XIV
THE MOTHER AND THE SON
Georget passed several days scouring Paris; but he made the most minute investigations in the Chaussée-d’Antin quarter; he asked for Monsieur de Roncherolle in all the fine hotels, and received everywhere the answer that no person of that name had apartments there. Then the young messenger would return in the afternoon to Boulevard du Château d’Eau, to say good-evening to Violette, to whom he would confide the ill success of his efforts; and before going home he would try to find work to do in order to earn a little money. Georget no longer passed the day loafing on the boulevard as before; he no longer passed the time with his friend Chicotin, who, if he had known why Georget was exploring Paris, could have put an end to his search with a word. Chicotin, on his side, was looking for the Baronne de Grangeville, but without fatiguing himself overmuch and without exhibiting as much zeal as his friend in his inquiries. And when night came, instead of returning to the neighborhood of the Château d’Eau, Monsieur Patatras, as he adored the play, hung about in the neighborhood of the people who were on their way to the theatres on Boulevard du Temple, and his felicity was complete when, toward the close of the evening, he succeeded in obtaining a check, by means of which he witnessed the last act of a melodrama or a farce.
Every morning before starting out, Georget deemed it his duty to go to Monsieur Malberg, to tell him what quarter and what streets he had explored the day before. Although the result of his investigations was not as yet satisfactory, he was desirous to prove to the man who had assisted him so generously that his zeal had not abated. The young messenger was rarely admitted to Monsieur Malberg’s presence, but he always found Pongo deep in conversation with the furniture; then he would tell the mulatto what he had done, and he never failed to report faithfully to his master all that Georget had told him.
The perseverance which the young man displayed in demonstrating his gratitude, ended by touching the heart of the gentleman on the third floor, who told his servant one morning to admit Georget when he called; and that order had scarcely been given when the young man appeared as usual to tell what he had done the day before.
Pongo immediately suspended the toilet of a kitten which he had picked up the night before in the street, to usher Georget into his master’s presence; then he left the room, saying:
“Now me breakfast with my new friend Carabi, that me found yesterday under a door, all alone and crying. Nothing to eat this long time, very thin, very unhappy; but me bring him here, me take him to bed with me, feed him, and this morning he all right, all happy; he purr and hump his back at me.”
“Come in, my friend,” said Monsieur Malberg to Georget, who stood timidly in the doorway; “come in and sit down.”
“Oh! monsieur is too kind; but I am not tired, and then I cannot presume to sit down in monsieur’s presence.”
“I tell you that I want you to sit down; I have something to say to you. Take this chair.”
Georget obeyed, and took his seat on the edge of a chair; then he made haste to say:
“I went to the Palais-Royal quarter yesterday, monsieur; I went the whole length of Rue Richelieu, Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs and all the streets leading into them. There are many hotels in that quarter, and yet I discovered nothing; no one there knows that gentleman.”
“My boy, it is eight or ten days now, I believe, that you have been engaged in this tiresome business for me! That is quite enough! Cease your investigations; you have more than earned the money which you pretend that you owe me.”
“But, monsieur, it doesn’t tire me at all to go about Paris; besides, it’s my trade, and I often do other errands while I am looking for monsieur; so why shouldn’t I keep on? I haven’t searched all Paris yet.”
“I tell you again, my friend, that I don’t want you to look any farther. I have reflected, and if heaven permits me to find this gentleman, whom you have sought in vain, it will bring me face to face with him; otherwise, it evidently means that He who governs everything does not choose that I should carry out my plans, and I must submit.”
“Perhaps monsieur is not satisfied with me; perhaps he thinks that I do not go about it in the right way, and——”
“On the contrary, I am entirely satisfied with you; your mother, whom I have seen, because she absolutely insisted upon thanking me,—your mother has no end of pleasant things to say about you.”
“Oh! you mustn’t believe it all, monsieur; mothers exaggerate a bit, you know, when they talk about their sons!”
“That may be, but other persons too have confirmed what your mother said.”
“Monsieur is too kind!”
“You have had some education; you know how to read and write and figure, do you not?”
“Yes, monsieur, tolerably well.”
“Listen, this is what I have to propose. I have quite a large estate at Nogent-sur-Marne; there are eight acres of orchard, kitchen garden and woods; but it is wretchedly cared for and kept up by a gardener who is very lazy, and who, having no one to watch him, fancies himself the owner of the property and does only what he pleases; for I rarely go there, and even in the summer I pass only a few weeks there; but if the house were well kept up and the garden taken care of, I should enjoy it much more. Well, I suggest that you and your mother go to live on that estate; your duty will be, not to work in the garden, but to oversee and direct the work, the planting, and the improvements. Oh! you will have plenty to do! Eight acres of ground—there is room for lots of things in that. There are also repairs to be made on the buildings. I give you full power; you will take my place, and you will be obeyed as I should be. As for your mother, she will look after the house, the dairy, the poultry yard, which is well stocked; and then, when I take a fancy to visit my estate, I shall be certain at least of finding a room in condition to receive me and lodge me. I offer you for this a thousand francs a year, and of course you will have your lodgings and fuel, and as much as you want of fruit, vegetables, rabbits and all the occupants of a poultry yard. Now if this is satisfactory to you and to your mother, you may go down and install yourselves there to-morrow, and I will undertake to pay what you owe the landlord here.”
While Monsieur Malberg was speaking, Georget, listening intently, changed color several times; sometimes he enjoyed the thought of the pleasant and happy life which was offered him; sometimes his brow became clouded and thoughtful; and it was plain that a bitter conflict was going on in his heart. When Monsieur Malberg ceased to speak, the poor boy said not a word, but seemed afraid to reply.
“Well, Georget, you say nothing; does that mean that you do not understand my proposal?”
“Oh! I beg pardon, monsieur; I understand perfectly all that you offer to do for us; what a peaceful and happy life you offer us; to live on a pleasant estate in the country, to have duties which are only pleasures, and to be paid for it all! Oh! that is too much good fortune. And my poor mother, who is so fond of the country and of gardens! Ah! how happy she would be there!”
“Well, then, you accept, Georget?”
The young man lowered his eyes; and soon two great tears escaped from them; he hid his face behind his handkerchief, stammering:
“No, monsieur—I—I decline.”
“You decline what would be, you say, a happy life for you, and would give your mother so much pleasure! I can’t understand you!”
“Yes, monsieur, I decline. Oh! I know very well that what I am doing is wrong! It is a horrible thing on my part to refuse what would certainly give my mother rest and happiness! It is outrageous, it is a wicked thing for me to do! But it is too much for me, monsieur! You won’t tell mother, I implore you, monsieur—will you? You won’t tell her that you offered me all this and I refused? It would make her unhappy and perhaps she wouldn’t forgive me!”
