“That is true enough, M. Noel, your governor is no longer the same since
his election. He has adopted a tone and manners which I can hardly but
describe as reprehensible. The day before yesterday, at the Territorial,
he raised a commotion which you can hardly imagine. He was heard to
exclaim before the whole board: ‘You have lied to me; you have robbed
me, and made me a robber as much as yourselves. Show me your books, you
set of rogues!’ If he has treated Moessard in the same sort of fashion,
I am not surprised any longer that the latter should be taking his
revenge in his newspaper.”
“But what does this article say?” asked M. Barreau. “Who is present that
has read it?”
Nobody answered. Several had tried to buy it, but in Paris scandal sells
like bread. At ten o’clock in the morning there was not a single copy
of the _Messenger_ left in the office. Then it occurred to one of my
nieces--a sharp girl, if ever there was one--to look in the pocket of
one of the numerous overcoats in the cloak-room, folded carefully in
large pigeon-holes. At the first which she examined:
“Here it is!” exclaimed the charming child with an air of triumph, as
she drew out a _Messenger_ crumpled in the folding like a paper that has
just been read.
“Here is another!” cried Tom Bois l’Hery, who was making a search on his
own account. A third overcoat, a third _Messenger_. And in every one the
same thing: pushed down to the bottom of a pocket, or with its titlepage
protruding, the newspaper was everywhere, just as its article must
have been in every memory; and one could imagine the Nabob up above
exchanging polite phrases with his guests, while they could have reeled
off by heart the atrocious things that had been printed about him. We
all laughed much at this idea; but we were anxious to make acquaintance
in our own turn with this curious article.
“Come, _pere_ Passajon, read it aloud to us.”
It was the general desire, and I assented.
I don’t know if you are like me, but when I read aloud I gargle my
throat with my voice; I introduce modulations and flourishes to such an
extent that I understand nothing of what I am saying, like those singers
to whom the sense of the words matters little, provided the notes be
true. The thing was entitled “The Boat of Flowers”--a sufficiently
complicated story, with Chinese names, about a very rich mandarin, who
had at one time in the past kept a “boat of flowers” moored quite at the
far end of the town near a barrier frequented by the soldiers. At the
end of the article we were not farther on than at the beginning. We
tried certainly to wink at each other, to pretend to be clever; but,
frankly, we had no reason. A veritable puzzle without solution; and we
should still be stuck fast at it if old Francis, a regular rascal who
knows everything, had not explained to us that this meeting place of
the soldiers must stand for the Military School, and that the “boat of
flowers” did not bear so pretty a name as that in good French. And this
name, he said it aloud notwithstanding the presence of the ladies.
There was an explosion of cries, of “Ah’s!” and “Oh’s!” some saying, “I
suspected it!” others, “It is impossible!”
“Pardon me,” added Francis, formerly a trumpeter in the Ninth
Lancers--the regiment of Mora and of Monpavon--“pardon me. Twenty years
ago, during the last half year of my service, I was in barracks in the
Military School, and I remember very well that near the fortifications
there was a dirty dancing-hall known as the Jansoulet Rooms, with a
little furnished flat above and bedrooms at twopence-halfpenny the hour,
to which one could retire between two quadrilles.”
“You are an infamous liar!” said M. Noel, beside himself with rage--“a
thief and a liar like your master. Jansoulet has never been in Paris
before now.”
Francis was seated a little outside our circle engaged in sipping
something sweet, because champagne has a bad effect on his nerves and
because, too, it is not a sufficiently distinguished beverage for him.
He rose gravely, without putting down his glass, and, advancing towards
M. Noel, said to him very quietly:
“You are wanting in manners, _mon cher_. The other evening I found
your tone coarse and unseemly. To insult people serves no good purpose,
especially in this case, since I happen to have been an assistant to a
fencing-master, and, if matters were carried further between us, could
put a couple of inches of steel into whatever part of your body I might
choose. But I am good-natured. Instead of a sword-thrust, I prefer to
give you a piece of advice, which your master will do well to follow.
This is what I should do in your place: I should go and find Moessard,
and I should buy him, without quibbling about price. Hemerlingue has
given him twenty thousand francs to speak; I would offer him thirty
thousand to hold his tongue.”
“Never! never!” vociferated M. Noel. “I should rather go and knock the
rascally brigand’s head off.”
“You will do nothing of the kind. Whether the calumny be true or false,
you have seen the effect of it this evening. This is a sample of the
pleasures in store for you. What can you expect, _mon cher_? You have
thrown away your crutches too soon, and thought to walk by yourselves.
That is all very well when one is well set up and firm on the legs; but
when one had not a very solid footing, and has also the misfortune
to feel Hemerlingue at his heels, it is a bad business. Besides, your
master is beginning to be short of money; he has given notes of hand to
old Schwalbach--and don’t talk to me of a Nabob who gives notes of hand.
I know well that you have millions over yonder, but your election must
be declared valid before you can touch them; a few more articles like
to-day’s, and I answer for it that you will not secure that declaration.
You set yourselves up to struggle against Paris, _mon bon_, but you are
not big enough for such a match; you know nothing about it. Here we
are not in the East, and if we do not wring the necks of people who
displease us, if we do not throw them into the water in a sack, we have
other methods of effecting their disappearance. Noel, let your master
take care. One of these mornings Paris will swallow him as I swallow
this plum, without spitting out either the stone or skin.”
He was terrible, this old man, and notwithstanding the paint on his
face, I felt a certain respect for him. While he was speaking, we could
hear the music upstairs, and the horses of the municipal guards shaking
their curb-chains in the square. From without, our festivities must have
seemed very brilliant, all lighted up by their thousands of candles,
and with the great portico illuminated. And when one reflected that ruin
perhaps lay beneath it all! We sat there in the vestibule like rats that
hold counsel with each other at the bottom of a ship’s hold, when the
vessel is beginning to leak and before the crew has found it out, and I
saw clearly that all the lackeys and chambermaids would not be long in
decamping at the first note of alarm. Could such a catastrophe indeed be
possible? And in that case what would become of me, and the Territorial,
and the money I had advanced, and the arrears due to me?
That Francis has left me with a cold shudder down my back.