[Illustration: “Her eye caught mine, and she ceased to dance.”]
THE
SHOW GIRL
BY
MAX PEMBERTON
Author of
“The Garden of Swords,”
“Sir Richard Escombe,” etc.
THE JOHN C. WINSTON COMPANY
PHILADELPHIA
[COPYRIGHT]
Copyright 1909
by Max Pemberton
Copyright 1908
by Max Pemberton
All Rights Reserved according to
the Copyright Laws of the
United States and Great Britain
[DEDICATION]
To
James Gordon Bennett
Hommage Reconnaissant
CONTENTS
1. Being a letter from Henry Gastonard, of the Maison du bon Tabac at
Paris, to his friend Paddy O’Connell, of Glendalough, County Wicklow
2. The response of Paddy O’Connell, of Glendalough, County Wicklow, to
his friend, Henry Gastonard, of the Maison du bon Tabac at Paris
3. A letter from the same brief author addressed to the Reverend
Arthur Warrington, of Beldon, Suffolk
4. Henry Gastonard continues the story in a letter to his friend Paddy
O’Connell
5. Henry Gastonard writes to Paddy O’Connell telling him the story of
a dinner and a challenge
6. Being a telegram from Paddy O’Connell to his friend, Henry
Gastonard
7. A letter from the Rev. Arthur Warrington, of Beldon, Suffolk, to
Mrs. Arthur Warrington at Porchester Terrace, Bayswater
8. In which Paddy O’Connell, of Glendalough, writes to his sister
Clara a full account of the duel between Henry Gastonard and the
Captain Bernard d’Alençon
9. Being a further instalment of the story from the pen of Paddy
O’Connell
10. Henry Gastonard writes to Paddy O’Connell a letter concerning his
search for Mimi the Simpleton
11. Henry Gastonard informs Paddy O’Connell of his probable return to
London
12. Henry Gastonard tells of a visit to his cousin, the Rev. Arthur
Warrington, at Lowestoft
13. The Reverend Arthur Warrington writes in all haste to his
Solicitor, Mr. James Frogg, of Serjeant’s Inn, Strand
14. Paddy O’Connell apologises for his silence
15. “The Chimes” at Yarmouth, and what Henry Gastonard learned of them
16. Henry Gastonard gives a further account of his meeting with Mimi
the Simpleton
17. Paddy O’Connell lays down the law
18. In which we hear something of the Pageant at Lowestoft
19. In which we translate a letter from Henry Gastonard, of the Maison
du bon Tabac, at Hampstead, to Mimi the Simpleton, at Felixstowe
20. In which Mimi replies to Monsieur Henry
21. Being a telegram from Henry Gastonard to his friend Paddy
O’Connell, of Glendalough
22. Being a reply from Paddy O’Connell to Henry Gastonard’s telegram
23. Paddy O’Connell shares the news with his sister Clara
24. In which Henry Gastonard keeps his promise to Martha Warrington
25. Containing certain instructions to M. Jules Farman, ex-agent of
police at 4 (bis), Rue de Quatre Septembre, Paris
26. Madame Mimi writes a letter to Paddy O’Connell
27. Paddy O’Connell replies to Mimi’s letter
28. The same author addresses Henry Gastonard at the Hotel Metropole,
Brighton
29. Henry Gastonard makes an urgent appeal to Jules Farman, of the Rue
de Quatre Septembre, Paris
30. Jules Farman sends to Henry Gastonard some account of his
stewardship
31. Henry Gastonard sends Paddy O’Connell some account of his labours
in Paris
32. In which Paddy O’Connell advised his friend Harry to pay a visit
33. The Reverend Arthur Warrington thanks Paddy O’Connell for services
rendered
34. Henry Gastonard tells Paddy O’Connell of his visit to Madame Lea
35. We meet the Marquis de Saint Faur and another old friend
36. Paddy O’Connell writes a brief letter from Jack Straw’s Castle at
Hampstead
37. In which we hear of Henry Gastonard at the Pavilion Henry Quatre,
in the town of St. Germain by Paris
38. The Reverend Arthur Warrington rebukes his wife, Martha
Warrington, upon a trivial account
39. We hear of Paddy O’Connell in a letter to Martha Warrington at
Cambridge
40. A brief note from Jules Farman, in Paris, to Henry Gastonard, at
St. Germain
41. In which Henry Gastonard receives a summons from the Marquis de
Saint Faur
42. Paddy O’Connell hears that he may leave London, and is invited to
take the first train to Paris
