CHAPTER VI
A SWEET CONSOLER
She passed her arm about him and pressed him to her, and with arms entwined they entered the study.
"How glad I am!" she said. "What a good idea I had!"
With a quick movement she took off her long gray cloak that enveloped her from head to foot.
"And are you glad?" she asked, as she stood looking at him.
"Can you ask that?"
"Only to hear you say that you are."
"Are you not my only joy, the sweet lamp that gives me light in the cavern where I work day and night?"
"Dear Victor!"
She was a tall, slender young woman with chestnut hair, whose thick curls clustering about her forehead almost touched her eyebrows. Her beautiful eyes were dark, her nose short, while her superb teeth and rich, ruby- colored lips gave her the effect of a pretty doll; and she had gayety, playful vivacity, gracious effrontery, and a passionate caressing glance. Dressed extravagantly, like the Parisian woman who has not a sou, but who adorns everything she wears, she had an ease, a freedom, a natural elegance that was charming. With this she had the voice of a child, a joyous laugh, and an expression of sensibility on her fresh face.
"I have come to dine with you," she said, gayly, "and I am so hungry."
He made a gesture that was not lost upon her.
"Do I disturb you?" she asked, uneasily.
"Not at all."
"Must you go out?"
"No."
"Then why did you make a gesture that showed indifference, or, at least, embarrassment?"
"You are mistaken, my little Phillis."
"With any one else I might be mistaken, but with you it is impossible. You know that between us words are not necessary; that I read in your eyes what you would say, in your face what you think and feel. Is it not always so when one loves—as I love you?"
He took her in his arms and kissed her long and tenderly. Then going to a chair on which he had thrown his coat, he drew from the pocket the bread that he had bought.
"This is my dinner," he said, showing the bread.
"Oh! I must scold you. Work is making you lose your head. Can you not take time to eat?"
He smiled sadly.
"It is not time that I want."
He fumbled in his pocket and brought out three big sous.
"I cannot dine at a restaurant with six sous."
She threw herself in his arms.
"O dearest, forgive me!" she cried. "Poor, dear martyr! Dear, great man! It is I who accuse you, when I ought to embrace your knees. And you do not scold me; a sad smile is your only reply. And it is really so bad as that! Nothing to eat!"
"Bread is very good eating. If I might be assured that I shall always have some!"
"Well, to-day you shall have something more and better. This morning, seeing the storm, an idea came to me associated with you. It is quite natural, since you are always in my heart and in my thoughts. I told mamma that if the storm continued I would dine at the pension. You can imagine with what joy I listened to the wind all day, and watched the rain and leaves falling, arid the dead branches waving in the whirlwind. Thank God, the weather was bad enough for mamma to believe me safe at the pension; and here I am. But we must not fast. I shall go and buy something to eat, and we will play at making dinner by the fire, which will be far more amusing than going to a restaurant."
She put on her cloak quickly.
"Set the table while I make my purchases."
"I have my article to finish that will be sent for at eight o'clock. Just think, I have three tonics to recommend, four preparations of iron, a dye, two capillary lotions, an opiate, and I don't know how many soaps and powders. What a business!"
"Very well, then, do not trouble yourself about the table; we will set it together when you have finished, and that will be much more amusing."
"You take everything in good part."
"Is it better to look on the dark side? I shall soon return."
She went to the door.
"Do not be extravagant," he said.
"There is no danger," she replied, striking her pocket.
Then, returning to him, she embraced him passionately.
"Work!"
And she ran out.
They had loved each other for two years. At the time they met, Saniel was giving a course of lectures on anatomy at a young ladies' school just outside of Paris, and every time he went out there he saw a young woman whom he could not help noticing. She came and went on the same trains that he did, and gave lessons in a rival school. As she frequently carried under her arm a large cartoon, and sometimes a plaster cast, he concluded that she gave lessons in drawing. At first he paid no attention to her. What was she to him? He had more important things in his head than women. But little by little, and because she was reserved and discreet, he was struck by the vivacity and gayety of her expression. He really enjoyed looking at this pretty and pleasing young woman. However, his looks said nothing; if their eyes smiled when they met, that was all; they did not make each other's acquaintance. When they left the train they did not notice each other; if he took the left side of the street, she took the other, and vice versa. This state of things lasted several months without a word having been exchanged between them; in due time they learned each other's names and professions. She was a professor of drawing, as he supposed, the daughter of an artist who had been dead several years, and was called Mademoiselle Phillis Cormier. He was a physician for whom a brilliant future was prophesied, a man of power, who would some day be famous; and, very naturally, their attitude remained the same. There was no particular reason why it should change. But accident made a reason. One summer day, at the hour when they ordinarily took the train back to Paris, the sky suddenly became overcast, and it was evident that a violent storm was approaching. Saniel saw Phillis hurrying to the station without an umbrella, and, as some friend had lent him one, he decided to speak to her for the first time.
"It seems as if the storm would overtake us before we reach the station. As you have no umbrella, will you permit me to walk beside you, and to shelter you with mine?"
She replied with a smile, and they walked side by side until the rain began to fall, when she drew nearer to him, and they entered the station talking gayly.
"Your umbrella is better than Virginia's skirt," she said.
"And what is Virginia's skirt?"
"Have you not read Paul and Virginia?"
"No."
She looked at him with a mocking smile, wondering what superior men read.
