CHAPTER IX

Letters of recommendation from Professors Mas-Roussel, Rémusot,

Flache, and Borriquel, written in the most flattering terms with

regard to Doctor Pierre Roland, their pupil, had been submitted by

Monsieur Marchand to the directors of the Transatlantic Shipping

Company, seconded by M. Poulin, judge of the Chamber of Commerce, M.

Lenient, a great ship-owner, and M. Marival, deputy to the Mayor of

Havre, and a particular friend of Captain Beausire's. It proved that

no medical officer had yet been appointed to the _Lorraine_, and

Pierre was lucky enough to be nominated within a few days.

The letter announcing it was handed to him one morning by Joséphine,

just as he was dressed. His first feeling was that of a man condemned

to death who is told that his sentence is commuted; he had an

immediate sense of relief at the thought of his early departure and of

the peaceful life on board, cradled by the rolling waves, always

wandering, always moving. His life under his father's roof was now

that of a stranger, silent and reserved. Ever since the evening when

he allowed the shameful secret he had discovered to escape him in his

brother's presence, he had felt that the last ties to his kindred were

broken. He was harassed by remorse for having told this thing to Jean.

He felt that it was odious, indecent, and brutal, and yet it was a

relief to him to have uttered it.

He never met the eyes either of his mother or his brother; to avoid

his gaze theirs had become surprisingly alert, with the cunning of

foes who fear to cross each other. He was always wondering: "What can

she have said to Jean? Did she confess or deny it? What does my

brother believe? What does he think of her--what does he think of me?"

He could not guess, and it drove him to frenzy. And he scarcely ever

spoke to them, excepting when Roland was by, to avoid his questioning.

As soon as he received the letter announcing his appointment he showed

it at once to his family. His father, who was prone to rejoicing over

everything, clapped his hands. Jean spoke seriously, though his heart

was full of gladness: "I congratulate you with all my heart, for I

know there were several other candidates. You certainly owe it to your

professors' letters."

His mother bent her head and murmured:

"I am very glad you have been successful."

After breakfast he went to the Company's offices to obtain information

on various particulars, and he asked the name of the doctor on board

the _Picardie_, which was to sail next day, to inquire of him as to

the details of his new life and any details he might think useful.

Doctor Pirette having gone on board, Pierre went to the ship, where he

was received in a little stateroom by a young man with a fair beard,

not unlike his brother. They talked together a long time.

In the hollow depths of the huge ship they could hear a confused and

continuous commotion; the noise of bales and cases pitched down into

the hold mingling with footsteps, voices, the creaking of the

machinery lowering the freight, the boatswain's whistle, and the

clatter of chains dragged or wound onto capstans by the snorting and

panting engine which sent a slight vibration from end to end of the

great vessel.

But when Pierre had left his colleague and found himself in the street

once more, a new form of melancholy came down on him, enveloping him

like the fogs which roll over the sea, coming up from the ends of the

world and holding in their intangible density something mysteriously

impure, as it were the pestilential breath of a far-away, unhealthy

land.

In his hours of greatest suffering he had never felt himself so sunk

in a foul pit of misery. It was as though he had given the last

wrench; there was no fiber of attachment left. In tearing up the

roots of every affection he had not hitherto had the distressful

feeling which now came over him, like that of a lost dog. It was no

longer a torturing mortal pain, but the frenzy of a forlorn and

homeless animal, the physical anguish of a vagabond creature without a

roof for shelter, lashed by the rain, the wind, the storm, all the

brutal forces of the universe. As he set foot on the vessel, as he

went into the cabin rocked by the waves, the very flesh of the man,

who had always slept in a motionless and steady bed, had risen up

against the insecurity henceforth of all his morrows. Till now that

flesh had been protected by a solid wall built into the earth which

held it, by the certainty of resting in the same spot, under a roof

which could resist the gale. Now all that, which it was a pleasure to

defy in the warmth of home, must become a peril and a constant

discomfort. No earth under foot, only the greedy, heaving, complaining

sea; no space around for walking, running, losing the way, only a few

yards of planks to pace like a convict among other prisoners; no

trees, no gardens, no streets, no houses; nothing but water and

clouds. And the ceaseless motion of the ship beneath his feet. On

stormy days he must lean against the wainscot, hold on to the doors,

cling to the edge of the narrow berth to save himself from rolling

out. On calm days he would hear the snorting throb of the screw, and

feel the swift flight of the ship, bearing him on in its unpausing,

regular, exasperating race.

And he was a prey to this vagabond convict's life solely because his

mother had sinned.

He walked on, his heart sinking with the despairing sorrow of those

who are doomed to exile. He no longer felt a haughty disdain and

scornful hatred of the strangers he met, but a woeful impulse to speak

to them, to tell them all that he had to quit France, to be listened

to and comforted. There was in the very depths of his heart the

shamefaced need of a beggar who would fain hold out his hand--a timid

but urgent need to feel that some one would grieve at his departing.

He thought of Marowsko. The old Pole was the only person who loved him

well enough to feel true and keen emotion, and the doctor at once

determined to go and see him.

When he entered the shop, the druggist, who was pounding powders in a

marble mortar, started and left his work:

"You are never to be seen nowadays," said he.

Pierre explained that he had had a great many serious matters to

attend to, but without giving the reason, and he took a seat, asking:

"Well, and how is business doing?"

Business was not doing at all. Competition was fearful, and rich folks

rare in that workman's quarter. Nothing would sell but cheap drugs,

and the doctors did not prescribe the costlier and more complicated

remedies on which a profit is made of five hundred per cent. The old

fellow ended by saying: "If this goes on for three months I shall shut

up shop. If I did not count on you, dear good doctor, I should have

turned shoeblack by this time."

Pierre felt a pang, and made up his mind to deal the blow at once,

since it must be done.

"I--oh, I cannot be of any use to you. I am leaving Havre early next

month."

Marowsko took off his spectacles, so great was his agitation.

"You! You! What are you saying?"

"I say that I am going away, my poor friend."

The old man was stricken, feeling his last hope slipping from under

him, and he suddenly turned against this man, whom he had followed,

whom he loved, whom he had so implicitly trusted, and who forsook him

thus.

He stammered out:

"You are surely not going to play me false--you?"

Pierre was so deeply touched that he felt inclined to embrace the old

fellow.

"I am not playing you false. I have not found anything to do here, and

I am going as medical officer on board a transatlantic passenger

boat."

"O Monsieur Pierre! And you always promised you would help me to make

a living!"

"What can I do? I must make my own living. I have not a farthing in

the world."

Marowsko said: "It is wrong; what you are doing is very wrong. There

is nothing for me but to die of hunger. At my age this is the end of

all things. It is wrong. You are forsaking a poor old man who came

here to be with you. It is wrong."

Pierre tried to explain, to protest, to give reasons, to prove that he

could not have done otherwise; the Pole, enraged by his desertion,

would not listen to him, and he ended by saying, with an allusion no

doubt to political events:

"You French--you never keep your word!"

At this Pierre rose, offended on his part, and taking rather a high

tone he said:

"You are unjust, père Marowsko; a man must have very strong motives to

act as I have done, and you ought to understand that. Au revoir--I

hope I may find you more reasonable." And he went away.

"Well, well," he thought, "not a soul will feel a sincere regret for

me."

His mind sought through all the people he knew or had known, and among

the faces which crossed his memory he saw that of the girl at the

tavern who led him to doubt his mother.

He hesitated, having still an instinctive grudge against her, then

suddenly reflected on the other hand: "After all, she was right." And

he looked about him to find the turning.

The beer-shop, as it happened, was full of people, and also full of

smoke. The customers, tradesmen, and laborers, for it was a holiday,

were shouting, calling, laughing, and the master himself was waiting

on them, running from table to table, carrying away empty glasses and

returning them crowned with froth.

When Pierre had found a seat not far from the desk he waited, hoping

that the girl would see him and recognize him. But she passed him

again and again as she went to and fro, pattering her feet under her

skirts with a smart little strut. At last he rapped a coin on the

table, and she hurried up.

"What will you take, sir?"

She did not look at him; her mind was absorbed in calculations of the

liquor she had served.

"Well," said he, "this is a pretty way of greeting a friend."

She fixed her eyes on his face: "Ah!" said she hurriedly. "Is it you?

You are pretty well? But I have not a minute to-day. A bock did you

wish for?"

"Yes, a bock!"

When she brought it he said:

"I have come to say good-by. I am going away."

And she replied indifferently:

"Indeed. Where are you going?"

"To America."

"A very fine country, they say."

And that was all!

Really he was very ill-advised to address her on such a busy day;

there were too many people in the café.

Pierre went down to the sea. As he reached the jetty he descried the

_Pearl_; his father and Beausire were coming in. Papagris was pulling,

and the two men, seated in the stern, smoked their pipes with a look

of perfect happiness. As they went past, the doctor said to himself:

"Blessed are the simple-minded!" And he sat down on one of the benches

on the breakwater, to try to lull himself in animal drowsiness.

When he went home in the evening his mother said, without daring to

lift her eyes to his face:

"You will want a heap of things to take with you. I have ordered your

underlinen, and I went into the tailor shop about cloth clothes; but

is there nothing else you need--things which I, perhaps, know nothing

about?"

His lips parted to say, "No, nothing." But he reflected that he must

accept the means of getting a decent outfit, and he replied in a very

calm voice: "I hardly know myself, yet. I will make inquiries at the

office."

He inquired, and they gave him a list of indispensable necessaries.

His mother, as she took it from his hand, looked up at him for the

first time for very long, and in the depths of her eyes there was the

humble expression, gentle, sad, and beseeching, of a dog that has been

beaten and begs forgiveness.

On the 1st of October the _Lorraine_ from Saint-Nazaire, came into the

harbor of Havre to sail on the 7th, bound for New York, and Pierre

Roland was to take possession of the little floating cabin in which

henceforth his life was to be confined.

Next day as he was going out, he met his mother on the stairs waiting

for him, to murmur in an almost inaudible voice:

"You would not like me to help you to put things to rights on board?"

"No, thank you. Everything is done."

Then she said:

"I should have liked to see your cabin."

"There is nothing to see. It is very small and very ugly."

And he went downstairs, leaving her stricken, leaning against the wall

with a wan face.

Now Roland, who had gone over the _Lorraine_ that very day, could talk

of nothing all dinner time but this splendid vessel, and wondered that

his wife should not care to see it as their son was to sail on board.

Pierre had scarcely any intercourse with his family during the days

which followed. He was nervous, irritable, hard, and his rough speech

seemed to lash every one indiscriminately. But the day before he left

he was suddenly quite changed, and much softened. As he embraced his

parents before going to sleep on board for the first time he said:

"You will come to say good-by to me on board, will you not?"

Roland exclaimed:

"Why, yes, of course--of course, Louise?"

"Certainly, certainly," she said in a low voice.

Pierre went on: "We sail at eleven precisely. You must be there by

half-past nine at the latest."

"Hah!" cried his father. "A good idea! As soon as we have bid you

good-bye, we will make haste on board the _Pearl_, and look out for

you beyond the jetty, so as to see you once more. What do you say,

Louise?"

