being less than nothing. I do not remember who at one time said, 'I am
that I am.' Pardon my lapse of memory. One can not remember everything.
But the unknown who spoke in that fashion was very imprudent. In
letting it be understood by this thoughtless observation that he was
deprived of attributes and denied all relations, he proclaimed that
he did not exist and thoughtlessly suppressed himself. I wager that
no one has heard of him since."--"You have lost," answered Monsieur
Bergeret. "He corrected the bad effect of these egotistical expressions
by employing quantities of adjectives, and he is often spoken of,
most often without judgment."--"I do not understand," said Monsieur
Goubin.--"It is not necessary to understand," replied Jean Marteau.
And he begged Monsieur Bergeret to speak of Putois.--"It is very kind
of you to ask me," said the master.--"Putois was born in the second
half of the nineteenth century, at Saint-Omer. He would have been
better off if he had been born some centuries before in the forest
of Arden or in the forest of Brocéliande. He would then have been a
remarkably clever evil spirit."--"A cup of tea, Monsieur Goubin," said
Pauline.--"Was Putois, then, an evil spirit?" said Jean Marteau.--"He
was evil," replied Monsieur Bergeret; "he was, in a way, but not
absolutely. It was true of him as with those devils that are called
wicked, but in whom one discovers good qualities when one associates
with them. And I am disposed to think that injustice has been done
Putois. Madame Cornouiller, who, warned against him, had at once
suspected him of being a loafer, a drunkard, and a robber, reflected
that since my mother, who was not rich, employed him, it was because he
was satisfied with little, and asked herself if she would not do well
to have him work instead of her gardener, who had a better reputation,
but expected more. The time had come for trimming the yews. She
thought that if Madame Eloi Bergeret, who was poor, did not pay Putois
much, she herself, who was rich, would give him still less, for it is
customary for the rich to pay less than the poor. And she already saw
her yews trimmed in straight hedges, in balls and in pyramids, without
her having to pay much. 'I will keep an eye open,' she said, 'to see
that Putois does not loaf or rob me. I risk nothing, and it will be all
profit. These vagabonds sometimes do better work than honest laborers.'
She resolved to make trial, and said to my mother: 'Dearest, send me
Putois. I will set him to work at Montplaisir.' My mother would have
done so willingly. But really it was impossible. Madame Cornouiller
waited for Putois at Montplaisir, and waited in vain. She followed up
her ideas and did not abandon her plans. When she saw my mother again,
she complained of not having any news of Putois. 'Dearest, didn't
you tell him that I was expecting him?'--'Yes! but he is strange,
odd.'--'Oh, I know that kind. I know your Putois by heart. But there
is no workman so crazy as to refuse to come to work at Montplaisir.
My house is known, I think. Putois must obey my orders, and quickly,
dearest. It will be sufficient to tell me where he lives; I will go
and find him myself.' My mother answered that she did not know where
Putois lived, that no one knew his house, that he was without hearth or
home. 'I have not seen him again, Madame. I believe he is hiding.' What
better could she say? Madame Cornouiller heard her distrustfully; she
suspected her of misleading, of removing Putois from inquiry, for fear
of losing him or making him ask more. And she thought her too selfish.
Many judgments accepted by the world that history has sanctioned are
as well founded as that."--"That is true," said Pauline.--"What is
true?" asked Zoe, half asleep.--"That the judgments of history are
often false. I remember, papa, that you said one day: 'Madame Roland
was very ingenuous to appeal to the impartiality of posterity, and not
perceive that, if her contemporaries were ill-natured monkeys, their
posterity would be also composed of ill-natured monkeys.'"--"Pauline,"
said Mademoiselle Zoe severely, "what connection is there between the
story of Putois and this that you are telling us?"--"A very great
one, my aunt."--"I do not grasp it."--Monsieur Bergeret, who was not
opposed to digressions, answered his daughter: "If all injustices
were finally redressed in the world, one would never have imagined
another for these adjustments. How do you expect posterity to pass
righteous judgment on the dead? How question them in the shades to
which they have taken flight? As soon as we are able to be just to them
we forget them. But can one ever be just? And what is justice? Madame
Cornouiller, at least, was finally obliged to recognize that my mother
had not deceived her and that Putois was not to be found. However,
she did not give up trying to find him. She asked all her relatives,
friends, neighbors, servants, and tradesmen if they knew Putois. Only
two or three answered that they had never heard of him. For the most
part they believed they had seen him. 'I have heard that name,' said
the cook, 'but I can not recall his face.'--'Putois! I must know him,'
said the street-sweeper, scratching his ear. 'But I can not tell you
who it is.' The most precise description came from Monsieur Blaise,
receiver of taxes, who said that he had employed Putois to cut wood
in his yard, from the 19th to the 23d of October, the year of the
comet. One morning, Madame Cornouiller, out of breath, dropped into
my father's office. 'I have seen Putois. Ah! I have seen him.'--'You
believe it?'--'I am sure. He was passing close by Monsieur Tenchant's
wall. Then he turned into the Rue des Abbesses, walking quickly. I
lost him.'--'Was it really he?'--'Without a doubt. A man of fifty,
thin, bent, the air of a vagabond, a dirty blouse.'--'It is true,' said
my father, 'that this description could apply to Putois.'--'You see!