And poor Georget knelt at Monsieur Malberg’s feet, repeating: “I beg you, monsieur, don’t say anything to my mother!”
“Rise, Georget, rise; no, of course I won’t say anything to your mother. Indeed, you must have powerful reasons for acting thus! Don’t weep, my friend, I do not wish to cause you pain; once more I say, forget my offer and let us not mention the subject again.”
“Forget it! Oh, no! I know very well that I shall not forget it, monsieur! It was so kind of you! As to my reasons—my reasons for declining, I haven’t got but one, but I don’t dare to tell you what it is.”
“Keep your secret; I don’t ask any questions.”
“But I don’t want you to think of me as a bad son, as a fellow who prefers the life of a vagabond in Paris to his mother’s happiness, monsieur. No; I would rather tell you everything. I am in love, monsieur; yes, madly in love with a young flower girl at the Château d’Eau, on the boulevard yonder. Violette is so pretty, and a respectable, virtuous girl, who doesn’t listen to anybody!”
“But she listens to you, doesn’t she?”
“No, monsieur, for I have never dared to tell her outright that I am in love with her; she may have seen it, but she doesn’t act as if she had. But, monsieur, I can see her every morning when I go out, and at night before I come home, for I always find an excuse to pass by her stand. But if I should go and live on your place in the country, then I should have to give up seeing Violette, in the morning or at night or ever! and you see, monsieur, I feel that it would be impossible for me to live without seeing her! It would be like not living at all; and then it seems to me that I shouldn’t be good for anything.”
“Poor boy!” murmured Monsieur Malberg; “so young, and in love already! If he is happy, I shall be very much surprised.”
“It’s very bad of me to do as I am doing, isn’t it, monsieur? On account of this love that turns my head, for this girl who perhaps doesn’t love me and will never love me, I refuse to assure my mother a peaceful life and livelihood. Ah! I feel that I am an ungrateful, wicked son! I hate myself, I would beat myself if it would do any good; but it wouldn’t cure me! This love has crept into my heart little by little; it’s more than three years now that I have seen Violette almost every day; I was very young at first, and then as I grew up I got used to loving her, and that sentiment grew up with me, and grew much faster than I did. So now there is no way to drive it from my heart; it can never leave it; and indeed if it could, I wouldn’t want it to. Could I ever guess that the day would come when it would cause me so much sorrow?”
“Don’t despair, Georget; it may be that there is still some way of arranging matters. Suggest to your mother to go and live on my estate and take care of my house; don’t tell her that there was a place there for you too; in this way your mother will be able to live in the country where you say she enjoys herself so much, and you can go to see her whenever you please; it is not far from here to Nogent,—three leagues at most.”
“Ah! how kind you are, monsieur! In that way, as you say, my mother will live comfortably, and the fresh country air will cure her entirely. It is true that it will be hard for me not to see her every day, not to live with her; but I shall be able to endure that privation, because I will say to myself: ‘It’s for her good, it’s for her happiness!’ but still it isn’t kind of me to think that I could get along without seeing mother and that I can’t make up my mind not to see Violette; is it, monsieur?”
“It isn’t your fault, my boy; nature has decreed that a new love is always fatal to the old ones.”
“But one’s love for one’s mother, monsieur! that ought not to grow any less in our hearts; but it is less unreasonable than the other. Ah! if you knew Violette, monsieur, you would understand that I cannot cease to love her. She is so pretty! She has her stand on the boulevard, near the Château d’Eau; would you like me to tell her to bring you a bouquet? She would ask nothing better, monsieur.”
“No, it isn’t necessary; I have no need of bouquets, and I take your word for all that you say of this girl.”
“Then, monsieur, with your permission, I will go right away and tell my mother what you are kind enough to offer her.”
“Go, Georget, and come back and tell me her answer.”
“Happy age,” said Monsieur Malberg to himself as he watched the young messenger walk away; “happy age, when one does not doubt constancy in love, when one believes in the sincerity of friendship! I, too, believed in those things, but I was most cruelly undeceived! He sacrifices everything to his love for a woman! Poor boy! he will be deceived like the others; but he begins that trade too early!”
And Monsieur Malberg, whose brow had darkened, relapsed into profound meditation.
Meanwhile, his servant Pongo had a sharp altercation with the cat which he had named Carabi, and which, in payment for the hospitality that had been bestowed upon him, had savagely clawed his benefactor.
“Ah! you naughty, Carabi,” said the mulatto, holding the cat by his two forepaws; “you hurt me, when me pick you up in the street; and you not handsome either; but thin, ugly, little short hair; you a gutter cat, you hear? You no angora, you gutter cat! and me take care of you, comb you and rub you, make nice porridge for you, so’s to make you pretty and fat; and you claw me on the nose when me try to talk with you, like two friends. You take care, Carabi! if me take Mamzelle Zima to beat you, Mamzelle Zima, she mind me right off, and she strike hard, Mamzelle Zima; will you be good boy now?”
The cat’s only reply was to howl in a piteous fashion; and he was beginning to vary his cries with snarls which boded no good to Pongo, when Georget returned and interrupted the conversation.
“Ah! little neighbor again! He want to speak to master or me?”
“I have come to bring your master my mother’s reply. He is very good——”
“Oh, no! he not good; but me beat him, me whip him if he claw again!”
“I am speaking of your master.”
“Oh! me tink it was my new friend Carabi; he claw my nose. Come, you go in right away.—Little gutter cat! you wait there till me come back. Don’t stir, or me take Zima!”
When he reappeared before Monsieur Malberg, Georget was sad, and seemed embarrassed; he kept his eyes on the floor, and dared not speak.
“Well, Georget, you have come to bring me your mother’s answer,” said Monsieur Malberg; “but to look at you one would think that you dared not tell me what it is.”
“Ah! monsieur, you see——”
“Mon Dieu! I will spare you the trouble of telling me, for I will wager that I can guess what your mother answered: she refused my offer, because she would have to part with you, and she prefers to live in poverty and not leave her son; isn’t that it?”
“Yes, monsieur, yes, that’s the truth; when I told her about monsieur’s offer, she was struck dumb at first; and when she did answer, I heard her voice trembling as if she were going to cry, when she said: ‘Well! if you want me to go away, if it bores you to live with your mother, why then I will go to this fine place in the country; but for my part, I should much prefer to live on a little, to be less comfortable, and to be where I could embrace my son every day; that would make me much happier!’—So then, monsieur, as you can imagine, I threw my arms about my mother’s neck and said to her: ‘It was in the hope of assuring your happiness that I offered you this; if you are happier with me, you must stay here, and I shall be happier too!’—Then she told me to come and thank you for your kindness, monsieur, and explain the reason for her refusal, and I beg you to forgive me for showing so little appreciation of your kindness; for in all this it is I who am most to blame. If I had had the courage to leave Paris, why, then my mother would have been very glad to go!”
