once upon a time set my village in uproar. At that distant date one of
the notables of the hamlet, a locksmith by trade, who had "inherited
property," was Claude Guillorit. Without vanity in his Roman Emperor's
name, he carried it with the quiet dignity of a man whose future is
assured. He was a "scholar," incredibly learned in the accumulation of
miscellaneous facts which almanacs spread even in the remotest
districts. He quoted proverbs, was full of strange saws, foretold the
future--approximately. He was to be met with by night, carrying a large
basket, in search of simples, which have special virtues when gathered
after sun-down. He brewed philters for the benefit of man and beast, and
cured fevers, I must admit, more easily than he did locks.
For, in spite of his explicit locksmith's sign, locks were wrapped in
mystery for Claudit--so called "for short." Village housewives, whose
furniture knows not intricate locks, are at the end of their resources
when they have cleaned the rust off their keys, or smeared a creaky lock
with oil. If the evil persisted, in those days, the cry of supreme
distress used to be: "Go and get Claudit," even as Napoleon's cry was:
"Send forward the guard!" when he was at the end of his genius.
Accompanied by a formidable clatter of ironware, a little slim, spare,
sharp man would approach, with long gray locks swinging about his face,
after straggling from under a black round of which no one could have
declared with any certainty whether it had been a hat or a cap at the
time of the Revolution. But it was not his headgear that held the eye.
What struck one, what fixed the attention, what filled even a person
unacquainted with him with a sort of superstitious uneasiness, was the
black dart of two small, lustreless eyes, which entered one's very soul
and stuck there. When the shaft of Claudit's glance had pierced one, it
was not to be plucked from the memory. The man, however, did not concern
himself with the impression he produced; he never broke the silence
except from necessity, and then spoke only of things pertaining to lock
mending.
When he had arrived before the recalcitrant lock, he would throw on the
ground--together with the great basket from which he was never
separated, and which no one ever saw open except on one memorable
occasion--an iron hoop, whence hung an extraordinary number of queerly
wrought and bent hooks; then he would kneel down as if in prayer, and
apply his eye to the keyhole. After a moment of scientific examination:
"_Pardine!_" he would cry--it was his favourite oath--"I see nothing at
all."
In which there was nothing surprising. Claudit seemed, none the less, to
experience great relief from this first ascertainment. Then followed
questions regarding the piece of furniture, what was its history, and
the probable age of its lock, then groans over the wretched work done in
olden days. And now the moment had come for the diagnosis. Every lock
may be afflicted with any one of numerous ailments. Claudit would
enumerate them with great erudition, giving his client his choice among
the various evils.
"It may be that, or it may be something else. I am no wizard. We shall
see."
Thereupon a storm of hammerblows would beat upon the wood and the iron.
The cloudburst over, the key would function no better.
He would have to resort to subtler methods. Unperturbed, Claudit would
brandish his hoop with the pendent hooks, and having examined each with
care, would select one and insert it very deliberately, with appropriate
contortions, into the orifice where lay the seat of the trouble.
Creakings would ensue beyond anything ever heard. Up and down, down and
up, from left to right, and right to left, and all around the compass,
he would turn and twist and rub the rusty point, would force it to the
exhaustion of human strength, and, since the truth must be told, I will
confess that I have seen locks which under this violent treatment took
the provisional course of behaving themselves. Claudit would exhibit no
pride. Such triumphs of his art were not calculated to surprise him.
When the lock seemed to be entirely bedevilled, Claudit would draw from
his pocket a two-penny knife, the blade of which had gained a saw-edge
from much usage, and for the final satisfaction of conscience would do
what he could by "rummaging" with it. After that it was finished.
"The King himself could do no more," he would declare, fully assured
that Louis Philippe would have succeeded no better than he. "If you
like, I will make you a new lock."
Do not imagine that the manufacture of this lock would give Claudit any
great trouble. He sent to Nantes for his locks. He unscrewed one, and
screwed on another, and by this simple performance acquired the
reputation of a "skilled workman."
