The first instinct of Jean Marot had been to kill Henri Lerouge.
Revenge is the natural heritage of his race. Revenge is taught as a
sacred duty in the common schools of France. Revenge keeps the fires
aglow under the boilers of French patriotism. Revenge is the first
thought to follow on the heels of private insult or personal injury.
It had been that of the ignorant human animal called Madeleine. How
the horrible design of Madeleine had chilled his blood! He was sorry
for the unhappy girl with a natural sympathy; yet he would have torn
her to pieces had she successfully carried her scheme of revenge into
execution.
Jean took to haunting Montrouge day and night, invariably passing down
Rue Dareau and contemplating No. 7, keeping his eye on the
porte-cochère and the fourth floor, as if she might be passing in or
out, or show herself at a lighted window. But he never saw her,--never
saw Lerouge. He never seemed to expect to see them.
He had ceased to attend classes. What were books and classes to him
now? He took more absinthe than was good for him.
His father's friend, Dr. Cardiac, visited him, remonstrated with him,
readily diagnosed his case, then wrote to Monsieur Marot the elder.
The result of this was a peremptory call home. To this summons Jean as
promptly replied. He refused to go. An equally prompt response told
him he had no home,--no father,--and that thenceforth he must shift
for himself,--that he had received his last franc.
Ten days later he unexpectedly encountered Mlle. Fouchette on
Boulevard St. Michel. It was Saturday evening, and all the student
world was abroad. But perhaps of that world none was more miserable
than Jean Marot.
"Ah! Then it is really you, monsieur?" There was a perceptible
coldness in her greeting. However, his condition was apparent. The
sharp blue eyes had taken his measure at a glance. She interrupted his
polite reply.
"Là! là! là! Then you are in trouble. You young men are always in
trouble. When it isn't one thing it is another."
"It is both this time, I'm afraid," he said, smiling at the heavy
philosophy from such a light source.
They crossed over and walked along the wall of the ancient College
d'Harcourt, where there were fewer people. The dark circles under his
handsome eyes seemed to soften her still further.
"I am sorry for you, monsieur."
"Thank you, mademoiselle."
"And poor Madeleine----"
"You have seen her, then?"
"Oh, of course!"
"Of course," he repeated.
"But, monsieur, you may not know that you were suspected of----"
"Go on," seeing her hesitation. "Of having something to do with it?"
"Precisely."
"I knew that."
To avoid the crowd and curious comment, Jean turned into the
Luxembourg garden.
"Well," he resumed, "you said I was suspected first by the police,
then----"
"By me," she said, promptly.
"By you!"
"Yes, monsieur."
"And what, my dear mademoiselle, had I done to merit so distinguished
an honor?"
"Dear me! monsieur, it was chiefly what you hadn't done; and then the
circumstantial evidence, you must confess, was strong."
"I realized that, also that in France it is not easy to get out of
prison, once in it, innocent or guilty."
"So you kept out. Very wisely, monsieur. But you know the papers next
morning spoke of Madeleine's lover, and talked of the lost clue of the
Place St. Jacques, where we met."
"It certainly would have been suspicious under some circumstances," he
admitted. "Now, if I had been her lover, for instance----"
"There! I went to the hospital. And don't you know, she would not
betray the man who did it, though she suffered horribly. She will lose
one of her eyes, poor girl!"
"Great heavens! What a misfortune!"
"Yes!"
"And she would not betray her assailant?"
"Not a word!" exclaimed Mlle. Fouchette. "I never believed Madeleine
could rise to that."
"Nor I," said Jean.
"And the police did worry that Lerouge," continued the girl.
"Oh, they did?"
"Yes; but he easily proved that he was not only not Madeleine's lover,
but that he was out somewhere with his--his----"
"Mistress, eh?" he said, bitterly. "Why not say it?"
"With his friend," she added, her eyes on the ground.
"Ugh!"
"But you, monsieur,--you have not yet told me your troubles. Your love
goes badly, I suppose, eh?"
"Always."
"It is the same old thing. I wonder how it is to be loved thus. Very
nice, no doubt."
"And has no one ever loved you, mademoiselle?" he asked.
"Non!"
"You astonish me! And the world is so full of lovers, too."
"I mean no man."
"Are you sure?"
"Very sure, monsieur. Could one be loved like that and not know it?"
"That is what I ask myself every day." He said this to himself rather
than to his wondering companion.
