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THE WORKS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT

VOLUME III

The Viaticum and Other Stories







National Library Company New York
Copyright, 1909, by Bigelow, Smith & Co.





CONTENTS


   THE VIATICUM

   THE RELICS

   THE THIEF

   A RUPTURE

   A USEFUL HOUSE

   THE ACCENT

   GHOSTS

   CRASH

   AN HONEST IDEAL

   STABLE PERFUME

   THE ILL-OMENED GROOM

   AN EXOTIC PRINCE

   VIRTUE IN THE BALLET

   IN HIS SWEETHEART'S LIVERY

   DELILA

   A MESALLIANCE

   BERTHA

   ABANDONED

   A NIGHT IN WHITECHAPEL

   COUNTESS SATAN

   KIND GIRLS

   PROFITABLE BUSINESS

   VIOLATED

   JEROBOAM

   THE LOG

   MARGOT'S TAPERS

   CAUGHT IN THE VERY ACT

   THE CONFESSION

   WAS IT A DREAM

   THE LAST STEP

   THE WILL

   A COUNTRY EXCURSION

   THE LANCER'S WIFE

   THE COLONEL'S IDEAS

   ONE EVENING

   THE HERMAPHRODITE

   MARROCA

   AN ARTIFICE

   THE ASSIGNATION

   AN ADVENTURE

   THE DOUBLE PINS

   UNDER THE YOKE

   THE REAL ONE AND THE OTHER

   THE UPSTART

   THE CARTER'S WENCH

   THE MARQUIS

   THE BED

   AN ADVENTURE IN PARIS

   MADAME BAPTISTE

   HAPPINESS




THE VIATICUM


"After all," Count d'Avorsy said, stirring his tea with the slow
movements of a prelate, "what truth was there in anything that was said
at Court, almost without any restraint, and did the Empress, whose
beauty has been ruined by some secret grief, who will no longer see
anyone and who soothes her continual mental weariness by some journeys
without an object and without a rest, in foggy and melancholy islands,
and did she really forget Caesar's wife ought not even to be suspected,
did she really give herself to that strange and attractive corrupter,
Ladislas Ferkoz?"

The bright night seemed to be scattering handfuls of stars into the
placid sea, which was as calm as a blue pond, slumbering in the depths
of a forest. Among the tall climbing roses, which hung a mantle of
yellow flowers to the fretted baluster of the terrace, there stood out
in the distance the illuminated fronts of the hotels and villas, and
occasionally women's laughter was heard above the dull, monotonous sound
of surf and the noise of the fog-horns.

Then Captain Sigmund Oroshaz, whose sad and pensive face of a soldier
who has seen too much slaughter and too many charnel houses, was marked
by a large scar, raised his head and said in a grave, haughty voice:

"Nobody has lied in accusing Maria-Gloriosa of adultery, and nobody has
calumniated the Empress and her minister, whom God has damned in the
other world. Ladislas Ferkoz was his sovereign's lover until he died,
and made his august master ridiculous and almost odious, for the man, no
matter who he be, who allows himself to be flouted by a creature who is
unworthy of bearing his name and of sharing his bread; who puts up with
such disgrace, who does not crush the guilty couple with all the weight
of his power, is not worth pity, nor does he deserve to be spared the
mockery. And if I affirm that so harshly, my dear Count--although years
and years have passed since the sponge passed over that old story--the
reason is that I saw the last chapter of it, quite in spite of myself,
however, for I was the officer who was on duty at the palace, and
obliged to obey orders, just as if I had been on the field of
battle--and on that day I was on duty near Maria-Gloriosa."

Madame de Laumières, who had begun an animated conversation on
crinolines, admist the fragrant odor of Russian cigarettes, and who was
making fun of the striking toilets, with which she had amused herself by
scanning through her opera glass a few hours previously at the races,
stopped, for even when she was talking most volubly she always kept her
ears open to hear what was being said around her, and as her curiosity
was aroused, she interrupted Sigmund Oroshaz.

"Ah! Monsieur," she said, "you are not going to leave our curiosity
unsatisfied.... A story about the Empress puts all our scandals on the
beach, and all our questions of dress into the shade, and, I am sure,"
she added with a smile at the corners of her mouth, "that even our
friend, Madame d'Ormonde will leave off flirting with Monsieur Le
Brassard to listen to you."

Captain Oroshaz continued, with his large blue eyes full of
recollections:

"It was in the middle of a grand ball that the Emperor was giving on the
occasion of some family anniversary, though I forget exactly what, and
where Maria-Gloriosa, who was in great grief, as she had heard that her
lover was ill and his life almost despaired of, far from her, was going
about with her face as pale as that of _Our Lady of Sorrows_, seemed to
be a soul in affliction, appeared to be ashamed of her bare shoulders,
as if she were being made a parade of in the light, while he, the adored
of her heart, was lying on a bed of sickness, getting weaker every
moment, longing for her and perhaps calling for her in his distress.
About midnight, when the violins were striking up the quadrille, which
the Emperor was to dance with the wife of the French Ambassador, one of
the ladies of honor, Countess Szegedin, went up to the Empress, and
whispered a few words to her, in a very low voice. Maria-Gloriosa grew
still paler, but mastered her emotion and waited until the end of the
last figure. Then, however, she could not restrain herself any longer,
and even without giving any pretext for running away in such a manner,
and leaning on the arm of her lady of honor, she made her way through
the crowd as if she were in a dream and went to her own apartments. I
told you that I was on duty that evening at the door of her rooms, and
according to etiquette, I was going to salute her respectfully, but she
did not give me time.

"'Captain,' she said excitedly and vehemently, 'give orders for my own
private coachman, Hans Hildersheim, to get a carriage ready for me
immediately,' but thinking better of it immediately she went on: 'But
no, we should only lose time, and every minute is precious; give me a
cloak quickly, Madame, and a lace veil; we will go out of one of the
small doors in the park, and take the first conveyance we see."

"She wrapped herself in her furs, hid her face in her mantilla, and I
accompanied her, without at first knowing what this mystery was, and
where we were going to, on this mad expedition. I hailed a cab that was
dawdling by the side of the pavement, and when the Empress gave me the
address of Ladislas Ferkoz, the Minister of State, in a low voice, in
spite of my usual phlegm, I felt a vague shiver of emotion, one of those
movements of hesitation and recoil, from which the bravest are not
exempt at times. But how could I get out of this unpleasant part of
acting as her companion, and how show want of politeness to a sovereign
who had completely lost her head? Accordingly, we started, but the
Empress did not pay any more attention to me than if I had not been
sitting by her side in that narrow conveyance, but stifled her sobs with
her pocket handkerchief, muttered a few incoherent words, and
occasionally trembled from head to foot. Her lover's name rose to her
lips as if it had been a response in a litany, and I thought that she
was praying to the Virgin that she might not arrive too late to see
Ladislas Ferkoz again in the possession of his faculties, and keep him
alive for a few hours. Suddenly, as if in reply to herself, she said: 'I
will not cry any more; he must see me looking beautiful, so that he may
remember me, even in death!'

"When we arrived, I saw that we were expected, and that they had not
doubted that the Empress would come to close her lover's eyes with a
last kiss. She left me there, and hurried to Ladislas Ferkoz's room,
without even shutting the doors behind her, where his beautiful,
sensual, gipsy head stood out from the whiteness of the pillows; but his
face was quite bloodless, and there was no life left in it, except in
his large, strange eyes, that were striated with gold, like the eyes of
an astrologer or of a bearded vulture.

"The cold numbness of the death struggle had already laid hold of his
robust body and paralyzed his lips and arms, and he could not reply even
by a sound of tenderness to Maria-Gloriosa's wild lamentations and
amorous cries. Neither reply nor smile, alas! But his eyes dilated, and
glistened like the last flame that shoots up from an expiring fire, and
filled them with a world of dying thoughts, of divine recollections, of
delirious love. They appeared to envelope her in kisses, they spoke to
her, they thanked her, they followed her movements, and seemed delighted
at her grief. And as if she were replying to their mute supplications,
as if she had understood them, Maria-Gloriosa suddenly tore off her
lace, threw aside her fur cloak, stood erect beside the dying man, whose
eyes were radiant, desirable in her supreme beauty with her bare
shoulders, her bust like marble and her fair hair, in which diamonds
glistened, surrounding her proud head, like that of the Goddess Diana,
the huntress, and with her arms stretched out towards him in an attitude
of love, of embrace and of blessing. He looked at her in ecstacy, he
feasted on her beauty, and seemed to be having a terrible struggle with
death, in order that he might gaze at her, that apparition of love, a
little longer, see her beyond eternal sleep and prolong this unexpected
dream. And when he felt that it was all over with him, and that even his
eyes were growing dim, two great tears rolled down his cheeks....

"When Maria-Gloriosa saw that he was dead, she piously and devoutly
kissed his lips and closed his eyes, like a priest who closes the gold
tabernacle after service, on an evening after benediction, and then,
without exchanging a word, we returned through the darkness to the
palace where the ball was still going on."

       *       *       *       *       *

There was a minute's silence, and while Madame de Laumières, who was
very much touched by this story and whose nerves were rather highly
strung, was drying her tears behind her open fan, suddenly the harsh and
shrill voices of the fast women who were returning from the Casino, by
the strange irony of fate, struck up an idiotic song which was then in
vogue: "_Oh! the poor, oh! the poor, oh! the poor, dear girl!_"




THE RELICS


They had given him a grand public funeral, like they do victorious
soldiers who have added some dazzling pages to the glorious annals of
their country, who have restored courage to desponding heads and cast
over other nations the proud shadow of their country's flag, like a yoke
under which those went who were no longer to have a country, or liberty.

During a whole bright and calm night, when falling stars made people
think of unknown metamorphoses and the transmigration of souls, who
knows whether tall cavalry soldiers in their cuirasses and sitting as
motionless as statues on their horses, had watched by the dead man's
coffin, which was resting, covered with wreaths, under the porch of the
heroes, every stone of which is engraved with the name of a brave man,
and of a battle.

The whole town was in mourning, as if it had lost the only object that
had possession of its heart, and which it loved. The crowd went silently
and thoughtfully down the avenue of the _Champs Elysées_, and they
almost fought for the commemorative medals and the common portraits
which hawkers were selling, or climbed upon the stands which street boys
had erected here and there, and whence they could see over the heads of
the crowd. The _Place de la Concorde_ had something solemn about it,
with its circle of statues hung from head to foot with long crape
coverings, which looked in the distance like widows, weeping and
praying.

According to his last wish, Jean Ramel had been conveyed to the Pantheon
in the wretched paupers' hearse, which conveys them to the common grave
at the shambling trot of some thin and broken-winded horse.

That dreadful, black conveyance without any drapery, without plumes and
without flowers, which was followed by Ministers and deputies, by
several regiments with their bands, and their flags flying above the
helmets and the sabers, by children from the national schools, by
delegates from the provinces, and an innumerable crowd of men in
blouses, of women, of shop-keepers from every quarter, had a most
theatrical effect, and while standing on the steps of the Pantheon, at
the foot of the massive columns of the portico, the orators successively
discanted on his apotheosis, tried to make their voices predominate over
the noise, emphasized their pompous periods, and finished the
performance by a poor third act, which makes people yawn and gradually
empties the theater, people remembered who that man had been, on whom
such posthumous honors were being bestowed, and who was having such a
funeral: it was Jean Ramel.

Those three sonorous syllables called up a lionine head, with white hair
thrown back in disorder, like a mane, with features that looked as if
they had been cut out with a bill-hook, but which were so powerful, and
in which there lay such a flame of life, that one forgot their vulgarity
and ugliness; with black eyes under bushy eyebrows, which dilated and
flashed like lightning, now were veiled as if in tears and then were
filled with serene mildness, with a voice which now growled so as almost
to terrify its hearers, and which would have filled the hall of some
working men's club, full of the thick smoke from strong pipes without
being affected by it, and then would be soft, coaxing, persuasive and
unctuous like that of a priest who is holding out promises of Paradise,
or giving absolution for our sins.

He had had the good luck to be persecuted, to be in the eyes of the
people, the incarnation of that lying formula which appears on every
public edifice, of those three words of the _Golden Age_, which make
those who think, those who suffer and those who govern, smile somewhat
sadly, _Liberty, Fraternity, Equality_. Luck had been kind to him, had
sustained, had pushed him on by the shoulders, and had set him up on his
pedestal again when he had fallen down, like all idols do.

He spoke and he wrote, and always in order to announce the good news to
all the multitudes who suffered--no matter to what grade of society they
might belong--to hold out his hand to them and to defend them, to attack
the abuses of the _Code_--that book of injustice and severity--to speak
the truth boldly, even when it lashed his enemies as if it had been a
whip.

His books were like Gospels, which are read chapter by chapter, and
warmed the most despairing and the most sorrowing hearts, and brought
comfort, hope and dreams to each.

He had lived very modestly until the end, and appeared to spend nothing;
and he only kept one old servant, who spoke to him in the Basque
dialect.

That chaste philosopher, who had all his life long feared women's snares
and wiles, who had looked upon love as a luxury made only for the rich
and idle, which unsettles the brain and interferes with acuteness of
thought, had allowed himself to be caught like an ordinary man, late in
life, when his hair was white and his forehead deeply wrinkled.

It was not, however, as happens in the visions of solitary ascetics,
some strange queen or female magician, with stars in her eyes and
witchery in her voice, some loose woman who held up the symbolical lamp
immodestly, to light up her radiant nudity, and the pink and white
bouquet of her sweet-smelling skin, some woman in search of voluptuous
pleasures, whose lascivious appeals it is impossible for any man to
listen to, without being excited to the very depths of his being.
Neither a princess out of some fairy tale, nor a frail beauty who was an
expert in the art of reviving the ardor of old men, and of leading them
astray, nor a woman who was disgusted with her ideals, that always
turned out to be alike, and who dreamt of awakening the heart of one of
those men who suffer, who have afforded so much alleviation to human
misery, who seemed to be surrounded by a halo, and who never knew
anything but the true, the beautiful and the good.

It was only a little girl of twenty, who was as pretty as a wild flower,
who had a ringing laugh, white teeth, and a mind that was as spotless as
a new mirror, in which no figure has been reflected as yet.

He was in exile at the time for having given public expression to what
he thought, and he was living in an Italian village which was buried in
chestnut trees and situated on the shores of a lake that was narrow and
so transparent that it might have been taken for some nobleman's fish
pond that was like an emerald in a large park. The village consisted of
about twenty red-tiled houses. Several paths paved with flint led up the
side of the hill among the vines where the Madonna, full of grace and
goodness extended her indulgence.

For the first time in his life Ramel remarked that there were some lips
that were more desirable, more smiling than others, that there was hair
in which it must be delicious to bury the fingers like in fine silk, and
which it must be delightful to kiss, and that there were eyes which
contained an infinitude of caresses, and he had spelled right through
the eclogue, which at length revealed true happiness to him, and he had
had a child, a son, by her.

This was the only secret that Ramel jealously concealed, and which no
more than two or three of his oldest friends knew anything about, and
while he hesitated about spending twopence on himself, and went to the
Institute and to the Chamber of Deputies outside an omnibus, Pepa led
the happy life of a millionaire who is not frightened of the to-morrow,
and brought up her son like a little prince, with a tutor and three
servants, who had nothing to do but to look after him.

All that Ramel made went into his mistress's hands, and when he felt
that his last hour was approaching, and that there was no hope of his
recovery--in full possession of his faculties and joy in his dull
eyes--he gave his name to Pepa, and made her his lawful widow, in the
presence of all his friends. She inherited everything that her former
lover left behind, a considerable income from his share of the annual
profits on his books, and also his pension, which the State continued to
pay to her.

Little Ramel throve wonderfully amidst all this luxury, and gave free
scope to his instincts and his caprices, without his mother ever having
the courage to reprove him in the least, and he did not bear the
slightest resemblance to Jean Ramel.

Full of pranks, effeminate, a superfine dandy, and precociously vicious,
he suggested the idea of those pages at the Court of Florence, whom we
frequently meet with in _The Decameron_, and who were the playthings for
the idle hands and tips of the patrician ladies.

He was very ignorant and lived at a great rate, bet on races, and played
cards for heavy stakes with seasoned gamblers, old enough to be his
father. And it was distressing to hear this lad joke about the memory of
him whom he called _the old man_, and persecute his mother because of
the worship and adoration which she felt for Jean Ramel, whom she spoke
of as if he had become a demigod when he died, like in Roman theogony.

He would have liked altogether to have altered the arrangement of that
kind of sanctuary, the drawing-room, where Pepa kept some of her
husband's manuscripts, the furniture that he had most frequently used,
the bed on which he had died, his pens, his clothes and his weapons. And
one evening, not knowing how to dress himself up more originally than
the rest for a masked ball that stout Toinette Danicheff was going to
give as her house-warming, without saying a word to his mother, he took
down the Academician's dress, the sword and cocked hat that had belonged
to Jean Ramel, and put it on as if it had been a disguise on Shrove
Tuesday.

Slightly built and with thin arms and legs, the wide clothes hung on
him, and he was a comical sight with the embroidered skirt of his coat
sweeping the carpet, and his sword knocking against his heels. The
elbows and the collar were shiny and greasy from wear, for the _Master_
had worn it until it was threadbare, to avoid having to buy another, and
had never thought of replacing it.

He made a tremendous hit, and fair Liline Ablette laughed so at his
grimaces and his disguise, that that night she threw over Prince
Noureddin for him, although he had paid for her house, her horses and
everything else, and allowed her six thousand francs a month--£240--for
extras and pocket money.




THE THIEF


"Certainly," Dr. Sorbier exclaimed, who, while appearing to be thinking
of something else, had been listening quietly to those surprising
accounts of burglaries and of daring acts which might have been borrowed
from the trial of Cartouche; "certainly, I do not know any viler fault,
nor any meaner action than to attack a girl's innocence, to corrupt her,
to profit by a moment of unconscious weakness and of madness, when her
heart is beating like that of a frightened fawn, when her body, which
has been unpolluted up till then, is palpitating with mad desire and her
pure lips seek those of her seducer; when her whole being is feverish
and vanquished, and she abandons herself without thinking of the
irremediable stain, nor of her fall nor of the painful awakening on the
morrow.

"The man who has brought this about slowly, viciously, and who can tell
with what science of evil, and who, in such a case, has not steadiness
and self-restraint enough to quench that flame by some icy words, who
has not sense enough for two, who cannot recover his self-possession and
master the runaway brute within him, and who loses his head on the edge
of the precipice over which she is going to fall, is as contemptible as
any man who breaks open a lock, or as any rascal on the look-out for a
house left defenseless and without protection, or for some easy and
profitable stroke of business, or as that thief whose various exploits
you have just related to us.

"I, for my part, utterly, refuse to absolve him even when extenuating
circumstances plead in his favor, even when he is carrying on a
dangerous flirtation, in which a man tries in vain to keep his balance,
not to exceed the limits of the game, any more than at lawn tennis; even
when the parts are inverted and a man's adversary is some precocious,
curious, seductive girl, who shows you immediately that she has nothing
to learn and nothing to experience, except the last chapter of love, one
of those girls from whom may fate always preserve our sons, and whom a
psychological novel writer has christened _The Semi-Virgins_.

"It is, of course, difficult and painful for that coarse and
unfathomable vanity which is characteristic of every man, and which
might be called _malism_, not to stir such a charming fire, to act the
Joseph and the fool, to turn away his eyes, and, as it were, to put wax
into his ears, like the companions of Ulysses did when they were
attracted by the divine, seductive songs of the sirens, just to touch
that pretty table, covered with a perfectly new cloth, at which you are
invited to take a seat before any one else, in such a suggestive voice,
and are requested to quench your thirst and to taste that new wine,
whose fresh and strange flavor you will never forget. But who would
hesitate to exercise such self-restraint if, when he rapidly examined
his conscience, in one of those instinctive returns to his sober self,
in which a man thinks clearly and recovers his head; if he were to
measure the gravity of his fault, think of his fault, think of its
consequences, of the reprisals, of the uneasiness which he would always
feel in the future, and which would destroy the repose and the happiness
of his life?

"You may guess that behind all these moral reflections, such as a
gray-beard like myself may indulge in, there is a story hidden, and sad
as it is, I am sure it will interest you on account of the strange
heroism that it shows."

He was silent for a few moments as if to classify recollections, and
with his elbows resting on the arms of his easy chair, and his eyes
looking into space, he continued in the slow voice of a hospital
professor, who is explaining a case to his class of medical students, at
a bedside:

"He was one of those men who, as our grandfathers used to say, never met
with a cruel woman, the type of the adventurous knight who was always
foraging, who had something of the scamp about him, but who despised
danger and was bold even to rashness. He was ardent in the pursuit of
pleasure, and a man who had an irresistible charm about him, one of
those men in whom we excuse the greatest excesses, as the most natural
things in the world. He had run through all his money at gambling and
with pretty girls, and so became, as it were, a soldier of fortune, who
amused himself whenever and however he could, and was at that time
quartered at Versailles.

"I knew him to the very depths of his childish heart, which was only too
easily penetrated and sounded, and I loved him like some old bachelor
uncle loves a nephew who plays him some tricks, but who knows how to
make him indulgent towards him, and how to wheedle him. He had made me
his confidant far more than his adviser, kept me informed of his
slightest tricks, though he always pretended to be speaking about one of
his friends, and not about himself, and I must confess that his youthful
impetuosity, his careless gaiety and his amorous ardor sometimes
distracted my thoughts and made me envy the handsome, vigorous young
fellow who was so happy at being alive, so that I had not the courage to
check him, to show him his right road, and to call out to him, 'Take
care!' as children do at blind man's buff.

"And one day, after one of those interminable _cotillons_, where the
couples do not leave each other for hours, but have the bridle on their
neck and can disappear together without anybody thinking of taking
notice of it, the poor fellow at last discovered what love was, that
real love which takes up its abode in the very center of the heart and
in the brain, and is proud of being there, and which rules like a
sovereign and tyrannous master, and so he grew desperately enamored of a
pretty, but badly brought up girl, who was as disquieting and as wayward
as she was pretty.

"She loved him, however, or rather she idolized him despotically, madly,
with all her enraptured soul, and all her excited person. Left to do as
she pleased by imprudent and frivolous parents, suffering from neurosis,
in consequence of the unwholesome friendships which she contracted at
the convent-school, instructed by what she saw and heard and knew was
going on around her, in spite of her deceitful and artificial conduct,
knowing that neither her father nor her mother, who were very proud of
their race, as well as avaricious, would ever agree to let her marry the
man whom she had taken a liking to, that handsome fellow who had little
besides visionary ideas and debts, and who belonged to the middle
classes, she laid aside all scruples, thought of nothing but of
belonging to him altogether, of taking him for her lover, and of
triumphing over his desperate resistance as an honorable man.

"By degrees, the unfortunate man's strength gave way, his heart grew
softened, his nerves became excited, and he allowed himself to be
carried away by that current which buffeted him, surrounded him and left
him on the shore like a waif and a stray.

"They wrote letters full of temptation and of madness to each other, and
not a day passed without their meeting, either accidentally, as it
seemed, or at parties and balls. She had given him her lips in long,
ardent caresses, and she had sealed their compact of mutual passion with
kisses of desire and of hope. And at last she brought him to her room,
almost in spite of himself."

The doctor stopped, and his eyes suddenly filled with tears, as these
former troubles came back to his mind, and then in a hoarse voice, he
went on, full of horror of what he was going to relate:

"For months he scaled the garden wall, and holding his breath and
listening for the slightest noise, like a burglar who is going to break
into a house, he went in by the servants' entrance, which she had left
open, went barefoot down a long passage and up the broad staircase,
which creaked occasionally, to the second story, where his mistress's
room was, and stopped there nearly the whole night.

"One night, when it was darker than usual, and he was making haste lest
he should be later than the time agreed on, the officer knocked up
against a piece of furniture in the ante-room and upset it. It so
happened that the girl's mother had not gone to sleep yet, either
because she had a sick headache, or else because she had sat up late
over some novel, and frightened at that unusual noise which disturbed
the silence of the house, she jumped out of bed, opened the door, saw
some one, indistinctly, running away and keeping close to the wall, and,
immediately thinking that there were burglars in the house, she aroused
her husband and the servants by her frantic screams. The unfortunate man
knew what he was about, and seeing into what a terrible fix he had got,
and preferring to be taken for a common thief to dishonoring his adored
mistress and to betraying the secret of their guilty love, he ran into
the drawing-room, felt en the tables and what-nots, filled his pockets
at random with valuable gew-gaws, and then cowered down behind the grand
piano, which barred up a corner of a large room.

"The servants who had run in with lighted candles, found him, and
overwhelming him with abuse, seized him by the collar and dragged him,
panting and appearing half dead with shame and terror, to the nearest
police station. He defended himself with intentional awkwardness when he
was brought up for trial, kept up his part with the most perfect
self-possession, and without any signs of the despair and anguish that
he felt in his heart, and condemned and degraded and made to suffer
martyrdom in his honor as a man and as a soldier, he did not protest,
but went to prison as one of those criminals whom society gets rid of,
like noxious vermin.

"He died there of misery and of bitterness of spirit, with the name of
the fair-haired idol, for whom he had sacrificed himself, on his lips,
as if it had been an ecstatic prayer, and he entrusted his will to the
priest who administered extreme unction to him, and requested him to
give it to me. In it, without mentioning anybody, and without in the
least lifting the veil, he at last explained the enigma, and cleared
himself of those accusations, the terrible burden of which he had borne
until his last breath.

"I have always thought myself, though I do not know why, that the girl
married and had several charming children, whom she brought up writh the
austere strictness, and in the serious piety of former days!"




A RUPTURE


"It is just as I tell you, my dear fellow, those two poor things whom we
all of us envied, who looked like a couple of pigeons when they are
billing and cooing, and were always spooning until they made themselves
ridiculous, now hate each other just as much as they used to adore each
other. It is a complete break, and one of those which cannot be mended
like you can an old plate! And all for a bit of nonsense, for something
so funny that it ought to have brought them closer together and have
made them amuse themselves together until they were ill. But how can a
man explain himself when he is dying of jealousy, and when he keeps
repeating to his terrified mistress, 'You are lying! you are lying!'
When he shakes her, interrupts her while she is speaking, and says such
hard things to her that at last she flies into a rage, has enough of it,
becomes hard and mad, and thinks of nothing but of giving him tit for
tat and of paying him out in his own coin; does not care a straw about
destroying his happiness, sends everything to the devil, and talks a lot
of bosh which she certainly does not believe. And then, because there is
nothing so stupid and so obstinate in the whole world as lovers, neither
he nor she will take the first steps, and own to having been in the
wrong, and regret having gone too far; but both wait and watch and do
not even write a few lines about nothing, which would restore peace. No,
they let day succeed day, and there are feverish and sleepless nights
when the bed seems so hard, so cheerless and so large, and habits get
weakened and the fire of love that was still smoldering at the bottom of
the heart evaporates in smoke. By degrees both find some reason for what
they wished to do, they think themselves idiots to lose the time which
will never return in that fashion, and so good-bye, and there you are!
That is how Josine Cadenette and that great idiot Servance separated."

Lalie Spring had lighted a cigarette, and the blue smoke played about
her fine, fair hair, and made one think of those last rays of the
setting sun which pierce through the clouds at sunset, and resting her
elbows on her knees, and with her chin in her hand in a dreamy attitude,
she murmured:

"Sad, isn't it?"

"Bah!" I replied, "at their age people easily console themselves, and
everything begins over again, even love!"

"Well, Josine had already found somebody else...."

"And did she tell you her story?"

"Of course she did, and it is such a joke!... You must know that
Servance is one of those fellows like one would wish to have when one
has time to amuse oneself, and so self-possessed that he would be
capable of ruining all the older ones in a girls' school, and given to
trifling as much as most men, so that Josine calls him 'perpetual
motion.' He would have liked to have gone on with his fun until the Day
of Judgment, and seemed to fancy that beds were not made to sleep in at
all, but she could not get used to being deprived of nearly all her
rest, and it really made her ill. But as she wished to be as
conciliatory as possible, and to love and to be loved as ardently as in
the past, and also to sleep off the effects of her happiness peacefully,
she rented a small room in a distant quarter, in a quiet, shady street
giving out that she had just come from the country, and put hardly any
furniture into it except a good bed and a dressing table. Then she
invented an old aunt for the occasion, who was ill and always grumbling,
and who suffered from heart disease and lived in one of the suburbs, and
so several times a week Josine took refuge in her sleeping place, and
used to sleep late there as if it had been some delicious abode where
one forgets the whole world. Sometimes they forgot to call her at the
proper time; she got back late, tired, with red and swollen eyelids,
involved herself in lies, contradicted herself and looked so much as if
she had just come from the confessional, feeling horribly ashamed of
herself, or, as if she had hurried home from some assignation, that at
last Servance worried himself about it, thought that he was being made a
fool of like so many of his comrades were, got into a rage and made up
his mind to set the matter straight, and so discover who this aunt of
his mistress's was, who had so suddenly fallen from the skies.

"He necessarily applied to an obliging agency, where they excited his
jealousy, exasperated him day after day by making him believe that
Josine Cadenette was making an absolute fool of him, had no more a sick
aunt than she had any virtue, but that during the day she continued the
little debaucheries which she committed with him at night, and that she
shamelessly frequented some discreet bachelor's lodgings, where more
than probably one of his own best friends was amusing himself at his
expense, and having his share of the cake. He was fool enough to
believe these fellows, instead of going and watching Josine himself,
putting his nose into the business and going and knocking at the door of
her room. He wanted to hear no more, and would not listen to her. For a
trifle, in spite of her tears, he would have turned the poor thing into
the streets, as if she had been a bundle of dirty linen. You may guess
how she flew out at him and told him all sorts of things to annoy him;
she let him believe he was not mistaken, that she had had enough of his
affection, and that she was madly in love with another man. He grew very
pale when she said that, looked at her furiously, clenched his teeth and
said in a hoarse voice:

"'Tell me his name, tell me his name!'

"'Oh!' she said, chaffingly, 'you know him very well!' and if I had not
happened to have gone in I think there would have been a tragedy.... How
stupid they are, and they were so happy and loved each other so.... And
now Josine is living with fat Schweinsshon, a low scoundrel who will
live upon her and Servance has taken up with Sophie Labisque, who might
easily be his mother; you know her, that bundle of red and yellow, who
has been at that kind of thing for eighteen years, and whom Laglandee
has christened, '_Saecula saeculorum_!'"

"By Jove! I should rather think I did!"




A USEFUL HOUSE


Royamount's fat sides shook with laughter at the mere recollection of
the funny story that he had promised to his friends, and throwing
himself back in the great arm-chair, which he completely filled, _that
picker up of bits of pinchbeck_, as they called him at the club, at last
said:

"It is perfectly true, Bordenave does not owe anyone a penny and can go
through any street he likes and publish those famous memoirs of
sheriff's officers, which he has been writing for the last ten years,
when he did not dare to go out, and in which he carefully brought out
the characters and peculiarities of all those generous distributors of
stamped paper with whom he had had dealings, their tricks and wiles,
their weaknesses, their jokes, their manner of performing their duties,
sometimes with brutal rudeness and at others with cunning good nature,
now embarrassed and almost ashamed of their work, and again ironically
jovial, as well the artifices of their clerks to get a few crumbs from
their employer's cake. The book will soon be published and Machin, the
Vaudeville writer, has promised him a preface, so that it will be a most
amusing work. You are surprised, eh? Confess that you are absolutely
surprised, and I will lay you any bet you like that you will not guess
how our excellent friend, whose existence is an inexplicable problem,
has been able to settle with his creditors, and suddenly produce the
requisite amount."

"Do get to the facts, confound it," Captain Hardeur said, who was
growing tired of all this verbiage.

"All right, I will get to them as quickly as possible," Royaumont
replied, throwing the stump of his cigar into the fire. "I will clear my
throat and begin. I suppose all of you know that two better friends than
Bordenave and Quillanet do not exist; neither of them could do without
the other, and they have ended by dressing alike, by having the same
gestures, the same laugh, the same walk and the same inflections of
voice, so that one would think that some close bond united them, and
that they had been brought up together from childhood. There is,
however, this great difference between them, that Bordenave is
completely ruined and that all that he possesses are bundles of
mortgages, laughable parchments which attest his ancient race, and
chimerical hopes of inheriting money some day, though these expectations
are already heavily hypothecated. Consequently, he is always on the
look-out for some fresh expedients for raising money, though he is
superbly indifferent about everything, while Sebastien Quillanet, of the
banking house of Quillanet Brothers, must have an income of eight
thousand francs a year, but is descended from an obscure laborer who
managed to secure some of the national property, then he became an army
contractor, speculated on defeat as well as victory, and does not know
now what to do with his money. But the millionaire is timid, dull and
always bored, the ruined spendthrift amuses him by his impertinent ways,
and his libertine jokes; he prompts him when he is at a loss for an
answer, extricates him out of his difficulties, serves as his guide in
the great forests of Paris which is strewn with so many pit-falls, and
helps him to avoid those vulgar adventures which socially ruins a man,
no matter how well ballasted he may be. Then he points out to him what
women would make suitable mistresses for him, who make a man noted, and
have the effect of some rare and beautiful flower pinned into his
buttonhole. He is the confidant of his intrigues, his guest when he
gives small, special entertainments, his daily familiar table companion,
and the buffoon whose sly humor one stimulates, and whose worst
witticisms one tolerates."

"Really, really," the captain interrupted him, "you have been going on
for more than a quarter of an hour without saying anything."

So Royaumont shrugged his shoulders and continued: "Oh you can be very
tiresome when you please, my dear fellow!... Last year, when he was at
daggers drawn with his people, who were deafening him with their
recriminations, were worrying him and threatening him with a lot of
annoyance, Quillanet got married. A marriage of reason, and which
apparently changed his habits and his tastes, more especially as the
banker was at that time keeping a perfect little marvel of a woman, a
Parisian jewel of unspeakable attractions and of bewitching delicacy,
that adorable Suzette Marly who is just like a pocket Venus, and who in
some prior stage of her existence must have been Phryne or Lesbia. Of
course he did not get rid of her, but as he was bound to take some
judicious precautions, which are necessary for a man who is deceiving
his wife, he rented a furnished house with a courtyard in front, and a
garden at the back, which one might think had been built to shelter some
amorous folly. It was the nest that he had dreamt of, warm, snug,
elegant, the walls covered with silk hangings of subdued tints, large
pier-glasses, allegorical pictures, and filled with luxurious, low
furniture that seemed to invite caresses and embraces. Bordenave
occupied the ground floor, and the first floor served as a shrine for
the banker and his mistress. Well, just a week ago, in order to hide the
situation better, Bordenave asked Quillanet and some other friends to
one of those luncheons which he understands so well how to order, such a
delicious luncheon, that before it was quite over, every man had a woman
on his knees already, and was asking himself whether a kiss from coaxing
and naughty lips, was not a thousand times more intoxicating than the
finest old brandy or the choicest vintage wines, and was looking at the
bedroom door wishing to escape to it, although the Faculty altogether
forbids that fashion of digesting a dainty repast, when the butler came
in with an embarrassed look, and whispered something to him.

"Tell the gentleman that he has made a mistake, and ask him to leave me
in peace," Bordenave replied to him in an angry voice. The servant went
out and returned immediately to say that the intruder was using threats,
that he refused to leave the house, and even spoke of having recourse to
the commissary of police. Bordenave frowned, threw his table napkin
down, upset two glasses and staggered out with a red face, swearing and
stammering out:

"This is rather too much, and the fellow shall find out what going out
of the window means, if he will not leave by the door." But in the
ante-room he found himself face to face with a very cool, polite,
impassive gentleman, who said very quietly to him:

"You are Count Robert de Bordenave, I believe. Monsieur?"

"Yes, Monsieur."

"And the lease that you signed at the lawyer's, Monsieur Albin Calvert,
in the _Rue du Faubourg-Poissonnière_, is in your name, I believe?"

"Certainly, Monsieur."

"Then I regret extremely to have to tell you that if you are not in a
position to pay the various accounts which different people have
intrusted to me for collection here, I shall be obliged to seize all the
furniture, pictures, plate, clothes etc., which are here, in the
presence of two witnesses who are waiting for me downstairs in the
street."

"I suppose this is some joke, Monsieur?"

"It would be a very poor joke, Monsieur le Comte, and one which I should
certainly not allow myself towards you!"

The situation was absolutely critical and ridiculous, the more so, that
in the dining-room the women who were slightly _elevated_, were tapping
the wine glasses with their spoons, and calling for him. What could he
do except to explain his misadventure to Quillanet, who became sobered
immediately, and rather than see his shrine of love violated, his secret
sin disclosed and his pictures, ornaments and furniture sold, gave a
check in due form for the claim there and then, though with a very wry
face. And in spite of this, some people will deny that men who are
utterly cleared out, often have a stroke of luck.




THE ACCENT


It was a large, upholstered house, with long white terraces shaded by
vines, from which one could see the sea. Large pines stretched a dark
dome over the sacked facade, and there was a look of neglect, of want
and wretchedness about it all, such as irreparable losses, departures to
other countries, and death leave behind them.

The interior wore a strange look, with half unpacked boxes serving for
wardrobes, piles of band boxes, and for seats there was an array of
worm-eaten armchairs, into which bits of velvet and silk, which had been
cut from old dresses, had been festooned anyhow, and along the walls
there were rows of rusty nails which made one think of old portraits and
of pictures full of associations, which had one by one been bought for a
low price by some second-hand furniture broker.

The rooms were in disorder and furnished no matter how, while velvets
were hanging from the ceilings and in the corners, and seemed to show
that as the servants were no longer paid except by hopes, they no longer
did more than give them an accidental, careless touch with the broom
occasionally. The drawing-room, which was extremely large, was full of
useless knick-knacks, rubbish which is put up for sale at stalls at
watering places, daubs, they could not be called paintings of portraits
and of flowers, and an old piano with yellow keys.

Such is the home where she, who had been called the handsome Madame de
Maurillac, was spending her monotonous existence, like some unfortunate
doll which inconstant, childish hands have thrown into a corner in a
loft, she who, almost passed for a professional seductress, and whose
coquetries, at least so the Faithful ones of the Party said, had been
able to excite a passing and last spark of desire in the dull eyes of
the Emperor.

Like so many others, she and her husband had waited for his return from
Elba, had discounted a fresh, immediate chance, had kept up boldly and
spent the remains of his fortune at that game of luxury.

On the day when the illusion vanished, and he was forced to awake from
his dream, Monsieur de Maurillac, without considering that he was
leaving his wife and daughter behind him almost penniless, but not being
able to make up his mind to come down in the world, to vegetate, to
fight against his creditors, to accept the derisive alms of some
sinecure, poisoned himself, like a shop girl who is forsaken by her
lover.

Madame de Maurillac did not mourn for him, and as this lamentable
disaster had made her interesting, and as she was assisted and supported
by unexpected acts of kindness, and had a good adviser in one of those
old Parisian lawyers who would get anybody out of the most inextricable
difficulties, she managed to save something from the wreck, and to keep
a small income. Then reassured and emboldened, and resting her ultimate
illusions and her chimerical hopes on her daughter's radiant beauty, and
preparing for that last game in which they would risk everything, and
perhaps also hoping that she might herself marry again, the ancient
flirt arranged a double existence.

For months and months she disappeared from the world, and as a pretext
for her isolation and for hiding herself in the country, she alleged her
daughter's delicate health, and also the important interests she had to
look after in the South of France.

Her frivolous friends looked upon that as a great act of heroism, as
something almost super-human, and so courageous, that they tried to
distract her by their incessant letters, religiously kept her up in all
the scandal, and love adventures, in the falls, as well as in the
apotheosis of the capital.

The difficult struggle which Madame de Maurillac had to keep up in order
to maintain her rank, was really as fine as any of those campaigns in
the twilight of glory, as those slow retreats where men only give way
inch by inch and fight until the last cartridge is expended, until at
last fresh troops arrive, reinforcement which bar the way to the enemy,
and save the threatened flag.

Broken in by the same discipline, and haunted by the same dream, mother
and daughter lived on almost nothing in the dull, dilapidated house
which the peasants called the _château_, and economized like poor people
who only have a few hundred francs a year to live on. But Fabienne de
Maurillac developed well in spite of everything, and grew up into a
woman like some rare flower which is preserved from all contact with the
outer air and is reared in a hot-house.

In order that she might not lose her Parisian accent by speaking too
much with the servants, who had remained peasants under their livery,
Madame de Maurillac, who had not been able to bring a lady's maid with
her, on account of the extra cost which her traveling expenses and wages
would have entailed, and who, moreover, was afraid that some
indiscretion might betray her maneuvers and cover her with ridicule,
made up her mind to wait on her daughter herself. And Fabienne talked
with nobody but her, saw nobody but her, and was like a little novice in
a convent. Nobody was allowed to speak to her, or to interfere with her
walks in the large garden, or on the white terraces that were reflected
in the blue water.

As soon as the season for the country and the seaside came, however,
they packed up their trunks, and locked the doors of their house of
exile. As they were not known, and taking those terrible trains which
stop at every station, and by which travelers arrive at their
destination in the middle of the night, with the certainty that nobody
will be waiting for you, and see you get out of the carriage, they
traveled third class, so that they might have a few bank notes the more,
with which to make a show.

A fortnight in Paris in the family house at Auteuil, a fortnight in
which to try on dresses and bonnets and to show themselves, and then
Trouville, Aix or Biarritz, the whole show complete, with parties
succeeding parties, money was spent as if they did not know its value,
balls at the Casinos, constant flirtations, compromising intimacies, and
those kind of admirers who immediately surround two pretty women, one in
the radiant beauty of her eighteen years, and the other in the
brightness of that maturity, which beautiful September days bring with
them.

Unfortunately, however, they had to do the same thing over again every
year, and as if bad luck were continuing to follow them implacably,
Madame de Maurillac and her daughter did not succeed in their endeavors,
and did not manage during her usual absence from home, to pick up some
nice fellow who fell in love immediately, who took them seriously, and
asked for Fabienne's hand, consequently, they were very unhappy. Their
energies flagged, and their courage left them like water that escapes,
drop by drop, through a crack in a jug. They grew low-spirited and no
longer dared to be open towards each other and to exchange confidences
and projects.

Fabienne, with her pale cheeks, her large eyes with blue circles round
them and her tight lips, looked like some captive princess who is
tormented by constant ennui, and troubled by evil suggestions; who
dreams of flight, and of escape from that prison where fate holds her
captive.

One night, when the sky was covered with heavy thunderclouds and the
heat was most oppressive, Madame de Maurillac called her daughter whose
room was next to hers. After calling her loudly for some time in vain,
she sprang out of bed in terror and almost broke open the door with her
trembling hands. The room was empty, and the pillows untouched.

Then, nearly mad and foreseeing some irreparable misfortune, the poor
woman ran all over the large house, and then rushed out into the garden,
where the air was heavy with the scent of flowers. She had the
appearance of some wild animal that is being pursued by a pack of
hounds, tried to penetrate the darkness with her anxious looks, and
gasped as if some one were holding her by the throat; but suddenly she
staggered, uttered a painful cry and fell down in a fit.

There before her, in the shadow of the myrtle trees, Fabienne was
sitting on the knees of a man--of the gardener--with both her arms round
his neck and kissing him ardently, and as if to defy her, and to show
her how vain all her precautions and her vigilance had been, the girl
was telling her lover in the country dialect, and in a cooing and
delightful voice, how she adored him and that she belonged to him....

Madame de Maurillac is in a lunatic asylum, and Fabienne has married the
gardener.

What could she have done better?




GHOSTS


Just at the time when the _Concordat_ was in its most flourishing
condition, a young man belonging to a wealthy and highly respected
middle class family went to the office of the head of the police at
P----, and begged for his help and advice, which was immediately
promised him.

"My father threatens to disinherit me," the young man then began,
"although I have never offended against the laws of the State, of
morality or of his paternal authority, merely because I do not share his
blind reverence for the Catholic Church and her Ministers. On that
account he looks upon me, not merely as Latitudinarian, but as a perfect
Atheist, and a faithful old manservant of ours, who is much attached to
me, and who accidentally saw my father's will, told me in confidence
that he had left all his property to the Jesuits. I think this is highly
suspicious, and I fear that the priests have been maligning me to my
father. Until less than a year ago, we used to live very quietly and
happily together, but ever since he has had so much to do with the
clergy, our domestic peace and happiness are at an end."

"What you have told me," the official replied, "is as likely as it is
regrettable, but I fail to see how I can interfere in the matter. Your
father is in the full possession of all his mental faculties, and can
dispose of all his property exactly as he pleases. I also think that
your protest is premature; you must wait until his will can legally take
effect, and then you can invoke the aid of justice; I am sorry to say
that I can do nothing for you."

"I think you will be able to," the young man replied; "for I believe
that a very clever piece of deceit is being carried on here."

"How? Please explain yourself more clearly."

"When I remonstrated with him, yesterday evening, he referred to my dead
mother, and at last assured me, in a voice of the deepest conviction,
that she had frequently appeared to him, and had threatened him with all
the torments of the damned, if he did not disinherit his son, who had
fallen away from God, and leave all his property to the Church. Now I do
not believe in ghosts."

"Neither do I," the police director replied; "but I cannot well do
anything on this dangerous ground, if I had nothing but superstitions to
go upon. You know how the Church rules all our affairs since the
_Concordat_ with Rome, and if I investigate this matter, and obtain no
results, I am risking my post. It would be very different if you could
adduce any proofs for your suspicions. I do not deny that I should like
to see the clerical party, which will, I fear, be the ruin of Austria,
receive a staggering blow; try, therefore, to get to the bottom of this
business, and then we will talk it over again."

About a month passed, without the young Latitudinarian being heard of;
but then he suddenly came one evening, evidently in a great state of
excitement, and told him that he was in a position to expose the
priestly deceit which he had mentioned, if the authorities would assist
him. The police director asked for further information.

"I have obtained a number of important clues," the young man said. "In
the first place, my father confessed to me, that my mother did not
appear to him in our house, but in the churchyard where she is buried.
My mother was consumptive for many years, and a few weeks before her
death she went to the village of S----, where she died and was buried.
In addition to this, I found out from our footman, that my father has
already left the house twice, late at night, in company of X----, the
Jesuit priest, and that on both occasions he did not return till
morning. Each time he was remarkably uneasy and low-spirited after his
return, and had three masses said for my dead mother. He also told me
just now, that he has to leave home this evening on business, but
immediately he told me that, our footman saw the Jesuit go out of the
house. We may, therefore, assume that he intends this evening to consult
the spirit of my dead mother again, and this would be an excellent
opportunity for getting on the track of the matter, if you do not object
to opposing the most powerful force in the Empire, for the sake of such
an insignificant individual as myself."

"Every citizen has an equal right to the protection of the State," the
police director replied; "and I think that I have shown often enough,
that I am not wanting in courage to perform my duty, no matter how
serious the consequences may be; but only very young men act without any
prospects of success, as they are carried away by their feelings. When
you came to me the first time, I was obliged to refuse your request for
assistance, but to-day your shares have risen in value. It is now eight
o'clock, and I shall expect you in two hours' time, here in my office.
At present, all you have to do is to hold your tongue; everything else
is my affair."

As soon as it was dark, four men got into a closed carriage in the yard
of the police office, and were driven in the direction of the village of
S----; their carriage, however, did not enter the village, but stopped
at the edge of a small wood in the immediate neighborhood. Here they all
four alighted; they were the police director, accompanied by the young
Latitudinarian, a police sergeant and an ordinary policeman, who was,
however, dressed in plain clothes.

"The first thing for us to do is to examine the locality carefully," the
police director said; "it is eleven o'clock and the exorcisers of ghosts
will not arrive before midnight, so we have time to look round us, and
to take our measure."

The four men went to the churchyard, which lay at the end of the
village, near the little wood. Everything was as still as death, and not
a soul was to be seen. The sexton was evidently sitting in the public
house, for they found the door of his cottage locked, as well as the
door of the little chapel that stood in the middle of the churchyard.

"Where is your mother's grave?" the police director asked; but as there
were only a few stars visible, it was not easy to find it, but at last
they managed it, and the police director looked about in the
neighborhood of it.

"The position is not a very favorable one for us," he said at last;
"there is nothing here, not even a shrub, behind which we could hide."

But just then the policeman said that he had tried to get into the
sexton's hut through the door or the window, and that at last he had
succeeded in doing so by breaking open a square in a window, which had
been mended with paper, and that he had opened it and obtained
possession of the key, which he brought to the police director.

His plans were very quickly settled. He had the chapel opened and went
in with the young Latitudinarian; then he told the police sergeant to
lock the door behind him and to put the key back where he had found it,
and to shut the window of the sexton's cottage carefully. Lastly, he
made arrangements as to what they were to do, in case anything
unforeseen should occur, whereupon the sergeant and the constable left
the churchyard, and lay down in a ditch at some distance from the gate,
but opposite to it.

Almost as soon as the clock struck half-past eleven, they heard steps
near the chapel, whereupon the police director and the young
Latitudinarian went to the window, in order to watch the beginning of
the exorcism, and as the chapel was in total darkness, they thought that
they should be able to see, without being seen; but matters turned out
differently from what they expected.

Suddenly, the key turned in the lock, and they barely had time to
conceal themselves behind the altar, before two men came in, one of whom
was carrying a dark lantern. One was the young man's father, an elderly
man of the middle class, who seemed very unhappy and depressed, the
other the Jesuit father K----, a tall, thin, big-boned man, with a thin,
bilious face, in which two large gray eyes shone restlessly under their
bushy, black eyebrows. He lit the tapers, which were standing on the
altar, and then began to say a _Requiem Mass_; while the old man knelt
on the altar steps and served him.

When it was over, the Jesuit took the book of the Gospels and the holy
water sprinkler, and went slowly out of the chapel, while the old man
followed him, with the holy water basin in one hand and a taper in the
other. Then the police director left his hiding place, and stooping
down, so as not to be seen, he crept to the chapel window, where he
cowered down carefully, and the young man followed his example. They
were now looking straight on his mother's grave.

The Jesuit, followed by the superstitious old man, walked three times
round the grave; then he remained standing before it, and by the light
of the taper, he read a few passages from the Gospel; then he dipped the
holy water sprinkler three times into the holy water basin, and
sprinkled the grave three times; then both returned to the chapel, knelt
down outside it with their faces towards the grave, and began to pray
aloud, until at last the Jesuit sprang up, in a species of wild ecstasy,
and cried out three times in a shrill voice:

"Exsurge! Exsurge! Exsurge!"[1]

[Footnote 1: Arise!]

Scarcely had the last word of the exorcism died away, when thick, blue
smoke rose out of the grave, which rapidly grew into a cloud, and began
to assume the outlines of a human body, until at last a tall, white
figure stood behind the grave, and beckoned with its hand.

"Who art thou?" the Jesuit asked solemnly, while the old man began to
cry.

"When I was alive, I was called Anna Maria B----," the ghost replied in
a hollow voice.

"Will you answer all my questions?" the priest continued.

"As far as I can."

"Have you not yet been delivered from purgatory by our prayers, and all
the masses for your soul, which we have said for you?"

"Not yet, but soon, soon I shall be."

"When?"

"As soon as that blasphemer, my son, has been punished."

"Has that not already happened? Has not your husband disinherited his
lost son, and made the Church his heir, in his place?"

"That is not enough."

"What must he do besides?"

"He must deposit his will with the Judicial Authorities, as his last
will and testament, and drive the reprobate out of his house."

"Consider well what you are saying. Must this really be?"

"It must, or otherwise I shall have to languish in purgatory much
longer," the sepulchral voice replied with a deep sigh; but the next
moment it yelled out in terror:

"Oh! Good Lord!" and the ghost began to run away as fast as it could. A
shrill whistle was heard, and then another, and the police director laid
his hand on the shoulder of the exorcisor, accompanied with the remark:

"You are in custody."

Meanwhile, the police sergeant and the policeman, who had come into the
churchyard, had caught the ghost, and dragged it forward. It was the
sexton, who had put on a flowing, white dress, and who wore a wax mask,
which bore striking resemblance to his mother, as the son declared.

When the case was heard, it was proved that the mask had been very
skillfully made from a portrait of the deceased woman. The Government
gave orders that the matter should be investigated as secretly as
possible, and left the punishment of Father K---- to the spiritual
authorities, which was a matter of course, at a time when priests were
outside the jurisdiction of the Civil Authorities; and it is needless to
say that he was very comfortable during his imprisonment, in a monastery
in a part of the country which abounded with game and trout.

The only valuable result of the amusing ghost story was, that it brought
about a reconciliation between father and son, and the former, as a
matter of fact, felt such deep respect for priests and their ghosts in
consequence of the apparition, that a short time after his wife had left
purgatory for the last time, in order to talk with him, he turned
_Protestant_.




CRASH


Love is stronger than death, and consequently also, than the greatest
crash.

A young, and by no means bad-looking son of Palestine, and one of the
barons of the Almanac of the _Ghetto_, who had left the field covered
with wounds in the last general engagement on the Stock Exchange, used
to go very frequently to the Universal Exhibition in Vienna in 1873, in
order to divert his thoughts, and to console himself amidst the varied
scenes, and the numerous objects of attraction there. One day he met a
newly married couple in the Russian section, who had a very old coat of
arms, but on the other hand, a very modest income.

This latter circumstance had frequently emboldened the stockbroker to
make secret overtures to the delightful little lady; overtures which
might have fascinated certain Viennese actresses, but which were sure to
insult a respectable woman. The baroness, whose name appeared in the
_Almanack de Gotha_, therefore felt something very like hatred for the
man from the _Ghetto_, and for a long time her pretty little head had
been full of various plans of revenge.

The stockbroker, who was really, and even passionately in love with her,
got close to her in the Exhibition buildings, which he could do all the
more easily, since the little woman's husband had taken to flight,
foreseeing mischief, as soon as she went up to the show-case of a
Russian fur dealer, before which she remained standing in rapture.

"Do look at that lovely fur," the baroness said, while her dark eyes
expressed her pleasure; "I must have it."

But she looked at the white ticket on which the price was marked.

"Four thousand roubles," she said in despair; "that is about six
thousand florins."

"Certainly," he replied, "but what of that? It is a sum not worth
mentioning in the presence of such a charming lady."

"But my husband is not in a position ..."

"Be less cruel than usual for once," the man from the _Ghetto_ said to
the young woman in a low voice, "and allow me to lay this sable skin at
your feet."

"I presume that you are joking."

"Not I ..."

"I think you must be joking, as I cannot think that you intend to insult
me."

"But, Baroness, I love you...."

"That is one reason more why you should not make me angry."

"But ..."

"Oh! I am in such a rage," the energetic little woman said; "I could
flog you like _Venus in the Fur_[2] did her slave."

[Footnote 2: One of Sacher-Masoch's novels.--TRANSLATOR.]

"Let me be your slave," the Stock Exchange baron replied ardently, "and
I will gladly put up with everything from you. Really, in this sable
cloak, and with a whip in your hand, you would make a most lovely
picture of the heroine of that story."

The baroness looked at the man for a moment with a peculiar smile.

"Then if I were to listen to you favorably, you would let me flog you?"
she said after a pause.

"With pleasure."

"Very well," she replied quickly. "You will let me give you twenty-five
cuts with a whip, and I will be yours after the twenty-fifth blow."

"Are you in earnest?"

"Fully."

The man from the _Ghetto_ took her hand, and pressed it ardently to his
lips.

"When may I come?"

"To-morrow evening at eight o'clock."

"And I may bring the sable cloak and the whip with me?"

"No, I will see about that myself."

The next evening the enamored stockbroker came to the house of the
charming little Baroness, and found her alone, lying on a couch, wrapped
in a dark fur, while she held a dog whip in her small hand, which the
man from the _Ghetto_ kissed.

"You know our agreement," she began.

"Of course I do," the Stock Exchange baron replied. "I am to allow you
to give me twenty-five cuts with the whip, and after the twenty-fifth
you will listen to me."

"Yes, but I am going to tie your hands first of all."

The amorous baron quietly allowed this new Delila to tie his hands
behind him, and then at her bidding, he knelt down before her, and she
raised her whip and hit him hard.

"Oh! That hurts me most confoundedly," he exclaimed.

"I mean it to hurt you," she said with a mocking laugh, and went on
thrashing him without mercy. At last the poor fool groaned with pain,
but he consoled himself with the thought that each blow brought him
nearer to his happiness.

At the twenty-fourth cut, she threw the whip down.

"That only makes twenty-four," the beaten would-be, _Don Juan_,
remarked.

"I will make you a present of the twenty-fifth," she said with a laugh.

"And now you are mine, altogether mine," he exclaimed ardently.

"What are you thinking of?"

"Have I not let you beat me?"

"Certainly; but I promised you to grant your wish after the twenty-fifth
blow, and you have only received twenty-four," the cruel little bit of
virtue cried, "and I have witnesses to prove it."

With these words, she drew back the curtains over the door, and her
husband, followed by two other gentlemen came out of the next room,
smiling. For a moment the stockbroker remained speechless on his knees
before the beautiful woman; then he gave a deep sigh, and sadly uttered
that one, most significant word:

_"Crash!"_




AN HONEST IDEAL


Among my numerous friends in Vienna, there is one who is an author, and
who has always amused me by his childish idealism.

Not by his idealism from an abstract point of view, for in spite of my
Pessimism I am an absurd Idealist, and because I am perfectly well aware
of this, I as a rule never laugh at people's Idealism, but his sort of
Idealism was really too funny.

He was a serious man of great capabilities who only just fell short of
being learned, with a clear, critical intellect; a man without any
illusions about Society, the State, Literature, or anything else, and
especially not about women; but yet he was the craziest Optimist as soon
as he got upon the subject of actresses, theatrical princesses and
heroines; he was one of those men, who, like Hackländer, cannot discover
the Ideal of Virtue anywhere, except in a ballet girl.