Besides, I called him. I cried: "Putois!" and he turned around.'--'That
is the method,' said my father, 'that they employ to assure themselves
of the identity of evil-doers that they are hunting for.'--'I told
you that it was he! I know how to find him, your Putois. Very well!
He has a bad face. You had been very careless, you and your wife, to
employ him. I understand physiognomy, and though I only saw his back,
I could swear that he is a robber, and perhaps an assassin. The rims
of his ears are flat, and that is a sign that never fails.'--'Ah! you
noticed that the rims of his ears were flat?'--'Nothing escapes me.
My dear Monsieur Bergeret, if you do not wish to be assassinated with
your wife and your children, do not let Putois come into your house
again. Take my advice: have all your locks changed.'--Well, a few
days afterward, it happened that Madame Cornouiller had three melons
stolen from her vegetable garden. The robber not having been found,
she suspected Putois. The gendarmes were called to Montplaisir, and
their report confirmed the suspicions of Madame Cornouiller. Bands
of marauders were ravaging the gardens of the countryside. But this
time the robbery seemed to have been committed by one man, and with
singular dexterity. No trace of anything broken, no footprints in the
damp earth. The robber could be no one but Putois. That was the opinion
of the corporal, who knew all about Putois, and had tried hard to put
his hand on that bird. The 'Journal of Saint-Omer' devoted an article
to the three melons of Madame Cornouiller, and published a portrait
of Putois from descriptions furnished by the town. 'He has,' said the
paper, 'a low forehead, squinting eyes, a shifty glance, crow's-feet,
sharp cheek-bones, red and shining. No rims to the ears. Thin, somewhat
bent, feeble in appearance, in reality he is unusually strong. He
easily bends a five-franc piece between the first finger and the
thumb.' There were good reasons for attributing to him a long series
of robberies committed with surprising dexterity. The whole town was
talking of Putois. One day it was learned that he had been arrested and
locked up in prison. But it was soon recognized that the man that had
been taken for him was an almanac seller named Rigobert. As no charge
could be brought against him, he was discharged after fourteen months
of detention on suspicion. And Putois remained undiscoverable. Madame
Cornouiller was the victim of another robbery, more audacious than the
first. Three small silver spoons were taken from her sideboard. She
recognized in this the hand of Putois, had a chain put on the door of
her bedroom, and was unable to sleep...."
