The cobbler of Nîmes

It was the month of June, 1703, and about noontide on the last day of the week. The fair in the market-place at Nîmes was therefore at its height. A juggler was swallowing a sword in the midst of an admiring circle. Mademoiselle Héloïse, the danseuse, was walking the tight-rope near at hand, and the pick-pockets were plying their trade profitably on the outskirts of the throng. There was a dancing bear, and beyond him—a rival attraction—a monkey in scarlet breeches, with a blouse or camisole over them. The little creature’s antics were hailed with shouts of derisive laughter and cries of “Camisard!” “Barbet!” “Huguenot!” the monkey’s little blouse being an unmistakable caricature of the dress of the Camisards. It therefore behooved the wise to laugh, and they did, and that loudly,—though many a heart was in secret sympathy with the Huguenot rebels of the Cévennes; but were they not in Nîmes? And the Intendant Bâville was there, and the dragoons of King Louis XIV.; so it was that the monkey gathered many a half-crown, and sous and deniers in profusion, in his little cap, and carried them—chattering—to the showman. It was a motley throng: broad, red-faced market-women, old crones with bearded lip and toothless gums, little gamins of the market with prematurely aged faces, countrymen who glanced askance at the monkey while they laughed, pretty peasant girls who had sold their eggs and their poultry, and come to spend their newly acquired riches in ribbons and trinkets, and to have their fortunes told by the old gypsy in the yellow pavilion. Some strolling musicians were playing a popular air, two drunken men were fighting, and a busy tradesman was selling his wares near the entrance of a tent that was manifestly the centre of attraction. It was of white canvas and decorated with numerous images of the devil,—a black figure with horns, hoofs, and tail, engaged in casting another person into the flames; the whole being more startling than artistic. At the door of this tent was a man mounted on a barrel, and dressed fantastically in black, with a repetition of the devils and flames, in red and yellow, around the edge of his long gown, which flapped about a pair of thin legs, set squarely in the centre of two long, schooner-shaped feet. This person, whose face was gross and dull rather than malicious, kept calling his invitation and bowing low as each new visitor dropped a half-crown into the box fastened on the front of the barrel beneath his feet.

“Messieurs et mesdames!” he cried, “only a half-crown to see the body of a damned person!”

He raised his voice almost to a scream, to be heard in the babel of tongues; he clapped his hands to attract notice; he swayed to and fro on his barrel.

“Here is the body of a damned person!” he shouted. “Dieu! what an opportunity for the good of your soul! Too much, madame?” he said to a fishwife who grumbled at the price, “too much! ’Tis a chance in a thousand! The body came from the Tour de Constance! Madame will have her money’s worth.”

Madame went in, licking her lips like a wolf. The curtain of the tent swung to behind her. A peasant lad followed her, hesitating too over the half-crown, but then the spectacle was worth money. A soldier followed, then a butcher, and two stupid-looking servant-girls, with frightened faces, but still eager to see. Then there was a pause, and the showman began to shout once more; he had need to, for the bear was performing with unusual vivacity, and the danseuse displayed her pretty legs as she tripped on the rope.

“Half a crown, messieurs et mesdames,” cried the man of the black robe; “half a crown to see a dead and damned Huguenot!”

“Too much, monsieur!” said a voice behind him.

He started and looked back into the face of a little hunchbacked man who had been watching him curiously.

“You are not a good Catholic, M. le Bossu!” replied the showman, mocking, for the hunchback wore a poor suit of brown and a frayed hat.

“I am a good Catholic,” he replied calmly, “but your price is high—’tis only a dead Huguenot.”

“Dame! but live ones are too plenty,” retorted the other, with a loud laugh. “What are you to complain?” he added gayly,—“the hunchback!—le bossu!”

“Le Bossu—yes,” replied the hunchback, calmly; “that is what men call me.”

Again the showman mocked him, doffing his cap and grinning.

“Your Excellency’s name?” he demanded.

The hunchback took no notice of him; he had his hand in his wallet feeling for a half-crown; he had determined to see the damned person. But the other got his answer; a little gamin piped up on the edge of the crowd, pointing his finger at the cripple.

“’Tis only Charlot,” he said, “the shoemaker of the Rue St. Antoine.”

The showman laughed again.

“Enter, Maître Savetier!” he said derisively, “and see the dead Huguenot. Dame! but I believe he is one himself,” he added, under his breath, peering sharply at the pale face of le Bossu as he entered the tent.

But a minute later the hunchback was forgotten and the showman was screaming again.

“This way, mesdames! This way, to see a damned person! Half a crown! half a crown!”