Not only had he not read Bernardin de Saint-Pierre's romance, nor any others, but he had never been in love. He knew nothing of the affairs of the heart nor of the imagination. Leisure must be had for light reading, and even more for love, for they require a liberty of mind and an independence of life that he had not. Where could he find time to read novels? When and how could he pay attention to a woman? Those that he had known since his arrival in Paris had not had the slightest influence over him, and he retained only faint memories of them. On the contrary, thinking of this walk in the rain, he remembered this young girl with a vividness entirely new to him. She made a strong impression on him, and it remained. He saw her again, with her smile that showed her brilliant teeth, he heard the music of her voice, and the bare plain that he had walked so many times now seemed the most beautiful country in the world to him. Evidently there was a change in him; something was awakened in his soul; for the first time he discovered that the hollow and muscular conoid organ called the heart had a use besides for the circulation of blood.
What a surprise and what a disappointment! Was he going to be simpleton enough to love this young girl and entangle his life, already so hard and heavily weighted, with a woman? A fine thing, truly, and nature had built him to play the lover! It is true that only those who wish it fall in love, and he knew the power of will by experience.
But he soon lost confidence in himself. Away from Phillis he could do as he wished, but with her it was as she wished. With one look she mastered him. He met her, furious at the influence she exercised over him, and against which he had struggled since their last meeting; he left her, ravished at feeling how profoundly he loved her.
To a man whose life had been ruled by reason and logic until this moment, these contradictions were exasperating; and he only excused himself for submitting to them by saying that they could in no way modify the line of conduct that he had traced out for himself, nor make him deviate from the road that he followed.
Rich, or even with a small fortune, he might—when he was with her and in her power—let himself be carried away; but when he was dying of hunger he was not going to commit the folly of taking a wife. What would he have to give her? Misery, nothing but misery; and shame, in default of any other reason, would forever prevent him from offering himself to her.
She was the daughter of an artist who, after years of struggle, died at the moment when fortune was beginning to smile upon him. Ten years more of work, and he would have left his family, if not rich, at least in comfortable circumstances. In reality, he left nothing but ruin. The hotel he built was sold, and, after the debts were paid, nothing remained but some furniture. His widow, son, and daughter must work. The widow, having no trade, took in sewing; the son left college to become the clerk of a money-lender named Caffie; the daughter, who, happily for her, had learned to draw and paint under her father's direction, obtained pupils, and designed menacs for the stationers, and painted silk fans and boxes. They lived with great economy, submitting to many privations. The brother, weary of his monotonous existence and of the exactions of his master, left them to try his fortunes in America.
If Saniel ever married, which he doubted, certainly he would not marry a woman situated as Phillis was.
This reflection was reassuring, and he was more devoted to her. Why should he not enjoy the delicious pleasure of seeing her and listening to her? His life was neither gay nor happy; he felt perfectly sure of himself, and, as he knew her now, he was also sure of her—a brave and honest girl. Otherwise, how had she divined that he loved her?
They continued to see each other with a pleasure that seemed equal on both sides, meeting in the station, arranging to take the same trains, and talking freely and gayly.
Things went on this way until the approach of vacation, when they decided to take a walk after their last lesson, instead of returning immediately to Paris.
When the day came the sun was very hot; they had walked some distance, when Phillis expressed a wish to rest for a few minutes. They seated themselves in a shady copse, and soon found themselves in each other's arms.
Since then Saniel had never spoken of marriage, and neither had Phillis.
They loved each other.
CHAPTER VII
A LITTLE DINNER FOR TWO
Saniel was still at work when Phillis returned.
"You have not yet finished, dear?"
"Give me time to cure, by correspondence, a malady that has not yielded to the care of ten physicians, and I am yours."
In three lines he finished the letter, and left his desk.
"I am ready. What shall I do?"
"Help me to take things out of my pockets."
"Don't press too hard," she said as he took each parcel.
At last the pockets were empty.
"Where shall we dine?" she asked.
"Here, as the dining-room is transformed into a laboratory."
"Then let us begin by making a good fire. I wet my feet coming from the station."
"I do not know whether there is any wood."
"Let us see."
She took the candle and they passed into the kitchen, which, like the dining-room, was a laboratory, a stable where Saniel kept in cages pigs from India and rabbits for his experiments, and where Joseph heaped pell- mell the things that were in his way, without paying any attention to the stove in which there never had been a fire. But their search was vain; there was everything in this kitchen except fire-wood.
"Do you value these boxes?" she asked, caressing a little pig that she had taken in her arms.
"Not at all; they enclosed the perfumes and tonics, but they are useless now."
They returned to the office, Saniel carrying the boxes.
"We will set the table here," she said, gayly, for Saniel told her that the dining-room was uninviting, as it was a small bacteriological laboratory.
The table was set by Phillis, who went and came, walking about with a gracefulness that Saniel admired.
"You are doing nothing," she said.
"I am watching you and thinking."
"And the result of these thoughts?"
"It is that you have a fund of good-humor and gayety, an exuberance of life, that would enliven a man condemned to death."
"And what would have become of us, I should like to know, if I had been melancholy and discouraged when we lost my poor papa? He was joy itself, singing all day long, laughing and joking. He brought me up, and I am like him. Mamma, as you know, is melancholy and nervous, looking on the dark side, and Florentin is like her. I obtained a place for Florentin, I found work for mamma and for myself. We all took courage, and gradually we became calm."
She looked at him with a smile that said:
"Will you let me do for you what I have done for others?"
But she did not speak these words. On the contrary, she immediately endeavored to destroy the impression which she believed her words had made upon him.
"Go and bring some water," she said, "and I will light the fire."