A little forge was attached to his house. It was littered with iron
junk. But no man alive ever saw it lighted, so that hens had formed the
habit of making their nest amid the cinders of the hearth, and the white
gleam of eggs was pleasant to see at the bottom of the crater where one
looked for glowing coals. I have seen as many as ten, for Claudit, owing
to an extreme love of poultry, permitted large numbers of hens to wander
at will about his dwelling.
In reality, the mending of locks and the brewing of healing philters
were merely the recreations of his life. Its passion was "the little
hen," as he tenderly called her. One of those silent passions deeply
rooted in our inmost being, for the satisfaction of which the Evil One
besieges us with temptations. It is certain that between Claudit and the
gallinaceous tribe obscure affinities existed. On Claudit's side the
sentiment might be explained by an appetite for toothsome eating. But
why did the hen feel Claudit's fascination? Why did she stand there,
stupidly motionless, fastened to the ground by the magnetism of that
black eye? They say that hypnotized hens will drop of themselves into
the fox's jaws. To quote Hamlet: "There are more things in heaven and
earth than are dreamed of in your philosophy."
Curious as it may seem, Claudit was not the only one in our village to
cultivate a fondness for poultry. From time immemorial housewives on all
sides had complained of missing hens. Everyone blamed it on the tramps,
who were never there to answer back. Claudit more than any other
suffered from these thefts, and bewailed his losses at every street
corner. His white hen gone, his black hen and his yellow hen gone, the
thieves were cleaning him out--and the neighbours got Christian
consolation in their misfortunes from the reflection that Claudit was
even more cruelly hit than they.
Claudit, as may be imagined, was on the lookout for marauders, but in
vain. One day he saw one, but was unable to catch up with him. It was a
bent old man, dragging along a bag, full of hens, no doubt. "A regular
gray fox," muttered the wronged and indignant Claudit.
The name stuck to the unknown. His description was given to the police,
and a warning was sent out by the authorities, against the despoiler of
farms, and chief of a band of marauders, known under the name of "Gray
Fox."
One day Claudit, on his way home from a heated battle with a stubborn
lock, was crossing the village, when he stopped at sight of a crowd. An
aged tramp, bent double under the weight of a coarse canvas bag, was
struggling with the rural guard, who had found him lying asleep beside a
ditch and was accusing him of all the vague crimes reported over the
whole canton. The women had come running out of their houses, and each
of them had some accusation to bring against the malefactor. One in
particular was making an outcry:
"My cuckoo hen was stolen this morning. He took it! Come, now, give me
back my hen and go get yourself hanged elsewhere!"
"Ah! So you stole a hen, did you?" exclaimed the rural guard. "I knew
there was something wrong."
Then addressing the crowd: "The bent old man with a bag is the 'Gray
Fox,' isn't he? You are the 'Gray Fox,' aren't you? You may as well
confess."
It was here that Claudit arrived upon the scene, by good luck, for
having once seen the thief, he could identify him better than any one
else. Way was made for him, and the entire village, hanging on his lips,
waited to hear what he would say.
"_Pardine!_" said Claudit, scratching his ear, "I believe we've got him
this time. Yes, yes, I recognize him. He is the 'Gray Fox.'"
"Hoo--hoo! To prison with the Gray Fox!" howled the delirious crowd.
"Give me back my cuckoo hen!" screamed the housewife.
But the man, not in the least agitated, straightened up and said:
"So I am the Gray Fox, am I? My word! You are too great fools! Often
enough, from the other side of a hedge, I have seen him at work, your
Gray Fox. I know him. Do you want me to show him to you?"
And with a kick he overturned Claudit's basket, whence fell the dead
body of the much-lamented cuckoo hen.
The entire canton still echoes with this spectacular stroke. With blows
and kicks the Gray Fox, the real one, was led back to his lair, and
there, in a secret cellar, was discovered a collection of stolen hens,
peacefully awaiting their turn to be cooked with accompaniment of
cabbage. Everyone recognized his own hen, and everyone hastily seized
it. Even Claudit's legitimate hens went by that road. But he was not the
man to let himself be despoiled in silence.
"You say these hens are yours!" he cried. "I know nothing about it. I am
willing to give them to you. But I shall let nobody steal the hens that
belong to me."
