"My wife, for instance, wanted to have her portrait painted by Ingres.
You've seen it--it isn't like her--but it's by Ingres. Well, do you know
what he asked me for it? Four hundred pounds. I paid it him, but I
consider that taking advantage; it's the war against capital. Do you
mean to say that because a man's name is known he should make me pay
just what he likes? because he's an artist, he has no price, no fixed
rate, he has a right to fleece me? Why, according to that he might ask
me a million for it. It's like the doctors who make you pay according to
your fortune. To begin with, how does any one know what I have? I call
it an iniquity. Yes, four hundred pounds; what do you think of that?"
M. Bourjot was standing by the chimney-piece talking to Denoisel. He put
the other foot, on which he had been standing, to the fire as he spoke.
"Upon my word," said Denoisel, very seriously, "you are quite right: all
these folks take advantage of their reputation. You see there's only one
way to prevent it, and that would be to decree a legal maximum for
talent, a maximum for master-pieces. Why, yes! It would be very easy."
"That's it; that would be the very thing!" exclaimed M. Bourjot, "and it
would be quite just, for you see----"
The Bourjots had dined that evening alone with the Mauperins. The two
families had been talking of the wedding, and were only waiting to fix
the day, until the expiration of a year from the date of the first
insertion of the name of Villacourt in the _Monitor_. It was M. Bourjot
who had insisted on this delay. The ladies were talking about the
trousseau, jewellery, laces, and wedding-presents, and Mme. Mauperin,
who was seated by Mme. Bourjot, was contemplating her as though she were
a person who had performed a miracle.
M. Mauperin's face beamed with joy. He had in the end yielded to the
fascination of money. This great, upright man, genuine, severe, rigid,
and incorruptible as he was, had gradually allowed the vast wealth of
the Bourjots to come into his thoughts and into his dreams, to appeal to
him and to his instincts as a practical man, as an old man, the father
of a family and a manufacturer. He had been won over and disarmed. Ever
since his son's success with regard to this marriage, he had felt that
respect for Henri which ability or the prospect of a large fortune
inspires in people, and, without being aware of it himself, he scarcely
blamed him now for having changed his name. Fathers are but men, after
all.
Renée, who for some time past had been worried, thoughtful, and
low-spirited, was almost cheerful this evening. She was amusing herself
with blowing about the fluffy feathers which Noémi was wearing in her
hair. The latter, languid and absent-minded, with a dreamy look in her
eyes, was replying in monosyllables to Mme. Davarande's ceaseless
chatter.
"Nowadays, everything is against money," began M. Bourjot again,
sententiously. "There's a league--now, for instance, I made a road for
the people at Sannois. Well, do you imagine that they even touch their
hats to us? Oh dear no, never. In 1848 we gave them bushels of corn; and
what do you think they said? Excuse me, ladies, if I repeat their words.
They said: 'That old beast must be afraid of us!' That was all the
gratitude I had. I started a model farm, and I applied to the Government
for a man to manage it; a red-hot radical was sent to me, a rascal who
had spent his life running down the rich. At present I have to do with a
Municipal Council with the most detestable opinions. I find work for
every one, don't I? Thanks to us, the country round is prosperous. Well,
if there were to be a revolution, now, I am convinced that they would
set fire to our place. They'd have no compunction about that. You've no
idea what enemies you get if you pay as much as three hundred and sixty
pounds for taxes. They'd simply burn us out of house and home--they'd
have no scruple about it. You see what happened in February. Oh, my
ideas with regard to the people have quite changed; and they are
preparing a nice future for us, you can count on that. We shall be
simply ruined by a lot of penniless wretches. I can see that beforehand.
I often think of all these things. If only it were not for one's
children--money, as far as I am concerned----"
"What's that you are saying, neighbour?" asked M. Mauperin, approaching.
"I'm saying that I'm afraid the day will come when our children will be
short of bread, M. Mauperin; that's what I'm saying."
"You'll make them hesitate about this wedding if you talk like that,"
said M. Mauperin.
"Oh, if my husband begins with his gloomy ideas, if he's going to talk
about the end of the world--" put in Mme. Bourjot.
"I congratulate you that you don't feel the anxiety I do," remarked M.
Bourjot, bowing to his wife; "but I can assure you that, without being
weak-minded, there is every reason for feeling very uneasy."
"Certainly, certainly," said Denoisel. "I think that money is in danger,
in great danger, in very great danger indeed. In the first place, it is
threatened by that envy which is at the bottom of nearly all
revolutions; and then by progress, which baptizes the revolutions."
"But, sir, such progress would be infamous. Take me, for instance: no
one could doubt me. I used to be a Liberal--I am now, in fact. I am a
soldier of Liberty, a born Republican; I am for progress of every kind.
But a revolution against wealth--why, it would be barbarous! We should
be going back to savage times. What we want is justice and common sense.
Can you imagine now a society without wealth?"
"No, not any more than a greasy pole without a silver cup."
"What," continued M. Bourjot, who in his excitement had not caught
Denoisel's words, "the money that I have earned with hard work, honestly
and with the greatest difficulty--the money that is mine, that I have
made, and which is for my children--why, there is nothing more sacred! I
even look upon the income-tax as a violation of property."
"Why, yes," said Denoisel in the most perfectly good-natured tone, "I am
quite of your opinion. And I should be very sorry," he added wickedly,
"to make things seem blacker to you than they already do. But you see we
have had a revolution against the nobility; we shall have one against
wealth. Great names have been abolished by the guillotine, and great
fortunes will be done away with next. A man was considered guilty if his
name happened to be M. de Montmorency; it will be criminal to be M. Two
Thousand Pounds a Year. Things are certainly getting on. I can speak all
the more freely as I am absolutely disinterested, myself. I should not
have had anything to be guillotined for in the old days, and I haven't
enough to be ruined for nowadays. So, you see----"
"Excuse me," put in M. Bourjot, solemnly, "but your comparison--no one
could deplore excesses more than I do, and the event of 1793 was a great
crime, sir. The nobility were treated abominably, and all honest people
must be of the same opinion as I am."