Thousand Pounds a Year. Things are certainly getting on. I can speak all +the more freely as I am absolutely disinterested, myself. I should not +have had anything to be guillotined for in the old days, and I haven't +enough to be ruined for nowadays. So, you see----" + +"Excuse me," put in M. Bourjot, solemnly, "but your comparison--no one +could deplore excesses more than I do, and the event of 1793 was a great +crime, sir. The nobility were treated abominably, and all honest people +must be of the same opinion as I am." + +M. Mauperin smiled as he thought of the Bourjot of 1822. + +"But then," continued M. Bourjot, "the situation is not the same at all. +Social conditions are entirely changed, the basis of society has been +restored. Everything is different. There were reasons--or pretexts, if +you prefer that--for this hatred of the nobility. The Revolution of '89 +was against privileges, which I am not criticising, but which existed. +That is quite different. The fact was people wanted equality. It was +more or less legitimate that they should have it, but at least there was +some reason in it. At present all that is altered; and where are the +privileges? One man is as good as another. Hasn't every man a vote? You +may say, 'What about money?' Well, every one can earn money; all trades +and professions are open to every one." + +"Except those that are not," put in Denoisel. + +"In short, all men can now arrive at anything and everything. The only +things necessary are hard work, intelligence----" + +"And circumstances," put in Denoisel, once more. + +"Circumstances must be made, sir, by each man himself. Just look at what +society is. We are all _parvenus_. My father was a cloth merchant--in a +wholesale way, certainly--and yet you see--now this is equality, sir, +the real and the right kind of equality. There is no such thing as caste +now. The upper class springs from the people, and the people rise to the +upper class. I could have found a count for my daughter, if I had wanted +to. But it is just simply a case of evil instincts, evil passions, and +these communist ideas--it is all this which is against wealth. We hear a +lot of rant about poverty and misery. Well, I can tell you this, there +has never been so much done for the people as at present. There is great +progress with regard to comfort and well-being in France. People who +never used to eat meat, now eat it twice a week. These are facts; and I +am sure that on that subject our young social economist, M. Henri, +could tell us----" + +"Yes, yes," said Henri, "that has been proved. In twenty-five years the +increase of cattle has been twelve per cent. By dividing the population +of France into twelve millions inhabiting the towns, and twenty-four to +twenty-five millions inhabiting the country districts, it is reckoned +that the former consume about sixty-five kilogrammes a head each year, +and the latter twenty kilogrammes twenty-six centigrammes. I can +guarantee the figures. What is quite sure is that the most conscientious +estimates prove that since 1789 there has been an increase in the +average length of life, and this progress is the surest sign of +prosperity for a nation. Statistics----" + +"Ah, statistics, the chief of the inexact sciences!" interrupted +Denoisel, who delighted in muddling M. Bourjot's brain with paradoxes. +"But I grant that," he went on. "I grant that the lives of the people +have been prolonged, and that they eat more meat than they have ever +eaten. Do you, on that account, believe in the immortality of the +present social constitution? There has been a revolution which has +brought about the reign of the middle class--that is to say, the reign +of money; and now you say: 'Everything is finished; there must be no +other; there can be no legitimate revolution now.' That is quite +natural; but, between ourselves, I don't know up to what point the +supremacy of the middle class can be considered as final. As far as you +are concerned, when once political equality is given to all, social +equality is complete: that is perhaps quite just; but the thing is to +convince people of it, whose interest it is _not_ to believe it. One man +is as good as another. Certainly he may be in the eyes of God. Every one +in this century of ours has a right to wear a black coat--provided he +can pay for it. Modern equality--shall I explain briefly what it is? It +is the same equality as our conscription; every man draws his number, +but if you can pay one hundred and twenty pounds, you have the right of +sending another man to be killed instead of you. You spoke of +privileges; there are no such things now, that's true. The Bastille was +destroyed; but it gave birth to others first. Let us take, for instance, +Justice, and I do acknowledge that a man's position, his name, and his +money weigh less and are made less of in courts of justice than anywhere +else. Well, commit a crime, and be, let us say, a peer of France; you +would be allowed poison instead of the scaffold. Take notice that I +think it should be so; I am only mentioning it to show you how +inequalities spring up again, and, indeed, when I see the ground that +they cover now I wonder where the others could have been. Hereditary +rights--something else that the Revolution thought it had buried. All +that was an abuse of the former Government, about which enough has been +said. Well, I should just like to know whether, at present, the son of a +politician does not inherit his father's name and all the privileges +connected with that name, his father's electors, his connection, his +place everywhere, and his chair at the Academy? We are simply overrun +with these sons. We come across them everywhere; they take all the good +berths and, thanks to these reversions, everything is barred for other +people. The fact is that old customs are terrible things for unmaking +laws. You are wealthy, and you say money is sacred. But why? Well, you +say 'We are not a caste.' No, but you are already an aristocracy, and +quite a new aristocracy, the insolence of which has already surpassed +all the impertinences of the oldest aristocracies on the globe. There is +no court now, you say. There never has been one, I should imagine, in +the whole history of the world where people have had to put up with such +contempt as in the private office of certain great bankers. You talk of +evil instincts and evil passions. Well, the power of the wealthy middle +class is not calculated to elevate the mind. When the higher ranks of +society are engaged in digesting and placing out money there are no +longer any ideas, nothing in fact but appetites, in the class below. +Formerly, when by the side of money there was something above it and +beyond it, during a revolution instead of asking bluntly for +money--clumsy rough coins with which to buy their happiness--the people +contented themselves with asking for the change of colours on a flag, or +with having a few words written over a guard-house, or even with +glorious victories that were quite hollow. But in our times--oh, we all +know where the heart of Paris is now. The bank would be besieged instead +of the Hotel de ville. Ah, the _bourgeoisie_ has made a great mistake!" + +"And what is the mistake, pray?" asked M. Bourjot, astounded by +Denoisel's tirade. + +"That of not leaving Paradise in heaven--which was certainly its place. +The day when the poor could no longer comfort themselves with the +thought that the next life would make up to them for this, the day when +the people gave up counting on the happiness of the other world--oh, I +can tell you, Voltaire did a lot of harm to the wealthy classes----" + +"Ah, you are right there!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, impulsively. "That is +quite evident. All these wretches ought to go to church regularly----" + + + + +XXXII + + +There was a grand ball at the Bourjots' in honour of the approaching +marriage of their daughter with M. Mauperin de Villacourt. + +"You are going in for it to-day. How you are dancing!" said Renee to +Noemi, fanning her as she stood talking in a corner of the vast +drawing-room. + +"I have never danced so much, that's quite true," answered Noemi, taking +her friend's arm and leading her away into the small drawing-room. "No, +never," she continued, drawing Renee to her and kissing her. "Oh, how +lovely it is to be happy," and then kissing her again in a perfect fever +of joy, she said: "_She_ does not care for him now. Oh, I'm quite sure +she doesn't care for him. In the old days I could see she did by the +very way she got up when he came; by her eyes, her voice, the very +rustle of her dress, everything. Then when he wasn't there, I could tell +by her silence she was thinking of him. You are surprised at my +noticing, silly thing that I am; but there are some things that I +understand with this"--and she drew Renee's hand on to her white moire +dress just where her heart was--"and this never deceives me." + +"And you love him now, do you?" asked Renee. + +Noemi stopped her saying any more by pressing her bouquet of roses +against her friend's lips. + +"Mademoiselle, you promised me the first redowa," and a young man took +Noemi away. She turned as she reached the door and threw a kiss to Renee +with the tips of her fingers. + +Noemi's confession had given Renee a thrill of joy, and she had revelled +in the smile on her friend's face. She herself felt immensely comforted +and relieved. In an instant everything had changed for her, and the +thought that Noemi loved her brother chased away all other ideas. She no +longer saw the shame and the crime which she had so long seen in this +marriage. She kept repeating to herself that Noemi loved him, that they +both loved each other. The rest all belonged to the past, and they would +each of them forget that past, Noemi by forgiving it, and Henri by +redeeming it. Suddenly the remembrance of something came back to her, +bringing with it an anxious thought and a vague dread. She was +determined, however, just then to see no dark clouds in the horizon and +nothing threatening in the future. Chasing all this from her mind, she +began to think of her brother and of Noemi once more. She pictured to +herself the wedding-day and their future home, and she recalled the +voices of some children she had once heard calling "Auntie! Auntie!" + +"Will mademoiselle do me the honour of dancing with me?" + +It was Denoisel who was bowing in front of her. + +"Do we dance together--you and I? We know each other too well. Sit down +there, and don't crease my dress. Well, what are you looking at?" + +Renee was wearing a dress of white tulle, trimmed with seven narrow +flounces and bunches of ivy leaves and red berries. In her bodice and +the tulle ruches of her sleeves she wore ivy and berries to match. A +long spray of the ivy was twisted round her hair with a few berries here +and there and the leaves hung down over her shoulders. She was leaning +her head back on the sofa, and her beautiful chestnut hair, which was +brought forward, fell slightly over her white forehead. There was a new +gleam, a soft intense light in her brown, dreamy eyes, the expression of +which could not be seen. A shadow played over her mouth at the corners, +and her lips, which were generally closed in a disdainful little pout, +were unsealed and half open, partially revealing the gladness which came +from her very soul. The light fell on her chin, and a ring of shadow +played round her neck each time that she moved her head. She looked +charming thus, the outline of her features indistinct under the full +light of the chandeliers, and her whole face beaming with childish joy. + +"You are very pretty this evening, Renee." + +"Ah--this evening?" + +"Well, to tell the truth, just lately you've looked so worried and so +sad. It suits you much better to enjoy yourself." + +"Do you think so? Do you waltz?" + +"As though I had just learnt and had been badly taught. But you have +only this very minute refused." + +"I, refused? What an idea! Why, I want to dance dreadfully. Well, +there's plenty of time--oh, don't look at your watch; I don't want to +know the time. And so you think I am gay, do you? Well, no, I don't feel +gay. I'm happy--I'm very happy--there, now! I say, Denoisel, when you +are strolling about in Paris, you know those old women who wear Lorraine +caps, and who stand in the doorways selling matches--well, you are to +give a sovereign each to the first five you meet; I'll give it you back. +I've saved some money--don't forget. Is that waltz still going on? Is it +really true that I refused to dance? Well, after this one I'm going to +dance everything, and I shall not be particular about my partners. They +can be as ugly as they like, they can wear shoes that have been resoled, +and talk to me about Royer-Collard if they like, they can be too tall +or too short, they can come up to my elbow or I can come up to their +waist--it won't matter to me even if their hands perspire--I'll dance +with any of them. That's how I feel to-night, and yet people say that I +am not charitable." + +Just at that moment a man entered the little drawing-room. It was M. +Davarande. + +"Invite me for this waltz, please," said Renee, and as she passed by +Denoisel she whispered: + +"You see I'm beginning with the family." + + + + +XXXIII + + +"What's the matter with your mother this evening?" Denoisel asked Renee. +They were alone, as Mme. Mauperin had just gone upstairs to bed, and M. +Mauperin to have a look round at the works, which were on late that +night. + +"What's the matter with her, she seems as----" + +"Surly as a bulldog--say it out." + +"Well, but what's it all about?" + +"Ah, that's just it," and Renee began to laugh. "The fact is I've just +lost a chance of being married--and so here I am still." + +"Another? But then that's your speciality!" + +"Oh, this is only the fourteenth. That's only an average number; and +it's all through you that I've lost this chance." + +"Through me? Well, I never! What do you mean?" + +Renee got up, put her hands in her pockets, and walked up and down the +room from one end to the other. Every now and then she stopped short, +turned round on one heel, and gave a sort of whistle. + +"Yes, through you!" she said, coming back to Denoisel. "What should you +think if I told you that I had refused eighty thousand pounds?" + +"They must have been astonished." + +"I can't say that I wasn't rather tempted. It's no good setting up for +being better than I am; and then, too, with you I don't make any +pretences. Well, I'll own that just for a minute I was very nearly +caught. It was M. Barousse who arranged it all--very nicely indeed. +Then, here at home, they worked me up to it; mamma and Henri besieged +me; I was bored to death about it all day long. And then, too, quite +exceptionally for me, I began to have fancies, too. Anyhow, it is quite +certain that I slept very badly two nights. These big fortunes do keep +you awake. Then, too, to be quite just, I must say that I thought a +great deal about papa in the midst of it all. Wouldn't he have been +proud--wouldn't he, now? Wouldn't he have revelled in my four thousand a +year? He has so much vanity always where I am concerned. Do you remember +his indignation and wrath that time? 'A son-in-law who would allow my +daughter to get in an omnibus!' He was superb, wasn't he? Then I began +to think of you--yes, of you--and your ideas, your paradoxes, your +theories, of all sorts of things you had said to me; I thought of your +contempt for money, and as I thought of it--well, I suppose it is +catching, for I felt the same contempt myself. And so all at once, one +fine morning, I just cut it all short. No, you influence me too much, my +dear boy, decidedly." + +"Well, but I'm--I'm an idiot, Renee. Oh, I'm so sorry. I--I thought that +sort of thing was not catching--indeed I did. Come, really now, was it +my fault?" + +"Yes, yours--in a great measure--and then just a little his fault, too." + +"Ah!" + +"Yes, it was just a little M. Lemeunier's. When I felt the money getting +into my head, when I was seriously thinking of marrying him, why, I just +looked at him. And you didn't know you were speaking so truly the other +day. I suddenly felt that I was a woman--oh, you've no idea what it was +like. Then on the other hand I saw how good he was. Oh, he really is +goodness itself. I tried him in every way, I turned him inside out, it +worried me to find him so perfect; but it was no use, there was no fault +to find in him. He is thoroughly good, that man is. Oh, he's quite +different from Reverchon and the others. Only fancy what he said to me: +'Mademoiselle,' he said, 'I know that you don't care for me, but will +you let me wait a little and see if you can dislike me less than you do +now?' It was quite pathetic. Sometimes I felt inclined to say to him: +'Suppose we were to sit down and cry a little together, shall we?' +Fortunately, when he made me feel inclined to cry, papa, on the other +hand, made me want to laugh. He looked so funny, my dear old father, +half gay and half sad. I never saw such a resigned kind of happiness. +The sadness of losing me, and the thought of seeing me make a good match +made him feel so mixed up. Well, it's all finished now, thank Heaven! He +makes great eyes at me as though he's angry--didn't you notice, when +mamma was looking at us? But he is not angry at all in reality. He's +very glad in his heart; I can see that." + + + + +XXXIV + + +Denoisel was at Henri Mauperin's. They were sitting by the fire talking +and smoking. Suddenly they heard a noise and a discussion in the hall, +and, almost at the same time, the room door was opened violently and a +man entered abruptly, pushing aside the domestic who was trying to keep +him back. + +"M. Mauperin de Villacourt?" he demanded. + +"That is my name, monsieur," said Henri, rising. + +"Well, my name is Boisjorand de Villacourt," and with the back of his +hand he gave Henri a blow which made his face bleed. Henri turned as +white as the silk scarf he was wearing as a necktie and, with the blood +trickling down his face, he bent forward to return the blow, and then, +just as suddenly, drew himself up and stretched his hand out towards +Denoisel, who stepped forward, folded his arms, and spoke in his calmest +tone: + +"I think I understand what you mean, sir," he said; "you consider that +there is a Villacourt too many. I think so too." + +The visitor was visibly embarrassed before the calmness of this man of +the