When he returned, carrying a carafe, the fire blazed brightly, lighting the whole room. Phillis was seated at the desk, writing.
"What are you doing?" he asked in surprise.
"I am writing our menu, for you know we are not going to sit down at the table like the bourgeois. How do you like it?"
She read it to him.
"Sardines de Nantes."
"Cuisse de dinde rotie."
"Terrine de pate de foie gras aux truffes du Perigord."
"But this is a feast."
"Did you think that I would offer you a fricandeau au jus?"
She continued:
"Fromage de Brie."
"Choux a la creme vanillge."
"Pomme de Normandie."
"Wine."
"Ah! Voila! What wine? I do not wish to deceive you. Let us put,
'Wine from the wine-seller at the corner.' And now we will sit down."
As he was about to seat himself, she said:
"You do not give me your arm to conduct me to the table. If we do not do things seriously and methodically we shall not believe in them, and perhaps the Perigord truffles will change into little black pieces of anything else."
When they were seated opposite to each other, she continued, jesting:
"My dear doctor, did you go to the representation of Don Juan, on
Monday?"
And Saniel, who, in spite of all, had kept a sober face, now laughed loudly.
"Charming!" she cried, clapping her hands. "No more preoccupation; no more cares. Look into my eyes, dear Victor, and think only of the present hour, of the joy of being together, of our love."
She reached her hand over the table, and he pressed it in his.
"Very well." The dinner continued gayly, Saniel replying to Phillis's smiles, who would not permit the conversation to languish. She helped him to each dish, poured out his wine, leaving her chair occasionally to put a piece of wood on the fire, and such shoutings and laughter had never been heard before in that office.
However, she noticed that, little by little, Saniel's face, that relaxed one moment, was the next clouded by the preoccupation and bitterness that she had tried hard to chase away. She would make a new effort.
"Does not this charming little dinner give you the wish to repeat it?"
"How? Where?"
"As I am able to come this evening without making mamma uneasy, I shall find some excuse to come again next week."
He shook his head.
"Have you engagements for the whole of next week?" she asked with uneasiness.
"Where shall I be next week, to-morrow, in a few days?"
"You alarm me. Explain, I beg of you. O Victor, have pity! Do not leave me in suspense."
"You are right; I ought to tell you everything, and not let your tender heart torment itself, trying to explain my preoccupation."
"If you have cares, do you not esteem me enough to let me share them with you? You know that I love you; you only, to-day, to-morrow, forever!"
Saniel had not left her ignorant of the difficulties of his position, but he had not entered into details, preferring to speak of his hopes rather than of his present misery.
The story that he had already told to Glady and Caffie he now told to Phillis, adding what had passed with the concierge, the wine-seller, the coal man, and Joseph.
She listened, stupefied.
"He took your coat?" she murmured.
"That was what he came for."
"And to-morrow?"
"Ah! to-morrow—to-morrow!"
"Working so hard as you have, how did you come to such a pass?"
"Like you, I believed in the virtue of work, and look at me! Because I felt within me a will that nothing could weaken, a strength that nothing could fatigue, a courage that nothing could, dishearten, I imagined that I was armed for battle in such a way that I should never be conquered, and I am conquered, as much by the fault of circumstances as by my own—"
"And in what are you to blame, poor dear?"
"For my ignorance of life, stupidity, presumption, and blindness. If I had been less simple, should I have been taken in by Jardine's propositions? Should I have accepted this furniture, this apartment? He told me that the papers he made me sign were mere formalities, that in reality I might pay when I could, and that he would be content with a fair interest. That seemed reasonable, and, without inquiring further, I accepted, happy and delighted to have a home, feeling sure of having strength to bear this burden. To have confidence in one's self is strength, but it is also weakness. Because you love me you do not know me; you do not see me as I am. In reality, I am not sociable, and I lack, absolutely, suppleness, delicacy, politeness, as much in my character as in my manners. Being so, how can I obtain a large practice, or succeed, unless it is by some stroke of luck? I have counted on the luck, but its hour has not yet sounded. Because I lack suppleness I have not been able to win the sympathy or interest of my masters. They see only my reserve; and because I stay away from them, as much through timidity as pride, they do not come to me—which is quite natural, I admit. And because I have not yielded my ideas to the authority of others, they have taken a dislike to me, which is still more natural. Because I lack politeness, and am still an Auvergnat, heavy and awkward as nature made me, men of the world disdain me, judging me by my exterior, which they see and dislike. More wary, more sly, more experienced, I should be, at least, sustained by friendship, but I have given no thought to it. What good is it? I had no need of it, my force was sufficient. I find it more easy to make myself feared than loved. Thus formed, there are only two things for me to do: remain in my poor room in the Hotel du Senat, living by giving lessons and by work from the booksellers, until the examination and admission to the central bureau; or to establish myself in an out-of-the-way quarter at Belleville, Montrouge, or elsewhere, and there practise among people who will demand neither politeness nor fine manners. As these two ways are reasonable, I have made up my mind to neither. Belleville, because I should work only with my legs, like one of my comrades whom I saw work at Villette: 'Your tongue, good. Your arm, good.' And while he is supposed to be feeling the pulse of the patient with one hand, with the other he is writing his prescription: 'Vomitive, purgative, forty sous;' and he hurries away, his diagnosis having taken less than five minutes; he had no time to waste. I object to the Hotel du Senat because I have had enough of it, and it was there that Jardine tempted me with his proposals. See what he has brought me to!"
"And now?"