About ten o'clock in the evening, Pauline having gone to her room,
Mademoiselle Bergeret said to her brother: "Do not forget to relate how
Putois betrayed Madame Cornouiller's cook."--"I was thinking of it, my
sister," answered Monsieur Bergeret. "To omit it would be to lose the
best of the story. But everything must be done in order. Putois was
carefully searched for by the police, who could not find him. When it
was known that he could not be found, each one considered it his duty
to find him; the shrewd ones succeeded. And as there were many shrewd
ones at Saint-Omer and in the suburbs, Putois was seen simultaneously
in the streets, in the fields, and in the woods. Another trait was
thus added to his character. He was accorded the gift of ubiquity,
the attribute of many popular heroes. A being capable of leaping long
distances in a moment, and suddenly showing himself at the place
where he was least expected, was honestly frightening. Putois was
the terror of Saint-Omer. Madame Cornouiller, convinced that Putois
had stolen from her three melons and three little spoons, lived in a
state of fear, barricaded at Montplaisir. Bolts, bars, and locks did
not reassure her. Putois was for her a frightfully subtle being who
could pass through doors. Trouble with her servants redoubled her
fear. Her cook having been betrayed, the time came when she could no
longer hide her misfortune. But she obstinately refused to name her
betrayer."--"Her name was Gudule," said Mademoiselle Zoe.--"Her name
was Gudule, and she believed that she was protected from danger by a
long, forked beard that she wore on her chin. The sudden appearance
of a beard protected the innocence of that holy daughter of the king
that Prague venerates. A beard, no longer youthful, did not suffice
to protect the virtue of Gudule. Madame Cornouiller urged Gudule to
tell her the man. Gudule burst into tears, but kept silent. Prayers
and menaces had no effect. Madame Cornouiller made a long and
circumstantial inquiry. She adroitly questioned her neighbors and
tradespeople, the gardener, the street-sweeper, the gendarmes; nothing
put her on the track of the culprit. She tried again to obtain from
Gudule a complete confession. 'In your own interest, Gudule, tell me
who it is.' Gudule remained mute. All at once a ray of light flashed
through the mind of Madame Cornouiller: 'It is Putois!' The cook cried,
but did not answer. 'It is Putois! Why did I not guess it sooner? It
is Putois! Miserable! miserable! miserable!' and Madame Cornouiller
remained convinced that it was Putois. Everybody at Saint-Omer, from
the judge to the lamplighter's dog, knew Gudule and her basket. At
the news that Putois had betrayed Gudule, the town was filled with
surprise, wonder, and merriment.... With this reputation in the town
and its environs he remained attached to our house by a thousand
subtle ties. He passed before our door, and it was believed that he
sometimes climbed the wall of our garden. He was never seen face to
face. At any moment we would recognize his shadow, his voice, his
footsteps. More than once we thought we saw his back in the twilight,
at the corner of a road. To my sister and me he gradually changed
in character. He remained mischievous and malevolent, but he became
childlike and very ingenuous. He became less real and, I dare say, more
poetical. He entered in the artless cycle of childish traditions. He
became more like Croquemitaine,[4] like Père Fouettard, or the sand man
who closes the children's eyes when evening comes. It was not that imp
that tangled the colts' tails at night in the stable. Less rustic and
less charming, but equally and frankly roguish, he made ink mustaches
on my sister's dolls. In our bed, before going to sleep, we listened;
he cried on the roofs with the cats, he howled with the dogs, he
filled the mill hopper with groans, and imitated the songs of belated
drunkards in the streets. What made Putois ever-present and familiar
to us, what interested us in him, was that the remembrance of him was
associated with all the objects about us. Zoe's dolls, my school books,
in which he had many times rumpled and besmeared the pages; the garden
wall, over which we had seen his red eyes gleam in the shadow; the blue
porcelain jar that he cracked one winter's night, unless it was the
frost; the trees, the streets, the benches--everything recalled Putois,
the children's Putois, a local and mythical being. He did not equal
in grace and poetry the dullest satyr, the stoutest fawn of Sicily
or Thessaly. But he was still a demigod. He had quite a different
character for our father; he was symbolical and philosophical. Our
father had great compassion for men. He did not think them altogether
rational; their mistakes, when they were not cruel, amused him and made
him smile. The belief in Putois interested him as an epitome and a
summary of all human beliefs. As he was ironical and a joker, he spoke
of Putois as if he were a real being. He spoke with so much insistence
sometimes, and detailed the circumstances with such exactness, that
my mother was quite surprised and said to him in her open-hearted
way: 'One would say that you spoke seriously, my friend: you know
well, however....' He replied gravely: 'All Saint-Omer believes in
the existence of Putois. Would I be a good citizen if I deny him? One
should look twice before setting aside an article of common faith.'
Only a perfectly honest soul has such scruples. At heart my father
was a Gassendiste.[5] He keyed his own particular sentiment with the
public sentiment, believing, like the countryside, in the existence of
Putois, but not admitting his direct responsibility for the theft of
the melons and the betrayal of the cook. Finally, he professed faith
in the existence of a Putois, to be a good citizen; and he eliminated
Putois in his explanations of the events that took place in the town.