My friend was always in love with some actress or other; of course only
Platonically, and from preference with some girl of rising talent, whose
literary knight he constituted himself, until the time came when her
admirers laid something much more substantial than laurel wreaths at her
feet; then he withdrew and sought for fresh talent which would allow
itself to be patronized by him.

He was never without the photograph of his ideal in his breast pocket,
and when he was in a good temper he used to show me one or other of
them, whom I had never seen, with a knowing smile, and once, when we
were sitting in a _café_ in the _Prater_, he took out a portrait without
saying a word, and laid it on the table before me.

It was the portrait of a beautiful woman, but what struck me in it first
of all was not the almost classic cut of her features, but her white
eyes.

"If she had not the black hair of a living woman, I should take her for
a statue," I said.

"Certainly," my friend replied; "for a statue of Venus, perhaps for the
Venus of Milo, herself."

"Who is she?"

"A young actress."

"That is a matter of course in your case; what I meant was, what is her
name?"

My friend told me, and it was a name which is at present one of the best
known on the German stage, with which a number of terrestrial adventures
are connected, as every Viennese knows, with which those of Venus
herself were only innocent toying, but which I then heard for the first
time.

My idealist described her as a woman of the highest talent, which I
believed, and as an angel of purity, which I did not believe; on that
particular occasion, however, I at any rate did not believe the
contrary.

A few days later, I was accidentally turning over the leaves of the
portrait album of another intimate friend of mine, who was a thoroughly
careless, somewhat dissolute Viennese, and I came across that strange
female face with the dead eyes again.

"How did you come by the picture of this Venus?" I asked him.

"Well, she certainly is a Venus," he replied, "but one of that cheap
kind who are to be met with in the _Graben_[3], which is their ideal
grove...."

[Footnote 3: The street where most of the best shops are to be found,
and much frequented by venial beauties.--TRANSLATOR.]

"Impossible!"

"I give you my word of honor it is so."

I could say nothing more after that. So my intellectual friend's new
ideal, that woman of the highest dramatic talent, that wonderful woman
with the white eyes, was a street Venus!

But my friend was right in one respect. He had not deceived himself with
regard to her wonderful dramatic gifts, and she very soon made a career
for herself; far from being a mute character on a suburban stage, she
rose in two years to be the leading actress at one of the principal
theaters.

My friend interested himself on her behalf with the manager of it, who
was not blinded by any prejudices. She acted in a rehearsal, and pleased
him; whereupon he sent her to star in the provinces, and my friend
accompanied her, and took care she was well puffed.

She went on the boards as Schiller's _Marie Stuart_, and achieved the
most brilliant success, and before she had finished her starring tour,
she obtained an engagement at a large theater in a Northern town, where
her appearance was the signal for a triumphant success.

Her reputation, that is, her reputation as a most gifted actress, grew
very high in less than a year, and the manager of the Court theater
invited her to star at the Court theater.

She was received with some suspicion at first, but she soon overcame all
prejudices and doubts; the applause grew more and more vehement at every
act, and at the close of the performance, her future was decided. She
obtained a splendid engagement, and soon afterwards became an actress at
the Court theater.

A well-known author wrote a racy novel, of which she was the heroine;
one of the leading bankers and financiers was at her feet; she was the
most popular personage, and the lioness of the capital; she had splendid
apartments, and all her surroundings were of the most luxurious
character, and she had reached that height in her career at which my
idealistic friend, who had constituted himself her literary knight,
quietly took his leave of her, and went in search of fresh talent.

But the beautiful woman with the dead eyes and the dead heart seemed to
be destined to be the scourge of the Idealists, quite against her will,
for scarcely had one unfolded his wings and flown away from her, than
another fell out of the nest into her net.

A very young student, who was neither handsome, nor of good family, and
certainly not rich or even well off, but who was enthusiastic,
intellectual and impressionable, saw her as _Marie Stuart_ in _The Maid
of Orleans, The Lady with the Camelias_, and most of the plays of the
best French play writers, for the manager was making experiments with
her, and she was doing the same with her talents.

The poor student was enraptured with the celebrated actress, and at the
same time conceived a passion for the woman, which bordered on madness.

He saved up penny by penny, he nearly starved himself, only in order
that he might be able to pay for a seat in the gallery whenever she
acted, and be able to devour her with his eyes. He always got a seat in
the front row, for he was always outside three hours before the doors
opened, so as to be one of the first to gain his Olympus, the seat of
the theatrical enthusiasts; he grew pale, and his heart beat violently
when she appeared; he laughed when she laughed, shed tears when she
wept, applauded her, as if he had been paid to do it by the highest
favors that a woman can bestow, and yet she did not know him, and was
ignorant of his very existence.

The regular frequenters of the Court theater noticed him at last, and
spoke about his infatuation for her, until at last she heard about him,
but still did not know him, and although he could not send her any
costly jewelry, and not even a bouquet, yet at last he succeeded in
attracting her attention.

When she had been acting and the theater had been empty for a long time,
and she left it, wrapped in valuable furs and got into the carriage of
her banker, which was waiting for her at the stage door, he always stood
there, often up to his ankles in snow, or in the pouring rain.

At first she did not notice him, but when her maid said something to her
in a whisper on one occasion, she looked round in surprise, and he got a
look from those large eyes, which were not dead then, but dark and
bright; a look which recompensed him for all his sufferings and filled
him with proud hopes, which constantly gained more power over the young
Idealist, who was usually so modest.

At last there was a thorough, silent understanding between the
theatrical princess and the dumb adorer. When she put her foot on the
carriage step, she looked round at him, and every time he stood there,
devouring her with his eyes; she saw it and got contentedly into her
carriage, but she did not see how he ran after the carriage, and how he
reached her house, panting for breath, when she did, nor how he lay down
outside after the door had closed behind her.

One stormy summer night, when the wind was howling in the chimneys, and
the rain was beating against the windows and on the pavement, the poor
student was again lying on the stone steps outside her house, when the
front door was opened very cautiously and quietly; for it was not the
banker who was leaving the house, but a wealthy young officer whom the
girl was letting out; he kissed the pretty little Cerebus as he put a
gold coin into her hand, and then accidentally trod on the Idealist, who
was lying outside.

They all three simultaneously uttered a cry; the girl blew out the
candle, the officer instinctively half drew his sword, and the student
ran away.

Ever since that night, the poor, crazy fellow went about with a dagger,
which he concealed in his belt, and it was his constant companion to the
theater, and the stage door, when the actress's carriage used to wait
for her, and to her house, where he nightly kept his painful watch.

His first idea was to kill his fortunate rival, then himself, then the
theatrical princess, but at last, he lay down again outside her door, or
stood on the pavement and watched the shadows, that flitted hither and
thither on her window, turned by the magic spell of the lovely actress.

And then, the most incredible thing happened, something which he could
never have hoped for, and which he scarcely believed when it did occur.

One evening, when she had been playing a very important part, she kept
the carriage waiting much longer than usual; but at last she appeared,
and got into it; she did not shut the door, however, but beckoned to the
young Idealist to follow her.

He was almost delirious with joy, just as a moment before he had been
almost mad from despair, and obeyed her immediately, and during the
drive he lay at her feet and covered her hands with kisses. She allowed
it quietly and even merrily, and when the carriage stopped at her door,
she let him lift her out of the carriage, and went upstairs leaning on
his arm.

There, the lady's maid showed him into a luxuriously furnished
drawing-room, while the actress changed her dress.

Presently she appeared in her dressing gown, sat down carelessly in an
easy chair, and asked him to sit down beside her.

"You take a great interest in me?" she said.

"You are my ideal!" the student cried enthusiastically.

The theatrical princess smiled, and said:

"Well, I will at any rate be an honest ideal; I will not deceive you,
and you shall not be able to say that I have misused your youthful
enthusiasm. I will give myself to you...."

"Oh! Heavens!" the poor Idealist exclaimed, throwing himself at her
feet.

"Wait a moment! Wait a moment!" she said with a smile. "I have not
finished yet. I can only love a man who is in a position to provide me
with all those luxuries which an actress, or, if you like, which I
cannot do without. As far as I know, you are poor, but I will belong to
you, only for to-night, however, and in return you must promise me not
to rave about me, or to follow me, from to-night. Will you do this?"

The wretched Idealist was kneeling before her; he was having a terrible
mental struggle.

"Will you promise me to do this?" she said again.

"Yes," he said, almost groaning.

The next morning a man, who had buried his Ideal, tottered downstairs.
He was pale enough; almost as pale as a corpse; but in spite of this, he
is still alive, and if he has any Ideal at all at present, it is
certainly not a theatrical princess.




STABLE PERFUME


Three ladies belonging to that class of society which has nothing useful
to do, and therefore does not know how to employ its time sensibly, were
sitting on a bench in the shade of some pine trees at Ischl, and were
talking incidentally of their preference for all sorts of smells.

One of the ladies, Princess F----, a slim, handsome brunette, declared
there was nothing like the smell of Russian leather; she wore dull brown
Russian leather boots, a Russian leather dress suspender, to keep her
petticoats out of the dirt and dust, a Russian leather belt which
spanned her wasp-like waist, carried a Russian leather purse, and even
wore a brooch and bracelet of gilt Russian leather; people declared that
her bedroom was papered with Russian leather, and that her lover was
obliged to wear high Russian leather boots and tight breeches, but that
on the other hand, her husband was excused from wearing anything at all
in Russian leather.

Countess H----, a very stout lady, who had formerly been very beautiful
and of a very loving nature, but loving after the fashion of her time _à
la_ Parthenia and Griseldis, could not get over the vulgar taste of the
young Princess. All she cared for was the smell of hay, and she it was
who brought the scent _New Mown Hay_ into fashion. Her ideal was a
freshly mown field in the moonlight, and when she rolled slowly along,
she looked like a moving haystack, and exhaled an odor of hay all about
her.

The third lady's taste was even more peculiar than Countess H----'s, and
more vulgar than the Princess's, for the small, delicate, light-haired
Countess W---- lived only for--the smell of stables. Her friends could
absolutely not understand this; the Princess raised her beautiful, full
arm with its broad bracelet to her Grecian nose and inhaled the sweet
smell of the Russian leather, while the sentimental hay-rick exclaimed
over and over again:

"How dreadful! What dost thou say to it, chaste moon?"

The delicate little Countess seemed very much embarrassed at the effect
that her confession had had, and tried to justify her taste.

"Prince T---- told me that that smell had quite bewitched him once," she
said; "it was in a Jewish town in Gallicia, where he was quartered once
with his hussar regiment, and a number of poor, ragged circus riders,
with half-starved horses came from Russia and put up a circus with a few
poles and some rags of canvas, and the Prince went to see them, and
found a woman among them, who was neither young nor beautiful, but bold
and impudent; and the impudent woman wore a faded, bright red jacket,
trimmed with old, shabby, imitation ermine, and that jacket stank of the
stable, as the Prince expressed it, and she bewitched him with that
odor, so that every time that the shameless wretch lay in his arms, and
laughed impudently, and smelled abominably of the stable, he felt as if
he were magnetized.

"How disgusting!" both the other ladies said, and involuntarily held
their noses.

"What dost thou say to it, chaste moon?" the haystack said with a
sigh, and the little light-haired Countess was abashed and held her
tongue.

At the beginning of the winter season the three friends were together
again in the gay, imperial city on the blue Danube. One morning the
Princess accidentally met the enthusiast for the hay at the house of the
little light-haired Countess, and the two ladies were obliged to go
after her to her private riding-school, where she was taking her daily
lesson. As soon as she saw them, she came up, and beckoned her
riding-master to her to help her out of the saddle. He was a young man
of extremely good and athletic build, which was set off by his tight
breeches and his short velvet coat, and he ran up and took his lovely
burden into his arms with visible pleasure, to help her off the quiet,
perfectly broken horse.

When the ladies looked at the handsome, vigorous man, it was quite
enough to explain their little friend's predilection for the smell of a
stable, but when the latter saw their looks, she blushed up to the roots
of her hair, and her only way out of the difficulty was to order the
riding-master, in a very authoritative manner, to take the horse back to
the stable. He merely bowed, with an indescribable smile, and obeyed
her.

A few months afterwards, Viennese society was alarmed at the news that
Countess W---- had been divorced from her husband. The event was all the
more unexpected, as they had apparently always lived very happily
together, and nobody was able to mention any man on whom she had
bestowed even the most passing attention, beyond the requirements of
politeness.

Long afterwards, however, a strange report became current. A chattering
lady's maid declared that the handsome riding-master had once so far
forgotten himself as to strike the Countess with his riding-whip; a
groom had told the Count of the occurrence, and when he was going to
call the insolent fellow to account for it, the Countess covered him
with her own body, and thus gave occasion for the divorce.

Years had passed since then and the Countess H---- had grow stouter and
more sentimental. Ischl and hayricks were not enough for her any longer;
she spent the winter on lovely _Lago Maggoire_, where she walked among
laurel bushes and cypress trees, and was rowed about on the luke warm,
moonlight nights.

One evening she was returning home in the company of an English lady who
was also a great lover of nature, from _Isola Bella_, when they met a
beautiful private boat in which a very unusual couple were sitting; a
small, delicate, light-haired woman, wrapped in a white burnoose, and a
handsome, athletic man, in tight, white breeches, a short, black velvet
coat trimmed with sable, a red fez on his head, and a riding whip in his
hand.

Countess K---- involuntarily uttered a loud exclamation.

"What is the matter with you?" the English lady asked. "Do you know
those people?"

"Certainly! She is a Viennese lady," Countess H---- whispered; "Countess
W----."

"Oh! Indeed you are quite mistaken; it is a Count Savelli and his wife.
They are a handsome couple, don't you think so?"

When the boat came nearer, she saw that in spite of that, it was little
Countess W---- and that the handsome man was her former riding-master,
whom she had married, and for whom she had bought a title from the Pope;
and as the two boats passed each other, the short sable cloak, which was
thrown carelessly over his shoulders, exhaled, like the old cat's skin
jacket of that impudent female circus rider, a strong _stable perfume_.




THE ILL-OMENED GROOM


An impudent theft, to a very large amount, had been committed in the
Capital. Jewels, a valuable watch set with diamonds, his wife's
miniature in a frame enchased with brilliants, and a considerable sum in
money, the whole amounting in value to a hundred and fifteen thousand
florins, had been stolen. The banker himself went to the Director of
Police[4] to give notice of the robberies, but at the same time he
begged as a special favor that the investigation might be carried on as
quietly and considerately as possible, as he declared that he had not
the slightest ground for suspecting anybody in particular, and did not
wish any innocent person to be accused.

[Footnote 4: Head of the Criminal Investigation
Department.--TRANSLATOR.]

"First of all, give me the names of all the persons who regularly go
into your bedroom," the police director said.

"Nobody, except my wife, my children, and Joseph, my valet, a man for
whom I would answer as I would for myself."

"Then you think him absolutely incapable of committing such a deed?"

"Most decidedly I do," the banker replied.

"Very well; then can you remember whether on the day on which you first
missed the articles that have been stolen, or on any days immediately
preceding it, anybody who was not a member of your household, happened
by chance to go to your bedroom?"

The banker thought for a moment, and then said with some hesitation:

"Nobody, absolutely nobody."

The experienced official, however, was struck by the banker's slight
embarrassment and momentary blush, so he took his hand, and looking him
straight in the face, he said:

"You are not quite candid with me; somebody was with you, and you wish
to conceal the fact from me. You must tell me everything."

"No, no; indeed there was nobody here." "Then at present, there is only
one person on whom any suspicion can rest--and that is your valet."

"I will vouch for his honesty," the banker replied immediately.

"You may be mistaken, and I shall be obliged to question the man."

"May I beg you to do it with every possible consideration?"

"You may rely upon me for that."

An hour later, the banker's valet was in the police director's private
room, who first of all looked at his man very closely, and then came to
the conclusion that such an honest, unembarrassed face, and such quiet,
steady eyes could not possibly belong to a criminal.

"Do you know why I have sent for you?"

"No, your Honor."

"A large theft has been committed in your master's house," the police
director continued, "from his bedroom. Do you suspect anybody? Who has
been into the room, within the last few days?"

"Nobody but myself, except my master's family."

"Do you not see, my good fellow, that by saying that, you throw
suspicion on yourself?"

"Surely, sir," the valet exclaimed, "you do not believe..."

"I must not believe anything; my duty is merely to investigate and to
follow up any traces that I may discover," was the reply. "If you have
been the only person to go into the room within the last few days, I
must hold you responsible."

"My master knows me..."

The police director shrugged his shoulders: "Your master has vouched for
your honesty, but that is not enough for me. You are the only person on
whom, at present, any suspicion rests, and therefore I must--sorry as I
am to do so--have you arrested."

"If that is so," the man said, after some hesitation, "I prefer to speak
the truth, for my good name is more to me than my situation. Somebody
was in my master's apartments yesterday."

"And this somebody was...?"

"A lady."

"A lady of his acquaintance?"

The valet did not reply for some time.

"It must come out," he said at length. "My master keeps a woman--you
understand, sir, a pretty, fair woman; and he has furnished a house for
her and goes to see her, but secretly of course, for if my mistress were
to find it out, there would be a terrible scene. This person was with
him yesterday."

"Were they alone?"

"I showed her in, and she was in his bedroom with him; but I had to call
him out after a short time, as his confidential clerk wanted to speak to
him, and so she was in the room alone for about a quarter of an hour."

"What is her name?"

"Cæcelia K----; she is a Hungarian." At the same time the valet gave him
her address.

Then the director of police sent for the banker, who, on being brought
face to face with his valet, was obliged to acknowledge the truth of the
facts which the latter had alleged, painful as it was for him to do so;
whereupon orders were given to take Cæcelia K---- into custody.

In less than half an hour, however, the police officer who had been
dispatched for that purpose, returned and said that she had left her
apartments, and most likely the Capital also, the previous evening. The
unfortunate banker was almost in despair. Not only had he been robbed of
a hundred and fifty thousand florins, but at the same time he had lost
the beautiful woman, whom he loved with all the passion of which he was
capable. He could not grasp the idea that a woman whom he had surrounded
with Asiatic luxury, whose strangest whims he had gratified, and whose
tyranny he had borne so patiently, could have deceived him so
shamefully, and now he had a quarrel with his wife, and an end of all
domestic peace, into the bargain.

The only thing the police could do was to raise the hue and cry after
the lady, who had denounced herself by her flight, but it was all of no
use. In vain did the banker, in whose heart hatred and thirst for
revenge had taken the place of love, implore the Director of Police to
employ every means to bring the beautiful criminal to justice, and in
vain did he undertake to be responsible for all the costs of her
prosecution, no matter how heavy they might be. Special police officers
were told off to try and discover her, but Cæcelia K---- was so rude as
not to allow herself to be caught.

Three years had passed, and the unpleasant story appeared to have been
forgotten. The banker had obtained his wife's pardon and--what he cared
about a good deal more--he had found another charming mistress, and the
police did not appear to trouble themselves about the beautiful
Hungarian any more.

We must now change the scene to London. A wealthy lady who created much
sensation in society, and who made many conquests both by her beauty and
her free behavior, was in want of a groom. Among the many applicants for
the situation, there was a young man, whose good looks and manners gave
people the impression that he must have been very well educated. This
was a recommendation in the eyes of the lady's maid, and she took him
immediately to her mistress's boudoir. When he entered, he saw a
beautiful, voluptuous looking woman, at most, twenty-five years of age,
with large, bright eyes and blue-black hair, which seemed to increase
the brilliancy of her fair complexion, lying on a sofa. She looked at
the young man, who also had thick black hair, and who turned his glowing
black eyes to the ground, beneath her searching gaze, with evident
satisfaction, and she seemed particularly taken with his slender,
athletic build, and then she said half lazily and half proudly:

"What is your name?"

"Lajos Mariassi."

"A Hungarian?"

And there was a strange look in her eyes.

"Yes."

"How did you come here?"

"I am one of the many emigrants who have forfeited their country and
their life; and I, who come of a good family, and who was an officer of
the Honveds, must now ... go into service, and thank God if I find a
mistress who is at the same time beautiful and an aristocrat, as you
are."

Miss Zoë--that was the lovely woman's name--smiled, and at the same time
showed two rows of pearly teeth.

"I like your looks," she said, "and I feel inclined to take you into my
service, if you are satisfied with my terms."

"A lady's whim," her maid said to herself, when she noticed the ardent
looks which Miss Zoë gave her manservant, "which will soon pass away."
But that experienced female was mistaken that time.

Zoë was really in love, and the respect with which Lajos treated her,
put her into a very bad temper. One evening, when she intended to go to
the Italian Opera, she countermanded her carriage, and refused to see
her noble adorer, who wished to throw himself at her feet, and ordered
her groom to be sent up to her boudoir.

"Lajos," she began, "I am not at all satisfied with you."

"Why, Madame?"

"I do not wish to have you about me any longer; here are your wages for
three months. Leave the house immediately." And she began to walk up and
down the room, impatiently.

"I will obey you, Madame," the groom replied, "but I shall not take my
wages."

"Why not?" she asked hastily.

"Because then I should be under your authority for three months," Lajos
said, "and I intend to be free, this very moment, so that I may be able
to tell you that I entered your service, not for the sake of your money,
but because I love and adore a beautiful woman in you."

"You love me!" Zoë exclaimed. "Why did you not tell me sooner? I merely
wished to banish you from my presence, because I love you, and did not
think that you loved me. But you shall smart for having tormented me so.
Come to my feet immediately."

The groom knelt before the lovely girl, whose moist lips sought his at
the same instant.

From that moment Lajos became her favorite. Of course he was not allowed
to be jealous, as the young lord was still her official lover, who had
the pleasure of paying everything for that licentious beauty, and
besides him, there was a whole army of so-called "good friends," who
were fortunate enough to obtain a smile now and then, and occasionally,
something more, and who, in return, had permission to present her with
rare flowers, a parrot or diamonds.

The more intimate Zoë became with Lajos, the more uncomfortable she felt
when he looked at her, as he frequently did, with undisguised contempt.
She was wholly under his influence and was afraid of him, and one day,
while he was playing with her dark curls, he said jeeringly:

"It is usually said that contrasts usually attract each other, and yet
you are as dark as I am."

She smiled, and then tore off her black curls, and immediately the most
charming, fair-haired woman was sitting by the side of Lajos, who looked
at her attentively, but without any surprise.

He left his mistress at about midnight, in order to look after the
horses, as he said, and she put on a very pretty nightdress and went to
bed. She remained awake for fully an hour, expecting her lover, and then
she went to sleep, but in two hours' time she was roused from her
slumbers, and saw a police inspector and two constables by the side of
her magnificent bed.

"Whom do you want?" she cried.

"Cæcelia K----."

"I am Miss Zoë."

"Oh! I know you," the Inspector said with a smile; "be kind enough to
take off your dark locks, and you will be Cæcelia K----. I arrest you in
the name of the law."

"Good heavens!" she stammered, "Lajos has betrayed me."

"You are mistaken, Madame," the Inspector replied; "he has merely done
his duty."

"What? Lajos . . . my lover?"

"No, Lajos, the detective."

Cæcelia got out of bed, and the next moment she sank fainting onto the
floor.




AN EXOTIC PRINCE


In the forthcoming reminiscences, a lady will frequently be mentioned
who played a great part in the annals of the police from 1848 to 1866,
and we will call her _Wanda von Chabert_. Born in Galicia of German
parents, and carefully brought up in every way, she married a rich and
handsome officer of noble birth, from love, when she was sixteen. The
young couple, however, lived beyond their means, and when her husband
died suddenly, two years after they were married, she was left anything
but well off.

As Wanda had grown accustomed to luxury and amusement, the quiet life in
her parents' house did not suit her any longer, and even while she was
still in mourning for her husband, she allowed a Hungarian magnate to
make love to her, and she went off with him at a venture, and continued
the same extravagant life which she had led when her husband was alive,
at her own authority. At the end of two years, however, her lover left
her in a town in North Italy, almost without means, and she was thinking
of going on the stage, when chance provided her with another resource,
which enabled her to reassure her position in society. She became a
secret police agent, and soon was one of their most valuable members. In
addition to the proverbial charms and wit of a Polish woman, she also
possessed high linguistic attainments, and she spoke Polish, Russian,
French, German, English and Italian, almost equally fluently and
correctly; then she had also that encyclopædic polish, which impresses
most people much more than the most profound learning of a specialist.
She was very attractive in appearance, and she knew how to set off her
good looks by all the arts of dress and coquetry.

In addition to this, she was a woman of the world in the widest sense of
the term; pleasure-loving, faithless, unstable, and therefore never in
any danger of really losing her heart, and consequently her head. She
used to change the place of her abode, according to what she had to do.
Sometimes she lived in Paris among the Polish emigrants, in order to
find out what they were doing, and maintained intimate relations with
the Tuileries and the Palais Royal at the same time; then she went to
London for a short time, or hurried off to Italy, to watch the Hungarian
exiles, only to reappear suddenly in Switzerland, or at one of the
fashionable German watering-places.

In revolutionary circles, she was looked upon as an active member of the
great _League of Freedom_, and diplomatists regarded her as an
influential friend of Napoleon III.

She knew every one, but especially those men whose names were to be met
with every day, in the papers, and she reckoned Victor Emmanuel, Rouher,
Gladstone, and Gortschakoff among her friends, as well as Mazzini,
Kossuth, Garibaldi, Mieroslawsky and Bakunin.

In the spring of 185- she was at Vevey, on the lovely lake of Geneva,
and went into raptures when talking to an old German diplomatist about
the beauties of nature, and about Calame, Stifter and Turgenev, whose
"Diary of a Hunter" had just become fashionable.

One day a man appeared at the _table d'hôte_, who excited unusual
attention, and hers especially, so that there was nothing strange in her
asking the proprietor of the hotel what his name was; and she was told
that he was a wealthy Brazilian, and that his name was Don Escovedo.

Whether it was an accident, or whether he responded to the interest
which the young woman felt for him, at any rate she constantly met him
wherever she went, when she was taking a walk, or was on the lake, or
was looking at the newspapers in the reading room; and at last she was
obliged to confess to herself that he was the handsomest man she had
ever seen. Tall, slim, and yet muscular, the young, beardless Brazilian
had a head which any woman might envy him; features which were not only
beautiful and noble, but were also extremely delicate, with dark eyes
which possessed a wonderful charm, and thick, auburn curly hair, which
completed the attractiveness and the strangeness of his appearance.

They soon became acquainted, through a Prussian officer, whom the
Brazilian had requested to introduce him to the beautiful Polish
lady--for Frau von Chabert was taken for one in Vevey--and she, cold and
designing as she was, blushed slightly when he stood before her for the
first time; and when he gave her his arm he could feel her hand tremble
slightly on it. The same evening they went out riding together, the next
he was lying at her feet, and on the third she was his. For four weeks
the lovely Wanda and the Brazilian lived together as if they had been in
Paradise, but he could not deceive her searching eyes any longer.

For her sharp and practiced gaze had already discovered in him that
indefinable something which makes a man appear a suspicious character.
Any other woman would have been pained and horrified at such a
discovery, but she found the strange consolation in it, that her
handsome adorer had promised also to become a very interesting object
for her pursuit, and so she began systematically to watch the man who
lay unsuspectingly at her feet.

She soon found out that he was no conspirator, but she asked herself in
vain whether she was to look for a common swindler, an impudent
adventurer or perhaps even a criminal in him. The day that she had
foreseen soon came; the Brazilian's banker "unaccountably" had omitted
to send him any money, and so he borrowed some of her. "So he is a male
courtesan," she said to herself; and the handsome man soon required
money again, and she lent it to him, until at last he left suddenly, and
nobody knew where he had gone to; only this much, that he had left Vevey
as the companion of an old but wealthy Wallachian lady; and so this
time, clever Wanda was duped.

A year afterwards she met the Brazilian unexpectedly at Lucca, with an
insipid-looking, light-haired, thin Englishwoman on his arm. Wanda stood
still and looked at him steadily, but he glanced at her quite
indifferently; he did not choose to know her again.

The next morning, however, his valet brought her a letter from him,
which contained the amount of his debt in Italian hundred liri notes,
which were accompanied by a very cool excuse. Wanda was satisfied, but
she wished to find out who the lady was, in whose company she constantly
saw Don Escovedo.

"Don Escovedo."

An Austrian count, who had a loud and silly laugh, said:

"Who has saddled you with that yarn? The lady is Lady Nitingsdale, and
his name is Romanesco."

"Romanesco?"

"Yes, he is a rich Boyar from Moldavia, where he has extensive estates."

Romanesco kept a faro bank in his apartments, and he certainly cheated,
for he nearly always won; it was not long, therefore, before other
people in good society at Lucca shared Madame von Chabert's suspicions,
and consequently Romanesco thought it advisable to vanish as suddenly
from Lucca as Escovedo had done from Vevey, and without leaving any more
traces behind him.

Some time afterwards, Madame von Chabert was on the island of
Heligoland, for the sea-bathing; and one day she saw Escovedo-Romanesco
sitting opposite to her at the _table d'hôte_, in very animated
conversation with a Russian lady; only his hair had turned black since
she had seen him last. Evidently his light hair had become too
compromising for him.

"The sea water seems to have a very remarkable effect upon your hair,"
Wanda said to him spitefully, in a whisper.

"Do you think so?" he replied, condescendingly.

"I fancy that at one time your hair was fair."

"You are mistaking me for somebody else," the Brazilian replied,
quietly.

"I am not."

"For whom do you take me, pray?" he said with an insolent smile.

"For Don Escovedo."

"I am Count Dembizki from Valkynia," the former Brazilian said with a
bow; "perhaps you would like to see my passport."

"Well, perhaps...."

And at last, he had the impudence to show her his false passport.

A year afterwards, Wanda met Count Dembizki in Baden, near Vienna. His
hair was still black, but he had a magnificent, full, black beard; he
had become a Greek prince, and his name was Anastasio Maurokordatos. She
met him once in one of the side walks in the park, where he could not
avoid her. "If it goes on like this," she called out to him in a mocking
voice, "the next time I see you, you will be king of some negro tribe or
other."

That time, however, the Brazilian did not deny his identity; on the
contrary, he surrendered at discretion, and implored her not to betray
him, and as she was not revengeful, she pardoned him, after enjoying his
terror for a time, and promised him that she would hold her tongue, as
long as he did nothing contrary to the laws.

"First of all, I must beg you not to gamble."

"You have only to command; and we do not know each other in future?"

"I must certainly insist on that," she said maliciously.

The Exotic Prince had, however, made the conquest of the charming
daughter of a wealthy Austrian Count, and had cut out an excellent young
officer who was wooing her; and he, in his despair began to make love to
Frau von Chabert, and at last told her he loved her, but she only
laughed at him.

"You are very cruel," he stammered in confusion.

"I? What are you thinking about?" Wanda replied, still smiling; "all I
mean is, that you have directed your love to the wrong address, for
Countess...."

"Do not speak of her; she is engaged to another man."

"As long as I choose to permit it," she said; "but what will you do, if
I bring her back to your arms? Will you still call me cruel?"

"Can you do this?" the young officer asked, in great excitement.

"Well, supposing I can do it, what shall I be then?"

"An angel, whom I shall thank on my knees."

A few days later, the rivals met at a coffee house; the Greek prince
began to lie and boast, and the Austrian officer gave him the lie
direct, and in consequence, it was arranged that they should fight a
duel with pistols next morning in a wood close to Baden. But as the
officer was leaving the house with his second the next morning, a Police
Commissary came up to him and begged him not to trouble himself any
further about the matter, but another time to be more careful before
accepting a challenge.

"What does it mean?" the officer asked, in some surprise.

"It means that this Maurokordatos is a dangerous swindler and
adventurer, whom we have just taken into custody."

"He is not a prince?"

"No; a circus rider."

An hour later the officer received a letter from the charming Countess,
in which she humbly begged for pardon; the happy lover set off to go and
see her immediately, but on the way a sudden thought struck him, and so
he turned back in order to thank beautiful Wanda, as he had promised, on
his knees.




VIRTUE IN THE BALLET


It is a strange feeling of pleasure that the writer about the stage and
the characters of the theatrical feels, when he occasionally discovers a
good, honest human heart in the twilight behind the scenes. Of all the
witches and semi-witches of that eternal _Walpurgis night_, whose boards
represent the world, the ladies of the ballet have at all times and in
all places been regarded at least like saints, although Hackländer
repeatedly told in vain in his earlier novels, to convince us that true
virtue appears in tights and short petticoats and is only to be found in
ballet girls. I fear that the popular voice is right as a general rule,
but is equally true that here and there one finds a pearl in the dust,
and even in the dirt, and the short story that I am about to relate,
will best illustrate my assertion.

Whenever a new, youthful dancer appeared at the Vienna Opera House, the
_habitués_ began to go after her, and did not rest, until the fresh
young rose had been plucked by some hand or other, though often it was
old and trembling. For how could those young and pretty, sometimes even
beautiful girls who, with every right to life, love and pleasure, were
poor and had to subsist on a very small salary, resist the seduction of
the smell of flowers and of the flash of diamonds? And if one resisted
it, it was love, some real, strong passion, that gave her the strength
for this, generally, however, only to go after luxury all the more
shamelessly and selfishly, when her lover forsook her.

At the beginning of the winter season of 185--the pleasing news was
spread among the _habitués_, that a girl of dazzling beauty was going to
appear very shortly in the ballet at the Court Theater. When the evening
came, nobody had yet seen that much discussed phenomenon, but report
spread her name from mouth to mouth; it was Satanella. The moment when
the troop of elastic figures in fluttering petticoats jumped onto the
stage, every opera-glass in the boxes and stalls was directed on the
stage, and at the same instant the new dancer was discovered, although
she timidly kept in the background.

She was one of those girls who are surrounded by the bright halo of
virginity, but who at the same time present a splendid type of
womanhood; she had the voluptuous form of Rubens' second wife, whom they
called, not untruly, the risen Green Helen, and her head with its
delicate nose, its small full mouth, and its dark inquiring eyes,
reminded people of the celebrated picture of the Flemish Venus in the
_Belvedere_ in Vienna.

She took the old guard of the Vienna Court Theater by storm, and the
very next morning a perfect shower of _billets doux_, jewels and
bouquets fell into the poor ballet girl's attic. For a moment she was
dazzled by all this splendor and looked at the gold bracelets, the
brooches set with rubies and emeralds, and at the sparkling earrings,
with flushed cheeks, but then an unspeakable terror of being lost and of
sinking into degradation, seized her, and she pushed the jewels away and
was about to send them back. But as is usual in such cases, her mother
intervened in favor of _the generous gentlemen_, and so the jewels were
accepted, but the notes which accompanied them were not answered at
present. A second and a third discharge of Cupid's artillery followed,
without making any impression on that virtuous girl; in consequence a
greater number of her admirers grew quiet, though some continued to send
her presents, and to assail her with love letters, and one had the
courage to go still further.

He was a wealthy banker, who had just called on the mother of Henrietta,
as we will call the fair-haired ballet girl, and then one evening, quite
unexpectedly, on the girl herself. He by no means met with the reception
which he had expected from the pretty girl in a faded cotton gown;
Henrietta treated him with a certain amount of good humored respect,
which had a much more unpleasant effect on him than that coldness and
prudery, which is so often synonymous with coquetry and selfish
speculation, among a certain class of women. In spite of everything,
however, he soon went to see her daily, and lavished his wealth, without
her asking him for anything, on the beautiful dancer, and he gave her no
chance of refusing, for he relied on the mother for everything. She took
pretty, small apartments for her daughter and herself in the
_Kärntnerstrasse_ and furnished them elegantly, hired a cook and
housemaid, made an arrangement with a fly-driver, and lastly clothed her
daughter's lovely limbs in silk, velvet and valuable lace.

Henrietta persistently held her tongue at all this; only once she said
to her mother in the presence of the Stock Exchange _Jupiter_:

"Have you won a prize in the lottery?"

"Of course, I have," her mother replied with a laugh.

The girl, however, had given away her heart long before, and quite
contrary to all precedent, to a man whose very name she was ignorant of,
and who sent her no diamonds, and not even any flowers. But he was young
and good-looking, and stood so retiringly, and so evidently in love, at
the small side door of the Opera House every night, when she got out of
her antediluvian rickety fly, and also when she got into it again after
the performance, that she could not help noticing him. Soon, he began to
follow her wherever she went, and once he summoned up courage to speak
to her, when she had been to see a friend in a remote suburb. He was
very nervous, but she thought all that he said very clear and logical,
and she did not hesitate for a moment to confess that she returned his
love.

"You have made me the happiest, and at the same time the most wretched
of men," he said after a pause.

"What do you mean?" she said innocently.

"Do you not belong to another man?" he asked her in a sad voice.

She shook her abundant, light curls.

"Up till now, I have belonged to myself alone, and I will prove it to
you, by requesting you to call upon me frequently and without restraint.
Everyone shall know that we are lovers. I am not ashamed of belonging to
an honorable man, but I will not sell myself."

"But your splendid apartments, and your dresses," her lover interposed
shyly, "you cannot pay for them out of your salary."

"My mother has won a large prize in the lottery, or made a hit on the
Stock Exchange." And with these words, the determined girl cut short all
further explanations.

That same evening the young man paid his first visit, to the horror of
the girl's mother, who was so devoted to the Stock Exchange, and he came
again the next day, and nearly every day. Her mother's reproaches were
of no more avail than Jupiter's furious looks, and when the latter one
day asked for an explanation as to _certain visits_, the girl said
proudly:

"That is very soon explained. He loves me as I love him, and I presume
you can guess the rest."

And he certainly did guess the rest, and disappeared, and with him the
shower of gold ceased.

The mother cried and the daughter laughed. "I never gave the worn out
old rake any hopes, and what does it matter to me, what bargain you made
with him? I always thought that you had been lucky on the Stock
Exchange. Now, however, we must seriously consider about giving up our
apartments, and make up our minds to live as we did before."

"Are you really capable of making such a sacrifice for me, to renounce
luxury and to have my poverty?" her lover said.

"Certainly I am! Is not that a matter of course when one loves?" the
ballet girl replied in surprise.

"Then let me inform you, my dear Henrietta," he said, "that I am not so
poor as you think; I only wished to find out, whether I could make
myself loved for my own sake, I have done so. I am Count L----, and
though I am a minor and dependent on my parents, yet I have enough to be
able to retain your pretty rooms for you, and to offer you, if not a
luxurious, at any rate a comfortable existence."

On hearing this, Mamma dried her tears immediately. Count L---- became
the girl's acknowledged lover, and they passed the happiest hours
together. Unselfish as the girl was, she was yet such a thoroughly
ingenuous Viennese, that, whenever she saw anything that took her fancy,
whether it was a dress, a cloak or one of those pretty little ornaments
for a side table, she used to express her admiration in such terms, as
forced her lover to make her a present of the object in question. In
this way, Count L---- incurred enormous debts, which his father paid
repeatedly; at last, however, he inquired into the cause of all this
extravagance, and when he discovered it, he gave his son the choice of
giving up his connection with the dancer, or of relinquishing all claims
on the paternal money box.

It was a sorrowful evening, when Count L---- told his mistress of his
father's determination.

"If I do not give you up, I shall be able to do nothing for you," he
said at last, "and I shall not even know how I should manage to live
myself, for my father is just the man to allow me to want, if I defy
him. That, however, is a very secondary consideration; but as a man of
honor, I cannot bind you, who have every right to luxury and enjoyment,
to myself, from the moment when I cannot even keep you from want, and so
I must set you at liberty."

"But I will not give you up," Henrietta said proudly.

The young Count shook his head sadly.

"Do you love me?" the ballet girl said, quickly.

"More than my life."

"Then we will not separate, as long as I have anything," she continued.

And she would not give up her connection with him, and when his father
actually turned Count L---- into the street, she took her lover into her
own lodgings. He obtained a situation as a copyist clerk in a lawyer's
office, and she sold her valuable dresses and jewels, and so they lived
for more than a year.

The young man's father did not appear to trouble his head about them,
but nevertheless he knew everything that went on in their small home,
and knew every article that the ballet girl sold; until at last,
softened by such love and strength of character, he himself made the
first advances to a reconciliation with his son.

At the present time, Henrietta wears the diamonds which formerly
belonged to the old Countess, and it is long since she was a ballet
girl, for now she sits by the side of her husband in a carriage on whose
panels their armorial bearings are painted.




IN HIS SWEETHEART'S LIVERY


At present she is a great lady, an elegant, intellectual woman, a
celebrated actress; but in the year 1847, when our story begins, she was
a beautiful, but not very moral girl, and then it was that the young,
talented Hungarian poet, who was the first to discover her gifts for the
stage, made her acquaintance.

The slim, ardent girl, with her bright, brown hair and her large blue
eyes, attracted the careless poet, and he loved her, and all that was
good and noble in her nature, put forth fresh buds and blossoms in the
sunshine of his poetic love.

They lived in an attic in the old Imperial city on the Danube, and she
shared his poverty, his triumphs and his pleasures, and she would have
become his true and faithful wife, if the Hungarian revolution had not
torn him from her arms.

The poet became the soldier of freedom, and followed the Magyar
tricolor, and the Honved drums, while she was carried away by the
current of the movement in the capital, and she might have been seen
discharging her musket, like a brave Amazon, at the Croats, who were
defending the town against Görgey's assaulting battalions.

But at last Hungary was subdued, and was governed as if it had been a
conquered country.

It was said that the young poet had fallen at Temesvar, and his mistress
wept for him, and married another man, which was nothing either new or
extraordinary. Her name was now Frau von Kubinyi, but her married life
was not happy; and one day it occurred to her that her lover had told
her that she had talent for the stage, and whatever he said, had always
proved correct, so she separated from her husband, studied a few parts,
appeared on the stage, and the public, the critics, actors and
literature were lying at her feet.

She obtained a very profitable engagement, and her reputation increased
with every part she played; and before the end of a year after her first
appearance, she was the lioness of society. Everybody paid homage to
her, and the wealthiest men tried to obtain her favors; but she remained
cold and reserved, until the General commanding the district, who was a
handsome man of noble bearing, and a gentleman in the highest sense of
the word, approached her.

Whether she was flattered at seeing that powerful man, before whom
millions trembled, and who had to decide over the life and death, the
honor and happiness of so many thousands, fettered by her soft curls, or
whether her enigmatical heart for once really felt what true love was,
suffice it to say, that in a short time she was his acknowledged
mistress, and her princely lover surrounded her with the luxury of an
Eastern queen.

But just then a miracle occurred--the resurrection of a dead man. Frau
von Kubinyi was driving through the _Corso_ in the General's carriage;
she was lying back negligently in the soft cushions, and looking
carelessly at the crowd on the pavement. Then, she caught sight of a
common Austrian soldier and screamed out aloud.

Nobody heard that cry, which came from the depths or a woman's heart,
nobody saw how pale and how excited that woman was, who usually seemed
made of marble, not even the soldier who was the cause of it. He was a
Hungarian poet, who, like so many other _Honveds_[5], now wore the
uniform of an Austrian soldier.

[Footnote 5: A Hungarian word, meaning literally, Defender of the
Fatherland. The term _Honved_ is applied to the Hungarian _Landnehr_, or
Militia.--Translator.]

Two days later, to his no small surprise he was told to go to the
General in command, as orderly, and when he reported himself to the
adjutant, he told him to go to Frau von Kubinyi's, and to await her
orders.

Our poet only knew her by report, but he hated and despised the
beautiful woman, who had sold herself to the enemy of the country, most
intensely; he had no choice, however, but to obey.

When he arrived at her house, he seemed to be expected, for the porter
knew his name, took him into his lodge, and without any further
explanation, told him immediately to put on the livery of his mistress,
which was lying there ready for him. He ground his teeth, but resigned
himself without a word to his wretched, though laughable fate; it was
quite clear that the actress had some purpose in making the poet wear
her livery. He tried to remember whether he could formerly have offended
her by his notices as a theatrical critic, but before he could arrive at
any conclusion, he was told to go and show himself to Frau von Kubinyi.

She evidently wished to enjoy his humiliation.

He was shown into a small drawing-room, which was furnished with an
amount of taste and magnificence such as he had never seen before, and
was told to wait. But he had not been alone many minutes, before the
door-curtains were parted and Frau von Kubinyi came in, calm but deadly
pale, in a splendid dressing gown of some Turkish material, and he
recognized his former mistress.

"Irma!" he exclaimed.

The cry came from his heart, and it also affected the heart of the
woman, who was surfeited with pleasure, so greatly that the next moment
she was lying on the breast of the man whom she had believed to be dead,
but only for a moment, and then he freed himself from her.

"We are fated to meet again thus!" she began.

"Not through any fault of mine," he replied bitterly.

"And not through mine either," she said quickly; "everybody thought that
you were dead, and I wept for you; that is my justification."

"You are really too kind," he replied sarcastically. "How can you
condescend to make any excuses to me? I wear your livery, and you have
to order, and I have to obey; our relative positions are clear enough."

Frau von Kubinyi turned away to hide her tears.

"I did not intend to hurt your feelings," he continued: "but I must
confess that it would have been better for both of us, if we had not met
again. But what do you mean by making me wear your livery? It is not
enough that I have been robbed of my happiness? Does it afford you any
pleasure to humiliate me as well?"

"How can you think that?" the actress exclaimed. "Oh! Ever since I have
discovered your unhappy lot, I have thought of nothing but the means of
delivering you from it, and until I succeed in doing this, however, I
can at least make it more bearable for you."

"I understand," the unhappy poet said with a sneer. "And in order to do
this, you have begged your present worshiper, to turn your former lover
into a footman."

"What a thing to say to me!"

"Can you find any other plea?"

"You wish to punish me for having loved you, idolized you, I suppose?"
the painter continued. "So exactly like a woman! But I can perfectly
well understand that the situation promises to have a fresh charm for
you..."

Before he could finish what he was saying, the actress quickly left the
room; he could hear her sobbing, but he did not regret his words, and
his contempt and hatred for her only increased, when he saw the
extravagance and the princely luxury with which she was surrounded. But
what was the use of his indignation? He was wearing her livery, he was
obliged to wait upon her and to obey her, for she had the corporal's
cane at her command, and it really seemed as if he incurred the
vengeance of the offended woman; as if the General's insolent mistress
wished to make him feel her whole power; as if he were not to be spared
the deepest humiliation.

The General and two of Frau von Kubinyi's friends, who were servants of
the Muses like she was, for one was a ballet dancer, and the two others
were actresses, had come to tea, and he was to wait on them.

While it was getting ready, he heard them laughing in the next room, and
the blood flew to his head, and when the butler opened the door Frau von
Kubinyi appeared on the General's arm; she did not, however, look at her
new footman, her former lover, triumphantly or contemptuously, but she
gave him a glance of the deepest commiseration.

Could he after all have wronged her?

Hatred and love, contempt and jealousy were struggling in his breast,
and when he had to fill the glasses, the bottle shook in his hand.

"Is this the man?" the General said, looking at him closely.

Frau von Kubinyi nodded.

"He was evidently not born for a footman," the General added.

"And still less for a soldier," the actress observed.

These words fell heavily on the unfortunate poet's heart, but she was
evidently taking his part, and trying to rescue him from his terrible
position.

Suspicion, however, once more gained the day.

"She is tired of all pleasures, and satisfied with enjoyment," he said
to himself; "she requires excitement and it amuses her to see the man
whom she formerly loved, and who, as she knows, still loves her, tremble
before her. And when she pleases she can see me tremble; not for my
life, but for fear of the disgrace which she can inflict upon me at the
moment if it should give her any pleasure."

But suddenly the actress gave him a look which was so sad and so
imploring, that he looked down in confusion.

From that time he remained in her house without performing any duties,
and without receiving any orders from her; in fact he never saw her, and
did not venture to ask after her, and two months had passed in this way,
when the General unexpectedly sent for him. He waited, with many others,
in the ante-room, and when the General came back from parade, he saw him
and beckoned him to follow, and as soon as they were alone, he said:

"You are free, as you have been allowed to purchase your discharge."

"Good heavens!" the poet stammered, "how am I to ..."

"That is already done," the General replied. "You are free."

"How is it possible? How can I thank your Excellency!"

"You owe me no thanks," he replied; "Frau von Kubinyi bought you out."

The poor poet's heart seemed to stop; he could not speak, nor even
stammer a word; but with a low bow, he rushed out and tore wildly
through the streets, until he reached the mansion of the woman whom he
had so misunderstood, quite out of breath; he must see her again, and
throw himself at her feet.

"Where are you going to?" the porter asked him.

"To Frau von Kubinyi's."

"She is not here."

"Not here?"

"She has gone away."

"Gone away? Where to?"

"She started for Paris two hours ago."




DELILA


In a former reminiscence,[6] we made the acquaintance of a lady, who had
done the police many services in former years, and whom we called Wanda
von Chabert. It is no exaggeration, if we say that she was at the same
time the cleverest, the most charming and the most selfish woman whom
one could possibly meet. She was certainly not exactly what is called
beautiful, for neither her face nor her figure were symmetrical enough
for that, but if her head was not beautiful in the style of the antique,
neither like the _Venus_ of Milo nor Ludoirsi's _Juno_, it was, on the
other hand, in the highest sense delightful like the ladies whom Wateau
and Mignard painted. Everything in her little face, and in its frame of
soft brown hair was attractive and seductive, her low, Grecian forehead,
her bright, almond shaped eyes, her small nose, and her full, voluptuous
lips, her middling height and her small waist with its, perhaps, almost
too full bust, and above all her walk, that half indolent, half
coquettish swaying of her broad hips, were all maddeningly alluring.

[Footnote 6: An Exotic Prince.]

And this woman, who was born for love, was as eager for pleasure and as
amorous as few other women have even been, but for that very reason she
never ran any danger of allowing her victims to escape her from pity; on
the contrary, she soon grew tired of each of her favorites, and her
connection with the police was then extremely useful to her, in order to
get rid of an inconvenient, or jealous lover.

Before the war between Austria and Italy in 1859, Frau von Chabert was
in London, where she lived alone in a small, one-storied house with her
servants, and was in constant communication with emigrants from all
countries.

She herself was thought to be a Polish refugee, and the luxury by which
she was surrounded, and a fondness for sport, and above all for horses,
which was remarkable even in England, made people give her the title of
Countess. At that period Count T---- was one of the most prominent
members of the Hungarian propaganda, and Frau von Chabert was
commissioned to pay particular attention to all he said and did; but in
spite of all the trouble she took, she had not hitherto even succeeded
in making his acquaintance. He lived the life of a misanthrope, quite
apart from the great social stream of London, and he was not believed to
be either gallant, or ardent in love. Fellow-countrymen of his, who had
known him formerly, during the Magyar revolution, described him as very
cautious, cold and silent, so that if any man possessed a charm against
the toils, which she set for him, it was he.

Just then it happened that as Wanda was riding in Hyde Park quite early
one morning before there were many people about, her thoroughbred
English mare took fright, and threatened to throw the plucky rider, who
did not for a moment lose her presence of mind, from the saddle. Before
her groom had time to come to her assistance, a man in a Hungarian
braided coat rushed from the path, and caught hold of the animal's
reins. When the mare had grown quite quiet, he was about to go away with
a slight bow, but Frau von Chabert detained him, so that she might thank
him, and so had leisure to examine him more closely. He was neither
young nor handsome, but was well-made, like all Hungarians are, and had
an interesting and very expressive face. He had a sallow complexion,
which was set off by a short, black full beard, and he looked as if he
were suffering, while he fixed two, great, black fanatical eyes on the
beautiful young woman, who was smiling at him so amiably, and it was the
strange look in those large eyes which aroused in the soul of the woman
who was so excitable, that violent, but passing feeling which she called
_love_. She turned her horse and accompanied the stranger on his side,
and he seemed to be even more charmed by her chatter than by her
appearance, for his grave face grew more and more animated, and at last
he himself became quite friendly and talkative. When he took leave of
her, Wanda gave him her card, on the back of which her address was
written, and he immediately gave her his in return.

She thanked him and rode off, looking at his name as she did so; it was
Count T----.

She felt inclined to give a shout of pleasure when she found that the
noble quarry, which she had been hunting so long, had at last come into
her preserves, but she did not even turn her head round to look at him,
such was the command which that woman had over herself and her
movements.

Count T---- called upon her the very next day, soon he came every day,
and in less than a month after that innocent adventure in Hyde Park, he
was at her feet; for when Frau von Chabert made up her mind to be loved,
nobody was able to withstand her. She became the Count's confidante
almost as speedily as she had become his mistress, and every day, and
almost every hour, she, with the most delicate coquetry, laid fresh
fetters on the Hungarian Samson. Did she love him?

Certainly she did, after her own fashion, and at first she had not the
remotest idea of betraying him; she even succeeded in completely
concealing her connection with him, not only in London but also in
Vienna.

Then the war of 1859 broke out, and like most Hungarian and Polish
refugees, Count T---- hurried off to Italy, in order to place himself at
the disposal of that great and patriotic Piedmontese statesman, Cavour.

Wanda went with him, and took the greatest interest in his revolutionary
intrigues in Turin; for some time she seemed to be his right hand, and
it looked as if she had become unfaithful to her present patrons.
Through his means, she soon became on intimate terms with Piedmontese
government circles, and that was his destruction.

A young Italian diplomatist, who frequently negotiated with Count T----,
or in his absence, with Wanda, fell madly in love with the charming
Polish woman, and she, who was never cruel, more especially when she
herself had caught fire, allowed herself to be conquered by the
handsome, intellectual, daring man. In measure as her passion for the
Italian increased, so her feelings for Count T---- declined, and at last
she felt that her connection with him was nothing but a hindrance and a
burden, and as soon as Wanda had reached that point, her adorer was as
good as lost.

Count T---- was not a man whom she could just coolly dismiss, or with
whom she might venture to trifle, and that she knew perfectly well; so
in order to avoid a catastrophe, the consequences of which might be
incalculable for her, she did not let him notice the change in her
feelings towards him at first, and kept the Italian, who belonged to
her, at a proper distance.

When peace had been concluded, and the great, peaceful revolution, which
found its provisional settlement in the Constitution of February and in
the Hungarian agreement, began in Austria, the Hungarian refugees
determined to send Count T---- to Hungary, that he might assume the
direction of affairs there. But as he was still an outlaw, and as the
death sentence of Arab hung over his head like the sword of Damocles, he
consulted with Wanda about the ways and means of reaching his fatherland
unharmed and of remaining there undiscovered. Although that clever woman
thought of a plan immediately, yet she told Count T---- that she would
think the matter over, and she did not bring forward her proposition for
a few days, which was then, however, received by the Count and his
friends with the highest approval, and was immediately carried into
execution. Frau von Chabert went to Vienna as Marchioness Spinola, and
T---- accompanied her as her footman; he had cut his hair short, and
shaved off his beard; so that in his livery, he was quite
unrecognizable. They passed the frontier in safety, and reached Vienna
without any interference from the authorities; and there they first of
all went to a small hotel, but soon took a small, handsome flat in the
center of the town. Count T---- immediately hunted up some members of his
party, who had been in constant communication with the emigrants, since
Vilagos, and the conspiracy was soon in excellent train, while Wanda
whiled away her time with a hussar officer, without, however, losing
sight of her lover and of his dangerous activity, for a moment, on that
account.

And at last, when the fruit was ripe for falling into her lap, she was
sitting in the private room of the Minister of Police, opposite to the
man with whom she was going to make the evil compact.

"The emigrants must be very uneasy and disheartened at an agreement
with, and reconciliation to, Hungary," he began.

"Do not deceive yourself," Frau von Chabert replied; "nothing is more
dangerous in politics than optimism, and the influence of the
revolutionary propaganda was never greater than it is at present. Do not
hope to conciliate the Magyars by half concessions, and, above all
things, do not underestimate the movement, which is being organized
openly, in broad daylight."

"You are afraid of a revolution?"

"I know that they are preparing for one, and that they expect everything
from that alone."

The skeptical man smiled.

"Give me something besides views and opinions, and then I will
believe..."

"I will give you the proof," Wanda said, "but before I do you the
greatest service that lies in my power, I must be sure that I shall be
rewarded for all my skill and trouble."

"Can you doubt it?"

"I will be open with you," Wanda continued.

"During the insurrectionary war in Transylvania, Urban had excellent
spies, but they have not been paid to this day. I want money...."

"How much?"

With inimitable ease, the beautiful woman mentioned a very considerable
sum. The skeptical man got up to give a few orders, and a short time
afterwards the money was in Wanda's hands.

"Well?"

"The emigrants have sent one of their most influential and talented
members to organize the revolution in Hungary."

"Have they sent him already?"

"More than that, for Count T---- is in Vienna at this moment."

"Do you know where he is hiding?"

"Yes."

"And you are sure that you are not mistaken?"

"I am most assuredly not mistaken," she replied with a frivolous laugh;
"Count T----, who was my admirer in London and Turin, is here in my
house, as my footman."

An hour later, the Count was arrested. But Wanda only wished to get rid
of her tiresome adorer, and not to destroy him. She had been on the most
intimate terms with him long enough, and had taken part in his political
plans and intrigues, to be able to give the most reliable information
about him personally, as well as about his intentions, and that
information was such that, in spite of the past, and of the Count's
revolutionary standpoint, they thought they had discovered in him the
man who was capable of bringing about a real reconciliation between the
monarch and his people. In consequence of this, T----, who thought that
he had incurred the gallows, stood in the Emperor's presence, and the
manner in which the latter expressed his generous intentions with regard
to Hungary, carried the old rebel away, and he gave him his word of
honor that he would bring the nation back to him, reconciled. And he
kept his word, although, perhaps, not exactly in the sense in which he
gave it.

He was allowed full liberty in going to Hungary, and Wanda accompanied
him. He had no suspicion that even in his mistress's arms he was under
police supervision, and from the moment when he made his appearance in
his native land officially, as the intermediary between the crown and
the people, she had a fresh interest in binding a man of such
importance, whom everybody regarded as Hungary's future
Minister-President, to herself.