“I don’t blame you, Georget, but I hope that your flower girl is worthy of the sacrifice you are making for her. Go, my boy.”
“And monsieur doesn’t want Violette to bring him a bouquet, so that—so that he can make her acquaintance.”
“No, I don’t want any bouquet.”
“And I am not to look for Monsieur de Roncherolle any more?”
“It’s no use.”
“But monsieur will still employ me when he needs a messenger?”
“That goes without saying. Now go.”
Georget went away in a sad frame of mind, for at the bottom of his heart he was not content with himself. As he passed through the reception room, he made no reply when Pongo called out to him:
“Monsieur Georget, Carabi not so bad now, he no claw nothing but my ear.”
XV
A TRAP
To Georget’s mind, the best way to find an excuse for his wrongdoing was to go to her who was the cause of his committing it; so that was what he did not fail to do; and as he looked at the fascinating flower girl, he said to himself:
“As if it would have been possible for me to live without seeing her! Oh, no! I should have died of grief, and that would have made my mother more unhappy than all the rest! So I did well not to accept Monsieur Malberg’s offer.”
Thus it is that man always finds a way to compromise with his conscience and to put himself on pleasant terms with it.
Violette smiled pleasantly at Georget, saying:
“So you’re not travelling all over Paris to-day, Georget?”
“No, mamzelle, my travels are ended; Monsieur Malberg doesn’t want me to go on looking for his man.—But what has become of Chicotin? I never see him here now.”
“That’s true, he doesn’t come so much as he did. I am not sorry, for he frequently knocked my customers down, and that would have ended by injuring my trade.”
“Your customers! You mean the fine gentlemen who come here to make sweet speeches to you! Do you still see those fellows?”
“Dear me! when it pleases them to buy flowers of me I can’t refuse to sell them.”
“Ah! if I was rich, Mamzelle Violette, you wouldn’t sell anything at all, you would have a home of your own, and a lovely room, with nothing else to do but arrange your hair!”
“Really, Georget, you would give me all that?”
“Indeed I would, and much more too if I had it!”
“Do you think that I would accept it from you rather than from another man?”
“Why, mamzelle, when a man has only honorable sentiments; you may be sure that I wouldn’t offer that to you as a mistress, but as—as—as—Oh! Violette, you understand me well enough, but you are not willing to help me a little!”
“No, Georget, I do not choose to understand you, because I don’t choose to take seriously the foolish things that you say to me.”
“Foolish things! oh! you are mistaken, mamzelle; and if you knew,—if you could guess—you would no longer doubt my love! Yes, Violette, I love you. I must pluck up courage to tell you, if you refuse to believe it; I love you to the point of—but I mustn’t tell you that.”
“What is it? Come, Georget, finish. You say nothing? Poor boy! you imagine that you love me; but in a month, in less than that perhaps, you will have something else in your mind. You are a child, do you know! A boy should never talk of love until he’s twenty-one.”
“Oh! mon Dieu! how I would like to grow old! So you don’t believe me, mamzelle?”
“I say again that it’s very possible that you believe what you say now; but it won’t be so for long,—you are too young.”
“Too young, that is the only thing you can throw in my face. What proofs do you want to make you believe in my love?”
“See, Georget, look at that little bit of a man passing over there, who looks at me in such a funny way.”
“Ah! I recognize him; it’s the little squint-eyed fellow. I had an idea that that creature was in love with you too; but I am not jealous of him! he’s too ugly! Why do you point him out to me? I wasn’t talking about him, mamzelle.”
“I pointed him out to you, Georget, because that little fellow, who can hardly be any older than you, a year at most, has been prowling about here all the time for several days; he constantly bargains for flowers with me, and then he too has told me that he adores me, and has suggested carrying me off and taking me to Saint-Germain or to Versailles, or even farther, declaring that he would make me happy.”
“What! that little wretch has told you all that?”
“Yes, that little fellow has told me all those foolish things; and I laughed in his face—that was the best thing for me to do. Since then, he has ceased to speak to me, but he comes here just as often and hurls savage glances at me—look, as he is doing now.”
“Ah! if he treats you discourteously, I’ll go and say a word to him.”
“No, Georget, he’s not discourteous, for he doesn’t speak; we can’t prevent his walking here; and besides, I am always tempted to laugh when I look at him, remembering that one day Chicotin knocked him down in such a way that he tore both knees of his trousers.”
“Oh! how I would have liked to see that! There he goes away; he has made up his mind it’s no use, and he has done well.”
“Well, Georget, if I had listened to what that young man said, do you think that I should have done right?”
“Oh, no! of course not!”
“So then you see that I should be no more reasonable if I should listen to you.”
“Oh! what a difference, Violette! You compare my love with that of that little popinjay who hardly knows you! Whereas I have seen you and loved you for three years! So I am nothing more to you than the first comer who pays you compliments as he buys your bouquets! Ah! it isn’t right to treat me so. You wouldn’t act like this if you knew——”
“What? if I knew what? Ah! you tire me, constantly beginning sentences which you don’t finish!”
Georget had on the end of his lips the avowal of the sacrifice he had made to his love for Violette; for in youth, one has not become accustomed to sacrifices, and it is natural to boast of them. However, the young lover retained that secret which was on the point of escaping him; he suspected that the pretty flower girl would scold him roundly for having acted so, and that, far from approving his conduct, she would try to compel him to accept Monsieur Malberg’s offer; so he deemed it prudent to hold his peace, and he did not answer Violette’s questions. At that moment someone came up who wanted Georget to run on an errand, and he seized that opportunity to take his leave, waving his hand as an adieu to the flower girl.
The pretty peddler was more moved than she had chosen to appear. Georget was such a dear fellow! It was the first time that he had told her in so many words that he loved her, and he had made that declaration in such a sweet voice, with such an affectionate expression, that it was difficult not to believe in his sincerity, and further, not to be touched by that genuine love, in which passion was so artlessly expressed.
While giving her young lover sage advice, and while pretending to laugh at his suffering, Violette had nevertheless felt a very keen sensation; her heart had opened to a happiness that she had not as yet known, and she was herself amazed by the unfamiliar joy which filled her whole being.
About an hour had passed since Georget had gone away, when a sort of servant approached Violette and said to her:
“Mademoiselle la bouquetière, I want a fine bouquet for my mistress, Madame de Belleval; all the rarest flowers that you have; the price does not matter. I will give you a hundred sous in advance, and if that isn’t enough, she will give you the rest.”
“That will be enough, monsieur; for a hundred sous I will make you a superb bouquet!”