By doing so in this instance, as in all others, he was an honorable and
a sensible man.
"As for our mother, she reproached herself somewhat for the birth of
Putois, and not without reason. Because, after all, Putois was the
child of our mother's invention, as Caliban was the poet's invention.
Without doubt the faults were not equal, and my mother was more
innocent than Shakespeare. However, she was frightened and confused to
see her little falsehood grow inordinately, and her slight imposture
achieve such a prodigious success, that, without stopping, extended
all over town and threatened to extend over the world. One day she
even turned pale, believing that she would see her falsehood rise up
before her. That day, a servant she had, new to the house and the
town, came to say to her that a man wished to see her. He wished to
speak to Madame. 'What man is it?'--'A man in a blouse. He looks like a
laborer.'--'Did he give his name?'--'Yes, Madame.'--'Well! what is
his name?'--'Putois.'--'He told you that was his name?'--'Putois,
yes, Madame.'--'He is here?'--'Yes, Madame. He is waiting in the
kitchen.'--'You saw him?'--'Yes, Madame.'--'What does he want?'--'He
did not say. He will only tell Madame.'--'Go ask him.'
"When the servant returned to the kitchen Putois was gone. This meeting
of the new servant with Putois was never cleared up. But from that day
I think my mother commenced to believe that Putois might well exist and
that she had not told a falsehood after all."
FOOTNOTES:
[4] The national "bugaboo" or "bogy man."
[5] A follower of Gassendi (d. 1655), an exponent of Epicurus.
SAC-AU-DOS
BY JORIS KARL HUYSMANS
[Illustration]
_Sac-au-dos means, literally, "pack-a-back." The "Athenæum"
calls the story "a masterpiece of concentrated observation and
description." It was first published, with stories by Zola, De
Maupassant, and two others, in a collection called "Soirées de
Médan." Huysmans, with his minute painting of detail, reminds
us of his Dutch ancestry of artists. His art criticisms have
marked him the most vigorous and intelligent champion of the
impressionists, Moreau, Pissaro, Monet, and Whistler._
_He was born at Paris in 1848. After 1892, when he retired to
the Trappe de Notre Dame d'Igny, Huysmans showed an altogether
new side to his genius. His conversion to Roman Catholicism
became complete, and his writings show a more sincere interest
in religious matters._
[Illustration]
SAC-AU-DOS
BY JORIS KARL HUYSMANS
Translated by L. G. Meyer. Copyright, 1907, by P. F. Collier & Son.
As soon as I had finished my studies my parents deemed it useful to
my career to cause me to appear before a table covered with green
cloth and surmounted by the living busts of some old gentlemen who
interested themselves in knowing whether I had learned enough of the
dead languages to entitle me to the degree of Bachelor.
The test was satisfactory. A dinner to which all my relations, far
and near, were invited celebrated my success, affected my future, and
ultimately fixed me in the law. Well I passed my examination and got
rid of the money provided for my first year's expenses with a blonde
girl who, at times, pretended to be fond of me.
I frequented the Latin Quarter assiduously and there I learned many
things; among others to take an interest in those students who blew
their political opinions into the foam of their beer, every night, then
to acquire a taste for the works of George Sand and of Heine, of Edgard
Quinet, and of Henri Mürger.
The psychophysical moment of silliness was upon me.
That lasted about a year; gradually I ripened. The electoral struggles
of the closing days of the Empire left me cold; I was the son neither
of a Senator nor a prescript and I had but to outlive, no matter what
the régime, the traditions of mediocrity and wretchedness long since
adopted by my family. The law pleased me but little. I thought that
the _Code_ had been purposely maldirected in order to furnish certain
people with an opportunity to wrangle, to the utmost limit, over the
smallest words; even to-day it seems to me that a phrase clearly worded
can not reasonably bear such diverse interpretation.
I was sounding my depths, searching for some state of being that I
might embrace without too much disgust, when the late Emperor found one
for me; he made me a soldier through the maladroitness of his policy.
The war with Prussia broke out. To tell the truth I did not understand
the motives that made that butchery of armies necessary. I felt neither
the need of killing others nor of being killed by them. However that
may be, enrolled in the _Garde mobile_ of the Seine, I received orders,
after having gone in search of an outfit, to visit the barber and to be
at the barracks in the Rue Lourcine at seven o'clock in the evening.