"Why, monsieur!----"
"But there are other things just now,--to-day," he said, abruptly
changing the subject; "and the worst thing----"
"The worst thing is money," she interrupted. "I have had 'the worst
thing.' It happens every now and then. You need not hesitate."
"Worse yet," he continued, smiling in spite of himself at her
conclusion.
"I can tell it in advance. It is the old story. Your love is not
reciprocated,--you neglect your classes,--you fail in the exams,--you
take to absinthe. Ah, çà!"
"Still worse, mon enfant."
"Ah! You play----"
"No. I never play. You are wrong only that once, mademoiselle."
He told her the truth. And she listened with the sage air of one who
knows all about it and was ready with her decision.
"Monsieur Marot,"--she paused a second,--"you think I'm a bad
girl----"
"Oh, don't be too sure of that. I----"
"Ah, çà!" impatiently waving his politeness aside; "but I owe you
much, and I would do you a service if possible."
"I thank you, mademoiselle."
"You think it impossible? Perhaps. I am nothing. I am only a poor
little woman, monsieur,--alone in the world. But I know this world,--I
have wrestled with it. I have had hard falls,--I got up again.
Therefore my experience has been bitter; but still it is experience."
"Sad experience, doubtless."
"Yes; and it ought to have taught me something, even if I were the
most stupid and vicious, eh?"
"Surely," he said.
"And my counsel ought to have some value in your eyes?"
"Why, yes; certainly, mademoiselle."
"At least it is disinterested----"
"Sure!"
"Go home!"
"But----"
She interrupted him sharply, nervously grasping his passive hand.
"Go home, Monsieur Jean,--at once!"
She trembled, and her voice grew low and softly sweet, and almost
pleading.
"Go home, Monsieur Jean! Leave all of this behind,--it is ruin!"
"Never! I cannot do that, mademoiselle. Besides, it is too late,--it
is impossible! I have no home, now. Never!"
"There!"
Mlle. Fouchette rose abruptly, shrugging her narrow shoulders with the
air of having done what she could and washing her hands of the
consequences. Her smile of half pity, half contempt, for the weakness
of a strong man clearly indicated that she had expected nothing and
was not disappointed. As he still remained absorbed in his own
miserable thoughts, she returned to the attack in a lively manner.
"So that is out of the way," she said. "Now let us see what you are
going to do. You probably have friends?"
"A few."
"Do not trust to friends, monsieur; it will spare you the humiliation
of finding them out. What are your resources?"
"I have none," he replied.
"How much money have you?"
"Nothing!"
"Ah, monsieur,"--she now sat down again, visibly softened,--"if you
will come and dine with me and petite Poupon we can talk it all over
at leisure, n'est-ce pas? I can make a bien joli pot-au-feu for a
franc,--which means soup, meat, and vegetables; and I know a petite
marchande de vins where one can get a litre of Bordeaux for cinquante,
which, with a salade at two sous and cheese for two more, will round
out a very good dinner for two. Ah! le voilà!"
She wound up her rapid summary of culinary delights with the charming
eagerness of a child, bringing forth from the folds of her dress a
small purse, through the netting of which glistened some silver coin,
and causing it to chink triumphantly.
Jean Marot, suddenly lifted out of himself by this impulsive
good-nature, was at first embarrassed, then stupefied. He was unable
to utter a word. He was ashamed of his own weakness; he was
overwhelmed by the sense of her impetuous good-will and practical
human sympathy. He silently pressed the thin hand which had
unconsciously crept into his.
"No, it is nothing," she said, lightly, withdrawing her hand. "I have
plenty to-day,--you will have it some other day; and then you can give
me a petit souper, monsieur, n'est-ce pas?"
"Very well. On that condition I will accept your invitation,
mademoiselle. We will dine with petite Poupon."
He had not the heart to tell her that his "nothing" meant a few
hundred francs to his credit and a few louis in his pocket at that
moment,--more than she had ever possessed at any one time in her life.
As it was, she walked along by his side with that feeling of
camaraderie experienced by those in the same run of luck as to the
world's goods, and with that buoyancy of spirit which attends a good
action. The few francs and odd sous in the little purse were abundant
for to-day,--the morrow could take care of itself.
They turned up the narrow Rue Royer-Collard, where she stopped for the
litre of Bordeaux, responding gayly to the wayside queries and
comments. Reaching the Rue St. Jacques, there were the salad and the
cheese to add to the necessary part of the French meal; and the bit of
beef and the inevitable onions brought up the rear of purchases.