world. He took off his hat, which he had kept on his head hitherto, +and began to stammer out a few words. + +"Will you kindly leave your address with my servant?" said Henri, +interrupting him; "I will send round to you to-morrow." + + * * * * * + +"A disagreeable affair," began Henri, when he was once more alone with +Denoisel. "Where can he have sprung from, this Villacourt? They told me +that there were none of them left. Ah, my face is bleeding," he said, +wiping it with his handkerchief. "He's a regular buffalo. Georges, bring +some water," he called out to his domestic. + +"You'll choose the sword, shall you not?" asked Denoisel. "Hand me a +stick. Now listen--you must be on guard from the first, and strike out +very little. That man's one of the bloodthirsty sort; he'll go straight +for you, and you must defend yourself with circular parries. When you +are hard pressed and he rushes headlong at you, move aside to the right +with the left foot, turn round on tip-toes on your right foot--like +that. He'll have nothing in front of him then, and you'll have him from +the side and can run him through like a frog." + +"No," said Henri, lifting his face from the basin, in which he was +sponging it, "not the sword." + +"But, my dear fellow, that man is evidently a sportsman; he'll be +accustomed to fire-arms." + +"My dear fellow, there are certain situations which are most awkward. +I've taken another name, and that's always ridiculous. Here's a man who +accuses me of having stolen it from him. I have enemies, and a good +number of them, too; they'll make a scandal with all this. I must kill +this fellow, that's very evident; it's the only way to make my position +good. I should put an end to everything by that, lawsuits, and all the +stories and gossip--everything. The sword would not serve my purpose. +With the sword you can kill a man who has been five years at it, who can +use it, and who keeps his body in the positions you have been accustomed +to. But a man who has had no sword practice, who jumps and dances about, +who flourishes it about like a stick; I should wound him, and that would +be all. Now with the pistol--I'm a good shot, you know. You must do me +the justice of admitting that I was wise in my choice of +accomplishments. And my idea is to put it there," he touched Denoisel as +he spoke just above the hip, "just there, you see. Higher up, it's no +good, the arm is there to ward it off; but here, why there are a lot of +very necessary organs; there's the bladder, for instance; now if you are +lucky enough to hit that, and if it should happen to be full, why it +would be a case of peritonitis. And you'll get the pistol for me. A +duel--without a fuss, you understand. I want it kept quite secret, so +that no one shall hear of it beforehand. Whom shall you take with you?" + +"Suppose I asked Dardouillet? He served in the National Guard, in the +cavalry; I shall have to appeal to his military instincts." + +"That's the very thing, good! Will you call in and see mother first. +Tell her that I cannot come before Thursday. It would be awkward if she +happened to drop in on us just the next day or two. I shall not go out; +I'll have a bath and get a little more presentable. This mark doesn't +show very much now, does it? I shall send out for dinner, and then spend +the evening writing two or three necessary letters. By-the-bye, if you +see the gentleman to-morrow morning, why not have it out in the +afternoon at four o'clock? It's just as well to get it over. To-morrow +you'll find me here all the day--or else I shall be at the shooting +gallery. Arrange things as you would for yourself, and thanks for all +your trouble, old man. Four o'clock, then--if possible." + + + + +XXXV + + +The name of the farm that Henri Mauperin had added to his surname to +make it sound more aristocratic happened, by a strange chance, such as +sometimes occurs, to be the name of an estate in Lorraine and of a +family, illustrious in former days, but at present so completely +forgotten that every one believed it had died out. + +The man who had just dealt Henri this blow was the last of those +Villacourts who took their name from the domain and chateau of +Villacourt, situated some three leagues from Saint-Mihiel, and owned by +them from time immemorial. + +In 1303 Ulrich de Villacourt was one of the three lords who set their +seal to the will of Ferry, Duke of Lorraine, by order of that prince. +Under Charles the Bold, Gantonnet de Villacourt, who had been taken +prisoner by the Messinians, only regained his liberty by giving his word +never to mount a battle-horse, nor to carry military weapons again. From +that time forth he rode a mule, arrayed himself in buffalo-skin, carried +a heavy iron bar, and returned to the fight bolder and more terrible +than ever. Maheu de Villacourt married Gigonne de Malain and afterward +Christine de Gliseneuve. His marble statue, between his two wives, was +to be seen before the Revolution in the Church of the Grey Friars at +Saint-Mihiel. Duke Rene allowed him to take eight hundred florins from +the town of Ligny for the ransom that he had had to pay after the +disastrous battle of Bulgneville. + +Remacle de Villacourt, Maheu's son, was killed in 1476, in the battle +waged by Duke Rene before Nancy against Charles the Daring. Hubert de +Villacourt, Remacle's sons, Seneschal of Barrois and Bailiff of +Bassigny, followed Duke Antoine as standard-bearer in the Alsatian war, +while his brother Bonaventure, a monk of the strict order of +Saint-Francois, was made three times over the triennial Superior of his +order, and confessor of Antoine and Francois, Dukes of Lorraine; and one +of his sisters, Salmone, was appointed Abbess of Sainte Glossinde of +Metz. + +Jean-Marie de Villacourt served in the French army, and after the +Landrecies day, the king made him a knight and embraced him. He was +afterward captain of three hundred foot soldiers and Equerry of the +King's stables, and was then appointed to the captaincy of Vaucouleurs +and made Governor of Langres. He had married a sister of Jean de +Chaligny, the celebrated gun-founder of Lorraine, who cast the famous +culverin, twenty-two feet high. His brother Philibert was a cavalry +captain under Charles IX. His brother Gaston made himself famous by his +duels. It was he who killed Captain Chambrulard, with two sword-strokes, +before four thousand persons assembled at the back of the Chartreux in +Paris. Jean-Marie had another brother, Angus, who was Canon of Toul and +Archdeacon of Tonnerrois, and a sister, Archange, who was Abbess of +Saint-Maur, Verdun. + +Then came Guillaume de Villacourt, who fought against Louis XIII. He was +obliged to surrender with Charles de Lenoncourt, who was defending the +town of Saint-Mihiel, and he shared his four years' captivity in the +Bastille. His son, Mathias de Villacourt, married in 1656 Marie +Dieudonnee, a daughter of Claude de Jeandelincourt, who opened the salt +mine of Chateau-Salins. Mathias had fourteen children, ten of whom were +killed in the service of Louis XIV: Charles, captain of the regiment of +the Pont, killed in the siege of Philisbourg; Jean, killed in the battle +of Nerwinde; Antoine, captain of the regiment of Normandie, killed in +the siege of Fontarabie; Jacques, killed in the siege of Bellegarde, +where he had gone by permission of the king; Philippe, captain of the +grenadiers in the Dauphin's regiment, killed in the battle of Marsaille; +Thibaut, captain in the same regiment, killed in the battle of +Hochstett; Pierre-Francois, commander in the Lyonnais regiment, killed +in the battle of Fleurus; Claude-Marie, commander in the Perigord +regiment, killed in the passage of the Hogue; Edme, lieutenant in his +brother's company, killed at his side in the same affair, and Gerard, +Knight of the Order of Saint-Jean of Jerusalem, killed in 1700, in a +conflict between four galleys of Christians and a Turkish man-of-war. Of +the three daughters of Charles-Mathias, Lydie married the Seigneur de +Majastre, Governor of Epinal, and the other two, Berthe and Phoebe, died +unmarried. + +The eldest of the sons of Charles-Mathias, Louis-Aime de Villacourt, who +served eighteen years and retired from service after the battle of +Malplaquet, died in 1702. His son left Villacourt, settled down in +Paris, threw himself into the life of the capital, and so got rid of the +remainder of a fortune which had already been encroached upon by the +loss of a lawsuit between his father and the d'Haraucourts. He +endeavoured to recover his losses at the gaming-table, got into debt, +and returned to Villacourt with a wife from Carrouge who had kept a +gambling house in Paris. He died in 1752, owning very little besides the +walls of the chateau, and leaving a name less famous and less honourable +than his father's had been. He had two children by his marriage, a +daughter and a son. The daughter became maid of honour to the +Empress-Queen, the son remained at Villacourt, leading a low, coarse +life as a country gentleman. On the abolition of privileges in 1790 he +gave up his rank and lived on a friendly and equal footing with the +peasants until he died in 1792. His son Jean, lieutenant in the regiment +of the Royal-Liegeois in 1787, was in the Nancy affair. He emigrated, +went through the campaigns of 1792 to 1801 in Mirabeau's legion, which +was then commanded by Roger de Damas, and in the Bourbon grenadiers in +Conde's army. On the thirteenth of August, 1796, he was wounded on the +head in the Oberkamlach battle. In 1802 he returned to France, bringing +with him a wife he had married in Germany, who died after bearing him +four children, four sons. He had become weak in intellect, almost +childish in fact, from the result of his wound, and after his wife's +death there was no one to regulate the household expenses. Disorder +gradually crept in, he kept open table and took to drinking, until at +last he was obliged to sell what little land he had round the chateau. +Finally the chateau itself began to crumble away. He could not have it +repaired, as he had no money to pay the workmen. The wind could be felt +through the cracks, and the rain came in. The family were obliged to +give up one room after another, taking refuge where the roof was still +sound. He himself was indifferent to all this; after drinking two or +three glasses of brandy he would take his seat in what used to be the +kitchen garden, on a stone bench near a meridian, the figures of which +had worn away, and there he would get quite cheerful in the sunshine, +calling to people over the hedge to come in and drink with him. Decay +and poverty, however, made rapid strides in the chateau. There was +nothing left of all the old silver but a salad-bowl, which was used for +the food of a horse called Brouska, that the exile had brought with him +from Germany, and which was now allowed to roam in liberty through the +rooms on the ground-floor. + +The four sons grew up as the chateau went to decay, accustomed to wind, +rain, and roughing it. They were entirely neglected and abandoned by +their father, and their only education consisted of a few lessons from +the parish priest. From living like the peasants, and mixing with them +in their work and games, they gradually became regular peasants +themselves, and the roughest and strongest in the country round. When +their father died the four brothers, by common consent, made over to a +land agent the remaining stones of their chateau in return for a few +pounds, with which to pay their most pressing debts, and an annuity of +twenty pounds, which was to be paid until the death of the last of the +four. They then took up their abode in the forest, which joined their +estate, and lived there with the wood-cutters and in the same way as +they did, making a regular den of their hut, and living there with +their sweethearts or wives, peopling the forest with a half-bred race, +in which the Villacourts were crossed with nature, noblemen mated with +children of the forest, whose language, even, was no longer French. Some +of Jean de Villacourt's old comrades in arms had tried, on his death, to +do something for his children. They were interested in this name, which +had been so great and had now fallen so low. In 1826 the youngest of the +boys, who was scarcely more than sixteen, was brought to Paris. The +little savage was clothed and presented to the Duchesse d'Angouleme: he +appeared three or four times in the _salons_ of the Minister of War, who +was related to his family, and who was very anxious to do something for +him; but at the end of a week, feeling stifled in these drawing-rooms, +and ill at ease in his clothes, he had escaped like a little wolf, gone +straight back to his hiding-place, and had not come out of it again for +years. + +Of these four Villacourts, he was the only one left at the end of twenty +years. His three brothers died one after the other, and all by violent +deaths; one from drunkenness, the second from illness, and the other +from blows he had received in a skirmish. All three had been struck down +suddenly, snatched as it were from the midst of life. Living among the +bastards they had left, this last of the Villacourts was looked up to in +the forest as the chieftain of a clan until 1854, when the game laws +came into force. All the regulations and the supervision, the trials, +fines, confiscations, and liabilities connected with the chase, which +had now become his very life, and the fear of giving way to his anger +some day and of putting a bullet into one of the keepers, disgusted him +with this part of the world, with France, and with this land which was +no longer his own. + +It occurred to him to go to America in order to be quite free, and to be +able to hunt in untrodden fields where no gun license was necessary. He +went to Paris to set sail from Havre, but he had not enough money for +the voyage. He then fell back on Africa, but there he found a second +France with laws, gendarmes, and forest-keepers. He tried working a +grant of land, and then a clearing, but that kind of labour did not suit +him. The country and the climate tried him, and the burning heat of the +sun and soil began to take effect on his robust health. At the end of +two years he returned to France. + +On going back to his log-hut at Motte-Noire he found a newspaper there, +the only thing which had come for him during his absence. It was a +number of the _Moniteur_ and was more than a year old. He tore it up to +light his pipe, and, just as he was twisting it, caught sight of a +red-pencil mark. He opened it out again and read the marked paragraph: + +"_M. Mauperin_ (_Alfred-Henri_), better known by the name of +_Villacourt_, is about to apply to the Keeper of the Seals for +permission to add to his name that of Villacourt, and will henceforth be +known as _Mauperin de Villacourt_." + +He got up, walked about, fumed, then sat down again, and slowly lighted +his pipe. + +Three days later he was in Paris. + +Just at first on reading the paper he had felt as though some one had +struck him across the face with a horsewhip. Then he had said to himself +that he was robbed of his name, but that was all, that his name was no +longer worth anything, as it was now the name of a beggar. This +philosophizing mood did not last long, the thought of the theft of his +name gradually came back to him, and it irritated and hurt him, and made +him feel bitter. After all he had nothing left but this name, and he +could not endure the idea of having it stolen from him, and so started +for Paris. + +On arriving he was as furious as a mad bull, and his one idea was to go +and knock this M. Mauperin down at once. When once he was in the +capital, though, with its streets and its crowds, face to face with its +people, its shops, its life, all the passers-by, and the noise, he felt +dazed, like some wild beast let loose in a huge circus, whose rage is +suddenly turned into fright and who stops short after its first leap. He +went straight to the law courts, and in the long hall accosted one of +those men in black, who are generally leaning against a pillar, and +told him what had happened. The man in black informed him that as the +year's delay had expired there was nothing to be done but appeal to the +high court against the decree authorizing the addition of the name, and +he gave him the address of a counsel of the higher court. M. de +Villacourt hurried to this counsel. He found a very cold, polite man, +wearing a white necktie, who, while leaning back in a green morocco +chair, listened with a fixed expression in his eyes all the time to his +case, his claims, his rights, his indignation, and to the sound of the +parchments he was turning over with a nervous hand. + +The expression of the counsel's face never changed, so that when M. de +Villacourt had finished he fancied that the other man had not +understood, and he began all over again. The lawyer stopped him with a +gesture, saying: "I think you will gain your case, monsieur." + +"You _think_ so? Do you mean to say you are not sure of it?" + +"A lawsuit is always a lawsuit, monsieur," answered the lawyer with a +faint smile, which was so sceptical that it chilled M. de Villacourt, +who was just prepared to burst out in a rage. "The chances are on your +side, though, and I am quite willing to undertake your case." + +"Here you are then," said M. de Villacourt, putting his roll of +title-deeds down on the desk. "Thank you, sir," he added, rising to take +his leave. + +"Excuse me," said the lawyer on seeing him walk towards the door, "but I +must call your attention to the fact that in business of this kind, in +an appeal to the higher court, we do not only act as the barrister but +as the lawyer of our client. There are certain expenses, for getting +information and examining deeds--If I take up your case I shall be +obliged to ask you to cover these expenses. Oh, it is only a matter of +from twenty to twenty-five pounds. Let us say twenty pounds." + +"Twenty to twenty-five pounds! Why, what do you mean!" exclaimed M. de +Villacourt, turning red with indignation. "Some one steals my name, and +because I have not seen the newspaper in which the man warns me that he +intends robbing me, I must pay twenty-five pounds to make this rascal +give up my name again. Twenty to twenty-five pounds! But I haven't the +money, sir," he said, lowering his head and letting his arms fall down +at his sides. + +"I am extremely sorry, monsieur, but this little formality is +indispensable. Oh, you must be able to find it. I feel sure that among +the relatives of the families into which your family has married--in +such questions as these, families are always ready to pull together." + +"I do not know any one--and the Count de Villacourt will never ask for +money. I had just twelve pounds when I arrived. I bought this coat for +about two pounds at the Palais Royal on the way here. This hat cost me +five and tenpence. I suppose my hotel bill will cost me about a +sovereign, and I shall want about a sovereign to get back home. Could +you do with what is left?" + +"I am very sorry, monsieur----" + +M. de Villacourt put his hat on and left the room. At the hall-door he +suddenly turned round, passed through the dining-room and opening the +office-door again, he said, in a smothered voice which he was doing his +utmost to control: + +"Can I have the address of M. Henri Mauperin--known as de +Villacourt--without paying for it?" + +"Certainly; he is a barrister. I shall find his address in this book. +Here it is; Rue Taitbout--14." + +It was after all this that M. de Villacourt had hurried away to Henri +Mauperin's. + + + + +XXXVI + + +When Denoisel entered the Mauperins' drawing-room that evening he found +every one more gay and cheerful than usual. There was a look of +happiness on all the faces; M. Mauperin's good-humour could be guessed +by the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. Mme. Mauperin was most gracious, +she positively beamed and looked blissfully happy. Renee was flitting +about the room, and her quick, girlish movements were so bird-like that +one could almost imagine the sound of a bird's wings. + +"Why, here's Denoisel!" exclaimed M. Mauperin. + +"Good-evening, m'sieu," said Renee, in a playful tone. + +"You haven't brought Henri with you?" asked Mme. Mauperin. + +"He couldn't come. He'll be here the day after to-morrow without fail." + +"How nice of you! Oh, isn't he a good boy to have come this evening," +said Renee, hovering round and trying to make him laugh as though he had +been a child. + +"Oh, he's a bad lot! Ah, my dear fellow--" and M. Mauperin shook hands +and winked at his wife. + +"Yes; just come here, Denoisel," said Mme. Mauperin. "Come and sit down +and confess your sins. It appears that you were seen the other day in +the Bois--driving----" + +She stopped a minute like a cat when it is drinking milk. + +"Ah, now your mother's wound up!" said M. Mauperin to Renee. "She's in +very good spirits to-day--my wife is. I warn you, Denoisel." + +Mme. Mauperin had lowered her voice. Leaning forward towards Denoisel +she was telling him a very lively story. The others could only catch a +word here and there between smothered bursts of laughter. + +"Mamma, it's not allowed; that sort of thing--laughing all to +yourselves. Give me back my Denoisel, or I'll tell stories like yours to +papa." + +"Oh, dear, wasn't it absurd!" said Mme. Mauperin, when she had finished +her bit of gossip, laughing heartily as old ladies do over a spicy tale. + +"How very lively you all are this evening!" exclaimed Denoisel, chilled +by all this gaiety. + +"Yes, we are as gay as Pinchon," said Renee, "that's how we all feel! +And we shall be like this to-morrow, and the day after, and always; +shall we not, papa?" and running across to her father she sat down on +his knees like a child. + +"My darling!" said M. Mauperin to his daughter. "Well, I never! Just +look, my dear, do you remember? This was her knee when she was a little +girl." + +"Yes," said Mme. Mauperin, "and Henri had the other one." + +"Yes, I can see them now," continued M. Mauperin; "Henri was the girl +and you were the boy, Renee. Just to fancy that all that was fifteen +years ago. It used to amuse you finely when I let you put your little +hands on the scars that my wounds had left. What rascals of children +they were! How they laughed!" Then turning to his wife he added, "What +work you had with them, my dear. It doesn't matter though, Denoisel; +it's a good thing to have a family. Instead of only having one heart, +it's as though you have several--upon my word it is!" + +"Ah, Denoisel, now that you are here, we shall not let you go again," +said Renee. "Your room has been waiting for you long enough." + +"I'm so sorry, Renee, but really I have some business to attend to this +evening in Paris; I have, really." + +"Oh, business! You? How important you must feel, to be sure!" + +"Do stay, Denoisel," said M. Mauperin. "My wife has a whole collection +of stories for you like the one she has just told you." + +"Oh yes, do, will you?" pleaded Renee. "We'll have such fun; you'll see. +I won't touch the piano at all, and I won't put too much vinegar in the +salad. We'll make puns on everything. Come now, Denoisel." + +"I accept your invitation for next week." + +"Horrid thing!" and Renee turned her back on him. + +"And Dardouillet," said Denoisel; "isn't he coming this evening?" + +"Oh, he'll come later on," said Mauperin. "By-the-bye, it's just +possible he won't come, though. He's very busy--in the very thick of +marking out his land. I fancy he's just busy transporting his mountain +into his lake and his lake on to the top of his mountain." + +"Well, but what about this evening?" + +"Oh, this evening--no one knows," said Renee. "He's full of mysteries, +M. Dardouillet. But how queer you look to-day, Denoisel!" + +"I do?" + +"Yes, you; you don't seem at all frolicsome; there's no sparkle about +you. What's been ruffling you?" + +"Denoisel, there's something the matter," said Mme. Mauperin. + +"Nothing whatever, madame," answered Denoisel. "What could be the matter +with me? I'm not low-spirited in the least. I'm simply tired; I've had +to rush about so much this last week for Henri. He would have my opinion +about everything in connection with his furnishing." + +"Ah yes," said Mme. Mauperin, her face lighting up with joy; "it's true, +the twenty-second is getting near. Oh, if any one had told me this two +years ago! I'm afraid I shall be too happy to live on that day. Just +think of it, my dear," and she half closed her eyes and revelled in her +dreams of the future. + +"I shall be simply lovely for the occasion, I can tell you, Denoisel," +said Renee. "I have had my dress tried on to-day, and it fits me to +perfection. But, papa, what about a dress-coat?" + +"My old dress-coat is quite new." + +"Oh, but you must have one made, a newer one still, if I'm to take your +arm. Oh, how silly I am; you won't take me in, of course. Denoisel, +please keep a quadrille for me. We shall give a ball, of course, mamma?" + +"A ball and everything that we can give," said Mme. Mauperin. "I expect +people will think it is not quite the thing; but I can't help that. I +want it to be very festive--as it was for our wedding, do you remember, +my dear? We'll dance and eat and drink, and----" + +"Yes, that's what we'll do," said Renee, "and we'll let all our work +people drink till they are quite merry--Denoisel too. It will liven him +up a little to have too much to drink." + +"Well, with all this, I don't fancy Dardouillet's coming----" + +"What in the world makes you so anxious to see Dardouillet, this +evening?" asked M. Mauperin. + +"Yes, that's true," put in Renee. "That hasn't been explained. Please +explain, Denoisel." + +"How inquisitive you are, Renee. It's just a bit of nonsense--nothing +that matters. I want him to lend me his bulldog for a rat-fight at my +club to-morrow. I've made a bet that he'll kill a hundred in two +minutes. And with that I must depart. Good-night, all!" + +"Good-night!" + +"Then, my boy will be here the day after to-morrow, for sure?" said Mme. +Mauperin at the door to Denoisel. + +Denoisel nodded without answering. + + + + +XXXVII + + +On arriving at Dardouillet's little house at the other end of the +village, Denoisel rang the bell. An old woman opened the door. + +"Has M. Dardouillet gone to bed?" + +"Gone to bed? No, indeed! A nice life he leads!" answered the old +servant; "he's pottering about in the garden; you'll find him there," +and she opened the long window of the dining-room. + +The bright moonlight fell on a garden absolutely bare, as square as a +handkerchief, and with the soil all turned over like a field. In one +corner, standing motionless and with folded arms, on a hillock, was a +black figure which looked like a spectre in one of Biard's pictures. It +was M. Dardouillet, and he was so deeply absorbed that he did not see +his visitor until Denoisel was quite close to him. + +"Ah, it's you, M. Denoisel? I'm delighted to see you. Just look now," +and he pointed to the loose soil all round. "What do you think of that? +Plenty of lines there, I hope; and it's all quite soft and loose, you +know," and he put his hand out over the plan of his rising ground as +though he were stroking the brow of his ideal hill. + +"Excuse me, M. Dardouillet," said Denoisel. "I've come about an affair +that----" + +"Moonlight--remember that--if ever you have a garden--there's nothing +like moonlight for seeing what you have done--exactly as it is. By +daylight you can't see the embankments----" + +"M. Dardouillet, I want to appeal to a man who has worn a soldier's +uniform. You are a friend of the Mauperins. I have come to ask you if +you will act for Henri as----" + +"A duel?" And Dardouillet fastened up the black coat he wore, winter and +summer alike, with all that was left of the button. "Good heavens! Yes, +a service of that kind is a duty." + +"I shall take you back with me, then," said Denoisel, putting his arm +through Dardouillet's. "You can sleep at my place. It must be settled +quickly. It will be all over to-morrow, or the day after at the latest." + +"Good!" said Dardouillet, looking regretfully at a line of stakes that +had been commenced, the shadows of which the moon threw on the ground. + + + + +XXXVIII + + +On leaving Henri Mauperin's, M. de Villacourt had suddenly recollected +that he had no friends, no one at all whom he could ask to serve as +seconds. This had not occurred to him before. He remembered two or three +names which had been mixed up in his father's family history, and he +went along the streets trying to find the houses where he had been taken +when he had come to Paris in his boyhood. He rang at several doors, but +either the people were no longer living there or they were not at home +to him. + +At night he returned to his lodging-house. He had never before felt so +absolutely alone in the world. When he was taking the key of his +bed-room, the landlady asked him if he would not have a glass of beer +and, opening a door in a passage, showed him into a cafe which took up +the ground-floor of the house. + +Some swords were hanging from the hat-pegs, with cocked hats over them. +At the far end, through the tobacco smoke, he could see men dressed in +military uniform moving about round a billiard-table. A sickly looking +boy with a white apron on was running to and fro, scared and bewildered, +giving the _Army Monitor_ and the other papers a bath, each time that he +put a glass or cup on the table. + +Near the counter, a drum-major was playing at backgammon with the +landlord of the cafe in his shirt-sleeves. On every side voices could be +heard calling out and answering each other, with the rolling accent +peculiar to soldiers. + +"To-morrow I'm on duty at the theatre." + +"I take my week." + +"Gaberiau is beadle at Saint-Sulpice." + +"He was proposed and was to be examined." + +"Who's on service at the Bourdon ball?" + +"What an idea! to blow his brains out when he hadn't a single punishment +down on his book!" + +It was very evident that they were the Paris Guards from the barracks, +just near, waiting until nine o'clock for the roll-call. + +"Waiter, a bowl of punch and three glasses," said M. de Villacourt, +taking his place at a table where two of the Guards were seated. + +When the punch was brought he filled the three glasses, pushed one +before each of the Guards, and rose to his feet. + +"Your health, gentlemen!" he said, and then lifting his glass he +continued: "You are military men--I have to fight to-morrow, and I +haven't any one I can ask. I feel sure that you will act as seconds for +me." + +One of the Guards looked full at M. de Villacourt, and then turned to +his comrade. + +"We may as well, Gaillourdot; what do you say?" + +The other did not reply, but picking up his glass touched M. de +Villacourt's with it. + + * * * * * + +"Well then, to-morrow morning at ten o'clock. Room 27." + +"Right!" answered the Guards. + + * * * * * + +The following morning, just as Denoisel was starting with Dardouillet to +call on M. Boisjorand de Villacourt, his door-bell rang and the two +Guards entered. As their mission was to accept everything, terms, +weapons, and distances, the arrangements for the duel were soon made. +Pistols were decided upon at a distance of thirty-five paces, both +adversaries to be allowed to walk ten paces. Denoisel requested, in +Henri's name, that the affair should be got over as quickly as possible. +This was precisely what M. de Villacourt's seconds were about to ask, as +they were supposed to be going to the theatre that evening, and were +only free that day until midnight. A meeting was fixed for four o'clock +at the Ville-d'Avray Lake. Denoisel next went to one of his friends who +was a surgeon, and then to order a carriage for bringing home the +wounded man. He called to see Henri, who was out; then went on to the +shooting-gallery, where he found him, amusing himself with shooting at +small bundles of matches hanging from a piece of string, at which he +fired, setting the brimstone alight with the bullet. + +"Oh, that's nothing!" he said to Denoisel; "I fancy those matches get +set on fire with the wind from the bullet; but look here!" and he showed +him a cardboard target, in the first ring of which he had just put a +dozen bullets. + +"It's to be to-day at four, as you wished," said Denoisel. + +"Good!" said Henri, giving his pistol to the man. "Look here," he +continued, putting his fingers over two holes on the cardboard which +were rather far away from the others; "if it were not for these two +flukes this would be fit to frame. Oh, I'm glad it's arranged for +to-day." He lifted his arm with the gesture of a man accustomed to +shooting and just about to take aim, and then shook his hand about to +get the blood into it again. + +"Only imagine," he continued, "that it had quite an effect on me--the +idea of this affair--when I was in bed this morning. It's that deuced +horizontal position; I don't fancy it's good for one's courage." + +They all lunched together at Denoisel's and then proceeded to smoke. +Henri was cheerful and communicative, talking all the time. The surgeon +arrived at the hour appointed, and they all four got into the carriage +and drove off. + +They had been silent until they were about half way, when Henri suddenly +threw his cigar out of the window impatiently. + +"Give me a cigar, Denoisel, a good one. It's very important to have a +good cigar when you are going to shoot, you know. If you are to shoot +properly you mustn't be nervous; that's the principal thing. I took a +bath this morning. One must keep calm. Now, driving is the most +detestable thing; the reins saw your hand for you. I'd wager you +couldn't shoot straight after driving; your fingers would be stiff. +Novels are absurd with their duels, where the man arrives and flings his +reins to his groom. What should you think if I told you that one ought +to go in for a sort of training? It's quite true, though. I never knew +such a good shot as an Englishman I once met; he goes to bed at eight +o'clock; never drinks stimulants and takes a short walk every evening +like my father does. Every time that I have driven in a carriage without +springs to the shooting-gallery, my targets have shown it. By-the-bye, +this is a very decent carriage, Denoisel. Well, with a cigar it's the +same thing. Now a cigar that's difficult to smoke keeps you at work, you +have to keep lifting your hand to your mouth, and that makes your hand +unsteady; while a good cigar--you ask any good shot, and he'll tell you +the same thing--it's soothing, it puts your nerves in order. There's +nothing better than the gentle movement of the arm as you take the cigar +out of your mouth and put it in again. It's slow and regular." + + * * * * * + +On arriving, they found M. de Villacourt and his seconds waiting between +the two lakes. The ground was white with the snow that had fallen during +the morning. In the woods the trees stretched their bare branches +towards the sky, and in the distance the red sunset could be seen +between the rows of dark trees. They walked as far as the Montalet road. +The distances were measured, Denoisel's pistols loaded, and the +opponents then took their places opposite each other. Two +walking-sticks, laid on the snow, marked the limits of the ten paces +they were each allowed. Denoisel walked with Henri to the place which +had fallen to his lot, and as he was pushing down a corner of his collar +for him which covered his necktie, Henri said in a low voice: "Thanks, +old man; my heart's beating a trifle under my armpit, but you'll be +satisfied----" + +M. de Villacourt took off his frock-coat, tore off his necktie, and +threw them both some distance from him. His shirt was open at the neck, +showing his strong, broad, hairy chest. The opponents were armed, and +the seconds moved back and stood together on one side. + +"Ready!" cried a voice. + +At this word M. de Villacourt moved forward almost in a straight line. +Henri kept quite still and allowed him to walk five paces. At the sixth +he fired. + +M. de Villacourt fell to the ground, and the witnesses watched him lay +down his pistol and press his thumbs with all his strength on the double +hole which the bullet had made on entering his body. + +"Ah! I'm not done for--Ready, monsieur!" he called out in a loud voice +to Henri, who, thinking all was over, was moving away. + +M. de Villacourt picked up his pistol and proceeded to do his four +remaining paces as far as the walking-stick, dragging himself along on +his hands and knees and leaving a track of blood on the snow behind him. +On arriving at the stick he rested his elbow on the ground and took aim +slowly and steadily. + +"Fire! Fire!" called out Dardouillet. + +Henri, standing still and covering his face with his pistol, was +waiting. He was pale, and there was a proud, haughty look about him. The +shot was fired; he staggered a second, then