“But, mademoiselle, you must have the kindness to carry it to madame yourself, for I am in a great hurry; I haven’t time to wait, and I shan’t come back this way.”
“I am to carry the bouquet? Is it far from here?”
“No, mademoiselle, Boulevard Beaumarchais, 98.”
“That is quite a long distance.”
“No, mademoiselle; you know, if you don’t leave the boulevard, you are soon there.”
“Oh! I know all about that, and if there is no great hurry——”
“Can you carry it within an hour?”
“Yes, I will go within an hour.”
“By the way, madame wants also to order a smaller one for to-morrow, to take to a wedding or a ball; madame will explain to you about it. So she can rely upon the bouquet, mademoiselle?”
“To be sure, monsieur, as I have received the money. You say Madame de Belleval, Boulevard Beaumarchais, 98?”
“That’s it; good-morning.”
The servant disappeared, and Violette began to select her finest flowers, saying to herself:
“It seems that this is likely to be a good customer! I can make as much as I choose! To think that Georget, when he was without money the other day and his mother was sick, didn’t apply to me! And he says that he loves me! Perhaps I spoke too harshly to him; and he thinks that I have an unfeeling heart; I don’t want him to think that!”
When the girl had finished the bouquet, with which she took the greatest care, she asked a neighbor to look after her booth and started for Boulevard Beaumarchais; she arrived at the number given her; she entered an attractive, newly-built house and asked the concierge:
“Madame de Belleval?”
The concierge assumed the expression of a person who does not know what one means; then suddenly he remembered and slapped his leg, exclaiming:
“Ah! what a stupid fool I am! I forgot all about it.—Go up to the fifth floor, the door at the right, for Madame de Belleval.”
“The fifth floor?”
“Yes, the door at the right.”
Violette went upstairs, saying to herself:
“That concierge acted very strangely when he answered me; perhaps he always has that manner. It’s surprising that a lady who buys such handsome bouquets should live so high; but lodgings are very dear now; and after all, it’s none of my business.”
And without the slightest suspicion, the girl quickly climbed the five flights and rang at the door on the right hand. It was opened immediately, and a woman who had the appearance of a box-opener out of a job said to Violette:
“Ah! mamzelle has brought the bouquet; that’s good! Come in, mamzelle, come in.”
“But I only have to deliver the bouquet,—it is paid for.”
“No matter; come in, mamzelle, she wants to speak to you; wait a minute.”
And the girl was almost pushed into a small salon the door of which was at once closed upon her.
“To be sure,” thought Violette, “that servant told me that his mistress wanted to order a bouquet for a ball to-morrow. I will wait. It isn’t very fine here; it’s pretty enough, but it’s funny that there’s no coquetry, no taste in the arrangement; I should think that I was in a gentleman’s room rather than a lady’s. And that woman who let me in—she’s neither a lady’s maid nor a cook. I believe that I am rather frightened here; I am inclined to go away.”
And Violette had already taken several steps toward the door of the salon, when it opened and Jéricourt appeared before her, in dressing-gown and slippers, like a person in his own home.
The flower girl uttered a cry; she realized that she had fallen into a trap; but in an instant she recovered her courage, and Violette had an ample store of it; in her case, fright was but temporary. She raised her head therefore and gazed steadfastly at the man before her.
Jéricourt assumed one of his most winning smiles and stepped toward the girl.
“You didn’t expect to see me, did you, bewitching damsel?”
“No, monsieur, I am waiting for a lady, Madame de Belleval; am I in her apartment?”
“Madame de Belleval is—is my aunt, dear child, and I live with her.”
“Ah! you live here? Well, why doesn’t your aunt come, monsieur? I have no business with you, and if this aunt doesn’t mean to come then I will go about my business.”
And Violette took several steps toward the door; but Jéricourt barred her passage and led her back into the salon, saying:
“Mon Dieu! how quick you are! Are you in such a great hurry, pray? Take a seat—she is coming.”
As she did not choose to disclose her apprehensions, Violette decided to sit down for a moment. Whereupon the young man also took a chair and placed it beside her and very near.
“Do you know, charming girl, that I am overjoyed to have a chat with you at last? I have wanted it a long while, and it is so hard to obtain the slightest favor from you!”
“Are you going to repeat the same song as on the boulevard, monsieur? I know it already; I have no wish to learn it by heart, for, as I have told you, I don’t like the tune.”
“How unkind you are! But this little outburst of anger makes you prettier than ever! Women who surrender at once cease to have any value; whereas your conquest would be a genuine triumph.”
“Your aunt doesn’t come, monsieur, so I will go.”
“My aunt! Ha! ha! ha! that’s a good one! do you still believe in that, little one?”
“What, monsieur, is it a lie? And this Madame de Belleval, who sent to me for this bouquet——”
“Never existed except in my imagination. I wanted to decoy you to my rooms, for you refused to come willingly; so I resorted to stratagem. That’s often done—it’s fair fighting.”
“Oh! but it’s an outrage!—So the concierge whom I asked for that lady——”
“I had warned him that someone would ask for a person of that name, and I ordered him to send her up to me; it’s as simple as good-day.”
“And that woman who opened the door and told me that Madame de Belleval would come in a minute——”
“Is an obliging neighbor; I paid her for that little service with a ticket to the theatre.”
“Why, this is frightful! And there are people who lend a hand to such outrages!”
“My dear child, you make a great fuss over a very small matter! To try to obtain a tête-à-tête with a pretty flower girl is no great crime; I might have kept up the deception much longer, but I am very honest, you see; I play with my cards on the table.—Come, don’t be angry; you will have to end by calming down, anyway. Let’s make peace at once, and seal the treaty with a kiss.”
Before Jéricourt could put his lips to Violette’s face, she rose and ran toward the door; but the young man ran after her and detained her by putting his arm about her waist.
“Oh! you shan’t escape me so, my dear; you are in my room and we are alone.—Come, don’t be so cruel; but let me kiss you.”
“Take care, monsieur; you think that you have a weak girl to deal with, but I am not afraid of you; you won’t get anything from me, I give you fair warning; and if you try to use force, look out! I won’t spare your face, that you’re so proud of.—Let me alone, monsieur, I don’t propose that you shall kiss me.”
Jéricourt paid no heed to the girl’s entreaties; he attempted to pursue his enterprise, but he met with a resistance which he was far from expecting; Violette’s hands were active and strong; she put one of them to her persecutor’s face and dug her nails in so far that the blood flowed freely, and the pain forced the young man to relax his hold. He went to the mirror to look at himself, and exclaimed angrily:
“That’s an abominable thing for you to do, mademoiselle—to scratch my face and mutilate me! only tigresses do that; it’s only among the canaille that such things are indulged in.”
“Indeed, monsieur! So I am of the canaille because I defend myself, because I don’t allow monsieur to take liberties with me. Why do you pay any attention to me then? why do you degrade yourself with a dealer in flowers?”