CHAPTER VIII
EXPLANATIONS
At this moment, without warning, the candle on the table went out.
Phillis rose. "Where are the candles?" she asked.
"There are no more; this was the last."
"Then we must brighten up the fire."
She threw a small log on the hearth, and then, instead of resuming her seat, she took a cushion from the sofa, and placing it before the chimney, threw herself upon it, and leaned her elbow on Saniel's knee.
"And now?" she repeated, her eyes raised to his.
"Now I suppose the only thing for me to do is to return to Auvergne and become a country doctor."
"My God! is it possible?" she murmured in a tone that surprised Saniel. If there was sadness in this cry, there was also a sentiment that he did not understand.
"On leaving the school I could continue to live at the Hotel du Senat, and, while giving lessons, prepare my 'concours'; now, after having reached a certain position, can I return to this life of poverty and study? My creditors, who have fallen on me here, will harass me, and my competitors will mock my misery—which is caused by my vices. They will think that I dishonor the Faculty, and I shall be rebuffed. Neither doctor of the hospitals nor fellow, I shall be reduced to nothing but a doctor of the quarter. Of what use is it? The effort has been made here; you see how it has succeeded."
"Then you mean to go?"
"Not without sorrow and despair, since it will be our separation, the renouncement of all the hopes on which I have lived for ten years, the abandonment of my work, death itself. You see now why, in spite of your gayety, I have not been able to hide my preoccupation from you. The more charming you were, the more I felt how dear you are, and the greater my despair at the thought of separation."
"Why should we separate?"
"What do you mean?"
She turned toward him.
"To go with you. You must acknowledge that until this moment I have never spoken to you of marriage, and never have I let the thought appear that you might one day make me your wife. In your position, in the struggle you have been through, a wife would have been a burden that would have paralyzed you; above all, such a poor, miserable creature as myself, with no dot but her misery and that of her family. But the conditions are no longer the same. You are as miserable as I am, and more desperate. In your own country, where you have only distant relatives who are nothing to you, as they have not your education or ideas, desires or habits, what will become of you all alone with your 158 disappointment and regrets? If you accept me, I will go with you; together, and loving each other, we cannot be unhappy anywhere. When you come home fatigued you will find me with a smile; when you stay at home you will tell me your thoughts, and explain your work, and I will try to understand. I have no fear of poverty, you know, and neither do I fear solitude. Wherever we are together I shall be happy. All that I ask of you is to take my mother with us, because you know I cannot leave her alone. In attending her, you have learned to know her well enough to know that she is not disagreeable or difficult to please. As for Florentin, he will remain in Paris and work. His trip to America has made him wise, and his ambition will now be easily satisfied; to earn a small salary is all that he asks. Without doubt we shall be a burden, but not so heavy as one might think at first. A woman, when she chooses, brings order and economy into a house, and I promise you that I will be that woman. And then I will work. I am sure my stationer will give me as many menus when I am in Auvergne as he does now that I am in Paris. I could, also, without doubt, procure other work. It would be a hundred francs a month, perhaps a hundred and fifty, perhaps even two hundred. While waiting for your patients to come, we could live on this money. In Auvergne living must be cheap."
She had taken his hands in hers, and she watched anxiously his face as the firelight shone on it, to see the effect of her words. It was the life of both of them that was to be decided, and the fulness of her heart made her voice tremble. What would he reply? She saw that his face was agitated, without being able to read more.
As she remained silent, he took her head in his hands, and looked in her face for several moments.
"How you love me!" he said.
"Let me prove it in some way besides in words."
"It would be cowardly to let you share my misery."
"It would be loving me enough to feel sure that I would be happy."
"And I?"
"Is not the love in your heart greater than pride? Do you not feel that since I have loved you my love has filled all my life, and that there is nothing in the world, in the present or in the future, but it and you? Because I see you for several hours from time to time in Paris, I am happy; whatever difficulties await us, I should be much happier in Auvergne, because we should be together always."
He remained silent for some time.
"Could you love me there?" he murmured.
Evidently it was more to himself than to her that he addressed this question, which was the sum of his reflections.
"O dear Victor!" she cried. "Why do you doubt me? Have I deserved it?
The past, the present, do they not assure the future?"
He shook his head.
"The man you have loved, whom you love, has never shown himself to you as he really is. In spite of the trials and sorrows of his life he has been able to answer your smile with a smile, because, cruel as his life was, he was sustained by hope and confidence; in Auvergne there will be no more hope or confidence, but the madness of a broken life, and the dejection of impotence. What sort of man should I be? Could you love such a man?"
"A thousand times more, for he would be unhappy, and I should have to comfort him."
"Would you have the strength to do it? After a time you would become weary, for the burden would be too heavy, however great your devotion or profound your tenderness, to see my real position and my hopes, and, descending into the future, to see my ruin. You know I am ambitious without having ever compassed the scope of this ambition, and of the hopes, dreams if you like, on which it rests. Understand that these dreams are on the eve of being realized; two months more, and in December or January I pass the 'concours' for the central bureau, which will make me a physician of the hospitals, and at the same time the one for the admission, which opens the Faculty of Medicine to me. Without pride, I believe myself in a position to succeed—what sportsmen call 'in condition.' And just when I have only a few days to wait, behold me ruined forever."
"Why forever?"