Within, the tent was lighted solely by a small aperture at the top, and the effect was rather of a murky twilight than of broad noonday. It was draped with cheap red cloth, and in the centre—directly under the opening in the top—was a rough bier constructed of bare boards, and on this lay a body only partially covered with a piece of coarse serge; images of the devil—cut out of black stuff—were sewed on the corners of this wretched pall. The visitors, the sight-seers, who had paid their half-crowns to enjoy this gruesome spectacle, moved slowly past it, making the circuit of the tent and finally passing out at the door by which they had entered. When the hunchback came in, he paused long enough to become accustomed to the swift transition from sunlight to shadow, and then he too proceeded to join the circle around the corpse. There were many comments made, the sight affected the spectators differently. The two servant-girls clung together, whispering hysterical confidences; the peasant youth stared open-mouthed, fright showing plainly in his eyes; the soldier looked down with brutal indifference; the old fishwife showed satisfaction, her wolf mouth was slightly opened by a grin that displayed three long yellow teeth—all she possessed; a red handkerchief was tied around her head and from below it hung her long gray locks. Her short petticoat and bodice revealed a withered, lean form, and her fingers were like talons. She feasted her eyes on the dead face, and then she squinted across the body at the man who stood like a statue opposite. He was young, with a sad, dark countenance and was poorly, even shabbily dressed. But it was none of these things that the old crone noted, it was the expression of grief and horror that seemed frozen on his features. He did not see her, he did not see the others passing by him—with more than one curious glance; he seemed like a man in a trance, deaf, blind, dumb, but yet gazing fixedly at the inanimate figure on the bier. It was the corpse of a young woman, who had been handsome; the features were still so, and her long black hair fell about her shoulders like a mourning pall.

“Dieu!” said the fishwife, licking her lips, “what a white throat she had; ’twould have been a pity to hang her. See, there is a mark there on her arm where ’twas bound! Is she not pretty, Bossu?”

The hunchback had approached the corpse, and at this appeal he nodded his head.

“Diable!” ejaculated the soldier turning on the old crone, “’tis heresy to call a damned person pretty, Mère Tigrane.”

Mère Tigrane leered at him with horrible intelligence.

“No one is to think a heretic pretty but the dragoons, eh?” she said grinning. “Dame! we know what you think, monsieur.”

The man laughed brutally, and she edged up to him, whispering in his ear, her narrow eyes on the silent visitor opposite. The dragoon looked over too at her words, and broke out with an oath.

“You are a witch, Mère Tigrane,” he said uneasily; “let me alone!”

Again she whispered, but laughed this time, showing her yellow teeth.

Meanwhile the showman had been fortunate and a dozen new-comers crowded into the tent, pressing the others aside. This afforded an opportunity for the hunchback to approach the young man, who had remained by the bier as if chained to the ground. Le Bossu touched his arm, at first lightly, but finding himself unheeded, he jerked the other’s sleeve. The stranger started and stared at him as if he had just awakened from sleep.

“A word with you, friend,” said the hunchback, softly.

The man hesitated, started, paused and cast another long look at the dead face, and then followed the cripple through the group at the door, out into the sunshine and uproar of the market-place. They were not unobserved by Mère Tigrane, but she made no effort to follow them; she was watching the new arrivals as they approached the corpse. As she saw their faces of curiosity and horror, she laughed.

“Mère de Dieu!” she said, “’tis worth a half-crown after all—and I paid Adolphe in false coin too, pauvre garçon!”

In the market-place, the stranger had halted with the hunchbacked cobbler.

“What do you want?” he demanded of le Bossu; “I do not know you.”

“You were in danger,” replied the hunchback, quietly, “and you are in trouble; the bon Dieu knows that I also am in trouble.”

The little man’s tone, his deformity, his kind eyes appealed to the other.

“We should be friends,” he said grimly. “Dieu! I am indeed in trouble.”

The hunchback made a sign to him to be cautious, the crowd hemmed them in, the monkey chattered, the bear danced, Mademoiselle Héloïse was singing a savory song from Paris. The whole square was white with the sunshine; above, the sky was deeply blue.

“Follow me, friend,” said le Bossu again, and commenced to thread his way through the crowd.

His new acquaintance hesitated a moment, cast a backward glance at the tent he had just quitted, and then quietly followed the hunchback. They had to cross the market-place, and the little cobbler seemed to be widely known. Goodwives greeted him, young girls giggled heartlessly before the misshapen figure passed, men nodded indifferently, the maliciously disposed children calling out “le Bossu!” at him as he went. A heartless rabble out for a gala day; what pity had they for the hunchbacked shoemaker of the St. Antoine? The man who followed him escaped notice; he was straight-limbed and erect, and his shabby dress disguised him as completely as any masquerade. When they had left the crowd behind, they walked together, but still silently, along the thoroughfare.

The groups of pleasure-seekers grew more rare as they advanced, and they were almost alone when they passed the Garden of the Récollets—the Franciscan Convent—and entered the Rue St. Antoine. Here it was that the stranger roused himself and addressed his companion.

“Where are we going?” he asked sharply.

“To my shop,” replied le Bossu; “’tis but ten yards ahead now. Have no fear,” he added kindly; “the bon Dieu made me in such shape that my heart is ever with the sorrowful.”

“I do not understand you,” said the other. “I do not know your name—you do not ask mine—why do you seek me out?”

“My name is Charlot,” returned the cripple, simply. “I make shoes, and they call me by more than one name. My rich patrons say Charlot, my poor ones call me le Savetier, others mock me as the hunchback—le Bossu! It does not matter. As for your name, I will know it when you please, monsieur.”

They had come to an arched gateway between two houses, and the cobbler entered, followed by the other man. They stood in a court, and on three sides of it were the faces of three houses; it was a veritable cul-de-sac. A small square of sunshine marked the centre of the opening, and in this a solitary weed had bloomed, springing up between the crevices in the stone pavement. To the left was an arched door with three steps leading to it, and over it hung a sign with two shoes painted upon it. The hunchback pointed at this.

“Behold my shop,” he said, “the sign of the Two Shoes.”

He took a key out of his wallet, and ascending the steps, opened the door and invited his new acquaintance to enter.