“As if I could suspect anything of the kind! To attack a man’s face—that’s the worst possible form!”
“You’ve got no more than you deserve, monsieur; I gave you fair warning; and if you should try again to keep me, I promise you that you wouldn’t get off so cheap.”
“Oh! I won’t keep you any longer, mademoiselle, I have had enough. You are free, but I have some scratches on my face that I shall not forget! You will be sorry that you treated me so!”
“Oh! I am not afraid of you, monsieur, and I have proved it. When a man acts as you have done, he shouldn’t threaten other people—he should try to be more decent in order to obtain forgiveness for what he has done.—Adieu, monsieur.”
Violette opened the door of the salon, passed through another small room, and opened another door; but in her haste she made a mistake; it was not the door leading to the landing, but she had almost entered the bedroom. Discovering her error, she retraced her steps, and at last found the outer door.
Meanwhile Jéricourt had followed and overtaken her, and he tried again to detain her by seizing her dress; but she roughly shook him off, and with a glance that banished any desire to stop her again, she rushed out on the landing and down the stairs, without turning her head; nor did she see a young man who was then standing at his open door, directly opposite Jéricourt’s.
This young man, who was no other than little Astianax, uttered a cry of surprise on recognizing the girl, who passed very near him. Having followed her with his eyes as she descended the stairs, he turned toward Jéricourt, who was standing in his doorway, and said:
“It is surely she; it’s the pretty flower girl of the Château d’Eau!—I say, neighbor, she came out of your room——”
“Why, to be sure; you must have seen her come out.”
“Yes, yes, I saw her.—Aha! so the little flower girl comes to see you! The deuce! you’re a lucky man!”
“It is true, I am generally lucky with women.”
“Is your face inflamed, neighbor, that you are holding your handkerchief over your cheek?”
“No, but I have a slight toothache.”
“All the same, I confess that I can’t get over it; Mademoiselle Violette coming out of your room! She was very red, and decidedly rumpled too!”
“Why—that was the result of our interview.”
“Oh, yes! I understand. Gad! you are favored by Venus! The pretty flower girl, who made such a parade of her pride and virtue, and sent me about my business when I made impassioned speeches to her, and snubbed me when I proposed to take her to Saint-Germain by train!”
“Let this be a lesson to you, young man; it will teach you that you mustn’t trust the airs these young women assume.—Au revoir, Astianax.”
“Au revoir, Joconde! Don Juan! Richelieu!”
Jéricourt returned to his room, saying to himself:
“Now I am sure of my revenge! Mademoiselle Violette will pay dear for the scratches she gave me!”
XVI
A DOWNFALL
Madame de Grangeville, whose place of abode Chicotin had not been able to ascertain, lived on Rue Fontaine-Saint-Georges, in a small apartment on the fourth floor of a recently-constructed house.
In houses which have just been finished, and of which the walls have not had time to dry and the paint to lose its odor, apartments are very commonly let to persons who offer to break them in, so to speak. Why are these persons very often lorettes or ballet-dancers out of employment? Probably because those ladies know that very little pains will be taken to seek information about them, and that they will be accepted as tenants with such effects as they choose to bring. Landlords are never exacting with those tenants who are willing to “dry the walls.”
The Baronne de Grangeville, however, did not belong to either of the various classes of women who are in the habit of hiring apartments without asking the price, and who reply to those persons who remark that their rent is high: “What difference does that make to me? I never pay!”
However, from her position, her tastes and her habits, it was impossible to mistake her position in life; it was easy to see that that lady had fallen from opulence.
Her furniture still retained some traces of her former opulence: it included a dressing-table and a couch of extreme daintiness, and side by side with them, easy-chairs and common chairs that were out of style, spotted and in wretched condition. There were ample curtains, large and small, in her bedroom; there were only very small ones in her salon. The dining-room was almost bare and there was very little furniture in the kitchen, but the baroness never, or very rarely, had cooking done in her apartment; she sent out to a restaurant for her meals; that way of living is more expensive, but Madame de Grangeville had never chosen to take the trouble to calculate, or to pay any heed to her expenses; so long as she had had a regular income, she had thought of nothing but satisfying her fancies, her most trifling desires, without stopping to think whether her means were sufficient for her innumerable whims; people who have no idea of order when they are young, rarely change when they are older; with them things go as best they can; they never think of the morrow. Such people are very agreeable in society and are generally considered very generous; they have nothing of their own and everyone exclaims:
“Ah! what an excellent heart!”
I consider that only those persons have a good heart who give what they themselves possess, and who, before everything, pay their creditors and do not run into debt. If you make a present to a friend, if you open your purse to obsequious flatterers who surround you, you inflict a real injury on your tailor whom you do not pay, on the restaurant keeper whom you put off from day to day by giving him small sums on account; it is not with your money that you are generous, but with that of your creditors. There are people who distribute alms after becoming bankrupt, and who pose as benefactors of mankind. There are such people who have great reputations for kindness of heart, for whom I have very little esteem! If you scratch the surface, you soon come to the rock.
As Madame de Grangeville could not afford to keep both a lady’s maid and a cook, she had dismissed the latter, whom it would have been more sensible to keep; unfortunately, she could not do without a lady’s maid; she would gladly have kept her cook as well, but the latter had become tired of buying food on credit at the dealers’, who also were tired of supplying goods without being paid.
When Madame Roc, that was the cook’s name, went to her mistress to ask for money, she would throw herself back on her couch and hold a phial of smelling salts to her nose, crying:
“Oh! Madame Roc, have you come to talk about money again? Leave me in peace, I beg you. I have an attack of vapors already, and you will give me an attack of hysteria.”
“But, madame, for dinner——”
“Don’t bother me about dinner; do what you choose; I give you carte blanche!”
“Carte blanche isn’t money, and they all want money; I can’t say to the butcher: ‘I have carte blanche to pay for your fillet.’”
“Mon Dieu! how you tire me! how you make my head ache!”
“But, madame, if I shouldn’t get any dinner for you, would you like that?”
“Heavens! how you annoy me, how intolerable you are! Go away, I tell you again, and leave me!”
This little scene, which is of frequent occurrence in Paris, will give an idea of the sort of person that the Baronne de Grangeville was. When the cook had been dismissed, matters arranged themselves better with the lady’s maid; she, being accustomed to flatter her mistresses in order to obtain a dress or a scarf, knew a thousand tricks to deceive creditors, to put them off the scent and send them away; and that was just the sort of lady’s maid that Madame de Grangeville needed.