And before a week had passed, Claudit had, by the power of speech, got
back all his hens, with, it was said, a few of doubtful ownership into
the bargain.
To this insistence and its success he owed a return of public esteem.
But when a lock thereafter required his attention he was emphatically
bidden to leave his basket at home.
XII
THE ADVENTURE OF MY CURÉ
I have had no very consecutive relations with the _curé_ of my village.
Many things stand between us. Our age, our occupations, our ideas. He
follows one path, I another. Which does not prevent our occasionally
meeting out in the country, or at the cross roads. We exchange greetings
which vary according to the time of day; we occasionally talk of the
weather, as it is, and as it should be to satisfy the peasants. In the
crops we find yet another subject for a brief conversation. But we
rarely venture beyond this circle of observations. His breviary claims
him, and the finger marking the page of his interrupted reading is a
delicate hint that the talk had best be brief. I have partridges to
deliver, and must not linger, either. There is a slight awkwardness
between us, even in saying good-bye. I am anxious not to say anything
that may offend the simplicity of his faith, but I always fear one of
those somewhat indiscreet suggestions which priests regard as part of
their duty. On his side, it is evident that he dreads my so far
forgetting myself as to make remarks which will oblige him to stand on
the defensive. I cannot help seeing that I am an incomprehensible enigma
to him, whereas his state of mind is not in the least puzzling to me.
How can I explain this mystery to him, without cruelly wounding him? We
therefore part, after a few conventional words, regretting the necessity
to stop short on the verge of a conversation which tempts us both, and
aware that we have something to say to each other which we shall never
say. To his last day he will undoubtedly regard me as an agent of the
Devil. And on my side I can only silently sympathize with his sorrow in
the recesses of my mind.
Abbé Mignot is a tall, robust, florid Burgundian, whose muscular frame
seems better suited to field labour than to the unctuous gestures of the
sacred ministry. The son of a vintner, he had begun life as a plowboy,
when an aged singer, who had been a great sinner while she trod the
boards of light opera in Paris, returned to her native village, there to
acquire spiritual merit by good works, which the remuneration for vice
out in the world enabled her to do. She reared altars, and munificently
endowed them. She enriched the church with incomparable raiment. The
pulpit praised the zeal of the excellent donor, who was earning Heaven
by the virtues belonging to old age, and by preaching austerity to
others.
One day this saintly lady, in quest of redemption, met at the edge of
the village a dishevelled boy who was subduing the fierceness of a
young bullock by the aid of sounding oaths and a shower of blows. The
picture seemed to her beautiful, even though the music was profane. She
questioned the child, whose precocious adolescence called up distant
memories connected with this same muddy, rustic setting, and being
suddenly vouchsafed light from on high, she conceived the plan of
redeeming her very earliest sin (which had led to so many others), by
means of the young bullock driver who seemed to her on the brink of
perdition. Providence, and not chance, had set on her path this
innocence to be saved from imminent peril. What an admirable priest the
youth would make, when properly scrubbed, with his great clear eyes, his
blond curls, his laughing insolence of a conquering hero! So the sinner
who had turned away so many souls from the path to Heaven would redeem
the past forever by leaving behind her an authentic servant of God, to
keep up the necessary expiatory work after her death.
All would have been well had not the vintner hung mightily back. His son
had cost him "a lot of money." He was just about to "bring him in
something" now. This was not the time for sending him away.
"If he goes," he said, "I shall have to hire a servant.... That costs a
great deal, counting his food. I can't afford it."
But the more obdurate the peasant was, the more obstinate became the
devout lady in her resolve to accomplish the duty laid upon her by
Heaven, as she declared. Negotiations were difficult, for Father Mignot
had no liking for "skullcaps," as he called priests, and a double
argument had to be used: one bag of money to repay him for his
"pecuniary loss," and a second bag to allay the scruples of
anticlericalism, aggravated by the circumstances. And this is what was
called "The vocation of Arsène Mignot."
