THE ADOPTION
Madame Desprez, who answered to the Christian name of Anastasie,
presented an agreeable type of her sex; exceedingly wholesome to look
upon, a stout _brune_, with cool smooth cheeks, steady, dark eyes, and
hands that neither art nor nature could improve. She was the sort of
person over whom adversity passes like a summer cloud; she might, in the
worst of conjunctions, knit her brows into one vertical furrow for a
moment, but the next it would be gone. She had much of the placidity of a
contented nun; with little of her piety, however; for Anastasie was of a
very mundane nature, fond of oysters and old wine, and somewhat bold
pleasantries, and devoted to her husband for her own sake rather than for
his. She was imperturbably good-natured, but had no idea of
self-sacrifice. To live in that pleasant old house, with a green garden
behind and bright flowers about the window, to eat and drink of the best,
to gossip with a neighbour for a quarter of an hour, never to wear stays
or a dress except when she went to Fontainebleau shopping, to be kept in
a continual supply of racy novels, and to be married to Dr. Desprez and
have no ground of jealousy, filled the cup of her nature to the brim.
Those who had known the Doctor in bachelor days, when he had aired quite
as many theories, but of a different order, attributed his present
philosophy to the study of Anastasie. It was her brute enjoyment that he
rationalised and perhaps vainly imitated.
Madame Desprez was an artist in the kitchen, and made coffee to a nicety.
She had a knack of tidiness, with which she had infected the Doctor;
everything was in its place; everything capable of polish shone
gloriously; and dust was a thing banished from her empire. Aline, their
single servant, had no other business in the world but to scour and
burnish. So Doctor Desprez lived in his house like a fatted calf, warmed
and cosseted to his heart's content.
The midday meal was excellent. There was a ripe melon, a fish from the
river in a memorable Béarnaise sauce, a fat fowl in a fricassee, and a
dish of asparagus, followed by some fruit. The Doctor drank half a bottle
_plus_ one glass, the wife half a bottle _minus_ the same quantity, which
was a marital privilege, of an excellent Côte-Rôtie, seven years old.
Then the coffee was brought, and a flask of Chartreuse for madame, for
the Doctor despised and distrusted such decoctions; and then Aline left
the wedded pair to the pleasures of memory and digestion.
"It is a very fortunate circumstance, my cherished one," observed the
Doctor--"this coffee is adorable--a very fortunate circumstance upon the
whole--Anastasie, I beseech you, go without that poison for to-day; only
one day, and you will feel the benefit, I pledge my reputation."
"What is this fortunate circumstance, my friend?" inquired Anastasie, not
heeding his protest, which was of daily recurrence.
"That we have no children, my beautiful," replied the Doctor. "I think of
it more and more as the years go on, and with more and more gratitude
towards the power that dispenses such afflictions. Your health, my
darling, my studious quiet, our little kitchen delicacies, how they would
all have suffered, how they would all have been sacrificed! And for what?
Children are the last word of human imperfection. Health flees before
their face. They cry, my dear; they put vexatious questions; they demand
to be fed, to be washed, to be educated, to have their noses blown; and
then, when the time comes, they break our hearts, as I break this piece
of sugar. A pair of professed egoists, like you and me, should avoid
offspring, like an infidelity."
"Indeed!" said she; and she laughed. "Now, that is like you--to take
credit for the thing you could not help."
"My dear," returned the Doctor solemnly, "we might have adopted."
"Never!" cried madame. "Never, Doctor, with my consent. If the child were
my own flesh and blood, I would not say no. But to take another person's
indiscretion on my shoulders, my dear friend, I have too much sense."
"Precisely," replied the Doctor. "We both had. And I am all the better
pleased with our wisdom, because--because----" He looked at her sharply.
"Because what?" she asked, with a faint premonition of danger.
"Because I have found the right person," said the Doctor firmly, "and
shall adopt him this afternoon."
Anastasie looked at him out of a mist. "You have lost your reason," she
said; and there was a clang in her voice that seemed to threaten trouble.