However, everything has an end, the patience of creditors no less than the confidence of dealers. Discovering a little late that she was likely to find herself in a very critical situation, after squandering a part of her principal, she sold what little she had left, and with the proceeds took it into her head to gamble on the Bourse. That was as good a way as another; it was a matter of luck, and she could still dream of wealth; for people who are devoid of order, it is a masterstroke to be able to rely on chance.
One morning, Madame de Grangeville, who had just risen and taken her chocolate à la vanille, told Lizida, her maid, to go out and buy a newspaper which had the quotations of railroad and manufacturing stocks.
The maid hastened to obey her mistress; the latter looked at herself in a mirror, as she tried on a very fashionable cap which she had worn only three times, but which did not rejuvenate her as much as she wished.
“Here is the paper, madame,” said Lizida, eyeing her mistress’s cap, which she coveted; “I inquired about the Mouzaias; hasn’t madame some Mouzaia stocks?”
“Yes, I have twenty shares; my last hope is in that.”
“What are the Mouzaias, madame? a sugar factory?”
“Alas! no, it isn’t sugar. I believe it’s a copper mine in Algeria; I don’t know exactly, but it doesn’t make any difference; a friend of mine doubled her money six months ago by buying shares in it; and I hope to double mine; but thus far I haven’t had any luck.—Do you think my cap is becoming, Lizida?”
“Mon Dieu, madame, it’s strange—but if you want my opinion——”
“To be sure, when I ask for it.”
“Well! madame, who is always so pretty—I don’t know how it is, but with that cap madame has a stern, serious look.”
“Say at once that it makes me older, for that is what you don’t dare to say.”
“Oh! it isn’t that; madame can’t look old; that is impossible; but madame has a less animated, less coquettish air—that’s it, less coquettish.”
Madame de Grangeville snatched off her cap and threw it on a chair, crying:
“You are quite right, Lizida; this cap certainly does make me a frightful object.”
“Oh! frightful! As if madame could be frightful when—when she is so pretty!”
“Hush, child; take the cap; I give it to you, it’s yours, do what you choose with it.”
“Madame is too good; but I wouldn’t want madame to think——”
“I tell you to take that cap, I never want to hear of it again. Go and get me the little blue one that I wore before I bought that one.”
Mademoiselle Lizida ran from the room to fetch the cap which her mistress asked for, and handed it to her; then she made haste to take to her own room the cap for which the baroness had paid thirty-five francs and which she had worn but three times, saying to herself:
“I knew very well that I should get it! Oh! it is a perfect beauty! It makes me look like an angel, and I will wear it on Sunday to go to the Château des Fleurs to dance.—How lovely it is!”
Then she returned to her mistress, who had put on the blue cap, and cried:
“Oh! how lovely madame is in that! madame is only twenty-five years old,—not a day more. Ah! if I was a man, how madly in love I should be with madame!”
“Hush, you mad girl! It’s a fact that this cap is very becoming to me.”
“Madame, you must have another one just like it made at once.”
“Yes, that is what I intend to do, when I am in funds.—Let me look at the newspaper, the quotations; I don’t understand them very well.”
“Madame, I was told that the Mouzaias had gone up.”
“Really? Oh! if only that were true! for I bought twenty shares at par, and they have fallen to forty-eight francs. Let me see,—a rise of fifty centimes! That is magnificent!”
“Then madame has not made anything?”
“If I should sell now, I shouldn’t get back a thousand francs of the two thousand that I invested; I should lose more than half!”
“Then you mustn’t sell, madame!”
“I mustn’t sell, but I must have money. I have promised to go to Nogent, to visit those Glumeaus, who are to have a family party, with theatricals.”
“The Glumeaus! Who on earth are they? Retired grocers?”
“No, they are—Faith, I don’t know what they used to do, nor do I care. If I had to inquire about such things as that, should I ever go into society? But they are excellent people; one enjoys oneself at their house; it is just like being at home. The company is a little mixed there perhaps, but isn’t it so everywhere? I met at Monsieur Glumeau’s a person whom I used to know, before I was married.”
“Ah! it must have been a long while ago then!”
Mademoiselle Lizida had no sooner made this remark than she saw that she had put her foot in it; she made haste to add:
“When I said a long time, I said something very foolish; I spoke without thinking, for after all, I have no idea whether madame was married long ago, any more than I know how long madame has been a widow. Sometimes one is widowed right away. A husband doesn’t always last a year.”
“Oh! my poor Lizida, there are many other things that you don’t know, and that would surprise you greatly if I should tell you them!”
Mademoiselle Lizida, who was inquisitive like all lady’s maids, seeing that her mistress was in one of those moods when one longs to disclose one’s secrets, to confide the most private mysteries which a woman always tires of keeping to herself, employed at first her usual tactics to make herself agreeable to her mistress.
“Mon Dieu! how very becoming that little blue cap is to madame! It gives her such a charming air! But then, madame always has that.”
“Oh! there are days when one looks better than on others; everybody is like that; to-day certainly seems to be one of my good days.”
“It would seem then that madame was married very young?”
“Yes, very young; I was seventeen years old, not more.”
“What a sweet little bride madame must have been!”
“Yes, everybody admired me!”
“And madame’s husband, the Baron de Grangeville, was he young? Was he a fine-looking man?”
“Why yes, my husband was a fine man, very good-looking, with a somewhat serious expression.—Would you believe, my dear child, that I was mad over that man?”
“Pray, madame, why not? There are wives who adore their husbands; it isn’t very common, but such things are seen.”
“Yes, I adored him—the first year after our marriage.”
“Ah! only the first year?”
“Men are agreeable for such a short time!”
“Oh! how true that is!—And madame’s husband became like the others, no doubt, surly, moody, fault-finding. There are some men who refuse their wives everything, even a cashmere shawl; and everybody knows that a woman who goes into good society cannot do without a cashmere shawl! The idea of such a thing! what would she look like?”
“My husband found no fault with my taste for dress; besides, I had my own money; I brought him twelve thousand francs a year when I married him.”
“Well! if with that amount the wife was not the mistress, it would be funny!”
“But he had nearly twenty thousand francs a year.”
“Then you must have lived very handsomely! Ah! your maid must have been very lucky! madame is so noble, so generous! madame was born to be waited upon; anyone can see that at once.”
“But my husband became jealous, so jealous that he made himself ridiculous!”
“Ah! that is another fault of these men! to be jealous! and what good does it do them, I ask you? None at all, except to bore their wives! and when a woman is bored, why, bless my soul, she seeks some sort of distraction! I say, madame, as monsieur le baron had become so jealous, it seems to me that you should not have been very sorry to be left a widow.—Dear me! what lovely pink cheeks madame has to-day!”
Madame de Grangeville smiled at herself in the mirror which stood before her; then, throwing herself back in an armchair, she said with a little sigh:
“Ah! you don’t know all, Lizida. What I am going to tell you will surprise you tremendously! but you must be very discreet, and never mention it to anyone!”