43. Martha Warrington, being returned to her home, receives there a
letter from the Château of Bougival
44. Mr. James Frogg, of Serjeant’s Inn, receives an unexpected answer
to an expectant letter
45. Mr. James Frogg, of Serjeant’s Inn, passes on the unpleasant news
to the Reverend Arthur Warrington, of Beldon, Suffolk
46. The Reverend Arthur Warrington receives the news and makes some
complaint of it
47. Paddy O’Connell informs his sister Clara that he is detained in
London upon business of some importance
48. In which Henry Gastonard hears of Jules Farman again, and of the
criminal known as Bedotte the valet
49. Madame Lea d’Alençon has really nothing to say; but she says it
charmingly as ever
50. Mimi the Simpleton writes a brief note to Madame the Princess
Hélène of Ilidze and we translate it
51. Mimi and Harry write to Paddy and advise him of their approaching
visit to Ireland
THE SHOW GIRL
CHAPTER I.
[Being a letter from Henry Gastonard of the Maison du bon Tabac at
Paris to his friend Paddy O’Connell of Glendalough, County Wicklow.]
Maison du bon Tabac,
May 15th, 1905.
Dear Paddy,--You will have seen it in the papers, if papers still
cross the pass to those ancient halls which enshroud the immortal
glories of the clan O’Connell--but, my dear Paddy, you will have
little idea of its meaning or be as far from the truth of it as Paul
Delmet from a parson’s cassock or the Chevalier Honoré de Villefort
from the castles in Spain which the entirely disinterested Baroness
has lately bequeathed to him.
I can hear your comments, your wisdom, can imagine your displeasure.
What--a man who should be riding his hack in the Row, putting a yacht
into commission at Cowes--or at the worst buying a thousand guinea
motor-car to carry his friends from their creditors--this man living
in a hovel at Montmartre, spending his money upon chansonniers,
grisettes, cocottes and all that paste-board riff-raff which has made
the Quat-Z-Arts famous wherever the American language is not spoken.
This is what you say, my dear Paddy--this is what my beloved cousin
Arthur is saying when he tells himself that in twelve months’ time the
curtain falls upon the play, and he, the patron, walks off with the
proceeds.
Be sure that I forget this unpleasant truth whenever life will permit
me to do so. The thought for to-morrow is not often the spectre at the
feasts over which Marcelle presides, nor one which Mimi La
Godiche--which is to say Mimi the Simpleton--long permits to remain in
heads as empty as her own. I am to lose my fortune of seven thousand
pounds a year if, at the mature age of twenty-five, I am not earning
five hundred pounds a year by my own labour and talent. So be it,
Paddy. Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we will dine. This fortune
may carry some little sunshine even to the benighted halls of the
Agile Wolf. I make no complaint of destiny--nor of Mimi La Godiche,
whose friends robbed me of a trumpery cigarette-box which is again
upon my table while I write this letter.
I say that I make no complaint of destiny--why should I? Let me but
open this window, upon which Gabriel de Math has drawn in the best
French chalk an impassioned sketch of an empty champagne bottle--let
me but open it and the world is at my feet--Paris of the golden domes,
Paris of the dark eyes and the meaner streets--a great black Paris, a
Paris of woods and gardens and river, of the mills which grind the
grisettes’ corn, of the hives whence issue the noctambules and night
hawks, whose prey has gossamer wings of greenbacks, whose morrow is
never because of the eternal to-day. All this lies in the great bowl
before me. I pour my fortune into the abyss and they strive for it far
below, in a glitter of brass and spangles, in a flutter of white
petticoats and silken hose and shirt fronts which would be better at
the laundry. But none knows the truth--I am the mad Englishman who
neither paints nor plays. And I am as poor as the rest of them--and
God knows how poor that is.