He began to negotiate, and at first everything went well, but soon the
yielding temper of the government gave rise continually to fresh
demands, and before long, what one side offered and the other side
demanded, was so far apart, that no immediate agreement could be thought
of. The Count's position grew more painful every day; he had pledged
himself too deeply to both sides, and in vain he sought for a way out of
the difficulty.

Then one day the Minister of Police unexpectedly received a letter from
Wanda, in which she told him that T----, urged on by his
fellow-countrymen, and branded as a traitor by the emigrants, was on the
point of heading a fresh conspiracy.

Thereupon, the government energetically reminded that thoroughly honest
and noble man of his word of honor, and T----, who saw that he was
unable to keep it, ended his life by a pistol bullet.

Frau von Chabert left Hungary immediately after the sad catastrophe, and
went to Turin, where new lovers, new splendors and new laurels awaited
her.

We may, perhaps, hear more of her.




A MESALLIANCE


It is a generally acknowledged truth, that the prerogatives of the
nobility are only maintained at the present time through the weakness of
the middle classes, and many of these who have established themselves
and their families by their intellect, industry and struggles, get into
a state of bliss, which reminds those who see it, of intoxication, as
soon as they are permitted to enter aristocratic circles, or can be seen
in public with barons and counts; and above all, when these treat them
in a friendly manner, no matter from what motive, or when they see a
prospect of a daughter of theirs driving in a carriage with armorial
bearings on the panels, as a countess.

Many women and girls of the citizen class would not hesitate for a
moment to refuse an honorable, good-looking man of their own class, in
order to go to the altar with the oldest, ugliest and stupidest dotard
among the aristocracy.

I shall never forget saying in a joke to a young, well-educated girl of
a wealthy, middle-class family, who had the figure and bearing of a
queen, shortly before her marriage, not to forget an ermine cloak in her
trousseau.

"I know it would suit me capitally," she replied in all seriousness,
"and I should certainly have worn one, if I had married Baron R----,
which I was nearly doing, as you know, but it is not suitable for the
wife of a government official."

When a girl of the middle classes wanders from the paths of virtue, her
fall may, as a rule, be rightly ascribed to her hankering after the
nobility.

In a small German town there lived, some years ago, a tailor, whom we
will call Löwenfuss, a man who, like all knights of the shears, was
equally full of aspirations after culture and liberty. After working for
one master for some time as a poor journeyman, he married his daughter,
and after his father-in-law's death, he succeeded to his business, and
as he was industrious, lucky and managed it well, he soon grew very well
off, and was in a position to give his daughters an education, for which
many a nobleman's daughters might have envied them; for they learned,
not only French and music, but had also acquired many more solid
branches of knowledge, and as they were both pretty and charming girls,
they soon became very much thought of and sought after.

Fanny, the eldest, especially, was her father's pride and the favorite
of society; she was of middle height, slim, with a thoroughly maidenly
figure, and with almost an Italian face, in which two large, dark eyes
seemed to ask for love and submission at the same time; and yet the girl
with the plentiful, black hair was not in the least intended to command,
for she was one of those romantic women who will give themselves, or
even throw themselves, away, but who can never be subjugated. A young
physician fell in love with her, and wished to marry her; Fanny returned
his love, and her parents gladly accepted him as a son-in-law, but she
made it a condition that he should visit her freely and frequently for
two years, before she would consent to become his wife, and she declared
that she would not go to the altar with him, until she was convinced
that not only their hearts, but also that their characters harmonized.
He agreed to her wish, and became a regular visitor at the house of the
educated tailor; they were happy hours for the lovers; they played, sang
and read together, and he told the girl some things from his medical
experiences, which excited and moved her.

Just then, one day an officer went to the tailor's house, to order some
civilian's clothes. This was not an unusual event in itself, but it was
soon to be the cause of one; for accidentally the daughter of _the
artist in clothes_ came into the shop, just as the officer was leaving
it, and on seeing her, he let go of the door-handle, and asked the
tailor who the young lady was.

"My daughter," the tailor said, proudly.

"May I beg you to introduce me to the young lady, Herr Löwenfuss?" the
hussar said.

"I feel flattered at the honor you are doing me," the tailor replied,
with evident pleasure.

"Fanny, the Captain wishes to make your acquaintance; this is my
daughter, Fanny, Captain ..."

"Captain Count Kasimir W----," the hussar interrupted him, as he went up
to the pretty girl, and paid her a compliment or two. They were very
commonplace, stale, everyday phrases, but in spite of this, they
flattered the girl, intelligent as she was, extremely, because it was a
cavalry officer and a Count to boot who addressed them to her. And when,
at last, the Captain, in the most friendly manner, asked the tailor's
permission to be allowed to visit at the house, both father and daughter
granted it to him most readily.

The very next day Count W---- paid his visit, in full dress uniform, and
when Mamma Löwenfuss made some observations about it, how handsome it
was, and how well it became him, he told them that he should not wear it
much longer, as he intended to quit the service soon, and to look for a
wife, in whom birth and wealth were matters of secondary consideration,
while a good education and a knowledge of domestic matters were of
paramount importance; adding that as soon as he had found one, he meant
to retire to his estates.

From that moment, Papa and Mamma Löwenfuss looked upon the Count as
their daughter's suitor; it is certain that he was madly in love with
Fanny; he used to go to their house every evening, and made himself so
liked by all of them, that the young doctor soon felt himself to be
superfluous, and so his visits became rarer and rarer. The Count
confessed his love to Fanny on a moonlight night, while they were
sitting in an arbor covered with honeysuckle, which formed nearly the
whole of Herr Löwenfuss' garden; he swore that he loved, that he adored
her, and when at last she lay trembling in his arms he tried to take her
by storm, but that bold cavalry-exploit did not succeed, and the
good-looking hussar found out, for the first time in his life, that a
woman can at the same time be romantic, passionately in love, and yet
virtuous.

The next morning, the tailor called on the Count, and begged him very
humbly to state what his intentions with regard to Fanny were. The
enamored hussar declared that he was determined to make the tailor's
little daughter, Countess W----. Herr Löwenfuss was so much overcome by
his feelings, that he showed great inclination to embrace his future
son-in-law, The Count, however, laid down certain conditions. The whole
matter must be kept a profound secret, for he had every prospect of
inheriting half a million of florins, on the death of an aunt, who was
already eighty years old, which he should risk by a mesalliance.

When they heard this, the girl's parents certainly hesitated for a time,
to give their consent to the marriage, but the handsome hussar, whose
ardent passion carried Fanny away, at last gained the victory. The
doctor received a pretty little note from the tailor's daughter, in
which she told him that she gave him back his promise, as she had not
found her ideal in him. Fanny then signed a deed, by which she formerly
renounced all claims to her father's property, in favor of her sister,
and left her home and her father's house with the Count under cover of
the night, in order to accompany him to Poland, where the marriage was
to take place in his castle.

Of course malicious tongues declared that the hussar had abducted Fanny,
but her parents smiled at such reports, for they knew better, and the
moment when their daughter would return as Countess W---- would amply
recompense them for everything.

Meanwhile, the Polish Count and the romantic German girl were being
carried by the train through the dreary plains of Masovia.[7] They
stopped in a large town to make some purchases, and the Count, who was
very wealthy and liberal, provided his future wife with everything that
befits a Countess, and which a girl could fancy, and then they continued
their journey. The country grew more picturesque, but more melancholy,
as they went further East; the somber Carpathians rose from the
snow-covered plains and villages, surrounded by white glistening walls,
and stunted willows stood by the side of the roads, ravens sailed
through the white sky, and here and there a small peasant's sledge shot
by, drawn by two thin horses.

[Footnote 7: A division of Poland, of which Warsaw is the
Capital.--TRANSLATOR.]

At last they reached the station, where the Count's steward was waiting
for them with a carriage and four, which brought them to their
destination almost as swiftly as the iron steed.

The numerous servants were drawn up in the yard of the ancient castle to
receive their master and mistress, and they gave loud cheers for her,
for which she thanked them smilingly. When she went into the dim, arched
passages, and the large rooms, for a moment she felt a strange feeling
of fear, but she quickly checked it, for was not her most ardent wish to
be fulfilled in a couple of hours?

She put on her bridal attire, in which a half comical, half
sinister-looking old woman with a toothless mouth and a nose like an
owl's, assisted her, and just as she was fixing the myrtle wreath onto
her dark curls, the bell began to ring, which summoned her to her
wedding. The Count himself, in full uniform, led her to the chapel of
the castle, where the priest, with the steward and the castellan as
witnesses, and the footmen in grand liveries, were awaiting the handsome
young couple.

After the wedding, the marriage certificate was signed in the vestry,
and a groom was sent to the station, where he dispatched a telegram to
her parents, to the effect that the hussar had kept his word, and that
Fanny Löwenfuss had become Countess Faniska W----.

Then the newly-married couple sat down to a beautiful little dinner in
company of the chaplain, the steward and the castellan; the champagne
made them all very cheerful, and at last the Count knelt down before his
young and beautiful wife, boldly took her white satin slipper off her
foot, filled it with wine, and emptied it to her health.

At length night came, a thorough, Polish wedding night, and Faniska had
just finished dressing and was looking at herself with proud
satisfaction in the great mirror that was fastened into the wall, from
top to bottom. A white satin train flowed down behind her like rays from
the moon, a half-open jacket of bright green velvet, trimmed with
valuable ermine, covered her voluptuous, virgin bust and her classic
arms, only to show them all the more seductively at the slightest
motion, while the wealth of her dark hair, in which diamonds hung here
and there like glittering dew-drops, fell down her neck and mingled with
the white fur. The Count came in a red velvet dressing gown trimmed with
sable; at a sign from him, the old woman who was waiting on his wife's
divinity left the room, and the next moment he was lying like a slave at
the feet of his lovely young wife, who raised him up, and was pressing
him to her heaving bosom, when a noise which she had never heard before,
a wild howling, startled the loving woman in the midst of her highest
bliss.

"What was that?" she asked, trembling.

The Count went to the window without speaking, and she followed him,
with her arms round him, and looked half timidly, half curiously out
into the darkness, where large bright spots were moving about in pairs,
in the park at her feet.

"Are they will-o'-the-wisps?" she whispered.

"No, my child, they are wolves," the Count replied, fetching his
double-barreled gun, which he loaded, and went out on the snow-covered
balcony, while she drew the fur more closely over her bosom, and
followed him.

"Will you shoot?" the Count asked her in a whisper, and when she nodded,
he said: "Aim straight at the first pair of bright spots that you see;
they are the eyes of those amiable brutes."

Then he handed her the gun and pointed it for her.

"That is the way--are you pointing straight?"

"Yes."

"Then fire."

A flash, a report, which the echo from the hills repeats four times, and
two of the unpleasant-looking lights had vanished.

Then the Count fired, and by that time their people were all awake; they
drove away the wolves with torches and shouts, and laid the two large
animals, the spoils of a Polish wedding night, at the feet of their
young mistress.

And the days that followed resembled that night. The Count showed
himself the most attentive husband, as his wife's knight and slave, and
she felt quite at home in that dull castle; she rode, drove, smoked,
read French novels and beat her servants as well as any Polish Countess
could have done. In the course of a few years, she presented the Count
with two children, and although he appeared very happy at that, yet,
like most husbands, he grew continually cooler, more indolent, and
neglectful of her. From time to time he left the castle, to see after
his affairs in the capital, and the intervals between those journeys
became continually shorter. Faniska felt that her husband was tired of
her, and much as it grieved her, she did not let him notice it; she was
always the same.

But at last the Count remained away altogether; at first he used to
write, but at last the poor, weeping woman did not even receive letters
to comfort her in her unhappy solitude, and his lawyer sent the money
that she and her children required.

She conjectured, hoped and doubted, suffered and wept for more than a
year; then she suddenly went to the capital and appeared unexpectedly in
his apartments. Painful explanations followed, until at last the Count
told her that he no longer loved her, and could not live with her for
the future, and when she wished to make him do so by legal means, and
entrusted her case to a celebrated lawyer, _the Count denied that she
was his wife_. She produced her marriage certificate, when the most
infamous fraud came to light. A confidential servant of the Count had
acted the part of the priest, and the tailor's beautiful daughter had,
as a matter of fact, merely been the Count's mistress, and her children
were bastards.

The virtuous woman then saw, when it was too late, that it was _she_ who
had formed a mesalliance. Her parents would have nothing to do with her,
and at last it turned out in the bargain that the Count was married long
before he knew her, but that he did not live with his wife.

Then Fanny applied to the police magistrates; she wanted to appeal to
justice, but she was dissuaded from taking criminal proceedings; for
although they would certainly lead to the punishment of her daring
seducer, they would also bring about her own total ruin.

At last, however, her lawyer effected a settlement between them, which
was favorable to Fanny, and which she accepted for the sake of her
children. The Count paid her a considerable sum down, and gave her the
gloomy castle to live in. Thither she returned with a broken heart, and
from that time she lived alone, a sullen misanthrope, a fierce despot.

From time to time, a stranger wandering through the Carpathians, meets a
pale woman of demonic beauty, wearing a magnificent sable skin jacket
and with a gun over her shoulder, in the forest, or in the winter in a
sledge, driving her foaming horses until they nearly drop from fatigue,
while the sleigh bells utter a melancholy sound, and at last die away in
the distance, like the weeping of a solitary, deserted human heart.




BERTHA


My old friend (one has friends occasionally who are much older than
oneself), my old friend Doctor Bonnet, had often invited me to spend
some time with him at Riom, and as I did not know Auvergne, I made up my
mind to go in the summer of 1876.

I got there by the morning train, and the first person I saw on the
platform was the doctor. He was dressed in a gray suit, and wore a soft,
black, wide-brimmed, high-crowned felt hat, which was narrow at the top
like a chimney pot, a hat which hardly any one except an Auvergnat would
wear, and which smacked of the charcoal burner. Dressed like that, the
doctor had the appearance of an old young man, with his spare body under
his thin coat, and his large head covered with white hair.

He embraced me with that evident pleasure which country people feel when
they meet long-expected friends, and stretching out his arm, he said
proudly:

"This is Auvergne!" I saw nothing except a range of mountains before me,
whose summits, which resembled truncated cones, must have been extinct
volcanoes.

Then, pointing to the name of the station, he said:

"_Riom_, the fatherland of magistrates, the pride of the magistracy, and
which ought rather to be the fatherland of doctors."

"Why?" I asked.

"Why?" he replied with a laugh. "If you transpose the letters, you have
the Latin word _mori_, to die.... That is the reason why I settled here,
my young friend."

And delighted at his own joke, he carried me off, rubbing his hands.

As soon as I had swallowed a cup of coffee, he made me go and see the
town. I admired the chemist's house, and the other celebrated houses,
which were all black, but as pretty as knick-nacks, with façades of
sculptured stone. I admired the statue of the Virgin, the patroness of
butchers, and he told me an amusing story about this, which I will
relate some other time, and then Doctor Bonnet said to me:

"I must beg you to excuse me for a few minutes while I go and see a
patient, and then I will take you to Chatel-Guyon, so as to show you the
general aspect of the town, and all the mountain chain of the
Puy-de-Dôme, before lunch. You can wait for me outside; I shall only go
upstairs and come down immediately."

He left me outside one of those old, gloomy, silent, melancholy houses,
which one sees in the provinces, and this one appeared to look
particularly sinister, and I soon discovered the reason. All the large
windows on the first floor were half boarded up with wooden shutters.
The upper part of them alone could be opened, as if one had wished to
prevent the people who were locked up in that huge stone trunk from
looking into the street.

When the doctor came down again, I told him how it had struck me, and he
replied:

"You are quite right; the poor creature who is living there must never
see what is going on outside. She is a mad woman, or rather an idiot,
what you Normans would call a _Niente_[8]. It is a miserable story, but
a very singular pathological case at the same time. Shall I tell you?"

[Footnote 8: A _Nothing_.--TRANSLATOR.]

I begged him to do so, and he continued:

"Twenty years ago, the owners of this house, who were my patients, had a
daughter who was like all other girls, but I soon discovered that while
her body became admirably developed, her intellect remained stationary.

"She began to walk very early, but she could not talk. At first I
thought she was deaf, but I soon discovered that although she heard
perfectly, she did not understand anything that was said to her. Violent
noises made her start and frightened her, without her understanding how
they were caused.

"She grew up into a superb woman, but she was dumb, from an absolute
want of intellect. I tried all means to introduce a gleam of sense into
her head, but nothing succeeded. I thought that I noticed that she knew
her nurse, though as soon as she was weaned, she failed to recognize her
mother. She could never pronounce that word, which is the first that
children utter, and the last which soldiers murmur when they are dying
on the field of battle. She sometimes tried to talk, but she produced
nothing but incoherent sounds.

"When the weather was fine, she laughed continually, and emitted some
low cries which might be compared to the twittering of birds; when it
rained she cried and moaned in a mournful, terrifying manner, which
sounded like the howling of a dog when a death occurs in a house.

"She was fond of rolling on the grass, like young animals do, and of
running about madly, and she used to clap her hands every morning, when
the sun shone into her room, and would jump out of bed and insist by
signs, on being dressed as quickly as possible, so that she might get
out.

"She did not appear to distinguish between people, between her mother
and her nurse, or between her father and me, or between the coachman and
the cook. I liked her parents, who were very unhappy on her account,
very much, and went to see them nearly every day. I dined with them
tolerably frequently, which enabled me to remark that Bertha (they had
called her Bertha), seemed to recognize the various dishes, and to
prefer some to others. At that time she was twelve years old, but as
fully formed in figure as a girl of eighteen, and taller than I was.
Then, the idea struck me of developing her greediness, and by these
means to try and produce some slight powers of distinguishing into her
mind, and to force her, by the diversity of flavors, if not to reason,
at any rate to arrive at instinctive distinctions, which would of
themselves constitute a species of work that was material to thought.
Later on, by appealing to her passions, and by carefully making use of
those which could serve us, we might hope to obtain a kind of reaction
on her intellect, and by degrees increase the insensible action of her
brain.

"One day I put two plates before her, one of soup, and the other of very
sweet vanilla cream. I made her taste each of them successively, and
then I let her choose for herself, and she ate the plate of cream. In a
short time I made her very greedy, so greedy that it appeared as if the
only idea she had in her head was the desire for eating. She perfectly
recognized the various dishes, and stretched out her hands towards those
that she liked, and took hold of them eagerly, and she used to cry when
they were taken from her. Then I thought I would try and teach her to
come to the dining room when the dinner bell rang. It took a long time,
but I succeeded in the end. In her vacant intellect, there was a fixed
correlation between the sound and her taste, a correspondence between
two senses, an appeal from one to the other, and consequently a sort of
connection of ideas--if one can call that kind of instinctive hyphen
between two organic functions an idea--and so I carried my experiments
further, and taught her, with much difficulty, to recognize meal times
on the face of the clock.

"It was impossible for me for a long time to attract her attention to
the hands, but I succeeded in making her remark the clockwork and the
striking apparatus. The means I employed were very simple; I asked them
not to have the bell rung for lunch, and everybody got up and went into
the dining room, when the little brass hammer struck twelve o'clock, but
I found great difficulty in making her learn to count the strokes. She
ran to the door each time she heard the clock strike, but by degrees she
learned that all the strokes had not the same value as far as regarded
meals, and she frequently fixed her eyes, guided by her ears, on the
dial of the clock.

"When I noticed that, I took care, every day at twelve and at six
o'clock to place my fingers on the figures twelve and six, as soon as
the moment she was waiting for, had arrived, and I soon noticed that she
attentively followed the motion of the small brass hands, which I had
often turned in her presence.

"She had understood! Perhaps I ought rather to say that she had seized
the idea. I had succeeded in getting the knowledge, or rather the
sensation of the time into her, just as is the case with carp, who
certainly have no clocks, when they are fed every day exactly at the
same time.

"When once I had obtained that result, all the clocks and watches in the
house occupied her attention almost exclusively. She spent her time in
looking at them, in listening to them and in waiting for meal times, and
once something very funny happened. The striking apparatus of a pretty
little Louis XVI. clock that hung at the head of her bed, having got out
of order, she noticed it. She sat for twenty minutes, with her eyes on
the hands, waiting for it to strike ten, but when the hand passed the
figure, she was astonished at not hearing anything; so stupefied was
she, indeed, that she sat down, no doubt overwhelmed by a feeling of
violent emotion, such as attacks us in the face of some terrible
catastrophe. And she had the wonderful patience to wait until eleven
o'clock, in order to see what would happen, and as she naturally heard
nothing, she was suddenly either seized with a wild fit of rage at
having been deceived, and imposed upon by appearances, or else overcome
by that fear which some frightened creature feels at some terrible
mystery, and by the furious impatience of a passionate individual who
meets with some obstacle, she took up the tongs from the fireplace and
struck the clock so violently that she broke it to pieces in a moment.

"It was evident, therefore, that her brain did act and calculate,
obscurely it is true, and within very restricted limits, for I could
never succeed in making her distinguish persons as she distinguished the
time; and to stir her intellect, it was necessary to appeal to her
passions, in the material sense of the word, and we soon had another,
and alas! a very terrible proof of this!"

       *       *       *       *       *

"She had grown up into a splendid girl; a perfect type of a race, a sort
of lovely and stupid Venus. She was sixteen, and I have rarely seen such
perfection of form, such suppleness and such regular features. I said
she was a Venus; yes, a fair, stout, vigorous Venus, with large, bright,
vacant eyes, which were as blue as the flowers of the flax plant; she
had a large mouth with full lips, the mouth of a glutton, of a
sensualist, a mouth made for kisses. Well, one morning her father came
into my consulting room, with a strange look on his face, and, sitting
down, without even replying to my greeting, he said:

"'I want to speak to you about a very serious matter.... Would it be
possible ... would it be possible for Bertha to marry?'

"'Bertha to marry!... Why, it is quite impossible!'

"'Yes, I know, I know,' he replied.... 'But reflect, Doctor ... don't
you think ... perhaps ... we hoped ... if she had children ... it would
be a great shock to her, but a great happiness, and ... who knows
whether maternity might not rouse her intellect...?'

"I was in a state of great perplexity. He was right, and it was possible
that such a new situation, and that wonderful instinct of maternity
which beats in the hearts of the lower animals, as it does in the heart
of a woman, which makes the hen fly at a dog's jaws to defend her
chickens, might bring about a revolution, an utter change in her vacant
mind, and set the motionless mechanism of her thoughts into movement.
And then, moreover, I immediately remembered a personal instance. Some
years previously I had possessed a spaniel bitch who was so stupid that
I could do nothing with her, but when she had had pups she became, if
not exactly intelligent, yet almost like many other dogs who have not
been thoroughly broken.

"As soon as I foresaw the possibility of this, the wish to get Bertha
married grew in me, not so much out of friendship for her and her poor
parents, as from scientific curiosity. What would happen? It was a
singular problem, and I said to her father:

"'Perhaps you are right ... You might make the attempt ... but ... but
you will never find a man to consent to marry her.'

"'I have found somebody,' he said in a low voice.

"I was dumbfounded, and said: 'Somebody really suitable? ... Some one of
your own rank and position in society?'

"'Decidedly,' he replied.

"'Oh! And may I ask his name?'

"'I came on purpose to tell you, and to consult you. It is Monsieur
Gaston du Boys de Lucelles.'

"I felt inclined to exclaim: 'What a wretch,' but I held my tongue, and
after a few moments' silence, I said:

"'Oh! Very good. I see nothing against it.'

"The poor man shook me heartily by the hand.

"'She is to be married next month,' he said."

       *       *       *       *       *

"Monsieur Gaston du Boys de Lucelles was a scape-grace of good family,
who, after having spent all that he had inherited from his father, and
having incurred debts by all kinds of doubtful means, had been trying to
discover some other way of obtaining money, and he had discovered this
method. He was a good-looking young fellow, and in capital health, but
fast; one of those odious race of provincial fast men, and he appeared
to me to be a sufficient sort of a husband, who could be got rid of
later, by making him an allowance. He came to the house to pay his
addresses, and to strut about before the idiot girl, who, however,
seemed to please him. He brought her flowers, kissed her hands, sat at
her feet and looked at her with affectionate eyes; but she took no
notice of any of his attentions, and did not make any distinction
between him and the other persons who were about her.

"However, the marriage took place, and you may guess how excited my
curiosity was. I went to see Bertha the next day, to try and discover
from her looks whether any feelings had been roused in her, but I found
her just the same as she was every day, wholly taken up with the clock
and dinner, while he, on the contrary, appeared really in love, and
tried to rouse his wife's spirits and affections by little endearments,
and such caresses as one bestows on a kitten. He could think of nothing
better.

"I called upon the married couple pretty frequently, and I soon
perceived that the young woman knew her husband, and gave him those
eager looks which she had hitherto bestowed only on sweet dishes.

"She followed his movements, knew his step on the stairs or in the
neighboring rooms, clapped her hands when he came in, and her face was
changed, and brightened by the flames of profound happiness, and of
desire.

"She loved him with her whole body, and with all her soul, to the very
depths of her poor, weak soul, and with all her heart, that poor heart
of some grateful animal. It was really a delightful and innocent picture
of simple passion, of carnal and yet modest passion, such as nature had
implanted into mankind, before man had complicated and disfigured it, by
all the various shades of sentiment. But he soon grew tired of this
ardent, beautiful, dumb creature, and did not spend more than an hour a
day with her, thinking it sufficient to devote his rights to her, and
she began to suffer in consequence. She used to wait for him from
morning till night, with her eyes on the clock; she did not even look
after the meals now, for he took all his away from home, _Clermont,
Chatel-Guyon, Royat_, no matter where, as long as he was not obliged
to come home.

"She began to grow thin; every other thought, every other wish, every
other expectation and every other confused hope, disappeared from her
mind, and the hours during which she did not see him, became hours of
terrible suffering to her. Soon he used frequently not to come home at
night; he spent them with women at the casino at _Royat_, and did not
come home until daybreak. But she never went to bed before he returned.
She remained sitting motionless in an easy chair, with her eyes fixed on
the clock, which turned so slowly and regularly round the china face, on
which the hours were painted.

"She heard the trot of his horse in the distance, and sat up with a
start, and when he came into the room, she got up with the movements of
a phantom, and pointed to the clock, as if to say to him: 'Look how late
it is!'

"And he began to be afraid of this amorous and jealous, half-witted
woman, and flew into a rage, like brutes do; and one night, he even went
so far as to strike her, so they sent for me. When I arrived she was
writhing and screaming, in a terrible crisis of pain, anger, passion,
how do I know what? Can one tell what goes on in such undeveloped
brains?

"I calmed her by subcutaneous injections of morphine, and forbade her to
see that man again, for I saw clearly that marriage would infallibly
kill her, by degrees."

       *       *       *       *       *

"Then she went mad! Yes, my dear friend, that idiot has gone mad. She is
always thinking of him and waiting for him; she waits for him all day
and night, awake or asleep, at this very moment, ceaselessly. When I saw
her getting thinner and thinner, and as she persisted in never taking
her eyes off the clocks, I had them removed from the house. I thus made
it impossible for her to count the hours, and to try to remember, from
her indistinct reminiscences, at what time he used to come home,
formerly. I hope to destroy the recollection of it in time, and to
extinguish that ray of thought which I kindled with so much difficulty.

"The other day, I tried an experiment. I offered her my watch; she took
it and looked at it for some time; then she began to scream terribly, as
if the sight of that little object had suddenly aroused her
recollection, which was beginning to grow indistinct. She is pitiably
thin now, with hollow cheeks and brilliant eyes, and she walks up and
down ceaselessly, like a wild beast does in its cage; I have had bars
put to the windows, and have had the seats fixed to the floor, so as to
prevent her from looking to see whether he is coming.

"Oh! her poor parents! What a life they must lead!"

We had got to the top of the hill, and the doctor turned round and said
to me:

"Look at Riom from here."

The gloomy town looked like some ancient city. Behind it, a green,
wooded plain studded with towns and villages, and bathed in a soft blue
haze, extended, until it was lost in the distance. Far away, on my
right, there was a range of lofty mountains with round summits, or else
cut off flat, as if with a sword, and the doctor began to enumerate the
villages, towns and hills, and to give me the history of all of them.
But I did not listen to him; I was thinking of nothing but the mad
woman, and I only saw her. She seemed to be hovering over that vast
extent of country like a mournful ghost, and I asked him abruptly:

"What has become of the husband?"

My friend seemed rather surprised, but after a few moments' hesitation,
he replied:

"He is living at Royat, on an allowance that they make, and is quite
happy; he leads a very fast life."

As we were slowly going back, both of us silent and rather low-spirited,
an English dog cart, drawn by a thoroughbred horse, came up behind us,
and passed us rapidly. The doctor took me by the arm.

"There he is," he said.

I saw nothing except a gray felt hat, cocked over one ear, above a pair
of broad shoulders, driving off in a cloud of dust.




ABANDONED


"I really think you must be mad, my dear, to go for a country walk in
such weather as this. You have had some very strange ideas for the last
two months. You take me to the sea side in spite of myself, when you
have never once had such a whim during all the forty-four years that we
have been married. You chose Fécamp, which is a very dull town, without
consulting me in the matter, and now you are seized with such a rage for
walking, you who hardly ever stir out on foot, that you want to go into
the country on the hottest day in the year. Ask d'Apreval to go with
you, as he is ready to gratify all your fancies. As for me, I am going
back to have a nap."

Madame de Cadour turned to her old friend and said:

"Will you come with me, Monsieur d'Apreval?"

He bowed with a smile, and with all the gallantry of by-gone years:

"I will go wherever you go," he replied.

"Very well, then, go and get a sunstroke," Monsieur de Cadour said; and
he went back to the _Hôtel des Bains_, to lie down on his bed for an
hour or two.

As soon as they were alone, the old lady and her old companion set off,
and she said to him in a low voice, squeezing his hand:

"At last! at last!"

"You are mad," he said in a whisper. "I assure you that you are mad.
Think of the risk you are running. If that man ..."

She started.

"Oh! Henri, do not say _that man_, when you are speaking of him."

"Very well," he said abruptly, "if our son guesses anything, if he has
any suspicions, he will have you, he will have us both in his power. You
have got on without seeing him for the last forty years; what is the
matter with you to-day?"

They had been going up the long street that leads from the sea to the
town, and now they turned to the right, to go to Etretat. The white road
extended in front of them, under a blaze of brilliant sunshine, so they
went on slowly in the burning heat. She had taken her old friend's arm,
and was looking straight in front of her, with a fixed and haunted gaze,
and at last she said:

"And so you have not seen him again, either?"

"No, never."

"Is it possible?"

"My dear friend, do not let us begin that discussion again. I have a
wife and children and you have a husband, so we both of us have much to
fear from other people's opinion."

She did not reply; she was thinking of her long-past youth, and of many
sad things that had occurred. She had been married as girls are married;
she hardly knew her betrothed, who was a diplomatist, and later, she
lived the same life with him that all women of the world live with their
husbands. But Monsieur d'Apreval, who was also married, loved her with a
profound passion, and while Monsieur de Cadour was absent in India, on a
political mission for a long time, she succumbed. Could she possibly
have resisted, have refused to give herself? Could she have had the
strength and courage not to have yielded, as she loved him also? No,
certainly not; it would have been too hard; she would have suffered too
much! How cruel and deceitful life is! Is it possible to avoid certain
attacks of fate, or can one escape from one's destiny? When a solitary,
abandoned woman, without children and with a careless husband, always
escapes from the passion which a man feels for her, as she would escape
from the sun, in order to live in darkness until she dies?

How well she recalled all the details, his kisses, his smiles, the way
he used to stop, in order to watch her until she was indoors. What happy
days they were; the only really delicious days she had ever enjoyed; and
how quickly they were over!

And then she discovered that she was pregnant! What anguish!

Oh! that journey to the South, that long journey, her sufferings, her
constant terror, that secluded life in the small, solitary house on the
shores of the Mediterranean, at the bottom of a garden, which she did
not venture to leave. How well she remembered those long days which she
spent lying under an orange tree, looking up at the round, red fruit,
amidst the green leaves. How she used to long to go out, as far as the
sea, whose fresh breezes came to her over the wall, and whose small
waves she could hear lapping on the beach. She dreamt of its immense
blue expanse sparkling under the sun, with the white sails of the small
vessels, and a mountain on the horizon. But she did not dare to go
outside the gate; suppose anybody had recognized her, unshapely as she
was, and showing her disgrace by her expanded waist!

And those days of waiting, those last days of misery and expectation!
The impending suffering and then, that terrible night! What misery she
had endured, and what a night it was! How she had groaned and screamed!
She could still see the pale face of her lover, who kissed her hand
every moment, and the clean-shaven face of the doctor, and the nurse's
white cap.

And what she felt when she heard the child's feeble cries, that mewling,
that first effort of a human voice!

And the next day! the next day! the only day of her life on which she
had seen and kissed her son, for from that time, she had never even
caught a glimpse of him.

And what a long, void existence hers had been since then, with the
thought of that child always, always floating before her. She had never
seen her son, that little creature that had been part of herself, even
once since then; they had taken him from her, carried him away and
hidden him. All she knew was, that he had been brought up by some
peasants in Normandy, that he had become a peasant himself, had married
well, and that his father, whose name he did not know, had settled a
handsome sum of money on him.

How often during the last forty years had she wished to go and see him,
and to embrace him. She could not imagine to herself that he had grown!
She always thought of that small, human _larva_, which she had held in
her arms and pressed to her side for a day.

How often she had said to her lover: "I cannot bear it any longer; I
must go and see him."

But he had always stopped her, and kept her from going. She would not be
able to restrain and to master herself; their son would guess it and
take advantage of her, blackmail her; she would be lost.

       *       *       *       *       *

"What is he like?" she said.

"I do not know; I have not seen him again, either."

"Is it possible? To have a son, and not to know him; to be afraid of him
and to repulse him as if he were a disgrace! It is horrible."

They went along the dusty road, overcome by the scorching sun, and
continually ascending that interminable hill.

"One might take it for a punishment," she continued; "I have never had
another child, and I could no longer resist the longing to see him,
which has possessed me for forty years. You men cannot understand that.
You must remember that I shall not live much longer, and suppose I had
never seen him again! never have seen him!... Is it possible? How could
I wait so long? I have thought about him every day since, and what a
terrible existence mine has been! I have never awakened, never, do you
understand, without my first thoughts being of him, of my child. How is
he? Oh! How guilty I feel towards him! Ought one to fear what the world
may say, in a case like this? I ought to have left everything to go
after him, to bring him up and to show love for him. I should certainly
have been much happier, but I did not dare, I was a coward. How I have
suffered! Oh! How those poor, abandoned children must hate their
mothers!"

She stopped suddenly, for she was choked by her sobs. The whole valley
was deserted and silent in the dazzling light, and the overwhelming
heat, and only the grasshoppers uttered their shrill, continuous chirp
among the sparse, yellow grass on both sides of the road.

"Sit down a little," he said.

She allowed herself to be led to the side of the ditch, and sank down
with her face in her hands. Her white hair, which hung in curls on both
sides of her face, had become all of a lump, and she wept, overcome by
profound grief, while he stood facing her, uneasy and not knowing what
to say, and he merely murmured: "Come, have courage."

She got up.

"I will," she said, and wiping her eyes, she began to walk again with
the jerky steps of an old woman.

Rather farther on, the road passed under a clump of trees, which hid a
few houses, and they could distinguish the vibrating and regular blows
of a blacksmith's hammer on the anvil; and soon they saw a cart drawn
upon the right in front of a low cottage, and two men shoeing a horse
under a shed.

Monsieur d'Apreval went up to them.

"Where is Pierre Benedict's farm?" he asked.

"Take the road on the left, close to the public house, and then go
straight on; it is the third house past Poret's. There is a small
spruce-fir close to the gate; you cannot make a mistake."

They turned to the left; she was walking very slowly now; her legs
threatened to give way, and her heart was beating so violently that she
felt as if she should be suffocated, while at every step she murmured,
as if in prayer:

"Oh! good heavens! good heavens!"

Monsieur d'Apreval, who was also nervous and rather pale, said to her
somewhat gruffly:

"If you cannot manage to command your feelings better, you will betray
yourself immediately. Do try and restrain yourself."

"How can I?" she replied. "My child! When I think that I am going to see
my child!"

They were going along one of those narrow country lanes between
farmyards, that are buried beneath a double row of beech trees, by the
sides of the ditches, and suddenly they found themselves in front of a
gate, over which there hung a young spruce-fir.

"This is it," he said.

She stopped suddenly and looked about her. The courtyard, which was
planted with apple-trees, was large and extended as far as the small,
thatched dwelling-house. Opposite to it, were the stable, the barn, the
cow-house and the poultry-house, while the gig, wagon and the manure
cart were under a slated outhouse. Four calves were grazing under the
shade of the trees, and black hens were wandering all about the
enclosure.

All was perfectly still; the house door was open, but nobody was to be
seen, and so they went in, when immediately a large, black dog came out
of a barrel that was standing under a pear tree, and began to bark
furiously.

There were four bee-hives on boards against the wall of the house.

Monsieur d'Apreval stood outside and called out:

"Is anybody at home?"

Then a girl appeared, a little girl of about ten, dressed in a chemise
and a linen petticoat, with dirty, bare legs, and a timid and cunning
look. She remained standing in the doorway, as if to prevent any one
going in.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"Is your father in?"

"No."

"Where is he?"

"I don't know."

"And your mother?"

"Gone after the cows."

"Will she be back soon?"

"I don't know."

But suddenly, the old woman, as if she feared that he might force her to
return, said quickly:

"I will not go without having seen him."

"We will wait for him, my dear friend."

As they turned away, they saw a peasant woman coming towards the house,
carrying two tin pails, which appeared to be heavy, and which glistened
brightly in the sunlight.

She limped with her right leg, and in her brown, knitted jacket, that
was faded by the sun, and washed out by the rain, she looked like a
poor, wretched, dirty servant.

"Here is Mamma," the child said.

When she got close to the house, she looked at the strangers angrily and
suspiciously, and then she went in, as if she had not seen them. She
looked old, and had a hard, yellow, wrinkled face, one of those wooden
faces like country people so often have.

Monsieur d'Apreval called her back.

"I beg your pardon, Madame, but we came in to know whether you could
sell us two glasses of milk."

She was grumbling when she reappeared in the door, after putting down
her pails.

"I don't sell milk," she replied.

"We are very thirsty," he said, "and Madame is old and very tired. Can
we not get something to drink?"

The peasant woman gave them an uneasy and cunning glance, and then she
made up her mind.

"As you are here, I will give you some," she said, going into the house,
and almost immediately the child came out and brought two chairs, which
she placed under an apple tree, and then the mother in turn brought out
two bowls of foaming milk, which she gave to the visitors. She did not
return to the house, however, but remained standing near them, as if to
watch them and to find out for what purpose they had come there.

"You have come from Fécamp?" she said.

"Yes," Monsieur d'Apreval replied, "we are staying at Fécamp for the
summer."

And then after a short silence he continued:

"Have you any fowls you could sell us, every week?"

The woman hesitated for a moment, and then replied:

"Yes, I think I have. I suppose you want young ones?"

"Yes, of course."

"What do you pay for them in the market?"

D'Apreval, who had not the least idea, turned to his companion:

"What are you paying for poultry in Fécamp, my dear lady?"

"Four francs, and four francs, fifty centimes," she said with her eyes
full of tears, and the farmer's wife, who was looking at her askance, in
much surprise, asked:

"Is the lady ill, as she is crying?"

He did not know what to say, and replied with some hesitation:

"No ... no ... but she lost her watch as we came, a very handsome watch,
and that troubles her. If anybody should find it, please let us know."

Mother Benedict did not reply, as she thought it a very equivocal soft
of answer, but suddenly she exclaimed:

"Oh! here is my husband!"

She was the only one who had seen him, as she was facing the gate.
D'Apreval started, and Madame de Cadour nearly fell, as she turned round
suddenly on her chair.

A man who was bent nearly double and who was panting for breath, was
there, ten yards from them, dragging a cow at the end of a rope; and
without taking any notice of the visitors, he said:

"Confound it! What a brute!"

And he went past them, and disappeared in the cow-house.

Her tears had dried quickly, as she sat there startled, without a word,
and with the one thought in her mind, that this was her son, and
d'Apreval, whom the same thought had struck very unpleasantly, said in
an agitated voice:

"Is this Monsieur Benedict?"

"Who told you his name?" the wife asked, still rather suspiciously.

"The blacksmith at the corner of the highroad," he replied, and then
they were all silent, with their eyes fixed on the door of the
cow-house, which formed a sort of black hole in the wall of the
building. Nothing could be seen inside, but they heard a vague noise,
movements, and footsteps and the sound of hoofs, which were deadened by
the straw on the floor, and soon he reappeared in the door, wiping his
forehead, and went towards the house with long, slow strides. He passed
the strangers without seeming to notice them, and said to his wife:

"Go and draw me a jug of cider; I am very thirsty."

Then he went back into the house, while his wife went into the cellar,
and left the two Parisians alone.

"Let us go, let us go Henri," Madame de Cadour said, nearly distracted
with grief, and so d'Apreval took her by the arm, helped her to rise,
and sustaining her with all his strength, for he felt that she was
nearly falling down, he led her out, after throwing five francs onto one
of the chairs.

As soon as they were outside the gate, she began to sob, and said,
shaking with grief:

"Oh! oh! is that what you have made of him?"

He was very pale, and replied coldly:

"I did what I could. His farm is worth eighty thousand francs, and that
is more than most of the children of the middle classes have."

They returned slowly, without speaking a word. She was still crying; the
tears ran down her cheeks continually for a time, but by degrees they
stopped, and they went back to Fécamp, where they found Monsieur de
Cadour waiting dinner for them, and as soon as he saw them, he began to
laugh, and exclaimed:

"So my wife has had a sunstroke, and I am very glad of it. I really
think she has lost her head for some time past!"

Neither of them replied, and when the husband asked them rubbing his
hands:

"Well, I hope that at least you have had a pleasant walk?"

Monsieur d'Apreval replied:

"A delightful walk, I assure you; perfectly delightful."




A NIGHT IN WHITECHAPEL


My friend Ledantec and I were twenty-five and we had come to London for
the first time in our lives. It was a Saturday evening in December, cold
and foggy, and I think that all that combined is more than enough to
explain why my friend Ledantec and I were most abominably drunk, though,
to tell the truth, we did not feel any discomfort from it. On the
contrary, we were floating in an atmosphere of perfect bliss. We did not
speak, certainly, for we were incapable of doing so, but then we had no
inclination for conversation. What would be the good of it? We could so
easily read all our thoughts in each others eyes! And all our thoughts
consisted in the sweet and unique knowledge, that we were thinking about
nothing whatever.

It was not, however, in order to arrive at that state of delicious,
intellectual nihility, thai we had gone to mysterious Whitechapel. We
had gone into the first public-house we saw, with the firm intention of
studying manners and customs,--not to mention morals,--there as
spectators, artists and philosophers, but in the second public-house we
entered, we ourselves became like the objects of our investigations,
that is to say, sponges soaked in alcohol. Between one public-house and
the other, the outer air seemed to squeeze those sponges, which then got
just as dry as before, and thus we rolled from public-house to
public-house, until at last the sponges could not hold any more.

Consequently, we had for some time bidden farewell to our studies in
morals, and now they were limited to two impressions: _zig-zags_ through
the darkness outside, and a gleam of light outside the public-houses. As
to the inhibition of brandies, whiskies and gins, that was done
mechanically, and our stomachs scarcely noticed it.

But what strange beings we had elbowed with during our long stoppages!
What a number of faces to be remembered, what clothes, what attitudes,
what talk and what rags!

At first we tried to note them exactly in our memory, but there were so
many of them, and our brain got mixed so quickly, that at present we had
no very clear recollection of anything or anybody. Even objects that
were immediately before us appeared to us in a vague, dusky
phantasmagoria and got confounded with precious objects in an
inextricable manner. The world became a sort of kaleidoscope to us, seen
in a dream through the penumbra of an aquarium.

Suddenly we were aroused from this state of somnolence, awakened as if
by a blow in the chest, and imperiously forced to fix our attention on
what we saw, for amidst this whirl of strange sights, one stranger than
all attracted our eyes and seemed to say to us: "Look at me."

It was at the open door of a public-house. A ray of light streamed into
the street through the half-open door, and that brutal ray fell right
onto the specter that had just risen up there, dumb and motionless.

For it was indeed a specter, pitiful and terrible, and, above all, most
real, as it stood out boldly against the dark background of the street,
which it made darker still behind it!

Young, yes; the woman was certainly young; there could be no doubt about
that, when one looked at her smooth skin, her smiling mouth which showed
her white teeth, and firm bust which could be plainly noted under her
thin dress.

But then, how explain her perfectly white hair, not gray or growing
gray, but absolutely white, as white as any octogenarian's?

And then her eyes, her eyes beneath her smooth brow, were surely the
eyes of an old woman? Certainly they were, and of a woman one could not
tell how old, for it must have taken years of trouble and sorrow, of
tears and of sleepless nights, and a whole long existence, thus to dull,
to wear out and to roughen those vitreous pupils.

Vitreous? Not exactly that. For roughened glass still retains a dull and
milky brightness, a recollection, as it were, of its former
transparency. But her eyes seemed rather to have been made of metal,
which had turned rusty, and really if pewter could rust I should have
compared them to pewter covered with rust. They had the dead color of
pewter, and at the same time, they emitted a glance which was the color
of reddish water.

But it was not until some time later that I tried to define them thus
approximately by retrospective analysis. At that moment, being
altogether incapable of such an effort, I could only establish in my own
mind the idea of extreme decrepitude and horrible old age, which they
produced in my imagination.

Have I said that they were set in very puffy eyelids, which had no
lashes whatever, and on her forehead without wrinkles there was not a
vestige of eyebrow? When I tell you this, and considering their dull
look beneath the hair of an octogenarian, it is not surprising that
Ledantec and I said in a low voice at the sight of this woman, who was
evidently young:

"Oh! poor, poor old woman!"

Her great age was further accentuated by the terrible poverty that was
revealed by her dress. If she had been better dressed, her youthful
looks would, perhaps, have struck us more, but her thin shawl, which was
all that she had over her chemise, her single petticoat which was full
of holes, and almost in rags, and which did not nearly reach to her bare
feet, her straw hat with ragged feathers and with ribbons of no
particular color through age, it all seemed so ancient, so prodigiously
antique!

From what remote superannuated, abolished period did they all spring?
One did not venture to guess, and by a perfectly natural association of
ideas, one seemed to infer that the unfortunate creature herself, was as
old as her clothes were. Now, by _one_, I mean by Ledantec and myself,
that is to say, by two men who were abominably drunk and who were
arguing with the special logic of intoxication.

It was also under the softening influence of alcohol that we looked at
the vague smile on those lips with the teeth of a child, without
stopping to reflect on the beauty of those youthful teeth, and seeing
nothing except her fixed and almost idiotic smile, which no longer
contrasted with the dull expression of her looks, but, on the contrary,
strengthened them. For in spite of her teeth, it was the smile of an old
woman in our imagination, and as for me, I was really pleased at the
thought of being so acute when I inferred that this grandmother with
such pale lips, had the set of teeth of a young girl, and still, thanks
to the softening influence of alcohol, I was not angry with her for this
artifice. I even thought it particularly praiseworthy, since, after all,
the poor creature thus carried out her calling conscientiously, which
was to seduce us. For there was no possible doubt about the matter, that
this grandmother was nothing more nor less than a prostitute.

And then, drunk! Horribly drunk, much more drunk than Ledantec and I
were, for we really could manage to say: "Oh! Pity the poor, poor old
woman!" While she was incapable of articulating a single syllable, of
making a gesture, or even of imparting a gleam of promise, a furtive
flash of allurement to her eyes. With her hands crossed on her stomach,
and resting against the front of the public-house, with her whole body
as stiff as if she had been in a state of catalepsy, she had nothing
alluring about her, except her sad smile, and that inspired us with all
the more pity because she was even more drunk than we were, and so, by
identical, spontaneous movement, we each of us seized her by an arm, to
take her into the public-house with us.

To our great astonishment she resisted, sprang back, and so was in the
shadow again, out of the ray of light which came through the door,
while, at the same time, she began to walk through the darkness and to
drag us with her, for she was clinging to our arms. We followed her
without speaking and without knowing where we were going, but without
the least uneasiness on that score. Only, when she suddenly burst into
violent sobs as she walked, Ledantec and I began to sob in unison.

The cold and the fog had suddenly congested our brains again, and we had
again lost all precise consciousness of our acts, of our thoughts and of
our sensations. Our sobs had nothing of grief in them, but we were
floating in an atmosphere of perfect bliss, and I can remember that at
that moment it was no longer the exterior world which seemed to me as if
I were looking at it through the penumbra of an aquarium; it was I
myself, an _I_ composed of three, which was changing into something that
was floating adrift in something, though what it was I did not know,
composed of palpable fog and intangible water, and it was exquisitely
delightful.

From that moment I remember nothing more until what follows, and which
had the effect of a clap of thunder on me, and made me rise up from the
bottom of the depth to which I had descended.

Ledantec was standing in front of me, his face convulsed with horror,
his hair standing on end and his eyes staring out of his head, and he
shouted to me:--

"Let us escape! Let us escape!" Whereupon I opened my eyes wide, and
found myself lying on the ground, in a room into which daylight was
shining. I saw some rags hanging against the wall, two chairs, a broken
jug lying on the floor by my side, and in a corner a wretched bed on
which a woman was lying, who was no doubt dead, for her head was hanging
over the side, and her long white hair reached almost to my feet.

With a bound I was up, like Ledantec.

"What!" I said to him, while my teeth chattered: "Did you kill her?"

"No, no," he replied. "But that makes no difference; let us be off."

I felt completely sober by that time, but I did think that he was still
suffering somewhat from the effects of last night's drunk; otherwise,
why should he wish to escape? while the remains of pity for the
unfortunate woman forced me to say:--

"What is the matter with her? If she is ill, we must look after her."

And I went to the wretched bed, in order to put her head back on the
pillow, but I discovered that she was neither dead nor ill, but only
sound asleep, and I also noticed that she was quite young. She still
wore that idiotic smile, but her teeth were her own and those of a girl.
Her smooth skin and her firm bust showed that she was not more than
sixteen; perhaps not so much.

"There! You see it, you can see it!" Ledantec said. "Let us be off."

He tried to drag me out, and he was still drunk; I could see it by his
feverish movements, his trembling hands and his nervous looks. Then he
implored me and said:--

"I slept beside the old woman; but she is not old. Look at her; look at
her; yes, she is old after all!"

And he lifted up her long hair by handfuls; it was like handfuls of
white silk, and then he added, evidently in a sort of delirium, which
made me fear an attack of _delirium tremens_: "To think that I have
begotten children, three, four children. Who knows how many children,
all in one night! And they were born immediately, and have grown up
already! Let us be off."

Decidedly it was an attack of madness. Poor Ledantec! What could I do
for him? I took his arm and tried to calm him, but he thought that I was
going to try and make him go to bed with her again, and he pushed me
away and exclaimed with tears in his voice: "If you do not believe me,
look under the bed; the children are there; they are there, I tell you.
Look here, just look here."

He threw himself down, flat on his stomach, and actually pulled out one,
two, three, four children, who had hidden under the bed. I do not
exactly know whether they were boys or girls, but all, like the sleeping
woman, had white hair, the hair of an octogenarian.

Was I still drunk, like Ledantec, or was I mad? What was the meaning of
this strange hallucination? I hesitated for a moment, and shook myself
to be sure that it was I.

No, no, I had all my wits about me, and I in reality saw that horrible
lot of little brats; they all had their faces in their hands, and were
crying and squalling, and then suddenly one of them jumped onto the bed;
all the others followed his example, and the woman woke up.

And then we stood, while those five pairs of eyes, without eyebrows or
eyelashes, eyes with the dull color of pewter, and whose pupils had the
color of red water, were steadily fixed on us.

"Let us be off! let us be off!" Ledantec repeated, leaving go of me, and
at that time I paid attention to what he said, and, after throwing some
small change onto the floor, I followed him, to make him understand,
when he should be quite sober, that he saw before him a poor Albino
prostitute, who had several brothers and sisters.




COUNTESS SATAN


I

They were discussing dynamite, the social revolution, Nihilism, and even
those who cared least about politics, had something to say. Some were
alarmed, others philosophized, while others again, tried to smile.

"Bah!" N---- said, "when we are all blown up, we shall see what it is
like. Perhaps, after all, it may be an amusing sensation, provided one
goes high enough."

"But we shall not be blown up at all," G---- the optimist, said,
interrupting him. "It is all a romance."

"You are mistaken, my dear fellow," Jules de C---- replied. "It is like a
romance, but with that confounded Nihilism, everything seems like one,
but it would be a mistake to trust to it. Thus, I myself, the manner in
which I made Bakounine's acquaintance ..."

They knew that he was a good narrator, and it was no secret that his
life had been an adventurous one, so they drew closer to him, and
listened religiously. This is what he told them.


II

"I met Countess Nioska W----, that strange woman who was usually called
Countess Satan, in Naples; I immediately attached myself to her out of
curiosity, and I soon fell in love with her. Not that she was beautiful,
for she was a Russian who had all the bad characteristics of the Russian
type. She was thin and squat, at the same time, while her face was
sallow and puffy, with high cheek bones and a Cossack's nose. But her
conversation bewitched every one.

"She was many-sided, learned, a philosopher, scientifically depraved,
satanic. Perhaps the word is rather pretentious, but it exactly
expresses what I want to say, for in other words, she loved evil for the
sake of evil. She rejoiced in other people's vices, and liked to sow the
seeds of evil, in order to see it flourish. And that on a fraud, on an
enormous scale. It was not enough for her to corrupt individuals; she
only did that to keep her hand in; what she wished to do, was to corrupt
the masses. By slightly altering it after her own fashion, she might
have adopted the famous saying of Caligula. She also wished that the
whole human race had but one head; but not in order that she might cut
it off, but that she might make the philosophy of _Nihility_ flourish
there.

"What a temptation to become the lord and master of such a monster! And
I allowed myself to be tempted, and undertook the adventure. The means
came unsought for by me, and the only thing that I had to do, was to
show myself more perverted and satanical that she was herself.--And so I
played the devil.

"'Yes,' I said, 'we writers are the best workmen for doing evil, as our
books may be bottles of poison. The so-called men of action, only turn
the handle of the mitrailleuse which we have loaded. Formulas will
destroy the world, and it is we who invent them.'

"'That is true,' she said, 'and that is what is wanting in Bakounine, I
am sorry to say.'

"That name was constantly in her mouth, and so I asked her for details,
which she gave me, as she knew the man intimately.

"'After all,' she said, with a contemptuous grimace, 'he is only a kind
of Garibaldi.'

"She told me, although she made fun of him as she did so, about his
Odyssey of the barricades and of the hulks which made up Bakounine's
legend, and which is, nevertheless, only the exact truth; his part of
chief of the insurgents, at Prague and then at Dresden; his first death
sentence; about his imprisonment at Olmütz and in the casemates of the
fortress of St. Peter and St. Paul; in a subterranean dungeon at
Schüsselburg; about his exile to Siberia and his wonderful escape down
the river Amour, on a Japanese coasting-vessel by way of Yokohama and
San Francisco, and about his final arrival in London, whence he was
directing all the operations of Nihilism.

"'You see,' she said, 'he is a thorough adventurer, and now all his
adventures are over. He got married at Tobolsk and became a mere
respectable, middle-class man. And then, he has no individual ideas.
Herzen, the phamphleteer of _Kolokol_ inspired him with the only fertile
phrase that he ever uttered: _Land and Liberty!_ But that is not yet the
definite formula, the general formula; what I will call, the dynamite
formula. At best, Bakounine would become an incendiary, and burn down
cities. And what is that, I ask you? Bah? A second-hand Rostopchin! He
wants a prompter, and I offered to become his but he did not take me
seriously.' ...

"It would be useless to enter into all the Psychological details which
marked the course of my passion for the Countess, and to explain to you
more fully the attraction of curiosity which she offered me more and
more every day. It was getting exasperating, and the more so, as she
resisted me as stoutly as the shyest of innocents could have done, but
at the end of a month of mad Satanism, I saw what her game was. Do you
know what she had thought of? She meant to make me Bakounine's prompter,
or, at any rate, that is what she said. But no doubt she reserved the
right to herself, and that is how I understood her, to prompt the
prompter, and my passion for her, which she purposely left unsatisfied,
assured her that absolute power over me.

"All this may appear madness to you, but it is, nevertheless, the exact
truth, and, in short, one morning she bluntly made the offer: 'Become
Bakounine's soul, and you shall have me.'

"Of course, I accepted, for it was too fantastically strange to refuse;
do you think so? What an adventure! What luck! A number of letters
between the Countess and Bakounine prepared the way; I was introduced to
him at his house, and they discussed me there. I became a sort of
Western prophet, a mystic charmer who was ready to nihilate the Latin
races, the Saint Paul of the new religion of nothingness, and at last a
day was fixed for us to meet in London. He lived in a small, one-storied
house in Pimlico, with a tiny garden in front, and nothing noticeable
about it.

"We were first of all shown into the commonplace parlor of all English
homes, and then upstairs. The room where the Countess and I were left,
was small, and very badly furnished, with a square table with writing
materials on it, in the middle. That was his sanctuary; the deity soon
appeared, and I saw him in flesh and bone; especially in flesh, for he
was enormously stout. His broad face, with prominent cheek-bones, in
spite of the fat; and with a nose like a double funnel, with small,
sharp eyes, which had a magnetic look, proclaimed the Tartar, the old
Turanian blood, which produced the Attilas, the Gengis-Khams, the
Tamerlanes. The obesity, which is characteristic of the nomad races, who
are always on horseback or driving, added to his Asiatic look. The man
was certainly not a European, a slave, a descendant of the deistic
Aryans, but a descendant of the Atheistic hordes, who had several times
already almost overrun Europe, and who, instead of any ideas of
progress, have the belief in nihility, at the bottom of their hearts.