"Certainly."

Roland went on: "And in that way you will not lose sight of us among

the crowd which throngs the breakwater when the great liners sail. It

is impossible to distinguish your own friends in the mob. Does that

meet your views?"

"Yes, to be sure; that is settled."

An hour later he was lying in his berth--a little crib as long and

narrow as a coffin. There he remained with his eyes wide open for a

long time, thinking over all that had happened during the last two

months of his life, especially in his own soul. By dint of suffering

and making others suffer, his aggressive and revengeful anguish had

lost its edge, like a blunted sword. He scarcely had the heart left in

him to owe any one or anything a grudge; he let his rebellious wrath

float away down stream, as his life must. He was so weary of

wrestling, weary of fighting, weary of hating, weary of everything,

that he was quite worn out; and tried to stupefy his heart with

forgetfulness as he dropped asleep. He heard vaguely, all about him,

the unwonted noises of the ship, slight noises, and scarcely audible

on this calm night in port; and he felt no more of the dreadful wound

which had tortured him hitherto but the discomfort and strain of its

healing.

He had been sleeping soundly when the stir of the crew roused him. It

was day; the tidal train had come down to the pier bringing the

passengers from Paris. Then he wandered about the vessel among all

these busy, bustling folks inquiring for their cabins, questioning and

answering each other at random, in the scare and fuss of a voyage

already begun. After greeting the captain and shaking hands with his

comrade the purser, he went into the saloon where some Englishmen were

already asleep in the corners. The large low room, with its white

marble panels framed in gilt beading, was furnished with

looking-glasses, which prolonged, in endless perspective, the long

tables flanked by pivot-seats covered with red velvet. It was fit,

indeed, to be the vast floating cosmopolitan dining hall, where the

rich natives of two continents might eat in common. Its magnificent

luxury was that of great hotels, and theaters, and public rooms; the

imposing and commonplace luxury which appeals to the eye of the

millionaire.

The doctor was on the point of turning into the second-class saloon,

when he remembered that a large cargo of emigrants had come on board

the night before, and he went down to the lower deck. There, in a sort

of basement, low and dark, like a gallery in a mine, Pierre could

discern some hundreds of men, women, and children, stretched on

shelves fixed one above another, or lying on the floor in heaps. He

could not see their faces, but could dimly make out this squalid,

ragged crowd of wretches, beaten in the struggle for life, worn out

and crushed, setting forth, each with a starving wife and weakly

children, for an unknown land where they hoped, perhaps, not to die

of hunger. And as he thought of their past labor--wasted labor, and

barren effort--of the mortal struggle taken up afresh and in vain each

day, of the energy expended by this tattered crew who were going to

begin again, not knowing where, this life of hideous misery, he longed

to cry out to them:

"Tumble yourselves overboard, rather, with your women and your little

ones." And his heart ached so with pity that he went away unable to

endure the sight.

He found his father, his mother, Jean, and Mme. Rosémilly waiting for

him in his cabin.

"So early!" he exclaimed.

"Yes," said Mme. Roland in a trembling voice. "We wanted to have a

little time to see you."

He looked at her. She was dressed all in black as if she were in

mourning, and he noticed that her hair, which only a month ago had

been gray, was now almost white. It was very difficult to find space

for four persons to sit down in the little room, and he himself got

onto his bed. The door was left open, and they could see a great crowd

hurrying by, as if it were a street on a holiday, for all the friends

of the passengers and a host of inquisitive visitors had invaded the

huge vessel. They pervaded the passages, the saloons, every corner of

the ship; and heads peered in at the doorway while a voice murmured

outside: "That is the doctor's cabin."

Then Pierre shut the door; but no sooner was he shut in with his own

party than he longed to open it again, for the bustle outside covered

their agitation and want of words.

Mme. Rosémilly at last felt she must speak.

"Very little air comes in through those little windows."

"Portholes," said Pierre. He showed her how thick the glass was, to

enable it to resist the most violent shocks, and took a long time

explaining the fastening. Roland presently asked: "And you have your

doctor's shop here?"

The doctor opened a cupboard and displayed an array of phials ticketed

with Latin names on white paper labels. He took one out and enumerated

the properties of its contents; then a second and a third, a perfect

lecture on therapeutics, to which they all listened with great

attention. Roland, shaking his head, said again and again: "How very

interesting." There was a tap at the door.

"Come in," said Pierre, and Captain Beausire appeared.

"I am late," he said as he shook hands, "I did not want to be in the

way." He too sat down on the bed and silence fell once more.

Suddenly the captain pricked his ears. He could hear orders being

given, and he said:

"It is time for us to be off if we mean to get on board the _Pearl_ to

see you once more outside, and bid you good-by out on the open sea."

Old Roland was very eager about this, to impress the voyagers on board

the _Lorraine_, no doubt, and he rose in haste.

"Good-by, my boy." He kissed Pierre on the whiskers and then opened

the door.

Mme. Roland had not stirred, but sat with downcast eyes, very pale.

Her husband touched her arm:

"Come," he said, "we must make haste, we have not a minute to spare."

She pulled herself up, went to her son and offered him first one and

then another cheek of white wax which he kissed without saying a word.

Then he shook hands with Mme. Rosémilly and his brother, asking:

"And when is the wedding to be?"

"I do not know yet exactly. We will make it fit in with one of your

return voyages."

At last they were all out of the cabin, and up on deck among the crowd

of visitors, porters and sailors. The steam was snorting in the huge

belly of the vessel which seemed to quiver with impatience.

"Good-by," said Roland in a great bustle.

"Good-by," replied Pierre, standing on one of the landing-planks lying

between the deck of the _Lorraine_ and the quay. He shook hands all

round once more, and they were gone.

"Make haste, jump into the carriage," cried the father.

A fly was waiting for them and took them to the outer harbor, where

Papagris had the _Pearl_ in readiness to put out to sea.

There was not a breath of air; it was one of those crisp, still autumn

days, when the sheeny sea looks as cold and hard as polished steel.

Jean took one oar, the sailor seized the other and they pulled off. On

the breakwater, on the piers, even on the granite parapets, a crowd

stood packed, hustling and noisy, to see the _Lorraine_ come out. The

_Pearl_ glided down between these two waves of humanity and was soon

outside the mole.

Captain Beausire, seated between the two women, held the tiller, and

he said:

"You will see, we shall be close in her way ---- close."

And the two oarsmen pulled with all their might to get out as far as

possible. Suddenly Roland cried out:

"Here she comes! I see her masts and her two funnels! She is coming

out of the inner harbor."

"Cheerily, lads!" cried Beausire.

Mme. Roland took out her handkerchief and held it to her eyes.

Roland stood up, clinging to the mast, and answered:

"At this minute she is working round in the outer harbor. She is

standing still--now she moves again! She was taking the tow-rope on

board, no doubt. There she goes. Bravo! She is between the piers! Do

you hear the crowd shouting? Bravo! The _Neptune_ has her in tow. Now

I see her bows--here she comes--here she is! Gracious heavens, what a

ship! Look! look!"

Mme. Rosémilly and Beausire looked up behind them, the oarsmen ceased

pulling; only Mme. Roland did not stir.

The immense steamship, towed by a powerful tug, which, in front of

her, looked like a caterpillar, came slowly and majestically out of

the harbor. And the good people of Havre, who crowded the piers, the

beach, and the windows, carried away by a burst of patriotic

enthusiasm, cried: "_Vive la Lorraine!_" with acclamations and

applause for this magnificent beginning, this birth of the beautiful

daughter given to the sea by the great maritime town.

She, as soon as she had passed beyond the narrow channel between the

two granite walls, feeling herself free at last, cast off the

tow-ropes and went off alone, like a monstrous creature walking on the

waters.

"Here she is--here she comes, straight down on us!" Roland kept

shouting; and Beausire, beaming, exclaimed: "What did I promise you!

Heh! Do I know the way?"

Jean in a low tone said to his mother: "Look, mother, she is close

upon us!" And Mme. Roland uncovered her eyes, blinded by tears.

The _Lorraine_ came on, still under the impetus of her swift exit from

the harbor, in the brilliant, calm weather. Beausire, with his glass

to his eye, called out:

"Look out! M. Pierre is at the stern, all alone, plainly to be seen!

Look out!"

The ship was almost touching the _Pearl_ now, as tall as a mountain

and as swift as a train. Mme. Roland, distraught and desperate, held

out her arms toward it; and she saw her son, her Pierre, with his

officer's cap on, throwing kisses to her with both hands.

But he was going away, flying, vanishing, a tiny speck already, no

more than an imperceptible spot on the enormous vessel. She tried

still to distinguish him, but she could not.

Jean took her hand:

"You saw?" he said.

"Yes, I saw. How good he is!"

And they turned to go home.

"Cristi! How fast she goes!" exclaimed Roland with enthusiastic

conviction.

The steamer, in fact, was shrinking every second, as though she were

melting away in the ocean. Mme. Roland, turning back to look at her,

watched her disappearing on the horizon, on her way to an unknown land

at the other side of the world.

In that vessel which nothing could stay, that vessel which she soon

would see no more, was her son, her poor son. And she felt as though

half her heart had gone with him; she felt, too, as if her life were

ended; yes, and she felt as though she would never see the child

again.

"Why are you crying?" asked her husband, "when you know he will be

back again within a month."

She stammered out: "I don't know, I cry because I am hurt."

When they had landed, Beausire at once took leave of them to go to

breakfast with a friend. Then Jean led the way with Mme. Rosémilly,

and Roland said to his wife:

"A very fine fellow, all the same, is our Jean."

"Yes," replied the mother.

And her mind being too much bewildered to think of what she was

saying, she went on:

"I am very glad that he is to marry Mme. Rosémilly."

The worthy man was astounded.

"Heh? What? He is to marry Mme. Rosémilly?"

"Yes, we meant to ask your opinion about it this very day."

"Bless me. And has this engagement been long in the wind?"

"Oh, no, only a very few days. Jean wished to make sure that she would

accept him before consulting you."

Roland rubbed his hands.

"Very good. Very good. It is capital. I entirely approve."

As they were about to turn off from the quay down the Boulevard

François 1er, his wife once more looked back to cast a last look at

the high seas, but she could see nothing now but a puff of gray smoke,

so far away, so faint that it looked like a film of haze.

DREAMS

It was after a dinner of friends, of old friends. There were five of

them, a writer, a doctor, and three rich bachelors without any

profession.

They had talked about everything, and a feeling of lassitude came on,

that feeling of lassitude which precedes and leads to the departure of

guests after festive gatherings. One of those present, who had for the

last five minutes been gazing silently at the surging boulevard

starred with gas-lamps, and rattling with vehicles, said suddenly:

"When you've nothing to do from morning till night, the days are

long."

"And the nights, too," assented the guest who sat next to him. "I

sleep very little; pleasures fatigue me; conversation is monotonous.

Never do I come across a new idea, and I feel, before talking to

anyone, a violent longing to say nothing and listen to nothing. I

don't know what to do with my evenings."