So, you see, Paddy, I have my consolations, and among others, as the
papers have told you, the friendship of Mimi La Godiche. What a fine
old cardboard tragedy they have made of it all! Did I not sally forth
at midnight, armed with a blunderbuss and a scimitar to cut down the
apaches who lurk beneath the shadow of la Galette? Did I not enter a
café which the police are afraid to enter? and did not these strong
hands drag therefrom the brave _fille_ who had returned my stolen
diamonds to me and was in danger because of her honesty? News “fitting
to the night,” upon my word, “black, fearful, comfortless and
horrible.” Would for the sake of this Hector that it were the truth
and nothing but the truth--but, my dear Paddy, there’s little of the
truth in it at all, as these indentures shall bear witness. It’s as
false as Fifine of the Alcazar, and not half as pretty.
You will remember that I have known Mimi La Godiche for some three
months now. She is a pretty, round-limbed blonde, with a mop of
tousled hair, eyes full of “fair speechless messages,” the reticence
of Cleopatra, the youth of Cupid, the devilry of the whole Rue
Champollion in the shape of her bewitching neck.
I saw her first at the Fête de Neuilly. She stood upon a platform
with a strong man, a juggler and a clown; and when she sang I
determined that she should come to the Quat-Z-Arts and sing to the
Bohemians of the Butte. Montmartre gave her the cold shoulder. Can you
wonder that an audience which has heard Odette Dulac sing “Je suis
Bête” should decline to hear Mimi La Godiche warble “Toujours
l’amour,” in a dress that makes her look like a kitchen-maid and a
voice that would befit a Sunday-school? She came, she saw, she did not
conquer. I offered to send her back to the lion-tamer, who is to her
father, mother, uncle and brother--she declined the invitation,
preferring to sit to Desmond Barrymore, the American, and not a little
delighted to earn her bread at so light a task.
Now, my dear Paddy, you must tell me, for by all the kingdoms of the
grisettes, I swear that I do not know what my obligations to this waif
and stray may be. Must I pose as the philanthropist of the books, and
send her to a convent at Brussels or a finishing school at Brighton?
Should I plod patiently beneath a soiled genealogical tree to discover
if, in some remote slum of Paris, Lyons, or Marseilles, there may not
be living a venerable kinswoman, perhaps newly released from prison,
who will harbour her? Or shall I remember that the devil knows his own
and will not forget her?
I cannot tell you. She is earning an honest living with Desmond
Barrymore, and will come to no harm there. Life and laughter and the
light of cities are her whole existence. And imagine the talk of the
Rue Pigalle repeated in the cloister or the argot Montmartrois at
church parade in that “fayre town of Brighton!” It can’t be done,
Paddy. I am the victim of my own enthusiasm, and Mimi will return to
her lion-tamer no more.
Meanwhile, there are the thieves. The papers have told you that I, a
young English student, studying the sculptor’s art in the great
ateliers of Montmartre, was robbed at the Quat-Z-Arts Ball of a gold
and diamond cigarette-case worth a hundred pounds. At the best it is a
half truth--at the worst an ignorant lie.
None knows better than yourself, Paddy, the deserved fame of the
Quat-Z-Arts Ball. Here America does not come, nor Sir Lord Moneybags
enter. There is no ticket more prized in all Paris than a ticket for
the Quat-Z-Arts; there is not a festivity in any ballroom in Europe
more decently conducted for those who see eye to eye with these
Bohemians of the Butte, and understand them. True, Venus in many
shapes rides sky-high upon the gilded floats; you sup upon the floor
from the contents of paper bags thrown down to you from the galleries
above; but of the vulgar things to be done in London or New York by
those who are merely vulgarian, you do none at all. So, my dear Paddy,
I certainly did not lose my pretty cigarette-case (given to me, you
remember, by old Bardon, the banker, for dragging his beloved
“cheeild” from the Solent) at the Quat-Z-Arts Ball; nor would anyone
outside a lunatic asylum puzzle his head to say where I did lose it.