"A man leaves his village for Paris to make a name for himself, and he returns only when bad luck or inability sends him back. And then it is only every four years that there is a 'concours' for admission. In four years what will be my moral and intellectual condition? How should I support this exile of four years? Imagine the effect that four years of isolation in the mountains will produce. But this is not all. Besides this ostensible end that I have pursued since I left my village, I have my special work that I can carry out only in Paris. Without having overwhelmed you with the details of medicine, you know that it is about to undergo a revolution that will transform it. Until now it has been taught officially, in pathology, that the human organism carries within itself the germ of a great many infectious diseases which develop spontaneously in certain conditions; for instance, that tuberculosis is the result of fatigue, privations, and physiological miseries. Well, recently it has been admitted, that is to say, the revolutionists admit, a parasitical origin for these diseases, and in France and Germany there is an army looking for these parasites. I am a soldier in this army, and to help me in these researches I established a laboratory in the dining- room. It is to the parasites of tuberculosis and cancers that I devote myself, and for seven years, that is, since I was house-surgeon, my comrades have called me the cancer topic. I have discovered the parasite of the tuberculosis, but I have not yet been able to free it from all its impurities by the process of culture. I am still at it. That is to say, I am very near it, and to-morrow, perhaps, or in a few days, I may make a discovery that will be a revolution, and cover its discoverer with glory. The same with the cancer. I have found its microbe. But all is not done. See what I must give up in leaving Paris."
"Why give all this up? Could you not continue your researches in
Auvergne?"
"It is impossible, for many reasons that are too long to explain, but one will suffice. The culture of these parasites can be done only in certain temperatures rigorously maintained at the necessary degree, and these temperatures can be obtained only by stoves, like the one in my laboratory, fed by gas, the entrance of which is automatically regulated by the temperature of the water. How could I use this stove in a country where there is no gas? No, no! If I leave Paris, everything is at an end my position, as well as my work. I shall become a country doctor, and nothing but a country doctor. Let the sheriff turn me out to-morrow, and all the four years' accumulations in my laboratory, all my works en train that demand only a few days or hours to complete, may go to the second-hand dealer, or be thrown into the street. Of all my efforts, weary nights, privations, and hopes, there remains only one souvenir—for me. And yet, if it did not remain, perhaps I should be less exasperated, and should accept with a heart less sore the life to which I shall never resign myself. You know very well that I am a rebel, and do not submit tamely."
She rose, and taking his hand, pressed it closely in her own.
"You must stay in Paris," she said. "Pardon me for having insisted that you could live in the country. I thought more of myself than of you, of our love and our marriage. It was an egotistic thought, a bad thought. A way must be found, no matter what it costs, to enable you to continue your work."
"But how to find it? Do you think I have not tried everything?"
He related his visits to Jardine, his solicitations, prayers, and also his request of a loan from Glady, and his visit to Caffie.
"Caffie!" she cried. "What made you think of going to Caffie?"
"I went partly because you had often spoken of him."
"But I spoke of him to you as the most wicked of men, capable of anything and everything that is bad."
"And partly, also, because I knew from one of my patients that he lends to those of whom he can make use."
"What did he say to you?"
"That it was probable he would not be able to find any one who would lend what I wished, but he would try to find some one, and would give me an answer tomorrow evening. He also promised to protect me from Jardine."
"You have put yourself in his hands?"
"Well, what do you expect? In my position, I am not at liberty to go to whom I wish and to those who inspire me with confidence in their honor. If I should go to a notary or a banker they would not listen to me, for I should be obliged to tell them, the first thing, that I have no security to offer. That is how the unfortunate fall into the hands of rascals; at least, these listen to them, and lend them something, small though it may be."
"What did he give you?"
"Advice."
"And you took it?"
"There is time gained. To-morrow, perhaps, I shall be turned into the street. Caffie will obtain a respite."
"And what price will he ask for this service?"
"It is only those who own something who worry about the price."
"You have your name, dignity, and honor, and once you are in Caffies hands, who knows what he may exact from you, what he may make you do, without your being able to resist him?."
"Then you wish me to leave Paris?"
"Certainly not; but I wish you to be on your guard against Caffie, whom you do not know, but I do, through what Florentin told us when he was with him. However secret a man may be, he cannot hide himself from his clerk. He is not only guilty of rascalities, but also of real crimes. I assure you that he deserves ten deaths. To gain a hundred francs he will do anything; he makes money only for the pleasure of making it, for he has neither child nor relative."
"Well, I promise to be on my guard as you advise. But, wicked as Caffie may be, I believe that I shall accept the concours that he offered me. Who knows what may happen in the short time that he gains for me? Because I need not tell you that I know beforehand what his reply will be to my request for a loan—he could find no one."
"I shall come, all the same, to-morrow evening to learn his answer."
CHAPTER IX
CAFFIE'S ANSWER
Although Saniel did not build any false hopes on Caffie's reply, he went to see him the next afternoon at the same hour.
As before, he waited some time after ringing the bell. At last he heard a slow step within.
"Who is there?" Caffie asked.
As soon as Saniel answered, the door was opened.
"As I do not like to be disturbed in the evening by troublesome people, I do not always open the door," Caffie said. "But I have a signal for my clients so that I may know them. After ringing, knock three times on the door."
During this explanation they entered Caffie's office.
"Have you done anything about my affair?" Saniel asked, after a moment, as Caffie seemed disinclined to open the conversation.
"Yes, my dear sir. I have been running about all the morning for you.
I never neglect my clients; their affairs are mine."
He paused.
"Well?" Saniel said.
Caffie put on an expression of despair.
"What did I tell you, my dear sir? Do you remember? Do me the honor to believe that a man of my experience does not speak lightly. What I foresaw has come to pass. Everywhere I received the same reply. The risk is too great; no one would take it."
