THE EX-PROFESSOR OF PLESSIS COLLEGE
The dwelling of the Marquis was not very far from his creditor's shop.
M. de Létorière occupied two small rooms on the fifth floor of a house
in the Rue St. Florentin.
He shared this poor asylum with Dr. Jean-François Dominique,
ex-professor in the College of Plessis.
By an odd freak of fortune, the young Marquis, destined to charm people
in so many conditions of life, had first exercised his inconceivable
fascinations on this old professor, who was drawn to him with the most
tender affection.
Notwithstanding a thousand malicious tricks of the frolicsome child,
Dr. Dominique recognized in his pupil so much spirit and heart, as well
as nobility of soul, that he became singularly attached to him. Perhaps,
also, the rare aptitude of the Marquis, who was one of the most
distinguished linguists of the Plessis College, for the study of the
dead languages, was another reason for the extraordinary devotion of the
old professor to his pupil.
The Abbé of Vighan, an uncle of M. de Létorière, had for six years
paid the college expenses of his nephew, a poor orphan. During a journey
of the Abbé, the balance of the quarterly account was left in arrears.
The Marquis interpreting, in a manner displeasing to his delicacy, some
words of the principal on the subject of this tardiness in the payment,
resolutely decided to quit the college.
Dominique, acquainted with his project, did his best to dissuade him
from its execution; but the Marquis was nineteen years of age, and had a
determined will. The poor professor, not being able to prevent him from
committing this folly, determined at least to accompany him in his
flight, so unwilling was he to leave the young Marquis to encounter
alone the temptations of a great city.
Dominique himself made all the plans for the escape; and one dark night
the master and scholar scaled the walls of the college, not without
danger to the old professor, little used to this kind of exercise.
The principal of the college, satisfied, perhaps, to be rid of a
mutinous and turbulent pupil, took no steps to arrest the fugitive.
Létorière possessed fifteen louis-d'or; Dominique had a little income
of fifty pistoles from the salt tax; these were their only pecuniary
resources.
The Marquis's father had left nothing to his son save two or three
interminable lawsuits. The most important of these, which had lasted
fifty years, had been instigated against the dukes of Brunswick-Oëls
and the princes of Brandebourg-Bareuth, on the subject of the claims of
a grand-aunt of M. de Létorière, Mademoiselle d'Olbreuse, who, at the
time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, had emigrated and married
one of the relations of the Duke of Brunswick.
A poor gentleman of Xaintonge, without influential friends and without
credit, Létorière despaired of ever carrying on the lawsuit upon which
depended the fortune that he could not hope to enjoy; twenty times on
the point of enlisting and becoming a soldier, the persuasions of the
good Dominique had withheld him.
The ex-professor of Plessis had carefully examined the papers of these
lawsuits. For love of his pupil he had become almost a lawyer. The
rights of the Marquis appeared to him evident; nothing was needed, he
said, but patience, and some day the suits would indubitably be gained.
More and more enthusiastic in his admiration of the Marquis, he boldly
compared him to Alcibiades, so seductive was his fascination. Jean
François Dominique modestly reserved to himself the austere part of
Socrates, and did not cease to predict the most brilliant fortune for
his pupil.
"But, my poor Dominique," the young man would say, "I have only my cloak
and my sword,--no protector; but for you I should be alone in the
world."
"But you are _charmant_, my child; all must love you as soon as they see
you; all cherish you as soon as they know you, on account of your good
and generous nature; you have talent; you know Latin and Greek as well
as I do; you understand German as your native tongue, thanks to your
late father, who caused you to be brought up by a German valet; you are
a noble gentleman, although you do not trace your lineage back to
Euryales, son of Ajax, as did Alcibiades, whom I call my hero, because
you resemble him extremely. Have patience, then; your career will
perhaps be more brilliant than my hero's. . . Yes, it will surely
be! . . . as true as that Socrates saved the life of his pupil at
Potidæa! But I know your heart, and I am sure that when you are on the
pinnacle of prosperity you will not forget the old Jean-François
Dominique, as Alcibiades forgot the old philosopher!"
However odd and foolish these predictions may have seemed to the young
Marquis, they sufficed for a long time to sustain his courage, to give
him some hope of gaining one of his lawsuits, and above all, to prevent
his enlisting as a private soldier, as he had often threatened to do, to
the great alarm of Dominique.
Madelaine Landry soon reached the Rue Florentin. Having mounted the five
flights of stairs which led to the apartments of her debtor, she stopped
a moment on the landing-place to recover breath, in order that she might
give free expression to her wrath.
When she had sufficiently recovered from her rapid ascent, she knocked;
the door was opened.
To her profound astonishment, a frightfully ugly man appeared before
her.
This was the ex-professor of Plessis. Jean-François Dominique was about
fifty years old; he was large and bony; his lean face, pale, and very
long, bore traces of the ravages of small-pox; his thin, gray hair was
tied at the back of his head with a piece of tape. An old woollen
coverlet, in which he had majestically draped himself, served him as a
dressing-gown. His countenance wore an expression of pedantic surliness
and of self-satisfaction in strange combination.