Perhaps it was in a cab on my way to the Abbaye de Thélème, that
sordid supper-house of the Butte, to which one resorts in sheer
despair of sleep and solitude; perhaps later on at the Capitol, to
which, I remember, Mistress Mimi would be conducted with Amé Decroix,
the poet; Honoré de Villefort, the Chevalier; and that bald-headed
old rogue of a perpetual mendicant, Georges Oleander, who writes the
revues. I neither know nor care; for my memories are of a night of
life, and colour, and music; of a scene glittering with dresses and
the pictures that great artists have given to their fellows--of music
which should have moved the feet of every dancing faun that ever trod
a pedestal--of wit and laughter, the veritable _elixir vitæ_.
This is no psalm-singing screed that I write to you, Paddy, nor are
you the man for the pæans of self-righteousness. I will confess
without shame to certain _bons moments_. Though I am not, and never
have been, the lover of Mimi La Godiche, there have been instants of
the madness in which I have played a madman’s part.
But Mimi neither misunderstands me nor is misled. Did I but drop the
shabbiest of handkerchiefs, she would become my mistress to-morrow;
but I have no intention of soiling fine linen in this way, nor do I
contemplate such a charming _ménage_ as she would certainly disgrace.
When I embraced her at the Quat-Z-Arts, the floats of my Lady Venus
were already sky-high and the parquet a sea of billowy chiffon--but I
did not do so to give her an opportunity of stealing my cigarette-case
(as that old blackguard Georges Oleander will have it), nor will all
the _avocats_ in Paris convince me that this was the moment of my
loss. No, my dear friend, it was at the Abbaye, I repeat, and if not
at the Abbaye, then at the Capitol.
I am asking you to keep this fact in mind that what follows after may
be better understood. You know me too well to suppose that I would
have cried to high Heaven for the loss of a twopenny-halfpenny diamond
box, or even be complaining of it to any man. But it was my misfortune
to be asked for a cigarette out of that same by the prince and father
of all beggars, Maître Georges Oleander aforesaid, and so, in a
moment of surprise, I discovered the loss.
What next is the tale, Paddy? You will guess it first time--that Mimi
La Godiche had thrown her fair arms about me, not in an ecstasy of
love or passion, but purely to pocket the case and enjoy the contents
at her leisure. This I had from the Chevalier Villefort not a week
ago. On Sunday I learned for the first time the true value of a
mendacious tongue and what it may mean even here on the “mountain”
whence you look down upon the domes of Paris.
The scandal was everywhere. Remember that there is in Montmartre a
great colony of artists, musicians and writers, not less honest, not
less clean-living than the inhabitants of many a sanctimonious town in
the country of your oppressor. These may esteem the marriage-tie
lightly; but they hold love to be a sacred thing, and they would no
more think of robbing their neighbour than of shooting the Pope.
These had been good friends to Mimi La Godiche because of my
patronage. But no sooner is the black word spoken than every door is
shut upon her, skirts drawn aside, tables shifted, slander uttered in
no mere whisper. They recalled her coming--the strong man of the Fête
de Neuilly, the clown, the tights, the van, the vagrant’s life. A
little more of it and they would have pushed her headlong over to the
great congregation of grisettes, maquereaux and night-hawks who throng
the cabarets of the Butte. In short, my dear Paddy, they would have
made a criminal and something worse of her--and you know what that
would mean among the savages of Montmartre. Let me tell you next how I
have come to save her from such a fate--if it be but for the
moment--for, as Richter has told us, woman is the most inconsistent
compound of obstinacy and self-sacrifice with which we are acquainted.
I have saved her. She is in this very room while I am writing this
letter; but, Paddy, if she were to walk a hundred yards down the alley
which has the honour to house me I would not answer for her life.
To make this clear, let me return to the Sunday after “the crime” and
to my own recreation upon that innocent day. A morning with Sabine
Monterey and old Villefort upon the Seine at Poissy; lunch in a frock
coat and glory with Lea d’Alençon at her apartment in the Avenue de
Malakoff; then to Longchamp; a little dinner at Armenonville, and
afterwards the long journey home, the steep climb to the Butte and the
card-box house which permits me to look down upon the sails of La
Galette.