fell flat, with his face on +the ground and with outstretched arms, his twitching fingers grasping +for a moment at the snow. + + + + +XXXIX + + +M. Mauperin had gone out into the garden as he usually did on coming +downstairs in the morning, when, to his surprise, he saw Denoisel +advancing to meet him. + +"You here, at this hour?" he said. "Why, where did you sleep?" + +"M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, pressing his hand as he spoke. + +"What is it? What's the matter?" asked M. Mauperin, feeling that +something had happened. + +"Henri is wounded." + +"Dangerously? Is it a duel?" + +Denoisel nodded. + +"Wounded? Ah, he is dead!" + +Denoisel took M. Mauperin's two hands in his for a second, without +uttering a word. + +"Dead!" repeated M. Mauperin mechanically, and he opened his hands as +though something had slipped from their grasp. "His poor mother, Henri!" +and the tears came with the words. "Oh, God--We don't know how much we +love them till this comes--and only thirty years old!" He sank down on +a garden-seat, choked with sobs. + +"Where is he?" he asked at last. + +"There," and Denoisel pointed to the window of Henri's room. + +From Ville-d'Avray he had taken the corpse straight to M. Dardouillet's, +and during the evening had found a pretext for sending for M. Bernard, +who had a key of the Mauperins' house. In the middle of the night, while +the family were asleep, the three men had taken off their shoes, carried +Henri's dead body upstairs, and laid it on the bed in his own room. + +"Thank you," said M. Mauperin, and making a sign to him that he could +not talk he got up. + +They walked round the garden four or five times in silence. The tears +came every now and then into M. Mauperin's eyes, but they did not fall. +Words, too, seemed to come to his lips and die away again. Finally, in a +deep, crushed voice, breaking the long silence by a desperate effort, +and not looking at Denoisel, M. Mauperin asked an abrupt question. + +"Was it an honourable death?" + +"He was your son," answered Denoisel. + +The father lifted his head at these words, as if strength had come to +him with which to fight against his grief. "Well, well; I must do my +duty now. You have done your part," and he drew Denoisel nearer to him, +his tears falling freely at last. + + + + +XL + + +"Murder is the name for affairs of this kind," M. Barousse was saying to +Denoisel as they followed the hearse to the cemetery. "Why didn't you +arrange matters between them?" + +"After that blow?" + +"After or before," said M. Barousse, peremptorily. + +"You'd better say that to his father!" + +"He's a soldier--but you, hang it all--you've never served in the army, +and you let him get killed! I consider you killed him." + +"Look here, I've had enough, M. Barousse." + +"You see, I reason things out; I've been a magistrate."--Barousse had +been a judge on the Board of Trade.--"You have the law courts and you +can demand justice. But duels are contrary to all laws, human or divine; +remember that. Why, just fancy--a scoundrel comes and gives me a blow in +the face; and he must needs kill me as well. Ah, I can promise you one +thing: if ever I'm on a jury, and there's a case of a duel--well, I look +upon it as murder. Duellists are assassins. In the first place it's a +cowardly thing----" + +"A cowardly thing that every one hasn't the courage to carry through, M. +Barousse; it's like suicide." + +"Ah, if you are going to uphold suicide," said Barousse, and leaving the +discussion he continued in a softened tone: "Such a fine fellow too, +poor Henri! And then Mauperin, and his wife, and his daughter--the whole +family plunged into this grief. No, it makes me wild when I think of it. +Why, I had known him all his life." Barousse pulled his watch half out +of his waistcoat-pocket as he spoke. "There!" he said, breaking off +suddenly; "I know it will be sold; I shall have missed _The Concert_, a +superb proof, earlier than the one with the dedication." + + * * * * * + +Denoisel returned to Briche with M. Mauperin, who, on arriving, went +straight upstairs to his wife. He found her in bed, with the blinds down +and the curtains drawn, overwhelmed and crushed by her terrible sorrow. + +Denoisel opened the drawing-room door and saw Renee, seated on an +ottoman, sobbing, with her handkerchief up to her mouth. + +"Renee," he said, going to her and taking her hands in his, "some one +killed him----" + +Renee looked at him and then lowered her eyes. + +"That man would never have known; he never read anything and he did not +see any one; he lived like a regular wolf; he didn't subscribe to the +_Moniteur_, of course. Do you understand?" + +"No," stammered Renee, trembling all over. + +"Well, it must have been an enemy who sent the paper to that man. Ah, +you can't understand such cowardly things; but that's how it all came +about, though. One of his seconds showed me the paper with the paragraph +marked----" + +Renee was standing up, her eyes wide open with terror; her lips moved +and she opened her mouth to speak--to cry out: "I sent it!" + +Then all at once she put her hand to her heart, as if she had just been +wounded there, and fell down unconscious and rigid on the carpet. + + + + +XLI + + +Denoisel came every day to Briche to inquire about Renee. When she was a +little better, he was surprised that she did not ask for him. He had +always been accustomed to seeing her when she was not well, even when +she was lying down, as though he had been one of the family. And +whenever she had been ill, he was always one of the first she had asked +for. She expected him to entertain and amuse her, to enliven her during +her convalescence and bring back her laughter. He was offended and kept +away for a day or two, and then when he came again he still could not +see her. One day he was told that she was too tired, another day that +the Abbe Blampoix was talking to her. Finally, at the end of a week, he +was allowed to see her. + +He expected an effusive welcome, such as invalids give their friends +when they see them again for the first time. He thought that after an +illness she would, in her impulsive way, be almost ready to embrace him. +Renee held out her hand to him and just let her fingers lie in his for a +second; she said a few words such as she might have said to any one, +and after about a quarter of an hour closed her eyes as though she were +sleepy. This coldness, which he could not understand in the least, +irritated Denoisel and made him feel bitter. He was deeply hurt and +humiliated, as his affection for Renee was pure and sincere and of such +long standing. He tried to imagine what she could possibly have against +him, and wondered whether M. Barousse had been instilling his ideas into +her. Was she blaming him, as a witness of the duel, for her brother's +death? Just about this time one of his friends who had a yacht at Cannes +invited him for a cruise in the Mediterranean, and he accepted the +invitation and went away at once. + +Renee was afraid of Denoisel. She only remembered the commencement of +the attack that she had had in his presence, that terrible moment which +had been followed by her fall and a fit of hysterics. She had had a +sensation of being suffocated by her brother's blood, and she knew that +a cry had come to her lips. She did not know whether she had spoken, +whether her secret had escaped her while she was unconscious. Had she +told Denoisel that she had killed Henri, that it was she who had sent +that newspaper? Had she confessed her crime? + +When Denoisel entered her room she imagined that he knew all. The +embarrassment which he felt and which was the effect of her manner to +him, his coldness, which was entirely due to her own, all this +confirmed her in her idea, in her certainty that she had spoken and that +it was a judge who was there with her. + +Before Denoisel's visit was over, her mother got up to go out of the +room a minute, but Renee clung to her with a look of terror and insisted +on her staying. It occurred to her that she might defend herself by +saying that it was a fatality; that by sending the newspaper she had +only meant to make the man put in his claim; that she had wanted to +prevent her brother from getting this name and to make him break off his +engagement; but then she would have been obliged to say why she had +wished to do this--why she had wished to ruin her brother's future and +prevent him from becoming a rich man. She would have had to confess all; +and the bare idea of defending herself in such a way, even in the eyes +of the man she respected more than any other, horrified and disgusted +her. It seemed to her that the least she could do would be to leave to +the one she had killed his fair fame and the silence of death. + +She breathed freely when she heard of Denoisel's departure, for it +seemed to her, then, as though her secret were her own once more. + + + + +XLII + + +Renee gradually recovered and in a few months' time seemed to be quite +well again. All the outward appearances of health came back to her, and +she had no suffering at all. She did not even feel anything of the +disturbance which illness leaves in the organs it has touched and in the +life it has just attacked. + +All at once the trouble began again. When she went upstairs or walked +uphill she suddenly felt suffocated. Palpitation became more frequent +and more violent, and then just as suddenly all this would stop again, +as it happens sometimes with these insidious diseases which at intervals +seem to entirely forget their victims. + +At the end of a few weeks the doctor from Saint-Denis, who was attending +Renee, took M. Mauperin aside. + +"I don't feel satisfied about your daughter," he said. "There is +something not quite clear to me. I should like to have a consultation +with a specialist. These heart affections are very treacherous +sometimes." + +"Yes, these heart affections--you are quite right," stammered M. +Mauperin. + +He could not find anything else to say. His former notions of medicine, +the desperate doctrines of the old school, Corvisart, the epigraph in +his famous book on the subject of heart affections: "_Haeret lateri +lethalis arundo_"; all these things came suddenly back to his mind, +clearly and distinctly. He could see the pages again of those books so +full of terror. + +"You see," the doctor went on, "the great danger of these diseases is +that they are so often of long standing. People send for us when the +disease has made great headway. There are symptoms that the patient has +not even noticed. Your daughter must have been very impressionable +always, from her very childhood, I should say; isn't that so? Torrents +of tears for the least blame, her face on fire for nothing at all, and +then her pulse beating a hundred a minute, a constant state of emotion +with her, very excitable, tempers like convulsions, always slightly +feverish. She would put a certain amount of passion into everything, I +should say, into her friendship, her games, her likes and dislikes; am I +not right? Oh yes, this is generally the way with children in whom this +organ predominates and who have an unfortunate predisposition to +hypertrophy. Tell me now, has she lately had any great emotion--any +great grief?" + +"Yes, oh yes; her brother's death." + +"Her brother's death. Ah yes, there was that," said the doctor, not +appearing to attach any great importance, nevertheless, to this +information. "I meant to ask you, though, whether she had been crossed +in love, for instance." + +"She? Crossed in love? Oh, good heavens!" and M. Mauperin shrugged his +shoulders, and half joining his hands looked up in the air. + +"Well, I'm only asking you that for the sake of having my conscience +clear. Accidents of this kind only develop the germ that is already +there and hasten on the disease. The physical influence of the passions +on the heart is a theory--It has been studied a great deal the last +twenty years; and quite right, too, in my opinion. The thesis that the +heart is lacerated in a burst of temper, in any great moral----" + +M. Mauperin interrupted him: + +"Then, a consultation--you fancy--you think--don't you?" + +"Yes, M. Mauperin, that will be quite the best thing. You see, it will +be more satisfactory for every one; for you, and for me. We should call +in M. Bouillaud, I suppose. He is considered the first authority." + +"Yes--M. Bouillaud," repeated M. Mauperin, mechanically nodding his head +in assent. + + + + +XLIII + + +It was just five minutes past twelve, and M. Mauperin was seated by +Renee's bed, holding her two hands in his. Renee glanced at the +time-piece. + +"He'll be here soon," said M. Mauperin. + +Renee answered by closing her eye-lids gently, and her breathing and the +beating of her heart could be heard like the ticking of a watch in the +silence of the room at night. + +Suddenly a peal of the door-bell rang out, clearly and imperiously, +vibrating through the house. It seemed to M. Mauperin as though it had +been rung within him, and a shudder passed through him to his very +finger-tips like a needle-prick. He went to the door and opened it. + +"It is some one who rang by mistake, sir," said the servant-man. + +"It's very warm," said M. Mauperin to his daughter as he took his seat +again, looking very pale. + +Five minutes later the servant knocked. The doctor was waiting in the +drawing-room. + +"Ah!" said M. Mauperin, getting up once more. + +"Go to him," murmured Renee, and then calling him back, she asked, +looking alarmed: "Is he going to examine me?" + +"I don't know; I don't think so. There'll be no need, perhaps," answered +M. Mauperin, playing with the knob of the door. + + * * * * * + +M. Mauperin had fetched the doctor and left him with his daughter. He +was in the drawing-room waiting the result. He had walked up and down, +taken a seat, and gazed mechanically at a flower on the carpet, and had +then gone to the window and was tapping with his fingers on the pane. + +It seemed to him as though everything within himself and all round had +suddenly stopped. He did not know whether he had been there an hour or a +minute. It was one of those moments in life for him, the measure and +duration of which cannot be calculated. He felt as though he were living +again through his whole existence, and as though all the emotions of a +lifetime were crowded into a moment that was eternal. + +He turned dizzy, like a man in a dream falling from a height and +enduring the anguish of falling. All kinds of indistinct ideas, of +confused anxieties and vague terrors, seemed to rise from the pit of his +stomach and buzz round his temples. Yesterday, to-day, to-morrow, the +doctor, his daughter, her illness, all this whirled round in his head, +perplexing him, mingled as it all was with a physical sensation of +uneasiness, anxiety, fear, and dread. Then all at once one idea became +distinct. He had one of those clear visions that cross the mind at such +times. He saw the doctor with his ear pressed against his daughter's +back and he listened with him. He thought he heard the bed creak as it +does when any one turns on it. It was over, they would be coming now; +but no one came. He began pacing up and down again, as he could not keep +still. He grew irritable with impatience and thought the doctor was a +very long time, but the next minute he said to himself that it was a +good sign, that a great specialist would not relish wasting his time, +and that if there had been nothing he could do, he would already have +been back. Fresh hope came to him with this thought: his daughter was +saved; when the doctor came in he should see by his face that his +daughter was saved. He watched the door, but no one came. Then he began +to say to himself that they would have to take precautions, that perhaps +she would always be delicate, that there were plenty of people who went +on living in spite of palpitation of the heart. Then the word, the +terrible word, _death_, came to him and haunted him. He tried to drive +it away by thinking over and over again the same thoughts about +convalescence, getting well, and good health. He went over in his mind +all the persons he had known, who had been ill a long time, and who were +not dead. And yet in spite of all his efforts the same question kept +coming back to him: "What would the doctor tell him?" + +He repeated this over and over again to himself. It seemed to him as +though this visit were never going to finish and never would finish. And +then at times he would shudder at the idea of seeing the door open. He +would have liked to remain as he was forever, and _never_ know. Finally +hope came back to him once more, just as the door opened. + +"Well?" said M. Mauperin to the doctor as he entered the room. + +"You must be brave," said the doctor. + +M. Mauperin looked up, glanced at the doctor, moved his lips without +uttering a word--his mouth was dry and parched. + +The doctor began to explain in full his daughter's disease, its gravity, +the complications that were to be feared: he then wrote out a long +prescription, saying to M. Mauperin at each item: + +"You understand?" + +"Perfectly!" answered M. Mauperin, looking stupefied. + + * * * * * + +"Ah, my dear little girl, you are going to get well!" + +These were M. Mauperin's words to his daughter when he went back to her +room. + +"Really?" she asked. + +"Kiss me." + +"What did he tell you?" + +"Well, you need only look at my face to know what he said," answered M. +Mauperin, smiling at her. He felt as though it would kill him, though, +that smile; and turning away under the pretence of looking for his hat, +he continued, "I must go to Paris to get the prescription made up." + + + + +XLIV + + +At the railway station M. Mauperin saw the doctor getting into the +train. He got into another compartment, as he did not feel as though he +had the strength to speak to him or even look at him. + +On arriving in Paris he went to a chemist's and was told that it would +take three hours to make up the prescription. "Three hours!" he +exclaimed, but at heart he was glad that it would be so long. It would +give him some time before returning to the house. When once he was in +the street he walked fast. He had no consecutive ideas, but a sort of +heavy, ceaseless throbbing in his head like the throb of neuralgia. His +sensations were blunted, as though he were in a stupor. He saw nothing +but the legs of people walking and the wheels of the carriages turning +round. His head felt heavy and at