I was at the place punctually. After roll-call part of the regiment
swarmed out of the barrack gates and emptied into the street. Then the
sidewalks raised a shout and the gutters ran.
Crowding one against another, workmen in blouses, workmen in tatters,
soldiers strapped and gaitered, without arms, they scanned to the
clink of glasses the Marseillaise over which they shouted themselves
hoarse with their voices out of time. Heads geared with képis[6] of
incredible height and ornamented with vizors fit for blind men and with
tin cockades of red, white and blue, muffled in blue-black jackets with
madder-red collars and cuffs, breeched in blue linen pantaloons with a
red stripe down the side, the militia of the Seine kept howling at the
moon before going forth to conquer Prussia. That was a deafening uproar
at the wine shops, a hubbub of glasses, cans and shrieks, cut into here
and there by the rattling of a window shaken by the wind. Suddenly the
roll of the drum muffled all that clamor; a new column poured out of
the barracks; there was carousing and tippling indescribable. Those
soldiers who were drinking in the wine shops shot now out into the
streets, followed by their parents and friends who disputed the honor
of carrying their knapsacks; the ranks were broken, it was a confusion
of soldiers and citizens; mothers wept, fathers, more contained,
sputtered wine, children frisked for joy and shrieked patriotic songs
at the top of their shrill voices.
They crossed Paris helter-skelter by the flashes of lightning
that whipped the storming clouds into white zigzags. The heat was
overpowering, the knapsack was heavy; they drank at every corner of the
street; they arrived at last at the railway station of Aubervilliers.
There was a moment of silence broken by the sound of sobbing, dominated
again by a burst of the Marseillaise, then they stalled us like cattle
in the cars. "Good night, Jules! may we meet soon again! Be good!
Above all write to me!" They squeezed hands for a last time, the train
whistled, we had left the station. We were a regular shovelful of fifty
men in that box that rolled away with us. Some were weeping freely,
jeered at by the others who, completely lost in drink were sticking
lighted candles into their provisions and bawling at the top of their
voices; "Down with Badinguet! and long live Rochefort!"[7] Others, in a
corner by themselves, stared silently and sullenly at the broad floor
that kept vibrating in the dust. All at once the convoy makes a halt--I
got out. Complete darkness--twenty-five minutes after midnight.
On all sides stretch the fields, and in the distance, lighted up by
sharp flashes of lightning, a cottage, a tree sketch their silhouette
against a sky swollen by the tempest. Only the grinding and rumbling
of the engine is heard, whose clusters of sparks flying from the
smokestack scatter like a bouquet of fireworks the whole length of
the train. Every one gets out, goes forward as far as the engine,
which looms up in the night and becomes huge. The stop lasted quite
two hours. The signal disks flamed red, the engineer was waiting
for them to reverse. They turn; again we get back into the wagons,
but a man who comes up on the run and swinging a lantern, speaks a
few words to the conductor, who immediately backs the train into a
siding where we remain motionless. Not one of us knows where we are.
I descend again from the carriage, and sitting on an embankment, I
nibble at a bit of bread and drink a drop or two, when the whirl of a
hurricane whistles in the distance, approaches, roaring and vomiting
fire, and an interminable train of artillery passed at full speed,
carrying along horses, men, and cannon whose bronze necks sparkle in
a confusion of light. Five minutes after we take up our slow advance,
again interrupted by halts that grow longer and longer. The journey
ends with daybreak, and leaning from the car window, worn out by the
long watch of the night, I look out upon the country that surrounds
us: a succession of chalky plains, closing in the horizon, a band of
pale green like the color of a sick turquoise, a flat country, gloomy,
meagre, the beggarly Champagne Pouilleuse!
Little by little the sun brightens, we, rumbling on the while, end,
however, by getting there! Leaving at eight o'clock in the evening, we
were delivered at three o'clock of the afternoon of the next day. Two
of the militia had dropped by the way, one who had taken a header from
the top of the car into the river, the other who had broken his head
on the ledge of a bridge. The rest, after having pillaged the hovels
and the gardens met along the route wherever the train stopped, either
yawned, their lips puffed out with wine, and their eyes swollen, or
amused themselves by throwing from one side of the carriage to the
other branches of shrubs and hen-coops which they had stolen.