Why I went so far that Sunday night I cannot tell you. There is still
my apartment in the Hôtel St. Paul open to me when I would return to
civilisation. But I think the amorous Lea had put thoughts of Mimi
into my head, and, wondering if all were well with her, I returned to
the Maison du bon Tabac and to my bed. Ten minutes after I had entered
the house, came Chocolat, the messenger from the old Café of the
Assassins, knocking as the devil knocked on old Luther’s door at
Weimar. Then I knew that all was not well with Mimi, and down I went,
the black man upon my heels, vainly endeavouring in three languages to
tell me what had happened.
What a jargon it was, what a medley of all the elusive argot of the
cabarets! This much alone was clear--that Mimi La Godiche had got
somehow into the Café of the Assassins (they call it the Lapin Agil
to-day), and that if I did not get her out she certainly would be
murdered.
True, there was a _cipi_, or municipal guard, to protect her from the
immediate fury of her friends; but these would force her presently to
the pavement, and then God help her! So much Chocolat, the messenger,
declared as we hurried down the alley, passed Cerberus at the gate
thereof, and plunged into the darkness of the labyrinth below. I could
save Mimi La Godiche--the _patron_ wished it; madame, his wife, was of
like opinion. The danger lay in the alleys--not in any house, and
certainly not at the famous cabaret of the Agile Wolf. Upon this point
Chocolat was emphatic. They could look after their own--the streets
were another affair.
Well, I reached the place at last, after as unpleasant a descent as
ever led to Avernus, and entered the café just upon the stroke of
midnight.
You know the place; the dirty courtyard before it; the rude benches in
the shed that serves for a concert-room; the horrid unshaven faces of
men who wear the mask of death; the savage ferocity in the women’s
eyes. Of course, there are lights enough; lights and a rousing piano,
and a chansonnier who lisps things we should be very sorry to repeat
to-morrow. The fellow was singing nothing more virile than “Monsieur
le Curé” when I came in, and, to be candid, not a soul there paid me
a sou’s worth of attention. Remember that I was unknown in these
places except as a poor devil of a sculptor trying to singe his wings
in the candle of ambition. This reputation has been my protection
hitherto, alike at the Maison du bon Tabac and in the alleys of the
Butte.
Here at the Lapin Agil I must lose it, finally and irreparably, as all
the omens seem to say--and losing it, have no longer a home upon the
Butte of Montmartre.
De Courcy was singing when I entered the cabaret, and a bald-headed
old man with a chalk-faced child, who should have been his daughter,
appeared the only claque which the performer commanded. Little Mimi La
Godiche I spied out at once, sitting at a table with a huge ruffian
they call the Mount upon the one side and Desmond Barrymore upon the
other. I was glad to see Desmond there, and pushed my way over to him.
Across the room there stood a company of as savage an appearance as
any defender of the Café des Assassins might desire--squat, burly,
black-eyed brigands, fearful women, girls who saw the sun rise every
day but rarely had seen it set. These were watching Mimi and the Mount
as though the whole drama moved about them. Desmond Barrymore,
however, did not appear to know what it was all about, and told me so
immediately.
“The man says he’s robbed,” he explained--pointing to the Mount with
the stump of a tattered cigarette. “I guess he’s dreaming. Come right
in, Henry, and help me to put the fear of God into him.”
He made way for me upon the bench, and I sat down and began to ask
Mimi about it. Her cheeks have not much colour in a common way, but
they were now a beautiful crimson and there was light enough in her
eyes to set the café on fire.
“What’s up, Mimi?” I asked her. “Why did you send Chocolat barking to
my door?”
She kicked a pair of fat legs against the bench, and, leaning back,
she laughed in the ruffian’s face as he bent down to catch her answer.
“_Ah, mes enfants_,” she cried, imitating the inimitable Georges
Tiercy in his famous song. “_Ah, mes enfants--ce cochon de
Jean-le-Mont a une écrevisse dans le vol-au-vent_”--and by that she
meant (for the line is already grown grey) that the fellow who
pestered her had a bee in his bonnet.
“How did you come here?” I asked her.
“In the automobile of Monsieur le Comte de Pigalle.”
They laughed at this, for I need not tell you, Paddy, that the Rue
Pigalle does not boast its Count, and that an automobile which could
climb the Butte might set out to-morrow to vanquish Mont Blanc.