the same time empty. As he saw other +people walking, he walked too. The passers-by appeared to be taking him +with them, and the crowd to be carrying him along in its stream. +Everything looked faint, indistinct, and of a neutral tint, as things +do the day after any wild excitement or intoxication. The light and +noise of the streets he seemed to see and hear in a dream. He would not +have known there was any sun if it had not been for the white trousers +the policemen were wearing, which had caught his eye several times. + +It was all the same to him whether he went to the right or left. He +neither wanted anything nor had he the energy to do anything. He was +surprised to see the movement around him--people who were hurrying +along, walking quickly, on their way to something. He had had neither +aim nor object in life for the last few hours. It seemed to him as +though the world had come to an end, as though he were a dead man in the +midst of the life and activity of Paris. He tried to think of anything +in all that might happen to a man capable of moving him, of touching him +in any way, and he could not conceive of anything which could reach to +the depths of his despair. + +Sometimes, as though he were answering inquiries about his daughter, he +would say aloud, "Oh, yes, she is very ill!" and it was as though the +words he had uttered had been said by some one else at his side. Often a +work-girl without any hat, a pretty young girl with a round waist, gay +and healthy with the rude health of her class, would pass by him. He +would cross the street that he might not see her again. He was furious +just for a minute with all these people who passed him, with all these +useless lives. They were not beloved as his daughter was, and there was +no need for them to go on living. He went into one of the public gardens +and sat down. A child put some of its little sand-pies on to the tails +of his coat; other children getting bolder approached him with all the +daring of sparrows. Presently, feeling slightly embarrassed, they left +their little spades, stopped playing and stood round, looking shyly and +sympathetically, like so many men and women in miniature, at this tall +gentleman who was so sad. M. Mauperin rose and left the garden. + +His tongue was furred and his throat dry. He went into a cafe, and +opposite him was a little girl wearing a white jacket and a straw hat. +Her frock was short, showing her little firm, bare legs with their white +socks. She was moving about all the time, climbing and jumping on to her +father and standing straight up on his knees. She had a little cross +round her neck. Every few minutes her father begged her to keep still. + +M. Mauperin closed his eyes; he could see his own little daughter just +as she had been at six years old. Presently he opened a review, _The +Illustration_, and bent over it, trying to make himself look at the +pictures, and when he reached the last page he set himself to find out +one of the enigmas. + +When M. Mauperin lifted his head again he wiped his face with his +handkerchief. He had made out the enigma: _"Against death there is no +appeal."_ + + + + +XLV + + +The terrible existence of those who have given up hope, and who can only +wait, now commenced for M. Mauperin; that life of anguish, fear and +trembling, of despair and of constant shocks, when every one is +listening and on the watch for death; that life when one is afraid of +any noise in the house, and just as afraid of silence, afraid of every +movement in the next room, afraid of the sound of voices drawing near, +afraid to hear a door close, and afraid of seeing the face of the person +who opens the door when one enters the house, and of whom one asks +without speaking if the beloved one still lives. + +As people frequently do when nursing their sick friends, he began to +reproach himself bitterly. He made his sorrow still harder to bear by +making himself believe that it was partly his own fault, that everything +had not been done which ought to have been, that she might have been +saved if only there had been a consultation earlier, if at a certain +time, a certain month or day, he had only thought of something or other. + +At night his restlessness in bed seemed to make his grief more wild and +feverish. In the solitude, the darkness, and the silence, one thought, +one vision, was with him all the time--his daughter, always his +daughter. His anxiety worked on his imagination, his dread increased, +and his wakefulness had all the intensity of the terrible sensation of +nightmare. In the morning he was afraid to wake up, and just as a man, +when half-awake, will instinctively turn over from the light, so he +would do his utmost to fall asleep again, to drive away his first +thoughts, not to remember anything and so escape for a moment longer +from the full consciousness of the present. + +Then the day came again with all its torments, and the father was +obliged to control his feelings, to conquer himself, to be gay and +cheerful, to reply to the smiles of the suffering girl, to answer her +pitiful attempts to be gay, and to keep up her feeble illusions, her +clinging to the future, with some of those heart-rending words of +comfort with which dying people will delude themselves, asking as they +so often do for hope from those who are with them. + +She would say to him, sometimes, in that feeble, soft whisper peculiar +to invalids and which dies away to a whisper, "How nice it would be to +have no pain! I can tell you, I shall enjoy life as soon as I get quite +well." + +"Yes, indeed," he would answer, choking down his tears. + + + + +XLVI + + +Sick people are apt to believe that there are places where they would be +better, countries which would cure them. There are certain spots and +memories which come back to their mind and seem to fascinate them as an +exile is fascinated by his native land, and which lull them as a child +is lulled to rest in its cradle. Just as a child's fears are calmed in +the arms of its nurse, so their hopes fly to a country, a garden, or a +village where they were born and where surely they could not die. + +Renee began to think of Morimond. She kept saying to herself that if she +were once there she should get well. She felt sure, quite sure of it. +This Briche house had brought her bad luck. She had been so happy at +Morimond! And with this longing for change, the wish to move about which +invalids get, this fancy of hers grew, and became more and more +persistent. She spoke of it to her father and worried him about it. It +would not make any difference to any one, she pleaded, the refinery +would go along by itself, and M. Bernard, his manager, was trustworthy +and would see to everything, and then they could come back in the +autumn. + +"When shall we start, father dear?" she kept saying, getting more and +more impatient every day. + +M. Mauperin gave in at last. His daughter promised him so faithfully +that she would get well at Morimond that he began to believe it himself. +He imagined that this sick fancy was an inspiration. + +"Yes, the country will perhaps do her good," said the doctor, accustomed +to these whims of dying people, who fancy that by going farther away +they will succeed in throwing death off their track. + +M. Mauperin promptly arranged his business matters, and the family +started for Morimond. + +The pleasure of setting off, the excitement of the journey, the nervous +force that all this gives even to people who have no strength at all, +the breeze coming in by the open window of the railway carriage kept the +invalid up as far as Chaumont. She reached there without being +overfatigued. M. Mauperin let her rest a day, and the following morning +hired the best carriage he could get in the town and they all set out +once more for Morimond. The road was bad and the journey was +disagreeable and long. It began to get warm at nine o'clock, and by +eleven the sun scorched the leather of the carriage. The horses breathed +hard, perspired, and went along with difficulty. Mme. Mauperin was +leaning back against the front cushion and dozing. M. Mauperin, seated +next his daughter, held a pillow at her back, against which she fell +after every little jolt. Every now and then she asked the time, and when +she was told she would murmur, "No later than that!" + +Towards three o'clock they were getting quite near their destination; +the sky was cloudy, there was less dust, and it was cooler altogether. A +water-wagtail began to fly in front of the carriage about thirty paces +at a time, rising from the little heaps of stones. There were elm-trees +all along the road and some of the fields were fenced round. Renee +seemed to revive as one does in one's natal air. She sat up and, leaning +against the door with her chin on her hand as children do when in a +carriage, she looked out at everything. It was as though she were +breathing in all she saw. As the carriage rolled along, she said: + +"Ah, the big poplar-tree at the Hermitage is broken. The little boys +used to fish for leeches in this pool--oh, there are M. Richet's rooks!" + +In the little wood near the village her father had to get out and pluck +a flower for her, which he could not see and which she pointed out to +him growing on the edge of the ditch. + +The carriage passed by the little inn, the first houses, the grocer's, +the blacksmith's, the large walnut-tree, the church, the watchmaker's, +who was also a dealer in curiosities, and the Pigeau farm. The +villagers were out in the fields. Some children who were tormenting a +wet cat stopped to see the carriage drive past. An old man, seated on a +bench in front of his cottage door, with a woollen shawl wrapped round +him and shivering in spite of the sun, lifted his cap. Then the horses +stopped, the carriage door was opened, and a man who was waiting in +front of the lodge lifted Mlle. Mauperin up in his arms. + +"Oh, our poor young lady; she's no heavier than a feather!" he said. + +"How do you do, Chretiennot--how do you do, comrade?" said M. Mauperin, +shaking hands with the old gardener, who had served under him in his +regiment. + + + + +XLVII + + +The next day and the days which followed, Renee had the most delicious +waking moments, when the light which was just breaking, the morning of +the earth and sky, mingled--in the dawn of her thoughts--with the +morning of her life. Her first memories came back to her with the first +songs outdoors. The young birds woke up in their nests, awakening her +childhood. + +Supported and indeed almost carried by her father, she insisted on +seeing everything again--the garden, the fruit-trees on the walls, the +meadow in front of the house, the shady canals, the pool with its wide +sheet of still water. She remembered all the trees and the garden paths +again, and they seemed to her like the things one gradually recalls of a +dream. Her feet found the way along paths which she used to know and +which were now grown over with trees. The ruins seemed as many years +older to her as she was older since she had last seen them. She +remembered certain places on the grass where she had seen the shadow of +her frock when as a child she had been running there. She found the +spot where she had buried a little dog. It was a white one, named +_Nicolas Bijou_. She had loved it dearly, and she could remember her +father carrying it about in the kitchen garden after it had been washed. + +There were hundreds of souvenirs, too, for her in the house. Certain +corners in the rooms had the same effect on her as toys that have been +stored away in a garret, and that one comes across years after. She +loved to hear the sound of the mournful old weather-cock on the +house-top, which had always soothed her fears and lulled her to sleep as +a child. + +She appeared to rouse up and to revive. The change, her natal air, and +these souvenirs seemed to do her good. This improvement lasted some +weeks. + +One morning, her father, who was with her in the garden, was watching +her. She was amusing herself with cutting away the old roses in a clump +of white rose-bushes. The sunshine made its way through the straw of her +large hat, and the brilliancy of the light and the softness of the shade +rested on her thin little face. She moved about gaily and briskly from +one rose-tree to another, and the thorns caught hold of her dress as +though they wanted to play with her. At every clip of her scissors, from +a branch covered with small, open roses, with pink hearts all full of +life, there fell a dead earth-coloured rose which looked to M. Mauperin +like the corpse of a flower. + +All at once, leaving everything, Renee flung herself into her father's +arms. + +"Oh, papa, how I do love you!" she said, bursting into tears. + + + + +XLVIII + + +From that day the improvement began to disappear again. She gradually +lost the healthy colour which life's last kiss had brought to her +cheeks. She no longer had that delightful restlessness of the +convalescent, that longing to move about which only a short time ago had +made her take her father's arm constantly for a stroll. No more gay +words sprang from her mind to her lips, as they had done at first when +she had forgotten for a time all suffering; there was no more of the +happy prattle which had been the result of returning hope. She was too +languid to talk or even to answer questions. + +"No, there's nothing the matter with me--I am all right;" but the words +fell from her lips with an accent of pain, sadness, and resignation. + +She suffered from tightness of breath now, and constantly felt a weight +on her chest, which her respiration had difficulty in lifting. A sort of +constraint and vague discomfort, caused by this, made itself felt +throughout her whole system, attacking her nerves, taking from her all +vital energy and all inclination to move about, keeping her crushed and +submissive, without any strength to fight against it or to do anything. + +Her father persuaded her to try the effect of a cupping-glass. + + + + +XLIX + + +She took off her shawl in that slow way peculiar to invalids, so slow +that it seems painful. Her trembling fingers felt about for the buttons +that she had to unfasten, her mother helped her to take off the flannel +and cotton-wool in which she was wrapped, leaving her poor thin neck and +arms bare. + +She looked at her father, at the lighted candle, the twisted paper and +the wine-glasses, with that dread that one feels on seeing the hot irons +or fire being prepared for torturing one's flesh. + +"Am I right like this?" she asked, trying to smile. + +"No, you want to be in this position," answered M. Mauperin, showing her +how to sit. + +She turned round on her arm-chair, put her two hands on the back of it +and her cheek down on her hand, pulled her legs up, crossed her feet, +and, half-kneeling and half-crouching, only showed the profile of her +frightened face and her bare shoulders. She looked ready for the coffin +with her bony angles. Her hair, which was very loose, glided with the +shadow down the hollow of her back. Her shoulder-blades projected, the +joints of her spine could be counted, and the point of a poor thin +little elbow appeared through the sleeves of her under-linen, which had +fallen to the bend of her arm. + +"Well, father?" + +He was standing there, riveted to the spot, and he did not even know of +what he was thinking. At the sound of his daughter's voice he picked up +a glass, which he remembered belonged to a set he had bought for a +dinner-party in honour of Renee's baptism. He lighted a piece of paper, +threw it into the glass, and closed his eyes as he turned the glass +over. Renee gave a little hiss of pain, a shudder ran through all the +bones down her back, and then she said: + +"Oh, well; I thought it would hurt me much more than that." + +M. Mauperin took his hand from the glass and it fell to the ground; the +cupping had not succeeded. + +"Give me another," he said to his wife. + +Mme. Mauperin handed it to him in a leisurely way. + +"Give it me," he said, almost snatching it from her. His forehead was +wet with perspiration, but he no longer trembled. This time the vacuum +was made: the skin puckered up all round the glass and rose inside as +though it were being drawn by the scrap of blackened paper. + +"Oh, father! don't bear on so," said Renee, who had been holding her +lips tightly together; "take your hand off." + +"Why, I'm not touching it--look," said M. Mauperin, showing her his +hands. + +Renee's delicate white skin rose higher and higher in the glass, turning +red, patchy, and violet. When once the cupping was done the glass had to +be taken away again, the skin drawn to the edge on one side of the +glass, and then the glass swayed backward and forward from the other +side. M. Mauperin was obliged to begin again, two or three times over, +and to press firmly on the skin, near as it was to the bones. + + + + +L + + +Disease does its work silently and makes secret ravages in the +constitution. Then come those terrible outward changes which gradually +destroy the beauty, efface the personality, and, with the first touches +of death, transform those we love into living corpses. + +Every day M. Mauperin sought for something in his daughter which he +could not find--something which was no longer there. Her eyes, her +smile, her gestures, her footstep, her very dress which used proudly to +tell of her twenty years, the girlish vivacity which seemed to hover +round her and light on others as it passed--everything about her was +changing and life itself gradually leaving her. She no longer seemed to +animate all that she touched. Her clothes fell loosely round her in +folds as they do on old people. Her step dragged along, and the sound of +her little heels was no longer heard. When she put her arms round her +father's neck, she joined her hands awkwardly, her caresses had lost +their pretty gracefulness. All her gestures were stiff, she moved about +like a person who feels cold or who is afraid of taking up too much +space. Her arms, which were generally hanging down, now looked like the +wet wings of a bird. She scarcely even resembled her old self. And when +she was walking in front of her father, with her bent back, her shrunken +figure, her arms hanging loosely at her sides, and her dress almost +falling off her, it seemed to M. Mauperin that this could not be his +daughter, and as he looked at her he thought of the Renee of former +days. + +There was a shadow round her mouth that seemed