And the third idler remarked:

"I would pay a great deal for anything that would enable me to pass

merely two pleasant hours every day."

Then the writer, who had just thrown his overcoat across his arm,

turned round to them and said:

"The man who could discover a new vice, and introduce it among his

fellow-creatures, even though it were to shorten their lives, would

render a greater service to humanity than the man who found the means

of securing to them eternal salvation and eternal youth."

The doctor burst out laughing, and, while he chewed his cigar, he

said:

"Yes, but 'tis not so easy as that to discover it. Men have, however

crudely, been seeking for and working for the object you refer to

since the beginning of the world. The men who came first reached

perfection at once in this way. We are hardly equal to them."

One of the three idlers murmured:

"'Tis a pity!"

Then, after a minute's pause, he added:

"If we could only sleep, sleep well without feeling hot or cold, sleep

with that perfect unconsciousness we experience on nights when we are

thoroughly fatigued, sleep without dreams."

"Why without dreams?" asked the guest sitting next to him.

The other replied:

"Because dreams are not always pleasant, and they are always

fantastic, improbable, disconnected, and because when we are asleep we

cannot have the sort of dreams we like. We require to be awake when we

dream."

"And what's to prevent you from being so?" asked the writer.

The doctor flung away the end of his cigar.

"My dear fellow, in order to dream when you are awake you need great

power and great exercise of will, and when you try to do it, great

weariness is the result. Now, real dreaming, that journey of our

thoughts through delightful visions, is assuredly the sweetest

experience in the world; but it must come naturally, it must not be

provoked in a painful manner, and must be accompanied by absolute

bodily comfort. This power of dreaming I can give you provided you

promise that you will not abuse it."

The writer shrugged his shoulders:

"Ah! yes, I know--haschich, opium, green tea--artificial paradises. I

have read Baudelaire, and I even tasted the famous drug, which made me

very sick."

But the doctor, without stirring from his seat, said:

"No: ether, nothing but ether, and I would suggest that you literary

men ought to use it sometimes."

The three rich men drew closer to the doctor.

One of them said:

"Explain to us the effects of it."

And the doctor replied:

"Let us put aside big words, shall we not? I am not talking of

medicine or morality; I am talking of pleasure. You give yourselves up

every day to excesses which consume your lives. I want to indicate to

you a new sensation, only possible to intelligent men, let us say even

very intelligent men, dangerous, like everything that overexcites our

organs, but exquisite. I might add that you would require a certain

preparation, that is to say, a practice, to feel in all their

completeness the singular effects of ether.

"They are different from the effects of haschich, from the effects of

opium and morphia, and they cease as soon as the absorption of the

drug is interrupted, while the other generators of day dreams continue

their action for hours.

"I am now going to try to analyze as clearly as possible the way one

feels. But the thing is not easy, so facile, so delicate, so almost

imperceptible, are these sensations.

"It was when I was attacked by violent neuralgia that I made use of

this remedy, which perhaps I have since slightly abused.

"I had in my head and in my neck acute pains, and an intolerable heat

of the skin, a feverish restlessness. I took up a large flagon of

ether, and lying down, I began to inhale it slowly.

"At the end of some minutes, I thought I heard a vague murmur, which

ere long became a sort of humming, and it seemed to me that all the

interior of my body had become light, light as air, that it was

dissolving into vapor.

"Then came a sort of torpor of the soul, a somnolent sense of comfort

in spite of the pains which still continued, but which, however, had

ceased to make themselves felt. It was one of those sensations which

we are willing to endure and not any of those frightful wrenches

against which our tortured body protests.

"Soon, the strange and delightful sense of emptiness which I felt in

my chest extended to my limbs, which, in their turn, became light, as

light as if the flesh and the bones had been melted and the skin only

were left, the skin necessary to enable me to realize the sweetness of

living, of bathing in this well-being. Then I perceived that I was no

longer suffering. The pain had gone, melted also, evaporated. And I

heard voices, four voices, two dialogues, without understanding what

was said. At one time, there were only indistinct sounds, at another

time a word reached my ear. But I recognized that this was only the

humming I had heard before, accentuated. I was not asleep; I was not

awake; I comprehended, I felt, I reasoned with the utmost clearness

and depth, with extraordinary energy and intellectual pleasure, with a

singular intoxication arising from this separation of my mental

faculties.

"It was not like the dreams caused by haschich or the somewhat sickly

visions that come from opium; it was an amazing acuteness of

reasoning, a new way of seeing, judging, and appreciating the things

of life, and with the certainty, the absolute consciousness that this

was the true way.

"And the old image of the Scriptures suddenly came back to my mind. It

seemed to me that I had tasted of the Tree of Knowledge, that all the

mysteries were unveiled, so much did I find myself under the sway of a

new, strange, and irrefutable logic. And arguments, reasonings,

proofs, rose up in a heap before my brain only to be immediately

displaced by some stronger proof, reasoning, argument. My head had in

fact, become a battle-ground of ideas. I was a superior being, armed

with invincible intelligence, and I experienced a huge delight at the

manifestation of my power.

"It lasted a long, long time. I still kept inhaling the ether from the

opening of my flagon. Suddenly I perceived that it was empty."

The four men exclaimed at the same time:

"Doctor, a prescription at once for a liter of ether!"

But the doctor, putting on his hat, replied:

"As for that, certainly not; go and get poisoned by others!"

And he left them.

Ladies and gentlemen, what is your idea on the subject?

MOONLIGHT

Madame Julie Roubere was awaiting her elder sister, Madame Henriette

Letore, who had just returned after a trip to Switzerland.

The Letore household had left nearly five weeks ago. Madame Henriette

had allowed her husband to return alone to their estate in Calvados,

where some matters of business required his attention, and come to

spend a few days in Paris with her sister. Night came on. In the quiet

parlor, darkened by twilight shadows, Madame Roubere was reading, in

an absent-minded fashion, raising her eyes whenever she heard a sound.

At last, she heard a ring at the door, and presently her sister

appeared, wrapped in a traveling cloak. And immediately without any

formal greeting, they clasped each other ardently, only desisting for

a moment to begin embracing each other over again. Then they talked,

asking questions about each other's health, about their respective

families, and a thousand other things, gossiping, jerking out hurried,

broken sentences and rushing about while Madame Henriette was removing

her hat and veil.

It was now quite dark. Madame Roubere rang for a lamp, and as soon as

it was brought in, she scanned her sister's face, and was on the point

of embracing her once more. But she held back, scared and astonished

at the other's appearance. Around her temples, Madame Letore had two

long locks of white hair. All the rest of her hair was of a glossy,

raven-black hue; but there alone, at each side of her head, ran as it

were, two silvery streams which were immediately lost in the black

mass surrounding them. She was nevertheless only twenty-four years

old, and this change had come on suddenly since her departure for

Switzerland.

Without moving, Madame Roubere gazed at her in amazement, tears rising

to her eyes, as she thought that some mysterious and terrible calamity

must have fallen on her sister. She asked:

"What is the matter with you, Henriette?"

Smiling with a sad face, the smile of one who is heartsick, the other

replied:

"Why nothing I assure you. Were you noticing my white hair?"

But Madame Roubere impetuously seized her by the shoulders, and with a

searching glance at her repeated:

"What is the matter with you? Tell me what is the matter with you. And

if you tell me a falsehood, I'll soon find it out."

They remained face to face, and Madame Henriette, who became so pale

that she was near fainting, had two pearly tears at each corner of her

drooping eyes.

Her sister went on asking:

"What has happened to you? What is the matter with you? Answer me!"

Then, in a subdued voice, the other murmured:

"I have--I have a lover."

And, hiding her forehead on the shoulder of her younger sister, she

sobbed.

Then, when she had grown a little calmer, when the heaving of her

breast had subsided, she commenced to unbosom herself, as if to cast

forth this secret from herself, to empty this sorrow of hers into a

sympathetic heart.

Thereupon, holding each other's hands tightly grasped, the two women

went over to a sofa in a dark corner of the room, into which they

sank, and the younger sister, passing her arm over the elder one's

neck, and drawing her close to her heart, listened.

* * * * *

"Oh! I recognize that there was no excuse for one; I do not understand

myself, and since that day I feel as if I were mad. Be careful my

child, about yourself--be careful! If you only knew how weak we are,

how quickly we yield, we fall. All it needs is a nothing, so little,

so little, a moment of tenderness, one of those sudden fits of

melancholy which steal into your soul, one of those longings to open

your arms, to love, to embrace, which we all have at certain moments.

"You know my husband, and you know how fond of him I am; but he is

mature and sensible, and cannot even comprehend the tender vibrations

of a woman's heart. He is always, always the same, always good, always

smiling, always kind, always perfect. Oh! how I sometimes have wished

that he would roughly clasp me in his arms, that he would embrace me

with those slow, sweet kisses which make two beings intermingle, which

are like mute confidences! How I wished that he was self-abandoned and

even weak, so that he should have need of me, of my caress, of my

tears!

"This all seems very silly; but we women are made like that. How can

we help it?

"And yet the thought of deceiving never came near me. To-day, it has

happened, without love, without reason, without anything, simply

because the moon shone one night on the Lake of Lucerne.

"During the month when we were traveling together, my husband, with

his calm indifference, paralyzed my enthusiasm, extinguished my poetic

ardor. When we were descending the mountain paths at sun-rise, when as

the four horses galloped along with the diligence, we saw, in the

transparent morning haze, valleys, woods, streams, and villages, I

clasped my hands with delight, and said to him: 'What a beautiful

scene, darling! Kiss me now!' He only answered with a smile of

chilling kindliness: 'There is no reason why we should kiss each other

because you like the landscape.'

"And his words froze me to the heart. It seems to me that when people

love each other, they ought to feel more moved by love than ever in

the presence of beautiful scenes.

"Indeed he prevented the effervescent poetry that bubbled up within me

from gushing out. How can I express it? I was almost like a boiler,

filled with steam and hermetically sealed.

"One evening (we had been for four days staying in the Hotel de

Fluelen), Robert, having got one of his sick headaches, went to bed

immediately after dinner, and I went to take a walk all alone along

the edge of the lake.

"It was a night such as one might read of in a fairy tale. The full

moon showed itself in the middle of the sky; the tall mountains, with

their snowy crests seemed to wear silver crowns; the waters of the

lake glittered with tiny rippling motions. The air was mild, with that

kind of penetrating freshness which softens us till we seem to be

swooning, to be deeply affected without any apparent cause. But how

sensitive, how vibrating, the heart is at such moments! How quickly it

leaps up, and how intense are its emotions!

"I sat down on the grass, and gazed at that vast lake so melancholy

and so fascinating, and a strange thing passed into me; I became

possessed with an insatiable need of love, a revolt against the gloomy

dullness of my life. What! Would it never be my fate to be clasped in

the arms of a man whom I loved on a bank like this under the glowing

moonlight? Was I never then, to feel on my lips those kisses so deep,

delicious, and intoxicating which lovers exchange on nights that seem

to have been made by God for passionate embraces? Was I never to know

such ardent, feverish love in the moonlit shadows of a summer's night?