"I have some potatoes and carrots," she said, reflectively,--"so much
saved. Let us see. It is not so bad,--quatre-vingt-cinq, dix,
cinquante,--un franc quarante-cinq."
She made the calculation as they went up the worn stairway after the
passage of the tunnel.
"Not half bad," said he, compelled to admire her cleverness.
Reaching her chamber, she deposited the entire evening investment on
the hearth, proceeding to the preliminary features of preparation. She
threw her hat on the bed, then pulled off the light bolero and sent it
after the hat, and then she began slipping out of her skirt by
suddenly letting it fall in a ring about her feet.
"Oh!" said Jean.
"Excuse me, will you? I can't risk my pretty skirt for appearances.
You won't mind, monsieur? Non!"
"That's right," he said,--"a skirt is only a skirt."
He watched her with a half-amused expression as she flitted nervously
about, more doll-like than ever she was, in the short yellow silken
petticoat with its terminating ruffles, or cheap lace balayeuse, her
blonde hair loosely drooping over her ears and caught up behind in the
prevailing fashion of the quarter. She kept up a continual chatter as
she opened drawers, prepared the potatoes, and arranged the little
table.
Poupon was already singing in the chimney-place. Her conversation, by
habit, was mostly directed to her little oil-stove, as if it were a
sentient thing, something to be encouraged by flattery and restrained
by reproach. It was the camaraderie of loneliness.
But to Jean, who was quick to fall back into his own reveries, her
voice died away into incomprehensible jargon. Once he glanced at the
sketch still on the wall and thought of her purring over her work like
a satisfied cat, then the next instant again forgot her. Now and then
she bestowed a keen glance on him or a passing word, but left him no
time to answer or to formulate any distinct idea as to what it was
about. Suddenly she pounced upon him with,--
"Monsieur Marot?"
"Well?"
"You still live----"
"Faubourg St. Honoré."
"Mon Dieu! How foolish!"
"Yes,--now," he admitted.
"You must change. What rent do you pay?"
"Fourteen hundred----"
"Dame! And the lease?"
"Two years yet to run," said he.
"Peste! What a bother!"
"But the rent is paid."
"Oh, very well. It can be sold. And the furniture?"
"Mine."
"Good! How much?"
"It cost about three thousand francs."
"It's a fortune, monsieur," she exclaimed, with sparkling eyes. "And
here I thought you were--purée!"
"Broke?"
"Yes,--that you had nothing."
"It is not much to me, who----"
"No; I understand that. I once read of a rich American who committed
suicide because he was suddenly reduced to two hundred and fifty
thousand francs. That was very drôle, was it not?"
"To most people, yes; but it would not be funny for one who had been
accustomed to twice or five times that much every year."
"No,--I forgot," she said, reflectively, "about your affairs,
monsieur. It is very simple."
"Is it?" He laughed lugubriously.
"You simply accept conditions. You give up your present mode of
living; you sell your lease and furniture; you take a small place here
somewhere, get only what is necessary, then find something to do. Why,
you will be independent,--rich!"
"Only, you omit one thing in the calculation, mademoiselle."
She divined at once what that was.
"One must arrange for the stomach before talking about love. And how,
then, is a young man to provide for a girl when he can't provide for
himself? Let the girl alone until you begin to see the way. Don't be
ridiculous, Monsieur Jean. No woman can love a man who is ridiculous.
Jamais!"
Love is not exactly a synonyme for Reason. To be in love is in a
measure to part company with the power of ratiocination. Nevertheless,
Jean saw in an absent-minded way that Mlle. Fouchette, for whom he had
never entertained even that casual respect accorded by the Anglo-Saxon
to womanhood in general, spoke the words of sense and soberness. His
intolerant nature, that would never have brooked such freedom from a
friend, allowed everything from one who was too insignificant to
excite resentment or even reply. In the same fashion Jean was touched
by the exhibition of human interest and womanly sympathy in this waif
of civilization. And he was of too gentle a heart not to meet it with
a show of appreciation. It gave her pleasure and did not hurt him. The
fact that she was probably abandoned and vicious in no wise lessened
this consideration,--possibly increased his confidence in her
disinterested counsel.