“No, nonsense. Mimi… there has been a row. What is it all about?”
Barrymore intervened, jerking a fine fat thumb towards the ruffian.
“The fellow says she robbed him.”
“Of what, Barrymore?”
“Of a cigarette-case set in diamonds.”
Again the café roared with laughter. A cigarette-case set with
diamonds at the Lapin Agil! Oh, famous treasure! I, of course, knew
the truth in an instant. Mimi La Godiche had stolen my property from
the man who stole it from me.
“What do you say to that, Mimi?”
She looked at me as a child in wonder--never was there a cleverer
little actress or one with a cooler head.
“Do not be foolish, Monsieur Henry (_ne faites pas des bêtises_), I
only smoke a pipe.”
“And you, my friend?”--this to the ruffian they call the Mount.
But he flinched at the question, and drained a glass of filthy liquor
before he answered it.
“She stole the box. Do I steal with my own hands? No, monsieur, but
the she-cats of Paris could rob the Bourse. I was walking to my seat
when she pushed against me. Ask the ‘cipi’ if it is not true? I will
have her searched, I tell you… she shall give me back my property!”
“Your property, good man! Do you carry cigarette boxes set in
diamonds?”
“Monsieur, I am an honest man--this property was lost in Paris, and I
would restore it to its rightful owner.”
“Then you will restore it to me immediately, for it is mine and was
lost at the Quat-Z-Arts Ball, as you very well know.”
Well, Paddy, this took him by the heels, so to speak, and laid him
upon his back. I had been careful not to advertise the case, fearing a
reputation for riches among the apaches of the Butte; but the cat was
out of the bag this time and every ear intent. As for the ruffian, he
was floored for the moment; but he recovered a second wind of argument
presently, and, being both drunk and querulous, was by no means done
with.
“It is an affair for the police,” he exclaimed, lurching as he sat,
and bringing his fist down with a smashing blow upon the table. “Ask
the ‘cipi’--she must go with me to the police-station and take the
affair there. I am an honest man and I will not be robbed. You say
that this is your case, monsieur--well, prove so much to the police
and I shall have no more to say. But you shall prove it--I will make
you, I, Jean-le-Mont--hear that, monsieur--I will make you prove it!”
He stretched an arm across the table and pulled the lappet of my coat
with clumsy vigour. I saw that an uproar was at hand, but determined
to keep my temper as long as possible. Big as Desmond Barrymore and I
are, we were no match for the black company upon the opposite side of
the room--and there was a magazine which any foolish word might fire
in an instant. So it was necessary to temporise and, above all things,
to keep the mob quiet; in which endeavour I called for a bottle of
wine and some cigars, and affected to make light of the fellow’s
impudence.
“You are talking nonsense,” I said. “My case had my name inside it--we
can easily prove that. Drink a glass of wine with me and then come to
the station. What’s the hurry about? We sha’n’t run away, and I don’t
suppose you have any engagement. Now, isn’t that a fair offer,
monsieur?”
He muttered something, I know not what, and sank back to glower at the
waiter Juno, who snapped the cork from a bottle and set it before me.
Mimi, I observed, was still smiling; Desmond Barrymore playing with
his cigarette as a man over-anxious, but not afraid. As for the
_canaille_ opposite, I perceived its hesitation, and did not fail to
take its meaning. There could be no brawl permitted in the cabaret,
but there might very well be a pretty affair outside. In a word, they
waited for us to go, each believing that he or she would shortly
become the possessor of a gold cigarette-case set with diamonds. This
was the state of the game when the man they call Jean-le-Mont spoiled
everything by a premature declaration of hostilities, both unexpected
and maladroit. For what should he do but lurch to his feet, catch Mimi
by both her slim arms, and begin to hug her like a bear; while he did
not cease to shower upon her that unnameable abuse in common use upon
the Butte.