"And I burst out weeping like a woman who has lost her reason. I heard

some person stirring behind me. A man was intently gazing at me. When

I turned my head round, he recognized me, and, advancing, said:

"'You are weeping, Madame?'

"It was a young barrister who was traveling with his mother, and whom

we had often met. His eyes had frequently followed me.

"I was so much confused that I did not know what answer to give or

what to think of the situation. I told him I felt ill.

"He walked on by my side in a natural and respectable fashion, and

began talking to me about what we had seen during our trip. All that I

had felt he translated into words; everything that made me thrill he

understood perfectly, better than I did myself. And all of a sudden

he recited some verses of Alfred de Musset. I felt myself choking,

seized with indescribable emotion. It seemed to me that the mountains

themselves, the lake, the moonlight, were singing to me about things

ineffably sweet.

"And it happened, I don't know how, I don't know why, in a sort of

hallucination.

"As for him I did not see him again till the morning of his departure.

"He gave me his card!"

* * * * *

And, sinking into her sister's arms, Madame Letore, broke into

groans--almost into shrieks.

Then, Madame Roubere, with a self-contained and serious air, said very

gently:

"You see, sister, very often it is not a man that we love, but love.

And your real lover that night was the moonlight."

THE CORSICAN BANDIT

The road with a gentle winding reached the middle of the forest. The

huge pine-trees spread above our heads a mournful-looking vault, and

gave forth a kind of long, sad wail, while at either side their

straight slender trunks formed, as it were, an army of organ-pipes,

from which seemed to issue that monotonous music of the wind through

the tree-tops.

After three hours' walking there was an opening in this row of tangled

branches. Here and there an enormous pine-parasol, separated from the

others, opening like an immense umbrella, displayed its dome of dark

green; then, all of a sudden, we gained the boundary of the forest,

some hundreds of meters below the defile which leads into the wild

valley of Niolo.

On the two projecting heights which commanded a view of this pass,

some old trees grotesquely twisted, seemed to have mounted with

painful efforts, like scouts who had started in advance of the

multitude heaped together in the rear. When we turned round, we saw

the entire forest stretched beneath our feet, like a gigantic basin of

verdure, whose edges, which seemed to reach the sky, were composed of

bare rocks shutting in on every side.

We resumed our walk, and, ten minutes later, we found ourselves in the

defile.

Then I beheld an astonishing landscape. Beyond another forest, a

valley, but a valley such as I had never seen before, a solitude of

stone ten leagues long, hollowed out between two high mountains,

without a field or a tree to be seen. This was the Niolo valley, the

fatherland of Corsican liberty, the inaccessible citadel, from which

the invaders had never been able to drive out the mountaineers.

My companion said to me: "Is it here, too, that all our bandits have

taken refuge?"

Ere long we were at the further end of this chasm so wild, so

inconceivably beautiful.

Not a blade of grass, not a plant--nothing but granite. As far as our

eyes could reach, we saw in front of us a desert of glittering stone,

heated like an oven by a burning sun, which seemed to hang for that

very purpose right above the gorge. When we raised our eyes towards

the crests, we stood dazzled and stupefied by what we saw. They looked

red and notched like festoons of coral, for all the summits are made

of porphyry; and the sky overhead seemed violet, lilac, discolored by

the vicinity of these strange mountains. Lower down the granite was of

scintillating gray, and under our feet it seemed rasped, pounded; we

were walking over shining powder. At our right, along a long and

irregular course, a tumultuous torrent ran with a continuous roar. And

we staggered along under this heat, in this light, in this burning,

arid, desolate valley cut by this ravine of turbulent water which

seemed to be ever hurrying onward, without being able to fertilize

these rocks, lost in this furnace which greedily drank it up without

being penetrated or refreshed by it.

But suddenly there was visible at our right a little wooden cross sunk

in a little heap of stones. A man had been killed there; and I said

to my companion:

"Tell me about your bandits."

He replied:

"I knew the most celebrated of them, the terrible St. Lucia. I will

tell you his history.

"His father was killed in a quarrel by a young man of the same

district, it is said; and St. Lucia was left alone with his sister. He

was a weak and timid youth, small, often ill, without any energy. He

did not proclaim the vendetta against the assassin of his father. All

his relatives came to see him, and implored of him to take vengeance;

he remained deaf to their menaces and their supplications.

"Then, following the old Corsican custom, his sister, in her

indignation, carried away his black clothes, in order that he might

not wear mourning for a dead man who had not been avenged. He was

insensible to even this outrage, and rather than take down from the

rack his father's gun, which was still loaded, he shut himself up, not

daring to brave the looks of the young men of the district.

"He seemed to have even forgotten the crime and he lived with his

sister in the obscurity of their dwelling.

"But, one day, the man who was suspected of having committed the

murder, was about to get married. St. Lucia did not appear to be moved

by this news, but, no doubt, out of sheer bravado, the bridegroom, on

his way to the church, passed before the two orphans' house.

"The brother and the sister, at their window, were eating little fried

cakes when the young man saw the bridal procession moving past the

house. Suddenly he began to tremble, rose up without uttering a word,

made the sign of the cross, took the gun which was hanging over the

fireplace, and he went out.

"When he spoke of this later on, he said: 'I don't know what was the

matter with me; it was like fire in my blood; I felt that I should do

it, that in spite of everything I could not resist, and I concealed

the gun in a cave on the road to Corte.'

"An hour later, he came back, with nothing in his hand, and with his

habitual air of sad weariness. His sister believed that there was

nothing further in his thoughts.

"But when night fell he disappeared.

"His enemy had, the same evening, to repair to Corte on foot,

accompanied by his two bridesmen.

"He was pursuing his way, singing as he went, when St. Lucia stood

before him, and looking straight in the murderer's face, exclaimed:

'Now is the time!' and shot him point-blank in the chest.

"One of the bridesmen fled; the other stared at the young man saying:

"'What have you done, St. Lucia?'

"Then he was going to hasten to Corte for help, but St. Lucia said in

stern tone:

"'If you move another step, I'll shoot you through the legs.'

"The other, aware that till now he had always appeared timid, said to

him: 'You would not dare to do it!' and he was hurrying off when he

fell instantaneously, his thigh shattered by a bullet.

"And St. Lucia, coming over to where he lay, said:

"'I am going to look at your wound; if it is not serious, I'll leave

you there; if it is mortal I'll finish you off.'

"He inspected the wound, considered it mortal, and slowly re-loading

his gun, told the wounded man to say a prayer, and shot him through

the head.

"Next day he was in the mountains.

"And do you know what this St. Lucia did after this?

"All his family were arrested by the gendarmes. His uncle, the curé,

who was suspected of having incited him to this deed of vengeance, was

himself put into prison, and accused by the dead man's relatives. But

he escaped, took a gun in his turn, and went to join his nephew in the

cave.

"Next, St. Lucia killed, one after the other, his uncle's accusers,

and tore out their eyes to teach the others never to state what they

had seen with their eyes.

"He killed all the relatives, all the connections of his enemy's

family. He massacred during his life fourteen gendarmes, burned down

the houses of his adversaries, and was up to the day of his death the

most terrible of the bandits, whose memory we have preserved."

* * * * *

The sun disappeared behind Monte Cinto and the tall shadow of the

granite mountain went to sleep on the granite of the valley. We

quickened our pace in order to reach before night the little village

of Albertaccio, nothing better than a heap of stones welded beside the

stone flanks of a wild gorge. And I said as I thought of the bandit:

"What a terrible custom your vendetta is!"

My companion answered with an air of resignation:

"What, would you have? A man must do his duty!"

A DEAD WOMAN'S SECRET

She had died painlessly, tranquilly, like a woman whose life was

irreproachable, and she now lay on her back in bed, with closed eyes,

calm features, her long white hair carefully arranged as if she had

again made her toilet ten minutes before her death, all her pale

physiognomy so composed, now that she had passed away, so resigned

that one felt sure a sweet soul had dwelt in that body, that this

serene grandmother had spent an untroubled existence, that this

virtuous woman had ended her life without any shock, without any

remorse.

On his knees, beside the bed, her son, a magistrate of inflexible

principles, and her daughter Marguerite, in religion, Sister Eulalie,

were weeping distractedly. She had from the time of their infancy

armed them with an inflexible code of morality, teaching them a

religion without weakness and a sense of duty without any compromise.

He, the son, had become a magistrate, and, wielding the weapon of the

law, he struck down without pity the feeble and the erring. She, the

daughter, quite penetrated with the virtue that had bathed her in this

austere family, had become the spouse of God through disgust with men.

They had scarcely known their father; all they knew was that he had

made their mother unhappy without learning any further details. The

nun passionately kissed one hand of her dead mother, which hung down,

a hand of ivory like that of Christ in the large crucifix which lay

on the bed. At the opposite side of the prostrate body, the other hand

seemed still to grasp the rumpled sheet with that wandering movement

which is called the fold of the dying, and the lines had retained

little wavy creases as a memento of those last motions which precede

the eternal motionlessness. A few light taps at the door caused the

two sobbing heads to rise up, and the priest who had just dined,

entered the apartment. He was flushed, a little puffed, from the

effects of the process of digestion which had just commenced; for he

had put a good dash of brandy into his coffee in order to counteract

the fatigue caused by the last nights he had remained up and that

which he anticipated from the night that was still in store for him.

He had put on a look of sadness, that simulated sadness of the priest

to whom death is a means of livelihood. He made the sign of the cross,

and coming over to them with his professional gesture said:

"Well, my poor children, I have come to help you to pass these

mournful hours."

But Sister Eulalie suddenly rose up.

"Thanks, father, but my brother and I would like to be left alone with

her. These are the last moments that we now have for seeing her; so we

want to feel ourselves once more, the three of us, just as we were

years ago when we--we--we were only children, and our poor--poor

mother--"

She was unable to finish with the flood of tears that gushed from her

eyes, and the sobs that were choking her.

But the priest bowed, with a more serene look on his face, for he was

thinking of his bed. "Just as you please, my children."

Then, he knelt down, again crossed himself, prayed, rose up, and

softly stole away murmuring as he went: "She was a saint."

They were left alone, the dead woman and her children. A hidden

timepiece kept regularly ticking in its dark corner, and through the

open window the soft odors of hay and of woods penetrated with faint

gleams of moonlight. No sound in the fields outside, save the

wandering notes of toads and now and then the humming of some

nocturnal insect darting into like a ball, and knocking itself against

the wall.

An infinite peace, a divine melancholy, a silent serenity surrounded

this dead woman, seemed to emanate from her, to evaporate from her

into the atmosphere outside and to calm Nature itself.

Then the magistrate, still on his knees, his head pressed against the

bed-clothes, in a far-off, heart-broken voice that pierced through the

sheets and the coverlet, exclaimed:

"Mamma, mamma, mamma!" And the sister, sinking down on the floor,

striking the wood with her forehead fanatically, twisting herself

about and quivering like a person in an epileptic fit, groaned:

"Jesus, Jesus--mamma--Jesus!"

And both of them shaken by a hurricane of grief panted with a rattling

in their throats.

