TWO CHILDREN
Eveline had arrived in Paris at a very important moment. Two great
changes had been made in the world of fashion: the Empress Eugenie had
decreed that the crinoline should be laid aside, and Cardinal Chigi,
the papal nuncio, had pronounced that dresses closed to the throat
should be worn at receptions. Piety had become the rage. It was
considered good taste to go to church and to wait for the sermon.
Piety being, therefore, the fashion, no better moment could have been
chosen by Kaulmann for floating the papal loan. He was well pleased to
find that Eveline was as eager in the pursuit of piety as any of her
fair sisters, the truth being that it harmonized with the poor child's
frame of mind. A few days after her arrival in Paris her cripple
brother had died. A celebrated surgeon had performed an operation
which had put him out of pain forever. Eveline grieved over her loss;
now she felt alone in the world, she had no one to love, no one to
live for. She kept the boy's useless crutches in her room, one on each
side of her dressing-table, and twice a week she went to the
church-yard and put fresh flowers on the little grave. The penitential
fashion just suited her. She preferred to sing Mozart and Handel in
the church than Verdi at the opera.
One day she conceived the idea that she would have a sacred concert
in her own drawing-room; the price of the tickets should be high, and
the proceeds would be for some good purpose--God knows what! perhaps
to buy arms for the papal zouaves. She was busy making out her
programme when the door opened, and Arpad Belenyi, unannounced, rushed
in in his old unceremonious way.
Eveline was delighted to see her former friend. She threw down her
pen, ran to meet him, holding out both her hands.
"Oh, you delightful person, what has brought you here?"
"My profession. I am looking for some place where I may strike the
cymbals and give a concert."
"What a coincidence; you have come at the right moment. But how did
you find me out?"
"Not much difficulty in that. If I didn't see your name in the list at
the Opera, I couldn't avoid seeing it outside St. Eustache."
"Then you have heard me sing?"
"In both places--the theatre and the church. I must tell you I think
the good fathers lay it on pretty strong. For twelve francs I heard
you at the Opera, and had the play into the bargain; but I didn't get
out of the church so cheap. A beautiful lady took twenty francs from
me."
"You silly man! Well, I will pay it back to you. What are your terms?"
"May I ask your reason for the question?"
"How stupid you are! I am not going to engage you for a restaurant.
What are your terms for playing the piano at an evening concert?"
"To you, merely thanks; to the public, five hundred francs."
"But if it is for a charitable purpose?"
"Then either not at all or for money."
"No, no. You are a cynical creature! Don't you feel sympathy for any
one? Would you do nothing for the poor?"
"I know a poor woman to whom I owe everything; that is my mother.
Every farthing which I give to another is taken from her. When the
world has given back to her all that she has lost, then I shall give
to the world all that I possess; but until then everything belongs to
my mother."
"Very good; you shall pay your mother. You shall have the five hundred
francs; but for this you must play something super-excellent--Liszt's
Mass or one of Handel's oratorios."
"What is the concert got up for? Is it to help a religious object? or
is it for the papal zouaves?"
"Yes. I am arranging it."
"Then I can do nothing."
"Why so?"
"Why, because I shall not play for Garibaldi's enemies!"
"Oh, what a goose you are, to be sure! Who asks you to play for
Garibaldi's enemies? You play for my friends."
But the young man kept repeating no, no, he wouldn't, and in his
excitement he got up from his seat, and, throwing back his waistcoat,
showed her that he wore a red shirt.
Eveline laughed unrestrainedly. "A red shirt! So that means that you
have enlisted as a Garibaldian?"
"I should have done so long ago only for my mother."
"And what would you do if your hand was shot off?"
"Then I should become a pensioner to some fine lady, who would, I
know, support me."
Eveline burst into tears. His words had touched a chord in her tender
heart. Arpad, however, could not imagine what he had said to grieve
her; he tried to console her, and asked how he had offended her. Still
sobbing, she said:
"My poor little brother is dead. There by my table I keep his
crutches."
"I am sorry for you; with all my heart I sympathize in your grief. He
and I were good friends; we had plenty of fun together."
"Yes; you liked him. The world is quite dead to me; everything is
changed. I listen for the sound of his crutches scratching along the
floor up the stairs. Ah, my little brother! I have no one now. I want
some one to take care of. I should like to nurse some one--an artist
who had lost his eyesight; a musician whose right hand had been shot
off; or a political hero, who, being pursued, concealed himself in my
room, and to whom I should be benefactress, protectress, bread-winner,
everything."
"Why don't you go to Garibaldi?"
She was laughing now; her moods were as variable as an April day.
"You have heard me sing in public. What do you say of me?"
"I say you would be a great artist if you could sing for the devils as
well as you do for the angels."
"I don't understand. What do you mean by the devils?"
"You surely have heard from the pulpit that the theatre is the devil's
synagogue?"
"You rude man! Don't you know that I belong to the theatre?"
"I beg pardon a thousand times. I believed that in the daytime you
were an abbess and at night you were an actress; that would be a fair
bargain."
"You silly boy! Why do you think I am an abbess?"
"Because you are dressed as such."
"This is only a penitential dress. You godless creature, you are
making fun of religion!"
"No, madame. I agree that it is a great mortification to wear gray
silk, a great penance to play the coquette with downcast eyes, a real
fast to eat crawfish at twenty francs the dish. I am also told that
the reason the fashionable ladies of Paris have taken to wearing high
dresses is that they discipline the flesh so severely that their
shoulders and necks are one mass of scars, and therefore the effects
of their flagellations must be concealed."
"That is not true. We don't do anything of the kind."
"The world says so. I don't want to inquire; it is your secret."
"It is not true," Eveline repeated. "We do not flagellate ourselves;
look!" And kneeling down before Arpad she raised the lace collar which
was round her neck and made him look at her fair skin.
They were a pair of children.
Arpad took his hat and his leave. He left a card with his address, but
he would have no share in her concert.
Eveline, however, went on writing her programme.