Now, this was very unexpected, Paddy, and left the “backs” rather
nonplussed. A table stood between the pair--bottle and glasses had
already gone crash to the floor. Had I struck at the man immediately,
I might have hit Mimi, and done her a mischief; it was impossible to
get at the fellow’s legs or to secure so firm a grip upon his arms as
would open them and release his prey. Luckily, Desmond is a man of
some wit, and did not fail me. I saw him watching the pair with a
droll expression upon his face; then he calmly put his cigarette under
the giant’s nose, and held it there until the fellow turned upon him
savagely and struck a Triton’s blow. Before he could repeat it I had
laid him on the floor with a counter that Molt of Cambridge taught me;
and you could count the minutes before he rose again.
Forgive me, Paddy, for thrusting upon you this plain tale of a tavern
brawl. The papers have a “piece” about it, and that is my excuse. It
will also permit you to understand the new _rôle_ in which I find
myself--that of brother, uncle, guardian, foster-father, tutor, friend
to a tousled-haired nymph of the slums, for whom now I am solely
responsible.
Admittedly, there has been some personal humiliation before this was
arrived at. Your ready mind will depict the scene in the cabaret after
that Jean-le-Mont lay upon the floor, and the “_cipi_” drew his sword
and bawled murder. Upon my life, I thought the three of us were done
for. The cries, the fierce oaths, the looks, the words of them! And
then upon it all, the enraged _patron_ forcing us all to the street,
swearing that he would have no murder in his house; which, my dear
Paddy, remembering that it used to be the Café of the Assassins, you
must admit to be both illogical and disloyal.
He said that we should go, and go it seemed we must. The place was in
an uproar now; the steep street very soon became a pandemonium. I knew
that the apaches were out, and I would tell you what I would tell no
other man alive, that I had the fear of God in me down to my very
toes.
And what of this waif and stray, Mimi La Godiche, who had my
cigarette-case upon her, and must, but for our protection, jostle with
the ravening wolves at the door? I had never understood the child, and
I understood her less in that moment--for there she was smiling still,
or, stooping, as her trick was, to smooth her short dress over her
knees; now bursting into laughter; now saying, “_Ah, mes enfants_,” in
that tone inimitable of the cabaret. And the ruffian at her feet had
drawn a knife long enough to cut up the beef at Smithfield. Oh, my
dear Paddy, what a harvest of the green years as Jehan Rictus would
paint them for us in those immortal verses which my countrymen so
rarely understand!
This babel of sounds endured five full and dreadful minutes, I
suppose, during which time the ladies of the company lost no time in
emptying the glasses of the gentlemen, and the gentlemen in picking
the pockets of the ladies. When it became clear that we must go or
face an enraged _patron_ and three of the prettiest bullies in
Montmartre, I whispered a word to Desmond to stand all close until we
reached the street, and then to go as calmly and with as little
concern as might be toward my box of a house upon the height.
Granted that this was the uninventive hope of a man who certainly
believed he would find a knife in him shortly; but, Paddy, what better
plan could you have named, or by what road did wisdom lie?
We had to go out into that darkness of the gutter, where the wolves
were waiting, and to go upon the instant. No excuse, no entreaty
seemed to modify the temper of the ruffian, who feared the police, and
would have none of us. For my part, I preferred the unknown dangers of
the pavement to the clubs of Chocolat and the _patron_; and, although
a scene in Thiers recurred to me, when the prisoners from the Abbey
were driven forth to slaughter in those fateful September massacres, I
chose to whistle one of Legay’s songs rather than to recite it. Then,
putting my arm about Mistress Mimi’s waist, I dragged her from the
place, and went pell-mell to the fray. Eheu, Paddy, what a moment to
live! what a pretty episode in the life of a young gentleman come to
Paris to study the sculptor’s art!
We were in the thick of it, then, and no mistake at all about the
matter. Fifty at least of the choicest blackguards of the Butte waited
in the alley and swarmed about us instantly. I felt their hands all
over me like mice upon a sack of corn. One rogue thrust his great
fingers into my waistcoat pocket, and had the satisfaction of taking
therefrom an American time-piece of the value of three shillings and
sixpence; another robbed me of a wooden pencil in a tin case; a third
of a couple of five-franc pieces and some small change. This plunder
was far from being what they wanted. Just as the vultures loom
mysteriously upon the horizon when a man sits down to die by the
wayside, so did they appear at this talk of gold and diamonds.