Then the fit gradually subsided, and they now wept in a less violent

fashion, like the rainy calm that follows a squall on a storm-beaten

sea. Then, after some time, they rose, and fixed their glances on the

beloved corpse. And memories, those memories of the past, so sweet, so

torturing to-day, came back to their minds with all those little

forgotten details, those little details so intimate and familiar,

which make the being who is no more live over again. They recalled

circumstances, words, smiles, certain intonations of voice which

belonged to one whom they should hear speaking to them again. They saw

her once more happy and calm, and phrases she used in ordinary

conversation rose to their lips. They even remembered a little

movement of the hand peculiar to her, as if she were keeping time when

she was saying something of importance.

And they loved her as they had never before loved her. And by the

depth of their despair they realized how strongly they had been

attached to her, and how desolate they would find themselves now.

She had been their mainstay, their guide, the best part of their

youth, of that happy portion of their lives which had vanished; she

had been the bond that united them to existence, the mother, the

mamma, the creative flesh, the tie that bound them to their ancestors.

They would henceforth be solitary, isolated; they would have nothing

on earth to look back upon.

The nun said to her brother:

"You know how mamma used always to read over her old letters. They are

all there in her drawer. Suppose we read them in our turn, and so

revive all her life this night by her side? It would be like a kind of

road of the cross, like making the acquaintance of her mother, of

grandparents whom we never knew, whose letters are there, and of whom

she has so often talked to us, you remember?"

* * * * *

And they drew forth from the drawer a dozen little packets of yellow

paper, carefully tied up and placed close to one another. They flung

these relics on the bed, and selecting one of them on which the word

"Father" was written, they opened and read what was in it.

It consisted of those very old letters which are to be found in old

family writing-desks, those letters which have the flavor of another

century. The first said, "My darling," another "My beautiful little

girl," then others "My dear child," and then again "My dear daughter."

And suddenly the nun began reading aloud, reading for the dead her own

history, all her tender souvenirs. And the magistrate listened, while

he leaned on the bed, with his eyes on his mother's face. And the

motionless corpse seemed happy.

Sister Eulalie, interrupting herself, said: "We ought to put them into

the grave with her, to make a winding-sheet of them, and bury them

with her."

And then she took up another packet, on which the descriptive word did

not appear.

And in a loud tone she began: "My adored one, I love you to

distraction. Since yesterday I have been suffering like a damned soul

burned by the recollection of you. I feel your lips on mine, your eyes

under my eyes, your flesh under my flesh. I love you! I love you! You

have made me mad! My arms open! I pant with an immense desire to

possess you again. My whole body calls out to you, wants you. I have

kept in my mouth the taste of your kisses."

The magistrate rose up; the nun stopped reading. He snatched the

letter from her, and sought for the signature. There was none, save

under the words, "He who adores you," the name "Henry." Their father's

name was René. So then he was not the man.

Then, the son, with rapid fingers, fumbled in the packet of letters

took another of them, and read: "I can do without your caresses no

longer."

And, standing up, with the severity of a judge passing sentence, he

gazed at the impassive face of the dead woman.

The nun, straight as a statue, with teardrops standing at each corner

of her eyes, looked at her brother, waiting to see what he meant to

do. Then he crossed the room, slowly reached the window, and looked

out thoughtfully into the night.

When he turned back, Sister Eulalie, her eyes now quite dry, still

remained standing near the bed, with a downcast look.

He went over to the drawer and flung in the letters which he had

picked up from the floor. Then he drew the curtains round the bed.

And when the dawn made the candles on the table look pale, the son

rose from his armchair, and without even a parting glance at the

mother whom he had separated from them and condemned, he said slowly:

"Now, my sister, let us leave the room."

THE CAKE

Let us say that her name was Madame Anserre so as not to reveal her

real name.

She was one of those Parisian comets which leave, as it were, a trail

of fire behind them. She wrote verses and novels; she had a poetic

heart, and was ravishingly beautiful. She opened her doors to very

few--only to exceptional people, those who are commonly described as

princes of something or other.

To be a visitor at her house constituted a claim, a genuine claim of

intellect: at least this was the estimate set on her invitations.

Her husband played the part of an obscure satellite. To be the husband

of a star is not an easy thing. This husband had, however, an original

idea, that of creating a State within a State, of possessing a merit

of his own, a merit of the second order; it is true; but he did, in

fact, in this fashion, on the days when his wife held receptions, hold

receptions also on his own account. He had his special set who

appreciated him, listened to him, and bestowed on him more attention

than they did on his brilliant partner.

He had devoted himself to agriculture--to agriculture in the Chamber.

There are in the same way generals in the Chamber--those who are born,

who live, and who die, on the round leather chairs of the War Office,

are all of this sort, are they not? Sailors in the Chambers--viz., in

the Admiralty--Colonizers in the Chamber, etc., etc. So he had studied

agriculture, indeed he had studied it deeply, in its relations with

the other sciences, with political economy, with the Fine Arts--we

dress up the Fine Arts with every kind of science, since we even call

the horrible railway bridges "works of art." At length he reached the

point when it was said of him: "He is a man of ability." He was quoted

in the Technical Reviews; his wife had succeeded in getting him

appointed a member of a committee at the Ministry of Agriculture.

This latest glory was quite sufficient for him.

Under the pretext of diminishing the expenses, he sent out invitations

to his friends for the day when his wife received hers, so that they

associated together, or rather they did not--they formed two groups.

Madame, with her escort of artists, academicians, and Ministers,

occupied a kind of gallery, furnished and decorated in the style of

the Empire. Monsieur generally withdrew with his agriculturists into a

smaller portion of the house used as a smoking-room and ironically

described by Madame Anserre as the Salon of Agriculture.

The two camps were clearly separated. Monsieur, without jealousy,

moreover, sometimes penetrated into the Academy, and cordial

handshakings were exchanged, but the Academy entertained infinite

contempt for the Salon of Agriculture, and it was rarely that one of

the princes of science, of thought, or of anything else mingled with

the agriculturists.

These receptions occasioned little expense--a cup of tea, a cake, that

was all. Monsieur, at an earlier period, had claimed two cakes, one

for the academy, and one for the agriculturists, but Madame having

rightly suggested that this way of acting seemed to indicate two

camps, two receptions, two parties, Monsieur did not press the matter,

so that they used only one cake, of which Madame Anserre did the

honors at the Academy, and which then passed into the Salon de

Agriculture.

Now, this cake was soon, for the Academy, a subject of observation

well calculated to arouse curiosity. Madame Anserre never cut it

herself. That function always fell to the lot of one or other of the

illustrious guests. The particular duty, which was supposed to carry

with it honorable distinction, was performed by each person for a

pretty long period, in one case for three months, scarcely ever for

more; and it was noticed that the privilege of "cutting the cake"

carried with it a heap of other marks of superiority--a sort of

royalty, or rather very accentuated vice-royalty.

The reigning cutter spoke in a haughty tone, with an air of marked

command; and all the favors of the mistress of the house were for him

alone.

These happy individuals were in moments of intimacy described in

hushed tones behind doors as the "favorites of the cake," and every

change of favorite introduced into the Academy a sort of revolution.

The knife was a scepter, the pastry an emblem; the chosen ones were

congratulated. The agriculturists never cut the cake. Monsieur himself

was always excluded, although he ate his share.

The cake was cut in succession by poets, by painters, and by

novelists. A great musician had the privilege of measuring the

portions of the cake for some time; an ambassador succeeded him.

Sometimes a man less well-known, but elegant and sought after, one of

those who are called according to the different epochs, "true

gentleman," or "perfect knight," or "dandy," or something else, seated

himself, in his turn, before the symbolic cake. Each of them, during

his ephemeral reign, exhibited greater consideration towards the

husband; then, when the hour of his fall had arrived, he passed on the

knife towards the other and mingled once more with the crowd of

followers and admirers of the "beautiful Madame Anserre."

This state of things lasted a long time, but comets do not always

shine with the same brilliance. Everything gets worn out in society.

One would have said that gradually the eagerness of the cutters grew

feebler; they seemed to hesitate at times when the tray was held out

to them; this office, once so much coveted, became less and less

desired. It was retained for a shorter time; they appeared to be less

proud of it.

Madame Anserre was prodigal of smiles and civilities. Alas! no one was

found any longer to cut it voluntarily. The new comers seemed to

decline the honor. The "old favorites" reappeared one by one like

dethroned princes who have been replaced for a brief spell in power.

Then, the chosen ones became few, very few. For a month (O, prodigy!)

M. Anserre cut open the cake; then he looked as if he were getting

tired of it; and one evening Madame Anserre, the beautiful Madame

Anserre, was seen cutting it herself. But this appeared to be very

wearisome to her, and, next day, she urged one of her guests so

strongly to do it that he did not dare to refuse.

The symbol was too well-known, however; the guests stared at one

another with scared anxious faces. To cut the cake was nothing, but

the privileges to which this favor had always given a claim now

frightened people; therefore, the moment the dish made its appearance

the academicians rushed pell-mell into the Salon of Agriculture, as if

to shelter themselves behind the husband, who was perpetually smiling.

And when Madame Anserre, in a state of anxiety, presented herself at

the door with a cake in one hand and the knife in the other, they all

seemed to form a circle around her husband as if to appeal to him for

protection.

Some years more passed. Nobody cut the cake now; but yielding to an

old inveterate habit, the lady who had always been gallantly called

"the beautiful Madame Anserre" looked out each evening for some

devotee to take the knife, and each time the same movement took place

around her, a general flight, skillfully arranged, and full of

combined maneuvers that showed great cleverness, in order to avoid the

offer that was rising to her lips.

But, one evening, a young man presented himself at her reception--an

innocent, unsophisticated youth. He knew nothing about the mystery of

the cake; accordingly, when it appeared, and when all the rest ran

away, when Madame Anserre took from the man-servant's hands the dish

and the pastry, he remained quietly by her side.

She thought that perhaps he knew about the matter; she smiled, and in

a tone which showed some emotion, said:

"Will you be kind enough, dear Monsieur, to cut this cake?"

He displayed the utmost readiness, and took off his gloves, flattered

at such an honor being conferred on him.

"Oh, to be sure Madame, with the greatest pleasure."

Some distance away in the corner of the gallery, in the frame of the

door which led into the Salon of the Agriculturists, faces which

expressed utter amazement were staring at him. Then, when the

spectators saw the new comer cutting without any hesitation, they

quickly came forward.

An old poet jocosely slapped the neophyte on the shoulder.

"Bravo, young man!" he whispered in his ear.

The others gazed at him with curiosity. Even the husband appeared to

be surprised. As for the young man, he was astonished at the

consideration which they suddenly seemed to show towards him; above

all, he failed to comprehend the marked attentions, the manifest

favor, and the species of mute gratitude which the mistress of the

house bestowed on him.

It appears, however, that he eventually found out.

At what moment, in what place, was the revelation made to him? Nobody

could tell; but, when he again presented himself at the reception, he

had a preoccupied air, almost a shamefaced look, and he cast around

him a glance of uneasiness.