"Not so, my dear," he replied; "I retain its complete exercise. To the
proof: instead of attempting to cloak my inconsistency, I have, by way of
preparing you, thrown it into strong relief. You will there, I think,
recognise the philosopher who has the ecstasy to call you wife. The fact
is, I have been reckoning all this while without an accident. I never
thought to find a son of my own. Now, last night, I found one. Do not
unnecessarily alarm yourself, my dear; he is not a drop of blood to me
that I know. It is his mind, darling, his mind that calls me father."
"His mind!" she repeated, with a titter between scorn and hysterics. "His
mind, indeed! Henri, is this an idiotic pleasantry, or are you mad? His
mind! And what of my mind?"
"Truly," replied the Doctor, with a shrug, "you have your finger on the
hitch. He will be strikingly antipathetic to my ever beautiful Anastasie.
She will never understand him; he will never understand her. You married
the animal side of my nature, dear; and it is on the spiritual side that
I find my affinity for Jean-Marie. So much so, that, to be perfectly
frank, I stand in some awe of him myself. You will easily perceive that I
am announcing a calamity for you. Do not," he broke out in tones of real
solicitude--"do not give way to tears after a meal, Anastasie. You will
certainly give yourself a false digestion."
Anastasie controlled herself. "You know how willing I am to humour you,"
she said, "in all reasonable matters. But on this point----"
"My dear love," interrupted the Doctor, eager to prevent a refusal, "who
wished to leave Paris? Who made me give up cards, and the opera, and the
boulevard, and my social relations, and all that was my life before I
knew you? Have I been faithful? Have I been obedient? Have I not borne my
doom with cheerfulness? In all honesty, Anastasie, have I not a right to
a stipulation on my side? I have, and you know it. I stipulate my son."
Anastasie was aware of defeat; she struck her colours instantly. "You
will break my heart," she sighed.
"Not in the least," said he. "You will feel a trifling inconvenience for
a month, just as I did when I was first brought to this vile hamlet; then
your admirable sense and temper will prevail, and I see you already as
content as ever, and making your husband the happiest of men."
"You know I can refuse you nothing," she said, with a last flicker of
resistance; "nothing that will make you truly happier. But will this? Are
you sure, my husband? Last night, you say, you found him! He may be the
worst of humbugs."
"I think not," replied the Doctor. "But do not suppose me so unwary as to
adopt him out of hand. I am, I flatter myself, a finished man of the
world; I have had all possibilities in view; my plan is contrived to meet
them all. I take the lad as stable-boy. If he pilfer, if he grumble, if
he desire to change, I shall see I was mistaken; I shall recognise him
for no son of mine, and send him tramping."
"You will never do so when the time comes," said his wife; "I know your
good heart."
She reached out her hand to him, with a sigh; the Doctor smiled as he
took it and carried it to his lips; he had gained his point with greater
ease than he had dared to hope; for perhaps the twentieth time he had
proved the efficacy of his trusty argument, his Excalibur, the hint of a
return to Paris. Six months in the capital, for a man of the Doctor's
antecedents and relations, implied no less a calamity than total ruin.
Anastasie had saved the remainder of his fortune by keeping him strictly
in the country. The very name of Paris put her in a blue fear; and she
would have allowed her husband to keep a menagerie in the back-garden,
let alone adopting a stable-boy, rather than permit the question of
return to be discussed.
About four of the afternoon, the mountebank rendered up his ghost; he had
never been conscious since his seizure. Doctor Desprez was present at his
last passage, and declared the farce over. Then he took Jean-Marie by the
shoulder and led him out into the inn garden, where there was a
convenient bench beside the river. Here he sat him down and made the boy
place himself on his left.