"I was astonished, for I had not expected that the majesty of a whole
race, could be thus revived in a man, and my stupefaction increased
after an hour's conversation. I could quite understand why such a
Colossus had not wished for the Countess as his Egeria; she was a mere
silly child to have dreamt of acting such a part to such a thinker. She
had not felt the profoundness of that horrible philosophy which was
hidden under that material activity, nor had she seen the prophet under
that man of the barricades. Or, perhaps, he had not thought it advisable
to reveal himself to her like that; but he revealed himself to me, and
inspired me with terror.

"A prophet? Oh! yes. He thought himself an Attila, and foresaw the
consequences of his revolution; it was not only from instinct, but also
from theory that he urged a nation on to nihilism. The phrase is not
his, but Tourgueneff's, I believe, but the idea certainly belongs to
him. He got his program of agricultural communism from Herzen, and his
destructive radicalism from Pougatcheff, but he did not stop there. I
mean that he went on to evil for the sake of evil. Herzen wished for the
happiness of the Slav peasant; Pougatcheff wanted to be elected Emperor,
but all that Bakounine wanted, was to overthrow the actual order of
things, no matter by what means, and to replace social concentration by
a universal upheaval.

"It was the dream of a Tartar; it was true nihilism pushed to extreme
practical conclusions. It was, in a word, the applied philosophy of
chance, the indeterminateism of anarchy. Monstrous it may be, but grand
in its monstrosity.

"And you must note, that the man of action who was so despised by the
Countess, discovered in Bakounine the gigantic dreamer whom I have just
shown you, and his dream did not remain a dream, but began to be
realized. It was by the care of that organizer that the Nihilistic party
assumed a body; a party in which there is a little of everything, you
know; but on the whole, a formidable party, on account of the advanced
guard in true Nihilism, whose object is nothing less than to destroy the
Western world, to see it blossom from under the ruins of a general
dispersion, which is the last conception of modern Tartarism.

"I never saw Bakounine again, for the Countess's conquest would have
been too dearly bought by any attempt to act a comedy with this
_Old-Man-of-the-Mountains_. And besides that, after this visit, poor
Countess Satan appeared to me quite silly. Her famous Satanism was
nothing but the flicker of a spirit-lamp, after the general
conflagration of which the other had dreamt, and she had certainly shown
herself very silly, when she could not understand that prodigious
monster. And as she had seduced me, only by her intellect and her
perversity, I was disgusted as soon as she laid aside that mask. I left
her without telling her of my intention, and never saw her again,
either.

"No doubt they both took me for a spy from the _Third section of the
Imperial Chancellery_. In that case, they must have thought me very
strong to have resisted, and all I have to do is to look out, if any
affiliated members of their society recognize me!..."


III

Then he smiled, and turning to the waiter who had just come in, he said:
"Meanwhile, open us another bottle of champagne, and make the cork pop!
It will, at any rate, somewhat accustom us to the day when we shall all
be blown up with dynamite ourselves."




KIND GIRLS


Every Friday, regularly, at about eleven o'clock in the morning, he came
into the courtyard, put down his soft hat at his feet, struck a few
chords on his guitar and then began a ballad in his full, rich voice.
And soon at every window in the four sides of that dull, barrack-like
building, some girls appeared, one in an elegant dressing gown, another
in a little jacket, most of them with their breasts and arms bare, all
of them just out of bed, with their hair hastily twisted up, their eyes
blinking in the sudden blaze of sunlight, their complexions dull and
their eyes still heavy from want of sleep.

They swayed themselves backwards and forwards to his slow melody, and
gave themselves up to the enjoyment of it, and coppers, and even silver,
poured into the handsome singer's hat, and more than one of them would
have liked to have followed the penny which she threw to him, and to
have gone with the singer who had the voice of a siren, and who seemed
to say to all these amorous girls; "Come, come to my retreat, where you
will find a palace of crystal and gold, and wreaths which are always
fresh, and happiness and love which never die."

That was what they seemed to hear, those unhappy girls, when they heard
him sing the songs of the old legends, which they had formerly believed.
That was what they understood by the foolish words of the ballad. Then
and nothing else, for how could any one doubt it, on seeing the fresh
roses on their cheeks, and the tender flame which flickered like a
mystic night-light in their eyes, which had, for the moment, become the
eyes of innocent young girls again? But of young girls, who had grown up
very quickly, alas! who were very precocious, and who very soon became
the women that they were, poor vendors of love, always in search of love
for which they were paid.

That was why, when he had finished his second ballad, and sometimes even
sooner, concupiscent looks appeared in their eyes. The boatman of their
dreams, the water-sprite of fairy tales, vanished in the mist of their
childish recollections, and the singer re-assumed his real shape, that
of musician and strolling player, whom they wished to pay, to be their
lover. And the coppers and small silver were showered on him again, with
engaging smiles, with the leers of a street-walker, even with: "_p'st,
p'st_," which soon transformed the barrack-like courtyard into an
enormous cage full of twittering birds, while some of them could not
restrain themselves, but said aloud, rolling their eyes with desire:
"How handsome the creature is! Good heavens, how handsome he is!"

He was really handsome, and nobody could deny it, and even too handsome,
with a regular beauty which almost palled on people. He had large,
almond-shaped, gentle eyes, a Grecian nose, a bow-shaped mouth, hidden
by a heavy moustache, and long, black, curly hair; in short, a head fit
to be put into a hair-dresser's window, or, better still, perhaps, onto
the front page of the ballads which he was singing. But what made him
still handsomer, was that his self-conceit had a look of sovereign
indifference for he was not satisfied with not replying to the smiles,
the ogles, and the _p'st, p'st's_, by taking no notice of them; but
when he had finished he shrugged his shoulders, he winked mischievously,
and turned his lips contemptuously, which said very clearly: "The stove
is not being heated for you, my little kittens!"

Often, one might have thought that he expressly wished to show his
contempt, and that he tried to make himself thought unpoetical in the
eyes of all those amorous girls, and to check their love, for he cleared
his throat ostentatiously and offensively, more than was necessary,
after singing, as if he would have liked to spit at them. But all that
did not make him unpoetical in their eyes, and many of them, most of
them, who were absolutely mad on him, went so far as to say that _he did
it like a swell_!

The girl, who in her enthusiasm had been the first to utter that
exclamation of intense passion, and who, after throwing him small
silver, had thrown him a twenty-franc gold piece, at last made up her
mind to have an explanation. Instead of a _p'st, p'st_, she spoke to him
boldly one morning, in the presence of all the others, who religiously
held their tongues.

"Come up here," she called out to him, and from habit she added: "I will
be very nice, you handsome dark fellow."

At first they were dumbfounded at her audacity, and then all their
cheeks flushed with jealousy, and the flame of mad desire shot from
their eyes, from every window there came a perfect torrent of:

"Yes, come up, come up." "Don't go to her! Come to me."

And, meanwhile, there was a shower of half-pence, of francs, of gold
coins, as well as of cigars and oranges, while lace pocket
handkerchiefs, silk neckties, and scarfs fluttered in the air and fell
round the singer, like a flight of many colored butterflies.

He picked up the spoil calmly, almost carelessly, stuffed the money into
his pocket, made a bundle of the furbelows, which he tied up as if they
had been soiled linen, and then raising himself up, and putting his felt
hat on his head, he said:

"Thank you, ladies, but indeed I cannot."

They thought that he did not know how to satisfy so many demands at
once, and one of them said: "Let him choose."

"Yes, yes, that is it!" they all exclaimed unanimously.

But he repeated: "I tell you, I cannot."

They thought he was excusing himself out of gallantry, and several of
them exclaimed, almost with tears of emotion: "Women are all heart!" And
the same voice that had spoken before, (it was one of the girls who
wished to settle the matter amicably), said: "We must draw lots."

"Yes, yes, that is it," they all cried. And again there was a religious
silence, more religious than before, for it wras caused by anxiety, and
the beatings of their hearts may have been heard.

The singer profited by it, to say slowly: "I cannot have that either;
nor all of you at once, nor one after the other; nothing! I tell you
that I cannot."

"Why? Why?" And now they were almost screaming, for they were angry and
sorry at the same time. Their cheeks had gone from scarlet to livid,
their eyes flashed fire, and some shook their fists menacingly.

"Silence!" the girl cried, who had spoken first. "Be quiet, you pack of
huzzys! Let him explain himself, and tell us why!"

"Yes, yes, let us be quiet! Make him explain himself in God's name!"

Then, in the fierce silence that ensued, the singer said, opening his
arms wide, with a gesture of despairing inability to do what they
wanted:

"What do you want? It is very amusing, but I cannot do more. I have two
girls of my own already, at home."




PROFITABLE BUSINESS


He certainly did not think himself a saint, nor had he any hypocritical
pretensions to virtue, but, nevertheless, he thought as highly of
himself as much as he did of anybody else, and perhaps, even a trifle
more highly. And that, quite impartially, without any more self love
than was necessary, and without his having to accuse himself of being
self conceited. He did himself justice, that was all, for he had good
moral principles, and he applied them, especially, if the truth must be
told, not only to judging the conduct of others, but also, it must be
allowed, in a measure for regulating his own conduct, as he would have
been very vexed if he had been able to think of himself:

"On the whole, I am what people call a perfectly honorable man."

Luckily, he had never (oh! never), been obliged to doubt that excellent
opinion which he had of himself, which he liked to express thus, in his
moments of rhetorical expansion:

"My whole life gives me the right to shake hands with myself."

Perhaps a subtle psychologist would have found some flaws in this armor
of integrity, which was sanctimoniously satisfied with itself. It was,
for example, quite certain that our friend had no scruples in making
profit out of the vices or misfortunes of his neighbors, provided that
he was not in his own opinion, the person who was solely, or chiefly
responsible for them. But, on the whole, it was only one manner of
looking at it, nothing more, and there were plenty of materials for
casuistic arguments in it. This kind of discussion is particularly
unpleasant to such simple natures as that of his worthy fellow, who
would have replied to the psychologist.

"Why go on a wild goose chase? As for me, I am perfectly sincere."

You must not, however, believe that this perfect sincerity prevented him
from having elevated views. He prided himself on having a weakness for
imagination and the unforeseen, and if he would have been offended at
being called a dishonorable man, he would, perhaps have been still more
hurt if anybody had attributed middle-class tastes to him.

Accordingly, in love affairs, he expressed a most virtuous horror of
adultery, for if he had committed it, it would not have been able to
bear that testimony to himself, which was so sweet to his conscience:

"Ah! As for me, I can declare that I never wronged anybody!"

While, on the other hand, he was not satisfied with pleasure which was
paid for by the hour, and which debases _the noblest desires of the
heart_, to the vulgar satisfaction of a physical requirement. What he
required, so he used to say, while lifting his eyes up to heaven was:

"Something rather more ideal than that!"

That search after the ideal did not, indeed, cost him any great effort,
as it was limited to not going to licensed houses of ill-fame, and to
not accosting streetwalkers with the simple words: "How much?"

It consisted chiefly in wishing to be gallant even with such women, and
in trying to persuade himself that they liked him for his own sake, and
in preferring those whose manner, dress and looks allowed room for
suppositions and romantic illusions, such as:

"She might be taken for a little work-girl who has not yet lost her
virtue."

"No, I rather think she is a widow, who has met with misfortunes."

"What if she be a fashionable lady in disguise!"

And other nonsense, which he knew to be such, even while imagining it,
but whose imaginary flavor was very pleasant to him, all the same.

With such tastes, it was only natural that this pilgrim followed and
pushed up against women in the large shops, and whenever there was a
crowd, and that he especially looked out for those ladies of easy
virtue, for nothing is more exciting than those half-closed shutters,
behind which a face is indistinctly seen, and from which one hears a
furtive: _"P'st! P'st!"_

He used to say to himself: "Who is she? Is she young and pretty? Is she
some old woman, who is terribly skillful at her business, but who yet
does not venture to show herself any longer? Or is she some new
beginner, who has not yet acquired the boldness of an old hand? In any
case, it is the unknown, perhaps, that is my ideal during the time it
takes me to find my way upstairs;" and always as he went up, his heart
beat, as it does at a first meeting with a beloved mistress.

But he had never felt such a delicious shiver as he did on the day on
which he penetrated into that old house in the blind alley in
Ménilmontant. He could not have said why, for he had often gone after
so-called love in much stranger places; but now, without any reason, he
had a presentiment that he was going to meet with an adventure, and that
gave him a delightful sensation.

The woman who had made the sign to him, lived on the third floor, and
all the way upstairs his excitement increased, until his heart was
beating violently when he reached the landing. At the same time, he was
going up, he smelt a peculiar odor, which grew stronger and stronger,
and which he had tried in vain to analyze, though all he could arrive at
was, that it smelt like a chemist's shop.

The door on the right, at the end of the passage, was opened as soon as
he put his foot on the landing, and the woman said, in a low voice:

"Come in, my dear."

A whiff of a very strong smell met his nostrils through the open door,
and suddenly he exclaimed:

"How stupid I was! I know what it is now; it is carbolic acid, is it
not?"

"Yes," the woman replied. "Don't you like it, dear? It is very
wholesome, you know."

The woman was not ugly, although not young; she had very good eyes,
although they were sad and sunken in her head; evidently she had been
crying, very much quite recently, and that imparted a special spice to
the vague smile which she put on, so as to appear more amiable.

Seized by his romantic ideas once more, and under the influence of the
presentiment which he had had just before, he thought--and the idea
filled him with pleasure:

"She is some widow, whom poverty has forced to sell herself."

The room was small, but very clean and tidy, and that confirmed him in
his conjecture, as he was curious to verify its truth, he went into the
three rooms which opened into one another. The bedroom, came first;
next there came a kind of a drawing-room, and then a dining-room, which
evidently served as a kitchen, for a Dutch tiled stove stood in the
middle of it, on which a stew was simmering, but the smell of carbolic
acid was even stronger in that room. He remarked on it, and added with a
laugh:

"Do you put it with your soup?"

And as he said this, he laid hold of the handle of the door which led
into the next room, for he wanted to see everything, even that nook,
which was apparently a store cupboard, but the woman seized him by the
arm, and pulled him violently back.

"No, no," she said, almost in a whisper, and in a hoarse and suppliant
voice, "no, dear, not there, not there, you must not go in there."

"Why?" he said, for his wish to go in had only become stronger.

"Because if you go in there, you will have no inclination to remain with
me, and I so want you to stay. If you only knew!"

"Well, what?" And with a violent movement, he opened the glazed door,
when the smell of carbolic acid seemed almost to strike him in the face,
but what he saw, made him recoil still more, for on a small iron
bedstead, lay the dead body of a woman fantastically illuminated by a
single wax candle, and in horror he turned to make his escape.

"Stop, my dear," the woman sobbed; and clinging to him, she told him
amidst a flood of tears, that her friend had died two days previously,
and that there was no money to bury her. "Because," she said, "you can
understand that I want it to be a respectable funeral, we were so very
fond of each other! Stop here, my dear, do stop. I only want ten francs
more. Don't go away."

They had gone back into the bedroom, and she was pushing him towards
the bed:

"No," he said, "let me go. I will give you the ten francs, but I will
not stay here; I cannot."

He took his purse out of his pocket, extracted a ten-franc piece, put it
on the table, and then went to the door; but when he had reached it, a
thought suddenly struck him, as if somebody were reasoning with him,
without his knowledge.

"Why lose these ten francs? Why not profit by this woman's good
intentions. She certainly did her business bravely, and if I had not
known about the matter, I should certainly not have gone away for some
time ... Well then?"

But other obscurer suggestions whispered to him:

"She was her friend! ... They were so fond of each other! Was it
friendship or love? Oh! love apparently. Well, it would surely be
avenging morality, if this woman were forced to be faithless to that
monstrous love?" And suddenly the man turned round and said in a low and
trembling voice: "Look here! If I give you twenty francs instead of ten,
I suppose you could buy some flowers for her, as well?"

The unhappy woman's face brightened with pleasure and gratitude.

"Will you really give me twenty?"

"Yes," he replied, "and more perhaps. It quite depends upon yourself."

And with the quiet conscience of an honorable man who, at the same time,
is not a fool he said gravely:

"You need only be very complaisant."

And he added, mentally: "Especially as I deserve it, as in giving you
twenty francs I am performing a good action."




VIOLATED


"Really," Paul repeated, "really!"

"Yes, I who am here before you have been violated, and violated by!...
But if I were to tell you immediately by whom, there would be no story,
eh? And as you want a story, eh? And as you want a story, I will tell
you all about it from beginning to end, and I shall begin at the
beginning.

"I had been shooting over the waste land in the heart of Brittany for a
week, which borders on the Black Mountain. It is a desolate and wild
country, but it abounds in game. One can walk for hours without meeting
a human being, and when one meets anybody, it is just the same as if one
had not, for the people are absolutely ignorant of French, and when I
got to an inn at night, I had to employ signs to let the people know
that I wanted supper and bed.

"As I happened to be in a melancholy frame of mind at the time, that
solitude delighted me, and my dog's companionship was quite enough for
me, and so you may guess my irritation when I perceived one morning that
I was being followed, absolutely followed, by another sportsman who
seemed to wish to enter into conversation with me. The day before, I had
already noticed him obstructing the horizon several times, and I had
attributed it to the chances of sport, which brought us both to the same
likely spots for game, but now I could not be mistaken! The fellow was
evidently following me, and was stretching his little pair of compasses
as much as he could, so as to keep up with my long strides, and took
short cuts, so as to catch me up at the half circle.

"As he seemed bent upon the matter, I naturally grew obstinate also, and
he spent his whole day in trying to catch me up, while I spent mine in
trying to baffle him, and we seemed to be playing at _hide-and-seek_;
the consequences were, that when it was getting dark, I had completely
lost myself in the most deserted part of the moor. There was no cottage
near, and not even a church spire in the distance. The only land-mark,
was the hateful outline of that cursed man, about five hundred yards
off.

"Of course he had won the game! I should have to put a good face on the
matter, and allow him to join me, or rather I should have to join him
myself, if I did not wish to sleep in the open air and with an empty
stomach, and so I went up to him, and asked my way in a half-surly
manner.

"He replied very affably, that there was no inn in the neighborhood, as
the nearest village was five leagues off, but that he lived only about
an hour's walk off, and that he considered himself very fortunate in
being able to offer me hospitality.

"I was utterly done up, and how could I refuse? So we went off through
the heather and furze; I walking slowly because I was so tired, and he
went tripping along merrily with his legs like a basset hound's, which
seemed untirable.

"And yet he was an old man, and not strongly built, for I could have
knocked him over by blowing on him; but how he could walk, the beast!

"But he was not a troublesome companion, as I imagined he would have
been, and he did not at all seem to wish to enter into conversation with
me, as I feared he would. When he had given his invitation, and I had
accepted it and thanked him in a few words, he did not open his lips
again, and we walked on in silence, and only his glances worried me, for
I felt them on me, as if he wished to force me into an intimacy, which
my closed lips refused. But on the whole, his tenacious looks, which I
noticed furtively, appeared sympathetic and even admiring--yes; really
admiring!

"But I could not give him as good as he brought, for he was certainly
not handsome; his legs were short, and rather bandy and he was thin and
narrow-chested. His face was like a bit of parchment, furrowed and
wrinkled, without a hair on it to hide the folds in his skin. His hair
resembled that of an _Ignorantin_[9] brother, with its gray locks
falling onto his greasy collar; he had a nose like a ferret, and rat's
eyes, but he was able to offer me food and quarters for the night, and
it was not requisite that he should be handsome, in order to do that.

[Footnote 9: A lay brother in a monastery, who is devoted to the
instruction of the poor.--TRANSLATOR.]

"Capital food, and very comfortable quarters! A manorial dwelling, a
real old, well-furnished manor-house; and in the large dining-room, in
front of the huge fireplace, where a large fire was blazing, dinner was
laid; I will say no more than that! A hotch-potch, which had been
stewing since morning, no doubt! A _salmis_ of woodcock, in defense of
which angels would have taken up arms; buckwheat cakes, in cream,
flavored with aniseed, and a cheese, which is a rare thing and hardly
ever to be found in Brittany, a cheese to make any one eat a four pound
loaf if he only smelt the rind! The whole washed clown by Chambertin,
and then brandy distilled by cider, which was so good that it made a man
fancy that he had swallowed a deity in velvet breeches; not to mention
the cigars, pure, smuggled havannahs; large, strong, not dry but green,
on the contrary, which made a strong and intoxicating smoke.

"And how the little old gentleman stuffed, and drank and smoked! He was
an ogre, a choirister, a sapper, and so was I, I must confess, and, upon
my word, I cannot remember what we talked about during our Gargantuan
feed! But we certainly talked, but what about? About shooting,
certainly, and about women most probably. Confound it! Among men, after
drinking! Yes, yes, about women, I am quite sure, and he told some funny
stories, did the little old man! Especially about a portrait which was
hanging over the large fireplace, and which represented his
grandmother, a marchioness of the old régime. She was a woman who had
certainly played some pranks, and they said that she was still frisky
and had good legs and thighs when she was seventy.

"'It is extraordinary,' I remarked, 'how like you are to that portrait.'

"'Yes,' the old man replied with a smile; and then he added in his
harsh, tremulous voice: 'I resemble her in everything. I am only sixty,
and I feel as if I should have lusty, hot blood in me until I am
seventy.'

"And then suddenly, very much moved, and looking at me admiringly, as he
had done once before, he said to the portrait:

"'I say, marchioness, what a pity that you did not know this handsome
young fellow!'

"I remembered that apostrophe and that look very well, when I went to
bed about an hour later, nearly drunk, in the large room papered in
white and gold, to which I was shown by a tall, broad-shouldered
footman, who wished me good-night in Breton.

"_Good-night_, yes! But that implied going to sleep, which was just what
I could not do. The Chambertin, the cider brandy and the cigars had
certainly made me drunk, but not so as to overcome me altogether. On the
contrary, I was excited, my nerves were highly strung, my blood was
heated, and I was in a half-sleep in which I felt that I was very much
alive, and my whole being was in a vibration and expansion, just as if I
had been smoking hashecah.

"Of course! That was it; I was dreaming while I was awake; but I saw the
door open and the marchioness come in, who had stepped down, out of her
frame. She had taken off her furbelows, and was in her nightgown. Her
high head-dress was replaced by a simple knot of ribbon, which confined
her powdered hair into a small chignon, but I recognized her quite
plainly, by the trembling light of the candle which she was carrying. It
was her face with its piercing eyes, its pointed nose and its smiling
and sensual mouth. She did not look so young to me as she appeared in
her portrait. Bah! Perhaps that was merely caused by the feeble,
flickering light! But I had not even time to account for it, not to
reflect on the strangeness of the sight, nor to discuss the matter with
myself and to say: 'Am I dead drunk, or is it a ghost?'

"No, I had no time, and that is the fact, for the candle was suddenly
blown out and the marchioness was in my bed and holding me in her arms,
and one fixed idea, the only one that I had, haunted me, which was:

"'Had the marchioness good limbs, and was she still frisky at seventy?'
And I did not care much if she was seventy and if she was a ghost or
not; I only thought of one thing: 'Has she really good limbs?'"

"By Jove, yes! She did not speak. Oh, marchioness! marchioness! And
suddenly in spite of myself and to convince myself that it was not a
mere fantastic dream, I exclaimed:

"'Why, good heavens! I am not dreaming!'

"'No, you are not dreaming,' two lips replied, trying to press
themselves against mine.

"But, oh! horror! The mouth smelt of cigars and brandy! The voice was
that of the little old man!

"With a bound I sent him flying on to the ground, and jumped out of bed,
shouting:

"'Beast! beast!'

"Then I heard the door slam, and bare feet pattering on the stairs as he
ran away; so I dressed hastily in the dark and went downstairs, still
shouting.

"In the hall below, where I could see through the upper windows that the
dawn was breaking, I met the broad-shouldered footman, who was holding a
great cudgel in his hand. He was bawling also, in Breton, and pointed to
the open door, outside where my dog was waiting. What could I say to
this savage who did not speak French? Should I face his cudgel? There
was no reason for doing so; and besides, I was even more ashamed than
furious; so I hastily took up my gun and my game-bag, which were in the
hall, and went off without turning round.

"Disgusted with sport in that part of the country, I returned to Brest
the same day, and there, timidly and with many precautions, I tried to
find out something about the little old man....

"'Oh, I know!' somebody replied at last to my question; 'you are
speaking of the manor-house at Hervénidozse, where the old countess
lives, who dresses like a man and sleeps with her coachman.'

"And with a deep sigh of relief, and much to the astonishment of my
informant, I replied:

"'Oh! so much the better!'"




JEROBOAM


Anyone who said, or even insinuated, that the Reverend William
Greenfield, Vicar of St. Sampson's, Tottenham, did not make his wife
Anna perfectly happy, would certainly have been very malicious. In their
twelve years of married life, he had honored her with twelve children,
and could anybody decently ask anything more of a saintly man?

Saintly to heroism in truth! For his wife Anna, who was endowed with
invaluable virtues, which made her a model among wives and a paragon
among mothers, had not been equally endowed physically, for, in one
word, she was hideous. Her hair, which was coarse though it was thin,
was the color of the national _half-and-half_, but of thick
_half-and-half_ which looked as if it had been already swallowed several
times, and her complexion, which was muddy and pimply, looked as if it
were covered with sand mixed with brickdust. Her teeth, which were long
and protruding, seemed as if they were about to start out of their
sockets in order to escape from that mouth with scarcely any lips, whose
sulphurous breath had turned them yellow. They were evidently suffering
from bile.

Her china-blue eyes looked vaguely, one very much to the right and the
other very much to the left, with a divergent and frightened squint; no
doubt in order that they might not see her nose, of which they felt
ashamed. And they were quite right! Thin, soft, long, pendant, sallow,
and ending in a violet knob, it irresistibly reminded those who saw it
of something which cannot be mentioned except in a medical treatise. Her
body, through the inconceivable irony of nature, was at the same time
thin and flabby, wooden and chubby, without having either the elegance
of slimness or the rounded gracefulness of stoutness. It might have been
taken for a body which had formerly been adipose, but which had now
grown thin, while the covering had remained floating on the framework.

She was evidently nothing but skin and bones, but then she had too many
bones and too little skin.

It will be seen that the reverend gentleman had done his duty, his whole
duty, more than his duty, in sacrificing a dozen times on this altar.
Yes, a dozen times bravely and loyally! A dozen times, and his wife
could not deny it nor dispute the number, because the children were
there to prove it. A dozen times, and not one less!

And alas! not once more; and that was the reason why, in spite of
appearances, Mrs. Anna Greenfield ventured to think, in the depths of
her heart, that the Reverend William Greenfield, Vicar of St. Sampson's,
Tottenham, had not made her perfectly happy; and she thought so all the
more as, for four years now, she had been obliged to renounce all hope
of that annual sacrifice, which was so easy and so fugitive formerly,
but which had now fallen into disuse. In fact, at the birth of the
twelfth child, the reverend gentleman had expressly said to her:

"God has greatly blessed our union, my dear Anna. We have reached the
sacred number of the twelve tribes of Israel, and were we now to
persevere in the works of the flesh, it would be mere debauchery, and I
cannot suppose that you would wish me to end my exemplary life in
lustful practices."

His wife blushed and looked down, and the holy man, with the legitimate
pride of virtue which is its own reward, audibly thanked Heaven that he
was "not as other men are."

A model among wives and the paragon of mothers, Anna lived with him for
four years on those terms, without complaining to anyone, and contented
herself by praying fervently to God that He would mercifully inspire her
husband with the desire to begin a second series of the twelve tribes.
At times even, in order to make her prayers more efficacious, she tried
to compass that end by culinary means. She spared no pains, and gorged
the reverend gentleman with highly-seasoned dishes. Hare soup, ox-tails
stewed in sherry, the green fat in turtle soup, stewed mushrooms,
Jerusalem artichokes, celery, and horse-radish; hot sauces, truffles,
hashes with wine and cayenne pepper in them, curried lobsters, pies made
of cocks' combs, oysters, and the soft roe of fish; and all these dishes
were washed down by strong beer and generous wines, Scotch ale,
Burgundy, dry champagne, brandy, whiskey and gin; in a word, by that
numberless array of alcoholic drinks with which the English people love
to heat their blood.

And, as a matter of fact, the reverend gentleman's blood became very
heated, as was shown by his nose and cheeks, but in spite of this, the
powers above were inexorable, and he remained quite indifferent as
regards his wife, who was unhappy and thoughtful at the sight of that
protruding nasal appendage, which, alas! was alone in its glory.

She became thinner, and at the same time, flabbier than ever, and almost
began to lose her trust in God, when, suddenly, she had an inspiration.
Was it not, perhaps, the work of devil?

She did not care to inquire too closely into the matter, as she thought
it a very good idea, and it was this:

"Go to the Universal Exhibition in Paris, and there, perhaps, you will
discover the secret to make yourself loved."

Decidedly luck favored her, for her husband immediately gave her
permission to go, and as soon as she got into the _Esplanade des
Invalides_, she saw the Algerian dancers, and she said to herself.

"Surely this would inspire William with the desire to be the father of
the thirteenth tribe!"

But how could she manage to get him to be present at such abominable
orgies? For she could not hide from herself that it was an abominable
exhibition, and she knew how scandalized he would be at their voluptuous
movements. She had no doubt that the devil had led her there, but she
could not take her eyes off the scene, and it gave her an idea; and so
for nearly a fortnight you might have seen the poor, unattractive woman
sitting, and attentively and curiously watching the swaying hips of the
Algerian women. She was learning.

The very evening of her return to London, she rushed into her husband's
bedroom, disrobed herself in an instant, except for a thin gauze
covering, and for the first time in her life appeared before him in all
the ugliness of her semi-nudity.

"Come, come," the saintly man stammered out, "are you--are you mad,
Anna! What demon has possessed you? Why inflict the disgrace of such a
spectacle on me?"

But she did not listen to him, and did not reply, but suddenly she also
began to sway her hips about like an almah[10]. The reverend gentleman
could not believe his eyes, and in his stupefaction, he did not think of
covering them with his hands or even of shutting them. He looked at her,
stupefied and dumbfounded, a prey to the hypnotism of ugliness. He
watched her as she came forward and retired, and went up and down, as
she skipped and wriggled, and threw herself into extraordinary
attitudes. For a long time he sat motionless and almost unable to speak.
He only said in a low voice:

[Footnote 10: Egyptian dancing girl.--TRANSLATOR.]

"Oh, Lord! To think that twelve times!... twelve times!... a whole
dozen!"

However, she fell into a chair, panting and worn out, and said to
herself:

"Thank Heaven! William looks like he used to do formerly on the days
that he honored me. Thank Heaven! There will be a thirteenth tribe, and
then a fresh series of tribes, for William is very methodical in all
that he does!"

But William merely took a blanket off the bed and threw it over her,
saying in a voice of thunder:

"Your name is no longer Anna, Mrs. Greenfield; for the future you shall
be called Jezabel. I only regret that I have twelve times mingled my
blood with your impure blood." And then, seized by pity, he added: "If
you were only in a state of inebriety, of intoxication, I could excuse
you."

"Well, yes, yes!" she exclaimed, repentantly, "yes, I am in that
state ... Forgive me, William--forgive a poor drunken woman!"

"I will forgive you, Anna," he replied, and he gave her a wash-hand
basin, saying: "Cold water will do you good, and when your head is
clear, remember the lesson which you must learn from this occurrence."

"What lesson?" she asked, humbly.

"That people ought never to depart from their usual habits."

"But why, then, William," she asked, timidly, "have you changed your
habits?"

"Hold your tongue!" he cried--"hold your tongue, Jezabel! Have you not
got over your intoxication yet? For twelve years I certainly followed
the divine precept: _increase and multiply_, once a year. But since
then, I have grown accustomed to something else, and I do not wish to
alter my habits."

And the Reverend William Greenfield, Vicar of St. Sampson's, Tottenham,
the saintly man whose blood was inflamed by heating food and liquor,
whose ears were like full-blown poppies and who had a nose like a
tomato, left his wife and, as had been his habit for four years, went to
make love to Polly, the servant.

"Now, Polly," he said, "you are a clever girl, and I mean, through you,
to teach Mrs. Greenfield a lesson she will never forget. I will try and
see what I can do for you."

And in order to this, he called her his little Jezabel, and said to her,
with an unctuous smile:

"Call me Jeroboam! You don't understand why? Neither do I, but that does
not matter. Take off all your things, Polly, and show yourself to Mrs.
Greenfield."

The servant did as she was bidden, and the result was that Mrs.
Greenfield never again hinted to her husband the desirability of laying
the foundation of a thirteenth tribe.




THE LOG


It was a small drawing-room, with thick hangings, and with a faint,
judicious smell of flowers and scents about it. A large fire was burning
in the grate, while one lamp, covered with a shade of old lace, on the
corner of the mantel-piece threw a soft light onto the two persons who
were talking.

She, the mistress of the house, was an old lady with white hair, but one
of those adorable old ladies whose unwrinkled skin is as smooth as the
finest paper, and scented, impregnated with perfume as the delicate
essences which she had used in her bath for so many years had penetrated
through the epidermis.

He was a very old friend, who had never married, a constant friend, a
companion in the journey of life, but nothing else.

They had not spoken for about a minute, and they were both looking at
the fire, dreaming no matter of what, in one of those moments of
friendly silence between people who have no need to be constantly
talking in order to be happy together, when suddenly a large log, a
stump covered with burning roots, fell out. It fell over the fire-dogs
into the drawing-room, and rolled onto the carpet, scattering great
sparks all round. The old lady sprang up with a little scream, as if she
was going to run away, while he kicked the log back onto the hearth and
trod out all the burning sparks with his boots.

When the disaster was repaired, there was a strong smell of burning, and
sitting down opposite to his friend, the man looked at her with a smile,
and said, as he pointed to the log:

"That is the reason why I never married."

She looked at him in astonishment, with the inquisitive gaze of women
who wish to know everything, that eye which women have who are no longer
very young, in which complicated, and often malicious curiosity is
reflected, and she asked:

"How so?"

"Oh! that is a long story," he replied; "a rather sad and unpleasant
story."

"My old friends were often surprised at the coldness which suddenly
sprang up between one of my best friends, whose Christian name was
Julien, and myself. They could not understand how two such intimate and
inseparable friends as we had been could suddenly become almost
strangers to one another, and I will tell you the reason of it.

"He and I used to live together at one time. We were never apart, and
the friendship that united us seemed so strong that nothing could break
it.

"One evening when he came home, he told me that he was going to get
married, and it gave me a shock as if he had robbed me or betrayed me.
When a man's friend marries, it is all over between them. The jealous
affection of a woman, that suspicious, uneasy, and carnal affection,
will not tolerate that sturdy and frank attachment, that attachment of
the mind, of the heart, and mutual confidence which exists between two
men.

"You see, however great the love may be that unites them, a man and a
woman are always strangers in mind and intellect; they remain
belligerants, they belong to different races. There must always be a
conqueror and a conquered, a master and a slave; now the one, now the
other--they are never two equals. They press each other's hands, those
hands trembling with amorous passion; but they never press them with a
long, strong, loyal pressure, with that pressure which seems to open
hearts and to lay them bare in a burst of sincere, strong, manly
affection. Philosophers of old, instead of marrying and pro-creating
children who would abandon them as a consolation for their old age,
sought for a good, reliable friend, and grew old with him in that
communion of thought which can only exist between men.

"Well, my friend Julien married. His wife was pretty, charming, a
little, light, curly-haired, plump, bright woman, who seemed to worship
him; and at first I went but rarely to their house, as I was afraid of
interfering with their affection, and afraid of being in their way. But
somehow they attracted me to their house; they were constantly inviting
me, and seemed very fond of me. Consequently, by degrees I allowed
myself to be allured by the charm of their life. I often dined with
them, and frequently, when I returned home at night, I thought that I
would do as he had done, and get married, as I now found my empty house
very dull.

"They seemed very much in love with one another, and were never apart.

"Well, one evening Julien wrote and asked me to go to dinner, and I
naturally went.

"'My dear fellow,' he said, 'I must go out directly afterwards on
business, and I shall not be back until eleven o'clock, but I shall be
at eleven precisely, and I reckon you to keep Bertha company.'

"The young woman smiled.

"'It was my idea,' she said, 'to send for you.'

"I held out my hand to her.

"'You are as nice as ever,' I said, and I felt a long, friendly pressure
of my fingers, but I paid no attention to it; so we sat down to dinner,
and at eight o'clock Julien went out.

"As soon as he had gone, a kind of strange embarrassment immediately
seemed to arise between his wife and me. We had never been alone
together yet, and in spite of our daily increasing intimacy, this
_tête-à-tête_ placed us in a new position. At first I spoke vaguely of
those indifferent matters with which one fills up an embarrassing
silence, but she did not reply, and remained opposite to me with her
head down in an undecided manner, as if she were thinking over some
difficult subject, and as I was at a loss for commonplace ideas, I held
my tongue. It is surprising how hard it is at times to find anything to
say.

"And then, again, I felt in the air, I felt in the unseen, something
which is impossible for me to express, that mysterious premonition which
tells you beforehand of the secret intentions, be they good or evil, of
another person with respect to yourself.

"That painful silence lasted some time, and then Bertha said to me:

"'Will you kindly put a log on the fire, for it is going out.'

"So I opened the box where the wood was kept, which was placed just
where yours is, took out the largest log, and put it on the top of the
others, which were three-parts burnt, and then silence reigned in the
room again.

"In a few minutes the log was burning so brightly that it scorched our
faces, and the young woman raised her eyes to me--eyes that had a
strange look to me.

"'It is too hot now,' she said; 'let us go and sit on the sofa over
there.'

"So we went and sat on the sofa, and then she said suddenly, looking me
full in the face:

"'What should you do if a woman were to tell you that she was in love
with you?'

"'Upon my word,' I replied, very much at a loss for an answer, 'I cannot
foresee such a case; but it would very much depend upon the woman.'

"She gave a hard, nervous, vibrating laugh; one of those false laughs
which seem as if they must break thin glasses, and then she added: 'Men
are never either venturesome nor acute.' And after a moment's silence,
she continued: 'Have you ever been in love, Monsieur Paul?' I was
obliged to acknowledge that I certainly had been, and she asked me to
tell her all about it, whereupon I made up some story or other. She
listened to me attentively with frequent sighs of approbation and
contempt, and then suddenly she said:

"'No, you understand nothing about the subject. It seems to me, that
real love must unsettle the mind, upset the nerves and distract the
head; that it must--how shall I express it?--be dangerous, even
terrible, almost criminal and sacrilegious; that it must be a kind of
treason; I mean to say that it is almost bound to break laws, fraternal
bonds, sacred obstacles; when love is tranquil, easy, lawful and without
dangers, is it really love?'

"I did not know what answer to give her, and I made this philosophical
reflection to myself: 'Oh! female brain, here indeed you show yourself!'

"While speaking, she had assumed a demure, saintly air; and resting on
the cushions, she stretched herself out at full length, with her head on
my shoulder and her dress pulled up a little, so as to show her red silk
stockings, which the fire-light made look still brighter. In a minute or
two she continued:

"'I suppose I have frightened you?' I protested against such a notion,
and she leant against my breast altogether, and without looking at me
she said: 'If I were to tell you that I love you, what would you do?'

"And before I could think of an answer, she had thrown her arms round my
neck, had quickly drawn my head down and put her lips to mine.

"Oh! My dear friend, I can tell you that I did not feel at all happy!
What! deceive Julien? become the lover of this little silly,
wrong-headed, cunning woman, who was no doubt terribly sensual, and for
whom her husband was already not sufficient! To betray him continually,
to deceive him, to play at being in love merely because I was attracted
by forbidden fruit, danger incurred and friendship betrayed! No, that
did not suit me, but what was I to do? To imitate Joseph, would be
acting a very stupid, and, moreover, difficult part, for this woman was
maddening in her perfidy, inflamed by audacity, palpitating and excited.
Let the man who has never felt on his lips, the warm kiss of a woman who
is ready to give herself to him, throw the first stone at me ...

"... Well, a minute more ... you understand what I mean? A minute more
and ... I should have been ... no, she would have been ... I beg your
pardon, he would have been!... when a loud noise made us both jump up.
The log had fallen into the room, knocking over the fire-irons and the
fender, and onto the carpet which it had scorched, and had rolled under
an arm-chair, which it would certainly set alight.

"I jumped up like a madman, and as I was replacing that log which had
saved me, on the fire, the door opened hastily, and Julien came in.

"'I have done,' he said, in evident pleasure. 'The business was over two
hours sooner than I expected!'

"Yes, my dear friend, without that log, I should have been caught in the
very act, and you know what the consequences would have been!

"You may be sure that I took good care never to be overtaken in a
similar situation again; never, never. Soon afterwards I saw that Julien
was giving me the 'cold shoulder,' as they say. His wife was evidently
undermining our friendship; by degrees he got rid of me, and we have
altogether ceased to meet.

"I have not got married which ought not to surprise you, I think."




MARGOT'S TAPERS


I

Margot Fresquyl had allowed herself to be tempted for the first time by
the delicious intoxication of the mortal sin of loving, on the evening
of Midsummer Day.

While most of the young people were holding each others' hands and
dancing in a circle round the burning logs, the girl had slyly taken the
deserted road which led to the wood, leaning on the arm of her partner,
a tall, vigorous farm servant, whose Christian name was Tiennou, which,
by the way, was the only name he had borne from his birth. For he was
entered on the register of births with this curt note: _Father and
mother unknown_; he having been found on St. Stephen's Day under a shed
on a farm, where some poor, despairing wretch had abandoned him, perhaps
even without turning her head round to look at him.

For months Tiennou had madly worshiped that fair, pretty girl, who was
now trembling as he clasped her in his arms, under the sweet coolness of
the leaves. He religiously rememberd how she had dazzled him--like some
ecstastic vision, the recollection of which always remains imprinted on
the eyes--the first time that he saw her in her father's mill, where he
had gone to ask for work. She stood out all rosy from the warmth of the
day, amidst the impalpable clouds of flour, which diffused an indistinct
whiteness through the air. With her hair hanging about her in untidy
curls, as if she had just awakened from a profound sleep, she stretched
herself lazily, with her bare arms clasped behind her head, and yawned
so as to show her white teeth, which glistened like those of a young
wolf, and her maiden nudity appeared beneath her unbuttoned bodice with
innocent immodesty. He told her that he thought her adorable, so
stupidly, that she made fun of him and scourged him with her cruel
laughter; and, from that day he spent his life in Margot's shadow. He
might have been taken for one of those wild beasts ardent with desire,
which ceaselessly utter maddened cries to the stars on nights when the
constellations bathe the dark coverts in warm light. Margot met him
wherever she went, and seized with pity, and by degrees agitated by his
sobs, by his dumb entreaties, by the burning looks which flashed from
his large eyes, she had returned his love; she had dreamt restlessly
that during a whole night she had been in his vigorous arms which
pressed her like corn that is being crushed in the mill, that she was
obeying a man who had subdued her, and learning strange things which the
other girls talked about in a low voice when they were drawing water at
the well.

She had, however, been obliged to wait until Midsummer Day, for the
miller watched over his heiress very carefully.

The two lovers told each other all this as they were going along the
dark road, and innocently giving utterance to words of happiness, which
rise to the lips like the forgotten refrain of a song. At times they
were silent, not knowing what more to say, and not daring to embrace
each other any more. The night was soft and warm, the warmth of a
half-closed alcove in a bedroom, and which had the effect of a tumbler
of new wine.

The leaves were sleeping motionless and in supreme peace, and in the
distance they could hear the monotonous sound of the brooks as they
flowed over the stones. Amidst the dull noise of the insects, the
nightingales were answering each other from tree to tree, and everything
seemed alive with hidden life, and the sky was bright with such a shower
of falling stars, that they might have been taken for white forms
wandering among the dark trunks of the trees.

"Why have we come?" Margot asked, in a panting voice. "Do you not want
me any more, Tiennou?"

"Alas! I dare not," he replied. "Listen: you know that I was picked up
on the high road, that I have nothing in the world except my two arms,
and that Miller Fresquyl will never let his daughter marry a poor devil
like me."

She interrupted him with a painful gesture, and putting her lips to his,
she said:

"What does that matter? I love you, and I want you ... Take me ..."

And it was thus, on St. John's night, Margot Fresquyl for the first time
yielded to the mortal sin of love.


II

Did the miller guess his daughter's secret, when he heard her singing
merrily from dawn till dusk, and saw her sitting dreaming at her window
instead of sewing as she was in the habit of doing?

Did he see it when she threw ardent kisses from the tips of her fingers
to her lover at a distance?

However that might have been, he shut poor Margot in the mill as if it
had been a prison. No more love or pleasure, no more meetings at night
at the verge of the wood. When she chatted with the passers-by, when she
tried furtively to open the gate of the enclosure and to make her
escape, her father beat her as if she had been some disobedient animal,
until she fell on her knees on the floor with clasped hands, scarcely
able to move and her whole body covered with purple bruises.

She pretended to obey him, but she revolted in her whole being, and the
string of bitter insults which he heaped upon her rang in her head. With
clenched hands, and a gesture of terrible hatred, she cursed him for
standing in the way of her love, and at night, she rolled about on her
bed, bit the sheets, moaned, stretched herself out for imaginary
embraces, maddened by the sensual heat with which her body was still
palpitating. She called out Tiennou's name aloud, she broke the peaceful
stillness of the sleeping house with her heartrending sobs, and her
dejected voice drowned the monotonous sound of the water that was
dripping under the arch of the mill, between the immovable paddles of
the wheel.


III

Then there came that terrible week in October when the unfortunate young
fellows who had drawn bad numbers had to join their regiments.[11]
Tiennou was one of them, and Margot was in despair to think that she
should not see him for five interminable years, that they could not
even, at that hour of sad farewells, be alone and exchange those
consoling words which afterwards alleviate the pain of absence.

[Footnote 11: Written before universal service was obligatory, and when
soldiers were selected by conscription, a certain amount of those who
drew high numbers, being exempt from service.--TRANSLATOR.]

Tiennou prowled about the house, like a starving beggar, and one
morning, while the miller was mending the wheel, he managed to see
Margot.

"I will wait for you in the old place to-night," he whispered, in
terrible grief. "I know it is the last time ... I shall throw myself
into some deep hole in the river if you do not come! ..."

"I will be there, Tiennou," she replied, in a bewildered manner. "I
swear I will be there ... even if I have to do something terrible to
enable me to come!"

       *       *       *       *       *

The village was burning in the dark night, and the flames, fanned by the
wind, rose up like sinister torches. The thatched roofs, the ricks of
corn, the haystacks, and the barns fell in, and crackled like rockets,
while the sky looked as if they were illuminated by an _aurora
borealis_. Fresquyl's mill was smoking, and its calcined ruins were
reflected on the deep water. The sheep and cows were running about the
fields in terror, the dogs were howling, and the women were sitting on
the broken furniture, and were crying and wringing their hands; while
during all this time Margot was abandoning herself to her lover's ardent
caresses, and with her arms round his neck, she said to him, tenderly:

"You see that I have kept my promise ... I set fire to the mill so that
I might be able to get out. So much the worse if all have suffered. But
I do not care as long as you are happy in having me, and love me!"

And pointing to the fire which was still burning fiercely in the
distance, she added with a burst of savage laughter:

"Tiennou, we shall not have such beautiful tapers at out wedding Mass
when you come back from your regiment!"

And thus it was that for the second time Margot Fresquyl yielded to the
mortal sin of love.




CAUGHT IN THE VERY ACT


"It is certain," Sulpice de Laurièr said, "that I had absolutely
forgotten the date on which I was to allow myself to be taken in the
very act, with a mistress for the occasion. As neither my wife nor I had
any serious nor plausible reason for a divorce, not even the slightest
incompatibility of temper, and as there is always a risk of not
softening the heart of even the most indulgent judge when he is told
that the parties have agreed to drag their load separately, each for
themselves, that they are too frisky, too fond of pleasure and of
wandering about from place to place to continue the conjugal experiment,
we between us got up the ingenious stage arrangement of, 'a serious
wrong...'

"This was funnier than all the rest, and under any other circumstances
it would have been repugnant to me to mix up our servants in the affair
like so many others do, or to distress that pretty little, fair and
delicate Parisian woman, even though it were only in appearance and to
pass as a common _Sganarelle_ with the manners of a carter, in the eyes
of some scoundrel of a footman, or of some lady's maid. And so when
Maître Le Chevrier, that kind lawyer who certainly knows more female
secrets than the most fashionable confessor, gave a startled exclamation
on seeing me still in my dressing-gown, and slowly smoking a cigar like
an idler who has no engagements down on his tablets, and who is quietly
waiting for the usual time for dressing and going to dine at his club,
he exclaimed:

"'Have you forgotten that this is the day, at the _Hôtel de Bade_,
between five and six o'clock? In an hour, Madame de Laurière will be at
the office of the Police Commissary in the Rue de Provence, with her
uncle and Maître Cantenac ...'

"An hour; I only had an hour, sixty short minutes to dress in, to take a
room, find a woman and persuade her to go with me immediately, and to
excite her feelings, so that this extravagant adventure might not appear
too equivocal to the Commissary of Police. One hour in which to carry
out such a program was enough to make a man lose his head. And there
were no possible means of putting off that obligatory entertainment, to
let Madame Le Laurière know in time, and to gain a few minutes more.

"'Have you found a woman, at any rate?' Maître de Chevrier continued
anxiously.

"'No, my dear sir!'

"I immediately began to think of the whole string of my dear female
friends. Should I choose Liline Ablette, who could refuse me nothing,
Blanch Rebus, who was the best comrade a man ever had, or Lalie Spring,
that luxurious creature, who was constantly in search of something new?
Neither one nor the other of them, for it was ninety-nine chances to one
that all these confounded girls were in the _Bois de Boulogne_, or at
their dressmakers!"

"'Bah! Just pick up the first girl you meet on the pavement.'

"And before the hour was up, I was bolting the door of a room, which
looked out onto the boulevard.

"The woman whom I had picked up, as she was walking past the _cafés_,
from the _Vaudeville_ to _Tortoni's_, was twenty at the most. She had an
impudent, snub nose, as if it had been turned up in fun by a fillip,
large eyes with-deep rims round them; her lips were too red, and she had
the slow, indolent walk of a girl who goes in for debauchery too freely
and who began too soon, but she was pretty, and her linen was very clean
and neat. And she was evidently used to chance love-making, and had a
way of undressing herself in two or three rapid movements, of throwing
her toggery to the right and left, until she was extremely lightly clad,
and of throwing herself onto the bed which astonished me as a sight that
was well worth seeing.

"She did not talk much, though she began by saying: 'Pay up at once, old
man ... You don't look like a fellow who would bilk a girl, but it puts
me into better trim when I have been paid.'

"I gave her two napoleons, and she eyed me with gratitude and respect at
the same time, but also with that uneasy look of a girl who asks
herself: 'What does this tool expect for it?'

"The whole affair began to amuse me, and I must confess that I was
rather taken with her, for she had a beautiful figure and complexion,
and I was hoping that the Commissary would not come directly, when there
was a loud rapping at the door.

"She sat up with a start, and grew so pale that one would have said she
was about to faint.

"'What a set of pigs, to come and interrupt people like this!' she
muttered between her teeth; while I affected the most complete calm.

"'Somebody who has made a mistake in the room, my dear,' I said.

"But this noise increased, and suddenly I heard a man's voice saying
clearly and authoritatively:

"'Open the door, in the name of the law!'

"On hearing that, one would have thought that she had received a shock
from an electric battery, by the nimble manner in which she jumped out
of bed; and quickly putting on her stays and her dress anyhow, she
endeavored to discover a way out in every corner of the room, like a
wild beast, trying to escape from its cage. I thought that she was going
to throw herself out of the window, so I seized hold of her to prevent
her.

"The unfortunate creature acted like a madwoman, and when she felt my
arm round her waist, she cried in a hoarse voice:

"'I see it ... You have sold me ... You thought that I should expose
myself.... Oh! you filthy brutes--you filthy brutes!'

"And suddenly, passing from abuse to entreaties, pale and with
chattering teeth, she threw herself at my feet, and said, in a low
voice:

"'Listen to me, my dear: you don't look a bad sort of fellow, and you
would not like them to lock me up. I have a kid and the old woman to
keep. Hide me behind the bed, do, and please don't give me up.... I
will make it up to you, and you shall have no cause for grumbling....'

"At that moment however, the lock which they had unscrewed fell onto the
floor with a metallic sound, and Madame de Laurière and the Police
Commissary, wearing his tricolored scarf, appeared in the door, while
behind them the heads of the uncle and of the lawyer could be seen
indistinctly in the background.

"The girl had uttered a cry of terror and going up to the Commissary she
said, panting:

"'I swear to you that I am not guilty, that I was not ... I will tell
you everything if you will promise me not to tell them that I spilt, for
they would pay me out....'

"The Commissary, who was surprised, but who guessed that there was
something which was not quite clear behind all this, forgot to draw up
his report, and so the lawyer went up to him and said:

"'Well, monsieur, what are we waiting for?'

"But he paid no attention to anything but the woman, and looking at her
sharply and suspiciously through his gold-rimmed spectacles, he said to
her in a hard voice:

"'Your names and surnames?'

"'Juliette Randal, or as I am generally called, Jujutte Pipehead.'

"'So you will swear you were not--'

"She interrupted him eagerly:

"'I swear it, monsieur, and I know that my little man had nothing to do
with it either. He was only keeping a look-out while the others collared
the swag. ... I will swear that I can account for every moment of my
time that night. Roquin was drunk, and told me everything.... They got
five thousand francs from Daddy Zacharias, and of course Roquin had his
share, but he did not work with his partners. It was Minon Ménilmuche,
whom they call _Drink-without-Thirst_, who held the gardener's hands,
and who bled him with a blow from his knife.'

"The Commissary let her run on, and when she had finished, he questioned
me, as if I had belonged to Jujutte's band.

"'Your name, Christian name, and profession?'

"'Marquis Sulpice de Laurièr, living on my own private income, at 24,
Rue de Galilee.'

"'De Laurièr? Oh, very well.... Excuse me, monsieur, but at Madame de
Laurière's request, I declare formally before these gentlemen, who will
be able to give evidence, that the girl Juliette Randal, whom they call
_Jujutte Tête-de-Pipe_, is your mistress. You are at liberty to go,
Monsieur le Marquis, and you, girl Randal answer my questions.'

"Thus, by the most extraordinary chance, our divorce suit created a
sensation which I had certainly never foreseen. I was obliged to appear
in the Assize Court as a witness in the celebrated case of those
burglars, when three of them were condemned to death, and to undergo the
questioning of the idiotic Presiding Judge, who tried by all means in
his power to make me acknowledge that I was Jujutte Tête-de-Pipe's
regular lover; and in consequence, ever since then I have passed as an
ardent seeker after novel sensations, and a man who wallows in the
lowest depths of the Parisian dunghill.

"I cannot say that this unjust reputation has brought me any pleasant
love affairs. Women are so perverse, so absurd, and so curious!"




THE CONFESSION


Monsieur de Champdelin had no reason to complain of his lot as a married
man; nor could he accuse destiny of having played him in a bad turn, as
it does so many others, for it would have been difficult to find a more
desirable, merrier, prettier little woman, or one who was easier to
amuse and to guide than his wife. To see the large, limpid eyes which
illuminated her fair, girlish face, one would think that her mother must
have spent whole nights before her birth, in looking dreamily at the
stars, and so had become, as it were, impregnated with their magic
brightness. And one did not know which to prefer--her bright, silky
hair, or her slightly _restroussé_ nose, with its vibrating nostrils,
her red lips, which looked as alluring as a ripe peach, her beautiful
shoulders, her delicate ears, which resembled mother-of-pearl, or her
slim waist and rounded figure, which would have delighted and tempted a
sculptor.

And then she was always merry, overflowing with youth and life, never
dissatisfied, only wishing to enjoy herself, to laugh, to love and be
loved, and putting all the house into a tumult, as if it had been a
great cage full of birds. In spite of all this, however, that worn out
fool, Champdelin, had never cared much about her, but had left that
charming garden lying waste, and almost immediately after their
honeymoon, he had resumed is usual bachelor habits, and had begun to
lead the same fast life that he had done of old.

It was stronger than he, for his was one of those libertine natures
which are constant targets for love, and which never resign themselves
to domestic peace and happiness. The last woman who came across him, in
a love adventure, was always the one whom he loved best, and the mere
contact with a petticoat inflamed him, and made him commit the most
imprudent actions.

As he was not hard to please, he fished, as it were, in troubled waters,
went after the ugly ones and the pretty ones alike, was bold even to
impudence, was not to be kept off by mistakes, nor anger, nor modesty,
nor threats, though he sometimes fell into a trap and got a thrashing
from some relative or jealous lover; he withstood all attempts to get
hush-money out of him, and became only all the more enamored of vice and
more ardent in his lures and pursuit of love affairs on that account.

But the work-girls and the shop-girls and all the tradesmen's wives in
Saint Martéjoux knew him, and made him pay for their whims and their
coquetry, and had to put up with his love-making. Many of them smiled or
blushed when they saw him under the tall plane-trees in the public
garden, or met him in the unfrequented, narrow streets near the
Cathedral, with his thin, sensual face, whose looks had something
satyr-like about them, and some of them used to laugh at him and make
fun of him, though they ran away when he went up to them. And when some
friend or other, who was sorry that he could forget himself so far, used
to say to him, when he was at a loss for any other argument: "And your
wife, Champdelin? Are you not afraid that she will have her revenge and
pay you out in your own coin?" his only reply was a contemptuous and
incredulous shrug of the shoulders.