to go inside when she +smiled. The beauty spot on her hand, just by her little finger, had +grown larger, and was as black as though mortification had set in. + + + + +LI + + +"Mother, it's Henri's birthday to-day." + +"Yes, I know," said Mme. Mauperin without moving. + +"Suppose we were to go to church?" + +Mme. Mauperin rose and went out of the room, returning very soon with +her bonnet and cape on. Half an hour later M. Mauperin was helping his +daughter out of the carriage at the Maricourt church-door. Renee went to +the little side-chapel, where the marble altar stood on which was the +little miraculous black wooden Virgin to which she had prayed with great +awe as a child. She sat down on a bench which was always there and +murmured a prayer. Her mother stood near her, looking at the church and +not praying at all. Renee then got up and, without taking her father's +arm, walked with a step that scarcely faltered right through the church +to a little side door leading into the cemetery. + +"I wanted to see whether _that_ was still there," she said to her +father, pointing to an old bouquet of artificial flowers among the +crosses and wreaths which were hung on the tomb. + +"Come, my child," said M. Mauperin; "don't stand too long. Let us go +home again now." + +"Oh, there's plenty of time." + +There was a stone seat under the porch with a ray of sunshine falling on +it. + +"It's warm here," she said, laying her hand on the stone. "Put my shawl +there so that I can sit down a little. I shall have the sun on my +back--there." + +"It isn't wise," said M. Mauperin. + +"Oh, just to make me happy." When she was seated and leaning against +him, she murmured in a voice as soft as a sigh, "How gay it is here." + +The lime-trees, buzzing with bees, were stirring gently in the faint +wind. A few fowl in the thick grass were running about, pecking and +looking for food. At the foot of a wall, by the side of a plough and +cart, the wheels of which were white with dry mud, on the stumps of some +old trees with the bark peeled off, some little chickens were frolicking +about, and some ducks were asleep, looking like balls of feathers. There +seemed to be a murmur of hushed voices from the church, and the light +played on the blue of the stained-glass windows. Flights of pigeons kept +starting up and taking refuge in the niches of sculpture and in the +holes between the old grey stones. The river could be seen and its +splashing sound heard; a wild white colt bounded along to the water's +edge. + +"Ah!" said Renee after a few moments, "we ought to have been made of +something else. Why did God make us of flesh and blood? It's frightful!" + +Her eyes had fallen on some soil turned up in a corner of the cemetery, +half hidden by two barrel-hoops crossed over each other and up which +wild convolvulus was growing. + + + + +LII + + +Renee's complaint did not make her cross and capricious, nor did it +cause her any of that nervous irritability so common to invalids, and +which makes those who are nursing them share their suffering morally. +She gave herself entirely up to her fate. Her life was ebbing away +without any apparent effort on her part to hold it back or to stop it in +its course. She was still affectionate and gentle. Her wishes had none +of the unreasonableness of dying fancies. The darkness which was +gathering round her brought peace with it. She did not fight against +death, but let it come like a beautiful night closing over her white +soul. + +There were times, however, when Nature asserted itself within her, when +her mind faltered from sheer bodily weakness, and when she listened to +the stealthy progress of the disease which was gradually detaching her +from her hold on life. At such times she would maintain a profound +silence and would be terribly calm, remaining for a long time mute and +motionless almost like a dead person. She would pass half the day in +this way without even hearing the clock strike, gazing before her just +beyond her feet with a steady, fixed gaze and seeing nothing at all. Her +father could not even catch the expression of her eyes at such times. +Her long lashes would quiver two or three times, and she would hide her +eyes by letting the lids droop over them, and it seemed to him then as +though she were asleep with her eyes half open. He would talk to her, +search his brains for something that might interest her, and endeavour +to make jokes, so that she should hear him and feel that he was there; +but in the middle of his sentence his daughter's attention, her +thoughts, and her intelligent look would leave him. He no longer felt +the same warmth in her affection, and when he was with her he himself +felt chilled now. It seemed as if disease were robbing him day by day of +a little more of his daughter's heart. + + + + +LIII + + +Sometimes, too, Renee would let a few words slip, showing that she was +mourning her fate as sick people do, words which sink to the heart and +give one a chill like death itself. + +One day her father was reading the newspaper to her; she took it from +him to look at the marriage announcements. + +"Twenty-nine! How old she was, wasn't she?" she said, as though speaking +to herself. She had been glancing down the death column. M. Mauperin did +not answer; he paced up and down the room for a few minutes and then +went away. + +When Renee was alone she got up to close the door, which her father had +not pulled to, and which kept banging. She fancied she heard a groan in +the corridor and looked, but there was no one there; she listened a +minute; but as everything was silent again she was just going to close +the door, when she thought she heard the same sound again. She went out +into the corridor as far as her father's room. It was from there that it +came. The key was not in the lock, and Renee stooped down and, through +the keyhole, saw her father, who had flung himself on his bed, weeping +bitterly and shaken with sobs. His head was buried in the pillow, and he +was endeavouring to stifle down his tears and his despair. + + + + +LIV + + +Renee was determined that her father should weep no more on her account. + +"Listen to me, papa," she said, the following morning. "We are going to +leave here at the end of September; that's settled, isn't it? We are +going everywhere, a month to one place and a fortnight to another--just +as we fancy. Well, _I_ want you to take me now to all the places where +you fought. Do you know, I've heard that you fell in love with a +princess? Suppose we were to come across her again, what should you say +to that? Wasn't it at Pordenone that you got those great scars?" And, +taking her father's face in her two hands, she pressed her lips to the +white, hollow places which had been marked by the finger of Glory. + +"I want you to tell me all about everything," she continued; "it will be +ever so nice to go all through your campaigns again with your daughter. +If one winter will not be enough for it all, why, we'll just take two. +And when I'm quite myself again--we are quite rich enough surely, +Henriette and I; you've worked hard enough for us--well, we'll just +sell the refinery, and we'll all come here. We'll go to Paris for two +months of the year to enjoy ourselves; that will be quite enough, won't +it? Then as you always like to have something to do, you can take your +farm again from Tetevuide's son-in-law. We'll have some cows and a nice +farm-yard for mamma--do you hear, mamma? I shall be outdoors all day; +and the end of it will be that I shall get _too_ well--you'll see. And +then we'll have people to visit us all the time. In the country we can +allow ourselves that little luxury--that won't ruin us--and we shall be +as happy, as happy--you'll see." + +Travelling and plans of all kinds--she talked of nothing but the future +now. She spoke of it as of a promised thing, a certainty. It was she, +now, who made every one hopeful, and she concealed the fact that she was +dying so skilfully and pretended so well that she wanted to live, that +M. Mauperin on seeing her and listening to her dreams, gave himself up +to dreaming with her of years which they had before them and which would +be full of peace, tranquility, and happiness. Sometimes, even, the +illusions that the invalid had invented herself dazzled her too, for an +instant, and she would begin to believe in her own fiction, forget +herself for a moment and, quite deceived like the others, she would say +to herself, "Suppose, after all, that I should get well!" At other +times she would delight in going back to the past. She would tell about +things that had happened, about her own feelings, funny incidents that +she remembered, or she would talk about her childish pleasures. It was +as though she had risen from her death-bed to embrace her father for the +last time with all she could muster of her youth. + +"Oh, my first ball-dress," she said to him one day; "I can see it +now--it was a pink tulle one. The dressmaker didn't bring it--- it was +raining--and we couldn't get a cab. How you did hurry along! And how +queer you looked when you came back carrying a cardboard box! And you +were so wet when you kissed me! I remember it all so well." + +Renee had only herself and her own courage to depend on, in her task of +keeping her father up and herself too. Her mother was there, of course; +but ever since Henri's death she had been buried in a sort of silent +apathy. She was indifferent to all that went on, mute and absent-minded. +She was there with her daughter, night and day, without a murmur, +patient and always even-tempered, ready to do anything, as docile and +humble as a servant, but her affection seemed almost mechanical. The +soul had gone out of her caresses, and all her ministrations were for +the body rather than the heart; there was nothing of the mother about +her now except the hands. + + + + +LV + + +Renee could still drag along with her father to the first trees of the +little wood near the house. She would then sink down with her back +against the moss of an oak-tree on the boundary of the wood. The smell +of hay from the fields, an odour of grass and honey came to her there +with a delicious warmth from the sunshine, the fresh air from the wood, +damp from the cool springs and the unmade paths. + +In the midst of the deep silence, an immense, indistinct rustling could +be heard, and a hum and buzz of winged creatures, which filled the air +with a ceaseless sound like that of a bee-hive and the infinite murmur +of the sea. All around Renee, and near to her, there seemed to be a +great living peace, in which everything was being swayed--the gnat in +the air, the leaf on the branch, the shadows on the bark of the trees, +the tops of the trees against the sky, and the wild oats on each side of +the paths. Then from this murmur came the sighing sound of a deep +respiration, a breeze coming from afar which made the trees tremble as +it passed them, while the blue of the heavenly vault above the shaking +leaves seemed fixed and immovable. The boughs swayed slowly up and down, +a breath passed over Renee's temples and touched her neck, a puff of +wind kissed and cheered her. Gradually she began to lose all +consciousness of her physical being, the sensation and fatigue of +living; an exquisite languor took possession of her, and it seemed to +her as though she were partially freed from her material body and were +just ready to pass away in the divine sweetness of all these things. +Every now and then she nestled closer to her father like a child who is +afraid of being carried away by a gust of wind. + +There was a stone bench covered with moss in the garden. After dinner, +towards seven o'clock, Renee liked to sit there; she would put her feet +up, leaning her head against the back of the seat, and with a trail of +convolvulus tickling her ear she would stay there, looking up at the +sky. It was just at the time of those beautiful summer days which fade +away in silvery evenings. Imperceptibly her eyes and her thoughts were +fascinated by the infinite whiteness of the sky, just ready to die away. +As she watched she seemed to see more brilliancy and light coming from +this closing day, a more dazzling brightness and serenity seemed to fall +upon her. Gradually some great depths opened in the heavens, and she +fancied she could see millions of little starry flames as pale as the +light of tapers, trembling with the night breeze. And then, from time to +time, weary of gazing into that dazzling brightness which kept receding, +blinded by those myriads of suns, she would close her eyes for an +instant as though shrinking from that gulf which was hanging over her +and drawing her up above. + + + + +LVI + + +"Mother," she said, "don't you see how nice I look? Just see all the +trouble I've taken for you;" and joining her hands over her head, her +dress loose at the waist, she sank down on the pillows full length on +the sofa in a careless, languid attitude which was both graceful and sad +to see. Renee thought that the bed and the white sheets made her look +ill. She would not stay there, and gathered together all her remaining +strength to get up. She dressed slowly and heroically towards eleven +o'clock, taking a long time over it, stopping to get breath, resting her +arms over and over again, after holding them up to do her hair. She had +thrown a fichu of point-lace over her head, and was wearing a +dressing-gown of starched white pique, with plenty of material in it, +falling in wide pleats. Her small feet were incased in low shoes, and +instead of rosettes she wore two little bunches of violets which +Chretiennot brought her every morning. In order to look more alive, as +invalids do when they are up and dressed, she would stay there all day +in this white girlish toilette fragrant with violets. + +"Oh, how odd it is when one is ill!" she said, looking down at herself +and then all round the room. "I don't like anything that is not pretty +now, just fancy! I couldn't wear anything ugly. Do you know I've thought +of something I want. You remember the little silver-mounted jug--so +pretty it was--we saw it in a jeweller's shop in the Rue Saint Honore +when we had just gone out of the theatre for the interval. If it isn't +sold--if he still has it, you might let him send it. Oh, I know I'm +getting the most ruinous tastes--I warn you of that. I want to arrange +things here. I'm getting very difficult to please; in everything I have +the most luxurious ideas. I used not to be at all elegant in my tastes; +and now I have eyes for everything I wear, and for everything all round +me--oh, such eyes! There are certain colours that positively pain +me--just fancy--and others that I had never noticed before. It is being +ill that makes me like this--it must be that. It's so ugly to be ill; +and so it makes you like everything that is beautiful all the more." + +With all this coquetry which the approach of death had brought to her, +these fancies and caprices, these little delicacies and elegancies, +other senses too seemed to come to Renee. She was becoming, and she felt +herself becoming, more of a woman. Under all the languor and indolence +caused by illness, her disposition, which had always been affectionate +but somewhat masculine and violent, grew gentler, more unbending, and +more calm. Gradually the ways, tastes, inclinations, and ideas--all the +signs of her sex, in fact--made their appearance to her. Her mind seemed +to undergo the same transformation. She gave up her impetuous way of +criticising and her daring speech. Occasionally she would use one of her +old expressions, and then she would say, smiling, "That is a bit of the +old Renee come back." She remembered speeches she had made, bold things +she had done, and her familiar manner with young men; she would no +longer dare to act and speak as in those old days. She was surprised, +and did not know herself in her new character. She had given up reading +serious or amusing books; she only cared now for works which set her +thinking, books with ideas. When her father talked to her about hunting +and the meets to which she had been and of those in store for her, it +gave her the sensation of being about to fall, and the very idea of +mounting a horse frightened her. All the emotions and weaknesses that +she felt were quite new to her. Flowers about which she had never +troubled much were now as dear to her as persons. She had never liked +needlework, and now that she had started to embroider a skirt, she +enjoyed doing it. She quite roused up and lived over again in the +memories of her early girlhood. She thought of the children with whom +she used to play, of the friends she had had, of different places to +which she had been, and of the faces of the girls in the same row with +her at her confirmation. + + + + +LVII + + +As she was looking out of the window one day, she saw a woman sit down +in the dust in the middle of the village street, between a stone and a +wheel-rut, and unswathe her little baby. The child lay face downward, +the upper part of its body in the shade, moving its little legs, +crossing its feet, and kicking about, and the sun caressed it lovingly +as it does the bare limbs of a child. A few rays that played over it +seemed to strew on its little feet some of the rose petals of a +Fete-Dieu procession. When the mother and child had gone away Renee +still went on gazing out of the window. + + + + +LVIII + + +"You see," she said to her father, "I never could fall in love; you made +me too hard to please. I always knew beforehand that no one could ever +love me as you did. I saw so many things come into your face when I was +there, such happiness! And when we went anywhere together, weren't you +proud of me! Oh! weren't you just proud to have me leaning on your arm! +It would have been all no good for any one else to have loved me; I +should never have found any one like my own father; you spoiled me too +much." + +"But all that won't prevent my dear little girl one of these fine days, +when she gets well, finding a handsome young man----" + +"Oh, your handsome young man is a long way off yet," said Renee, a smile +lighting up her eyes. "It seems strange to you," she went on, "doesn't +it, that I have never seemed anxious to marry. Well, I tell you, it is +your own fault. Oh, I'm not sorry in the least. What more did I want? +Why, I had everything; I could not imagine any other happiness. I never +even thought of such a thing. I didn't want any change. I was so well +off. What _could_ I have had, now, more than I already had? My life was +so happy with you; and I was so contented. Yes," she went on, after a +minute's silence, "if I had been like so many girls, if I had had +parents who were cold and a father not at all like you; oh yes, I should +certainly have done as other girls do, I should have wanted to be loved, +I should have thought about marriage as they do. Then, too, I may as +well tell you all, I should have had hard work to fall in love; it was +never much in my way, all that sort of thing, and it always made me +laugh. Do you remember before Henriette's marriage, when her husband was +making love to her? How I did tease them! _'Bad child!'