The bell rang for tea. The man-servant appeared. Madame Anserre, with

a smile, seized the dish, casting a look about her for her young

friend; but he had fled so precipitately that no trace of him could be

seen any longer. Then, she went looking everywhere for him, and ere

long she discovered him in the Salon of the Agriculturists. With his

arm locked in that of the husband, he was consulting that gentleman as

to the means employed for destroying phylloxera.

"My dear Monsieur," she said to him, "will you be so kind as to cut

this cake for me?"

He reddened to the roots of his hair, and hanging down his head,

stammered out some excuses. Thereupon M. Anserre took pity on him, and

turning towards his wife, said:

"My dear, you might have the goodness not to disturb us. We are

talking about agriculture. So get your cake cut by Baptiste."

And since that day nobody has ever cut Madame Anserre's cake.

A LIVELY FRIEND

They had been constantly in each other's society for a whole winter in

Paris. After having lost sight of each other, as generally happens in

such cases, after leaving college, the two friends met again one

night, long years after, already old and white-haired, the one a

bachelor, the other married.

M. de Meroul lived six months in Paris and six months in his little

chateau of Tourbeville. Having married the daughter of a gentleman in

the district, he had lived a peaceful, happy life with the indolence

of a man who has nothing to do. With a calm temperament and a sedate

mind, without any intellectual audacity or tendency towards

revolutionary independence of thought, he passed his time in mildly

regretting the past, in deploring the morals and the institutions of

to-day, and in repeating every moment to his wife, who raised her eyes

to Heaven, and sometimes her hands also, in token of energetic assent:

"Under what a government do we live, great God!"

Madame de Meroul mentally resembled her husband, just as if they had

been brother and sister. She knew by tradition that one ought, first

of all, to reverence the Pope and the King!

And she loved them and respected them from the bottom of her heart,

without knowing them, with a poetic exaltation, with a hereditary

devotion, with all the sensibility of a well-born woman. She was

kindly in every fold of her soul. She had no child, and was

incessantly regretting it.

When M. de Meroul came across his old school fellow Joseph Mouradour

at a ball, he experienced from this meeting a profound and genuine

delight, for they had been very fond of one another in their youth.

After exclamations of astonishment over the changes caused by age in

their bodies and their faces, they had asked one another a number of

questions as to their respective careers.

Joseph Mouradour, a native of the South of France, had become a

Councilor General in his own neighborhood. Frank in his manners, he

spoke briskly and without any circumspection telling all his thoughts

with sheer indifference to prudential considerations. He was a

Republican, of that race of good-natured Republicans who make their

own ease the law of their existence, and who carry freedom of speech

to the verge of brutality.

He called at his friend's address in Paris, and was immediately a

favorite, on account of his easy cordiality, in spite of his advanced

opinions. Madame de Meroul exclaimed:

"What a pity! such a charming man!"

M. de Meroul said to his friend, in a sincere and confidential tone:

"You cannot imagine what a wrong you do to our country." He was

attached to his friend nevertheless, for no bonds are more solid than

those of childhood renewed in later life. Joseph Mouradour chaffed the

husband and wife, called them "my loving turtles," and occasionally

gave vent to loud declarations against people who were behind the age,

against all sorts of prejudices and traditions.

When he thus directed the flood of his democratic eloquence, the

married pair, feeling ill at ease, kept silent through a sense of

propriety and good-breeding; then the husband tried to turn off the

conversation, in order to avoid any friction. Joseph Mouradour did not

want to know anyone unless he was free to say what he liked.

Summer came round. The Merouls knew no greater pleasure than to

receive their old friends in their country house at Tourbeville. It

was an intimate and healthy pleasure, the pleasure of homely

gentlefolk who had spent most of their lives in the country. They used

to go to the nearest railway station to meet some of their guests, and

drove them to the house in their carriage, watching for compliments on

their district, on the rapid vegetation, on the condition of the roads

in the department, on the cleanliness of the peasants' houses, on the

bigness of the cattle they saw in the fields, on everything that met

the eye as far as the edge of the horizon.

They liked to have it noticed that their horse trotted in a wonderful

manner for an animal employed a part of the year in field-work; and

they awaited, with anxiety the newcomer's opinion on their family

estate, sensitive to the slightest word, grateful for the slightest

gracious attention.

Joseph Mouradour was invited, and he announced his arrival.

The wife and the husband came to meet the train, delighted to have the

opportunity of doing the honors of their house.

As soon as he perceived them, Joseph Mouradour jumped out of his

carriage with a vivacity which increased their satisfaction. He

grasped their hands warmly, congratulated them, and intoxicated them

with compliments.

He was quite charming in his manner as they drove along the road to

the house; he expressed astonishment at the height of the trees, the

excellence of the crops, and the quickness of the horse.

When he placed his foot on the steps in front of the chateau, M. de

Meroul said to him with a certain friendly solemnity:

"Now you are at home."

Joseph Mouradour answered: "Thanks old fellow; I counted on that. For

my part, besides, I never put myself out with my friends. That's the

only hospitality I understand."

Then, he went up to his own room, where he put on the costume of a

peasant, as he was pleased to describe it, and he came down again not

very long after, attired in blue linen, with yellow boots, in the

careless rig-out of a Parisian out for a holiday. He seemed, too to

have become more common, more jolly, more familiar, having assumed

along with his would-be rustic garb a free and easy swagger which he

thought suited the style of dress. His new apparel somewhat shocked M.

and Madame de Meroul who even at home on their estate always remained

serious and respectable, as the particle "de" before their name

exacted a certain amount of ceremonial even with their intimate

friends.

After lunch, they went to visit the farms; and the Parisian stupefied

the respectable peasants by talking to them as if he were a comrade of

theirs.

In the evening, the curé dined at the house--a fat old priest,

wearing his Sunday suit, who had been specially asked that day in

order to meet the newcomer.

When Joseph saw him he made a grimace, then he stared at the priest in

astonishment as if he belonged to some peculiar race of beings, the

like of which he had never seen before at such close quarters. He told

a few smutty stories allowable enough with a friend after dinner, but

apparently somewhat out of place in the presence of an ecclesiastic.

He did not say, "Monsieur l'Abbe," but merely "Monsieur"; and he

embarrassed the priest with philosophical views as to the various

superstitions that prevailed on the surface of the globe.

He remarked:

"Your God, monsieur, is one of those persons whom we must respect, but

also one of those who must be discussed. Mine is called Reason; he has

from time immemorial been the enemy of yours."

The Merouls, greatly put out, attempted to divert his thoughts.

The curé left very early.

Then the husband gently remarked:

"You went a little too far with that priest."

But Joseph immediately replied:

"That's a very good joke, too! Am I to bother my brains about a

devil-dodger? At any rate, do me the favor of not ever again having

such an old fogy to dinner. Curses on his impudence!"

"But, my friend, remember his sacred character."

Joseph Mouradour interrupted him:

"Yes, I know. We must treat them like girls, who get roses for being

well behaved! That's all right, my boy! When these people respect my

convictions, I will respect theirs!"

This was all that happened that day.

Next morning, Madame de Meroul, on entering her drawing-room, saw

lying on the table three newspapers which made her draw back in

horror. "Le Voltaire," "Le Republique Francaise," and "La Justice."

Presently, Joseph Mouradour, still in his blue blouse, appeared on the

threshold, reading "L'Intransigeant" attentively. He exclaimed:

"There is a splendid article by Rochefort. This fellow is marvelous."

He read the article in a loud voice, laying so much stress on its most

striking passages that he did not notice the entrance of his friend.

M. de Meroul had a paper in each hand. "Le Gaulois" for himself and

"Le Clarion" for his wife.

The ardent prose of the master-writer who overthrew the empire,

violently declaimed, recited in the accent of the South, rang through

the peaceful drawing-room, shook the old curtains with their rigid

folds, seemed to splash the walls, the large upholstered chairs, the

solemn furniture fixed in the same position for the past century, with

a hail of words, rebounding, impudent, ironical and crushing.

The husband and the wife, the one standing, the other seated, listened

in a state of stupor, so scandalized that they no longer even ventured

to make a gesture. Mouradour launched out the concluding passage in

the article as one lets forth a jet of fireworks, then in an emphatic

tone remarked:

"That's a stinger, eh?"

But suddenly he perceived the two prints belonging to his friend, and

he seemed himself for a moment overcome with astonishment. Then, he

came across to his host with great strides, demanding in angry tone:

"What do you want to do with these papers?" M. de Meroul replied in a

hesitating voice:

"Why, these--these are my--my newspapers."

"Your newspapers! Look here, now, you are only laughing at me! You

will do me the favor to read mine, to stir you up with a few new

ideas, and, as for yours--this is what I do with them--"

And before his host, filled with confusion, could prevent him, he

seized the two newspapers and flung them out through the window. Then

he gravely placed "La Justice" in the hands of Madame de Meroul and

"Le Voltaire" in those of her husband, and he sank into an armchair to

finish "L'Intransigeant."

The husband and the wife, through feelings of delicacy, made a show of

reading a little, then they handed back the Republican newspapers,

which they touched with their finger-tips as if they had been

poisoned.

Then he burst out laughing, and said:

"A week of this sort of nourishment, and I'll have you converted to my

ideas."

At the end of the week, in fact, he ruled the house. He had shut the

door on the curé, whom Madame Meroul went to see in secret. He gave

orders that neither the "Gaulois" nor the "Clarion" were to be

admitted into the house, which a man-servant went to get in a

mysterious fashion at the post-office, and which, on his entrance,

were hidden away under the sofa cushions. He regulated everything

just as he liked, always charming, always good-natured, a jovial and

all powerful tyrant.

Other friends were about to come on a visit, religious people with

Legitimist opinions. The master and mistress of the chateau considered

it would be impossible to let them meet their lively guest, and, not

knowing what to do, announced to Joseph Mouradour one evening that

they were obliged to go away from home for a few days about a little

matter of business, and they begged of him to remain in the house

alone.

He showed no trace of emotion, and replied:

"Very well; 'tis all the same to me; I'll wait here for you as long as

you like. What I say is this--there need be no ceremony between

friends. You're quite right to look after your own affairs--why the

devil shouldn't you? I'll not take offense at your doing that, quite

the contrary. It only makes me feel quite at my ease with you. Go, my

friends--I'll wait for you."

M. and Madame Meroul started next morning.

He is waiting for them.

THE ORPHAN

Mademoiselle Source had adopted this boy under very sad circumstances.

She was at the time thirty-six years old. She was deformed, having in

her infancy slipped off her nurse's lap into the fireplace, and

getting her face so shockingly burned that it ever afterwards

presented a frightful appearance. This deformity had made her resolve

not to marry, for she did not want any man to marry her for her money.

A female neighbor of hers, being left a widow during her pregnancy,

died in child-birth, without leaving a sou. Mademoiselle Source took

the new-born child, put him out to nurse, reared him, sent him to a

boarding-school, then brought him home in his fourteenth year, in

order to have in her empty house somebody who would love her, who

would look after her, who would make her old age pleasant.

She resided on a little property four leagues away from Rennes, and

she now dispensed with a servant. The expenses having increased to

more than double what they had been since this orphan's arrival, her

income of three thousand francs was no longer sufficient to support

three persons.