The aspect of the room which he occupied was forlorn, but everything in
it was scrupulously clean. At the end of the alcove was a little bed,
composed of a single mattress; a commode, a table, and four walnut
chairs, carefully waxed, completed the furniture. The open door of a
small adjoining room showed a bed of neatly-woven thongs. Although the
weather was extremely cold, there was no trace of fire in the fireplace
of this wintry chamber. At the foot of the painted wooden couch were two
little pastel portraits, in rich gilt frames. One represented a man of
middle age, wearing a wig of the Louis XIV. style, and having the cross
of the Order of St. Louis attached to one of the clasps of his
breastplate. The other was that of a lady of rare beauty, dressed as
Diana the huntress.
There was recognizable in this room an air of proud poverty, which would
have softened any female heart but that of Madelaine Landry.
"Does not _one_ M. Létorière live here?" she inquired brusquely of the
tall old man, clad with a woollen coverlet as with a Roman toga.
These words, "one M. Létorière," seemed to affect the ex-professor of
Plessis College disagreeably. He answered with caustic dignity: "I only
know that the great and powerful Lord Lancelot-Marie-Joseph de Vighan,
Seigneur of Marsailles and Marquis of Létorière, lodges in this
apartment, my good woman."
"'Good woman!' Don't 'good woman' me!" cried Madelaine, angrily, "I'll
let you know, I will, if I'm a 'good woman!' Where is your master, your
beautiful Marquis of Sharpers? your high and powerful seigneur of
Roguery?"
Jean François Dominique drew himself up erect in his toga, extended his
long arm, naked and scrawny, from the side of the door, and said in an
imperial voice: "Clear out this instant! The Marquis, my noble pupil,
has not come in . . . I do not know when he will return . . . but at any
rate I presume it will give him no pleasure to see you, my dear . . .
for if anger disfigures the most charming countenances, as says the
sage, _à fortiori_, it makes truly hideous those whom nature has
treated like a cruel step-mother! This applies particularly to you. Do
me the favor to" . . . and Dominique pointed again to the door with a
very significant gesture.
Enraged by this insult, the tailor's wife threw her umbrella on the
ground, seated herself hastily on a chair, crying: "'Tis well for you,
you villanious old owl . . . to speak of the homeliness of others! This
fine boy is your pupil, is he? Good gracious, I can readily believe it,
for you look like a master in iniquity. You miserable old wretch! As for
me, I shall not budge . . . not till I am paid . . . do you hear?
_paid_; or by St. Madelaine, my patron saint, if I go, it will only be
to search for a constable . . ."
"Aha! Paid, and for what, if you please?" demanded Dominique.
"I wish to be paid for the coat which your vagabond has on his
back . . . I am the wife of Master Landry, the tailor at The Golden
Scissors; and if my husband has been fool enough to give you credit until
now, I will not be fool enough to imitate him . . . I will have my
money . . . I will not go from here without my money . . ."
"How!" cried Dominique, folding his arms with the most disdainful air
imaginable; "is it for such a miserable trifle that you come to crack my
ears with your frightful chatter,--for this that you come to torment the
Marquis? Do you forget that once all the cities of Greece were disputing
the honor of offering their services to Alcibiades, that the Ephesians
pitched his tents? that the men of Chios fed his horses? that the
Lesbians supplied his tables? and all _gratis_, do you understand,
_gratis_; all, only that they might have the honor of offering something
to Alcibiades? And you, you miserable workwoman, for three hundred
insignificant livres, not the tenth part of a talent! for a paltry sum
owed you by the Marquis, my pupil, who is, or who will be, a very
different person from Alcibiades, you come screeching here like an
osprey! But, you old fool, you may, on the contrary, bless the day when
my pupil deigned to cast his eye on your ignoble workshop! Remember,
also, that the shoe-maker of Athens, who had the good luck to work for
Alcibiades, made more money in a year than you will gain in your whole
miserable life. Do you hear that?"
Madelaine Landry, seeing the rage of this big man wrapped in a coverlet,
thought herself in the presence of a lunatic.
"But at any rate you have brought the coat that the Marquis did your
husband the honor to order," resumed Dominique. "Take good care that he
redoubles his diligence and dexterity to perfect this garment, for on it
depends all his future business prosperity; and if it suits my pupil,
your husband's fortune is made . . . Come, let's see the coat!" And
Dominique advanced gravely towards Madelaine.
She rose hastily from her chair, resolved to jump at the eyes of the
maniac, as she thought him.
"Don't come near me, or I will hit you over the head with my umbrella!"
she cried.
"You are a fool, my dear woman . . . Who thinks of hurting you? So you
have not brought the coat?" he continued, in a milder tone.
"What! have I brought the coat?--impudence!" said Madelaine, a little
gaining courage,--"certainly not; I have not brought it; and it is no
fault of mine that your pupil has on his back the one that my fool of a
husband sold him, and for which I come to be paid; for, I repeat it, I
am not going away until I am paid . . . If I am not paid, there is yet,
God be thanked, such a place as the lock-up to put rogues into . . .
When one hasn't the wherewith to pay for fine clothes, Marquis though he
may be, he ought to wear coarse clothes, and not steal the time and
goods of poor working-people."
At this moment light steps were heard ascending the stairs.
"That is the Marquis!" said Dominique.
"Ah! now we shall have good sport," cried Dame Madelaine.
"My dear woman," said Dominique--this time in a supplicating
voice--"spare him; on my word, you shall be paid."
"Pshaw! Now we shall see him--this smuggling Marquis."
The door was gently opened, and the Marquis appeared.
"I have not courage enough to witness this scene," said the trembling
Dominique, and he shut himself up in his dark chamber.