She deceive him, indeed; she, who was as devout, as virtuous, and as
ignorant of forbidden things as a nun, who cared no more for love than
she did for an old slipper! She, who did not even venture on any veiled
allusions, who was always laughing, who took life as it came, who
performed her religious duties with edifying assiduity, she to pay him
back, so as to make him look ridiculous, and to gad about at night?
Never! Anyone who could think such a thing must have lost his senses.

However, one summer day, when the roofs all seemed red-hot, and the
whole town appeared dead, Monsieur de Champdelin had followed two
milliner's girls, with bandboxes in their hands from street to street,
whispering nonsense to them, and promising beforehand to give them
anything they asked him for, and had gone after them as far as the
Cathedral. In their fright, they took refuge there, but he followed them
in, and, emboldened by the solitude of the nave, and by the perfect
silence in the building, he became more enterprising and bolder. They
did not know how to defend themselves, or to escape from him, and were
trembling at his daring attempts, and at his kisses, when he saw a
confessional whose doors were open, in one of the side chapels. "We
should be much more comfortable in there, my little dears," he said,
going into it, as if to get such an unexpected nest ready for them.

But they were quicker than he, and throwing themselves against the
grated door, they pushed it to before he could turn round, and locked
him in. At first he thought it was only a joke, and it amused him; but
when they began to laugh heartily and putting their tongues at him, as
if he had been a monkey in a cage, and overwhelmed him with insults, he
first of all grew angry, and then humble, offering to pay well for his
ransom, and he implored them to let him out, and tried to escape like a
mouse does out of a trap. They, however, did not appear to hear him, but
naively bowed to him ceremoniously, wished him good night, and ran out
as fast as they could.

Champdelin was in despair; he did not know what to do, and cursed his
bad luck. What would be the end of it? Who would deliver him from that
species of prison, and was he going to remain there all the afternoon
and night, like a portmanteau that had been forgotten at the lost
luggage office? He could not manage to force the lock, and did not
venture to knock hard against the sides of the confessional, for fear of
attracting the attention of some beadle or sacristan. Oh! those wretched
girls, and how people would make fun of him and write verses about him,
and point their fingers at him, if the joke were discovered and got
noised abroad!

By and by, he heard the faint sound of prayers in the distance and
through the green serge curtain that concealed him Monsieur Champdelin
heard the rattle of the beads on the chaplets, as the women repeated
their _Ave Maria's_, and the rustle of dresses and the noise of
footsteps on the pavement.

Suddenly, he felt a tickling in his throat that nearly choked him, and
he could not altogether prevent himself from coughing, and when at last
it passed off, the unfortunate man was horrified at hearing some one
come into the chapel and up to the confessional. Whoever it was, knelt
down, and gave a discreet knock at the grating which separated the
priest from his penitents, so he quickly put on the surplice and stole
which were hanging on a nail, and covering his face with his
handkerchief, and sitting back in the shade, he opened the grating.

It was a woman, who was already saying her prayers and he gave the
responses as well as he could, from his boyish recollections, and was
somewhat agitated by the delicious scent that emanated from her
half-raised veil and from her bodice; but at her first words he started
so, that he almost fainted. He had recognized his wife's voice, and it
felt to him as if his seat were studded with sharp nails, that the sides
of the confessional were closing in on him, and as if the air were
growing rarified.

He now collected himself, however, and regaining his self-possession, he
listened to what she had to say with increasing curiosity, and with some
uncertain, and necessary interruptions. The young woman sighed, was
evidently keeping back something, spoke about her unhappiness, her
melancholy life, her husband's neglect, the temptations by which she was
surrounded, and which she found it so difficult to resist; her
conscience seemed to be burdened by an intolerable weight, though she
hesitated to accuse herself directly. And in a low voice, with unctuous
and coaxing tones, and mastering himself, Champdelin said:

"Courage, my child; tell me everything; the divine mercy is infinite;
tell me all, without hesitation."

Then, all at once, she told him everything that was troubling her; how
passion and desire had thrown her into the arms of one of her husband's
best friends, the exquisite happiness that they felt when they met every
day, his delightful tenderness, which she could no longer resist, the
sin which was her joy, her only object, her consolation, her dream. She
grew excited, sobbed, seemed enervated and worn out, as if she were
still burning from her lover's kisses, hardly seemed to know what she
was saying, and begged for temporary absolution from her sins; but then
Champdelin, in his exasperation, and unable to restrain himself any
longer, interrupted her in a furious voice:

"Oh! no! Oh! no; this is not at all funny ... keep such sort of things
to yourself, my dear!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Poor little Madame de Champdelin nearly went out of her mind with fright
and astonishment, and they are now waiting for the decree which will
break their chains and let them part.




WAS IT A DREAM?


"I had loved her madly! Why does one love? Why does one love? How queer
it is to see only one being in the world, to have only one thought in
one's mind, only one desire in the heart, and only one name on the lips;
a name which comes up continually, which rises like the water in a
spring, from the depths of the soul, which rises to the lips, and which
one repeats over and over again which one whispers ceaselessly,
everywhere, like a prayer.

"I am going to tell you our story, for love only has one, which is
always the same. I met her and loved her; that is all. And for a whole
year I have lived on her tenderness, on her caresses, in her arms, in
her dresses, on her words, so completely wrapped up, bound, imprisoned
in everything which came from her, that I no longer knew whether it was
day or night, if I was dead or alive, on this old earth of ours, or
elsewhere.

"And then she died. How? I do not know. I no longer know; but one
evening she came home wet, for it was raining heavily, and the next day
she coughed, and she coughed for about a week, and took to her bed. What
happened I do not remember now, but doctors came, wrote and went away.
Medicines were brought, and some women made her drink them. Her hands
were hot, her forehead was burning, and her eyes bright and sad. When I
spoke to her, she answered me, but I do not remember what we said. I
have forgotten everything, everything, everything! She died, and I very
well remember her slight, feeble sigh. The nurse said: 'Ah! and I
understood, I understood!'

"I knew nothing more, nothing. I saw a priest, who said: 'Your
mistress?' and it seemed to me as if he were insulting her. As she was
dead, nobody had the right to know that any longer, and I turned him
out. Another came who was very kind and tender, and I shed tears when he
spoke to me about her.

"They consulted me about the funeral, but I do not remember anything
that they said, though I recollected the coffin, and the sound of the
hammer when they nailed her down in it. Oh! God, God!

"She was buried! Buried! She! In that hole! Some people came--female
friends. I made my escape, and ran away; I ran, and then I walked
through the streets, and went home, and the next day I started on a
journey."

       *       *       *       *       *

"Yesterday I returned to Paris, and when I saw my room again--our room,
our bed, our furniture, everything that remains of the life of a human
being after death, I was seized by such a violent attack of fresh grief,
that I was very near opening the window and throwing myself out into the
street. As I could not remain any longer among these things, between
these walls which had enclosed and sheltered her, and which retained a
thousand atoms of her, of her skin and of her breath in their
imperceptible crevices, I took up my hat to make my escape, and just as
I reached the door, I passed the large glass in the hall, which she had
put there so that she might be able to look at herself every day from
head to foot as she went out, to see if her toilet looked well, and was
correct and pretty, from her little boots to her bonnet.

"And I stopped short in front of that looking-glass in which she had so
often been reflected. So often, so often, that it also must have
retained her reflection. I was standing there, trembling, with my eyes
fixed on the glass--on that flat, profound, empty glass--which had
contained her entirely, and had possessed her as much as I had, as my
passionate looks had. I felt as if I loved that glass. I touched it, it
was cold. Oh! the recollection! sorrowful mirror, burning mirror,
horrible mirror, which makes us suffer such torments! Happy are the men
whose hearts forget everything that it has contained, everything that
has passed before it, everything that has looked at itself in it, that
has been reflected in its affection, in its love! How I suffer!

"I went on without knowing it, without wishing it; I went towards the
cemetery. I found her simple grave, a white marble cross, with these few
words:

"'_She loved, was loved, and died._'

"She is there, below, decayed! How horrible! I sobbed with my forehead
on the ground, and I stopped there for a long time, a long time. Then I
saw that it was getting dark, and a strange, a mad wish, the wish of a
despairing lover seized me. I wished to pass the night, the last night
in weeping on her grave. But I should be seen and driven out. How was I
to manage? I was cunning, and got up, and began to roam about in that
city of the dead. I walked and walked. How small this city is, in
comparison with the other, the city in which we live: And yet, how much
more numerous the dead are than the living. We want high houses, wide
streets, and much room for the four generations who see the daylight at
the same time, drink water from the spring, and wine from the vines, and
eat the bread from the plains.

"And for all the generations of the dead, for all that ladder of
humanity that has descended down to us, there is scarcely anything
afield, scarcely anything! The earth takes them back, oblivion effaces
them. Adieu!

"At the end of the abandoned cemetery, I suddenly perceived that the one
where those who have been dead a long time finish mingling with the
soil, where the crosses themselves decay, where the last comers will be
put to-morrow. It is full of untended roses, of strong and dark cypress
trees, a sad and beautiful garden, nourished on human flesh.

"I was alone, perfectly alone, and so I crouched in a green tree, and
hid myself there completely among the thick and somber branches, and I
waited, clinging to the stem, like a shipwrecked man does to a plank.

"When it was quite dark, I left my refuge and began to walk softly,
slowly, inaudibly, through that ground full of dead people, and I
wandered about for a long time, but could not find her again. I went on
with extended arms, knocking against the tombs with my hands, my feet,
my knees, my chest, even with my head, without being able to find her. I
touched and felt about like a blind man groping his way, I felt the
stones, the crosses, the iron railings, the metal wreaths, and the
wreaths of faded flowers! I read the names with my fingers, by passing
them over the letters. What a night! What a night! I could not find her
again!

"There was no moon. What a night! I am frightened, horribly frightened
in these narrow paths, between two rows of graves. Graves! graves!
graves! nothing but graves! On my right, on my left, in front of me,
around me, everywhere there were graves! I sat down on one of them, for
I could not walk any longer, my knees were so weak. I could hear my
heart beat! And I could hear something else as well. What? A confused,
nameless noise. Was the noise in my head in the impenetrable night, or
beneath the mysterious earth, the earth sown with human corpses? I
looked all around me, but I cannot say how long I remained there; I was
paralyzed with terror, drunk with fright, ready to shout out, ready to
die.

"Suddenly, it seemed to me as if the slab of marble on which I was
sitting, was moving. Certainly, it was moving, as if it were being
raised. With a bound, I sprang on to the neighboring tomb, and I saw,
yes, I distinctly saw the stone which I had just quitted, rise upright,
and the dead person appeared, a naked skeleton, which was pushing the
stone back with its bent back. I saw it quite clearly, although the
night was so dark. On the cross I could read:

"'_Here lies Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of fifty-one. He loved
his family, was kind and honorable, and died in the grace of the Lord._'

"The dead man also read what was inscribed on his tombstone; then he
picked up a stone off the path, a little, pointed stone, and began to
scrape the letters carefully. He slowly effaced them altogether, and
with the hollows of his eyes he looked at the places where they had been
engraved, and, with the tip of the bone, that had been his forefinger,
he wrote in luminous letters, like those lines which one traces on walls
with the tip of a lucifer match:

"'_Here reposes Jacques Olivant, who died at the age of fifty-one. He
hastened his father's death by his unkindness, as he wished to inherit
his fortune, he tortured his wife, tormented his children, deceived his
neighbors, robbed everyone he could, and died wretched._'

"When he had finished writing, the dead man stood motionless, looking at
his work, and on turning round I saw that all the graves were open, that
all the dead bodies had emerged from them, and that all had effaced the
lies inscribed on the gravestones by their relations, and had
substituted the truth instead. And I saw that all had been tormentors of
their neighbors--malicious, dishonest, hypocrites, liars, rogues,
calumniators, envious; that they had stolen, deceived, performed every
disgraceful, every abominable action, these good fathers, these faithful
wives, these devoted sons, these chaste daughters, these honest
tradesmen, these men and women who were called irreproachable, and they
were called irreproachable, and they were all writing at the same time,
on the threshold of their eternal abode, the truth, the terrible and the
holy truth which everybody is ignorant of, or pretends to be ignorant
of, while the others are alive.

"I thought that _she_ also must have written something on her tombstone,
and now, running without any fear among the half-open coffins, among the
corpses and skeletons, I went towards her, sure that I should find her
immediately. I recognized her at once, without seeing her face, which
was covered by the winding-sheet, and on the marble cross, where shortly
before I had read: '_She loved, was loved, and died_,' I now saw:
'_Having gone out one day, in order to deceive her lover, she caught
cold in the rain and died._'"

       *       *       *       *       *

"It appears that they found me at daybreak, lying on the grave
unconscious."




THE LAST STEP


Monsier de Saint-Juéry would not have deceived his old mistress for
anything in the world: perhaps from an instinctive fear that he had
heard of adventures that turn out badly, make a noise, and bring about
hateful family quarrels, crises from which one emerges enervated and
exasperated with destiny, and, as it were, with the weight of a bullet
on one's feet, and also from his requirement for a calm, sheep-like
existence, whose monotony was never disturbed by any shock, and perhaps
from the remains of the love which had so entirely made him, during the
first years of their connection, the slave of the proud, dominating
beauty, and of the enthralling charm of that woman.

He kept out of the way of temptation almost timidly, and was faithful to
her, and as submissive as a spaniel. He paid her every attention, did
not appear to notice that the outlines of her figure, which had formerly
been so harmonious and supple, were getting too full and puffy, that her
face, which used to remind him of a blush rose, was getting wrinkled,
and that her eyes were getting dull. He admired her in spite of
everything, almost blindly, and clothed her with imaginary charms, with
an autumnal beauty, with the majestic and serene softness of an October
twilight, and with the last blossoms which unfold by the side of the
walks, strewn with dead leaves.

But although their connection had lasted for many years, though they
were as closely bound to each other as if they had been married, and
although Charlotte Guindal pestered him with entreaties, and upset him
with continual quarrels on the subject, and, in spite of the fact that
he believed her to be absolutely faithful to him, and worthy of his most
perfect confidence and love, yet Monsieur de Saint-Juéry had never been
able to make up his mind to give her his name, and to put their false
position on a legal footing.

He really suffered from this, but remained firm and defended his
position, quibbled, sought for subterfuges, replied by the eternal and
vague: "What would be the good of it," which nearly sent Charlotte mad,
made her furious and caused her to say angry and ill-tempered things.
But he remained passive and listless, with his back bent like a restive
horse under the whip.

He asked her whether it was really necessary to their happiness, as they
had no children? Did not everybody think that they were married? Was not
she everywhere called Madame de Saint-Juéry, and had their servants any
doubt that they were in the service of respectable, married people? Was
not the name which had been transmitted to a man from father to son,
intact, honored, and often with a halo of glory round it, a sacred trust
which no one had a right to touch? What would she gain if she bore it
legitimately? Did she for a moment suppose that she would rise higher in
people's estimation, and be more admitted into society, or that people
would forget that she had been his regular mistress before becoming his
wife? Did not everybody know that formerly, before he rescued her from
that Bohemian life in which she had been waiting for her chance in vain,
and was losing her good looks, Charlotte Guindal frequented all the
public balls, and showed her legs liberally at the _Moulin-Rouge_[12].

[Footnote 12: A café chantant, and casino.]

Charlotte knew his crabbed, though also kindly character, which was at
the same time logical and obstinate, too well to hope that she would
ever be able to overcome his opposition and scruples, except by some
clever woman's trick, some well-acted scene in a comedy; so she appeared
to be satisfied with his reasons, and to renounce her bauble, and
outwardly she showed an equable and conciliatory temper, and no longer
worried Monsieur de Saint-Juéry with her recriminations, and thus the
time went by, in calm monotony, without fruitless battles or fierce
assaults.

Charlotte Guindal's medical man was Doctor Rabatel, one of those clever
men who appear to know everything, but whom a country bone-setter would
reduce to a "why?" by a few questions; one of those men who wish to
impress everybody with their apparent value, and who make use of their
medical knowledge as if it were some productive commercial house, which
carried on a suspicious business; who can scent out those persons whom
they can manage as they please, as if they were a piece of soft wax, who
keep them in a continual state of terror, by keeping the idea of death
constantly before their eyes.

They soon manage to obtain the mastery over such persons, scrutinize
their consciences as well as the cleverest priest could do, make sure of
being well paid for their complicity as soon as they have obtained a
footing anywhere, and drain their patients of their secrets, in order to
use them as a weapon for extorting money on occasions. He felt sure
immediately that this middle-aged lady wanted something of him, as by
some extraordinary perversion of taste, he was rather fond of the
remains of a good-looking woman, if they were well got up, and offered
to him; of that high flavor which arises from soft lips, which had been
made tender through years of love, from gray hair powdered with gold,
from a body engaged in its last struggle, and which dreams of one more
victory before abdicating power altogether, he did not hesitate to
become his new patient's lover.

When winter came, however, a thorough change took place in Charlotte's
health, that had hitherto been so good. She had no strength left, she
felt ill after the slightest exertion, complained of internal pains, and
spent whole days lying on the couch, with set eyes and without uttering
a word, so that everybody thought that she was dying of one of those
mysterious maladies which cannot be coped with, but which, by degrees,
undermines the whole system. It was sad to see her rapidly sinking,
lying motionless on her pillows, while a mist seemed to have come over
her eyes, and her hands lay helplessly on the bed and her mouth seemed
sealed by some invisible finger. Monsieur de Saint-Juéry was in despair;
he cried like a child, and he suffered as if somebody had plunged a
knife into him, when the doctor said to him in his unctuous voice:

"I know that you are a brave man, my dear sir, and I may venture to tell
you the whole truth.... Madame de Saint-Juéry is doomed, irrevocably
doomed.... Nothing but a miracle can save her, and alas! there are no
miracles in these days. The end is only a question of a few hours, and
may come quite suddenly...."

Monsieur de Saint-Juéry had thrown himself into a chair, and was sobbing
bitterly, covering his face with his hands.

"My poor dear, my poor darling," he said, through his tears.

"Pray compose yourself, and be brave," the doctor continued, sitting
down by his side, "for I have to say something serious to you, and to
convey to you our poor patient's last wishes.... A few minutes ago, she
told me the secret of your double life, and of your connection with
her.... And now, in view of death, which she feels approaching so
rapidly, for she is under no delusion, the unhappy woman wishes to die
at peace with heaven, with the consolation of having regulated her
equivocal position, and of having become your wife."

Monsieur de Saint-Juéry sat upright, with a bewildered look, while he
moved his hands nervously; in his grief he was incapable of manifesting
any will of his own, or of opposing this unexpected attack.

"Oh! anything that Charlotte wishes, doctor; anything, and I will myself
go and tell her so, on my knees!"

       *       *       *       *      *

The wedding took place discreetly, with something funereal about it, in
the darkened room, where the words which were spoken had a strange
sound, almost of anguish. Charlotte, who was lying in bed, with her eyes
dilated through happiness, had put both trembling hands into those of
Monsieur de Saint-Juéry, and she seemed to expire with the word: "Yes"
on her lips. The doctor looked at the moving scene, grave and impassive,
with his chin buried in his white cravat, and his two arms resting on
the mantel-piece, while his eyes twinkled behind his glasses....

The next week, Madame de Saint-Juéry began to get better, and that
wonderful recovery about which Monsieur de Saint-Juéry tells everybody
with effusive gratitude, who will listen to him, has so increased Doctor
Rabatel's reputation, that at the next election he will be made a member
of the Academy of Medicine.




THE WILL


I knew that tall young fellow, René de Bourneval. He was an agreeable
man, though of a rather melancholy turn of mind, who seemed prejudiced
against everything, very skeptical, and able to tear worldly hypocrisies
to pieces. He often used to say:

"There are no honorable men, or at any rate, they only appear so when
compared to low people."

He had two brothers, whom he never saw, the Messieurs de Courcils, and I
thought they were by another father, on account of the difference in the
name. I had frequently heard that something strange had happened in the
family, but I did not know the details.

As I took a great liking to him, we soon became intimate, and one
evening, when I had been dining with him alone, I asked him by chance:
"Are you by your mother's first or second marriage?" He grew rather
pale, and then flushed, and did not speak for a few moments; he was
visibly embarrassed. Then he smiled in a melancholy and gentle manner,
which was peculiar to him, and said:

"My dear friend, if it will not weary you, I can give you some very
strange particulars about my life. I know that you are a sensible man,
so I do not fear that our friendship will suffer by my revelations, and
should it suffer, I should not care about having you for my friend any
longer.

"My mother, Madame de Courcils, was a poor little timid woman, whom her
husband had married for the sake of her fortune, and her whole life was
one of martyrdom. Of a loving, delicate mind, she was constantly being
ill-treated by the man who ought to have been my father, one of those
bores called country gentleman. A month after their marriage he was
living with a servant, and besides that, the wives and daughters of his
tenants were his mistresses, which did not prevent him from having three
children by his wife, or three, if you count me in. My mother said
nothing, and lived in that noisy house like a little mouse. Set aside,
disparaged, nervous, she looked at people with her bright, uneasy,
restless eyes, the eyes of some terrified creature which can never shake
off its fear. And yet she was pretty, very pretty and fair, a
gray-blonde, as if her hair had lost its color through her constant
fears.

"Among Monsieur de Courcil's friends who constantly came to the
_château_, there was an ex-cavalry officer, a widower, a man who was
feared, who was at the same time tender and violent, capable of the most
energetic resolutions, Monsieur de Bourneval, whose name I bear. He was
a tall, thin man, with a heavy black moustache, and I am very like him.
He was a man who had read a great deal, and whose ideas were not like
those of most of his class. His great-grandmother had been a friend of
J.J. Rousseau's, and one might have said that he had inherited something
of this ancestral connection. He knew the _Contrat Social_, and the
_Nouvelle Héloîse_ by heart, and all those philosophical books which
long beforehand prepared the overthrow of our old usages, prejudices,
superannuated laws and imbecile morality.

"It seems that he loved my mother, and she loved him, but their intrigue
was carried on so secretly, that no one guessed it. The poor, neglected,
unhappy woman, must have clung to him in a despairing manner, and in her
intimacy with him must have imbibed all his ways of thinking, theories
of free thought, audacious ideas of independent love; but as she was so
timid that she never ventured to speak aloud, it was all driven back,
condensed and expressed in her heart, which never opened itself.

"My two brothers were very hard towards her, like their father was, and
never gave her a caress, and, used to seeing her count for nothing in
the house, they treated her rather like a servant, and so I was the only
one of her sons who really loved her, and whom she loved.

"When she died, I was seventeen, and I must add, in order that you may
understand what follows, that there had been a law suit between my
father and my mother, and that their property had been separated, to my
mother's advantage, as, thanks to the tricks of the law, and the
intelligent devotion of a lawyer to her interests, she had preserved the
right of making her will in favor of anyone she pleased.

"We were told that there was a will lying at the lawyer's, and were
invited to be present at the reading of it. I can remember it, as if it
were yesterday. It was a grand, dramatic, burlesque, surprising scene,
brought about by the posthumous revolt of that dead woman, by that cry
for liberty, that claim from the depths of her tomb, of that martyred
woman who had been crushed by our habits during her life, and, who, from
her closed tomb, uttered a despairing appeal for independence.

"The man who thought that he was my father, a stout, ruddy-faced man,
who gave everyone the idea of a butcher, and my brothers, two great
fellows of twenty and twenty-two, were waiting quietly in their chairs.
Monsieur de Bourneval, who had been invited to be present, came in and
stood behind me. He was very pale, and bit his moustache, which was
turning gray. No doubt he was prepared for what was going to happen, and
the lawyer double-locked the door and began to read the will, after
having opened the envelope, which was sealed with red wax, and whose
contents he was ignorant of, in our presence."

My friend stopped suddenly and got up, and from his writing-table he
took an old paper, unfolded it, kissed it, and then continued: "This is
the will of my beloved mother:

     "'I, the undersigned, Anne Catherine-Genevieve-Mathilde de
     Croixlure, the legitimate wife of Leopold-Joseph Goutran de
     Courcils, sound in body and mind, here express my last wishes.

     "'I first of all ask God, and then my dear son René, to pardon me
     for the act I am about to commit. I believe that my child's heart
     is great enough to understand me, and to forgive me. I have
     suffered my whole life long. I was married out of calculation, then
     despised, misunderstood, oppressed and constantly deceived by my
     husband.

     "'I forgive him, but I owe him nothing.

     "'My eldest sons never loved me, never spoilt me, scarcely treated
     me as a mother, but during my whole life I was everything that I
     ought to have been, and I owe them nothing more after my death. The
     ties of blood cannot exist without daily and constant affection. An
     ungrateful son is less than a stranger; he is a culprit, for he has
     no right to be indifferent towards his mother.

     "'I have always trembled before men, before their unjust laws,
     their inhuman customs, their shameful prejudices. Before God, I
     have no longer any fear. Dead, I fling aside disgraceful hypocrisy;
     I dare to speak my thoughts, and to avow and to sign the secret of
     my heart.

     "'I therefore leave that part of my fortune of which the law allows
     me to dispose, as a deposit with my dear lover Pierre-Gennes-Simon
     de Bourneval, to revert afterwards to our dear son, René.

     "'(This wish is, moreover, formulated more precisely in a notarial
     deed).

     "'And I declare before the Supreme Judge who hears me, that I
     should have cursed heaven and my own existence, if I had not met my
     lover's deep, devoted, tender, unshaken affection, if I had not
     felt in his arms that the Creator made His creatures to love,
     sustain and console each other, and to weep together in the hours
     of sadness.

     "'Monsieur de Courcils is the father of my two eldest sons; René
     alone owes his life to Monsieur de Bourneval. I pray to the Master
     of men and of their destinies, to place father and son above social
     prejudices, to make them love each other until they die, and to
     love me also in my coffin.

     "'These are my last thoughts, and my last wish.

     "'MATHILDE DE CROIXLUCE.'"


"'Monsieur de Courcils had arisen and he cried:

"'It is the will of a mad woman.'

"Then Monsieur de Bourneval stepped forward and said in a loud and
penetrating voice: 'I, Simon de Bourneval, solemnly declare that this
writing contains nothing but the strict truth, and I am ready to prove
it by letters which I possess.'

"On hearing that, Monsieur de Courcils went up to him, and I thought
they were going to collar each other. There they stood, both of them
tall, one stout and the other thin, both trembling. My mother's husband
stammered out: 'You are a worthless wretch!' And the other replied in a
loud, dry voice: 'We will meet somewhere else, monsieur. I should have
already slapped your ugly face, and challenged you a long time ago, if I
had not, before everything else, thought of the peace of mind of that
poor woman whom you made suffer so much during her lifetime.'

"Then, turning to me, he said: 'You are my son; will you come with me? I
have no right to take you away, but I shall assume it, if you will
kindly come with me.' I shook his hand without replying, and we went out
together; I was certainly three parts mad.

"Two days later Monsieur de Bourneval killed Monsieur de Courcils in a
duel. My brothers, fearing some terrible scandal, held their tongues,
and I offered them, and they accepted, half the fortune which my mother
had left me. I took my real father's name, renouncing that which the law
gave me, but which was not really mine. Monsieur de Bourneval died three
years afterwards, and I have not consoled myself yet."

He rose from his chair, walked up and down the room, and, standing in
front of me, he said:

"Well, I say that my mother's will was one of the most beautiful and
loyal, as well as one of the grandest acts that a woman could perform.
Do you not think so?"

I gave him both my hands:

"Most certainly I do, my friend."




A COUNTRY EXCURSION


For five months they had been talking of going to lunch at some country
restaurant in the neighborhood of Paris, on Madame Dufour's birthday,
and as they were looking forward very impatiently to the outing, they
had got up very early that morning. Monsieur Dufour had borrowed the
milkman's tilted cart, and drove himself. It was a very tidy,
two-wheeled conveyance, with a hood, and in it the wife, resplendent in
a wonderful, sherry-colored, silk dress, sat by the side of her husband.

The old grandmother and a girl were accommodated with two chairs, and a
boy with yellow hair was lying at the bottom of the trap, of whom
however, nothing was to be seen except his head.

When they got to the bridge of Neuilly, Monsieur Dufour said: "Here we
are in the country at last!" and at that signal, his wife had grown
sentimental about the beauties of nature. When they got to the cross
roads at Courbevoie, they were seized with admiration for the distant
horizon down there; on the right, was the spire of Argenteuil church,
and above it rose the hills of Sannois, and the mill of Orgemont, while
on the left, the aqueduct of Marly stood out against the clear morning
sky, and in the distance they could see the terrace of Saint-Germain;
and opposite to them, at the end of a low chain of hills, the new fort
of Cormeilles. Quite in the distance, a very long way off, beyond the
plains and villages, one could see the somber green of the forests.

The sun was beginning to shine in their faces, the dust got into their
eyes, and on either side of the road there stretched an interminable
tract of bare, ugly country which smelt unpleasantly. One might have
thought that it had been ravaged by the pestilence, which had even
attacked the buildings, for skeletons of dilapidated and deserted
houses, or small cottages, which were left in an unfinished state, as
the contractors had not been paid, reared their four roofless walls on
each side.

Here and there tall factory chimneys rose up from the barren soil; the
only vegetation on that putrid land, where the spring breezes wafted an
odor of petroleum and shist, which was mingled with another smell, that
was even still less agreeable. At last, however, they crossed the Seine
a second time, and it was delightful on the bridge. The river sparkled
in the sun, and they had a feeling of quiet satisfaction and enjoyment,
in drinking in the purer air, that was not impregnated by the black
smoke of factories, nor by the miasma from the deposits of night soil. A
man whom they met, told them that the name of the place was _Bézons_,
and so Monsieur Dufour pulled up, and read the attractive announcement
outside an eating-house: _Restaurant Poulin, stews and fried fish,
private rooms, arbors and swings._

"Well! Madame Dufour, will this suit you? Will you make up your mind at
last?"

She read the announcement in her turn, and then looked at the house for
a time.

It was a white, country inn, built by the road side, and through the
open door she could see the bright zinc of the counter, at which two
workmen, out for the day, were sitting. At last she made up her mind,
and said:

"Yes, this will do; and, besides, there is a view."

So they drove into a large yard with trees in it, behind the inn, which
was only separated from the river by the towing-path, and got out. The
husband sprang out first, and then held out his arms for his wife, and
as the step was very high, Madame Dufour, in order to reach him, had to
show the lower part of her limbs, whose former slenderness had
disappeared in fat, the Monsieur Dufour, who was already getting excited
by the country air, pinched her calf, and then taking her in his arms,
he set her onto the ground, as if she had been some enormous bundle. She
shook the dust out of the silk dress, and then looked round, to see in
what sort of a place she was.

She was a stout woman, of about thirty-six, full-blown and delightful to
look at. She could hardly breathe, as her stays were laced too tightly,
and their pressure forced the heaving mass of her superabundant bosom up
to her double chin. Next, the girl put her hand onto her father's
shoulder, and jumped lightly out. The boy with the yellow hair had got
down by stepping on the wheel, and he helped Monsieur Dufour to get his
grandmother out. Then they unharnessed the horse, which they tied up to
a tree, and the carriage fell back, with both shafts in the air. The men
took off their coats, and washed their hands in a pail of water, and
then went and joined their ladies who had already taken possession of
the swings.

Mademoiselle Dufour was trying to swing herself standing up, but she
could not succeed in getting a start. She was a pretty girl of about
eighteen; one of those women who suddenly excite your desire when you
meet them in the street, and who leave you with a vague feeling of
uneasiness, and of excited senses. She was tall, had a small waist and
large hips, with a dark skin, very large eyes, and very black hair. Her
dress clearly marked the outlines of her firm, full figure, which was
accentuated by the motion of her hips as she tried to swing herself
higher. Her arms were stretched over her head to hold the rope, so that
her bosom rose at every movement she made. Her hat, which a gust of wind
had blown off, was hanging behind her, and as the swing gradually rose
higher and higher, she showed her delicate limbs up to the knees each
time, and the wind from the petticoats, which was more heady than the
fumes of wine, blew into the faces of the two men, who were looking at
her and smiling.

Sitting in the other swing, Madame Dufour kept saying in a monotonous
voice:

"Cyprian, come and swing me; do come and swing me, Cyprian!"

At last he went, and turning up his shirt sleeves as if he intended to
work very hard, he, with much difficulty set his wife in motion. She
clutched the two ropes, and held her legs out straight, so as not to
touch the ground. She enjoyed feeling giddy at the motion of the swing,
and her whole figure shook like a jelly on a dish, but as she went
higher and higher, she grew too giddy and got frightened. Every time she
was coming back she uttered a piercing scream which made all the little
urchins come round, and, down below, beneath the garden hedge, she
vaguely saw a row of mischievous heads, who made various grimaces as
they laughed.

When a servant girl came out, they ordered lunch.

"Some fried fish, a stewed rabbit, salad, and dessert," Madame Dufour
said, with an important air.

"Bring two quarts of beer and a bottle of claret," her husband said.

"We will have lunch on the grass," the girl added.

The grandmother, who had an affection for cats, had been running after
one that belonged to the house, and had been bestowing the most
affectionate words on it, for the last ten minutes. The animal, which
was no doubt secretly flattered by her attentions, kept close to the
good woman, but just out of reach of her hand, and quietly walked round
the trees, against which she rubbed herself, with her tail up, and
purring with pleasure.

"Hulloh!" the young man with the yellow hair, who was ferreting about,
suddenly exclaimed, "here are two swell boats!" They all went to look at
them, and saw two beautiful skiffs in a wooden boat-house, which were as
beautifully finished as if they had been objects of luxury. They were
moored side by side, like two tall, slender girls, in their narrow
shining length, and excited the wish to float in them on warm summer
mornings and evenings, along the bower-covered banks of the river, where
the trees dipped their branches into the water, where the rushes are
continually rustling in the breeze, and where the swift king-fishers
dart about like flashes of blue lightning.

The whole family looked at them with great respect.

"Oh! They are indeed two swell boats," Monsieur Dufour repeated gravely,
and he examined them gravely, and he examined them like a connoisseur.
He had been in the habit of rowing in his younger days, he said, and
when he had that in his hands--and he went through the action of pulling
the oars--he did not care a fig for anybody. He had beaten more than one
Englishman formerly at the Joinville regattas. He grew quite excited at
last, and offered to make a bet, that in a boat like that, he could row
six leagues an hour, without exerting himself.

"Lunch is ready," the waitress said, appearing at the entrance to the
boat-house, so they all hurried off, but two young men were already
lunching at the best place, which Madame Dufour had chosen in her mind
as her seat. No doubt they were the owners of the skiffs, for they were
dressed in boating costume. They were stretched out, almost lying on
chairs, and were sunburnt, and had on flannel trousers and thin cotton
jerseys, with short sleeves, which showed their bare arms, which were as
strong as blackmiths'. They were two strong fellows, who thought a great
deal of their vigor, and who showed in all their movements that
elasticity and grace of the limbs which can only be acquired by
exercise, and which is so different to the deformity with which the same
continual work stamps the mechanic.

They exchanged a rapid smile when they saw the mother, and then a look
on seeing the daughter.

"Let us give up our place," one of them said: "it will make us
acquainted with them."

The other got up immediately, and holding his black and red boating-cap
in his hand, he politely offered the ladies the only shady place in the
garden. With many excuses they accepted, and so that it might be more
rural, they sat on the grass, without either tables or chairs.

The two young men took their plates, knives, forks, etc., to a table a
little way off, and began to eat again, and their bare arms, which they
showed continually, rather embarrassed the girl. She even pretended to
turn her head aside, and not to see them, while Madame Dufour, who was
rather bolder, tempted by feminine curiosity, looked at them every
moment, and no doubt compared them with the secret unsightliness of her
husband. She had squatted herself on the ground, with her legs tucked
under her, after the manner of tailors, and she kept wriggling about
continually under the pretext that ants were crawling about her
somewhere. Monsieur Dufour, whom the presence of strangers of politeness
had put into rather a bad tempter, was trying to find a comfortable
position, which he did not, however, succeed in doing, and the young man
with the yellow hair was eating as silently as an ogre.

"It is lovely weather, Monsieur," the stout lady said to one of the
boating-men. She wished to be friendly, because they had given up their
place.

"It is, indeed, Madame," he replied; "do you often go into the country?"

"Oh! Only once or twice a year, to get a little fresh air; and you,
monsieur?"

"I come and sleep here every night."

"Oh! That must be very nice?"

"Certainly it is, Madame." And he gave them such a practical account of
his daily life, that it gave rise in the hearts of these shop-keepers,
who were deprived of the meadows, and who longed for country walks, to
that foolish love of nature, which they all feel so strongly the whole
year round, behind the counter in their shop.

The girl raised her eyes, and looked at the oarsman with emotion, and
Monsieur Dufour spoke for the first time.

"It is indeed a happy life," he said. And then he added: "A little more
rabbit, my dear?"

"No, thank you," she replied and turning to the young men again, and
pointing to their arms asked: "Do you never feel cold like that?"

They both began to laugh, and they frightened the family by the account
of the enormous fatigue they could endure, of their bathing while in a
state of tremendous perspiration, of their rowing in the fog at night,
and they struck their chests violently, to show how they sounded.

"Ah! You look very strong," the husband said, who did not talk any more
of the time when he used to beat the English. The girl was looking at
them aside now, and the young fellow with the yellow hair was coughing
violently, as he had swallowed some wine the wrong way, and bespattering
Madame Dufour's cherry-colored silk dress, who got angry, and sent for
some water, to wash the spots.

Meanwhile it had grown unbearably hot, the sparkling river looked like a
blaze of fire, and the fumes of the wine were getting into their heads.
Monsieur Dufour, who had a violent hiccough, had unbuttoned his
waistcoat, and the top of his trousers, while his wife, who felt
choking, was gradually unfastening her dress. The apprentice was shaking
his yellow wig in a happy frame of mind, and kept helping himself to
wine, and as the old grandmother felt drunk, she also felt very stiff
and dignified. As for the girl, she showed nothing, except a peculiar
brightness in her eyes, while the brown skin on the cheeks became more
rosy.

The coffee finished them off; they spoke of singing, and each of them
sang, or repeated a couplet, which the others repeated frantically. Then
they got up with some difficulty, and while the two women, who were
rather dizzy, were getting the fresh air, the two men, who were
altogether drunk, were performing gymnastic tricks. Heavy, limp, and
with scarlet faces, they hung awkwardly onto the iron rings, without
being able to raise themselves, while their shirts were continually
threatening to leave their trousers, and to flap in the wind like flags.

Meanwhile, the two boating-men had got their skiffs into the water, and
they came back, and politely asked the ladies whether they would like a
row.

"Would you like one, Monsieur Dufour?" his wife exclaimed,--"Please
come!"

He merely gave her a drunken look, without understanding what she said.
Then one of the rowers came up, with two fishing-rods in his hand; and
the hope of catching a gudgeon, that great aim of the Parisian
shop-keeper, made Dufour's dull eyes gleam, and he politely allowed them
to do whatever they liked, while he sat in the shade, under the bridge,
with his feet dangling over the river, by the side of the young man with
the yellow hair, who was sleeping soundly close to him.

One of the boating men made a martyr of himself and took the mother.

"Let us go to the little wood on the _Ile aux Anglias_!" he called out,
as he rowed off. The other skiff went slower, for the rower was looking
at his companion so intently, that he thought of nothing else, and his
emotion paralyzed his strength, while the girl, who was sitting on the
steerer's seat, gave herself up to the enjoyment of being on the water.
She felt disinclined to think, felt a lassitude in her limbs, and a
total abandonment of herself, as if she were intoxicated, and she had
become very flushed, and breathed shortly. The effects of the wine,
which were increased by the extreme heat, made all the trees on the bank
seem to bow, as she passed. A vague wish for enjoyment and a
fermentation for her blood, seemed to pervade her whole body, which was
excited by the heat of the day; and she was also agitated by this
_tête-à-tête_ on the water, in a place which seemed depopulated by the
heat, with this young man who thought her pretty, whose looks seemed to
caress her skin, and whose looks were as penetrating and pervading as
the sun's rays.

Their inability to speak, increased their emotion, and they looked about
them, but at last he made an effort and asked her name.

"Henriette," she said.

"Why! My name is Henri," he replied. The sound of their voices had
calmed them, and they looked at the banks. The other skiff had passed
them, and seemed to be waiting for them, and the rower called out:

"We will meet you in the wood; we are going as far as _Robinson's_[13]
because Madame Dufour is thirsty." Then he bent over his oars again, and
rowed off so quickly that he was soon out of sight.

[Footnote 13: A well-known restaurant on the banks of the Seine, which
is much frequented by the middle classes.--TRANSLATOR.]

Meanwhile, a continual roar, which they had heard for some time, came
nearer, and the river itself seemed to shiver, as if the dull noise were
rising from its depths.

"What is that noise?" she asked. It was the noise of the weir, which cut
the river in two, at the island, and he was explaining it to her, when
above the noise of the waterfall, they heard the song of a bird, which
seemed a long way off.

"Listen!" he said; "the nightingales are singing during the day, so the
females must be sitting."

A nightingale! She had never heard one before, and the idea of listening
to one roused visions of poetic tenderness in her heart. A nightingale!
That is to say, the invisible witness of her lovers' interview which
Juliette invoked on her balcony[14]; the celestial music, which is
attuned to human kisses, that eternal inspirer of all those languorous
romances which open an ideal sky to all the poor little tender hearts of
sensitive girls!

[Footnote 14: Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene V.]

She was going to hear a nightingale.

"We must not make a noise," her companion said, "and then we can go into
the wood, and sit down close to it."

The skiff seemed to glide. They saw the trees on the island, whose banks
were so low, that they could look into the depths of the thickets. They
stopped, he made the boat fast, Henriette took hold of Henri's arm, and
they went beneath the trees.

"Stop," he said, so she bent down, and they went into an inextricable
thicket of creepers, leaves, and reed-grass, which formed an
inpenetrable asylum, and which the young man laughingly called, "his
private room."

Just above their heads, perched in one of the trees which hid them, the
bird was still singing. He uttered shakes and roulades, and then long,
vibrating sounds that filled the air, and seemed to lose themselves on
the horizon, across the level country, through that burning silence
which weighed upon the whole country round. They did not speak for fear
of frightening it away. They were sitting close together, and slowly
Henri's arm stole round the girl's waist and squeezed it gently. She
took that daring hand without any anger, and kept removing it whenever
he put it round her; without, however, feeling at all embarrassed by
this caress, just as if it had been something quite natural, which she
was resisting just as naturally.

She was listening to the bird in ecstasy. She felt an infinite longing
for happiness, for some sudden demonstration of tenderness, for the
revelation of super-human poetry, and she felt such a softening at her
heart, and relaxation of her nerves, that she began to cry, without
knowing why, and now the young man was straining her close to him, and
she did not remove his arm; she did not think of it. Suddenly the
nightingale stopped, and a voice called out in the distance:

"Henriette!"

"Do not reply," he said in a low voice; "you will drive the bird away."

But she had no idea of doing so, and they remained in the same position
for some time. Madame Dufour had sat down somewhere or other, for from
time to time they heard the stout lady break out into little bursts of
laughter.

The girl was still crying; she was filled with strange sensations.
Henri's head was on her shoulder, and suddenly he kissed her on the
lips. She was surprised and angry, and, to avoid him, she stood up.

They were both very pale, when they quitted their grassy retreat. The
blue sky looked dull to them, and the ardent sun was clouded over to
their eyes, but they perceived not the solitude and silence. They walked
quickly side by side, without speaking or touching each other, for they
appeared to be irreconcilable enemies, as if disgust had sprung up
between them, and hatred between their souls, and from time to time
Henriette called out: "Mamma!"

By-and-bye they heard a noise in a thicket, and the stout lady appeared
looking rather confused, and her companion's face was wrinkled with
smiles which he could not check.

Madame Dufour took his arm, and they returned to the boats, and Henri,
who was going on first, still without speaking, by the girl's side, and
at last they got back to Bézons. Monsieur Dufour, who had got sober, was
waiting for them very impatiently, while the young man with the yellow
hair, was having a mouthful of something to eat, before leaving the inn.
The carriage was in the yard, with the horse in, and the grandmother,
who had already got in, was very frightened at the thought of being
overtaken by night, before they got back to Paris, as the outskirts were
not safe.

They shook hands, and the Dufour family drove off.

"Good-bye, until we meet again!" the oarsman cried, and the answer they
got was a sigh and a tear.

       *       *       *       *       *

Two months later, as Henri was going along the _Rue des Martyrs_, he saw
_Dufour, Ironmonger_ over a door, and so he went in, and saw the stout
lady sitting at the counter. They recognized each other immediately, and
after an interchange of polite greetings, he asked after them all.

"And how is Mademoiselle Henriette?" he inquired, specially.

"Very well, thank you; she is married."

"Ah!" ... But mastering his feelings, he added: "Whom was she married
to?"

"To that young man who went with us, you know, he has joined us in
business."

"I remember him, perfectly."

He was going out, feeling very unhappy, though scarcely knowing why,
when Madame called him back.

"And how is your friend?" she asked, rather shyly.

"He is very well, thank you."

"Please give him our compliments, and beg him to come and call, when he
is in the neighborhood."

She then added: "Tell him it will give me great pleasure."

"I will be sure to do so. Adieu!"

"I will not say that; come again, very soon."

       *       *       *       *       *

The next year, one very hot Sunday, all the details of that adventure
which he had never forgotten, suddenly came back to him so clearly, that
he returned to their room in the wood, and he was overwhelmed with
astonishment when he went in. She was sitting on the grass, looking very
sad, while by her side, again in his shirt sleeves the young man with
the yellow hair was sleeping soundly, like some brute.

She grew so pale when she saw Henri, that at first he thought she was
going to faint, then, however, they began to talk quite naturally. But
when he told her that he was very fond of that spot, and went there very
often on Sundays, she looked into his eyes for a long time. "I, too,
think of it," she replied.

"Come, my dear," her husband said, with a yawn; "I think it is time for
us to be going."




THE LANCER'S WIFE


I

It was after Bourbaki's defeat in the East of France. The army, broken
up, decimated and worn out, had been obliged to retreat into
Switzerland, after that terrible campaign, and it was only the short
time that it lasted, which saved a hundred and fifty thousand men from
certain death. Hunger, the terrible cold, forced marches in the snow
without boots, over bad mountainous roads, had caused us
_francs-tireurs_ especially the greatest sufferings, for we were without
tents and almost without food, always in front when we were marching
towards Belfort, and in the rear, when returning by the Jura. Of our
little band that had numbered twelve hundred men on the first of
January, there remained only twenty-two pale, thin, ragged wretches,
when we at length succeeded in reaching Swiss territory.

There we were safe and could rest. Everybody knows what sympathy was
shown to the unfortunate French army, and how well it was cared for. We
all gained fresh life, and those who had been rich and happy before the
war, declared that they had never experienced a greater feeling of
comfort than they did then. Just think. We actually had something to eat
every day, and could sleep every night.

Meanwhile, the war continued in the East of France, which had been
excluded from the armistice. Besançon still kept the enemy in check, and
the latter had their revenge by ravaging the _Franché Comte_. Sometimes
we heard that they had approached quite close to the frontier, and we
saw Swiss troops, who were to form a line of observation between us and
them, set out on their march.

That pained us in the end, and as we regained health and strength the
longing for fighting laid hold of us. It was disgraceful and irritating
to know that within two or three leagues of us, the Germans were
victorious and insolent, to feel that we were protected by our
captivity, and to feel that on that account we were powerless against
them.

One day, our captain took five or six of us aside, and spoke to us about
it, long and furiously. He was a fine fellow that captain. He had been a
sub-lieutenant in the Zouaves, was tall and thin, and as hard as steel,
and during the whole campaign he had cut out their work for the Germans.
He fretted in inactivity and could not accustom himself to the idea of
being a prisoner and of doing nothing.

"Confound it!" he said to us, "does it not pain you to know that there
is a number of Uhlans within two hours of us? Does it not almost drive
you mad to know that those beggarly wretches are walking about as
masters in our mountains, where six determined men might kill a whole
spitful any day? I cannot endure it any longer, and I must go there."

"But how can you manage it, Captain?"

"How? It is not very difficult! Just as if we had not done a thing or
two within the last six months, and got out of woods that were guarded
by very different men from the Swiss. The day that you wish to cross
over into France, I will undertake to get you there."

"That may be; but what shall we do in France without any arms?"

"Without arms? We will get them over yonder, by Jove!"

"You are forgetting the treaty," another soldier said; "we shall run the
risk of doing the Swiss an injury, if Manteuffel learns that they have
allowed prisoners to return to France."

"Come," said the captain, "those are all bad reasons. I mean to go and
kill some Prussians; that is all I care about. If you do not wish to do
as I do, well and good; only say so at once. I can quite well go by
myself; I do not require anybody's company."

Naturally we all protested and as it was quite impossible to make the
captain alter his mind, we felt obliged to promise to go with him. We
liked him too much to leave him in the lurch, as he never failed us in
any extremity; and so the expedition was decided on.


II

The Captain had a plan of his own, that he had been cogitating over for
some time. A man in that part of the country, whom he knew, was going to
lend him a cart, and six suits of peasants' clothes. We could hide under
some straw at the bottom of the wagon, and it would be loaded with
Gruyère cheese, which he was supposed to be going to sell in France. The
captain told the sentinels that he was taking two friends with him, to
protect his goods, in case any one should try to rob him, which did not
seem an extraordinary precaution. A Swiss officer seemed to look at the
wagon in a knowing manner, but that was in order to impress his
soldiers. In a word, neither officers nor men could make it out.

"Get on," the captain said to the horses, as he cracked his whip, while
our three men quietly smoked their pipes. I was half-suffocated in my
box, which only admitted the air through those holes in front, while at
the same time I was nearly frozen, for it was terribly cold.

"Get on," the captain said again, and the wagon loaded with Gruyère
cheese entered France.

The Prussian lines were very badly guarded, as the enemy trusted to the
watchfulness of the Swiss. The sergeant spoke North German, while our
captain spoke the bad German of the _Four Cantons_, and so they could
not understand each other; the sergeant, however, pretended to be very
intelligent, and in order to make us believe that he understood us, they
allowed us to continue our journey, and after traveling for seven hours,
being continually stopped in the same manner, we arrived at a small
village of the Jura, in ruins, at nightfall.

What were wre going to do? Our only arms were the captain's whip, our
uniforms, our peasants' blouses, and our food our Gruyère cheese. Our
sole riches consisted in our ammunition, packets of cartridges which we
had stowed away inside some of the huge cheeses. We had about a thousand
of them, just two hundred each, but then we wanted rifles, and they must
be Chassepots; luckily, however, the captain was a bold man of an
inventive mind, and this was the plan that he hit upon.

While three of us remained hidden in a cellar in the abandoned village,
he continued his journey as far as Besançon with the empty wagon and one
man. The town was invested, but one can always make one's way into a
town among the hills by crossing the table-land till within about ten
miles of the walls, and then by following paths and ravines on foot.
They left their wagon at Omans, among the Germans, and escaped out of it
at night on foot, so as to gain the heights which border the river
Doubs; the next day they entered Besançon, where there were plenty of
Chassepots. There were nearly forty thousand of them left in the
arsenal, and General Roland, a brave marine, laughed at the captain's
daring project, but let him have six rifles and wished him "good luck."
There he had also found his wife, who had been through all the war with
us before the campaign in the East, and who had been only prevented by
illness from continuing with Bourbaki's army. She had recovered,
however, in spite of the cold, which was growing more and more intense,
and in spite of the numberless privations that awaited her, she
persisted in accompanying her husband. He was obliged to give way to
her, and they all three, the captain, his wife, and our comrade, started
on their expedition.

Going was nothing in comparison to returning. They were obliged to
travel by night, so as to avoid meeting anybody, as the possession of
six rifles would have made them liable to suspicion. But in spite of
everything, a week after leaving us, the captain and his _two men_ were
back with us again. The campaign was about to begin.


III

The first night of his arrival, he began it himself, and, under the
pretext of examining the country round, he went along the high road.

I must tell you, that the little village which served as our fortress
was a small collection of poor, badly built houses, which had been
deserted long before. It lay on a steep slope, which terminated in a
wooded plain. The country people sell the wood; they send it down the
ravines, which are called _coulées_, locally, and which lead down to the
plain, and there they stack it into piles, which they sell thrice a year
to the wood merchants. The spot where this market is held, is indicated
by two small houses by the side of the high road, and which serve for
public-houses. The captain had gone down there by one of these
_coulées_.

He had been gone about half-an-hour, and we were on the look-out at the
top of the ravine when we heard a shot. The captain had ordered us not
to stir, and only to come to him when we heard him blow his trumpet. It
was made of a goat's horn, and could be heard a league off, but it gave
no sound, and in spite of our cruel anxiety we were obliged to wait in
silence, with out rifles by our side.

It is nothing to go down these _coulées_; one need only let oneself
glide down, but it is more difficult to get up again; one has to
scramble up by catching hold of the hanging branches of the trees, and
sometimes on all fours, by sheer strength. A whole mortal hour passed
and he did not come, nothing moved in the brushwood. The captain's wife
began to grow impatient; what could he be doing? Why did he not call us?
Did the shot that we had heard proceed from an enemy, and had he killed
or wounded our leader, her husband? They did not know what to think, but
I myself fancied, either that he was dead, or that his enterprise was
successful, and I was merely anxious and curious to know what he had
done.

Suddenly we heard the sound of his trumpet, and we were much surprised
that instead of coming from below, as we had expected, it came from the
village behind us. What did that mean? It was a mystery to us, but the
same idea struck us all, that he had been killed, and that the Prussians
were blowing the trumpet to draw us into an ambush. We therefore
returned to the cottage, keeping a careful look out, with our fingers on
the trigger, and hiding under the branches, but his wife, in spite of
our entreaties, rushed on, leaping like a tigress. She thought that she
had to avenge her husband, and had fixed the bayonet to her rifle, and
we lost sight of her at the moment that we heard the trumpet again, and
a few moments later we heard her calling out to us:

"Come on! come on! he is alive! it is he!"

We hastened on, and saw the captain smoking his pipe at the entrance of
the village, but strangely enough he was on horseback.

"Ah! Ah!" he said to us, "you see that there is something to be done
here. Here I am on horseback already. I knocked over a uhlan yonder, and
took his horse; I suppose they were guarding the wood, but it was by
drinking and swilling in clover. One of them, the sentry at the door,
had not time to see me before I gave him a sugar plum in his stomach,
and then, before the others could come out, I jumped on to the horse and
was off like a shot. Eight or ten of them followed me, I think, but I
took the cross-roads through the woods; I have got scratched and torn a
bit, but here I am, and now, my good fellows, attention, and take care!
Those brigands will not rest until they have caught us, and we must
receive them with rifle bullets. Come along; let us take up our posts!"

We set out. One of us took up his position a good way from the village
of the cross-roads; I was posted at the entrance of the main street,
where the road from the level country enters the village, while the two
others, the captain and his wife were in the middle of the village, near
the church, whose tower served for an observatory and citadel.

We had not been in our places long before we heard a shot followed by
another, and then two, then three. The first was evidently a chassepot;
one recognized it by the sharp report, which sounds like the crack of a
whip, while the other three came from the lancers' carbines.

The captain was furious. He had given orders to the outpost to let the
enemy pass and merely to follow them at a distance, if they marched
towards the village, and to join me when they had gone well between the
houses. Then they were to appear suddenly, take the patrol between two
fires, and not allow a single man to escape, for posted as we were, the
six of us could have hemmed in ten Prussians, if needful.

"That confounded Piédelot has roused them," the captain said, "and they
will not venture to come on blindfold any longer. And then I am quite
sure that he has managed to get a shot into himself somewhere or other,
for we hear nothing of him. It serves him right; why did he not obey
orders?" And then, after a moment, he grumbled in his beard: "After all,
I am sorry for the poor fellow, he is so brave and shoots so well!"

The captain was right in his conjectures. We waited until evening,
without seeing the uhlans: they had retreated after the first attack,
but unfortunately we had not seen Piédelot either. Was he dead or a
prisoner? When night came, the captain proposed that we should go out
and look for him, and so the three of us started. At the cross-roads we
found a broken rifle and some blood, while the ground was trampled down,
but we did not find either a wounded man or a dead body, although we
searched every thicket, and at midnight we returned without having
discovered anything of our unfortunate comrade.

"It is very strange," the captain growled. "They must have killed him
and thrown him into the bushes somewhere; they cannot possibly have
taken him prisoner, as he would have called out for help. I cannot
understand it all." Just as he said that, bright, red flames shot up in
the direction of the inn on the high road, which illuminated the sky.

"Scoundrels! cowards!" he shouted. "I will bet they have set fire to the
two houses on the market-place, in order to have their revenge and then
they will scuttle off without saying a word. They will be satisfied with
having killed a man and setting fire to two houses. All right. It shall
not pass over like that. We must go for them; they will not like to
leave their illuminations in order to fight."

"It would be a great stroke of luck, if we could set Piédelot free at
the same time," some one said.

The five of us set off, full of rage and hope. In twenty minutes we had
got to the bottom of the _coulée_, and we had not yet seen anyone, when
we had got within a hundred yards of the inn. The fire was behind the
house, and so all that we saw of it was the reflection above the roof.
However, we were walking rather slowly, as we were afraid of a trap,
when suddenly we heard Piédelot's well-known voice. It had a strange
sound, however, for it was at the same time dull and vibrating, stifled
and clear, as if he was calling out as loud as he could with a bit of
rag stuffed into his mouth. He seemed to be hoarse and panting, and the
unlucky fellow kept exclaiming: "Help! Help!"

We sent all thoughts of prudence to the devil, and in two bounds we were
at the back of the inn, where a terrible sight met our eyes.