_ do you +remember, that was what they used to call me. Oh, I've had my fancies, +like every one else; dreamy days when I used to go about building +castles in the air. One wouldn't be a woman without all that. But it was +only like a little music in my mind; it just gave me a little +excitement. It all came and went in my imagination; but I never had any +special man in my mind, oh never. And then, too, when once I came out of +my room, it was all over. As soon as ever any one was there, I only had +my eyes; I thought of nothing but watching everything so that I could +laugh afterward--and you know how your dreadful daughter could watch. +They would have had to----" + +"Monsieur," said Chretiennot, opening the door, M. Magu is downstairs; +"he wants to know if he can see mademoiselle." + +"Oh, father," said Renee, beseechingly, "no doctor to-day, please. I +don't feel inclined. I'm very well. And then, too, he snorts so; why +does he snort like that, father?" + +M. Mauperin could not help laughing. + +"I'll tell you," she went on, "it's the effect of driving about in a gig +on his rounds in the winter. As both his hands are occupied, one with +the reins and the other with the whip, he's got into the way of not +using his handkerchief----" + + + + +LIX + + +"Is the sky blue all over, father? Look out and tell me, will you?" said +Renee, one afternoon, as she lay on the sofa. + +"Yes, my child," answered M. Mauperin from the window, "it is superb." + +"Oh!" + +"Why? Are you in pain?" + +"No, only it seemed to me that there must be clouds--as though the +weather were going to change. It's very odd when one is ill, it seems as +if the sky were much nearer. Oh, I'm a capital barometer now." And she +went on reading the book she had laid down while she spoke. + +"You tire yourself with reading, little girl; let us talk instead. Give +it me," and M. Mauperin held out his hand for the book, which she +slipped from her fingers into his. On opening it, M. Mauperin noticed +some pages that he had doubled down some years before, telling her not +to read them, and these forbidden pages were still doubled down. + +Renee appeared to be sleepy. The storm which was not yet in the sky had +already begun to weigh on her. She felt a most unbearable heaviness +which seemed to overwhelm her, and at the same time a nervous uneasiness +took possession of her. The electricity in the air was penetrating her +and working on her. + +A great silence had suddenly come over everything, as though it had been +chased from the horizon, and the breath of solemn calm passing over the +country filled her with immense anxiety. She looked at the clock, did +not speak again, but kept moving her hands about from place to place. + +"Ah, yes," said M. Mauperin, "there is a cloud, really, a big cloud over +Fresnoy. How it is moving along! Ah, it's coming over on to our +side--it's coming. Shall I shut everything up--the window and the +shutters, and light up? Like that my big girl won't be so frightened." + +"No," said Renee, quickly, "no lights in the daytime--no, no! And then, +too," she went on, "I'm not afraid of it now." + +"Oh, it is some distance off yet," said M. Mauperin, for the sake of +saying something. His daughter's words had called up a vision of lighted +tapers in this room. + +"Ah, there's the rain," said Renee, in a relieved tone. "It's like dew, +that rain is. It's as if we were drinking it, isn't it? Come here--near +me." + +Some large drops came down, one by one, at first. Then the water poured +from the sky, as it does from a vase that has been upset. The storm +broke over Morimond and the thunder rolled and burst in peals. The +country round was all fire and then all dark. And at every moment in the +gloomy room, lighted up with pale gleams, the flashes would suddenly +cover the reclining figure of the invalid from head to foot, throwing +over her whole body a shroud of light. + +There was one last peal of thunder, so loud and which burst so near, +that Renee threw her arms round her father's neck and hid her face +against him. + +"Foolish child, it's over now," said M. Mauperin; and like a bird which +lifts its head a little from under its wing, she looked up, keeping her +arms round him. + +"Ah, I thought we were all dead!" she said, with a smile in which there +was something of a regret. + + + + +LX + + +One morning on going to see Renee, who had had a bad night, M. Mauperin +found her in a doze. At the sound of his footstep she half opened her +eyes and turned slightly towards him. + +"Oh, it's you, papa," she said, and then she murmured something vaguely, +of which M. Mauperin only caught the word "journey." + +"What are you saying about a journey?" he asked. + +"Yes, it's as though I had just come back from far away--from very far +away--from countries I can't remember." And opening her eyes wide, with +her two hands flat out on the sheet, she seemed to be trying to recall +where she had been, and from whence she had just come. A confused +recollection, an indistinct memory remained to her of stretches and +spaces of country, of vague places, of those worlds and limbos to which +sick people go during those last nights which are detaching them from +earth, and from whence they return, surprised, with the dizziness and +stupor of the Infinite still upon them, as if in the dream they have +forgotten they had heard the first flapping of the wings of Death. + +"Oh, it's nothing," she said after a minute's silence, "it's just the +effect of the opium--they gave me some last night to make me sleep." And +moving as though to shake off her thoughts, she said to her father, +"Hold the little glass for me, will you, so that I can make myself look +nice? Higher up--oh, these men--how awkward they are, to be sure." + +She put her thin hands through her hair to fluff it up and pulled her +lace into its place again. + +"There now," she said, "talk to me. I want to be talked to," and she +half closed her eyes while her father talked. + +"You are tired, Renee; I'll leave you," said M. Mauperin, seeing that +she did not appear to be listening. + +"No, I have a touch of pain. Talk to me, though; it makes me forget it." + +"But you are not listening to me. Come now, what are you thinking about, +my dear little girl?" + +"I'm not thinking about anything. I was trying to remember. Dreams, you +know--it isn't really like that--it was--I don't remember. Ah!" + +She broke off suddenly, with a pang of sharp pain. + +"Does it hurt you, Renee?" + +She did not answer, and M. Mauperin could not help his lips moving, as +he looked up with an expression of revolt. + +"Poor father," said Renee, after a few minutes. "You see I'm resigned. +No, we ought not to be so angry with pain. It is sent to us for some +reason. We are not made to suffer simply for the sake of suffering." + +And in a broken voice, stopping continually to get breath, she began +talking to him of all the good sides of suffering, of the wells of +tenderness it opens up in us, of the delicacy of heart, and the +gentleness of character that it gives to those who accept its bitterness +without allowing themselves to get soured by it. + +She spoke to him of all the meannesses and the pettinesses that go away +from us when we suffer; of the tendency to sarcasm which leaves us, and +the unkind laughter which we restrain; of the way in which we give up +finding pleasure in other people's little miseries, and of the +indulgence that we have for every one. + +"If you only knew," she said, "what a stupid thing wit seems to me now." +And M. Mauperin heard her expressing her gratitude to suffering as a +proof of election. She spoke of selfishness and of all the materiality +in which robust health wraps us up; of that hardness of heart which is +the result of the well-being of the body; and she told him what ease and +deliverance come with sickness; how light she felt inwardly and what +aspirations it brings with it for something outside ourselves. + +She spoke, too, of suffering as an ill which takes our pride away, which +reminds us of our infirmity, which makes us humane, causes us to feel +with all those who suffer, and which instils charity into us. + +"And then, too," she added with a smile, "without it there would be +something wanting for us; we should never be sad, you know----" + + + + +LXI + + +"My dear fellow, we are very unhappy," said M. Mauperin, one evening, a +few days later, to Denoisel, who had just jumped down from a hired trap. +"I had a presentiment you would come to-day," he went on. "She is asleep +now; you'll see her to-morrow. Oh, you'll find her very much changed. +But you must be hungry," and he led the way to the dining-room, where +supper was being laid for him. + +"Oh, M. Mauperin," said Denoisel, "she is young. At her age something +can always be done." + +M. Mauperin put his elbows on the table and great tears rolled slowly +from his eyes. + +"Oh, come, come, M. Mauperin; the doctors haven't given her up; there's +hope yet." + +M. Mauperin shook his head and did not answer, but his tears continued +to flow. + +"They haven't given her up?" + +"Yes, they have," said M. Mauperin, who could not contain himself any +longer, "and I didn't want to have to tell you. One is afraid of +everything, you see, when it comes to this stage. It seems to me that +there are certain words which would bring the very thing about, and to +own this, why, I fancied it would kill my child. And then, too, there +might be a miracle. Why shouldn't there be? They spoke of miracles--the +doctors did. Oh, God! She still gets up, you know; it's a great thing, +that she can get up. The last two days there has been an improvement, I +think. And then to lose two in a year--it would be too terrible. Oh, +that would be too much! But there, eat, man, you are not eating +anything," and he put a large piece of meat on Denoisel's plate. "Well, +well, we must bear up and be men; that's all we can do. What's the +latest news in Paris?" + +"There isn't any; at least, I don't know any. I've come straight from +the Pyrenees. Mme. Davarande read me one of your letters; but she is far +from thinking her so ill." + +"Have you no news of Barousse?" + +"Oh, yes! I met him on the way to the station. I wanted to bring him +with me, but you know what Barousse is; nothing in the world would +induce him to leave Paris for a week. He must take his morning walk +along the quays. The idea of missing an engraving with its full +margin----" + +"And the Bourjots?" asked M. Mauperin with an effort. + +"They say that Mlle. Bourjot will never marry." + +"Poor child, she loved him." + +"As to the mother, it is the saddest thing--it appears it's an awful +ending--there are rumours of strange things--madness, in fact. There's +some talk of sending her to a private asylum." + + + + +LXII + + +"Renee," said M. Mauperin, on entering his daughter's room the following +day, "there is some one downstairs who wants to see you." + +"Some one?" And she looked searchingly at her father. "I know, it's +Denoisel. Did you write to him?" + +"Not at all. You did not ask to see him, so that I did not know whether +it would give you any pleasure. Do you mind?" + +"Mother, give me my little red shawl--there, in the drawer," she said, +without answering her father. "I mustn't frighten him, you know. Now +then, bring him here quickly," she added, as soon as her shawl was tied +at the neck like a scarf. + +Denoisel came into the room, which was impregnated with that odour +peculiar to the young when they are ill, and which reminds one of a +faded bouquet and of dying flowers. + +"It's very nice of you to have come," said Renee. "Look, I've put this +shawl on for your benefit; you used to like me in it." + +Denoisel stooped down, took her hands in his and kissed them. + +"It's Denoisel," said M. Mauperin to his wife, who was seated at the +other end of the room. + +Mme. Mauperin did not appear to have heard. A minute later she got up, +came across to Denoisel, kissed him in a lifeless sort of way, and then +went back to the dark corner where she had been sitting. + +"Well, how do you think I look? I haven't changed much, have I?" And +then without giving him time to answer, she went on: "I have a dreadful +father who will keep saying I don't look well, and who is most +obstinate. It's no good telling him I am better; he will have it that I +am not. When I am quite well again, you'll see--he'll insist on fancying +that I am still an invalid." + +Denoisel was looking at her wasted arm, just above the wrist. + +"Oh, I'm a little thinner," said Renee, quickly buttoning her sleeve, +"but that's nothing; I shall soon pick up again. Do you remember our +good story about that, papa? It made us laugh so. It was at a farmer's +house at Tetevuide's--that dinner, you remember, don't you? Only imagine +it, Denoisel, the good fellow had been keeping some shrimps for us for +two years. Just as we were sitting down to table, papa said, 'Oh, but +where's your daughter, Tetevuide? She must dine with us. Isn't she +here?' 'Oh, yes, sir.' 'Well, fetch her in, then, or I shall not touch +the soup.' Thereupon the father went into the next room, and we heard +talking and crying going on for the next quarter of an hour. He came +back alone, finally. 'She will not come in,' he said, 'she says she's +too thin.' But, papa," Renee went on, suddenly changing the subject, +"for the last two days mamma has never been out of this room. Now that I +have a new nurse, suppose you take her out for a stroll?" + + * * * * * + +"Ah, Renee dear," said Denoisel, when they were alone, "you don't know +how glad I am to see you like this--to find you so gay and cheerful. +That's a good sign, you know; you'll soon be better, I assure you. And +with that good father of yours, and your poor mother, and your stupid +old Denoisel to look after you--for I'm going to take up my abode here, +for a time, with your permission." + +"You, too, my dear boy? Now do just look at me!" + +And she held out her two hands for him to help her to turn over, so that +she could face him and have the daylight full on her. + +"Can you see me now?" + +The smile had left her eyes and her lips, and all animation had suddenly +dropped from her face like a mask. + +"Ah, yes," she said, lowering her voice, "it's all over, and I haven't +long to live now. Oh, I wish I could die to-morrow. I can't go on, you +know, doing as I am doing. I can't go on any longer cheering them all +up. I have no strength left. I've come to the end of it, and I want to +finish now. He doesn't see me as I am, does he? I can't kill him +beforehand, you know. When he sees me laugh, why it doesn't matter about +the doctors having given me up--he forgets that--he doesn't see +anything, and he doesn't remember anything--so, you see, I am obliged to +go on laughing. Ah, for people who can just pass away as they would like +to--finish peacefully, die calmly, in a quiet place, with their face to +the wall--why, that must be so easy. It's nothing to pass away like +that. Well, anyhow, the worst part is over. And now you are here; and +you'll help me to be brave. If I were to give way, you would be there to +second me. And when--when I go, I count on you--you'll stay with him the +first few months. Ah, don't cry," she said; "you'll make me cry, too." + +There was a moment's silence. + +"Six months already since Henri's funeral," she began again. "We've only +seen each other once since that day. What a fearful turn I had, do you +remember?" + +"Yes, indeed I do remember," said Denoisel. "I've gone through it all +again, often enough. I can see you now, my poor child, enduring the +most horrible suffering, and your lips moving as though you wanted to +cry out, to say something, and you could not utter a single word." + +"I could not utter a single word," said Renee, repeating Denoisel's last +words. + +She closed her eyes, and her lips moved for a second as though they were +murmuring a prayer. Then, with such an expression of happiness that +Denoisel was surprised, she said: + +"Ah, I am so glad to see you! Both of us together--you'll see how brave +we shall be. And we'll take them all in finely--poor things!" + + + + +LXIII + + +It was stiflingly hot. Renee's windows were left open all the evening, +and the lamp was not lighted, for fear of attracting the moths, which +made her so nervous. They were talking, until as the daylight gradually +faded, their words and thoughts were influenced by the solemnity of the +long hours of dreamy reverie, without light. + +They all three soon ceased speaking at all, and remained there mute, +breathing in the air and giving themselves up to the evening calm. M. +Mauperin was holding Renee's hand in his, and every now and then he +pressed it fondly. + +The gloom was gathering fast, and gradually the whole room grew quite +dark. Lying full length on the sofa, Renee herself disappeared in the +indistinct whiteness of her dressing-gown. Presently nothing at all +could be seen, and the room itself seemed all one with the sky. + +Renee began to talk then in a low, penetrating voice. She spoke gently +and very beautifully; her words were tender, solemn, and touching, +sometimes sounding like the chant of a pure conscience, and sometimes +falling on the hearts around her with angelic consolation. + +Her ideas became more and more elevated, excusing and pardoning all +things. At times the things she said fell on the ear as from a voice +that was far away from earth, higher than this life, and gradually a +sort of sacred awe born of the solemnity of darkness, silence, night, +and death, fell on the room where M. and Mme. Mauperin, and Denoisel +were listening eagerly to all which seemed to be already fluttering away +from the dying girl in this voice. + + + + +LXIV + + +On the wall-paper were bouquets of corn, cornflowers, and poppies, and +the ceiling