In Paris one elbows this species every day,--in the Quartier Latin
young Frenchmen come in contact with it every night,--and without that
sense of self-abasement or disgust evoked by similar association in
the United States. The line of demarcation that separates
respectability from shame is not rigidly drawn in Paris; in the
Quartier Latin, where the youth of France and, to a considerable
extent, of the whole world are prepared for earth and heaven, it
cannot be said to be drawn at all.
By his misfortunes Jean Marot had unexpectedly fallen within her
reach. With her natural spirit of domination she had at once
appropriated the position of mentor and manager. The precocious
worldliness of her mentality amused while it sometimes astonished him.
This comparatively ignorant girl of eighteen had no hesitation in
guiding the man of more mature years, and succeeded through her
naïveté rather than by force of character. The weakest of women can
dominate the strongest of men.
"Doctors never prescribe for themselves," she said, by way of
justifying her interest in him. "Is it not so, Monsieur Jean?"
"No; but they call in somebody of their own profession," he replied.
"Not if he had the same disease, surely!" she retorted.
"So you think love a disease?" he laughingly asked.
"Virulent, but not catching," said she, helping him to some soup.
There were no soup-plates and she had dipped it from the pot with a
teacup and served it in a bowl; but the soup was just as good and was
rich with vegetable nutrition. He showed his appreciation by a
vigorous onslaught.
"And if it were a disease and catching?" he remarked presently.
"Then you would not be here," she replied. "You see, I'd run too much
risk. As it is--have some more wine?--But who understands love better
than a woman, monsieur?"
"Oh, I surrender, mademoiselle,--that is, provided she has loved and
loves no longer."
"Been sick and been cured, eh?" she suggested. "But that is more than
you require of the medical profession."
"True----"
He paused and listened. She turned her head at the same moment. There
were two distinct raps on the wall. He had heard, vaguely, the sound
of persons coming and going next door; had distinguished voices in the
next flat. There was nothing strange about that. But the knock was the
knock of design and at once arrested his attention.
The young girl started to her feet, her finger on her lips.
"He wants me," she said.
"That is evident, whoever 'he' may be," replied Jean, significantly.
"Oh, it is only Monsieur de Beauchamp. A sitting, perhaps," she added.
She slipped out of the room without deeming it necessary to resume her
overskirt. The feminine inhabitants of Rue St. Jacques were so
extremely unconventional,--they not infrequently went down into the
street for rolls and other articles attired in this charming negligée
of the bedroom boudoir. And would, perhaps, have extended this
unconventionality to the neighboring cafés, only the proprietaires
had to draw a line somewhere, and had unanimously drawn it at hats
and skirts, or full street dress.
Jean began to think himself entirely deserted, when Mlle. Fouchette
burst rather than walked into the room conducting her next-door
neighbor.
Jean saw before him a man scarcely older than himself, rather spare of
figure and pale of face, in the garb of a provincial and with an air
of the Jesuit enthusiast rather than the student of art. His long,
dark hair was thick and bushy and worn trimmed straight around the
neck after the fashion of Jeanne d'Arc's time. It completely hid his
ears and fell in sprays over his temples. His face was the typical
Christ of the old masters, the effect being heightened by the soft,
fine, virgin beard and moustache of somewhat fairer color, and by the
melancholy eyes, dark and luminous, with their curled and drooping
lashes. These eyes gave rather a suggestion of sadness and inward
suffering, but when animated seemed to glow with the smouldering fire
of centuries.
"Pardon, Monsieur de Beauchamp," said Jean, upon being introduced to
him, "but mademoiselle appears to have forgotten me for art."
"Ah! and as if there were no art in making a salad!" exclaimed the
painter, as he shook hands with the other.
"Oh! là, là, là!" cried Mlle. Fouchette, wresting the dish from Jean's
grasp; "there would be precious little art in this if you made it!"
And she proceeded with the salad on her own account, using the two
bowls that had but recently served them for soup.
Monsieur de Beauchamp and Jean discussed the student "manifestations"
planned for the next day. The Dreyfusardes--a term by which all who
differed from the military régime were known--had announced a public
meeting, and a counter-demonstration had been called to not only
prevent that meeting but to publicly chastise such as dared to take
part in it.
No attempt was made to conceal these patriotic intentions from the
police. The walls blazed with flaming revolutionary posters. The
portrait of the Duc d'Orléans appeared over specious promises in case
of Restoration. The Royal Claimant was said to be concealed in Paris.