“Madame must know me, she knows that I am not a chatterbox; I would rather be chopped in pieces than betray a secret.”
“Well, my dear, I am not a widow.”
“Oho! is it possible? Madame’s husband is still alive?”
“Yes, and what is more, I know from someone who has met him lately that he is living in Paris at this moment.”
“Well, that is news indeed; the Baron de Grangeville is alive!”
“Not the Baron de Grangeville, for that isn’t his name; I did not choose to bear his name any longer.”
“I understand; so madame is not really a baroness then?”
“I was a countess, Lizida, which is much better; for my husband is a count!”
“Oh! excuse me, madame, excuse me! madame la comtesse! Ah! ‘madame la comtesse’! how lovely it is to say that! will you allow me to call you that, madame?”
“No, you would become accustomed to it; besides, I don’t want that title any more, it would remind me of a time that I wish to forget.”
“Oh! of course, since madame was so unhappy with her husband, that she was obliged to leave him—after many years, no doubt.”
“Why, no; we had been married hardly three years when we separated.”
“Only three years! That isn’t very long! Was he very unkind from the beginning, that husband of yours?”
“Yes, he began to be very—very ridiculous at once!”
“Madame had no children?”
“No, I had none.”
“That is very lucky, for sometimes there is a dispute as to who shall have the children, or who shall not have them; whereas, when there are none, it’s: ‘Adieu, bonsoir; we can’t live together any longer, let us part!’—Isn’t that the way it’s done, madame?”
“Not quite so easy as that when you wish to separate according to law, and that is what we did, Monsieur de—my husband having his separate property and I mine, we both took our own.”
“Ah! but if your husband should die, madame, would you inherit from him?”
“No indeed, I should not get a sou.”
“How unjust that is! Just think of that! A poor little woman gives herself to a man who makes her unhappy, and if he dies, she doesn’t inherit! And monsieur le comte, your husband, has at least twenty thousand francs a year, you say?”
“Oh! in more than nineteen years that have passed, it seems that he has doubled his fortune at least, in undertakings, speculations.”
“What! nineteen years madame has left her husband?”
Madame de Grangeville made a gesture of irritation, and the maid made haste to add:
“No, no, that is not possible; madame made a mistake; doubtless madame meant to say nine years.”
“Yes, you are right, I did make a mistake; it is much less. However, what does it matter? It is of no use to think about that any more.”
“I beg pardon, madame,—don’t be offended at what I am going to say; it is an idea that came into my head, and I submit it to you.”
“Go on; you know very well that I never am angry.”
“Well, since madame’s former husband is so rich, and madame finds herself annoyed, besieged by those demons of creditors, as we have been for some time—suppose madame should send to monsieur le comte and ask him to let her have a few thousand-franc notes—would he refuse them?”
“O Lizida! that is impossible!”
“Why so? Just let madame tell me her husband’s name and address, and I will willingly undertake the errand.”
“It is impossible, Lizida, because I don’t choose to do it, because I shall never apply to the count. No, I would prefer to be deprived of everything, rather than let him know my position. Besides, he would reply: ‘You had your property, madame. You should have kept it.’”
“Kept it! kept it! That is very easy to say; but madame has such a kind heart, she is so noble, so generous—madame has too noble a mind to know how to calculate. Pshaw! it is only the petty bourgeois who do that!”
“But they are wise, perhaps!”
“To think that madame is not a widow! I cannot get over it. So that is the reason that madame does not marry. See how wicked it is to forbid divorce!”
“If only those infernal Mouzaias would go back to the price I paid for them! I absolutely must have some money; I am going to Nogent in four days; they are going to have theatricals, there’ll be a great many people there, and I must have another bonnet; mine is no longer fresh enough.”
“It is true that it is beginning to be unworthy of madame; and madame is always so well dressed that everybody always admires her costume!”
“Yes, I used to be one of the women who were famous for their taste in dress; I set the fashion.”
“Madame might set the fashion again if she would.”
“Say rather if I could, my dear Lizida! But listen—someone rang; if it is Monsieur de Merval, you will let him come in; he is the person whom I met at the Glumeaus’.”
“But if it’s an Englishman——”
“A creditor! Mon Dieu! you know well enough what you must say to them, for you are used to receiving those fellows.”
“Oh yes, madame, I will get around him.”
XVII
AN OLD FRIEND
The lady’s maid went to the door. Madame de Grangeville took her place anew before her dressing-table, and arranged her cap and her hair. To try to attract, to appear young, was in her a desire so identified with her nature, that she would go to look at herself in her mirror before allowing a chimney sweep to enter her room.
But no one appeared; she heard only the sound of voices in the reception room. It lasted some time, and Madame de Grangeville, who divined what was happening, threw herself back in her chair and began to look over the newspaper as if what were going on in her reception room did not concern her.
After some little time the outer door closed and Mademoiselle Lizida reappeared, crying:
“Heavens! how unendurable those people are getting to be! They have no manners at all; I thought that it would never end.”
“Who was it?”
“Mon Dieu! it was that idiot of a grocer opposite, who has taken it into his head to come himself now.”
“The grocer! what on earth can I owe to a grocer? I don’t eat here, that is to say, I send out for everything.”
“To be sure, no cooking is done in madame’s apartment, but I make her chocolate; and then candles,—madame uses a great many of them; and I have to have oil for the lamps, and then sugar—we can’t get along without sugar—and tea, and coffee—I take coffee in the morning. And then soap, and matches, and I don’t know what; there’s no end to the things, although we seem not to need anything.—In fact, he demands a total of ninety-six francs!”
“As much as that for trifles?”
“Yes, madame. I tell you the sugar goes fast, when one drinks tea!”
“Well, I will pay him when I have money.”
“That’s what I told him; but would you believe, madame, that he had the face to reply: ‘Your mistress has money enough to hire cabs, for she goes out in them often enough; she ought to have some to pay her grocer!’”
“What a shocking thing! Why, it is disgusting! The idea! I must stop to think before taking a cab, because of a miserable creditor!”
“Yes, madame, things have got to that point. That is the result of our revolutions.”
“Lizida, you will get nothing more at that man’s shop, I forbid you!”
“Oh! madame has no need to forbid me, there’s no danger of my going there again; besides, he wouldn’t let me have anything more on credit! He says that if he doesn’t get his money in two days he’ll go before the justice of the peace.”
“All right! let him go before his justice of the peace! I won’t go myself, that’s all.—How unfortunate it is to have to do with such people!—Heavens!—someone else is ringing; can it be that that clown has come back?”
“This time I will take my broom, and if it’s the grocer again, I will sweep his legs out from under him!”