More than twenty years later, Abbé Mignot came to us with the remnants
of his family: a widowed sister and three nephews without means of
support. As I am telling nothing but what is strictly true, I have to
admit that he met with a chilly reception. The old _curé_, whom we had
just lost, had had enough to do to guard his eighty years from the heat
and the cold, and to quaver out his masses. Our peasants are not fond of
being too closely questioned. When they saw this new man, still under
forty, carrying his need for action into their very houses, breaking,
from one day to the next, the happy-go-lucky traditions which had made
his predecessor popular, they silently assumed the attitude of
self-defence. But the _curé_, being a peasant, knew his peasants. When
he discovered his mistake, he had the sense to change his course, and to
win back the discontented, one by one, without noise or waste of words.
And so, our village would have had no story, but for a hospital
belonging to it, and standing in a hamlet two miles away. This hospital,
privately endowed, was tended by four nuns of I know not what order.
Disease, however, never marred the spot by its presence. Against the
express wish of the founder, a school had been established in it, and
any sick person coming to ask admission was told that his presence would
be dangerous to the school children, upon which he obediently went to
die elsewhere. Two elderly spinsters, who did the work of servants,
figured in the Sisters' conversation as "our incurables." By this means
they were entitled to retain the inscription on the wall, announcing
that hospital care might there be obtained.
Concerning the Sisters themselves there is nothing to say. They taught
the catechism, sang off the key at mass, and made a great show of zeal
toward the one they called "Mother." Their chief entertainment was
luncheon at the _curé's_ on Sunday after church. A sweet dish and a
little glass of Chartreuse crowned this extravagance. Then there would
be much puerile chatter on topics drawn chiefly from the _Religious
Weekly_. New recruits were proudly enumerated, eyes were rolled
heavenward at talk of "apostates," and the latest miracles were related
in minutest detail. A touch of politics occasionally spiced the heroic
resolution to brave martyrdom. At parting, all were in a state of
edification.
The trouble was that Abbé Mignot, without income, had four mouths to
feed. The cost of the luncheon could not be brought within the limits of
his budget. He made a frank confession of this to the "Mother," who
answered haughtily that privation was the luxury of her estate, and that
the Sisters would uncomplainingly return to sharing the "bread of the
sick," at the hospital. Her words came true, for the very next week
there was a patient at the hospital: the "Mother" herself, whom an
attack of erysipelas carried off in three days. The school had to be
dismissed and everything scientifically disinfected, before the scholars
could return. This duty fell upon the new Mother, a charming young nun,
whose beautiful eyes, gentle speech, and affable manners, created a
sensation in the countryside.
Mother Rosalie was gifted with a beautiful soprano voice, which proved
to be a source of divine refreshment to Abbé Mignot, who was fond of
playing the organ. There can be no music without work. Work at their
music threw the Mother and the _curé_ together. And as one study leads
to another, the visits of Mother Rosalie to Abbé Mignot came to be
fairly frequent. Presently there was gossip, and after a time what had
at first been a playful buzzing became rumblings of scandal. Is it
credible? The first threat of a storm came from the three Sisters at the
hospital. These old maids, who had until that moment been totally
insignificant, felt surging in them, of a sudden, an irrepressible wave
of spleen, intensified and again intensified by the acid of celibacy.
Although touched in a sensitive spot by the discontinuance of luncheon
at the rectory on Sundays, sole amusement of their lives, they had made
no sign. But the moment their one-time host laid himself open to
criticism, the hurricane burst, and the flood of heinous words came
beating against the very walls of the sacred edifice.
Nothing can be hidden in a village. Life is carried on in broad
daylight. The ditches, the stones, the bushes have eyes. Everyone knew
very well that Abbé Mignot and "the pretty Mother," as she was currently
called, had never met anywhere but in the church, the door of which was
open to all. The pealing of the organ and the pure voice rising to the
rafters ought, it would seem, to have counteracted the poison of
malevolent insinuations.
"Certainly," said the peasants, "they are doing no harm, _as long as
they keep on singing_!"
Occasionally, when the organ was silent, Mother Rosalie knelt in the
confessional. Busybodies, stationed behind pillars, considered that she
remained there too long, and that she confessed oftener than necessary.
This was all that any one could find to say against them. I did my best
to defend them, when occasion arose, but the only effect of my pleading,
I fear, was to give more importance to the spiteful words.