Had there been but two or three there gathered together, I don’t doubt
they would have dealt with us as men deal with chickens at Easter; but
their very numbers defeated a set purpose, and the lights of the
cabaret forbade a murder. For a little while we swayed about as a ship
caught in a vortex; the lamps shone down upon faces besotten with
drink or fired by greed; I could see the room behind us, the figure of
the _patron_, who still gesticulated, the gaunt form of Jean-le-Mont,
now risen to his feet; and it seemed to me to take the place of a
pleasant harbour one had quitted in despair. Then I think a ruffian
tried to pull me down from behind; but the press was too close, and I
caught his hand in mine and went near to breaking his wrist. This was
a mistake, for he also possessed a knife, and drew it, and it needed
an iron hand upon his throat to silence him.
I am going deeper than I meant into these police-court news, Paddy,
chiefly that you may understand my present difficulty with Mimi La
Godiche. Let me tell you that when the fun really began, when fists
were busy and hats were flying down the Butte, when the women shrieked
and fled and the men called upon their fellows to make an end of us, I
discovered that she had friends, even among such as these, that she
could call them by their gutter-names and that they would answer her.
It may be that many of them hung back just because it was Mimi of the
booths and the _fêtes foraines_, and by no chance could she be
credited with the possession of sixpence; but, the reflection apart,
my spirits sank when I heard them recognise her, and a sense of
degradation, impossible to define, afflicted me anew.
What a position for Henry Gastonard to be in--self-sought, inevitable,
the price of this gipsy’s game upon the Butte; the consequence of a
chosen masquerade and a self-imposed war upon civilisation!
Were there not a thousand devils of my Saxon self-respect crying at my
elbow to have done with it--to pitch them a handful of money--to say
to them, “There is your sister in the arts; take her by the hand and
lead her to her home?” A flash of thought it may have been, while I
dealt with the gentlemen of the pavement and calculated the chances
with a greater precision; but there it was, and while it ran strong in
my head, the girl herself lay almost in my very arms, smiling still, a
very _gamin_ enjoying a brawl as a common incident in her daily life.
Do you wonder, Paddy, that I clung to my wreckage and refused to part
with it to any other robber upon the shore? By heaven and earth, I
swear she is the best plucked ’un that ever wore a red silk stocking
or showed it on a booth to a gaping multitude. And that you shall come
to believe for yourself presently--when I take you fifty paces further
from the cabaret and show you in a line just why we were not murdered.
Do you remember the Rue St. Vincent, that narrow lane by the
Assassins, with the great black buttresses and the dingy oil-lamp we
used to deride together? Well, it was just by there that we seemed in
for the worst; just by the very corner that you would not have paid
the half of a brass farthing for our chances.
I had as good as given it up, and fallen to wondering what it feels
like to have six inches of steel in your vitals while twenty hands are
picking your pockets and twenty more are rifling your shoes. That this
was premature, the unexpected but quite gentlemanly appearance of some
fifteen agile _sergents de ville_ immediately assured me. They had
been fetched, it seemed, by the “cipi,” or municipal guard, at the
cabaret, who, while he would not have lifted a finger to save Mimi La
Godiche, was by no means willing that an Englishman should be papered
to-morrow, or found drowned upon the following morning. Thus the
company, armed to its very teeth, and thus the rats scuttling to their
holes, the women left to slither down the steep, the men crying that
Mimi La Godiche was _une guêpe_, and that they would settle with her
upon another occasion.
I thanked the guard, Paddy; thanked Desmond Barrymore for his kindness
to the girl; and bidding him “good night” (it should have been good
morning), I climbed the mountain to that verdant alley wherein my home
lies, and took Mimi to the parlour with me. Her first act was to
return me my diamonds. I need not particularise as to where she had
hidden them, or what was her inspiration. She is here as I write this,
like a dog upon my carpet. She has been for twenty hours almost in the
same position--but what am I going to do with her, what provision make
for her, or how am I going to smuggle her in safety from this mount of
thieves, I know, my dear Paddy, no more than your estimable self.
So let me have your consolations. All places are filled with fools,
says Cicero--but there are but two at the Maison du bon Tabac, and one
is Mimi La Godiche and the other--
Yours eternally,
Henry Gastonard.