She attended to the housekeeping and the cooking herself, and she sent

out the boy on errands, letting him further occupy himself with

cultivating the garden. He was gentle, timid, silent, and caressing.

And she experienced a deep joy, a fresh joy at being embraced by him,

without any apparent surprise or repugnance being exhibited by him on

account of her ugliness. He called her "Aunt" and treated her as a

mother.

In the evening they both sat down at the fireside, and she got nice

things ready for him. She heated some wine and toasted a slice of

bread, and it made a charming little meal before going to bed. She

often took him on her knees and covered him with kisses, murmuring in

his ear with passionate tenderness. She called him: "My little flower,

my cherub, my adored angel, my divine jewel." He softly accepted her

caresses, concealing his head on the old maid's shoulder. Although he

was now nearly fifteen years old, he had remained small and weak, and

had a rather sickly appearance.

Sometimes Mademoiselle Source brought him to the city, to see two

married female relatives of hers, distant cousins, who were living in

the suburbs, and who were the only members of her family in existence.

The two women had always found fault with her for having adopted this

boy on account of the inheritance; but for all that they gave her a

cordial welcome, having still hopes of getting a share for themselves,

a third, no doubt, if what she possessed were only equally divided.

She was happy, very happy, always taken up with her adopted child. She

bought books for him to improve his mind, and he devoted himself

ardently to reading.

He no longer now climbed on her knees to fondle her as he had formerly

done; but instead would go and sit down in his little chair in the

chimney-corner and open a volume. The lamp placed at the edge of the

little table, above his head, shone on his curly hair, and on a

portion of his forehead; he did not move, he did not raise his eyes,

he did not make any gesture. He read on, interested, entirely absorbed

in the adventures which formed the subject of the book.

She, seated opposite to him, gazed at him with an eager, steady look,

astonished at his studiousness, often on the point of bursting into

tears.

She said to him now and then: "You will fatigue yourself, my

treasure!" in the hope that he would raise his head, and come across

to embrace her; but he did not even answer her; he had not heard or

understood what she was saying; he paid no attention to anything save

what he read in these pages.

For two years he devoured an incalculable number of volumes. His

character changed.

After this, he asked Mademoiselle Source many times for money, which

she gave him. As he always wanted more, she ended by refusing, for she

was both regular and energetic, and knew how to act rationally when it

was necessary to do so. By dint of entreaties he obtained a large sum

one night from her; but when he urged her to give him another sum a

few days later, she showed herself inflexible, and did not give way to

him further, in fact.

He appeared to be satisfied with her decision.

He again became quiet, as he had formerly been, loving to remain

seated for entire hours, without moving, plunged in deep reverie. He

now did not even talk to Madame Source, merely answering her remarks

with short, formal words. Nevertheless, he was agreeable and attentive

in his manner towards her; but he never embraced her now.

She had by this time grown slightly afraid of him when they sat facing

one another at night at opposite sides of the chimney-piece. She

wanted to wake him up, to make him say something, no matter what, that

would break this dreadful silence, which was like the darkness of a

wood. But he did not appear to listen to her, and she shuddered with

the terror of a poor feeble woman when she had spoken to him five or

six times successively without being able to get a word out of him.

What was the matter with him? What was going on in that closed up

head? When she had been thus two or three hours sitting opposite him,

she felt herself getting daft, and longed to rush away and to escape

into the open country in order to avoid that mute, eternal

companionship and also some vague danger, which she could not define,

but of which she had a presentiment.

She frequently shed tears when she was alone. What was the matter with

him? When she gave expression to a desire, he unmurmuringly carried it

into execution. When she wanted to have anything brought to her from

the city, he immediately went there to procure it. She had no

complaint to make of him; no, indeed! And yet....

Another year flitted by, and it seemed to her that a new modification

had taken place in the mind of the young man. She perceived it; she

felt it; she divined it. How? No matter! She was sure she was not

mistaken; but she could not have explained in what the unknown

thoughts of this strange youth had changed.

It seemed to her that till now he had been like a person in a

hesitating frame of mind who had suddenly arrived at a determination.

This idea came to her one evening as she met his glance, a fixed

singular glance which she had not seen in his face before.

Then, he commenced to watch her incessantly and she wished she could

hide herself in order to avoid that cold eye, riveted on her.

He kept staring at her, evening after evening for hours together, only

averting his eyes when she said, utterly unnerved:

"Do not look at me like that, my child!"

Then he hung down his head.

But, the moment her back was turned, she once more felt that his eyes

were upon her. Wherever she went he pursued her with his persistent

gaze.

Sometimes, when she was walking in her little garden, she suddenly

noticed him squatted on the stump of a tree as if he were lying in

wait for her; and again when she sat in front of the house mending

stockings while he was digging some cabbage-bed, he kept watching her,

as he worked, in a sly, continuous fashion.

It was in vain that she asked him:

"What's the matter with you, my boy? For the last three years you have

become very different. I don't find you the same. Tell me what ails

you, and what you are thinking of, I beg of you."

He invariably replied, in a quiet, weary tone:

"Why, nothing ails me, Aunt!"

And when she persisted, appealing to him thus:

"Ah! my child, answer me, answer me when I speak to you. If you knew

what grief you caused me, you would always answer, and you would not

look at me that way. Have you any trouble? Tell me! I'll console you!"

He went away with a tired air, murmuring:

"But there is nothing the matter with me, I assure you."

He had not grown much, having always a childish aspect, although the

features of his face were those of a man. They were, however, hard and

badly-cut. He seemed incomplete, abortive, only half-finished, and

disquieting as a mystery. He was a close, impenetrable being, in whom

there seemed always to be some active, dangerous mental travail taking

place.

Mademoiselle Source was quite conscious of all this, and she could not

from that time forth, sleep at night, so great was her anxiety.

Frightful terrors, dreadful nightmares assailed her. She shut herself

up in her own room, and barricaded the door, tortured by fear.

What was she afraid of? She could not tell.

Fear of everything, of the night, of the walls, of the shadows thrown

by the moon on the white curtains of the windows, and above all, fear

of him.

Why?

What had she to fear? Did she know what it was?

She could live this way no longer! She felt certain that a misfortune

threatened her, a frightful misfortune.

She set forth secretly one morning, and went into the city to see her

relatives. She told them about the matter in a gasping voice. The two

women thought she was going mad and tried to reassure her.

She said:

"If you knew the way he looks at me from morning till night. He never

takes his eyes off me! At times, I feel a longing to cry for help, to

call in the neighbors, so much am I afraid. But what could I say to

them? He does nothing to me except to keep looking at me."

The two female cousins asked:

"Is he ever brutal to you? Does he give you sharp answers?"

She replied:

"No, never; he does everything I wish; he works hard; he is steady;

but I am so frightened I don't mind that much. He has something in his

head, I am certain of that--quite certain. I don't care to remain all

alone like that with him in the country."

The relatives, scared by her words, declared to her that they were

astonished, and could not understand her; and they advised her to keep

silent about her fears and her plans, without, however, dissuading her

from coming to reside in the city, hoping in that way that the entire

inheritance would eventually fall into their hands.

They even promised to assist her in selling her house and in finding

another near them.

Mademoiselle Source returned home. But her mind was so much upset that

she trembled at the slightest noise, and her hands shook whenever any

trifling disturbance agitated her.

Twice she went again to consult her relatives, quite determined now

not to remain any longer in this way in her lonely dwelling. At last,

she found a little cottage in the suburbs, which suited her, and she

privately bought it.

The signature of the contract took place on a Tuesday morning, and

Mademoiselle Source devoted the rest of the day to the preparations

for her change of residence.

At eight o'clock in the evening she got into the diligence which

passed within a few hundred yards of her house, and she told the

conductor to let her down in the place where it was his custom to stop

for her. The man called out to her as he whipped his horses:

"Good evening, Mademoiselle Source--good night!"

She replied as she walked on:

"Good evening, Pere Joseph." Next morning, at half-past seven, the

postman who conveyed letters to the village, noticed at the

cross-road, not far from the high road, a large splash of blood not

yet dry. He said to himself: "Hallo! some boozer must have got a

bleeding in the nose."

But he perceived ten paces farther on a pocket-handkerchief also

stained with blood. He picked it up. The linen was fine, and the

postman in alarm, made his way over to the dike, where he fancied he

saw a strange object.

Mademoiselle Source was lying at the bottom on the grass, her throat

cut open with a knife.

An hour later, the gendarmes, the examining magistrate, and other

authorities made an inquiry as to the cause of death.

The two female relatives, called as witnesses, told all about the old

maid's fears and her last plans.

The orphan was arrested. Since the death of the woman who had adopted

him, he wept from morning till night, plunged at least to all

appearance, in the most violent grief.

He proved that he had spent the evening up to eleven o'clock in a

café. Ten persons had seen him, having remained there till his

departure.

Now the driver of the diligence stated that he had set down the

murdered woman on the road between half-past nine and ten o'clock.

The accused was acquitted. A will, a long time made, which had been

left in the hands of a notary in Rennes, made him universal legatee.

So he inherited everything.

For a long time, the people of the country put him into a quarantine,

as they still suspected him. His house, which was that of the dead

woman, was looked upon as accursed. People avoided him in the street.

But he showed himself so good-natured, so open, so familiar, that

gradually these horrible doubts were forgotten. He was generous,

obliging, ready to talk to the humblest about anything as long as they

cared to talk to him.

The notary, Maitre Rameay, was one of the first to take his part,

attracted by his smiling loquacity. He said one evening at a dinner at

the tax-collector's house:

"A man who speaks with such facility and who is always in good humor

could not have such a crime on his conscience."

Touched by his argument, the others who were present reflected, and

they recalled to mind the long conversations with this man who made

them stop almost by force at the road corners to communicate his ideas

to them, who insisted on their going into his house when they were

passing by his garden, who could crack a joke better than the

lieutenant of the gendarmes himself, and who possessed such contagious

gayety that, in spite of the repugnance with which he inspired them,

they could not keep from always laughing in his company.

All doors were opened to him, after a time.

He is, to-day, the mayor of his own township.

THE BLIND MAN

How is it that the sunlight gives us such joy? Why does this radiance

when it falls on the earth fill us with so much delight of living? The

sky is all blue, the fields are all green, the houses all white; and

our ravished eyes drink in those bright colors which bring

mirthfulness to our souls. And then there springs up in our hearts a

desire to dance, a desire to run, a desire to sing, a happy lightness

of thought, a sort of enlarged tenderness; we feel a longing to

embrace the sun.

The blind, as they sit in the doorways, impassive in their eternal

darkness, remain as calm as ever in the midst of this fresh gayety,

and, not comprehending what is taking place around them, they keep

every moment stopping their dogs from gamboling.

When, at the close of the day, they are returning home on the arm of a

young brother or a little sister, if the child says: "It was a very

fine day!" the other answers: "I could notice that 'twas fine. Loulou

wouldn't keep quiet."

I have known one of these men whose life was one of the most cruel

martyrdoms that could possibly be conceived.