IV

Piédelot was being burnt alive. He was writhing in the middle of a heap
of fagots, against a stake to which they had fastened him, and the
flames were licking him with their sharp tongues. When he saw us, his
tongue seemed to stick in his throat, he drooped his head, and seemed as
if he were going to die. It was only the affair of a moment to upset the
burning pile, to scatter the embers, and to cut the ropes that fastened
him.

Poor fellow! In what a terrible state we found him. The evening before,
he had had his left arm broken, and it seemed as if he had been badly
beaten since then, for his whole body was covered with wounds, bruises,
and blood. The flames had also begun their work on him, and he had two
large burns, one on his loins, and the other on his right thigh, and his
beard and his hair were scorched. Poor Piédelot!

Nobody knows the terrible rage we felt at this sight! We would have
rushed headlong at a hundred thousand Prussians. Our thirst for
vengeance was intense but the cowards had run away, leaving their crime
behind them. Where could we find them now? Meanwhile, however, the
captain's wife was looking after Piédelot, and dressing his wounds as
best she could, while the captain himself shook hands with him excitedly
and in a few minutes he came to himself.

"Good morning, captain, good morning, all of you," he said. "Ah! the
scoundrels, the wretches! Why twenty of them came to surprise us."

"Twenty, do you say?"

"Yes, there was a whole band of them, and that is why I disobeyed
orders, captain, and fired on them, for they would have killed you all,
so I preferred to stop them. That frightened them, and they did not
venture to go further than the cross-roads. They were such cowards. Four
of them shot at me at twenty yards, as if I had been a target, and then
they slashed me with their swords. My arm was broken so that I could
only use my bayonet with one hand."

"But why did you not call for help?"

"I took good care not to do that, for you would all have come, and you
would neither have been able to defend me nor yourselves, being only
five against twenty."

"You know that we should not have allowed you to have been taken, poor
old fellow."

"I preferred to die by myself, don't you see! I did not want to bring
you there, for it would have been a mere ambush."

"Well, we will not talk about it any more. Do you feel rather easier?"

"No, I am suffocating. I know that I cannot live much longer. The
brutes! They tied me to a tree, and beat me till I felt half dead, and
then they shook my broken arm, but I did not make a sound. I would
rather have bitten my tongue out than have called out before them....
Now I can say what I am suffering and shed tears; it does one good.
Thank you, my kind friends."

"Poor Piédelot! But we will avenge you, you may be sure!"

"Yes, yes, I want you to do that. Especially, there is a woman among
them, who passes as the wife of the lancer whom the captain killed
yesterday. She is dressed like a lancer, and she tortured me the most
yesterday, and suggested burning me, and it was she who set fire to the
wood. Oh! the wretch, the brute.... Ah! how I am suffering! My loins, my
arms!" and he fell back panting and exhausted, writhing in his terrible
agony, while the captain's wife wiped the perspiration from his
forehead, and we all shed tears of grief and rage, as if we had been
children. I will not describe the end to you; he died half-an-hour
later, but before that he told us in which direction the enemy had gone.
When he was dead, we gave ourselves time to bury him, and then we set
out in pursuit of them, with our hearts full of fury and hatred.

"We will throw ourselves on the whole Prussian army, if it be needful,"
the captain said, "but we will avenge Piédelot. We must catch those
scoundrels. Let us swear to die, rather than not to find them, and if I
am killed first, these are my orders: all the prisoners that you make
are to be shot immediately, and as for the lancer's wife, she is to be
violated before she is put to death."

"She must not be shot, because she is a woman," the captain's wife said.
"If you survive, I am sure that you would not shoot a woman. Outraging
her will be quite sufficient; but if you are killed in this pursuit, I
want one thing, and that is to fight with her; I will kill her with my
own hands, and the others can do what they like with her if she kills
me.

"We will outrage her! We will burn her! We will tear her to pieces!
Piédelot shall be avenged, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth!"


V

The next morning we unexpectedly fell on an outpost of uhlans four
leagues away. Surprised by our sudden attack, they were not able to
mount their horses, nor even to defend themselves, and in a few moments
we had five prisoners, corresponding to our own number. The captain
questioned them, and from their answers we felt certain that they were
the same whom we had encountered the previous day, then a very curious
operation took place. One of us was told off to ascertain their sex, and
nothing can depict our joy when we discovered what we were seeking among
them, the female executioner who had tortured our friend.

The four others were shot on the spot, with their backs towards us, and
close to the muzzles of our rifles, and then we turned our attention to
the woman; what were we going to do with her? I must acknowledge that we
were all of us in favor of shooting her. Hatred, and the wish to avenge
Piédelot had extinguished all pity in us, and we had forgotten that we
were going to shoot a woman, but a woman reminded us of it, the
captain's wife; at her entreaties, therefore, we determined to keep her
prisoner.

The captain's poor wife was to be severely punished for this act of
clemency.

The next day we heard that the armistice had been extended to the
Eastern part of France, and we had to put an end to our little campaign.
Two of us, who belonged to the neighborhood, returned home, so there
were only four of us, all told; the captain, his wife, and two men. We
belonged to Besançon, which was still being besieged in spite of the
armistice.

"Let us stop here," said the captain. "I cannot believe that the war is
going to end like this. The devil take it. Surely there are men still
left in France, and now is the time to prove what they are made of. The
spring is coming on, and the armistice is only a trap laid for the
Prussians. During the time that it lasts, a new army will be formed, and
some fine morning we shall fall upon them again. We shall be ready, and
we have a hostage--let us remain here."

We fixed our quarters there. It was terribly cold, and we did not go out
much, and somebody had always to keep the female prisoner in sight.

She was sullen and never said anything, or else spoke of her husband,
whom the captain had killed. She looked at him continually with fierce
eyes, and we felt that she was tortured by a wild longing for revenge.
That seemed to us to be the most suitable punishment for the terrible
torments that she had made Piédelot suffer, for impotent vengeance is
such intense pain!

Alas! we who knew how to avenge our comrade, ought to have thought that
this woman would know how to avenge her husband, and have been on our
guard. It is true that one of us kept watch every night, and that at
first we tied her by a long rope to the great oak bench that was
fastened to the wall. But, by and by, as she had never tried to escape,
in spite of her hatred for us, we relaxed our extreme prudence, and
allowed her to sleep somewhere else except on the bench, and without
being tied. What had we to fear? She was at the end of the room, a man
was on guard at the door, and between her and the sentinel the captain's
wife and two other men used to lie. She was alone and unarmed against
four, so there could be no danger.

One night when we were asleep, and the captain was on guard, the
lancer's wife was lying more quietly in her corner than usual, and she
had even smiled for the first time since she had been our prisoner,
during the evening. Suddenly, however, in the middle of the night, we
were all awakened by a terrible cry. We got up, groping about and
scarcely were we up when we stumbled over a furious couple who were
rolling about and fighting on the ground. It was the captain and the
lancer's wife. We threw ourselves on to them, and separated them in a
moment. She was shouting and laughing, and he seemed to have the death
rattle. All this took place in the dark. Two of us held her, and when a
light was struck, a terrible sight met our eyes. The captain was lying
on the floor in a pool of blood, with an enormous wound in his throat,
and his sword bayonet that had been taken from his rifle, was sticking
in the red, gaping wound. A few minutes afterwards he died, without
having been able to utter a word.

His wife did not shed a tear. Her eyes were dry, her throat was
contracted, and she looked at the lancer's wife steadfastly, and with a
calm ferocity that inspired fear.

"This woman belongs to me," she said to us suddenly. "You swore to me
not a week ago, to let me kill her as I chose, if she killed my husband,
and you must keep your oath. You must fasten her securely to the
fireplace, upright against the back of it, and then you can go where you
like, but far from here. I will take my revenge on her to myself. Leave
the captain's body, and we three, he, she, and I, will remain here."

We obeyed and went away. She promised to write to us to Geneva, as we
were returning there.


VI

Two days later, I received the following letter, dated the day after we
had left, and that had been written at an inn on the high road:

     "MY FRIEND,

     "I am writing to you, according to my promise. For the moment I am
     at the inn, where I have just handed my prisoner over to a Prussian
     officer.

     "I must tell you, my friend, that this poor woman has left two
     children in Germany. She had followed her husband whom she adored,
     as she did not wish him to be exposed to the risks of war by
     himself, and as her children were with their grandparents. I have
     learnt all this since yesterday, and it has turned my ideas of
     vengeance into more humane feelings. At the very moment when I felt
     pleasure in insulting this woman, and in threatening her with the
     most fearful torments, in recalling Piédelot, who had been burnt
     alive, and in threatening her with a similar death, she looked at
     me coldly, and said:

     "'What have you got to reproach me with, Frenchwoman? You think
     that you will do right in avenging your husband's death, is not
     that so?'

     "'Yes, I replied.'

     "'Very well then; in killing him, I did what you are going to do in
     burning me. I avenged my husband, for your husband killed him.'

     "'Well,' I replied, 'as you approve of this vengeance, prepare to
     endure it.'

     "'I do not fear it.'

     "And in fact she did not seem to have lost courage. Her face was
     calm, and she looked at me without trembling, while I brought wood
     and dried leaves together, and feverishly threw on to them the
     powder from some cartridges, which was to make her funeral pile the
     more cruel.

     "I hesitated in my thoughts of persecution for a moment. But the
     captain was there, pale and covered with blood, and he seemed to be
     looking at me with his large, glassy eyes, and I applied myself to
     my work again after kissing his pale lips. Suddenly, however, on
     raising my head, I saw that she was crying, and I felt rather
     surprised.

     "'So you are frightened?' I said to her.

     "'No, but when I saw you kiss your husband, I thought of mine, of
     all whom I love."

     "She continued to sob, but stopping suddenly she said to me in
     broken words, and in a low voice:

     "'Have you any children?'

     "A shiver ran over me, for I guessed that this poor woman had some.
     She asked me to look in a pocketbook which was in her bosom, and in
     it I saw two photographs of quite young children, a boy and a girl,
     with those kind, gentle, chubby faces that German children have. In
     it there were also two locks of light hair and a letter in a large
     childish hand, and beginning with German words which meant: 'My
     dear little mother.'

     "I could not restrain my tears, my dear friend, and so I untied
     her, and without venturing to look at the face of my poor, dead
     husband, who was not to be avenged, I went with her as far as the
     inn. She is free; I have just left her, and she kissed me with
     tears. I am going upstairs to my husband; come as soon as possible,
     my dear friend, to look for our two bodies."

I set off with all speed, and when I arrived, there was a Prussian
patrol at the cottage, and when I asked what it all meant, I was told
that there was a captain of _Franc-tireurs_ and his wife inside, both
dead. I gave their names; they saw that I knew them, and I begged to be
allowed to undertake their funeral.

"Somebody has already undertaken it," was the reply. "Go in if you wish
to, as you knew them. You can settle about their funeral with their
friend."

I went in. The captain and his wife were lying side by side on a bed,
and were covered by a sheet. I raised it, and saw that the woman had
inflicted a similar wound in her throat to that from which her husband
had died.

At the side of the bed there sat, watching and weeping, the woman who
had been mentioned to me as their best friend. It was the lancer's wife.




THE COLONEL'S IDEAS


"Upon my word," Colonel Laporte said, "I am old and gouty, my legs are
as stiff as two pieces of wood, and yet if a pretty woman were to tell
me to go through the eye of a needle, I believe I should take a jump at
it, like a clown through a hoop. I shall die like that; it is in the
blood. I am an old beau, one of the old school, and the sight of a
woman, a pretty woman, stirs me to the tips of my toes. There!

"And then, we are all very much alike in France; we remain cavaliers,
cavaliers of love and fortune, since God has been abolished, whose
body-guard we really were. But nobody will ever get a woman out of our
hearts; there she is, and there she will remain, and we love her, and
shall continue to love her, and go on committing all kinds of frolics on
her account, as long as there is a France on the map of Europe, and even
if France were to be wiped off the map, there would always be Frenchmen
left.

"When I am in the presence of a woman, of a pretty woman, I feel capable
of anything. By Jove! When I feel her looks penetrating me, her
confounded looks which set your blood on fire, I should like to do I
don't know what; to fight a duel, to have a row, to smash the furniture,
in order to show that I am the strongest, the bravest, the most daring,
and the most devoted of men.

"But I am not the only one, certainly not; the whole French army is like
me, that I will swear to you. From the common soldier to the general, we
all go forward, and to the very end, when there is a woman in the case,
a pretty woman. Remember what Joan of Arc made us do formerly! Come, I
will make a bet that if a pretty woman had taken command of the army on
the eve of Sedan, when Marshal Mac-Mahon was wounded, we should have
broken through the Prussian lines, by Jove! and have had a drink out of
their guns.

"It was not Trochu, but Saint-Geneviève, who was required in Paris, and
I remember a little anecdote of the war which proves that we are capable
of everything in the presence of a woman.

"I was a captain, a simple captain, at the time, and I was in command of
a detachment of scouts, who were retreating through a district which
swarmed with Prussians. We were surrounded, pursued, tired out, and half
dead with fatigue and hunger, and by the next day we were bound to reach
Bar-sur-Tain, otherwise we should be done for, cut off from the main
body and killed. I do not know how we managed to escape so far. However,
we had ten leagues to go during the night, ten leagues through the snow,
and with empty stomachs, and I thought to myself:

"'It is all over; my poor devils of fellows will never be able to do
it.'

"We had eaten nothing since the day before, and the whole day long we
remained hidden in a barn, and huddled close together, so as not to feel
the cold so much; we did not venture to speak or even move, and we slept
by fits and starts, like one sleeps when one is worn out with fatigue.

"It was dark by five o'clock; that wan darkness caused by the snow, and
I shook my men. Some of them would not get up; they were almost
incapable oí moving or of standing upright, and their joints were stiff
from the cold and want of motion.

"In front of us, there was a large expanse of flat, bare country; the
snow was still falling like a curtain, in large, white flakes, which
concealed everything under a heavy, thick, frozen mantle, a mattress of
ice. One might have thought that it was the end of the world.

"'Come, my lads, let us start.'

"They looked at the thick, white dust which was coming down, and they
seemed to think: 'We have had enough of this; we may just as well die
here!' Then I took out my revolver, and said:

"'I will shoot the first man who flinches.' And so they set off, but
very slowly, like men whose legs were of very little use to them, and I
sent four of them three hundred yards ahead, to scout, and the others
followed pell-mell, walking at random and without any order. I put the
strongest in the rear, with orders to quicken the pace of the sluggards
with the points of their bayonets... in the back.

"The snow seemed as if it were going to bury us alive; it powdered our
_kepis_[15] and cloaks without melting, and made phantoms of us, a
species of specters of dead soldiers, who were very tired, and I said to
myself: 'We shall never get out of this, except by a miracle.'

[Footnote 15: Forage Caps.]

"Sometimes we had to stop for a few minutes, on account of those who
could not follow us, and then we heard nothing except the falling snow,
that vague, almost indiscernible sound which all those flakes make, as
they come down together. Some of the men shook themselves, but others
did not move, and so I gave the order to set off again; they shouldered
their rifles, and with weary feet we set out, when suddenly the scouts
fell back. Something had alarmed them; they had heard voices in front of
them, and so I sent six men and a sergeant on ahead, and waited.

"All at once a shrill cry, a woman's cry, pierced through the heavy
silence of the snow, and in a few minutes they brought back two
prisoners, an old man and a girl, and I questioned them in a low voice.
They were escaping from the Prussians, who had occupied their house
during the evening, and who had got drunk, The father had become alarmed
on his daughter's account, and, without even telling their servants,
they had made their escape into the darkness. I saw immediately that
they belonged to the upper classes, and, as I should have done in any
case, I invited them to come with us, and we started off together, and
as the old man knew the road, he acted as our guide.

"It had ceased snowing; the stars appeared, and the cold became intense.
The girl, who was leaning on her father's arm, walked wrearily, and with
jerks, and several times she murmured:

"'I have no feeling at all in my feet;' and I suffered more than she
did, I believe, to see that poor little woman dragging herself like that
through the snow. But suddenly she stopped, and said:

"'Father, I am so tired that I cannot go any further ther,'

"The old man wanted to carry her, but he could not even lift her up, and
she fell on the ground, with a deep sigh. We all came round her, and as
for me, I stamped on the ground, not knowing what to do, and quite
unable to make up my mind to abandon that man and girl like that, when
suddenly one of the soldiers, a Parisian, whom they had nicknamed
_Pratique_, said:

"'Come, comrades, we must carry the young lady, otherwise we shall not
show ourselves Frenchmen, confound it!'

"I really believe that I swore with pleasure, and said: 'That is very
good of you, my children, and I will take my share of the burden.'

"We could indistinctly see the trees of a little wood on the left,
through the darkness, and several men went into it, and soon came back
with a bundle of branches twisted into a litter.

"'Who will lend his cloak? It is for a pretty girl, comrades,' Pratique
said, and ten cloaks were thrown to him. In a moment, the girl was
lying, warm and comfortable, among them, and was raised upon six
shoulders. I placed myself at their head, on the right, and very pleased
I was with my charge.

"We started off much more briskly, as if we had been having a drink of
wine, and I even heard a few jokes. A woman is quite enough to electrify
Frenchmen, you see. The soldiers, who were reanimated and warm, had
almost reformed their ranks, and an old _franc-tireur_[16] I who was
following the litter, waiting for his turn to replace the first of his
comrades who might give in, said to one of his neighbors, loud enough
for me to hear:

[Footnote 16: Self-constituted volunteers, in the Franco-German war of
1870-71, whom the Germans often made short work of, when
caught.--TRANSLATOR.]

"'I am not a young man, now; but by ----, there is nothing like the
women to make you feel queer from head to foot!'"

"We went on, almost without stopping, until three o'clock in the
morning, when suddenly our scouts fell back again, and soon the whole
detachment showed nothing but a vague shadow on the ground, as the men
lay on the snow, and I gave my orders in a low voice, and heard the
harsh, metallic sound of the cocking of rifles. For there, in the middle
of the plain, some strange object was moving about. It might have been
taken for some enormous animal running about, which unfolded itself like
a serpent, or came together into a coil, suddenly went quickly to the
right or left, stopped, and then went on again. But presently that
wandering shape came near, and I saw a dozen lancers, one behind the
other, who were trying to find their way, which they had lost."

"They were so near by that time, that I could hear the panting of the
horses, the clink of their swords, and the creaking of their saddles,
and so cried: 'Fire!'"

"Fifty rifle shots broke the stillness of the night, then there were
four or five reports, and at last one single shot was heard, and when
the smoke had cleared away, we saw that the twelve men and nine horses
had fallen. Three of the animals were galloping away at a furious pace,
and one of them was dragging the body of its rider, which rebounded from
the ground in a terrible manner, whose foot had caught in the stirrup
behind it."

"One of the soldiers behind me gave a terrible laugh, and said: 'There
are a number of widows there!'"

"Perhaps he was married. And a third added: 'It did not take long!'"

"A head was put out of the litter:

"'What is the matter?' she asked; 'you are fighting?'"

"'It is nothing, Mademoiselle,' I replied; 'we have got rid of a dozen
Prussians!'"

"'Poor fellows!' she said. But as she was cold, she quickly disappeared
beneath the cloaks again, and we started off once more. We marched on
for a long time, and at last the sky began to grow pale. The snow became
quite clear, luminous and bright, and a rosy tint appeared in the East,
and suddenly a voice in the distance cried:

"'Who goes there?'"

"The whole detachment halted, and I advanced to say who we were. We had
reached the French lines, and as my men defiled before the outpost, a
commandant on horseback, whom I had informed of what had taken place,
asked in a sonorous voice, as he saw the litter pass him: 'What have you
there?'"

"And immediately, a small head, covered with light hair, appeared,
disheveled and smiling, and replied:"

"'It is I, Monsieur.'"

"At this, the men raised a hearty laugh, and we felt quite
light-hearted, while Pratique, who was walking by the side of the
litter, waved his kepi, and shouted:"

"'Vive la France!' And I felt really moved. I do not know why, except
that I thought it a pretty and gallant thing to say."

"It seemed to me as if we had just saved the whole of France, and had
done something that other men could not have done, something simple and
really patriotic. I shall never forget that little face, you may be
sure, and if I had to give my opinion about abolishing drums, trumpets,
and bugles, I should propose to replace them in every regiment by a
pretty girl, and that would be even better than playing the
_Marseillaise_. By Jove! It would put some spirit into a trooper to have
a Madonna like that, a living Madonna, by the colonel's side."

He was silent for a few moments, and then continued, with an air of
conviction, and jerking his head:

"All the same, we are very fond of women, we Frenchmen!"




ONE EVENING


The steamboat _Kleber_ had stopped, and I was admiring the beautiful bay
of Bougie, that was opened out before us. The high hills were covered
with forests, and in the distance the yellow sands formed a beach of
powdered gold, while the sun shed its fiery rays on the white houses of
the town.

The warm African breeze blew the odor of that great, mysterious
continent into which men of the Northern races but rarely penetrate,
into my face. For three months I had been wandering on the borders of
that great, unknown world, on the outskirts of that strange world of the
ostrich, the camel, the gazelle, the hippopotamus, the gorilla, the lion
and the tiger, and the negro. I had seen the Arab galloping like the
wind, and passing like a floating standard, and I had slept under those
brown tents, the moving habitation of those white birds of the desert,
and I felt, as it were, intoxicated with light, with fancy, and with
space.

But now, after this final excursion, I should have to start, to return
to France and to Paris, that city of useless chatter, of commonplace
cares, and of continual hand-shaking, and I should bid adieu to all that
I had got to like so much, which was so new to me, which I had scarcely
had time to see thoroughly, and which I so much regretted to leave.

A fleet of small boats surrounded the steamer, and, jumping into one
rowed by a negro lad, I soon reached the quay near the old Saracen gate,
whose gray ruins at the entrance of the Kabyle town, looked like an old
escutcheon of nobility. While I was standing by the side of my
portmanteau, looking at the great steamer lying at anchor in the roads,
and filled with admiration at that unique shore, and that semi-circle of
hills, bathed in blue light, which were more beautiful than those of
Ajaccio, or of Porto, in Corsica, a heavy hand was laid on my shoulder,
and on turning round I saw a tall man with a long beard, dressed in
white flannel, and wearing a straw hat, standing by my side, and looking
at me with his blue eyes.

"Are you not an old school-fellow of mine?" he said.

"It is very possible. What is your name?"

"Trémoulin."

"By Jove! You were in the same class as I was."

"Ah! Old fellow, I recognized you immediately."

He seemed so pleased, so happy at seeing me, that in an outburst of
friendly selfishness, I shook both the hands of my former school-fellow
heartily, and felt very pleased at meeting him thus.

For four years Trémoulin had been one of the best and most intimate
school friends, one of those whom we are too apt to forget as soon as we
leave. In those days he had been a tall, thin fellow, whose head seemed
to be too heavy for his body; it was a large, round head, and hung
sometimes to the right and sometimes to the left, onto his chest.
Trémoulin was very clever, however, and had a marvelous aptitude for
learning, and had an instinctive intuition for all literary studies, and
gained nearly all the prizes in our class.

We were fully convinced at school, that he would turn out a celebrated
man, a poet, no doubt, for he wrote verses, and was full of ingeniously
sentimental ideas. His father, who kept a chemist's shop near the
_Panthéon_, was not supposed to be very well off, and I had lost sight
of him as soon as he had taken his bachelor's degree, and now I
naturally asked him what he was doing there.

"I am a planter," he replied.

"Bah! You really plant?"

"And I have my harvest."

"What is it?"

"Grapes, from which I make wine."

"Is your wine-growing a success?"

"A great success."

"So much the better, old fellow."

"Were you going to the hotel?"

"Of course I was."

"Well, then, you must just come home with me, instead!"

"But! ..."

"The matter is settled."

And he said to the young negro who was watching our movements: "Take
that home, Al."

And the lad put my portmanteau on his shoulder, and set off, raising the
dust with his black feet, while Trémoulin took my arm and led me off.
First of all, he asked me about my journey, and what impressions it had
had on me, and seeing how enthusiastic I was about it, he seemed to like
me better than ever. He lived in an old Moorish house, with an interior
courtyard, without any windows looking into the street, and commanded by
a terrace, which, in its turn, commanded those of the neighboring
houses, as well as the bay, and the forests, the hill, and the open sea,
and I could not help exclaiming:

"Ah! That is what I like; the whole of the East lays hold of me in this
place. You are indeed lucky to be living here! What nights you must
spend upon that terrace! Do you sleep there?"

"Yes, in the summer. We will go onto it this evening. Are you fond of
fishing?"

"What kind of fishing?"

"Fishing by torchlight."

"Yes, I am particularly fond of it."

"Very well, then, we will go after dinner, and we will come back and
drink sherbet on my roof."

After I had had a bath, he took me to see the charming Kabyle town, a
veritable cascade of white houses toppling down to the sea, and then,
when it was getting dusk, we went in, and after an excellent dinner, we
went down to the quay, and we saw nothing except the fires and the
stars, those large, bright, scintillating African stars. A boat was
waiting for us, and as soon as we had got in, a man whose face I could
not distinguish, began to row, while my friend was getting ready the
brazier which he would light later, and he said to me: "You know I have
a mania for a fish-spear, and nobody can handle it better than I can."

"Allow me to compliment you on your skill." We had rowed round a kind of
mole, and now we were in a small bay full of high rocks, whose shadows
looked like towers built in the water, and I suddenly perceived that the
sea was phosphorescent, and as the oars moved gently, they seemed to
light up moving flames, that followed in our wake, and then died out,
and I leant over the side of the boat and watched it, as we glided over
that glimmer in the darkness.

Where were we going to? I could not see my neighbors; in fact, I could
see nothing but the luminous ripple, and the sparks of water dropping
from the oars; it was hot, very hot, and the darkness seemed as hot as a
furnace, and this mysterious motion with these two men in that silent
boat, had a peculiar effect upon me.

Suddenly the rower stopped. Where were we? I heard a slight scratching
noise close to me, and I saw a hand, nothing but a hand applying a
lighted match to the iron grating which was fastened over the bows of
the boat, which was covered with wood, as if it had been a floating
funeral pile, and which soon was blazing brightly and illuminating the
boat and the two men, an old, thin, pale, wrinkled sailor, with a
pocket-handkerchief tied round his head, instead of a cap, and
Trémoulin, whose fair beard glistened in the light.

The other began to row again, while Trémoulin kept throwing wood onto
the brazier, which burnt red and brightly. I leant over the side again,
and could see the bottom, and a few feet below us there was that strange
country of the water, which vivifies plants and animals, just like the
air of heaven does. Trémoulin, who was standing in the bows with his
body bent forward, and holding the sharp-pointed trident in his hand,
was on the look-out with the ardent gaze of a beast of prey watching for
its spoil, and, suddenly, with a swift movement, he darted his forked
weapon into the sea so vigorously that it secured a large fish swimming
near the bottom. It was a conger eel, which managed to wriggle, half
dead as it was, into a puddle of the brackish water.

Trémoulin again threw his spear, and when he pulled it up, I saw a great
lump of red flesh which palpitated, moved, rolled and unrolled, long,
strong, soft feelers round the handle of the trident. It was an octopus,
and Trémoulin opened his knife, and with a swift movement plunged it
between the eyes, and killed it. And so our fishing continued until the
wood began to run short. When there was not enough left to keep up the
fire, Trémoulin dipped the braziers into the sea, and we were again
buried in darkness.

The old sailor began to row again, slowly and regularly, though I could
not tell where the land or where the port was. By-and-bye, however, I
saw lights. We were nearing the harbor.

"Are you sleepy?" my friend said to me.

"Not the slightest."

"Then we will go and have a chat on the roof."

"I shall be delighted."

Just as we got onto the terrace, I saw the crescent moon rising behind
the mountains, and around us, the white houses, with their flat roofs,
descending down towards the sea, while human forms were standing or
lying on them, sleeping or dreaming under the stars; whole families
wrapped in long gowns, and resting in the calm night, after the heat of
the day.

It suddenly seemed to me as if the Eastern mind were taking possession
of me, the poetical and legendary spirit of a people with simply and
flowery thoughts. My head was full of the Bible and of _The Arabian
Nights_; I could hear the prophets proclaiming miracles, and I could see
princesses wearing silk drawers on the roofs of the palaces, while
delicate perfumes, whose smoke assumed the forms of genii, were burning
on silver dishes, and I said to Trémoulin:

"You are very fortunate in living here."

"I came here quite by accident," he replied.

"By accident?"

"Yes, accident and unhappiness brought me here."

"You have been unhappy?"

"Very unhappy."

He was standing in front of me, wrapped in his bournoose, and his voice
had such a painful ring in it that it almost made me shiver; after a
moment's silence, he continued:

"I will tell you what my troubles have been; perhaps it will do me good
to speak about them."

"Let me hear them."

"Do you really wish it?"

"Yes."

"Very well, then. You remember what I was at school; a sort of poet,
brought up in a chemist's shop. I dreamt of writing books, and I tried
it, after taking my degree, but I did not succeed. I published a volume
of verse, and then a novel, and neither of them sold, and then I wrote a
play, which was never acted."

"Next, I lost my heart, but I will not give you an account of my
passion. Next door to my father's shop, there was a tailor's, who had a
daughter, with whom I fell in love. She was very clever, and had
obtained her certificates for higher education, and her mind was bright
and active, quite in keeping indeed with her body. She might have been
taken for fifteen, although she was two-and-twenty. She was very small,
with delicate features, outlines and tints, just like some beautiful
water color. Her nose, her mouth, her blue eyes, her light hair, her
smile, her waist, her hands, all looked as if they were fit for a
stained window, and not for everyday life, but she was lively, supple,
and incredibly active, and I was very much in love with her. I remember
two or three walks in the Luxembourg Garden, near the _Medices_
fountain, which were certainly the happiest hours of my life. I dare say
you have known that foolish condition of tender madness, which causes us
to think of nothing but of acts of adoration! One really becomes
possessed, haunted by a woman, and nothing exists for us, by the side of
her.

"We soon became engaged, and I told her my projects of the future, which
she did not approve of. She did not believe that I was either a poet, a
novelist, or a dramatic author, and thought a prosperous business could
afford perfect happiness. So I gave up the idea of writing books, and
resigned myself to selling them, and I bought a bookseller's business at
Marseilles, the owner of which had just died.

"I had three very prosperous years. We had made our shop into a sort of
literary drawing-room, where all the men of letters in the town used to
come and talk. They came in, as if it had been a club, and exchanged
ideas on books, on poets, and especially on politics. My wife, who took
a very active part in the business, enjoyed quite a reputation in the
town, but, as for me, while they were all talking downstairs, I was
working in my studio upstairs, which communicated with the shop by a
winding staircase. I could hear their voices, their laughter, and their
discussions, and sometimes I left off writing in order to listen. I kept
in my own room to write a novel--which I never finished.

"The most regular frequenters of the shop were Monsieur Montina, a man
of good private means, a tall, handsome man, like one meets with in the
South of France, with an olive skin, and dark, expressive eyes; Monsieur
Barbet, a magistrate; two merchants, who were partners, Messrs. Faucil
and Labarrègue, and General, the Marquis de la Flèche, the head of the
Royalist party, the principal man in the whole district, an old fellow
of sixty-six.

"My business prospered, and I was happy, very happy. One day, however,
about three o'clock, when I was out on business, as I was going through
the _Rue Saint Ferréol_, I suddenly saw a woman come out of a house,
whose figure and appearance were so much like my wife's that I should
have said to myself: 'There she is!' if I had not left her in the shop
half an hour before, suffering from a headache. She was walking quickly
on before me, without turning round, and, in spite of myself, I followed
her, as I felt surprised and uneasy. I said to myself: 'It it she; no,
it is quite impossible, as she has a sick headache. And then, what could
she have to do in that house?' However, as I wished to have the matter
cleared up, I made haste after her. I do not know whether she felt or
guessed that I was behind her, or whether she recognized my step, but
she turned round suddenly. It was she! When she saw me, she grew very
red and stopped, and then, with a smile, she said: 'Oh! Here you are!' I
felt choking.

"'Yes; so you have come out? And how is your headache?'

"'It is better, and I have been out on an errand.'

"'Where?'

"'To Lacaussade's, in the Rue Cassinelli, to order some pencils,'

"She looked me full in the face. She was not flushed now, but rather
pale, on the contrary. Her clear, limpid eyes--ah! those women's
eyes!--appeared to be full of truth, but I felt vaguely and painfuly
that they were full of lies. I was much more confused and embarrassed
than she was herself, without venturing to suspect, but sure that she
was lying, though I did not know why, and so I merely said:

"'You were quite right to go out, if you felt better.'

"'Oh! yes; my head is much better.'

"'Are you going home?'

"'Yes, of course I am.'

"I left her, and wandered about the streets by myself. What was going
on? While I was talking to her, I had an intuitive feeling of her
falseness, but now I could not believe that it was so, and when I
returned home to dinner, I was angry for having suspected her, even for
a moment.

"Have you ever been jealous? It does not matter whether you have or not,
but the first drop of jealousy had fallen into my heart, and that is
always like a spark of fire. It did not formulate anything, and I did
not think anything; I only knew that she had lied. You must remember
that every night, after the customers and clerks had left, we were
alone, and either strolled as far as the harbor, when it was fine, or
remained talking in my office, if the weather was bad, and I used to
open my heart to her without any reserve, because I loved her. She was
part of my life, the greater part, and all my happiness, and in her
small hands she held my trusting, faithful heart captive.

"During those first days, those days of doubt, and before my suspicions
increased and assumed a precise shape, I felt as depressed and chilly as
when we are going to be seriously ill. I was continually cold, really
cold, and could neither eat nor sleep. Why had she told me a lie? What
was she doing in that house? I went there, to try and find out
something, but I could discover nothing. The man who rented the first
floor, and who was an upholsterer, had told me all about his neighbors,
but without helping me the least. A midwife had lived on the second
floor, a dressmaker and a manicure and chiropodist on the third, and two
coachmen and their families in the attics.

"Why had she told me a lie? It would have been so easy for her to have
said that she had been to the dressmaker's or the chiropodist's. Oh! How
I longed to question them, also! I did not say so, for fear that she
might guess my suspicions. One thing, however, was certain; she had been
into that house, and had concealed the fact from me, so there was some
mystery in it. But what? At one moment, I thought there might be some
laudable purpose in it, some charitable deed that she wished to hide,
some information which she wished to obtain, and I found fault with
myself for suspecting her. Have not all of us the right of our little,
innocent secrets, a kind of second, interior life, for which one ought
not to be responsible to anybody? Can a man, because he has taken a girl
to be his companion through life, demand that she shall neither think
nor do anything without telling him, either before or afterwards? Does
the word marriage mean renouncing all liberty and independence? Was it
not quite possible that she was going to the dressmaker's without
telling me, or that she was going to assist the family of one of the
coachmen? Or she might have thought that I might criticize, if not
blame, her visit to the house. She knew me thoroughly, and my slightest
peculiarities, and perhaps she feared a discussion, even if she did not
think that I should find fault with her. She had very pretty hands, and
I ended by supposing that she was having them secretly attended to by
the manicure in the house which I suspected, and that she did not tell
me of it, for fear that I should think her extravagant. She was very
methodical and economical, +and looked after all her household duties
most carefully, and no doubt she thought that she should lower herself
in my eyes, were she to confess that slight piece of feminine
extravagance. Women have very many subtleties and innate tricks in their
soul!

"But none of my own arguments reassured me. I was jealous, and I felt
that my suspicion was affecting me terribly, that I was being devoured
by it. I felt secret grief and anguish, and a thought which I still
veiled, and I did not dare to lift the veil, for beneath it I should
find a terrible doubt.... A lover! ... Had not she a lover? ... It was
unlikely, impossible.... A mere dream ... and yet? ...

"I continually saw Montina's face before my eyes. I saw the tall,
silly-looking, handsome man, with his bright hair, smiling into her
face, and I said to myself: 'He is the one!' I concocted a story of
their intrigues. They had talked a book over together, had discussed the
love ventures it contained, had found something in it that resembled
them, and they had turned that analogy into reality. And so I watched
them, a prey to the most terrible sufferings that a man can endure. I
bought shoes with india-rubber soles, so that I might be able to walk
about the house without making any noise, and I spent half my time in
going up and down my little spiral staircase, in the hope of surprising
them, but I always found that the clerk was with them.

"I lived in a constant state of suffering. I could no longer work, nor
attend to my business. As soon as I went out, as soon as I had walked a
hundred yards along the street, I said to myself: 'He is there!' and
when I found he was not there, I went out again! But almost immediately
I went back again, thinking: 'He has come now!' and that went on every
day.

"At night it was still worse, for I felt her by my side in bed asleep,
or pretending to be asleep! Was she really sleeping? No, most likely
not. Was that another lie?

"I remained motionless on my back, hot from the warmth of her body,
panting and tormented. Oh! how intensely I longed to get up, to get a
hammer and to split her head open, so as to be able to see inside it! I
knew that I should have seen nothing except what is to be found in every
head, and I should have discovered nothing, for that would have been
impossible. And her eyes! When she looked at me, I felt furious with
rage. I looked at her ... she looked at me! Her eyes were transparent,
candid ... and false, false! Nobody could tell what she was thinking of,
and I felt inclined to run pins into them, and to destroy those mirrors
of falseness.

"Ah! how well I could understand the Inquisition! I would have applied
the torture, the boot.... Speak!...Confess!...You will not? ...Then
wait!...And I would have seized her by the throat until I choked her....
Or else I would have held her fingers into the fire. ...Oh! how I should
have enjoyed doing it! ...Speak!...Speak!...You will not? I would have
held them on the coals, and when the tips were burnt, she would have
confessed... certainly she would have confessed!"

Trémoulin was sitting up, shouting, with clenched fists. Around us, on
the neighboring roofs, people awoke and sat up, as he was disturbing
their sleep. As for me, I was moved and powerfully interested, and in
the darkness I could see that little woman, that little, fair, lively,
artful woman, as if I had known her personally. I saw her selling her
books, talking with the men whom her childish ways attracted, and in her
delicate, doll-like head, I could see little crafty ideas, silly ideas,
the dreams which a milliner smelling of musk attached to all heroes of
romantic adventures. I suspected her just like he did, I hated and
detested her, and would willingly have burnt her fingers and made her
confess.

Presently, he continued more calmly: "I do not know why I have told you
all this, for I have never mentioned it to anyone, but then, I have not
seen anybody or spoken to anybody for two years! And it was seething in
my heart like a fermenting wine. I have got rid of it, and so much the
worse for you. Well, I had made a mistake, but it was worse than I
thought, much worse. Just listen. I employed the means which a man
always does under such circumstances, and pretended that I was going to
be away from home for a day, and whenever I did this my wife went out to
lunch. I need not tell you how I bribed a waiter in the restaurant to
which they used to go, so that I might surprise them.

"He was to open the door of their private room for me and I arrived at
the appointed time, with the fixed determination of killing them both. I
could see the whole scene, just as if it had already occurred! I could
see myself going in. A small table covered with glasses, bottles and
plates separated her from Montina, and they would be so surprised when
they saw me, that they would not even attempt to move, and without a
word, I should bring down the loaded stick which I had in my hand, on
the man's head. Killed by one blow, he would fall with his head on the
table, and then, turning towards her, I should leave her time--a few
moments--to understand it all and to stretch out her arms towards me,
mad with terror, before dying in her turn. Oh! I was ready, strong,
determined, and pleased, madly pleased at the idea. The idea of the
terrified look that she would throw at my raised stick, of her arms that
she would stretch out to me, of her horrified cry, of her livid and
convulsed looks, avenged me beforehand. I would not kill her at one
blow! You will think me cruel, I dare say; but you do not know what a
man suffers. To think that a woman, whether she be wife or mistress,
whom one loves, gives herself to another, yields herself up to him as
she does to you, and receives kisses from his lips, as she does from
yours! It is a terrible, an atrocious thing to think of. When one feels
that torture, one is ready for anything. I only wonder that more women
are not murdered, for every man who has been deceived longs to commit
murder, has dreamt of it in the solitude of his own room, or on a
deserted road, and has been haunted by the one fixed idea of satisfied
vengeance.

"I arrived at the restaurant, and asked whether they were there. The
waiter whom I had bribed replied: 'Yes, Monsieur,' and taking me
upstairs, he pointed to a door, and said: 'That is the room!' So I
grasped my stick, as if my fingers had been made of iron, and went in. I
had chosen a most appropriate moment, for they were kissing most
lovingly, but it was not Montina; it was General de la Fléche, who was
sixty-six years old, and I had so fully made up my mind that I should
find the other one there, I was motionless from astonishment.

"And then ... and then, I really do not quite know what I thought; no, I
really do not know. If I had found myself face to face with the other, I
should have been convulsed with rage, but on seeing this old man, with a
fat stomach and pendulous cheeks, I was nearly choked with disgust. She,
who did not look fifteen, small and slim as she was, had given herself
to this fat man, who was nearly paralyzed, because he was a marquis and
a general, the friend and representative of dethroned kings. No, I do
not know what I felt, nor what I thought. I could not have lifted my
hand against this old man; it would have been a disgrace to me, and I no
longer felt inclined to kill my wife, but all women who could be guilty
of such things! I was no longer jealous, but felt distracted, as if I
had seen the horror of horrors!

"Let people say what they like of men, they are not so vile as that! If a
man is known to have given himself up to an old woman in that fashion,
people point their fingers at him. The husband or lover of an old woman
is more despised than a thief. We men are a decent lot, as a rule, but
many women, especially in Paris, are absolutely bad. They will give
themselves to all men, old or young, from the most contemptible and
different motives, because it is their profession, their vocation, and
their function. They are the eternal, unconscious, and serene
prostitutes, who give up their bodies, because they are the merchandise
of love, which they sell or give, to the old man who frequents the
pavements with money in his pocket, or else for glory, to a lecherous
old king, or to a celebrated and disgusting old man."

He vociferated like a prophet of old, in a furious voice, under the
starry sky, and with the rage of a man in despair, he repeated all the
glorified disgrace of all the mistresses of old kings, the respectable
shame of all those virgins who marry old husbands, the tolerated
disgrace of all those young women who accept old kisses with a smile.

I could see them, as he evoked their memory, since the beginning of the
world, surging round us in that Eastern night, girls, beautiful girls,
with vile souls, who, like the lower animals, who know nothing of the
age of the male, are docile to senile desires. They rose up before one,
the handmaids of the patriarchs, who are mentioned in the Bible, Hagar,
Ruth, the daughters of Lot, Abigail, Abishag, the virgin of Shunam, who
reanimated David with her caresses when he was dying, and the others,
young, stout, white, patricians or plebeians, irresponsible females
belonging to a master, and submissive slaves, whether caught by the
attraction of royalty, or bought as slaves!

"What did you do?" I asked.

"I went away," he replied simply. And we remained sitting side by side
for a long time without speaking, only dreaming! ...

I have retained an impression of that evening that I can never forget.
All that I saw, felt, and heard, our fishing excursion, the octopus
also, perhaps that harrowing story, amidst those white figures on the
neighboring roofs, all seemed to concur in producing a unique sensation.
Certain meetings, certain inexplicable combinations of things, decidedly
contain a larger quantity of the secret quintessence of life, than that
which is spread over the ordinary events of our days, without anything
exceptional happening to them.




THE HERMAPHRODITE


"Upon my word, I laughed at it as much as the rest," Navarette
exclaimed; "I laughed at it with that profound, cruel pitilessness which
we all of us, who are well made and vigorous, feel for those whom their
step-mother, Nature, has disfigured in some way or other, for those
laughable, feeble creatures who are, however, more to be pitied than
those poor deformed wretches from whom we turn away in spite of
ourselves.

"I had been the first to make fun of him at the club, to find those easy
words which are remembered, and to turn that smooth, flabby, pink, ugly
face, like that of an old woman, and of a Levantine eunuch in which the
mouth is like a piece of inert flesh, and where the small eyes glisten
with concentrated cunning, and remind us of the watchful, angry eyes of
a gorilla, at the same time, into ridicule. I knew that he was selfish,
without any affection, unreliable, full of whims, turning like a
weathercock with every wind that blows, and caring for nothing in the
world except gambling and old Dresden china.

"However, our intercourse was invariably limited to a careless, 'Good
morning,' and to the usual shake of the hands which men exchange when
they meet at the theater or the club, and so I had neither to defend
him, nor to uphold him as a friend. But I can swear to you that now I
reproach myself for all these effusive jeers and bitter things, and they
weigh on my conscience now that I have been told the other side, the
equivocal enigma of that existence."

"A Punch and Judy secret," Bob Shelley said, throwing the end of his
cigar into the fire.

"Oh! yes; we were a hundred miles from the truth when we merely supposed
that he was unfit for service. This unhappy Lantosque, a well-born,
clever man, and very rich to boot, might have exhibited himself in some
traveling booth, for he was an hermaphrodite; do you understand? an
hermaphrodite. And his whole life was one of long, incessant torture, of
physical and moral suffering, which was more maddening than that which
Tantalus endured on the banks of the river Acheron. He had nearly
everything of the woman about him; he was a ridiculous caricature of our
sex, with his shrill voice, his large hips, his bust concealed by a
loose, wide coat, his cheeks, his chin, and upper lip without a vestige
of hair, and he had to appear like a man, to restrain and stifle his
instincts, his tastes, desires, and dreams, to fight ceaselessly against
himself, and never to allow anything of that which he endured, nor what
he longed for, nor that which was sapping his very life, to be
discovered.

"Once only he was on the point of betraying himself, in spite of
himself. He ardently loved a man, as Chloe must have loved Daphnis. He
could not master himself, or calm his feverish passion, and went towards
the abyss as if seized by mental giddiness. He could imagine nothing
handsomer, more desirable, or more charming than that chance friend. He
had sudden transports, fits of surprise, tenderness, curiosity,
jealousy, the ardent longings of an old maid who is afraid of dying a
virgin, who is waiting for love as for her deliverance, who attaches
herself and devotes herself to a lover with her whole being, and who
grows emaciated and dries up, and remains misunderstood and despised.

"And as they have both disappeared now, the lover dead from a sword
thrust in the middle of the chest, at Milan, on account of some ballet
girl, and as he certainly died without knowing that he had inspired such
a passion, I may tell you his name.

"He was Count Sebinico, who used to deal at faro with such delicate,
white hands, and who wore rings on nearly every finger, who had such a
musical voice, and who, with his wavy hair, and his delicate profile,
looked like a handsome, Florentine Condottiere.

"It must be very terrible to be thus ashamed of oneself, to have that
longing for kisses which console the most wretched in their misery,
which satisfy hunger and thirst, and assuage pain; that illusion of
delicious, intoxicating kisses, the delight and the balm of which such a
person can never know; the horror of that dishonor of being pointed at,
made fun of, driven away like unclean creatures that prostitute their
sex, and make love vile by unmentionable rites; oh! the constant
bitterness of seeing that the person we love makes fun of us, ill-uses
us, and does not show us even the slightest friendship!"

"Poor devil!" Jean d'Orthyse said, in a sad and moved voice. "In his
place, I should have blown my brains out."

"Everybody says that, my dear fellow, but how few there are who venture
to forestall that intruder, who always come too quickly."

"Lantosque had splendid health, and declared that he had never put a
penny into a doctor's pocket, and if he had allowed himself to have been
looked after when he was confined to his bed two months before, by an
attack of influenza, we should still be hearing him propose a game of
poker before dinner, in his shrill voice. His death, however, was as
tragic and mysterious as all those tales from beyond the grave are, on
which the Invisible rests."

"Although he had a cough, which threatened to tear his chest to pieces,
and although he was haunted by the fear of death, of that great depth of
darkness in which we lose ourselves in the abyss of Annihilation and
Oblivion, he obstinately refused to have his chest sounded, and repulsed
Doctor Pertuzés almost furiously, who thought he had gone out of his
mind."

"He cowered down, and covered himself with the bed-clothes up to his
chin, and found strength enough to tear up the prescriptions, and to
drive everyone, whether friend or relation, who tried to make him listen
to reason, and who could not understand his attacks of rage and neurosis
from his bedside. He seemed to be possessed by some demon, like those
women in hysterical convulsions, whom the bishops used formerly to
exorcise writh much pomp. It was painful to see him."

"That went on for a week, during which time the pneumonia had ample
opportunities for ravaging and giving the finishing stroke to his body,
which had been so robust and free from ailments hitherto, and he died,
trying to utter some last words which nobody understood, and endeavoring
to point out one particular article of furniture in the room."

"His nearest relation was a cousin, the Marquis de Territet, a skeptic,
who lived in Burgundy, and whom all this disturbance had upset in his
habits, and whose only desire was to get it all over, the legal
formalities, the funeral, and all the rest of it, as soon as possible.

"Without reflecting on the strange suggestiveness of that death-bed, and
without looking to see whether there might not be, somehow or other, a
will in which Lantosque expressed his last wishes, he wanted to spare
his corpse the contact of mercenary hands, and to lay him out himself.

"You may judge of his surprise when, on throwing back the bed-clothes,
he first of all saw that Lantosque was dressed from head to foot in
tights, which accentuated, rather than otherwise, his female form.

"Much alarmed, feeling that he must have been violating some supreme
order, and comprehending it all, he went to his cousin's writing-table,
opened it, and successively searched every drawer, and soon found an
envelope fastened with five seals, and addressed to him. He broke them
and read as follows, written on a sheet of black-edged paper:

"'This is my only will. I leave all that I possess to my cousin, Roland
de Territet, on condition that he will undertake my funeral; that in his
own presence, he will have me wrapped up in the sheets of the bed on
which I die, and have me put into the coffin so, without any further
preparations. I wish to be cremated at _Père-Lachaise_, and not to be
subjected to any examination, or _post-mortem_, whatever may happen.'"

"And how came the marquis to betray the secret?" Bob Shelley asked.

"The marquis is married to a charming Parisian woman, and was any
married man, who loved his wife, ever known to keep a secret from her?"




MARROCA


You ask me, my dear friend, to send you my impressions of Africa, my
adventures, and especially an account of my love affairs in this country
which has attracted me for so long. You laughed a great deal beforehand
at my dusky sweethearts, as you called them, and declared that you could
see me returning to France, followed by a tall, ebony-colored woman,
with a yellow silk handkerchief round her head, and wearing voluminous
bright-colored trousers.

No doubt the Moorish women will have their turn, for I have seen several
of them who have made me feel very much inclined to have to fall in love
with them; but by way of making a beginning, I came across something
better, and very original.

In your last letter to me, you say: "When I know how people love in a
country, I know that country well enough to describe it, although I may
never have seen it." Let me tell you, then, that here they love
furiously. From the very first moment, one feels a sort of trembling
ardor, of constant desire, to the very tips of the fingers, which
over-excites our amorous powers, and all our faculties of physical
sensation, from the simple contact of the hands, down to that unnamable
requirement which makes us commit so many follies.

Do not misunderstand me. I do not know whether you call love of the
heart, love of the soul, whether sentimental idealism, Platonic love, in
a word, can exist on this earth; I doubt it, myself. But that other
love, sensual love, which has something good, a great deal of good about
it, is really terrible in this climate. The heat, the burning atmosphere
which makes you feverish, those suffocating blasts of wind from the
south, those waves of fire which come from the desert which is so near
us, that oppressive sirocco, which is more destructive and withering
than fire, that perpetual conflagration of an entire continent, that is
burnt even to its stones by a fierce and devouring sun, inflame the
blood, excite the flesh, and make brutes of us.

But to come to my story, I shall not tell you about the beginning of my
stay in Africa. After going to Bona, Constantine, Biskara and Setif, I
went to Bougie through the defiles of Chabet, by an excellent road
through a large forest, which follows the sea at a height of six hundred
feet above it, as far as that wonderful bay of Bougie, which is as
beautiful as that of Naples, of Ajaccio, or of Douarnenez, which are the
most lovely that I know.

Far away in the distance, before one goes round the large inlet where
the water is perfectly calm, one sees the Bougie. It is built on the
steep sides of a high hill, which is covered with trees, and forms a
white spot on that green slope; it might almost be taken for the foam of
a cascade, falling into the sea.

I had no sooner set foot in that delightful, small town, than I knew
that I should stay for a long time. In all directions the eye rests on
rugged, strangely shaped hill-tops, which are so close together that one
can hardly see the open sea, so that the gulf looks like a lake. The
blue water is wonderfully transparent, and the azure sky, a deep azure,
as if it had received two coats of paint, expands its wonderful beauty
above it. They seem to be looking at themselves in a glass, and to be a
reflection of each other.

Bougie is a town of ruins, and on the quay, when one arrives, one sees
such a magnificent ruin, that one might imagine one was at the opera. It
is the old Saracen Gate, overgrown with ivy, and there are ruins in all
directions on the hills round the town, fragments of Roman walls, bits
of Saracen monuments, the remains of Arabic buildings.

I had taken a small, Moorish house, in the upper town. You know those
dwellings, which have been described so often. They have no windows on
the outside; but they are lighted from top to bottom, by an inner court.
On the first floor, they have a large, cool room, in which one spends
the days, and a terrace on the roof, on which one spends the nights.

I at once fell in with the custom of all hot countries, that is to say,
of having a siesta after lunch. That is the hottest time in Africa, the
time when one can scarcely breathe; when the streets, the fields, and
the long, dazzling, white roads are deserted, when everyone is asleep,
or at any rate, trying to sleep, attired as scantily as possible.

In my drawing-room, which had columns of Arabic architecture, I had
placed a large, soft couch, covered with a carpet from Djebel Amour,
very nearly in the costume of Assan, but I could not sleep, as I was
tortured by my continence. There are two forms of torture on this earth,
which I hope you will never know: the want of water, and the want of
women, and I do not know which is the worst. In the desert, men would
commit any infamy for the sake of a glass of clean, cold water, and what
would one not do in some of the towns of the littoral, for a handsome,
fleshy, healthy girl? For there is no lack of girls in Africa; on the
contrary, they abound, but to continue my comparison, they are as
unwholesome and decayed as the muddy water in the wells of Sahara.

Well, one day when I was feeling more enervated than usual, I was trying
in vain to close my eyes. My legs twitched as if they were being
pricked, and I tossed about uneasily on my couch, until at last, unable
to bear it any longer, I got up and went out. It was a terribly hot day,
in the middle of July, and the pavement was hot enough to bake bread on.
My shirt, which was soaked with perspiration immediately, clung to my
body, and on the horizon there was a slight, white vapor, which seemed
to be palpable heat.

I went down to the sea, and going round the port, I went along the shore
of the pretty bay where the baths are. There was nobody about, and
nothing was stirring; not a sound of bird or of beast was to be heard,
the very waves did not lap, and the sea appeared to be asleep in the
sun.

Suddenly, behind one of the rocks, which were half covered by the silent
water, I heard a slight movement, and on turning round, I saw a tall,
naked girl, sitting up to her breasts in the water, taking a bath; no
doubt she reckoned on being alone, at that hot period of the day. Her
head was turned towards the sea, and she was moving gently up and down,
without seeing me.

Nothing could be more surprising than that picture of the beautiful
woman in the water, which was as clear as crystal, under a blaze of
light. For she was a marvelously beautiful woman, tall, and modeled like
a statue. She turned round, uttered a cry, and half swimming, half
walking, she went and hid altogether behind her rock; but as she must
necessarily come out, I sat down on the beach and waited. Presently, she
just showed her head, which was covered with thick black plaits. She had
a rather large mouth, with full lips, large, bold eyes, and her skin,
which was rather tanned by the climate, looked like a piece of old,
hard, polished ivory.

She called out to me: "Go away!" and her full voice, which corresponded
to her strong build, had a guttural accent, and as I did not move, she
added: "It is not right of you to stop there, monsieur." I did not move,
however, and her head disappeared. Ten minutes passed, and then her
hair, then her forehead, and then her eyes reappeared, but slowly and
prudently, as if she were playing at hide-and-seek, and were looking to
see who was near. This time she was furious, and called out: "You will
make me get some illness, and I shall not come out as long as you are
there." Thereupon, I got up and went away, but not without looking round
several times. When she thought I was far enough off, she came out of
the water; bending down and turning her back to me, she disappeared in a
cavity in the rock, behind a petticoat that was hanging up in front of
it.

I went back the next day. She was bathing again, but she had a bathing
costume, and she began to laugh, and showed her white teeth. A week
later we were friends, and in another week we were eager lovers. Her
name was Marroca, and she pronounced it as if there were a dozen _r's_
in it. She was the daughter of Spanish colonists, and had married a
Frenchman, whose name was Pontabeze. He was in government employ, though
I never exactly knew what his functions were. I found out that he was
always very busy, and I did not care for anything else.

She then altered her time for having her bath, and came to my house
every day, to have a siesta there. What a siesta! It could scarcely be
called reposing! She was a splendid girl, of a somewhat animal, but
superb type. Her eyes were always glowing with passion; her half-open
mouth, her sharp teeth, and even her smiles, had something ferociously
loving about them; and her curious, long and straight breasts, which
were as pointed as if they had been pears of flesh, and as elastic as if
they contained steel springs, gave her whole body something of the
animal, made her a sort of inferior and magnificent being, a creature
who was destined for unbridled love, and which roused in me the idea of
those ancient deities, who gave expression to their tenderness on the
grass and under the trees.

And then, her mind was as simple as two and two are four, and a sonorous
laugh served her instead of thought.

Instinctively proud of her beauty, she hated the slightest covering, and
ran and frisked about my house with daring and unconscious immodesty.
When she was at last overcome and worn out by her cries and movements,
she used to sleep soundly and peacefully while the overwhelming heat
brought out minute spots of perspiration on her brown skin, and from
under her arms.

Sometimes she returned in the evening, when her husband was on duty
somewhere, and we used to lie on the terrace, scarcely covered by some
fine, gauzy, Oriental fabric. When the full moon lit up the town and the
gulf, with its surrounding frame of hills, we saw on all the other
terraces what looked like an army of silent phantoms lying, who would
occasionally get up, change their places, and lie down again, in the
languorous warmths of the starry sky.