was painted with clouds, fresh-looking and vapoury. Between +the door and window a carved wood praying-chair with a tapestry cushion +looked quite at home in its corner; above it, against the light, was a +holy-water vessel of brass-work, representing St. John baptizing Christ. +In the opposite corner, hanging on the wall with silk cords, was a small +bracket with some French books leaning against each other, and a few +English works in cloth bindings. In front of the window, which was +framed with creeping plants joining each other over the top and with the +leaves that hung over bathed in light, was a dressing-table, covered +with silk and guipure lace, with a blue velvet mirror and silver-mounted +toilet bottles. The shaped mantel-shelf surmounted with a carved panel, +had its glass framed with the same light shade of velvet as that on the +dressing-table. On each side of the glass were miniatures of Renee's +mother, one when quite young and wearing a string of pearls round her +neck, and a daguerrotype representing her much older. Above this was a +portrait of her father in his uniform, painted by herself, the frame of +which, leaning forward, caused the picture to dominate the whole room. +On a rosewood dinner-wagon, in front of the chimney-piece, were one or +two knick-knacks, the sick girl's latest fancies--the little jug and the +Saxony bowl that she had wanted. A little farther away, by the second +window, all the souvenirs that Renee had collected in her riding +days--her hunting and shooting relics, riding-canes, a Pyrenees whip, +and some stags' feet with a card tied with blue ribbon, telling the day +and place where the animal had been run to cover. Beyond the window was +a little writing-desk which had been her father's at the military +school, and on its shelf stood the boxes, baskets, and presents she had +received as New Year's gifts. The bed was entirely draped with muslin. +At the back of it, and as though under the shelter of its curtains, all +the prayer-books Renee had had since her childhood were arranged on an +Algerian bracket, from which some chaplets were hanging. Then came a +chest of drawers covered with a hundred little nothings: doll's-house +furniture, some glass ornaments, halfpenny jewellery, trifles won in +lotteries, even little animals made of bread-crumbs cooked in the stove +and with matches for legs, a regular museum of childish things, such as +young girls hoard up and treasure as reminiscences. The room was bright +and warm with the noonday sun. Near the bed was a little table arranged +as an altar, covered with a white cloth. Two candles were burning and +flickering in the golden daylight. + +Through the dead silence, broken only by sobs, could be heard the heavy +footsteps of a country priest going away. Then all was hushed, and the +tears which were falling round the dying girl suddenly stopped as though +by a miracle. In a few seconds all signs of disease and the anxious look +of pain had disappeared from Renee's thin face, and in their place an +ecstatic beauty, a look of supreme deliverance had come, at the sight of +which her father, her mother, and her friend instinctively fell on their +knees. A rapturous joy and peace had descended upon her. Her head sank +gently back on the pillow as though she were in a dream. Her eyes, which +were wide open and looking upward, seemed to be filled with the +infinite, and her expression gradually took the fixity of eternal +things. A holy aspiration seemed to rise from her whole face. All that +remained of life--one last breath, trembled on her silent lips, which +were half open and smiling. Her face had turned white. A silvery pallor +lent a dull splendour to her delicate skin and shapely forehead. It was +as though her whole face were looking upon another world than ours. +Death was drawing near her in the form of a great light. + +It was the transfiguration of those heart diseases which enshroud dying +girls in all the beauty of their soul and then carry away to Heaven the +young faces of their victims. + + + + +LXV + + +People who travel in far countries may have come across, in various +cities or among old ruins--one year in Russia, another perhaps in +Egypt--an elderly couple who seem to be always moving about, neither +seeing nor even looking at anything. They are the Mauperins, the poor +heart-broken father and mother, who are now quite alone in the world, +Renee's sister having died after the birth of her first child. + +They sold all they possessed and set out to wander round the world. They +no longer care for anything, and go about from one country to another, +from one hotel to the next, with no interest whatever in life. They are +like things which have been uprooted and flung to the four winds of +heaven. They wander about like exiles on earth, rushing away from their +tombs, but carrying their dead about with them everywhere, endeavouring +to weary out their grief with the fatigue of railway journeys, dragging +all that is left them of life to the very ends of the earth, in the hope +of wearing it out and so finishing with it. + + + + +THE PORTRAITS OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT + + + + + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +Drawn from life by Will Rothenstein, 1894.] + +Like Dickens, Theophile Gautier, Merimee, and some other literary +celebrities, the brothers Goncourt tried their hands at drawing and +engraving before devoting themselves to letters. Sometimes in their +hours of leisure they further made essays in water-colour and pastel. +Thanks to Philippe Burty, Jules de Goncourt's "Etchings," collected in a +volume, and some of Edmond's sepia and washed drawings, allow us to +glean certain of the earliest of those records in which the faithful +Dioscuri endeavoured to portray each other with a care both affectionate +and touching. A very pretty "Portrait of Jules as a child, in the +costume of a Garde Francaise," a drawing heightened with pastel, is +described by Burty as one of Edmond's best works, but one, +unfortunately, which it was not possible to reproduce. "In the +swallow-tail coat of the French Guard," says Burty, "starting for a +fancy dress ball, the brilliance of his eyes heightened by the powder, +his hand on his sword-guard, at the age of ten, plump and spirited as +one of Fragonard's Cupids." Here we have the younger of the Goncourts, +delineated with all the subtlety of a delicate mannerism. Edmond was +eighteen at the time. Scarcely free of the ferule of his pedagogues, he +already looked at life with that air of keen astonishment which was +never to leave him, and which was to kindle in his eye the sort of +phosphorescent reflection that shone there to his last hour. It was the +elder and more observant of the two who first attempted to represent his +young brother, the one who was to be the greater artist of the pair, as +if the compact had already been entered upon, as if both by tacit +consent accepted the prolific life in common, then only at its dawn. A +great delight to the two brothers was their meeting with Gavarni, at the +offices of _L'Eclair_, a paper founded towards the end of 1851 by the +Comte de Villedeuil. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching by Jules de Goncourt, 1860.] + +[Illustration: JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a water-colour by Edmond de Goncourt, 1857.] + +From that first meeting dated the strong friendship between the trio, a +friendship that verged on worship on the side of the Goncourts, and on +tenderness on that of Gavarni. Two years later, on April 15, 1853, in +the series called _Messieurs du Feuilleton_ which he began in _Paris_, +the master draughtsman of the _lorette_ and the prodigal gave a +delicious sketch of Edmond and Jules de Goncourt. In his _Masques et +Visages_, M. Alidor Delzant, a bibliophile very learned in the +iconography of the Goncourts, declares these to be the best and most +faithful of all the portraits of the two brothers. We give a +reproduction of this fine lithograph. Seated in a box at the theatre in +profile to the right, an eye-glass in his eye, Jules, apparently intent +on the play, leans forward from beside Edmond, who sits in a meditative +attitude, his hands on his knees. M. Delzant compares these portraits +to those of Alfred and Tony Johannot by Jean Gigoux. And do they not +also recall another group of two literary brothers, older, it is true, +the delicate faces of Paul and Alfred de Musset in the delicious frame +of the Musee Carnavalet? Gavarni's drawing is a perfect master-piece of +expression and subtlety. + +[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching from life by Jules de Goncourt, 1861.] + + +[Illustration: EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From a lithograph by Gavarni, 1853.] + +Placed one against the other, like the antique medals on which Castor +and Pollux are graved in profile in the same circle, how admirably each +of these gentle faces, in which we note more than one analogy, completes +the other! And as we admire them, are we not tempted to exclaim: Here +indeed are the Freres Zemganno of letters! + +[Illustration: MEDALLION OF EDMOND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. + +From an engraving by Bracquemond, 1875.] + +The reputation of the two brothers increased proportionately with their +works--works of the most intense and subtle psychological research. +Installed in that apartment of the Rue Saint Georges which they so soon +transformed into a veritable museum of prints and trinkets, Edmond and +Jules de Goncourt prepared those brilliant monographs of queens and +favourites, which have made them the rare and enchanting historians of +the most licentious and factious of centuries. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT + +In 1888. + +Portrait on wood in _La Vie Populaire_.] + +In 1857 Edmond made the water-colour drawing of "Jules smoking a Pipe," +which was afterward lithographed. His feet on the edge of the +mantel-piece in front of him, Jules, seated in an arm-chair, a small +pipe in his mouth, gives himself up to the delights of the _far niente_. +This contemplative attitude was a favourite one with him, and one in +which he was often discovered by visitors. By representing him thus, +Edmond gave an additional force to the living memory that all who knew +his brother have retained of him. + +Three years later (1860) Jules in his turn made a portrait of Edmond, +not in the same indolent attitude, but also in profile, and with a pipe +in his mouth. This print is one of the best in the Burty album. We know +of no further mutual representations by the brothers; with the exception +of Jules de Goncourt's etching of Edmond seated across a chair, smoking +a cigar, the design of which we reproduce. But there are several fine +portraits by other hands of the younger brother, the one who was the +first to go, perforce abandoning his sublime and suicidal task. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From a photograph by Nadar, 1892.] + +It was in 1870 that Jules de Goncourt died at the age of thirty-nine. +"It was impossible," wrote Paul de Saint-Victor in _La Liberte_, "to +know and not to love this young man, with his child's face, his +pleasant, ready laugh, his eyes sparkling with intellect and purpose.... +That blond young head was bent over his work for months at a time...." +It was the profile of this "blond young head" that Claudius Popelin +traced for the enamel that was set into the binding of the _Necrologe_, +in which Edmond preserved all the articles, letters, and tokens of +sympathy called forth by the irreparable loss of his beloved companion +and fellow-labourer. This medallion, etched by Abot, was prefixed +afterward to the edition of Jules de Goncourt's _Letters_, published by +Charpentier. The profile, which is reproduced as the frontispiece to +this edition of _Renee Mauperin_, is infinitely gentle; the emaciated +contours, the extraordinary delicacy of the features, betray the +intellectual dreamer, his mind intent on literary questions, and we +understand M. Emile Zola's dictum: "Art killed him." + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From an etching by Bracquemond, 1882. + +(The original drawing is in the Luxembourg Museum.)] + +Prince Gabrielli and Princesse Mathilde also made certain furtive +sketches of Jules which have since been photographed. Meaulle engraved a +portrait of him on wood, and Varin made an etching of him. Henceforth, +save in Bracquemond's double medallion, and in one or two papers in +which studies of him by different hands appeared, Edmond de Goncourt was +no longer represented in company with his gifted brother, but always +alone. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +From a photograph by Nadar, 1893.] + +On March 15, 1885, the _Journal Illustre_ published two portraits of the +Goncourts drawn by Franc Lamy, and on November 20, 1886, the _Cri du +Peuple_ gave two others, in connection with the appearance of _Renee +Mauperin_ at the Odeon. We may also note that the medallion of the two +brothers drawn and engraved by Bracquemond for the title-page of the +first edition of _L'Art du XVIIIeme Siecle_ appeared in 1875. A delicate +commemorative fancy caused the artist to surround the profile of Jules +with a wreath of laurel. + +[Illustration: PORTRAITS OF THE FRERES DE GONCOURT. + +Part of a design by Willette, in _Le Courrier Francais_, 1895.] + +Utterly crushed at first by the sense of loneliness and desolation his +loss had created, Edmond de Goncourt was long entirely absorbed in +memories of the departed. The spiritual presence of Jules filled the +house with its mute and mournful sentiment. The heart-broken survivor +could find consolation and relief for his pain only in friendship. +Theophile Gautier, Paul de Saint-Victor, Jules Valles, the painter De +Nittis, Burty, Flaubert, Renan, Taine, and Theodore de Banville +sustained him with their affection. A band of ardent, active, and +audacious young men, among whom M. Emile Zola was specially +distinguished by the research of his formulae, began to link him with +Flaubert, offering them a common worship. Alphonse Daudet (we have now +come to the year 1879) sketched the most faithful portrait of him to +whom a whole generation was soon to give the respectful title of "the +Marshal of Letters": "Edmond de Goncourt looks about fifty. His hair is +gray, a light steel gray; his air is distinguished and genial; he has a +tall, straight figure, and the sharp nose of the sporting dog, like a +country gentleman keen for the chase, and, on his pale and energetic +face, a smile of perpetual sadness, a glance that sometimes kindles, +sharp as the graver's needle. What determination in that glance, what +pain in that smile!" Many artists attempted to fix that glance and that +smile with pencil or burin, but how few were successful! + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +By Eugene Carriere. + +Lithographed in 1895.] + +One of these few was the sculptor Alfred Lenoir, in a remarkable work +executed quite at the end of Edmond de Goncourt's life. His white +marble bust well expresses the patrician of letters, the collector, the +worshipper of all kinds of beauty. A voluptuous thrill seems to stir the +nostrils, a flash of sympathetic observation to gleam from the deep set +eyes. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +By Eugene Carriere. + +From the cover of a vellum-bound book.] + +The author of this bust, a work elaborated and modelled after the manner +of those executed by Pajou, Caffieri, and Falconnet in the eighteenth +century (see the reproduction at the beginning of this volume), may +congratulate himself on having given to Edmond de Goncourt's friends the +most exquisite semblance of their lost comrade. Carriere, on the other +hand, in his superb lithograph, where only the eyes are vivid, and Will +Rothenstein, in a sketch from nature which represents the master with a +high cravat round his throat, his chin resting on a hand of incomparable +form and distinction, have reproduced, with great intensity and +comprehension, Edmond de Goncourt grown old, but still robust, upright +and gallant, a soldier of art in whom the creative faculty is by no +means exhausted. Rothenstein's lithograph in particular, with the sort +of morbid languor that pervades it, the mournful fixity of the gaze, the +aristocratic slenderness of the hands and the features, surprises and +startles the spectator. "By nature and by education," says M. Paul +Bourget, "M. Ed. de Goncourt possesses an intelligence, the +overacuteness of which verges on disease in its comprehension of +infinitesimal gradations and of the infinitely subtle creature." Mr. +Rothenstein has made this intelligence flash from every line of his +drawing. + +Frederic Regamey, Bracquemond (in the fine drawing at the Luxembourg), +De Nittis (in pastel), Raffaelli (in an oil painting), Desboutins (in an +etching), and finally M. Helleu (in dry point), have striven to +penetrate and preserve the subtle psychology of the master's grave, +proud, and gentle countenance. With these distinguished names the +iconography of the Goncourts concludes. Perhaps, as a light and graceful +monument of memory, we might add the fine drawing made by Willette on +the occasion of the Edmond de Goncourt banquet, which represents the +elder brother standing, leaning against the pedestal of his brother's +statue, while at his feet three creatures, symbolizing the principal +forms of their inspiration, are grouped, superb and mournful. Who are +they? No doubt _Madame de Pompadour_, the _Geisha_ of Japanese art, and +finally, bestial and degraded, _La Fille Elisa_--types that symbolize +the most salient aspects of that genius--historic, aesthetic, and +fictional--which will keep green the precious memory of Edmond and Jules +de Goncourt. + +OCTAVE UZANNE. + +[Illustration: EDMOND DE GONCOURT. + +Unpublished portrait from life, by Georges Jeanniot.] + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENéE MAUPERIN*** + + +******* This file should be named 24604.txt or 24604.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/0/24604 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/24604.zip b/24604.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0a001be --- /dev/null +++ b/24604.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1eef0ea --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #24604 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24604) |