"Not even for a large interest?"
"Not even for a large interest; there is so much competition in your profession. As for me, I believe in your future, and I have proved it by my proposition; but, unfortunately, I am only an intermediary, and not the lender of money."
Caffie emphasized the words, "my proposition," and underlined them with a glance; but Saniel did not appear to understand.
"And the upholsterer's summons?" he asked.
"You may be easy on that point. I have attended to it. Your landlord, to whom he owes rent, will interfere, and your creditor must indemnify him before going farther. Will he submit? We shall see. If he does, we shall defend ourselves on some other ground. I do not say victoriously, but in a way to gain time."
"How much time?"
"That, my dear sir, I do not know; the whole thing depends upon our adversary. But what do you mean by 'how much time?'—eternity?"
"I mean until April."
"That is eternity. Do you believe that you will be able to free yourself in April? If you have expectations founded on something substantial, you should tell me what they are, my dear sir."
This question was put with such an air of benevolence, that Saniel was taken in by it.
"I have no guarantee," he said. "But, on the other hand, it is of the utmost importance to me that I should have this length of time. As I have explained to you, I am about to pass two examinations; they will last three months, and in March, or, at the latest, in April, I shall be a physician of the hospitals, and fellow of the Faculty. In that case I should then offer a surface to the lenders, that would permit you, without doubt, to find the sum necessary to pay Jardine, whatever expenses there may be, and your fee."
As he spoke, Saniel saw that he was wrong in thus committing himself, but he continued to the end.
"I should be unworthy of your confidence, my dear sir," Caffie replied, "if I encouraged you with the idea that we could gain so much time. Whatever it costs me—and it costs me much, I assure you—I must tell you that it is impossible, radically impossible; a few days, yes, or a few weeks, but that is all."
"Well, obtain a few weeks," Saniel said, rising, "that will be something."
"And afterward?"
"We shall see."
"My dear sir, do not go. You would not believe how much I am touched by your position; I think only of you. When I learned that I could not find the sum you desire, I paid a friendly visit to my young client of whom I spoke to you—"
"The one who received a superior education in a fashionable convent?"
"Exactly; and I asked her what she would think of a young doctor, full of talent, future professor of the Faculty, actually considered already a savant of the first order, handsome—because you are handsome, my dear sir, and it is no flattery to say this—in good health, a peasant by birth, who presented himself as a husband. She appeared flattered, I tell you frankly. But immediately afterward she said, 'And the child?' To which I replied that you were too good, too noble, too generous, not to have the indulgence of superior men, who accept an involuntary fault with serenity. Did I go too far?"
He did not wait for an answer.
"No?" he went on. "Exactly. The child was present, for the mother watches over it with a solicitude that promises much for the future, and I examined it leisurely. It is very delicate, my dear sir, and like its father. The poor baby! I doubt if you, with all your skill, can make it live. If it should die, as it is to be feared it will, it would not injure your reputation. You can give it care, but not life."
"Speaking of health," interrupted Saniel, who did not wish to reply, "did you do what I advised about yourself?"
"Not yet. The chemists of this quarter are only licensed cutthroats; but I am going this evening to see one of my clients who is a chemist, and he will deal honestly with me."
"I will see you again, then."
"When you wish, my dear sir; when you have reflected. You have the password."
Before leaving home Saniel gave his key to the concierge, so that on her arrival Phillis might go immediately to his rooms. On his return the concierge told him that "madame" was up-stairs, and when he rang the bell, Phillis opened the door.
"Well?" she asked in a trembling voice, before he had time to enter.
"It is as I told you yesterday; he has found no one."
She clasped him in a long, passionate embrace.
"And the upholsterer?"
"Caffie has promised to gain some time for me."
While speaking, they entered the office. A fire burned on the hearth, and an inviting dinner was on the table. Saniel looked at it in surprise.
"I have set the table, you see; I am going to dine with you."
And throwing herself in his arms:
"Knowing Caffie better than you do, I knew what his answer would be, and I did not wish you to be alone on your return. I made an excuse for not dining with mamma."
"But this chicken?"
"We must have a piece de resistance."
"This fire, and these candles?"
"There, that is the end of my economies. I should have been so happy if they had been less miserable and more useful."
As on the previous evening, they sat before the fire, and she began to talk of various things in order to distract him. But what their lips did not say, their eyes, on meeting, expressed with more intensity than words could do.
It was Saniel who suddenly betrayed his preoccupation.
"Your brother studied Caffie well," he said, as if speaking to himself.
"He did, indeed!"
"He is certainly the most thorough rascal that I have ever met."
"He proposed something infamous, I am sure."
"He proposed that I should marry."
"I suspected that."
"This is the reason why he refuses to lend me the money. I was foolish enough to tell him frankly just how I am situated, and how important it is for me to be free until April. He hopes that I shall be so pushed that I will accept one of the women whom he has proposed to me. With the knife at my throat, I should have to yield."
"And these women?" she asked, not daring to look at him.
"Do not be alarmed, you have nothing to fear. One is the drunken widow of a butcher, and the other is a young girl who has a baby."
"He dares to propose such women to a man like you!"
And Saniel repeated all that Caffie had said to him about these two women.
"What a monster he is!" Phillis said.
"While he was telling me these things I thought of what you said—that if some one killed him, it would be no more than he deserved."
"That is perfectly true."