But in spite of the brightness of African nights, Marroca would insist
on stripping herself almost naked in the clear rays of the moon; she did
not trouble herself much about anybody who might see us, and often, in
spite of my fears and entreaties, she uttered long, resounding cries,
which made the dogs in the distance howl.

One night, when I was sleeping under the starry sky, she came and knelt
down on my carpet, and putting her lips, which curled slightly, close to
my face, she said: "You must come and stay at my house." I did not
understand her, and asked: "What do you mean?" "Yes, when my husband has
gone away; you must come and be with me."

I could not help laughing, and said: "Why, as you come here?" And she
went on almost talking into my mouth, sending her hot breath into my
throat, and moistening my moustache with her lips: "I want it as a
remembrance." Still I did not grasp her meaning; she put her arms round
my neck. "When you are no longer here, I shall think of it."

I was touched and amused at the same time, and said: "You must be mad. I
would much rather stop here."

As a matter of fact, I have no liking for assignations under the
conjugal roof; they are mouse-traps, in which the unwary are always
caught. But she begged and prayed, and even cried, and at last said:
"You shall see how I will love you there." Her wish seemed so strange
that I could not explain it to myself; but on thinking it over, I
thought I could discern a profound hatred for her husband, the secret
vengeance of a woman who takes a pleasure in deceiving him, and who,
moreover, wishes to deceive him in his own house.

"Is your husband very unkind to you?" I asked her. She looked vexed, and
said: "Oh! No, he is very kind." "But you are not fond of him?" She
looked at me with astonishment in her large eyes. "Indeed, I am very
fond of him, very; but not so fond as I am of you."

I could not understand it all, and while I was trying to get at her
meaning, she pressed one of those kisses, whose power she knew so well,
onto my lips, and whispered: "But you will come, will you not?" I
resisted, however, and so she got up immediately, and went away; nor did
she come back for a week. On the eighth day she came back, stopped
gravely at the door of my room, and said: "Are you coming to my house
to-night? ... If you refuse, I shall go away." Eight days is a very long
time, my friend, and in Africa those eight days are as good as a month.
"Yes," I said, and opened my arms, and she threw herself into them.

At night she waited for me in a neighboring street, and took me to their
house, which was very small, and near the harbor. I first of all went
through the kitchen, where they had their meals, and then into a very
tidy, whitewashed room, with photographs on the walls, and paper flowers
under a glass case. Marroca seemed beside herself with pleasure, and she
jumped about, and said: "There, you are at home, now." And I certainly
acted as though I had been, though I felt rather embarrassed and
somewhat uneasy.

Suddenly a loud knocking at the door made us start, and a man's voice
called out: "Marroca, it is I." She started: "My husband! ... Here, hide
under the bed, quickly." I was distractedly looking for my overcoat, but
she gave me a push, and panted out: "Come along, come along."

I lay down flat on my stomach, and crept under the bed without a word,
while she went into the kitchen. I heard her open a cupboard, and then
shut it again, and she came back into the room, carrying some object
which I could not see, but which she quickly put down; and as her
husband was getting impatient, she said, calmly: "I cannot find the
matches." Then suddenly she added: "Oh! Here they are; I will come and
let you in."

The man came in, and I could see nothing of him but his feet, which were
enormous. If the rest of him was in proportion, he must have been a
giant.

I heard kisses, a little pat on her naked flesh, and a laugh, and he
said, in a strong Marseilles accent: "I forgot my purse, so I was
obliged to come back; you were sound asleep, I suppose." He went to the
cupboard, and was a long time in finding what he wanted; and as Marocca
had thrown herself onto a bed, as if she were tired out, he went up to
her, and no doubt tried to caress her, for she flung a volley of angry
_r's_ at him. His feet were so close to me that I felt a stupid,
inexplicable longing to catch hold of them, but I restrained myself, and
when he saw that he could not succeed in his wish, he got angry, and
said: "You are not at all nice, to-night. Good-bye." I heard another
kiss, then the big feet turned, and I saw the nails in the soles of his
shoes as he went into the next room, the front door was shut, and I was
saved!

I came slowly out of my retreat, feeling rather humiliated, and while
Marroca danced a jig round me, shouting with laughter, and clapping her
hands, I threw myself heavily into a chair. But I jumped up with a
bound, for I had sat down on something cold, and as I was no more
dressed than my accomplice was, the contact made me start, and I looked
round. I had sat down on a small axe, used for cutting wood, and as
sharp as a knife. How had it got there? ... I had certainly not seen it
when I went in; but Marroca seeing me jump up, nearly choked with
laughter, and coughed with both hands on her stomach.

I thought her amusement rather out of place; we had risked our lives
stupidly, and I still felt a cold shiver down my back, and I was rather
hurt at her foolish laughter. "Supposing your husband had seen me?" I
said. "There was no danger of that," she replied. "What do you mean? ...
No danger? That is a good joke! ... If he had stooped down, he must have
seen me."

She did not laugh any more; she only looked at me with her large eyes,
which were bright with merriment. "He would not have stooped." "Why?" I
persisted. "Just suppose that he had let his hat fall, he would have
been sure to pick it up, and then... I was well prepared to defend
myself, in this costume!" She put her two strong, round arms about my
neck, and, lowering her voice, as she did when she said: "I _adorre_
you," she whispered: "Then he would _never_ have got up again." I did
not understand her, and said: "What do you mean?"

She gave me a cunning wink, and put out her hand to the chair on which I
had sat down, and her outstretched hands, her smile, her half-open lips,
her white, sharp, and ferocious teeth, all drew my attention to the
little axe which was used for cutting wood, whose sharp blade was
glistening in the candle-light, and while she put out her hand as if she
were going to take it, she put her left arm round me, and drawing me to
her, and putting her lips against mine, with her right arm she made a
motion as if she were cutting off the head of a kneeling man!

This, my friend, is the manner in which people here understand conjugal
duties, love, and hospitality!




AN ARTIFICE


The old doctor and his young patient were talking by the side of the
fire. There was nothing the matter with her, except that she had one of
those little feminine ailments from which pretty women frequently
suffer; slight anaemia, nervous attack, and a suspicion of fatigue, of
that fatigue from which newly married people often suffer at the end of
the first month of their married life, when they have made a love match.

She was lying on the couch and talking. "No, doctor," she said; "I shall
never be able to understand a woman deceiving her husband. Even allowing
that she does not love him, that she pays no heed to her vows and
promises, how can she give herself to another man? How can she conceal
the intrigue from other people's eyes? How can it be possible to love
amidst lies and treason?"

The doctor smiled, and replied: "It is perfectly easy, and I can assure
you that a woman does not think of all those little subtle details, when
she has made up her mind to go astray. I even feel certain that no woman
is ripe for true love until she has passed through all the
promiscuousness and all the loathsomeness of married life, which,
according to an illustrious man, is nothing but an exchange of
ill-tempered words by day, and disagreeable odors at night. Nothing is
more true, for no woman can love passionately until after she has
married.

"As for dissimulation, all women have plenty of it on hand on such
occasions, and the simplest of them are wonderful, and extricate
themselves from the greatest dilemmas in an extraordinary way."

The young woman, however, seemed incredulous. ... "No, doctor," she
said, "one never thinks until after it has happened, of what one ought
to have done in a dangerous affair, and women are certainly more liable
than men to lose their heads on such occasions." The doctor raised his
hands. "After it has happened, you say! Now, I will tell you something
that happened to one of my female patients, whom I always considered as
an immaculate woman.

"It happened in a provincial town, and one night when I was sleeping
profoundly, in that deep, first sleep from which it is so difficult to
arouse us, it seemed to me, in my dreams, as if the bells in the town
were sounding a fire alarm, and I woke up with a start. It was my own
bell, which was ringing wildly, and as my footman did not seem to be
answering the door, I, in turn, pulled the bell at the head of my bed,
and soon I heard banging, and steps in the silent house, and then Jean
came into my room, and handed me a letter which said: 'Madame Lelièvre
begs Doctor Simeon to come to her immediately.'

"I thought for a few moments, and then I said to myself: 'A nervous
attack, vapors, nonsense; I am too tired.' And so I replied: 'As Doctor
Simeon is not at all well, he must beg Madame Lelièvre to be kind enough
to call in his colleague, Monsieur Bonnet.' I put the note into an
envelope, and went to sleep again, but about half an hour later the
street bell rang again, and Jean came to me and said: 'There is somebody
downstairs; I do not quite know whether it is a man or a woman, as the
individual is so wrapped up, who wishes to speak to you immediately. He
says it is a matter of life and death for two people. Whereupon, I sat
up in bed and told him to show the person in.

"A kind of black phantom appeared, who raised her veil as soon as Jean
had left the room. It was Madame Berthe Lelièvre, quite a young woman,
who had been married for three years to a large shop-keeper in the town,
who was said to have married the prettiest girl in the neighborhood.

"She was terribly pale, her face was contracted like the faces of mad
people are, occasionally, and her hands trembled violently. Twice she
tried to speak, without being able to utter a sound, but at last she
stammered out: 'Come... quick... quick, Doctor... Come... my... my lover
has just died in my bedroom.' She stopped, half suffocated with emotion,
and then went on: 'My husband will... be coming home from the club very
soon.'

"I jumped out of bed, without even considering that I was only in my
night-shirt, and dressed myself in a few moments, and then I said: 'Did
you come a short time ago?' 'No,' she said, standing like a statue
petrified with horror. 'It was my servant... she knows.' And then, after
a short silence, she went on: 'I was there... by his side.' And she
uttered a sort of cry of horror, and after a fit of choking, which made
her gasp, she wept violently, and shook with spasmodic sobs for a minute
or two. Then her tears suddenly ceased, as if by an internal fire, and
with an air of tragic calmness, she said: 'Let us make haste.'

"I was ready, but I exclaimed: 'I quite forgot to order my carriage.' 'I
have one,' she said; 'it is his, which was waiting for him!' She wrapped
herself up, so as to completely conceal her face, and we started."

"When she was by my side in the darkness of the carriage, she suddenly
seized my hand, and crushing it in her delicate fingers, she said, with
a shaking voice, that proceeded from a distracted heart: 'Oh! If you
only knew, if you only knew what I am suffering! I loved him, I have
loved him distractedly, like a mad woman, for the last six months.' 'Is
anyone up in your house?' I asked. 'No, nobody except Rose, who knows
everything.'

"We stopped at the door, and evidently everybody was asleep, and we went
in without making any noise, by means of her latch-key, and walked
upstairs on tip-toe. The frightened servant was sitting on the top of
the stairs, with a lighted candle by her side, as she was afraid to stop
by the dead man, and I went into the room, which was turned upside down,
as if there had been a struggle in it. The bed, which was tumbled and
open, seemed to be waiting for somebody; one of the sheets was hanging
onto the floor, and wet napkins, with which they had bathed the young
man's temples, were lying on the floor, by the side of a wash-hand basin
and a glass, while a strong smell of vinegar pervaded the room."

"The dead man's body was lying at full length in the middle of the room,
and I went up to it, looked at it, and touched it. I opened the eyes,
and felt the hands, and then, turning to the two women, who were shaking
as if they were frozen, I said to them: 'Help me to carry him onto the
bed.' When we had laid him gently onto it, I listened to his heart, and
put a looking-glass to his lips, and then said: 'It is all over; let us
make haste and dress him.' It was a terrible sight!

"I took his limbs one by one, as if they had belonged to some enormous
doll, and held them out to the clothes which the women brought, and they
put on his socks, drawers, trousers, waistcoat, and lastly the coat, but
it was a difficult matter to get the arms into the sleeves.

"When it came to buttoning his boots, the two women knelt down, while I
held the light, but as his feet were rather swollen, it was very
difficult, and as they could not find a button-hook, they had to use
their hairpins. When the terrible toilet was over, I looked at our work,
and said: 'You ought to arrange his hair a little.' The girl went and
brought her mistress's large-toothed comb and brush, but as she was
trembling, and pulling out his long, matted hair in doing it, Madame
Lelièvre took the comb out of her hand, and arranged his hair as if she
were caressing him. She parted it, brushed his beard, rolled his
moustachios gently round her fingers, as she had no doubt been in the
habit of doing, in the familiarities of their intrigue.

"Suddenly, however, letting go of his hair, she took her dead lover's
inert head in her hands, and looked for a long time in despair at the
dead face, which no longer could smile at her, and then, throwing
herself onto him, she took him into her arms and kissed him ardently.
Her kisses fell like blows onto his closed mouth and eyes, onto his
forehead and temples, and then, putting her lips to his ear, as if he
could still hear her, and as if she were about to whisper something to
him, to make their embraces still more ardent, she said several times,
in a heartrending voice: 'Adieu, my darling!'

"Just then the clock struck twelve, and I started up. 'Twelve o'clock!'
I exclaimed. 'That is the time when the club closes. Come, Madame, we
have not a moment to lose!' She started up, and I said: 'We must carry
him into the drawing-room.' And when we had done this, I placed him on a
sofa, and lit the chandeliers, and just then the front door was opened
and shut noisily. He had come back, and I said: Rose, bring me the basin
and the towels, and make the room look tidy. Make haste, for heaven's
sake! Monsieur Lelièvre is coming in.'

"I heard his steps on the stairs, and then his hands feeling along the
walls. 'Come here, my dear fellow,' I said, 'we have had an accident.'

"And the astonished husband appeared in the door with a cigar in his
mouth, and said: 'What is the matter? What is the meaning of this?' 'My
dear friend,' I said, going up to him; 'you find us in great
embarrassment. I had remained late, chatting with your wife and our
friend, who had brought me in his carriage, when he suddenly fainted,
and in spite of all we have done, he has remained unconscious for two
hours. I did not like to call in strangers, and if you will now help me
downstairs with him, I shall be able to attend to him better at his own
house.'

"The husband, who was surprised, but quite unsuspicious, took off his
hat, and then he took his rival, who would be quite inoffensive for the
future, under his arms. I got between his two legs, as if I had been a
horse between the shafts, and we went downstairs, while his wife lighted
us. When we got outside, I held the body up, so as to deceive the
coachman, and said: 'Come, my friend; it is nothing; you feel better
already, I expect. Pluck up your courage, and make an attempt. It will
soon be over.' But as I felt that he was slipping out of my hands, I
gave him a slap on the shoulder, which sent him forward and made him
fall into the carriage, and then I got in after him. Monsieur Lelièvre,
who was rather alarmed, said to me: 'Do you think it is anything
serious?' To which I replied, '_No_,' with a smile, as I looked at his
wife, who had put her arm into that of her legitimate husband, and was
trying to see into the carriage.

"I shook hands with them, and told my coachman to start, and during the
whole drive the dead man kept falling against me. When we got to his
house, I said that he had become unconscious on the way home, and helped
to carry him upstairs, where I certified that he was dead, and acted
another comedy to his distracted family, and at last I got back to bed,
not without swearing at lovers."

The doctor ceased, though he was still smiling, and the young woman, who
was in a very nervous state, said: "Why have you told me that terrible
story?"

He gave her a gallant bow, and replied:

"So that I may offer you my services, if necessary."




THE ASSIGNATION


Although she had her bonnet and jacket on, with a black veil over her
face, and another in her pocket, which she would put on over the +other
as soon as she had got into the cab, she was beating +the top of her
little boot with the point of her parasol, and remained sitting in her
room, without being able to make up her mind to keep this appointment.

And yet, how many times within the last two years had she dressed
herself thus, when she knew that her husband would be on the Stock
Exchange, in order to go to the bachelor chambers of her lover, the
handsome Viscount de Martelet.

The clock behind her was ticking loudly, a book which she had half read
through was lying open on a little rosewood writing-table between the
windows, and a strong, sweet smell of violets from two bunches which
were in a couple of Dresden china vases, mingled with a vague smell of
verbena which came through the half-open door of her dressing-room.

The clock struck three, she rose up from her chair, she turned round to
look at herself in the glass and smiled. "He is already waiting for me,
and will be getting tired."

Then she left the room, told her footman that she would be back in an
hour, at the latest--which was a lie; went downstairs and ventured into
the street on foot.

It was towards the end of May, that delightful time of the year, when
the spring seems to be besieging Paris, and to conquer it over its
roofs, invading the houses through their walls, and making it look gay,
shedding brightness over its stone façades, the asphalt of its
pavements, the stones on the roads, bathing it and intoxicating it with
sap, like a forest putting on its spring verdure.

Madame Haggan went a few steps to the right, intending, as usual, to go
along the Parade Provence, where she would hail a cab; but the soft air,
that feeling of summer which penetrates our breast on some days, now
took possession of her so suddenly that she changed her mind, and went
down the Rue de la Chausée d'Antin, without knowing why, but vaguely
attracted by a desire to see the trees in the _Square de la Trinité_.

"He may just wait ten minutes longer for me," she said to herself. And
that idea pleased her also as she walked slowly through the crowd. She
fancied that she saw him growing impatient, looking at the clock,
opening the window, listening at the door, sitting down for a few
moments, getting up again, and not daring to smoke, as she had forbidden
him to do so when she was coming to him, and throwing despairing looks
at his box of cigarettes.

She walked slowly, interested in what she saw, the shops and the people
she met, walking slower and slower, and so little eager to get to her
destination that she only sought for some pretext for stopping, and at
the end of the street, in the little square, the verdure attracted her
so much, that she went in, took a chair, and, sitting down, watched the
hands of the clock as they moved.

Just then, the half hour struck, and her heart beat with pleasure when
she heard the chimes. She had gained half-an-hour; then it would take
her a quarter of an hour to reach the Rue Miromesnil, and a few minutes
more in strolling along--an hour! a whole hour saved from her
_rendez-vous_! She would not stop three-quarters of an hour, and that
business would be finished once more.

Oh! she disliked going there! Just like a patient going to the dentist,
so she had the intolerable recollection of all their past meetings, one
a week on an average, for the last two years; and the thought that
another was going to take place immediately made her shiver with misery
from head to foot. Not that it was exactly painful, like a visit to the
dentist, but it was wearisome, so wearisome, so complicated, so long, so
unpleasant, that anything, even a visit to the dentist would have seemed
preferable to her. She went on, however, but very slowly, stopping,
sitting down, going hither and thither, but she went. Oh! how she would
have liked to miss this meeting, but she had left the unhappy viscount
in the lurch, twice following, during the last month, and she did not
dare to do it again so soon. Why did she go to see him? Oh! why? Because
she had acquired the habit of doing it, and had no reason to give poor
Martelet when he wanted to know _the why_! Why had she begun it? Why?
She did not know herself, any longer. Had she been in love with him?
Very possibly! Not very much, but a little, a long time ago! He was very
nice, sought after, perfectly dressed, most courteous, and after the
first glance, he was a perfect lover for a fashionable woman. He had
courted her for three months--the normal period, an honorable strife and
sufficient resistances--and then she had consented, and with what
emotion, what nervousness, what terrible, delightful fear, and that
first meeting in his small, ground-floor bachelor rooms, in the Rue de
Miromesnil. Her heart? What did her little heart of a woman who had been
seduced, vanquished, conquered, feel when she for the first time entered
the door of that house which was her nightmare? She really did not know!
She had quite forgotten. One remembers a fact, a date, a thing, but one
hardly remembers, after the lapse of two years, what an emotion, which
soon vanished, because it was very slight, was like. But, oh! she had
certainly not forgotten the others, that rosary of meetings, that road
to the cross of love, and those stations, which were so monotonous, so
fatiguing, so similar to each other, that she felt a nauseating taste in
her mouth at what was going to happen so soon.

And the very cabs were not like the other cabs which one makes use of
for ordinary purposes! Certainly, the cabmen guessed. She felt sure of
it, by the very way they looked at her, and the eyes of these Paris
cabmen are terrible! When one remembers they are constantly remembering,
in the Courts of Justices, after a lapse of several years, faces of
criminals whom they have only driven once, in the middle of the night,
from some street or other to a railway station, and that they have to do
with almost as many passengers as there are hours in the day, and that
their memory is good enough for them to declare: "That is the man whom I
took up in the Rues des Martyrs, and put down at the Lyons Railway
Station, at 12 o'clock at night, on July 10, last year!" Is it not
terrible when one risks what a young woman risks when she is going to
meet her lover, and has to trust her reputation to the first cabman she
meets? In two years she had employed at least a hundred to a hundred and
twenty in that drive to the Rue Miromesnil, reckoning only one a week,
and they were so many witnesses, who might appear against her at a
critical moment.

As soon as she was in the cab, she took another veil, which was as thick
and dark as a domino mask, out of her pocket, and put it on. That hid
her face, but what about the rest, her dress, her bonnet, and her
parasol? They might be remarked; they might, in fact, have been seen
already. Oh! I What misery she endured in this Rue de Miromesnil! She
thought that she recognized all the foot-passengers, the servants,
everybody, and almost before the cab had stopped, she jumped out and ran
past the porter who was standing outside his lodge. He must know
everything, everything!--her address, her name, her husband's
profession--everything, for those porters are the most cunning of
policemen! For two years she had intended to bribe him, to give him (to
throw at him one day as she passed him) a hundred-franc bank-note, but
she had never once dared to do it. She was frightened! What of? She did
not know! Of his calling her back, if he did not understand? Of a
scandal? Of a crowd on the stairs? Of being arrested, perhaps? To reach
the Viscount's door, she had only to ascend a half a flight of stairs,
and it seemed to her as high as the tower of Saint Jacques' Church.

As soon as she had reached the vestibule, she felt as if she were caught
in a trap, and the slightest noise before or behind her, nearly made her
faint. It was impossible for her to go back, because of that porter who
barred her retreat; and if anyone came down at that moment she would not
dare to ring at Martelet's door, but would pass it as if she had been
going elsewhere! She would have gone up, and up, and up! She would have
mounted forty flights of stairs! Then, when everything would seem quiet
again down below, she would run down, feeling terribly frightened, lest
she would not recognize the lobby.

He was there in a velvet coat lined with silk, very stylish, but rather
ridiculous, and for two years he had never altered his manner of
receiving her, not in a single movement! As soon as he had shut the
door, he used to say this: "Let me kiss your hands, my dear, dear
friend!" Then he followed her into the room, when with closed shutters
and lighted candles, out of refinement, no doubt, he knelt down before
her and looked at her from head to foot with an air of adoration. On the
first occasion that had been very nice and very successful; but now it
seemed to her as if she saw Monsieur Delauney acting the last scene of a
successful piece for the hundred and twentieth time. He might really
change his manner of acting. But no, he never altered his manner of
acting, poor fellow. What a good fellow he was, but very commonplace!

And how difficult it was to undress and dress without a lady's maid!
Perhaps that was the moment when she began to take a dislike to him.
When he said: "Do you want me to help you?" she could have killed him.
Certainly there were not many men as awkward as he was, or as
uninteresting. Certainly, little Baron de Isombal would never have asked
her in such a manner: "Do you want me to help you?" He would have helped
her, he was so witty, so funny, so active. But there! He was a
diplomatist, he had been about in the world, and had roamed everywhere,
and, no doubt, dressed and undressed women who were arrayed in every
possible fashion! ...

The church clock struck the three-quarters, and she looked at the dial,
and said: "Oh, how agitated he will be!" and then she quickly left the
square; but she had not taken a dozen steps outside, when she found
herself face to face with a gentleman who bowed profoundly to her.

"Why! Is that you, Baron?" she said, in surprise. She had just been
thinking of him.

"Yes, Madame." And then, after asking how she was, and a few vague
words, he continued: "Do you know that you are the only one--you will
allow me to say of my lady friends, I hope? who has not yet seen my
Japanese collection."

"But my dear Baron, a lady cannot go to a bachelor's room like this."

"What do you mean? That is a great mistake, when it is a question of
seeing a rare collection!"

"At any rate, she cannot go alone."

"And why not? I have received a number of ladies alone, only for the
sake of seeing my collection! They come every day. Shall I tell you
their names? No--I will not do that; one must be discreet, even when one
it not guilty; as a matter of fact, there is nothing improper in going
to the house of a well-known serious man who holds a certain position,
unless one goes for an unavoidable reason!"

"Well, what you have said is certainly correct, at bottom."

"So you will come and see my collection?"

"When?"

"Well, now, immediately."

"Impossible; I am in a hurry."

"Nonsense, you have been sitting in the square for this last half hour."

"You were watching me?"

"I was looking at you."

"But I am sadly in a hurry."

"_I_ am sure you are not. Confess that you are in no particular hurry."

Madame Haggan began to laugh, and said: "Well, ... no ... not ...
very...."

A cab passed close to them, and the little Baron called out: "Cabman!"
and the vehicle stopped, and opening the door, he said: "Get in,
Madame."

"But, Baron! no, it is impossible to-day; I really cannot."

"Madame, you are acting very imprudently; get in! people are beginning
to look at us, and you will collect a crowd; they will think I am trying
to carry you off, and we shall both be arrested; please get in!"

She got in, frightened and bewildered, and he sat down by her side,
saying to the cabman: "Rue de Provence."

But suddenly she exclaimed: "Good heavens! I have forgotten a very
important telegram; please drive to the nearest telegraph office first
of all."

The cab stopped a little farther on, in the Rue de Châteaudun, and she
said to the Baron: "Would you kindly get me a fifty centimes telegraph
form? I promised my husband to invite Martelet to dinner to-morrow, and
had quite forgotten it."

When the Baron returned and gave her the blue telegraph form, she wrote
in pencil:

     "My Dear Friend: I am not at all well. I am suffering terribly from
     neuralgia, which keeps me in bed. Impossible to go out. Come and
     dine to-morrow night, so that I may obtain my pardon.

     "JEANNE."

She wetted the gum, fastened it carefully, and addressed it to:
"Viscount de Martelet, 240 Rue Miromesnil," and then, giving it back to
the Baron, she said: "Now, will you be kind enough to throw this into
the telegram box."




AN ADVENTURE


"Come! Come!" Pierre Dufaille said, shrugging his shoulders. "What are
you talking about, when you say that there are no more adventures? Say
that there are no more adventurous men, and you will be right! Yes,
nobody ventures to trust to chance, in these days, for as soon as there
is any slight mystery, or a spice of danger, they draw back. If,
however, a man is willing to go into them blindly, and to run the risk
of anything that may happen, he can still meet with adventures, and even
I, who never look for them, met with one in my life, and a very
startling one; let me tell you.

"I was staying in Florence, and was living very quietly, and all I
indulged in, in the way of adventures, was to listen occasionally to the
immoral proposals with which every stranger is beset at night on the
_Piazzo de la Signoria_, by some worthy Pandarus or other, with a head
like that of a venerable priest. These excellent fellows generally
introduce you to their families, where debauchery is carried on in a
very simple, and almost patriarchal fashion, and where one does not run
the slightest risk.

"One day as I was admiring Benvenuto Cellini's wonderful Perseus, in
front of the _Loggia del Lanzi_, I suddenly felt my sleeve pulled
somewhat roughly, and on turning round, I found myself face to face with
a woman of about fifty, who said to me with a strong German accent:
'You are French, Monsieur, are you not?' 'Certainly, I am,' I replied.
'And would you like to go home with a very pretty woman?'

"'Most certainly I should,' I replied, with a laugh.

"Nothing could have been funnier than the looks and the serious air of
the procuress, or than the strangeness of the proposal, made to broad
daylight, and in very bad French, but it was even worse when she added:
'Do you know everything they do in Paris?' 'What do you mean, my good
woman?' I asked her, rather startled. 'What is done in Paris, that is
not done everywhere else?'

"However, when she explained her meaning, I replied that I certainly
could not, and as I was not quite so immodest as the lady, I blushed a
little. But not for long, for almost immediately afterwards I grew pale,
when she said: 'I want to assure myself of it, personally.' And she said
this in the same phlegmatic manner, which did not seem so funny to me
now, but, on the contrary, rather frightened me. 'What!' I said.
'Personally! You! Explain yourself!'

"If I had been rather surprised before, I was altogether astonished at
her explanation. It was indeed an adventure, and was almost like a
romance. I could scarcely believe my ears, but this is what she told me.

"She was the confidential attendant on a lady moving in high society,
who wished to be initiated into the most secret refinements of Parisian
high life, and who had done me the honor of choosing me for her
companion. But then, this preliminary test! 'By Jove!' I said to myself,
'this old German hag is not so stupid as she looks!' And I laughed in my
sleeve, as I listened inattentively to what she was saying to persuade
me.

"'My mistress is the prettiest woman you can dream of; a real beauty;
springtime! A flower!' 'You must excuse me, but if your mistress is
really like springtime and a flower, you (pray excuse me for being so
blunt) are not exactly that, and perhaps I should not exactly be in a
mood to humor you, my dear lady, in the same way that I might her.'

"She jumped back, astonished in turn: 'Why, I only want to satisfy
myself with my own eyes; not by injuring you.' And she finished her
explanation, which had been incomplete before. All she had to do was to
go with me to _Mother Patata's_ well-known establishment, and there to
be present while I conversed with one of its fair and frail inhabitants.

"'Oh!' I said to myself, 'I was mistaken in her tastes. She is, of
course, an old, shriveled up woman, as I guessed, but she is a
specialist. This is interesting, upon my word! I never met with such a
one before!'

"Here, gentlemen, I must beg you to allow me to hide my face for a
moment. What I said was evidently not strictly correct, and I am rather
ashamed of it; my excuse must be that I was young, that _Patata's_ was a
celebrated place, of which I had heard wonderful things said, but the
entry to which was barred me, on account of my small means. Five
napoleons was the price! Fancy! I could not treat myself to it, and so I
accepted the good lady's offer. I do not say that it was not
disagreeable, but what was I to do? And then, the old woman was a
German, and so her five napoleons were a slight return for our five
milliards, which we paid them as our war indemnity.

"Well, _Patata's_ boarder was charming, the old woman was not too
troublesome, and your humble servant did his best to sustain the ancient
glory of Frenchmen.

"Let me drink my disgrace to the dregs! On the next day but one after, I
was waiting at the statue of Perseus. It was shameful, I confess, but I
enjoyed the partial restitution of the five milliards, and it is
surprising how a Frenchman loses his dignity, when he is traveling.

"The good lady made her appearance at the appointed time. It was quite
dark, and I followed her without a word, for, after all, I was not very
proud of the part I was playing. But if you only knew how fair that
little girl at _Patata's_ was! As I went along, I thought only of her,
and did not pay any attention to where we were going, and I was only
roused from my reverie by hearing the old woman say: 'Here we are. Try
and be as entertaining as you were the day before yesterday.'

"We were not outside _Patata's_ house, but in a narrow street running by
the side of a palace with high walls, and in front of us was a small
door, which the old woman opened gently.

"For a moment I felt inclined to draw back. Apparently the old hag was
also ardent on her own account! She had me in a trap! No doubt she
wanted in her turn to make use of my small talents! But, no! That was
impossible!

"'Go in! Go in!' she said. 'What are you afraid of? My mistress is so
pretty, so pretty, much prettier than the little girl of the other day.'
So it was really true, this story out of _The Arabian Nights_? Why not?
And after all, what was I risking? The good woman would certainly not
injure me, and so I went in, though somewhat nervously.

"Oh! My friend, what an hour I spent then! Paradise! and it would be
useless, impossible to describe it to you! Apartments fit for a
princess, and one of those princesses out of fairy tales, a fairy
herself. An exquisite German woman, exquisite as German women can be,
when they try. An Undine of Heinrich Heine's, with hair like the Virgin
Mary's, innocent blue eyes, and a skin like strawberries and cream.

"Suddenly, however, my Undine got up, and her face convulsed with fury
and pride. Then, she rushed behind some hangings, where she began to
give vent to a flood of German words, which I did not understand, while
I remained standing, dumbfounded. But just then, the old woman came in,
and said, shaking with fear: 'Quick, quick; dress yourself and go, if
you do not wish to be killed.'

"I asked no questions, for what was the good of trying to understand?
Besides, the old woman, who grew more and more terrified, could not find
any French words, and chattered wildly. I jumped up and got into my
shoes and overcoat and ran down the stairs, and in the street.

"Ten minutes later, I recovered my breath and my senses, without knowing
what streets I had been through, nor where I had come from, and I stole
furtively into my hotel, as if I had been a malefactor.

"In the _cafés_ the next morning, nothing was talked of except a crime
that had been committed during the night. A German baron had killed his
wife with a revolver, but he had been liberated on bail, as he had
appealed to his counsel, to whom he had given the following explanation,
to the truth of which the lady companion of the baroness had certified.

"She had been married to her husband almost by force, and detested him,
and she had some particular reasons (which were not specified) for her
hatred of him. In order to have her revenge on him, she had had him
seized, bound and gagged by four hired ruffians, who had been caught,
and who had confessed everything. Thus, reduced to immobility, and
unable to help himself, the baron had been obliged to witness a
degrading scene, where his wife caressed a Frenchman, and thus outraged
conjugal fidelity and German honor at the same time. As soon as he was
set at liberty, the baron had punished his faithless wife, and was now
seeking her accomplice."

"And what did you do?" someone asked Pierre Dufaille.

"The only thing I could do, by George!" he replied. "I put myself at the
poor devil's disposal; it was his right, and so we fought a duel. Alas!
It was with swords, and he ran me right through the body. That was also
his right, but he exceeded his right when he called me her _ponce_. Then
I gave him his chance, and as I fell, I called out with all the strength
that remained to me: 'A Frenchman! A Frenchman! Long live France!'"




THE DOUBLE PINS


"Ah; my-dear fellow, what jades women are!"

"What makes you say that?"

"Because they have played me an abominable trick."

"You?"

"Yes, me."

"Women, or a woman?"

"Two women."

"Two women at once?"

"Yes."

"What was the trick?"

The two young men were sitting outside a _café_ on the Boulevards, and
drinking liquors mixed with water, those aperients which look like
infusions of all the shades in a box of water-colors. They were nearly
the same age, twenty-five to thirty. One was dark and the other fair,
and they had the same semi-elegant look of stock-jobbers, of men who go
to the Stock Exchange, and into drawing-rooms, who are to be seen
everywhere, who live everywhere, and love everywhere. The dark one
continued.

"I have told you of my connection with that little woman, a tradesman's
wife, whom I met on the beach at Dieppe?"

"Yes."

"My dear fellow, you know what it is. I had a mistress in Paris, whom I
loved dearly; an old friend, a good friend, and it has grown into a
habit, in fact, and I value it very much."

"Your habit."

"Yes, my habit, and hers also. She is married to an excellent man, whom
I also value very much, a very cordial fellow. A capital companion! I
may say, I think that my life is bound up with that house."

"Well?"

"Well! they could not manage to leave Paris, and I found myself a
widower at Dieppe."

"Why did you go to Dieppe?"

"For change of air. One cannot remain on the Boulevards the whole time."

"And then?"

"Then I met the little woman I mentioned to you on the beach there."

"The wife of that head of the public office?"

"Yes; she was dreadfully dull; her husband only came every Sunday, and
he is horrible! I understand her perfectly, and we laughed and danced
together."

"And the rest?"

"Yes, but that came later. However, we met, we liked each other. I told
her I liked her, and she made me repeat it, so that she might understand
it better, and she put no obstacles in my way."

"Did you love her?"

"Yes, a little; she is very nice."

"And what about the other?"

"The other was in Paris! Well, for six weeks it was very pleasant, and
wre returned here on the best of terms. Do you know how to break with a
woman, when that woman has not wronged you in any way?"

"Yes, perfectly well."

"How do you manage it?"

"I give her up."

"How do you do it?"

"I do not see her any longer."

"But supposing she comes to you?"

"I am ... not at home."

"And if she comes again?"

"I say I am not well."

"If she looks after you?"

"I play her some dirty trick."

"And if she puts up with it?"

"I write to her husband anonymous letters, so that he may look after her
on the days that I expect her."

"That is serious! I cannot resist, and do not know how to bring about a
rupture, and so I have a collection of mistresses. There are some whom I
do not see more than once a year, others every ten months, others on
those days when they want to dine at a restaurant, those whom I have put
at regular intervals do not worry me, but I often have great difficulty
with the fresh ones, so as to keep them at proper intervals."

"And then...."

"And then ... Then, this little woman was all fire and flame, without
any fault of mine, as I told you! As her husband spends all the whole
day at his office, she began to come to me unexpectedly, and twice she
nearly met my regular one on, the stairs."

"The devil!"

"Yes; so I gave each of them her days, regular days, to avoid confusion;
Saturday and Monday for the old one, Tuesday, Friday and Sunday for the
new one."

"Why did you show her the preference?"

"Ah! My dear friend, she is younger."

"The devil!"

"Yes; so I gave each of them her days, regular days, to avoid confusion;
Saturday and Monday for the old one, Tuesday, Friday and Sunday for the
new one."

"Why did you show her the preference?"

"Ah! My dear friend, she is younger."

"So that only gave you two days to yourself in a week."

"That is enough for one."

"Allow me to compliment you on that."

"Well, just fancy that the most ridiculous and most annoying thing in
the world happened to me. For four months everything had been going on
perfectly; I felt perfectly safe, and I was really very happy, when
suddenly, last Monday, the crash came.

"I was expecting my regular one at the usual time, a quarter past one,
and was smoking a good cigar, and dreaming, very well satisfied with
myself, when I suddenly saw that it was past the time, at which I was
much surprised, for she is very punctual, but I thought that something
might have accidentally delayed her. However, half-an-hour passed, then
an hour, an hour and a half, and then I knew that something must have
detained her; a sick headache, perhaps, or some annoying visitor. That
sort of waiting is very vexatious, that ... useless waiting ... very
annoying and enervating. At last, I made up my mind to go out, and not
knowing what to do, I went to her and found her reading a novel."

"Well!" I said to her. And she replied quite calmly:

"My dear I could not come; I was hindered."

"How?"

"My ... something else."

"What was it?

"A very annoying visit."

"I saw that she would not tell me the true reason, and as she was very
calm, I did not trouble myself any more about it, and hoped to make up
for lost time with the other, the next day, and on the Tuesday, I was
very ... very excited, and amorous in expectation of the public
official's little wife, and I was surprised that she had not come before
the appointed time, and I looked at the clock every moment, and watched
the hands impatiently, but the quarter past, then the half-hour, then
two o'clock. I could not sit still any longer, and walked up and down
very soon in great strides, putting my face against the window, and my
ears to the door, to listen whether she was not coming upstairs."

"Half-past two, three o'clock! I seized my hat, and rushed to her house.
She was reading a novel my dear fellow! 'Well!' I said, anxiously, and
she replied as calmly as usual: 'I was hindered, and could not come.'

"'By what?'

"'An annoying visit.'

"Of course, I immediately thought that they both knew everything, but
she seemed so calm and quiet, that I set aside my suspicions, and
thought it was only some strange coincidence, as I could not believe in
such dissimulation on her part, and so, after half-an-hour's friendly
talk, which was, however, interrupted a dozen times by her little girl
coming in and out of the room. I went away, very much annoyed. Just
imagine the next day...."

"The same thing happened?"

"Yes, and the next also. And that went on for three weeks without any
explanation, without anything explaining that strange conduct to me, the
secret of which I suspected, however."

"They knew everything?"

"I should think so, by George. But how? Ah! I had a great deal of
anxiety before I found it out."

"How did you manage it at last?"

"From their letters, for on the same day they both gave me their
dismissal in identical terms."

"Well?"

"This is how it was.... You know that women always have an array of pins
about them. I know hairpins, I doubt them, and look after them, but the
others are much more treacherous; those confounded little black-headed
pins which look all alike to us, great fools that we are, but which they
can distinguish, just as we can distinguish a horse from a dog.

"Well, it appears that one day my minister's little wife left one of
those tell-tale instruments pinned to the paper, close to my
looking-glass. My usual one had immediately seen this little black
speck, no bigger than a flea, and had taken it out without saying a
word, and then had left one of her pins, which was also black, but of a
different pattern, in the same place.

"The next day, the minister's wife wished to recover her property, and
immediately recognized the substitution. Then her suspicions were
aroused, and she put in two and crossed them, and my original one
replied to this telegraphic signal by three black pellets, one on the
top of the other, and as soon as this method had begun, they continued
to communicate with one another, without saying a word, only to spy on
each other. Then it appears that the regular one, being bolder, wrapped
a tiny piece of paper round the little wire point, and wrote upon it:
_C. D., Poste Restante, Boulevards, Malherbes_.

"Then they wrote to each other. You understand that was not everything
that passed between them. They set to work with precaution, with a
thousand stratagems, with all the prudence that is necessary in such
cases, but the regular one did a bold stroke, and made an appointment
with the other. I do not know what they said to each other; all that I
know is, that I had to pay the costs of their interview. There you have
it all!"

"Is that all?"

"Yes."

"And you do not see them any more?"

"I beg your pardon. I see them as friends, for we have not quarreled
altogether."

"And have they met again?"

"Yes, my dear fellow, they have become intimate friends."

"And has not that given you an idea?"

"No, what idea?"

"You great booby! The idea of making them put back the pins where they
found them."




UNDER THE YOKE


As he was a man of quiet and regular habits, and of a simple and
affectionate disposition, and had nothing to disturb the even tenor of
his life, Monsieur de Loubancourt suffered more than most men do from
his widowerhood. He regretted his lost happiness, was angry with fate,
which separated united couples so brutally, and which made choice of a
tranquil existence, whose sleepy quietude had not hitherto been troubled
by any cares or chimeras, in order to rob it of its happiness.

Had he been younger, he might, perhaps, have been tempted to form a new
line, to fill up the vacant place, and to marry again. But when a man is
nearly sixty, such ideas make people laugh, for they have something
ridiculous and insane about them; and so he dragged on his dull and
weary existence, escaped from all those familiar objects which
constantly recalled the past to him, and went from hotel to hotel
without taking an interest in anything, without becoming intimate with
anyone, even temporarily; inconsolable, silent, almost enigmatical, and
looking funereal in his eternal black clothes.

He was generally alone, though on rare occasions he was accompanied by
his only son, who used to yawn by stealth, and who seemed to be mentally
counting the hours, as if he were performing some hateful, enforced duty
in spite of himself.

Two years of this crystallization went past, and one was as monotonous,
and as void of incident, as the other.

One evening, however, in a boarding-house at Cannes, where he was
staying on his wanderings, there was a young woman dressed in mourning,
among the new arrivals, who sat next to him at dinner. She had a sad,
pale face, that told of suffering, a beautiful figure, and large, blue
eyes with deep rings round them, but which, nevertheless, looked like
the first star which shines in the twilight.

All remarked her, although he usually took no notice of women, no matter
whatever they were, ugly or pretty; he looked at her and listened to
her. He felt less lonely by her side, though he did not know why. He
trembled with instinctive and confused happiness, just as if in some
distant country he had found some female friend or relative, who at last
would understand him, tell him some news, and talk to him in his dear
native language about everything that a man leaves behind him when he
exiles himself from home.

What strange affinity had thrown them together thus? What secret forces
had brought their grief in contact? What made him so sanguine and so
calm, and incited him to take her suddenly into his confidences, and
urged him on to resistless curiosity?

She was an experienced traveler, who had no illusions, and was in search
of adventures; one of those women who frequently change their name, and
who, as they have made up their minds to swindle if luck is not on their
side, act a continual part, an adventuress, who could put on every
accent; who for the sake of her course, transformed herself into a Slav,
or into an American, or simply into a provincial; who was ready to take
part in any comedy in order to make money, and not to be obliged to
waste her strength and her brains on fruitless struggles or on wretched
expedients. Thus she immediately guessed the state of this melancholy
sexagenarian's mind, and the illusions which attracted him to her, and
scented the spoils which offered themselves to her cupidity of their own
accord, and divined under what guise she ought to show herself, to make
herself accepted and loved.

She initiated him into depths of grief which were unknown to him, by
phrases which were cut short by sighs, by fragments of her story, which
she finished by a disgusted shrug of the shoulders, and a heartrending
smile, and by insensibly exciting his feelings. In a word, she triumphed
over the last remaining doubts, which might still have mingled with the
affectionate pity with which that poor, solitary heart, which, so full
of bitterness, overflowed.

And so, for the first time since he had become a widower, the old man
confided in another person, poured out his old heart into that soul
which seemed to be so like his own, which seemed to offer him a refuge
where he could be cheered up, and where the wounds of his heart could be
healed, and he longed to throw himself into those sisterly arms, to dry
his tears and to exercise his grief there.

       *       *       *       *       *

Monsieur de Loubancourt, who had married at twenty-five, as much from
love as from judgment, had lived quietly and peacefully in the country,
much more than in Paris. He was ignorant of the female wiles of
temptations, offered to creatures like Wanda Pulska, who was made up of
lies, and only cared for pleasure, a virgin soil on which any seed will
grow.

She attached herself to him, became his shadow, and by degrees, part of
his life. She showed herself to be a charitable woman who devoted
herself to an unhappy man, who endeavored to console him, and who, in
spite of her youth, was willing to be the inseparable companion of the
old man in his slow, daily walks. She never appeared to tire of his
anecdotes and reminiscences, and she played cards with him. She waited
on him carefully when he was confined to his bed, appeared to have no
sex, and transformed herself; and though she handled him skillfully, she
seemed ingenuous and ignorant of evil. She acted like an innocent young
girl, who had just been confirmed; but for all that, she chose dangerous
hours and certain spots in which to be sentimental and to ask questions
which agitated and disconcerted him, and abandoned her slender fingers
to his feverish hands, which pressed and held them in a tender clasp.

And then, there were wild declarations of love, prayers and sobs which
frightened her; wild _adieux_, which were not followed by his departure,
but which brought about a touching reconciliation and the first kiss,
and then, one night, while they were traveling together, he forced open
the door of her bedroom at the hotel, which she had locked, and came in
like a mad man. There was the phantom of violence, and the fallacious
submission of a woman, who was overcome by so much tenderness, who
rebelled no longer, but who accepted the yoke of her master and lover.
And then, the conquest of the body after the conquest of the heart,
which forged his chain link by link, pleasures which besot and corrupt
old men, and dry up their brains, until at last he allowed himself to be
induced, almost unconsciously, to make an odious and stupid will.

Informed, perhaps, by anonymous letters, or astonished because his
father kept him altogether at a distance from him, and gave no signs of
life, Monsieur de Loubancourt's son joined them in Provence. But Wanda
Pulska, who had been preparing for that attack for a long time, waited
for it fearlessly.

She did not seem disconcerted at that sudden visit, but was very
charming and affable towards the new comer, reassured him by her
careless airs of a girl, who took life as it came, and who was suffering
from the consequences of a fault, and did not trouble her head about the
future.

He envied his father, and grudged him such a treasure. Although he had
come to combat her dangerous influence, and to treat the woman, who had
assumed the place of death, and who governed her lover as his sovereign
mistress, as an enemy, he shrunk from his task, panted with desire, lost
his head, and thought of nothing but treason and of an odious
partnership.

She managed him even more easily than she had managed Monsieur de
Loubancourt, molded him just as she chose; made him her tool, without
even giving him the tips of her fingers, or granting him the slightest
favor, induced him to be so imprudent, that the old man grew jealous,
watched them, discovered the intrigue, and found mad letters in which
his son was angry, begged, threatened and implored.

One evening, when she knew that her lover had come in, and was hiding in
a dark cupboard in order to watch them, Wanda happened to be alone in
the drawing-room, which was full of light, of beautiful flowers, with
this young fellow, five-and-twenty. He threw himself at her feet and
declared his love, and besought her to run away with him, and when she
tried to bring him to reason and repulsed him, and told him in a loud
and very distinct voice, how she loved Monsieur de Loubancourt, he
seized her wrists with brutal violence, and maddened with passion and
stammering words of love and lust, he pushed her towards one of the
couches.

"Let me go," she said, "let me go immediately,... You are a brute to
take advantage of a woman like that.... Please let me go, or I shall
call the servants to my assistance."

The next moment, the old man, terrible in his rage, rushed out of his
hiding place with clenched fists and a slobbering mouth, threw himself
on the startled son, and pointing to the door with a superb gesture, he
said:

"You are a dirty scoundrel, sir. Get out of my house immediately, and
never let me see you again!"

       *        *        *        *        *

The comedy was over. Grateful for such fidelity and real affection,
Monsieur de Loubancourt married Wanda Pulska, whose name appeared on the
civil register--which was a detail of no importance to a man who was in
love--as Frida Krubstein; she came from Saxony, and had been a servant
at an inn. Then he disinherited his son, as far as he could.[17]

[Footnote 17: According to French law, nobody can altogether disinherit
a child, and no son or daughter can be "cut off" with a "proverbial
shilling."]

And now that she is a respectable and respected widow, Madame de
Loubancourt is received everywhere by society in those places of winter
resort where people's by-gone history is so rarely gone into, and where
women bear a name, who are pretty, and who can waltz--like the Germans
can, are always well received.




THE READ ONE AND THE OTHER


"Well, really," Chasseval said, standing with his back to the fire,
"could any of those respectable shop-keepers and wine growers have
possibly believed that that pretty little Parisian woman, with her soft
innocent eyes, like those of a Madonna, with such smiling lips and
golden hair, and who always dressed so simple, was their candidate's
mistress?"

She was a wonderful help to him, and accompanied him even to the most
outlying farms; went to the meetings in the small village _cafés_ and
had a pleasant and suitable word for every one, and did not recoil at a
glass of mulled wine or a grip of the hand, and was always ready to join
in _farandole_.[18] She seemed to be so in love with Eliénne Rulhiére,
to trust him so entirely, to be so proud of forming half of his life,
and of belonging to him, gave him such looks full of pleasure and of
hope, and listened to all he said so intently, that voters who might
have hesitated, allowed themselves by degrees to be talked over and
persuaded; and promised their votes to the young doctor, whose name they
never heard mentioned in the district before.

[Footnote 18: A dance in Provence in which the dancers form a chain, and
the movements are directed by the leader.--TRANSLATOR.]

That electoral campaign had been like a truant's escapade for Jane
Dardenne; it was a delightful and unexpected holiday, and as she was an
actress at heart, she played her part seriously, and threw herself into
her character, and enjoyed herself more than she ever enjoyed herself in
her most adventurous outings.

And then there came in the pleasure of being taken for a woman of the
world, of being flattered, respected and envied, and of getting out of
the usual groove for a time, and also the dream that this journey of a
few weeks would have the sequence, that her lover would not separate
from her on their return, but would sacrifice the woman whom he no
longer loved, and whom he ironically used to call his _Cinderella_, to
her.

At night, when they had laid aside all pretense, and when they were
alone in their room in the hotel, she coaxed him and flattered him,
spurred his ambition on, threw her quivering arms around him, and amidst
her kisses, whispered those words to him, which make a man proud and
warm his heart, and give him strength, like a stout dram of alcohol.

The two between them captured the district, and won the election easily,
and in spite of his youth, Eliénne Rulhiére was chosen by a majority of
five thousand. Then, of course, there were more fetes and banquets, at
which Jane was present, and where she was received with enthusiastic
shouts; there were fireworks, when she was obliged to set light to the
first rocket, and balls at which she astonished those worthy people by
her affability. And when they left, three little girls dressed in white,
as if they were going to be confirmed, came onto the platform and
recited some complimentary verses to her while the band played the
_Marseillaise_, the women waved their pocket-handkerchiefs, and the men
their hats, and leaning out of the carriage window, looking charming in
her traveling costume, with a smile on her lips, and with moist eyes, as
was fitting at such a pathetic leave-taking, actress as she was, with a
sudden and childlike gesture, she blew kisses to them from the tips of
her fingers, and said:

"Good-bye, my friends, good-bye, only for the present; I shall never
forget you!"

The deputy, who was also very effusive, had invited his principal
supporters to come and see him in Paris as there were plenty of
excursion trains. They all took him at his word, and Rulhière was
obliged to invite them all to dinner.

In order to avoid any possible mishaps, he gave his wife a foretaste of
their guests. He told her that they were rather noisy, talkative, and
unpolished, and that they would, no doubt, astonish her by their manners
and their accent, but that, as they had great influence, and were
excellent men, they deserved a good reception. It was a very useful
precaution, for when they came into the drawing-room in their new
clothes, expanding with pleasure, and with their hair pomatumed as if
they had been going to a country wedding, they felt inclined to fall
down before the new Madame Rulhière to whom the deputy introduced them,
and who seemed to be perfectly at home there.

At first they were embarrassed, felt uncomfortable and out of place, did
not know what to say, and had to seek their words; they buttoned and
unbuttoned their gloves, answered her questions at random, and racked
their brains to discover the solution of the enigma. Captain Mouredus
looked at the fire, with the fixed gaze of a somnambulist, Marius
Barbaste scratched his fingers mechanically, while the three others, the
factory manager, Casemajel, Roquetton, the lawyer, and Dustugue, the
hotel proprietor, looked at Rulhière anxiously.

The lawyer was the first to recover himself. He got up from his arm
chair laughing heartily, dug the deputy in the ribs with his elbow, and
said:

"I understand it all, I understand it; you thought that people do not
come to Paris to be bored, eh? Madame is delightful, and I congratulate
you, Monsieur."

He gave a wink, and made signs behind his back to his friends, and then
the captain had his turn.

"We are not boobies, and that fellow Roquetton is the most knowing of
the lot of us.... Ah! Monsieur Rulhière, without any exaggeration, you
are the cream of good fellows."

And with a flushed face, and expanding his chest, he said sonorously:

"They certainly turn them out very pretty in your part of the country,
my little lady!"

Madame Rulhière, who did not know what to say, had gone up to her
husband for protection; but she felt much inclined to go to her own room
under some pretext or other, in order to escape from her intolerable
task. She kept her ground, however, during the whole of dinner, which
was a noisy, jovial meal, during which the five electors, with their
elbows on the table, and their waistcoats unbuttoned, and half drunk,
told coarse stories, and swore like troopers. But as the coffee and the
liquors were served in the smoking room, she took leave of her guests in
an impatient voice, and went to her own room with the hasty step of an
escaped prisoner, who is afraid of being retaken.

The electors sat staring after her with gaping mouths, and Mouredus lit
a cigar, and said:

"Just listen to me, Monsieur Rulhiére; it was very kind of you to invite
us here, to your little quiet establishment, but to speak to you
frankly, I should not, in your place, wrong my lawful wife for such a
stuck-up piece of goods as this one is."

"The captain is quite right," Roquetton the notary opined; "Madame
Rulhiére, the lawful Madame Rulhiére, is much more amiable, and
altogether nicer. You are a scoundrel to deceive her; but when may we
hope to see her?"

And with a paternal grimace, he added:

"But do not be uneasy; we will all hold our tongue; it would be too sad
if she were to find it out."




THE UPSTART


You know good-natured, stout Dupontel, who looks like the type of a
happy man, with his fat cheeks that are the color of ripe apples, his
small, reddish moustache, turned up over his thick lips, with his
prominent eyes, which never know any emotion or sorrow, which remind one
of the calm eyes of cows and oxen, and his long back fixed onto two
little wriggling, crooked legs, which obtained for him the nickname of
corkscrew from some nymph of the ballet.

Dupontel, who had taken the trouble to be born, but not like the grand
seigneurs whom Beaumarchais made fun of once upon a time, was ballasted
with a respectable number of millions, as is becoming in the sole heir
of a house that had sold household utensils and appliances for over a
century.

Naturally, like every other upstart who respects himself, he wished to
appear something, to play at being a clubman, and also to play to the
gallery, because he had been educated at Vangirard and knew a little
English; because he had gone through his voluntary service in the army
for twelve months[19] at Rouen; because he was a tolerable singer, could
drive four-in-hands, and play lawn-tennis.

[Footnote 19: Although, in France, as in Germany, military service is
compulsory, men are allowed to serve in both countries as _one-year
volunteers_; they enjoy certain privileges, find their own uniform, &c.,
and it, of course, entails considerable expense.--TRANSLATOR.]

Always studiedly well-dressed, too correct in every way, copying his way
of speaking, his hats and his trousers from the three or four snobs who
set the fashion, reproducing other people's witticisms, learning
anecdotes and jokes by heart, like a lesson, to use them again at small
parties, constantly laughing, without knowing why his friends burst into
roars of merriment, and was in the habit of keeping pretty girls for the
pleasure of his best friends. Of course he was a perfect fool, but after
all, a capital fellow, to whom it was only right to extend a good deal
of indulgence.

When he had taken his thirty-first mistress, and had made the discovery
that in love, money does not create happiness two-thirds of the time,
that they had all deceived him, and made him perfectly ridiculous at the
end of the week, Charles Dupontel made up his mind to settle down as a
respectable married man, and to marry, not from calculation or from
reason, but for love.

One autumn afternoon at Auteuil, he noticed in front of the club stand,
among the number of pretty women who were standing round the braziers, a
girl with such lovely delicate complexion that it looked like an apple
blossom; her hair was like threads of gold, and she was so slight and
supple that she reminded him of those outlines of saints which one sees
in old stained-glass church windows. There was also something
enigmatical about her, for she had at the same time the delightfully
ingenuous look of a school girl during the holidays, and also of some
enlightened young lady, who already knew the how and the why of
everything, who is exuberant with youth and life, and who is eagerly
waiting for the moment when marriage will at length allow her to say and
to do everything that comes into her head, and to amuse herself to
satiety.

Then she had such small feet that they would have gone into a woman's
hand, a waist that could have been clasped by a bracelet, turned up
eyelashes, which fluttered like the wings of a butterfly, close on an
impudent and sensual nose, and a vague, mocking smile that made folds in
her lips, like the petals of a rose.

Her father was a member of the Jockey Club, who was generally _cleared
out_, as they call it, in the great races, but who yet defended his
position bravely, and continued that, and who kept himself afloat by
prodigies of coolness and skill. He belonged to a race which could prove
that his ancestors had been at the court of Charlemagne, and not as
musicians or cooks, as some people declared.

Her youth and beauty and her father's pedigree dazzled Dupontel, upset
his brain, and altogether turned him upside down, and combined they
seemed to him to be a mirage of happiness and of pride of family.

He got introduced to her father, at the end of a game of baccarat,
invited him to shoot with him, and a month later, as if it were an
affair to be hurried over, he asked for and obtained the hand of
Mademoiselle Therése de Montsaigne, and felt as happy as a miner who has
discovered a vein of precious metal.