Meanwhile, Abbé Mignot and Mother Rosalie continued happy in their music
and their friendship. I never knew Mother Rosalie, and will not invent a
psychology for her. We exchanged a few words on several occasions, and I
received the impression of a remarkably refined nature. Whatever I might
say beyond this would be drawn from my imagination. With regard to the
Abbé, the reader is as well qualified to judge him as I. Bound over to
continence by an adept in the reverse, he resigned himself to inevitable
fate, the cruelty of which he had recognized when it was too late.
Heaven, chance, or destiny had thrown a friendly soul in his path, a
prisoner of the same destiny. He surrendered to the delight of the
association, happy to come out of himself, to give a little of his life,
to receive something of a human life in return, and to feel his pleasure
shared. They did not conceal themselves, having nothing to conceal. This
seemed to them a safeguard, under the eyes of their brothers in
humanity.
The "scandal" lasted three months. One fine day, without warning, an
elderly, hunchbacked Sister descended from the coach, and having entered
the hospital, exhibited, along with her titles as the new "Mother," the
order to "Sister Rosalie" to return _within the hour_ to the convent.
Sister Rosalie bowed her head in submission, asked whether time would be
allowed her for one leave-taking, and upon receiving a negative answer,
retired to her chamber, "to pray and to obey." She came out with
faltering steps, and departed never to return.
The following day was Sunday. The event had been kept secret for the
sake of a more dramatic climax. When the priest, coming before the
altar, met the shock of the sardonic joy twisting the lips of the
hunchbacked Mother and her three acolytes in the charity of the Lord, he
fell a step backward, as if mocked by Satan himself. Pale, shaken, he
was unable to restrain the trembling of his lips. The thunderbolt had
struck. In the anguish of death he retained the appearance of life, and
must play the part of a living man. By an heroic effort he regained self
command. Violently the _Introit_ rang out, as if from depths beyond the
grave, and in it were mingled the tragedy of the man and of the God.
There was but one word at the end of mass:
"_Monsieur le curé_ made the pretty Mother sing too much. She has gone
away to rest."
Last month I met Abbé Mignot out among the rocks of Deux Fontaines. He
sat with knitted brows at the foot of a bush, and nervously turned the
pages of his breviary. He was evidently making a desperate effort to
fasten down his wandering attention. He did not notice me, and had not
my dog run up to him, I should have turned and walked away, to avoid
disturbing him in his lonely struggle. When he saw me he rose, afraid of
having been caught betraying something of himself. I held out my hand
in friendship, and this time I would gladly have stopped for a talk had
I not seemed to read in his eyes an entreaty to pass on without
speaking. I obeyed the silent appeal. But yielding to an obscure need--
"_Monsieur le curé_," I said, "you ought to be careful. There are snakes
among those stones. You must have been warned before?"
"Yes, I know," he answered in a muffled voice. "This place is infested
with vipers--most pernicious beasts, _Monsieur_. I hope that on your
side you will be able to guard against them."
XIII
MASTER BAPTIST, JUDGE
What kind of justice did Saint Louis dispense under his oak tree?
History does not tell us that he was a doctor of law. Everything leads
us to suppose that he owed extremely little if anything at all to
Papinian, Ulpian, or Tribonian. He was, of course, a Saint, and those
among us chosen by Providence to make Its Supreme Will known receive
appropriate inspiration from on high. King Solomon, like other Asiatic
kings, who are by their people regarded as mouthpieces of divine wisdom,
consulted no text when he spoke the famous judgment upon which his glory
still rests.
Jews or Christians, the ancient leaders of the people judged in equity,
and without too great difficulty arrived at an approximate justice,
superior to the "judgments of God," which had too often what looked like
the iniquitous unfairness of chance. Codes, by their inflexible rules
applied to every case, have overthrown the ancient order, under which an
arbitrary procedure fitted the law to each individual transgression.
Laws and judges have since become more flexible, they would otherwise be
intolerable, but they are still too rigid to bend felicitously to the
modifications by which natural right might be promoted. In addition to
which, gratuitous "justice" not infrequently ruins the person seeking
it.