"Nothing would have been easier than for me to have made away with him. He had the toothache, and when he showed me his teeth I could easily have strangled him. We were alone, and a miserable diabetic, such as he is, who has not more than six months to live, I am sure, could not have resisted a grasp like this. I could take his keys from his pocket, open his safe, and take the thirty, forty, sixty thousand francs that I saw heaped up there. The devil take me if it were ever discovered. A doctor does not strangle his patients, he poisons them. He kills them scientifically, not brutally."
"People who have no conscience can do such things; but for us they are impossible."
"I assure you it is not conscience that would have restrained me."
"The fear of remorse, if I may use an ugly word."
"But intelligent persons have no remorse, my dear child, because they reason before the deed, and not after. Before acting they weigh the pros and cons, and know what the consequences of their actions will be to others as well as to themselves. If this previous examination proves to them that for some reason or other they may act, they will always be calm, assured that they will feel no remorse, which is only the reproach of conscience."
"Without doubt what you say is to the point, but it is impossible for me to accept it. If I have never committed crimes, I have often been foolish and have committed faults, many of them deliberately, after the examination of which you speak. I should have been, according to you, perfectly placid and free from the reproach of conscience; however, the next morning I woke unhappy, tormented, often overwhelmed, and unable to stifle the mysterious voice that accused me."
"And in whose name did it speak, this voice, more vague than mysterious?"
"In the name of my conscience, evidently."
"'Evidently' is too much, and you would be puzzled if called upon to demonstrate this evidence; whereas, nothing is more uncertain and elusive than the thing that is called conscience, which is in reality only an affair of environment and of education."
"I do not understand."
"Does your conscience tell you it is a crime to love me?"
"No, decidedly."
"You see, then, that you have a personal way of understanding what is good and bad, which is not that of our country, where it is admitted, from the religious and from the social point of view, that a young girl is guilty when she has a lover. Of course, you see, also, that conscience is a bad weighing-machine, since each one, in order to make it work, uses a weight that he has himself manufactured."
"However it is, you did right not to strangle Cafflie."
"Whom you, yourself, have condemned to death."
"By the hand of justice, whether human or divine; but not by yours, any more than by Florentin's or mine, although we know better than any one that he does not deserve any mercy."
"And you see I foresaw your objections, as I did not tighten his cravat."
"Happily."
"Is it necessary to say 'happily'?"
CHAPTER X
SANIEL MAKES A RESOLUTION
This evening Phillis was obliged to be at home early, but she cleared off the table, and put everything in order before leaving.
"You can breakfast on the remains of the chicken," she said, as she put it in the pantry.
And as Saniel accompanied her with a candle in his hand, he saw that she had thought not only of his breakfast for the following day, but for many days, besides carrots for the rabbits.
"What a good heart you have!" he said.
"Because I think of the rabbits?"
"Because of your tenderness and thoughtfulness."
"I wish I could do something for you!"
As soon as she was gone he seated himself at his desk and began to work, anxious to make up for the time that he had given to sentiment. The fact that his work might not be of use to him, and that his experiments might be rudely interrupted the next morning or in a few days, was not a sufficient reason for being idle. He had work to do, and he worked as if with the certitude that he would pass his examinations, and that his experiments of four years past would have a good ending, without interference from any one.
This was his strong point, this power to work, that was never disturbed or weakened by anything; not by pleasure or pain, by preoccupation or by misery. In the street he could think of Phillis, be he hungry or sleepy; at his desk he had no thought of Phillis, neither of hunger nor of sleep, no cares, no memories; his work occupied him entirely.
It was his strength, and also his pride, the only superiority of which he boasted; for although he knew that he had others, he never spoke of them, while he often said to his comrades:
"I work when I will and as much as I wish. My will never weakens when I am at work."
This evening he worked for about an hour, in his usual condition of mind; neither sheriffs, nor Jardine, nor Caffie troubled him. But having to draw upon his memory for certain facts, he found that it did not obey him as usual; there were a hesitation, a fogginess, above all, extraordinary wanderings. He wrestled with it and it obeyed, but only for a short time, and soon again it betrayed him a second time, then a third and fourth time.
Decidedly he was not in a normal state, and his will obeyed in place of commanding.
There were a name and a phrase that recurred to him mechanically from time to time. The name was Caffie, and the phrase was, "Nothing easier."
Why should this hypothesis to strangle Caffie, of which he had lightly spoken, and to which he had attached no importance at the moment when he uttered it, return to him in this way as a sort of obsession?
Was it not strange?
Never, until this day, had he had an idea that he could strangle a man, even as wicked as this one, and yet, in talking of it, he found very natural and legitimate reasons for the murder of this scamp.
Had not Phillis herself condemned him?
To tell the truth, she had added that Providence or justice should be his executor, but this was the scruple of a simple conscience, formed in a narrow environment, to which influence he would not submit.
Had he these scruples, this old man who coldly, and merely for the interest of so much a hundred on a dot, advised him to hasten the death of a woman by drunkenness, and that of an infant in any way he pleased?
When he reached this conclusion he stopped, and asked himself whether he were mad to pursue this idea; then immediately, to get rid of it, he set to work, which absorbed him for a certain time, but not so long a time as at first.
Then, finding that he could not control his will, he turned his thoughts to Caffie.
It was only too evident that if he had carried out the idea of strangling Caffie, all the difficulties against which he had struggled, and which would overwhelm him, if not the following day, at least in a few days, would have disappeared immediately.
No more sheriffs, no more creditors. What a deliverance!