"Jean-Marie," he said very gravely, "this world is exceedingly vast; and
even France, which is only a small corner of it, is a great place for a
little lad like you. Unfortunately it is full of eager, shouldering
people moving on; and there are very few bakers' shops for so many
eaters. Your master is dead; you are not fit to gain a living by
yourself; you do not wish to steal? No. Your situation then is
undesirable; it is, for the moment, critical. On the other hand, you
behold in me a man not old, though elderly, still enjoying the youth of
the heart and the intelligence; a man of instruction; easily situated in
this world's affairs; keeping a good table:--a man, neither as friend nor
host, to be despised. I offer you your food and clothes, and to teach you
lessons in the evening, which will be infinitely more to the purpose for
a lad of your stamp than those of all the priests in Europe. I propose
no wages, but if ever you take a thought to leave me, the door shall be
open, and I will give you a hundred francs to start the world upon. In
return, I have an old horse and chaise, which you would very speedily
learn to clean and keep in order. Do not hurry yourself to answer, and
take it or leave it as you judge aright. Only remember this, that I am no
sentimentalist or charitable person, but a man who lives rigorously to
himself; and that if I make the proposal, it is for my own ends--it is
because I perceive clearly an advantage to myself. And now, reflect."
"I shall be very glad. I do not see what else I can do. I thank you, sir,
most kindly, and I will try to be useful," said the boy.
"Thank you," said the Doctor warmly, rising at the same time and wiping
his brow, for he had suffered agonies while the thing hung in the wind. A
refusal, after the scene at noon, would have placed him in a ridiculous
light before Anastasie. "How hot and heavy is the evening, to be sure! I
have always had a fancy to be a fish in summer, Jean-Marie, here in the
Loing beside Gretz. I should lie under a water-lily and listen to the
bells, which must sound most delicately down below. That would be a
life--do you not think so too?"
"Yes," said Jean-Marie.
"Thank God you have imagination!" cried the Doctor, embracing the boy
with his usual effusive warmth, though it was a proceeding that seemed to
disconcert the sufferer almost as much as if he had been an English
schoolboy of the same age. "And now," he added, "I will take you to my
wife."
Madame Desprez sat in the dining-room in a cool wrapper. All the blinds
were down, and the tile floor had been recently sprinkled with water; her
eyes were half shut, but she affected to be reading a novel as they
entered. Though she was a bustling woman, she enjoyed repose
between-whiles and had a remarkable appetite for sleep.
The Doctor went through a solemn form of introduction, adding, for the
benefit of both parties, "You must try to like each other for my sake."
"He is very pretty," said Anastasie.--"Will you kiss me, my pretty little
fellow?"
The Doctor was furious, and dragged her into the passage. "Are you a
fool, Anastasie?" he said. "What is all this I hear about the tact of
women? Heaven knows, I have not met with it in my experience. You address
my little philosopher as if he were an infant. He must be spoken to with
more respect, I tell you; he must not be kissed and Georgy-porgy'd like
an ordinary child."
"I only did it to please you, I am sure," replied Anastasie; "but I will
try to do better."
The Doctor apologised for his warmth. "But I do wish him," he continued,
"to feel at home among us. And really your conduct was so idiotic, my
cherished one, and so utterly and distantly out of place, that a saint
might have been pardoned a little vehemence in disapproval. Do, do
try--if it is possible for a woman to understand young people--but of
course it is not, and I waste my breath. Hold your tongue as much as
possible at least, and observe my conduct narrowly; it will serve you for
a model."
Anastasie did as she was bidden, and considered the Doctor's behaviour.
She observed that he embraced the boy three times in the course of the
evening, and managed generally to confound and abash the little fellow
out of speech and appetite. But she had the true womanly heroism in
little affairs. Not only did she refrain from the cheap revenge of
exposing the Doctor's errors to himself, but she did her best to remove
their ill-effect on Jean-Marie. When Desprez went out for his last breath
of air before retiring for the night, she came over to the boy's side and
took his hand.
"You must not be surprised or frightened by my husband's manners," she
said. "He is the kindest of men, but so clever that he is sometimes
difficult to understand. You will soon grow used to him, and then you
will love him, for that nobody can help. As for me, you may be sure, I
shall try to make you happy, and will not bother you at all. I think we
should be excellent friends, you and I. I am not clever, but I am very
good-natured. Will you give me a kiss?"
He held up his face, and she took him in her arms and then began to cry.
The woman had spoken in complaisance; but she had warmed to her own
words, and tenderness followed. The Doctor, entering, found them enlaced:
he concluded that his wife was in fault; and he was just beginning, in an
awful voice, "Anastasie----," when she looked up at him, smiling, with an
upraised finger; and he held his peace, wondering, while she led the boy
to his attic.