At any rate, his agents were busy. They were in league with the
Bonapartists, the Socialists, the Anti-Semites, against the things
that were, and called the combination Nationalists. They were really
Opportunists. The republic overthrown, they agreed to fight out their
rival claims to power between themselves.
The unfortunate Jew merely served them as a weapon. They were the real
traitors to their country. With the most fulsome adulation and the Jew
they courted the army and sought to lead it against the republic.
And the republic,--poor, weak, headless combination of
inconsistencies,--through a tricky and vacillating Ministry and a
bitter, factional Parliament, greatly encouraged the idea of any sort
of a change.
Popular intolerance had, after a farcical civil trial overawed by
military authority, driven the foremost writer of France into exile,
as it had Voltaire and Rousseau and many thousands of the best blood
of the French before him.
The many noble monuments of the Paris carrefours, representing the
élite of France, the heroes, the apostles of letters and liberty, who
were murdered, exiled, denied Christian burial or dragged through the
streets after death by Frenchmen, stand morally united in one grand
monumental fane commemorative of French intolerance.
Wherever is reared a monument to French personal worth, there also is
a mute testimonial of collective French infamy.
"Dans la rue!" was now the battle-cry.
All of these student "manifestations" were seized upon by the worst
elements of Paris. The estimable character of these elements found in
the Place Maubert and vicinity may be surmised from the fact that a
few days previous to the event about to be herein recorded twenty men
of the neighborhood were chosen to maintain its superiority to the
Halles Centrales against a like number selected by the latter.
The contending factions were drawn up in order of battle in Place
Maubert, on Boulevard St. Germain, in broad afternoon, each man being
armed with a knife, and precipitated an engagement that required one
hundred police reserves to quell.
"If we could only keep that pestiferous gang out of our
manifestations," said Jean now to Monsieur de Beauchamp,--"they
disgrace us always!"
"Oh, but they are good fighters; and there is to be fighting pretty
soon," observed the artist.
"Vive l'armée!" cried Mlle. Fouchette, flourishing a salad-spoon.
Mlle. Fouchette had a martial spirit.
"Whenever a student is arrested he turns out to be one of the roughs
of Place Maubert or a hoodlum of Rue Monge, or a cutthroat of Rue
Mouffetard. It is disgraceful!"
"But it shows the discretion of our police, Monsieur Marot," said the
artist, with his sweet smile. "You see the police are with us. We must
not be too particular who fights on our side, my friend. We can't
afford to quarrel with anybody just now going in our direction. They
are but means to an end, let us remember, and that end the ancient
prestige and glory of France."
"À bas les Juifs!" exclaimed Mlle. Fouchette, without looking up.
The godlike face of the painter glowed with the enthusiasm that
consumed his soul. He now turned his grand eyes upon the girl with
inexpressible sadness.
"That is a question that does not concern us," said he, "except as
another means to an end. Innocent or guilty, shall the pleasure or
pain of one man stand between the millions of our countrymen and the
welfare and perpetuity of France?"
"Never!" cried Mlle. Fouchette, in her excitement bringing down the
salad-bowl with a crash that sent the pieces flying about the room.
"Parbleu!" exclaimed Jean, laughing heartily; "there goes my salad!"
"No; the salad is here. There goes my pretty bowl!"
"Very well, then, let us turn out to-morrow, Monsieur Marot, and do
our duty. Au revoir."
In parting the artist nodded his head in cold recognition of the
existence of Mlle. Fouchette. The latter turned on her dainty heel
with a glance at Jean that spoke volumes. But she began arranging the
little table slowly, absent-mindedly, without a word. He thought she
was lamenting the loss of the salad-bowl.
"I'll buy you a pretty one," he said.
"A pretty--er--a what?"
"Salad-bowl."
"Oh, dame! I was not thinking of the salad-bowl."
"Something more serious?"
"Yes. Don't go to-morrow, Monsieur Jean!"
Her voice was earnest, but sunk to a whisper. He regarded her with
astonishment.
"Don't go, Monsieur Jean!" she repeated. "Have nothing to do with
them! There will be two thousand hired roughs from La Villette, the
killers from the abattoirs, and----" She stopped short.
"How now, mon enfant? How----"
But she had clapped her small hand over his mouth in a half-vexed,
half-frightened way, with a definite gesture towards the next room.
"Have a care, monsieur," she whispered in his ear, then laughingly
resumed her bantering tone. "How do you like my salad? Is it not
capital?"