Mademoiselle Lizida went out in a rage. Madame de Grangeville listened, this time with some little emotion; but she heard no voices, it was evidently not a creditor. The maid reappeared with a very different expression.
“Monsieur de Merval asks if he may present his respects to madame la baronne?”
“Yes, to be sure; show him in.”
And the baroness made haste to cast another glance at the mirror, to arrange her hair and to assume a gracious attitude in her easy-chair.
Monsieur de Merval was ushered into the room; he entered with the exquisite courtesy which distinguished him, and took a chair near Madame de Grangeville, who said to him with her most engaging smile:
“I am very glad that you remembered the promise that you gave me at Monsieur Glumeau’s. I did not rely very much upon it.”
“Why so, madame? Do you think that I also was not delighted to meet again, to see once more, a person who carried me back to the pleasant days of my youth—in memory, to be sure; but those memories are too agreeable ever to be effaced entirely.”
“Dear Armand!—I beg pardon, will you permit me still to call you so?”
“It is a token of friendship for which I thank you.”
“I was unmarried when I knew you; we used to meet often at parties; then you came to my uncle’s house.”
“Yes, madame, yes, the evenings at your uncle’s were delightful; you did the honors with such grace; so that we rated ourselves as very fortunate when we were on the list of your guests.”
“Yes, we used to have music and singing. Do you remember little Dumesnil, how false she sang?”
“I remember especially that you sang like an angel. We used to dance, too, quite often.”
“Yes, while the sober people played whist or bouillotte. You waltzed divinely, Armand; you were our best waltzer.”
“True, the waltz was my specialty.”
“And you never were able to make tall Adèle Brillange dance in time; do you remember her—rather a pretty blonde?”
“Really, I hardly remember her. Just remember that that was fully twenty-three or twenty-four years ago!”
Madame de Grangeville bit her lips, not at all pleased to find that her old acquaintance remembered dates so well.
“Do you still waltz, Monsieur de Merval?”
“Oh! that is all over, madame; I have had my day.”
“Bless my soul! to hear you, one would think that we belonged to the age of Louis XV!”
“No one would think so to look at you, madame; time has stood still for you.”
This compliment restored the serenity of Madame de Grangeville’s expression, and she replied, simpering a little:
“Ah! you are always agreeable; would that I were back in those happy days! Tell me, Armand, if I remember aright, you used to pay court to me then,—yes, you were very attentive to me.”
Monsieur de Merval seemed decidedly embarrassed; he glanced about the salon and replied at last:
“I don’t deny it, madame, but I remember also that as soon as the Comte de Brévanne was introduced to you, discovering that his love was welcomed with enthusiasm, I thought only of making an honorable retreat; and I was wise, as the count became your husband.”
“Yes, he became my husband.”
“It was a love match, was it not, madame?”
“Oh! mon Dieu! is it possible to say, when one is so young? One always imagines that one is in love, but one does not even know what love is. You must have been very much surprised to learn that I was no longer living with Monsieur de Brévanne?”
“Yes, madame; and yet such things happen rather often.”
“Look you, Armand, I am sorry that I didn’t marry you; we should never have parted.”
Monsieur de Merval shook his head slightly and answered with a smile:
“No one knows, no one knows!”
Madame de Grangeville blushed, then assumed a serious air.
“You may perhaps believe all the slanders that Monsieur de Brévanne no doubt spread about me?”
“I knew nothing, heard nothing, madame. Monsieur de Brévanne is too well-bred a man to say anything which could possibly injure your reputation.”
“Oh! when a man is jealous, monsieur, when he fancies himself betrayed, he is sometimes so absurd!”
Monsieur de Merval made no reply, but continued to look about the salon, and seemed painfully affected by the lack of harmony in the furniture.
“Yes,” said Madame de Grangeville after a long pause, “women are always the victims; that is their fate; the men make the laws for us, and we are the weaker party in every respect; we must needs endure the harsh treatment, the violent scenes, the sarcasms of those gentlemen. I tell you, Armand, that all the fault is on the men’s part; I know it, poor abandoned wife that I am!”
Monsieur de Merval, who seemed far from convinced by the lamentations of his old acquaintance, rejoined:
“And Monsieur de Roncherolle, what have you done with him, madame? He was a very amiable, very gallant gentleman, who had great success with the ladies. A good-looking fellow, a hard drinker, and of a courage proof against any test; he had everything that a man needs to succeed.”
The face of the abandoned wife had undergone a complete transformation; her lips were compressed, her brow was wrinkled, her eyes assumed a vague expression, and she retorted in a decidedly curt tone:
“Why do you apply to me for news of Monsieur de Roncherolle? What reason have you to think that I can tell you anything about him?”
“Really, madame, I had no idea of offending you by asking you that question; but a good friend of mine who met you thirteen or fourteen years ago in the Pyrenees, at the Baths of Bagnères, I believe, told me then that you were travelling with Roncherolle; that was what made me think that perhaps you still kept up some relations with him.”
Madame de Grangeville was disconcerted.
“Oh! yes,” she stammered, “that is true; I did meet Monsieur de Roncherolle when I was travelling in the Pyrenees, and we travelled together for some little time. Well, Monsieur de Merval, do you see any harm in that? After all, wasn’t I at liberty to travel with whomever I pleased, since I had already been separated from my husband for several years?”
“I have already had the honor to tell you, madame, that I see no harm anywhere; I simply repeated what I have heard, as we were talking of our old acquaintances, that is all.—And in your financial affairs, I most sincerely hope that you have not suffered, madame? You had an independent fortune, I believe?”
“Yes, that is true, I had a fortune—I had one.”
“What! have you had the misfortune to suffer from somebody’s bankruptcy?”
“Why, yes, I think so; and then, you know, women are so stupid about managing their property.”
“But when it is simply a matter of receiving income, one does not need a business agent for that.”
The bell rang again. The baroness started, and Monsieur de Merval took his hat, saying:
“Somebody has come to visit you, madame, and I will take my leave.”
“Why no, don’t go yet, I beg you; it is no visitor, I expect no one; no one ever comes to see me now!”
The poor woman said this in such a melancholy tone that Monsieur de Merval was touched; he replaced his hat on the chair, and his eyes rested again on various parts of the furniture, which clearly betrayed the lamentable plight of their owner. As he passed these objects in review, in order to conceal what was in his mind, he began to talk about the Glumeau family; but soon a hoarse voice arose in the reception room and dominated Lizida’s, although she did her utmost to drown it.
Thereupon Madame de Grangeville also tried to talk very loud, so that her visitor should not hear the altercation which was taking place in her reception room. She even tried to laugh.
“Oh, yes! ha! ha! ha! that party that those good people gave was very comical; there were such amusing faces there! They put me at the table beside an old gentleman who looked like an owl. Ha! ha! ha!”