Repose, the possibility of passing examinations with a calm spirit that the fever of material troubles would not disturb—in this condition he felt his success was assured.
And his experiments! He would run no danger of seeing them rudely interrupted. His preparations were not cast out-of-doors; his precious culture-tubes were not broken; his vases, his balloons, were not at the second-hand dealer's. He continued this train of thought to the results that he desired for him, glory; for humanity, the cure of one, and perhaps two, of the most terrible maladies with which it was afflicted.
The question was simple:
On one side, Caffie;
On the other side, humanity and science;
An old rascal who deserved twenty deaths, and who would, anyhow, die naturally in a short time;
And humanity, science, which would profit by a discovery of which he would be the author.
He saw that the perspiration stood out on his hands, and he felt it run down his neck.
Why this weakness? From horror of the crime, the possibility of which he admitted? Or from fear of seeing his experiments destroyed?
He would reflect, think about it, be upon his guard.
He had told Phillis that intelligent men, before engaging in an action, weigh the pro and con.
Against Caffie's death he saw nothing.
For, on the contrary, everything combined.
If he had had Phillis's scruples, or Brigard's beliefs, he would have stopped.
But, not having them, would he not be silly to draw back?
Before what should he shrink? Why should he stop?
Remorse? But he was convinced that intelligent men had no remorse when they came to a decision on good grounds. It was before that they felt remorse, not after; and he was exactly in this period of before.
Fear of being arrested? But intelligent men do not let themselves be arrested. Those who are lost are brutes who go straight ahead, or the half-intelligent, who use their skill and cunning to combine a complicated or romantic act, in which their hand is plainly seen. As for him, he was a man of science and precision, and he would not compromise himself by act or sentiment; there would be nothing to fear during the action, and nothing afterward. Caffie strangled, suspicion would not fall upon a doctor, but on a brute. When doctors wish to kill any one, they do it learnedly, by poison or by some scientific method. Brutal men kill brutally; murder, called the assassin's profession.
A few minutes before, he was inundated by perspiration; this word froze him.
He rose nervously, and walked up and down the room with long, unsteady steps. The fire had long since gone out; out-of-doors the street noises had ceased, and in his brain resounded the one word that he pronounced in a low tone, "Assassin!"
Was be the man to be influenced and stopped by a word? Where are the rich, the self-made men, the successful men, who have not left some corpses on the road behind them? Success carries them safely, and they achieved success only because they had force.
Certainly, violence was not recreation, and it would be more agreeable to go in his way peacefully, by the power of intelligence and work, than to make a way by blows; but he had not chosen this road, he was thrown into it by circumstances, by fate, and whoever wishes to reach the end cannot choose the means. If one must walk in the mud, what matters it, when one knows that one will not get muddy?
If Caffie had had heirs, poor people who expected to be saved from misery by inheriting his fortune, he would have been touched by this consideration, undoubtedly. Robber! The word was yet more vile than that of assassin. But who would miss the few banknotes that he would take from the safe? To steal is to injure some one. Whom would he injure? He could see no one. But he saw distinctly an army of afflicted persons whom he would benefit.
A timid ring of the bell made him start violently, and he was angry with himself for being so nervous, he who was always master of his mind as of his body.
He opened the door, and a man dressed like a laborer bowed humbly.
"I beg your pardon for disturbing you, sir."
"What do you want?"
"I called on account of my wife, if you will be so good as to come to see her."
"What is the matter with her?"
"She is about to be confined. The nurse does not know what to do, and sent me for a doctor."
"Did the nurse tell you to come for me?"
"No, sir; she sent me to Doctor Legrand."
"Well?"
"His wife told me he could not get up on account of his bronchitis. And the chemist gave me your address."
"That is right."
"I must tell you, sir, I am an honest man, but we are not rich; we could not pay you—immediately."
"I understand. Wait a few minutes."
Saniel took his instruments and followed the laborer, who, on the way, explained his wife's condition.
"Where are we going?" Saniel asked, interrupting these explanations.
"Rue de la Corderie."
It was behind the Saint Honore' market, on the sixth floor, under the roof, in a room that was perfectly clean, in spite of its poverty. As soon as Saniel entered the nurse came forward, and in a few words told him the woman's trouble.
"Is the child living?"
"Yes."
"That is well; let us see."
He approached the bed and made a careful examination of the patient, who kept repeating:
"I am going to die. Save me, doctor!"
"Certainly, we shall save you," he said, very softly. "I promise you."
He turned away from the bed and said to the nurse:
"The only way to save the mother is to kill the child."
The operation was long, difficult, and painful, and after it was over Saniel remained a long time with the patient. When he reached the street a neighboring clock struck five, and the market-place had already begun to show signs of life.
But in the streets was still the silence and solitude of night, and Saniel began to reflect on what had occurred during the last few hours. Thus, he had not hesitated to kill this child, who had, perhaps, sixty or seventy years of happy life before it, and he hesitated at the death of Caffie, to whom remained only a miserable existence of a few weeks. The interests of a poor, weak, stunted woman had decided him; his, those of humanity, left him perplexed, irresolute, weak, and cowardly. What a contradiction!
He walked with his eyes lowered, and at this moment, before him on the pavement, he saw an object that glittered in the glare of the gas. He approached it, and found that it was a butcher's knife, that must have been lost, either on going to the market or the slaughterhouse.
He hesitated a moment whether he should pick it up or leave it there; then looking all about him, and seeing no one in the deserted street, and hearing no sound of footsteps in the silence, he bent quickly and took it.
Caffie's fate was decided.