He was a peasant, the son of a Norman farmer. As long as his father

and mother lived, he was more or less taken care of; he suffered

little save from his horrible infirmity; but as soon as the old people

were gone, an atrocious life of misery commenced for him. A dependent

on a sister of his, everybody in the farmhouse treated him as a beggar

who is eating the bread of others. At every meal the very food he

swallowed was made a subject of reproach against him; he was called a

drone, a clown; and although his brother-in-law had taken possession

of his portion of the inheritance, the soup was given to him

grudgingly--just enough to save him from dying.

His face was very pale, and his two big white eyes were like wafers;

and he remained unmoved in spite of the insults inflicted upon him, so

shut up in himself that one could not tell whether he felt them at

all.

Moreover, he had never known any tenderness, his mother having always

treated him unkindly, and caring scarcely at all for him; for in

country places the useless are obnoxious, and the peasants would be

glad, like hens, to kill the infirm of their species.

As soon as the soup had been gulped down, he went to the door in

summer-time and sat down, to the chimney-corner in winter time, and,

after that, never stirred all night. He made no gesture, no movement;

only his eyelids, quivering from some nervous affection, fell down

sometimes over his white, sightless orbs. Had he any intellect, any

thinking faculty, any consciousness of his own existence? Nobody cared

to inquire as to whether he had or no.

For some years things went on in this fashion. But his incapacity for

doing anything as well as his impassiveness eventually exasperated his

relatives, and he became a laughing-stock, a sort of martyred buffoon,

a prey given over to native ferocity, to the savage gaiety of the

brutes who surrounded him.

It is easy to imagine all the cruel practical jokes inspired by his

blindness. And, in order to have some fun in return for feeding him,

they now converted his meals into hours of pleasure for the neighbors

and of punishment for the helpless creature himself.

The peasants from the nearest houses came to this entertainment; it

was talked about from door to door, and every day the kitchen of the

farmhouse was full of people. Sometimes they put on the table, in

front of his plate, when he was beginning to take the soup, some cat

or some dog. The animal instinctively scented out the man's infirmity,

and, softly approaching, commenced eating noiselessly, lapping up the

soup daintily; and, when a rather loud licking of the tongue awakened

the poor fellow's attention, it would prudently scamper away to avoid

the blow of the spoon directed at it by the blind man at random!

Then the spectators huddled against the walls burst out laughing,

nudged each other, and stamped their feet on the floor. And he,

without ever uttering a word, would continue eating with the aid of

his right hand, while stretching out his left to protect and defend

his plate.

At another time they made him chew corks, bits of wood, leaves, or

even filth, which he was unable to distinguish.

After this, they got tired even of these practical jokes; and the

brother-in-law, mad at having to support him always, struck him,

cuffed him incessantly, laughing at the useless efforts of the other

to ward off or return the blows. Then came a new pleasure--the

pleasure of smacking his face. And the plough-men, the servant girls,

and even every passing vagabond were every moment giving him cuffs,

which caused his eyelashes to twitch spasmodically. He did not know

where to hide himself, and remained with his arms always held out to

guard against people coming too close to him.

At last he was forced to beg.

He was placed somewhere on the high-road on market-days, and as soon

as he heard the sound of footsteps or the rolling of a vehicle, he

reached out his hat, stammering:--

"Charity, if you please!"

But the peasant is not lavish, and for whole weeks he did not bring

back a sou.

Then he became the victim of furious, pitiless hatred. And this is how

he died.

One winter the ground was covered with snow, and it froze horribly.

Now his brother-in-law led him one morning at this season a great

distance along the high-road in order that he might solicit alms. The

blind man was left there all day, and when night came on, the

brother-in-law told the people of his house that he could find no

trace of the mendicant. Then he added:

"Pooh! best not bother about him! He was cold, and got someone to take

him away. Never fear! he's not lost. He'll turn up soon enough

to-morrow to eat the soup."

Next day, he did not come back.

After long hours of waiting, stiffened with the cold, feeling that he

was dying, the blind man began to walk. Being unable to find his way

along the road, owing to its thick coating of ice, he went on at

random, falling into dykes, getting up again, without uttering a

sound, his sole object being to find some house where he could take

shelter.

But by degrees the descending snow made a numbness steal over him, and

his feeble limbs being incapable of carrying him farther, he had to

sit down in the middle of an open field. He did not get up again.

The white flakes which kept continually falling buried him, so that

his body, quite stiff and stark, disappeared under the incessant

accumulation of their rapidly thickening mass; and nothing any longer

indicated the place where the corpse was lying.

His relatives made pretense of inquiring about him and searching for

him for about a week. They even made a show of weeping.

The winter was severe, and the thaw did not set in quickly. Now, one

Sunday, on their way to mass, the farmers noticed a great flight of

crows, who were whirling endlessly above the open field, and then,

like a shower of black rain, descended in a heap at the same spot,

ever going and coming.

The following week these gloomy birds were still there. There was a

crowd of them up in the air, as if they had gathered from all corners

of the horizon; and they swooped down with a great cawing into the

shining snow, which they filled curiously with patches of black, and

in which they kept rummaging obstinately. A young fellow went to see

what they were doing, and discovered the body of the blind man,

already half devoured, mangled. His wan eyes had disappeared, pecked

out by the long, voracious beaks.

And I can never feel the glad radiance of sunlit days without sadly

remembering and gloomily pondering over the fate of the beggar so

disinherited in life that his horrible death was a relief for all

those who had known him.

A WIFE'S CONFESSION

My friend, you have asked me to relate to you the liveliest

recollections of my life. I am very old, without relatives, without

children; so I am free to make a confession to you. Promise me one

thing--never to reveal my name.

I have been much loved, as you know; I have often myself loved. I was

very beautiful; I may say this to-day, when my beauty is gone. Love

was for me the life of the soul, just as the air is the life of the

body. I would have preferred to die rather than exist without

affection, without having somebody always to care for me. Women often

pretend to love only once with all the strength of their hearts; it

has often happened to be so violent in one of my attachments that I

thought it would be impossible for my transports ever to end. However,

they always died out in a natural fashion, like a fire when it has no

more fuel.

I will tell you to-day the first of my adventures, in which I was very

innocent, but which led to the others. The horrible vengeance of that

dreadful chemist of Pecq recalls to me the shocking drama of which I

was, in spite of myself, a spectator.

I had been a year married to a rich man, Comte Herve de Ker---- a

Breton of ancient family, whom I did not love, you understand. True

love needs, I believe at any rate, freedom and impediments at the same

time. The love which is imposed, sanctioned by law, and blessed by the

priest--can we really call that love? A legal kiss is never as good

as a stolen kiss. My husband was tall in stature, elegant, and a

really fine gentleman in his manners. But he lacked intelligence. He

spoke in a downright fashion, and uttered opinions that cut like the

blade of a knife. He created the impression that his mind was full of

ready-made views instilled into him by his father and mother, who had

themselves got them from their ancestors. He never hesitated, but on

every subject immediately made narrow-minded suggestions, without

showing any embarrassment and without realizing that there might be

other ways of looking at things. One felt that his head was closed up,

that no ideas circulated in it, none of those ideas which renew a

man's mind and make it sound, like a breath of fresh air passing

through an open window into a house.

The chateau in which we lived was situated in the midst of a desolate

tract of country. It was a large, melancholy structure, surrounded by

enormous trees, with tufts of moss on it resembling old men's white

beards. The park, a real forest, was enclosed in a deep trench called

the ha-ha; and at its extremity, near the moorland, we had big ponds

full of reeds and floating grass. Between the two, at the edge of a

stream which connected them, my husband had got a little hut built for

shooting wild ducks.

We had, in addition to our ordinary servants, a keeper, a sort of

brute devoted to my husband to the death, and a chambermaid, almost a

friend, passionately attached to me. I had brought her back from Spain

with me five years before. She was a deserted child. She might have

been taken for a gipsy with her dusky skin, her dark eyes, her hair

thick as a wood and always clustering around her forehead. She was at

the time sixteen years old, but she looked twenty.

The autumn was beginning. We hunted much, sometimes on neighboring

estates, sometimes on our own; and I noticed a young man, the Baron de

C----, whose visits at the chateau became singularly frequent. Then he

ceased to come; I thought no more about it; but I perceived that my

husband changed in his demeanor towards me.

He seemed taciturn and preoccupied; he did not kiss me; and, in spite

of the fact that he did not come into my room, as I insisted on

separate apartments in order to live a little alone, I often at night

heard a furtive step drawing near my door, and withdrawing a few

minutes after.

As my window was on the ground-floor I thought I had also often heard

someone prowling in the shadow around the chateau. I told my husband

about it, and, having looked at me intently for some seconds, he

answered:

"It is nothing--it is the keeper."

* * * * *

Now, one evening, just after dinner, Herve, who appeared to be

extraordinarily gay, with a sly sort of gaiety, said to me:

"Would you like to spend three hours out with the guns, in order to

shoot a fox who comes every evening to eat my hens?"

I was surprised. I hesitated; but, as he kept staring at me with

singular persistency, I ended by replying:

"Why, certainly, my friend." I must tell you that I hunted like a man

the wolf and the wild boar. So it was quite natural that he should

suggest this shooting expedition to me.

But my husband, all of a sudden, had a curiously nervous look; and all

the evening he seemed agitated, rising up and sitting down feverishly.

About ten o'clock, he suddenly said to me:

"Are you ready?"

I rose; and, as he was bringing me my gun himself, I asked:

"Are we to load with bullets or with deershot?"

He showed some astonishment; then he rejoined:

"Oh! only with deershot; make your mind easy! that will be enough."

Then, after some seconds, he added in a peculiar tone:

"You may boast of having splendid coolness."

I burst out laughing.

"I? Why, pray? Coolness because I went to kill a fox? But what are you

thinking of, my friend?"

And we quietly made our way across the park. All the household slept.

The full moon seemed to give a yellow tint to the old gloomy building,

whose slate roof glittered brightly. The two turrets that flanked it

had two plates of light on their summits, and no noise disturbed the

silence of this clear, sad night, sweet and still, which seemed in a

death-trance. Not a breath of air, not a shriek from a toad, not a

hoot from an owl; a melancholy numbness lay heavy on everything. When

we were under the trees in the park, a sense of freshness stole over

me, together with the odor of fallen leaves. My husband said nothing;

but he was listening, he was watching, he seemed to be smelling about

in the shadows, possessed from head to foot by the passion for the

chase.

We soon reached the edges of the ponds.

Their tufts of rushes remained motionless; not a breath of air

caressed it; but movements which were scarcely perceptible ran through

the water. Sometimes the surface was stirred by something, and light

circles gathered around, like luminous wrinkles enlarging

indefinitely.

When we reached the hut where we were to lie in wait, my husband made

me go in first; then he slowly loaded his gun, and the dry cracking of

the powder produced a strange effect on me. He saw that I was

shuddering, and asked:

"Does this trial happen to be quite enough for you? If so, go back."

I was much surprised, and I replied:

"Not at all. I did not come to go back without doing anything. You

seem queer this evening."