The young woman did not require more than twenty-four hours to discover
that her husband was nothing but a ridiculous puppet, and immediately
set about to consider how she might best escape from her cage, and
befool the poor fellow, who loved her with all his heart.

And she deceived him without the least pity or the slightest scruple;
she did it as if it were from instinctive hatred, as if it were a
necessity for her not only to make him ridiculous, but also to forget
that she ought to sacrifice her virgin dreams to him, to belong to him,
and to submit to his hateful caresses without being able to defend
himself and to repel him.

She was cruel, as all women are when they do not love, delighted in
doing audacious and absurd things, and in visiting everything, and in
braving danger. She seemed like a young colt, that is intoxicated with
the sun, the air and its liberty, and which gallops wildly across the
meadows, jumps hedges and ditches, kicks, and whinnies joyously, and
rolls about in the long, sweet grass.

But Dupontel remained quite imperturbable; he had not the slightest
suspicion, and was the first to laugh when anybody told him some good
story of a husband who had been cuckolded, although his wife repelled
him, quarreled with him, and constantly pretended to be out of sorts or
tired out, in order to escape from him. She seemed to take a malicious
pleasure in checkmating him by her personal remarks, her disenchanting
answers, and her apparent listlessness.

They saw a great deal of company, and he called himself Du Pontel now,
and he even had thoughts of buying a title from the Pope; he only read
certain newspapers, kept up a regular correspondence with the Orleans
Princes, was thinking of starting a racing stable, and finished up by
believing that he really was a fashionable man, and strutted about, and
was puffed out with conceit, as he had probably never read La Fontaine's
fable, in which he tells the story of the ass that is laden with relics
which people salute, and so takes their bows to himself.

Suddenly, however, anonymous letters disturbed his quietude, and tore
the bandage from his eyes.

At first he tore them up without reading them, and shrugged his
shoulders disdainfully; but he received so many of them, and the writer
seemed so determined to dot his _i's_ and cross his _t's_ and to clear
his brain for him, that the unhappy man began to grow disturbed, and to
watch and to ferret about. He instituted minute inquiries, and arrived
at the conclusion that he no longer had the right to make fun of other
husbands, and that he was the perfect counterpart of _Sganarelle_.[20]

[Footnote 20: The _Cocu Imaginaire_ (The Imaginary Cuckold), in
Molière's play of that name.]

Furious at having been duped, he set a whole private inquiry agency to
work, continually acted a part, and one evening appeared unexpectedly
with a commissary of police in the snug little bachelor's quarters which
concealed his wife's escapades.

Therése, who was terribly frightened, and at her wits' end at being thus
surprised in all the disorder of her lover's apartments, and pale with
shame and terror, hid herself behind the bed curtains, while he, who was
an officer of dragoons, very much vexed at being mixed up in such a
pinchbeck scandal, and at being caught in a silk shirt by these men who
were so correctly dressed in frock coats, frowned angrily, and had to
restrain himself so as not to fling his victim out of a window.

The police commissary, who was calmly looking at this little scene with
the coolness of an amateur, prepared to verify the fact that they were
caught _flagrante delicto_, and in an ironical voice said to her
husband, who had claimed his services:

"I must ask for your name in full, Monsieur?"

"Charles Joseph Edward Dupontel," was the answer. And as the commissary
was writing it down from his dictation, he added suddenly: "Du Pontel in
two words, if you please, Monsieur le Commissionaire!"




THE CARTER'S WENCH


The driver, who had jumped from his box, and was now walking slowly by
the side of his thin horses, waking them up every moment by a cut of the
whip, or a coarse oath, pointed to the top of the hill, where the
windows of a solitary house, in which the inhabitants were still up,
although it was very late and quite dark, were shining like yellow
lamps, and said to me:

"One gets a good drop there, Monsieur, and well served, by George."

And his eyes flashed in his thin, sunburnt face, which was of a deep
brickdust color, while he smacked his lips like a drunkard, who
remembers a bottle of good liquor that he has lately drunk, and drawing
himself up in a blouse like a vulgar swell, he shivered like the back of
an ox, when it is sharply pricked with the goad.

"Yes, and well served by a wench who will turn your head for you before
you have tilted your elbow and drank a glass!"

The moon was rising behind the snow-covered mountain peaks, which looked
almost like blood under its rays, and which were crowned by dark, broken
clouds, which whirled about and floated, and reminded the passenger of
some terrible Medusa's head. The gloomy plains of Capsir, which were
traversed by torrents, extensive meadows in which undefined forms were
moving about, fields of rye, like huge golden table-covers, and here and
there wretched villagers, and broad sheets of water, into which the
stars seemed to look in a melancholy manner, opened out to the view.
Damp gusts of winds swept along the road, bringing a strong smell of
hay, of resin of unknown flowers, with them, and erratic pieces of rock,
which were scattered on the surface like huge boundary stones, had
spectral outlines.

The driver pulled his broad-brimmed felt hat over his eyes, twirled his
large moustache, and said in an obsequious voice:

"Does Monsieur wish to stop here? This is the place!"

It was a wretched wayside public-house, with a reddish slate roof, that
looked as if it were suffering from leprosy, and before the door there
stood three wagons drawn by mules, and loaded with huge stems of trees,
and which took up nearly the whole of the road; the animals, which were
used to halting there, were dozing, and their heavy loads exhaled a
smell of a pillaged forest.

Inside, three wagoners, one of whom was an old man, while the other two
were young, were sitting in front of the fire, which cackled loudly,
with bottles and glasses on a large round-table by their side, and were
singing and laughing boisterously. A woman with large round hips, and
with a lace cap pinned onto her hair, in the Catalan fashion, who looked
strong and bold, and who had a certain amount of gracefulness about her,
and with a pretty, but untidy head, was urging them to undo the strings
of their great leather purses, and replied to their somewhat indelicate
jokes in a shrill voice, as she sat on the knee of the youngest, and
allowed him to kiss her and to fumble in her bodice, without any signs
of shame.

The coachman pushed open the door, like a man who knows that he is at
home.

"Good evening, Glaizette, and everybody; there is room for two more, I
suppose?"

The wagoners did not speak, but looked at us cunningly and angrily, like
dogs whose food had been taken from them, and who showed their teeth,
ready to bite, while the girl shrugged her shoulders and looked into
their eyes like some female wild beast tamer; and then she asked us with
a strange smile:

"What am I to get you?"

"Two glasses of cognac, and the best you have in the cupboard,"
Glaizette, the coachman replied, rolling a cigarette.

While she was uncorking the bottle I noticed how green her eyeballs
were; it was a fascinating, tempting green, like that of the great green
grasshopper; and also how small her hands were, which showed that she
did not use them much; how white her teeth were, and how her voice,
which was rather rough, though cooing, had a cruel, and at the same
time, a coaxing sound. I fancied I saw her, as in a mirage, reclining
triumphantly on a couch, indifferent to the fights which were going on
about her, always waiting--longing for him who would prove himself the
stronger, and who would prove victorious. She was, in short, the
hospitable dispenser of love, by the side of that difficult, stony road,
who opened her arms to poor men, and who made them forget everything in
the profusion of her kisses. She knew dark matters, which nobody in the
world besides herself should know, which her sealed lips would carry
away inviolate to the other world. She had never yet loved, and would
never really love, because she was vowed to passing kisses which were so
soon forgotten.

I was anxious to escape from her as soon as possible; no longer to see
her pale, green eyes, and her mouth that bestowed caresses from pure
charity; no longer to feel the woman with her beautiful, white hands, so
near one; so I threw her a piece of gold and made my escape without
saying a word to her, without waiting for any change, and without even
wishing her good-night, for I felt the caress of her smile, and the
disdainful restlessness of her looks.

The carriage started off at a gallop to Formiguéres, amidst a furious
jingling of bells. I could not sleep any more; I wanted to know where
that woman came from, but I was ashamed to ask the driver and to show
any interest in such a creature, and when he began to talk, as we were
going up another hill, as if he had guessed my sweet thoughts, he told
me all he knew about Glaizette. I listened to him with the attention of
a child, to whom somebody is telling some wonderful fairy tale.

She came from Fontpédrouze, a muleteers' village, where the men spend
their time in drinking and gambling at the inn when they are not
traveling on the high roads with their mules, while the women do all the
field work, carry the heaviest loads on their back, and lead a life of
pain and misery.

Her father kept an inn; the girl grew up very happy; she was courted
before she was fifteen, and was so coquettish that she was certain to be
almost always found in front of her looking-glass, smiling at her own
beauty, arranging her hair, trying to make herself like a young lady on
the _prado_. And now, as none of the family knew how to keep a
halfpenny, but spent more than they earned, and were like cracked jugs,
from which the water escapes drop by drop, they found themselves ruined
one fine day, just as if they had been at the bottom of a blind alley.
So on the "Feast of Our Lady of Succor," when people go on a pilgrimage
to Font Romea, and the villages are consequently deserted, the
inn-keeper set fire to the house. The crime was discovered through _la
Glaizette_, who could not make up her mind to leave the looking-glass,
with which her room was adorned, behind her, and so had carried it off
under her petticoat.

The parents were sentenced to many years' imprisonment, and being let
loose to live as best she could, the girl became a servant, passed from
hand to hand, inherited some property from an old farmer, whom she had
caught, as if she had been a thrush on a twig covered with bird-lime,
and with the money she had built this public-house on the new road which
was being built across the Capsir.

"A regular bad one, Monsieur," the coachman said in conclusion, "a vixen
such as one does not see now in the worst garrison towns, and who would
open the door to the whole fraternity, and not at all avaricious, but
thoroughly honest...."

I interrupted him in spite of myself, as if his words had pained me, and
I thought of those pale green eyes, those magic eyes, eyes to be dreamt
about, which were the color of grasshoppers, and I looked for them, and
saw them in the darkness; they danced before me like phosphorescent
lights, and I would have given then the whole contents of my purse to
that man if he would only have been silent and urged his horses on to
full speed, so that their mad gallop might carry me off quickly, quickly
and far, and continually further from that girl.




THE MARQUIS


It was quite useless to expostulate when that obstinate little Sonia,
with a Russian name and Russian caprices, had said: "I choose to do it."
She was so delicate and pretty also, with her slightly turned-up nose,
and her rosy and childish cheeks, while every female perversity was
reflected in the depths of her strange eyes, which were the color of the
sea on a stormy evening. Yes, she was very charming, very fantastic, and
above all, so Russian, so deliciously and imperiously Russian, and all
the more Russian, as she came from Montmarte, and in spite of this, not
one of her seven lovers who composed her usual menagerie had laughed
when their enslaver said one day:

"You know my feudal castle at Pludun-Herlouët, near Saint
Jacut-de-la-Mer, which I bought two years ago, and in which I have not
yet set foot? Very well, then! The day after to-morrow, which is the
first of May, we will have a house-warming there."

The seven had not asked for any further explanation, but had accompanied
little Sonia, and were now ready to sit down to dinner under her
presidency in the dining-room of the old castle, which was situated ten
hours from Paris. They had arrived there that morning; they were going
to have dinner and supper together, and start off again at daybreak next
morning; such were Sonia's orders, and nobody had made the slightest
objection.

Two of her admirers, however, who were not yet used to her sudden whims,
had felt some surprise, which was quickly checked by expressions of
enthusiastic pleasure on the part of the others.

"What a delightful, original idea! Nobody else would have thought of
such things! Positively, nobody else. Oh! these Russians!" But those who
had known her for some time, and who had been consequently educated not
to be surprised at anything, found it all quite natural.

It was half-past six in the evening, and the gentlemen were going to
dress. Sonia had made up her mind to keep on her morning-gown, or if she
dressed, she would do so later. Just then she was not inclined to move
out of her great rocking-chair, from which she could see the sun setting
over the sea. The sight always delighted her very much. It might have
been taken for a large red billiard ball, rebounding from the green
cloth. How funny it was! And how lucky that she was all alone to look at
it, for those seven would not have understood it at all! Those men never
have any soul, have they?

Certainly, the sunset was strange at first, but at length it made her
sad, and just now Sonia's heart felt almost heavy, though the very
sadness was sweet. She was congratulating herself more than ever on
being alone, so as to enjoy that languor, which was almost like a gentle
dream, when, in perfect harmony with that melancholy and sweet
sensation, a voice rose from the road, which was overhung by the
terrace; a tremulous, but fresh and pure voice sang the following words
to a slow melody:

    "Walking in Paris,
      Having my drink,
    A friend of mine whispered:
     _What do you think?
    If love makes you thirsty,
    Then wine makes you lusty_."

The sound died away, as the singer continued on his way, and Sonia was
afraid that she should not hear the rest; it was really terrible; so she
jumped out of the rocking-chair, ran to the balustrade of terrace, and
leaning over it, she called out: "Sing it again! I insist on it. The
song, the whole song!"

On hearing this, the singer looked round and then came back, without
hurrying, however, and as if he were prompted by curiosity, rather than
by any desire to comply with her order, and holding his hand over his
eyes, he looked at Sonia attentively, who, on her part, had plenty of
time to look closely at him.

He was an old man of about sixty-five, and his rags and the wallet over
his shoulder denoted a beggar, but Sonia immediately noticed that there
was a certain amount of affectation in his wretchedness. His hair and
beard were not shaggy and ragged, like such men usually wear them, and
evidently he had his hair cut occasionally, and he had a fine, and even
_distinguished_ face, as Sonia said to herself. But she did not pay much
attention to that, as for some time she had noticed that old men at the
seaside nearly all looked like gentlemen.

When he got to the foot of the terrace, the beggar stopped, and wagged
his head and said: "Pretty! The little woman is very pretty!" But he did
not obey Sonia's order, who repeated it, almost angrily this time,
beating a violent tattoo on the stone-work. "The song, the whole song!"

He did not seem to hear, but stood there gaping, with a vacant smile on
his face, and as his head was rather inclined towards his left shoulder,
a thin stream of saliva trickled from his lips onto his beard, and his
looks became more and more ardent. "How stupid I am!" Sonia suddenly
thought. "Of course he is waiting for something." She felt in her
pocket, in which she always carried some gold by way of half-pence, took
out a twenty-franc piece and threw it down to the old man. He, however,
did not take any notice of it, but continued looking at her
ecstatically, and was only roused from his state of bliss by receiving a
handful of gravel which she threw at him, right in his face.

"Do sing!" she exclaimed. "You must; I will have it; I have paid you."
And then, still smiling, he picked up the napoleon and threw it back
onto the terrace, and then he said proudly, though in a very gentle
voice: "I do not ask for charity, little lady; but if it gives you
pleasure, I will sing you the whole song, the whole of it, as often as
you please." And he began the song again, in his tremulous voice, which
was more tremulous than it had been before, as if he were much touched.

Sonia was overcome, and without knowing was moved into tears; delighted
because the man had spoken to her so familiarly, and rather ashamed at
having treated him as a beggar; and now her whole being was carried away
by the slow rhythm of the melody, which related an old love story, and
when he had done he again looked at her with a smile, and as she was
crying, he said to her: "I dare say you have a beautiful horse, or a
little dog that you are very fond of, which is ill. Take me to it, and I
will cure it: I understand it thoroughly. I will do it _gratis_, because
you are so pretty."

She could not help laughing. "You must not laugh," he said. "What are
you laughing at? Because I am poor? But I am not, for I had work
yesterday, and again to-day. I have a bag full. See, look here!" And
from his belt he drew a leather purse in which coppers rattled. He
poured them out into the palm of his hand, and said merrily: "You see,
little one, I have a purse. Forty-seven sous; forty-seven!" "So you will
not take my napoleon?" Sonia said. "Certainly not," he replied. "I do
not want it; and then, I tell you again, I will not accept alms. So you
do not know me?" "No, I do not." "Very well, ask anyone in the
neighborhood. Everybody will tell you that the Marquis does not live on
charity."

The Marquis! At that name she suddenly remembered that two years ago she
had heard his story. It was at the time that she bought the property,
and the vendor had mentioned the _Marquis_ as one of the curiosities of
the soil. He was said to be half silly, at any rate an original, almost
in his dotage, living by any lucky bits that he could make as
horse-coper and veterinary. The peasants gave him a little work, as they
feared that he might throw spells over anyone who refused to employ him.
They also respected him on account of his former wealth and of his
title, for he had been rich, very rich, and they said that he really was
a marquis, and it was said that he had ruined himself in Paris by
speculating. The reason, of course, _was women_!

At that moment the dinner bell began to ring, and a wild idea entered
Sonia's head. She ran to the little door that opened onto the terrace,
overtook the musician, and with a ceremonious bow she said to him: "Will
you give me the pleasure and the honor of dining with me, Marquis?"

The old man left off smiling and grew serious; he put his hand to his
forehead, as if to bring old recollections back, and then with a very
formal, old-fashioned bow, he said: "With pleasure, my dear." And
letting his wallet drop, he offered Sonia his arm.

When she introduced this new guest to them, all the seven, even to the
best drilled, started. "I see what disturbs you," she said. "It is his
dress. Well! It really leaves much to be desired. But wait a moment;
that can soon be arranged."

She rang for her lady's maid and whispered something to her, and then
she said: "Marquis, your bath is ready in your dressing-room. If you
will follow Sabina, she will show you to it. These gentlemen and I will
wait dinner for you." And as soon as he had gone out, she said to the
youngest there: "And now, Ernest, go upstairs and undress; I will allow
you to dine in your morning coat, and you will give your dress coat and
the rest to Sabina, for the Marquis."

Ernest was delighted at having to play a part in the piece, and the six
others clapped their hands. "Nobody else could think of such things;
nobody, nobody!"

Half an hour later they were sitting at dinner, the Marquis in a dress
coat on Sonia's left, and it was a great deception for the seven. They
had reckoned on having some fun with him, and especially Ernest, who set
up as a wit, had intended to _draw him_. But at the first attempt of
this sort, Sonia had given him a look which they all understood, and
dinner began very ceremoniously for the seven, but merrily and without
restraint between Sonia and the old man.

They cut very long faces, those seven, but inwardly, if one can say so,
for of course they could not dream of showing how put out they were, and
those inward long faces grew longer still when Sonia said to the old
fellow, quite suddenly: "I say, how stupid these gentlemen are! Suppose
we leave them to themselves?"

The Marquis rose, offered her his arm again, and said: "Where shall we
go to?" But Sonia's only reply was to sing the couplet of that song
which she had remembered:

    "For three years I passed
    The nights with my love,
    In a beautiful bed
    In a splendid alcove.
    Though wine makes me sleepy,
    Yet love keeps me frisky."

And the seven, who were altogether dumbfounded this time, and who could
not conceal their vexation, saw the couple disappear out of the door
which led to Sonia's apartments. "Hum!" Ernest ventured to say, "this is
really rather strong!" "Yes," the eldest of the menagerie replied. "It
certainly is rather strong, but it will do! You know, there is nobody
like her for thinking of such things!"

The next morning, the _château_ bell woke them up at six o'clock, when
they had agreed to return to Paris, and the seven men asked each other
whether they should go and wish Sonia good-morning, as usual, before she
was out of her room. Ernest hesitated more than any of them about it,
and it was not until Sabina, her maid, came and told them that her
mistress insisted upon it, that they could make up their minds to do so,
and they were surprised to find Sonia in bed by herself.

"Well!" Ernest asked boldly, "and what about the Marquis?" "He left very
early," Sonia replied. "A queer sort of marquis, I must say!" Ernest
observed contemptuously, and growing bolder. "Why, I should like to
know?" Sonia replied, drawing herself up. "The man has his own habits, I
suppose!" "Do you know, Madame," Sabina observed, "that he came back
half an hour after he left?" "Ah!" Sonia said, getting up and walking
about the room. "He came back? What did he want, I wonder?" "He did not
say, Madame. He merely went upstairs to see you. He was dressed in his
old clothes again."

And suddenly Sonia uttered a loud cry, and clapped her hands, and the
seven came round to see what had caused her emotion. "Look here! Just
look here!" she cried. "Do look on the mantel-piece! It is really
charming! Do look!"

And with a smiling, and yet somewhat melancholy expression in her eyes,
with a tender look which they could not understand, she showed them a
small bunch of wild flowers, by the side of a heap of half-pennies.
Mechanically she took them up and counted them, and then began to cry.

There were forty-seven of them.




THE BED


On a hot afternoon during last summer, the large auction rooms seemed
asleep, and the auctioneers were knocking down the various lots in a
listless manner. In a back room, on the first floor, two or three lots
of old silk, ecclesiastical vestments, were lying in a corner.

They were copes for solemn occasions, and graceful chasubles on which
embroidered flowers surrounded symbolic letters on a yellowish ground,
which had become cream-colored, although it had originally been white.
Some second-hand dealers were there, two or three men with dirty beards,
and a fat woman with a big stomach, one of those women who deal in
second-hand finery, and who also manage illicit love affairs, who are
brokers in old and young human flesh, just as much as they are in new
and old clothes.

Presently a beautiful Louis XV. chasuble was put up for sale, which was
as pretty as the dress of a marchioness of that period; it had retained
all its colors, and was embroidered with lilies of the valley round the
cross, and long blue iris, which came up to the foot of the sacred
emblem, and wreaths of roses in the corners. When I had bought it, I
noticed that there was a faint scent about it, as if it were permeated
with the remains of incense, or rather, as if it were still pervaded by
those delicate, sweet scents of by-gone years, which seemed to be only
the memory of perfumes, the soul of evaporated essences.

When I got it home, I wished to have a small chair of the same period
covered with it; and as I was handling it in order to take the necessary
measures, I felt some paper beneath my fingers, and when I cut the
lining, some letters fell at my feet. They were yellow with age, and the
faint ink was the color of rust, and outside the sheet, which was folded
in the fashion of years long past, it was addressed in a delicate hand:
_To Monsieur l'Abbé d'Argence_

The first three lines merely settled places of meeting, but here is the
third:

"My Friend; I am very unwell, ill in fact, and I cannot leave my bed.
The rain is beating against my windows, and I lie dreaming comfortably
and warmly on my eider-down coverlet. I have a book of which I am very
fond, and which seems as if it really applied to me. Shall I tell you
what it is? No, for you would only scold me. Then, when I have read a
little, I think, and will tell you what about.

"Having been in bed for three days, I think about my bed, and even in my
sleep I meditate on it still, and I have come to the conclusion that the
bed constitutes our whole life; for we were born in it, we live in it,
and we shall die in it. If, therefore, I had Monsieur de Crébillon's
pen, I should write the history of a bed, and what exciting and
terrible, as well as delightful moving occurrences would not such a book
contain! What lessons and what subjects for moralizing could one not
draw from it, for everyone?

"You know my bed, my friend, but you will never guess how many things I
have discovered in it within the last three days, and how much more I
love it, in consequence. It seems to me to be inhabited, haunted, if I
may say so, by a number of people I never thought of, who, nevertheless,
have left something of themselves in that couch.

"Ah! I cannot understand people who buy new beds, beds to which no
memories or cares are attached. Mine, ours, which is so shabby, and so
spacious, must have held many existences in it, from birth to the grave.
Think of that, my friend; think of it all; review all those lives, a
great part of which was spent between these four posts, surrounded by
these hangings embroidered by human figures, which have seen so many
things. What have they seen during the three centuries since they were
first put up?

"Here is a young woman lying on this bed. From time to time she sighs,
and then she groans and cries out; her mother is with her, and presently
a little creature that makes a noise like a cat mewing, and which is all
shriveled and wrinkled, comes from her. It is a male child to which she
has given birth, and the young mother feels happy in spite of her pain;
she is nearly suffocated with joy at that first cry, and stretches out
her arms, and those around her shed tears of pleasure; for that little
morsel of humanity which has come from her means the continuation of the
family, the perpetuation of the blood, of the heart, and of the soul of
the old people, who are looking on, trembling with excitement.

"And then, here are two lovers, who for the first time are flesh to
flesh together in that tabernacle of life. They tremble; but transported
with delight, they have the delicious sensation of being close together,
and by degrees their lips meet. That divine kiss makes them one, that
kiss, which is the gate of a terrestrial heaven, that kiss which speaks
of human delights, which continually promises them, announces them, and
precedes them. And their bed is agitated like the tempestuous sea, and
it bends and murmurs, and itself seems to become animated and joyous,
for the maddening mystery of love is being accomplished on it. What is
there sweeter, what more perfect in this world than those embraces,
which make one single being out of two, and which give to both of them
at the same moment the same thought, the same expectation, and the same
maddening pleasure, which descends upon them like a celestial and
devouring fire?

"Do you remember those lines from some old poet, which you read to me
last year? I do not remember who wrote them, but it may have been
Rousard:

    "When you and I in bed shall lie,
    Lascivious we shall be,
    Enlaced, playing a thousand tricks,
    Of lovers, gamesomely.

"I should like to have that verse embroidered on the top of my bed,
where Pyramus and Thisbe are continually looking at me out of their
tapestry eyes.

"And think of death, my friend; of all those who have breathed out their
last sigh to God in this bed. For it is also the tomb of hopes ended,
the door which closes everything, after having been the one which lets
in the world. What cries, what anguish, what sufferings, what groans,
how many arms stretched out towards the past; what appeals to happiness
that has vanished for ever; what convulsions, what death-rattles, what
gaping lips and distorted eyes have there not been in this bed, from
which I am writing to you, during the three centuries that it has
sheltered human beings!

"The bed, you must remember, is the symbol of life; I have discovered
this within the last three days. There is nothing good except the bed,
and are not some of our best moments spent in sleep?

"But then again, we suffer in bed! It is the refuge of those who are ill
and suffering; a place of repose and comfort for worn-out bodies, and,
in a word, the bed is part and parcel of humanity.

"Many other thoughts have struck me, but I have no time to note them
down for you, and then, should I remember them all? Besides that, I am
so tired that I mean to retire to my pillows, stretch myself out at full
length, and sleep a little. But be sure and come to see me at three
o'clock to-morrow; perhaps I may be better, and able to prove it to you.

"Good-bye, my friend; here are my hands for you to kiss, and I also
offer you my lips."




AN ADVENTURE IN PARIS


Is there any stronger feeling than curiosity in a woman? Oh! Fancy
seeing, knowing, touching what one has dreamt about! What would a woman
not do for that? When once a woman's eager curiosity is aroused, she
will be guilty of any folly, commit any imprudence, venture upon
anything, and recoil from nothing. I am speaking of women who are really
women, who are endowed with that triple-bottomed disposition, which
appears to be reasonable and cold on the surface, but whose three secret
compartments are filled. The first, with female uneasiness, which is
always in a state of flutter; the next, with sly tricks which are
colored in imitation of good faith, with those sophistical and
formidable tricks of apparently devout women; and the last, with all
those charming, improper acts, with that delightful deceit, exquisite
perfidy, and all those wayward qualities, which drive lovers who are
stupidly credulous, to suicide; but which delight others.

The woman whose adventure I am about to relate, was a little person from
the provinces, who had been insipidly chaste till then. Her life, which
was apparently so calm, was spent at home, with a busy husband and two
children, whom she brought up like an irreproachable woman. But her
heart beat with unsatisfied curiosity, and some unknown longing. She was
continually thinking of Paris, and read the fashionable papers eagerly.
The accounts of parties, of the dresses and various entertainments,
excited her longing; but, above all, she was strangely agitated by those
paragraphs which were full of double meaning, by those veils which were
half raised by clever phrases, and which gave her a glimpse of culpable
and ravishing delights, and from her country home, she saw Paris in an
apotheosis of magnificent and corrupt luxury.

And during the long nights, when she dreamt, lulled by the regular
snores of her husband, who was sleeping on his back by her side, with a
silk handkerchief tied round his head, she saw in her sleep those
well-known men whose names appeared on the first page of the newspapers
as great stars in the dark skies; and she pictured to herself their life
of continual excitement, of constant debauches, of orgies such as they
indulged in in ancient Rome, which were horridly voluptuous, with
refinements of sensuality which were so complicated that she could not
even picture them to herself.

The boulevards seemed to her to be a kind of abyss of human passions,
and there could be no doubt that the houses there concealed mysteries of
prodigious love. But she felt that she was growing old, and this,
without having known life, except in those regular, horridly monotonous,
everyday occupations, which constitute the happiness of the home. She
was still pretty, for she was well preserved in her tranquil existence,
like some winter fruit in a closed cupboard; but she was agitated and
devoured by her secret ardor. She used to ask herself whether she should
die without having experienced any of those damning, intoxicating joys,
without having plunged once, just once into that flood of Parisian
voluptuousness.

By dint of much perseverance, she paved the way for a journey to Paris,
found a pretext, got some relations to invite her, and as her husband
could not go with her, she went alone, and as soon as she arrived, she
invented a reason for remaining for two days, or rather for two nights,
if necessary, as she told him that she had met some friends who lived a
little way out of town.

And then she set out on a voyage of discovery. She went up and down the
boulevards, without seeing anything except roving and numbered vice. She
looked into the large _cafés_, and read the _Agony Column_ of the
_Figaro_, which every morning seemed to her like a tocsin, a summons to
love. But nothing put her on the track of those orgies of actors and
actresses; nothing revealed to her those temples of debauchery which she
imagined opened at some magic word, like the cave in the _Arabian
Nights_, or those catacombs in Rome, where the mysteries of a persecuted
religion were secretly celebrated.

Her relations, who were quite middle-class people, could not introduce
her to any of those well-known men with whose names her head was full,
and in despair she was thinking of returning, when chance came to her
aid. One day, as she was going along the _Rue de la Chaussee d'Antin_,
she stopped to look into a shop full of those colored Japanese
knick-knacks, which strike the eye on account of their color. She was
looking at the little ivory buffoons, the tall vases of flaming enamel,
and the curious bronzes, when she heard the shop-keeper dilating, with
many bows, on the value of an enormous, pot-bellied, comical figure,
which was quite unique, he said, to a little, bald-headed, gray-bearded
man.

Every moment, the shop-keeper repeated his customer's name, which was a
celebrated one, in a voice like a trumpet. The other customers, young
women and well-dressed gentlemen, gave a swift and furtive, but
respectful glance at the celebrated writer, who was looking admiringly
at the china figure. They were both equally ugly, as ugly as two
brothers who had sprung from the same mother.

"I will let you have it for a thousand francs, Monsieur Varin, and that
is exactly what it cost me. I should ask anybody else fifteen hundred,
but I think a great deal of literary and artistic customers, and have
special prices for them. They all come to me, Monsieur Varin. Yesterday,
Monsieur Busnach bought a large, antique goblet of me, and the other day
I sold two candelabra like this (is it not handsome?) to Monsieur
Alexander Dumas. If Monsieur Zola were to see that Japanese figure, he
would buy it immediately, Monsieur Varin."

The author hesitated in perplexity, as he wanted to have the figure, but
the price was above him, and he thought no more about her looking at him
than if he had been alone in the desert. She came in trembling, with her
eyes fixed shamelessly upon him, and she did not even ask herself
whether he were good-looking, elegant or young. It was Jean Varin
himself, Jean Varin. After a long struggle, and painful hesitation, he
put the figure down onto the table. "No, it is too dear," he said. The
shop-keeper's eloquence redoubled. "Oh! Monsieur Varin, too dear? It is
worth two thousand francs, if it is worth a son." But the man of letters
replied sadly, still looking at the figure with the enameled eyes: "I do
not say it is not; but it is too dear for me." And thereupon, she,
seized by a kind of mad audacity, came forward and said: "What shall you
charge me for the figure?" The shop-keeper, in surprise, replied:
"Fifteen hundred francs, Madame." "I will take it."

The writer, who had not even noticed her till that moment, turned round
suddenly; he looked at her from head to foot, with half-closed eyes,
observantly, and then he took in the details, as a connoisseur. She was
charming, suddenly animated by that flame which had hitherto been
dormant in her. And then, a woman who gives fifteen hundred francs for a
knick-knack is not to be met with every day.

But she was overcome by a feeling of delightful delicacy, and turning to
him, she said in a trembling voice: "Excuse me, Monsieur; no doubt I
have been rather hasty, as perhaps you had not finally made up your
mind." He, however, only bowed, and said: "Indeed, I had, Madame." And
she, filled with emotion, continued: "Well, Monsieur, if either to-day,
or at any other time, you change your mind, you can have this Japanese
figure. I only bought it because you seemed to like it."

He was visibly flattered, and smiled. "I should much like to find out
how you know who I am?" he said. Then she told him how she admired him,
and became quite eloquent as she quoted his works, and while they were
talking he rested his arms on a table, and fixed his bright eyes upon
her, trying to make out who and what she really was. But the shop-keeper,
who was pleased to have that living puff of his goods, called out, from
the other end of the shop: "Just look at this, Monsieur Varin; is it not
beautiful?"

And then everyone looked round, and she almost trembled with pleasure at
being seen talking so intimately with such a well-known man.

At last, however, intoxicated, as it were, by her feelings, she grew
bold, like a general does, who is going to give the order for an
assault. "Monsieur," she said, "will you do me a great, a very great
pleasure? Allow me to offer you this funny Japanese figure, as a
keepsake from a woman who admires you passionately, and whom you have
seen for ten minutes."

Of course he refused, and she persisted, but still he resisted her
offer, at which he was much amused, and at which he laughed heartily;
but that only made her more obstinate, and she said: "Very well, then, I
shall take it to your house immediately. Where do you live?"

He refused to give her his address, but she got it from the shop-keeper,
and when she had paid for her purchase, she ran out to take a cab. The
writer went after her, as he did not wish to accept a present for which
he could not possibly account. He reached her just as she was jumping
into the vehicle, and getting in after her, he almost fell onto her, and
then tumbled onto the bottom of the cab as it started. He picked himself
up, however, and sat down by her side, feeling very much annoyed.

It was no good for him to insist and to beg her; she showed herself
intractable, and when they got to the door, she stated her conditions.
"I will undertake not to leave this with you," she said, "if you will
promise to do all I want to-day." And the whole affair seemed so funny
to him that he agreed. "What do you generally do at this time?" she
asked him; and after hesitating for a few moments, he replied: "I
generally go for a walk." "Very well, then, we will go to the _Bois de
Boulogne_!" she said, in a resolute voice, and they started.

He was obliged to tell her the names of all the well-known women, pure
or impure, with every detail about them; their life, their habits, their
private affairs, and their vices; and when it was getting dusk, she said
to him: "What do you do every day at this time?" "I have some absinthe,"
he replied, with a laugh. "Very well, then, Monsieur," she went on,
seriously, "let us go and have some absinthe."

They went into a large _café_ on the boulevard which he frequented, and
where he met some of his colleagues, whom he introduced to her. She was
half mad with pleasure, and she kept saying to herself: "At last! At
last!" But time went on, and she observed that she supposed it must be
about his dinner time, and she suggested that they should go and dine.
When they left _Bignon's_, after dinner, she wanted to know what he did
in the evening, and looking at her fixedly, he replied: "That depends;
sometimes I go to the theater." "Very well, then, Monsieur; let us go to
the theater."

They went to the Vaudeville with an order, thanks to him, and, to her
great pride, the whole house saw her sitting by his side, in the balcony
stalls.

When the play was over, he gallantly kissed her hand, and said: "It only
remains for me to thank you for this delightful day...." But she
interrupted him: "What do you do at this time, every night?" "Why ...
why ... I go home." She began to laugh, a little tremulous laugh. "Very
well, Monsieur ... let us go to your rooms."

They did not say anything more. She shivered occasionally, from head to
foot, feeling inclined to stay, and inclined to run away, but with a
fixed determination, after all, to see it out to the end. She was so
excited that she had to hold onto the baluster as she went upstairs, and
he came up behind her, with a wax match in his hand.

As soon as they were in the room, she undressed herself quickly, and
retired without saying a word, and then she waited for him, cowering
against the wall. But she was as simple as it was possible for a
provincial lawyer's wife to be, and he was more exacting than a pascha
with three tails, and so they did not at all understand each other. At
last, however, he went to sleep, and the night passed, and the silence
was only disturbed by the _tick-tack_ of the clock, and she, lying
motionless, thought of her conjugal nights; and by the light of the
Chinese lantern, she looked, nearly heart-broken, at the little fat man
lying on his back, whose round stomach raised up the bed-clothes like a
balloon filled with gas. He snored with the noise of a wheezy organ
pipe, with prolonged snorts and comic chokings. His few hairs profited
by his sleep, to stand up in a very strange way, as if they were tired
of having been fastened for so long to that pate, whose bareness they
were trying to cover, and a small stream of saliva was running out of
one corner of his half-open mouth.

At last the daylight appeared through the drawn blinds; so she got up
and dressed herself without making any noise, and she had already half
opened the door, when she made the lock creak, and he woke up and rubbed
his eyes. He was some moments before he quite came to himself, and then,
when he remembered all that had happened, he said: "What! Are you going
already?" She remained standing, in some confusion, and then she said,
in a hesitating voice: "Yes, of course; it is morning..."

Then he sat up, and said: "Look here, I have something to ask you, in my
turn." And as she did not reply, he went on: "You have surprised me most
confoundedly since yesterday. Be open, and tell me why you did it all,
for upon my word I cannot understand it in the least." She went close up
to him, blushing like as if she had been a virgin, and said: "I wanted
to know ... what ... what vice ... really was, ... and ... well ...
well, it is not at all funny."

And she ran out of the room, and downstairs into the street.

A number of sweepers were busy in the streets, brushing the pavements,
the roadway, and sweeping everything on one side. With the same regular
motion, the motion of mowers in a meadow, they pushed the mud in front
of them in a semi-circle, and she met them in every street, like dancing
puppets, walking automatically with their swaying motion. And it seemed
to her as if something had been swept out of her; as if her over-excited
dreams had been pushed into the gutter, or into the drain, and so she
went home, out of breath, and very cold, and all that she could remember
was the sensation of the motion of those brooms sweeping the streets of
Paris in the early morning.

As soon as she got into her room, she threw herself onto her bed and
cried.




MADAME BAPTISTE


When I went into the waiting-room at the station at Loubain, the first
thing I did was to look at the clock, and I found that I had two hours
and ten minutes to wait for the Paris express.

I felt suddenly tired, as if I had walked twenty miles, and then I
looked about me as if I could find some means of killing the time on the
station walls, and at last I went out again, and stopped outside the
gates of the station, racking my brains to find something to do. The
street, which was a kind of a boulevard, planted with acacias, between
two rows of houses of unequal shape and different styles of
architecture, houses such as one only sees in a small town, ascended a
slight hill, and at the extreme end of it, there were some trees, as if
it ended in a park.

From time to time, a cat crossed the street, and jumped over the
gutters, carefully. A cur sniffed at every tree, and hunted for
fragments from the kitchens, but I did not see a single human being, and
I felt listless and disheartened. What could I do with myself? I was
already thinking of the inevitable and interminable visit to the small
_café_ at the railway station, where I should have to sit over a glass
of undrinkable beer and the illegible newspaper, when I saw a funeral
procession coming out of a side street into the one in which I was, and
the sight of the hearse was a relief to me. It would, at any rate, give
me something to do for ten minutes. Suddenly, however, my curiosity was
aroused. The corpse was followed by eight gentlemen, one of whom was
weeping, while the others were chatting together, but there was no
priest, and I thought to myself:

"This is a non-religious funeral," but then I reflected that a town like
Loubain must contain at least a hundred free-thinkers, who would have
made a point of making a manifestation. What could it be then? The rapid
pace of the procession clearly proved that the body was to be buried
without ceremony, and, consequently, without the intervention of
religion.

My idle curiosity framed the most complicated suppositions, and as the
hearse passed me, a strange idea struck me, which was to follow it, with
the eight gentlemen. That would take up my time for an hour, at least,
and I, accordingly, walked with the others, with a sad look on my face,
and on seeing this, the two last turned round in surprise, and then
spoke to each other in a low voice.

No doubt they were asking each other whether I belonged to the town, and
then they consulted the two in front of them, who stared at me in turn.
This close attention which they paid me, annoyed me, and to put an end
to it, I went up to them, and, after bowing, I said:

"I beg your pardon, gentlemen, for interrupting your conversation, but
seeing a civil funeral, I have followed it, although I did not know the
deceased gentleman whom you are accompanying."

"It is a woman," one of them said.

I was much surprised at hearing this, and asked:

"But it is a civil funeral, is it not?"

The other gentleman, who evidently wished to tell me all about it, then
said: "Yes and no. The clergy have refused to allow us the use of the
church."

On hearing that I uttered a prolonged _A--h_! of astonishment. I could
not understand it at all, but my obliging neighbor continued:

"It is rather a long story. This young woman committed suicide, and that
is the reason why she cannot be buried with any religious ceremony. The
gentleman who is walking first, and who is crying, is her husband."

I replied with some hesitation:

"You surprise and interest me very much, Monsieur. Shall I be indiscreet
if I ask you to tell me the facts of the case? If I am troubling you,
think that I have said nothing about the matter."

The gentleman took my arm familiarly.

"Not at all, not at all. Let us stop a little behind the others, and I
will tell it you, although it is a very sad story. We have plenty of
time before getting to the cemetery, whose trees you see up yonder, for
it is a stiff pull up this hill."

And he began:

"This young woman, Madame Paul Hamot, was the daughter of a wealthy
merchant in the neighborhood, Monsieur Fontanelle. When she was a mere
child of eleven, she had a terrible adventure; a footman violated her.
She nearly died, in consequence, and the wretch's brutality betrayed
him. A terrible criminal case was the result, and it was proved that for
three months the poor young martyr had been the victim of that brute's
disgraceful practices, and he was sentenced to penal servitude for life.

"The little girl grew up stigmatized by disgrace, isolated without any
companions, and grown-up people would scarcely kiss her, for they
thought that they would soil their lips if they touched her forehead,
and she became a sort of monster, a phenomenon to all the town. People
said to each other in a whisper: 'You know, little Fontanelle,' and
everybody turned away in the streets when she passed. Her parents could
not even get a nurse to take her out for a walk, as the other servants
held aloof from her, as if contact with her would poison everybody who
came near her.

"It was pitiable to see the poor child. She remained quite by herself,
standing by her maid, and looking at the other children amusing
themselves. Sometimes, yielding to an irresistible desire to mix with
the other children, she advanced, timidly, with nervous gestures, and
mingled with a group, with furtive steps, as if conscious of her own
infamy. And, immediately, the mothers, aunts and nurses used to come
running from every seat, who took the children entrusted to their care
by the hand and dragged them brutally away.

"Little Fontanelle remained isolated, wretched, without understanding
what it meant, and then she began to cry, nearly heart-broken with
grief, and then she used to run and hide her head in her nurse's lap,
sobbing.

"As she grew up, it was worse still. They kept the girls from her, as if
she were stricken with the plague. Remember that she had nothing to
learn, nothing; that she no longer had the right to the symbolical
wreath of orange-flowers; that almost before she could read, she had
penetrated that redoubtable mystery, which mothers scarcely allow their
daughters to guess, trembling as they enlighten them, on the night of
their marriage.

"When she went through the streets, always accompanied by her governess,
as if her parents feared some fresh, terrible adventure, with her eyes
cast down under the load of that mysterious disgrace, which she felt was
always weighing upon her, the other girls, who were not nearly so
innocent as people thought, whispered and giggled as they looked at her
knowingly, and immediately turned their heads absently, if she happened
to look at them. People scarcely greeted her; only a few men bowed to
her, and the mothers pretended not to see her, whilst some young
blackguards called her _Madame Baptiste_, after the name of the footman
who had outraged and ruined her.

"Nobody knew the secret torture of her mind, for she hardly ever spoke,
and never laughed, and her parents themselves appeared uncomfortable in
her presence, as if they bore her a constant grudge for some irreparable
fault.

"An honest man would not willingly give his hand to a liberated convict,
would he, even if that convict were his own son? And Monsieur and Madame
Fontanelle looked on their daughter as they would have done on a son who
had just been released from the hulks. She was pretty and pale, tall,
slender, distinguished-looking, and she would have pleased me very much,
Monsieur, but for that unfortunate affair.

"Well, when a new sub-prefect was appointed here eighteen months ago, he
brought his private secretary with him. He was a queer sort of fellow,
who had lived in the _Latin Quarter_[21], it appears. He saw
Mademoiselle Fontanelle, and fell in love with her, and when told of
what occurred, he merely said: 'Bah! That is just a guarantee for the
future, and I would rather it should have happened before I married her,
than afterwards. I shall sleep tranquilly with that woman.'

[Footnote 21: The students' quarter in France, where so many of them
lead rackety, fast lives.--TRANSLATOR.]

"He paid his addresses to her, asked for her hand, and married her, and
then, not being deficient in boldness, he paid wedding-calls,[22] as if
nothing had happened. Some people returned them, others did not, but, at
last, the affair began to be forgotten, and she took her proper place in
society.

[Footnote 22: In France and Germany, the newly-married couple pay the
wedding-calls, which is the direct opposite to our custom.--TRANSLATOR.]

"She adored her husband as if he had been a god, for, you must remember,
he had restored her to honor and to social life, that he had braved
public opinion, faced insults, and, in a word, performed such a
courageous act, as few men would accomplish, and she felt the most
exalted and uneasy love for him.

"When she became pregnant, and it was known, the most particular people
and the greatest sticklers opened their doors to her, as if she had been
definitely purified by maternity.

"It is funny, but so it is, and thus everything was going on as well as
possible, when, the other day, was the feast of the patron saint of our
town. The Prefect, surrounded by his staff and the authorities, presided
at the musical competition, and when he had finished his speech, the
distribution of medals began, which Paul Hamot, his private secretary,
handed to those who were entitled to them.

"As you know, there are always jealousies and rivalries, which make
people forget all propriety. All the ladies of the town were there on
the platform, and, in his proper turn, the bandmaster from the village
of Mourmillon came up. This band was only to receive a second-class
medal, for one cannot give first-class medals to everybody, can one? But
when the private secretary handed him his badge, the man threw it in his
face and exclaimed:

"'You may keep your medal for Baptiste. You owe him a first-class one,
also, just as you do me.'

"There were a number of people there who began to laugh. The common herd
are neither charitable nor refined, and every eye was turned towards
that poor lady. Have you ever seen a woman going mad, Monsieur? Well, we
were present at the sight! She got up and fell back on her chair three
times following, as if she had wished to make her escape, but saw that
she could not make her way through the crowd, and then another voice in
the crowd exclaimed:

"'Oh I Oh! Madame Baptiste!'

"And a great uproar, partly laughter, and partly indignation, arose. The
word was repeated over and over again; people stood on tip-toe to see
the unhappy woman's face; husbands lifted their wives up in their arms,
so that they might see the unhappy woman's face, and people asked:

"'Which is she? The one in blue?'

"The boys crowed like cocks, and laughter was heard all over the place.

"She did not move now on her state chair, just as if she had been put
there for the crowd to look at. She could not move, nor disappear, nor
hide her face. Her eyelids blinked quickly, as if a vivid light were
shining in her face, and she panted like a horse that is going up a
steep hill, so that it almost broke one's heart to see it. Meanwhile,
however, Monsieur Hamot had seized the ruffian by the throat, and they
were rolling on the ground together, amidst a scene of indescribable
confusion, and the ceremony was interrupted.

"An hour later, as the Hamots were returning home, the young woman, who
had not uttered a word since the insult, but who was trembling as if all
her nerves had been set in motion by springs, suddenly sprang on the
parapet of the bridge, and threw herself into the river, before her
husband could prevent her. The water is very deep under the arches, and
it was two hours before her body was recovered. Of course, she was
dead."

The narrator stopped, and then added:

"It was, perhaps, the best thing she could do in her position. There are
some things which cannot be wiped out, and now you understand why the
clergy refused to have her taken into church. Ah! If it had been a
religious funeral, the whole town would have been present, but you can
understand that her suicide added to the other affair, and made families
abstain from attending her funeral; and then, it is not an easy matter,
here, to attend a funeral which is performed without religious rites."

We passed through the cemetery gates and I waited, much moved by what I
had heard, until the coffin had been lowered into the grave, before I
went up to the poor fellow who was sobbing violently, to press his hand
vigorously. He looked at me in surprise through his tears, and then
said:

"Thank you, Monsieur." And I was not sorry that I had followed the
funeral.




HAPPINESS


The sky was blue, with light clouds that looked like swans slowly
sailing on the waters of a lake, and the atmosphere was so warm, so
saturated with the subtle odors of the mimosas, that Madame de
Viellemont ordered coffee to be served on the terrace which overlooked
the sea.

And while the steam rose from the delicate china cups, one felt an
almost inexpressible pleasure in looking at the sails, which were
gradually becoming lost in the mysterious distance, and at the almost
motionless sea, which had the sheen of jewels, which attracted the eyes
like the looks of a dreamy woman.

Monsieur de Pardeillac, who had arrived from Paris, fresh from the
remembrance of the last election there, from that Carnival of variegated
posters, which for weeks had imparted the strange aspect of some
Oriental bazaar to the whole city, had just been relating the victory of
_The General_, and went on to say that those who had thought that the
game was lost, were beginning to hope again.

After listening to him, old Count de Lancolme, who had spent his whole
life in rummaging libraries, and who had certainly compiled more
manuscripts than any Benedectine friar, shook his bald head, and
exclaimed in his shrill, rather mocking voice:

"Will you allow me to tell you a very old story, which has just come
into my head, while you were speaking, my dear friend, which I read
formerly in an old Italian city, though I forget at this moment where it
was?

"It happened in the fifteenth century, which is far removed from our
epoch, but you shall judge for yourselves whether it might not have
happened yesterday.

"Since the day, when mad with rage and rebellion, the town had made a
bonfire of the Ducal palace, and had ignominiously expelled that
patrician who had been their _podestat_[23], as if he had been some
vicious scoundrel, had thrust his lovely daughter into a convent, and
had forced his sons, who might have claimed their parental heritage, and
have again imposed the abhorred yoke upon them, into a monastery, the
town had never known any prosperous times. One after another the shops
closed, and money became as scarce as if there had been an invasion of
barbarian hordes, who had emptied the State treasury, and stolen the
last gold coin.

[Footnote 23: Venetian and Genoese magistrate.--TRANSLATOR.]

"The poor people were in abject misery, and in vain held out their hands
to passers-by under the church porches, and in the squares, while only
the watchmen disturbed the silence of the starlit nights, by their
monotonous and melancholy call, which announced the flight of the hours
as they passed.

"There were no more serenades; no longer did viols and flutes trouble
the slumbers of the lovers' choice; no longer were amorous arms thrown
round women's supple waists, nor were bottles of red wine put to cool in
the fountains under the trees. There were no more love adventures, to
the rhythm of laughter and of kisses; nothing but heavy, monotonous
weariness, and the anxiety as to what the next day might bring forth,
and ceaseless, unbridled ambitions and lusts.

"The palaces were deserted, one by one, as if the plague were raging,
and the nobility had fled to Florence and to Rome. In the beginning, the
common people, artisans and shop-keepers had installed themselves in
power, as in a conquered city, and had seized posts of honor and
well-paid offices, and had sacked the Treasury with their greedy and
eager hands. After them, came the middle classes, and those solemn
upstarts and hypocrites, like leathern bottles blown out with wind,
acting the tyrant and lying without the least shame, disowned their
former promises, and would soon have given the finishing stroke to the
unfortunate city, which was already at its last shifts.

"Discontent was increasing, and the _sbirri_[24] could scarcely find
time to tear the seditious placards, which had been posted up by unknown
hands, from the walls.

[Footnote 24: Italian police officers.--TRANSLATOR]

"But now that the old _podestat_ had died in exile, worn out with grief,
and that his children, who had been brought up under monastic rules, and
were accustomed to nothing so much as to praying, thought only of their
own salvation, there was nobody who could take his place.

"And so these kinglets profited by the occasion to strut about at their
ease like great nobles, to cram themselves with luxurious meals, to
increase their property by degrees, to put everything up for sale, and
to get rid of those who, later on, could have called for accounts, and
have nailed them to the pillory by their ears.

"Their arrogance knew no bounds, and when they were questioned about
their acts, they only replied by menaces or raillery, and this state of
affairs lasted for twenty years, when, as war was imminent with Lucca,
the Council raised troops and enrolled mercenaries. Several battles were
fought in which the enemy was beaten and was obliged to flee, abandoning
their colors, their arms, prisoners, and all the booty in their camp.

"The man who had led the soldiers from battle, whom they had acclaimed
as triumphant and laurel-crowned Caesar, around their campfires, was a
poor _condottiere_[25], who possessed nothing in the world except his
clothes, his buff jerkin and his heavy sword.

[Footnote 25: Italian mercenary or free-lance, in the Middle
Ages.--TRANSLATOR.]

"They called him _Hercules_, on account of his strong muscles, his
imposing build, and his large head, and also _Malavista_, because in
those butcheries he had no pity, no weakness, but seemed, with his great
murderous arms, as if he had the long reach of death itself. He had
neither title, deeds, fortune, nor relations, for he had been born one
night in the tent of a female camp follower; for a long time, an old,
broken drum had been his cradle, and he had grown up anyhow, without
knowing those maternal kisses and endearments that warm the heart, or
the pleasure of not always sleeping on a hard bed, or of always eating
tough beef, or of being obliged to tighten his sword belt when luck had
turned like a weathercock when the wind shifts, and a man would gladly
give all his share of the next booty for a moldy crust of bread and a
glass of water.

"He was a simple and a brave man, whose heart was as virgin as some
virgin shore, on which no human foot has ever yet left its imprint.

"The Chiefs of the Council were imprudent enough to summon Hercules
Malavista within the walls of the town, and to celebrate his arrival
with almost imperial splendor, more, however, to deceive the people and
to regain their waning popularity by means of some one else, by a
ceremony copied from those of Pagan Rome, than to honor and recompense
the services of a soldier whom they despised at the bottom of their
hearts.

"The bells rang a full peal, and the archbishop and clergy and choir
boys went to meet the Captain, singing psalms and hymns of joy, as if it
might have been Easter. The streets and squares were strewn with
branches of box roses and marjoram, while the meanest homes were
decorated with flags, and hung with drapery and rich stuffs.

"The conqueror came in through Trajan's gate, bare-headed, and with the
symbolical golden laurel wreath on his head; and sitting on his horse,
that was as black as a starless night, he appeared even taller, more
vigorous and more masculine than he really was. He had a joyous and
tranquil smile on his lips, and a hidden fire was burning in his eyes,
and his soldiers bore the flags and the trophies that he had gained,
before him, and behind him there was a noise of clashing partisans and
cross-bows, and of loud voices shouting _vivats_ in his honor.

"In this fashion he traversed all the quarters of the town, and even the
suburbs. The women thought him handsome and proud, blew kisses to him,
and held up their children so that they might see him, and he might
touch them, and the men cheered him, and looked at him with emotion, and
many of them reflected and dreamt about that bright, unknown man, who
appeared to be surrounded by a halo of glory.

"The members of the Council began to perceive the extent of the almost
irreparable fault that they had committed, and did not know what to do
in order to ward off the danger by which they were menaced, and to rid
themselves of a guest who was quite ready to become their master. They
saw clearly that their hours were numbered, that they were approaching
that fatal period at which rioting becomes imminent, when the leaders
are carried away with it, like pieces of straw in a swift current.

"Hercules could not show himself in public without being received with
shouts of acclamation and noisy greetings, and deputations from the
nobility, as well as from the people, came repeatedly and told him that
he had only to make a sign and to say a word, for his name to be in
every mouth, and for his authority to be accepted. They begged him on
their knees to accept the supreme authority, as though he would be
conferring a favor on them, but the free-lance did not seem to
understand them, and repelled their offers with the superb indifference
of a soldier who has nothing to do with the people or a crown.

"At length, however, his resistance grew weaker; he felt the
intoxication of power, and grew accustomed to the idea of holding the
lives of thousands in his hands, of having a palace, arsenals full of
arms, chests full of gold, ships which he could send on adventurous
cruises wherever he pleased, and of governing that city, with all its
houses and all its churches, and of being a leading figure at all grand
functions in the cathedral.

"The shop-keepers and merchants were overcome by terror at this, and
bowed before the shadow of that great sword, which might sweep them all
away and upset their false weights and scales. So they assembled
secretly in a monastery of the Carmelite friars outside the gates of the
city, and a short time afterwards the weaver Marconelli, and the
money-changer Rippone brought Giaconda, who was one of the most
beautiful courtesans in Venice, and who knew every secret in the _Art of
Love_, and whose kisses were a foretaste of Paradise, back with them
from that city. She soon managed to touch the soldier with her delicate,
fair skin, to make him inhale its bewitching odor in close proximity,
and to dazzle him with her large, dark eyes, in which the reflection of
stars seemed to shine, and when he had once tasted that feast of love,
and that heavy wine of kisses, when he had clasped that pink and white
body in his arms, and had listened to that voice which sounded as soft
as music, and which promised him eternities of joy, and vowed to him
eternities of pleasures, Hercules lost his head, and forgot his dreams
and his oaths.

"Why lose precious hours in conspiring, in deluding himself with
chimeras; why risk his life when he loved and was loved, and when the
minutes were all too short, when he would have wished never to detach
his lips from those of the woman he loved?

"And so he did whatever Gioconda demanded.

"They fled from the city, without even telling the sentinels who were on
guard before his palace. They went far, far away, as they could not find
any retreat that was sufficiently unknown and hidden, and at last they
stopped at a small, quiet fishing village, where there were gardens full
of lemon trees, where the deserted beach looked as if it were covered
with gold, and where the sea was a deep blue until it was lost in the
distance. And while the captain and the courtesan loved each other and
wore themselves out with pleasure--with the enchantment of the sea close
to them--the irritated citizens, whom he had left were clamoring for
their idol, were indignant at his desertion, and tore up the paving
stones in the streets, to stone the man who had betrayed their
confidence and worship.

"And they pulled his statue down from its pedestal, amidst spiteful
songs and jokes, and the members of the Council breathed again ... as
they were no longer afraid of the great sword."