THE COUNCILLOR FLACHSINFINGEN
The next day after Létorière's visit to Dr. Sphex, there was an
extraordinary disturbance in the house of the Aulic Councillor
Flachsinfingen. It was eleven o'clock in the morning; Madame Martha
Flachsinfingen, a large woman, about forty years of age, lean, pale, and
solemn, clothed in a long brown dress, with a starched neckerchief and a
kind of loose sack of black velvet, was conversing with her husband, the
councillor, a great abdominous, rubicund man, with a jolly and simple
look.
Enveloped in a Chinese silk dressing-gown, his head covered with a
night-cap bound with a flame-colored ribbon, the councillor seemed to
listen to his wife with mingled deference and impatience.
She held in her scraggy hands a note which she was reading for the
second time, with profound attention, weighing each word.
This note read thus:
"Monsieur the Marquis of Létorière will have the honor of presenting
himself at noon, to-day, to _Madame la Conseillère_ de Flachsinfingen,
if she will deign to receive him."
After reading it, she repeated:
"'Will present himself to Madame la Conseillère.' What impudence!"
"But, Martha," said the councillor, humbly, "I don't see any impudence
in . . ."
"You don't see! oh! certainly, you are so penetrating! you don't see
that such a letter, from a libertine, from a débauché, from a
Nebuchadnezzar like this Marquis of Létorière, is worse than an
insult! for it is, so to speak, a premeditation and threat of insult!"
"How so, Martha?"
"Have you forgotten all that we have heard of this abominable man, who
leaves behind him, they say, only ruined girls and guilty wives? . . .
Don't you know that he is a Pharaoh, who thinks he can bewitch one with
a glance . . . a kind of unbridled Tarquin, who the first time he meets
a woman dares to address her in the most wicked language of gallantry?"
"The fact is, he is one of those brisk sparks whom husbands, fathers
and mothers send to the devil twenty times a day. Ha, ha, ha!" answered
the councillor, with a horse-laugh.
This fit of inopportune laughter was severely punished by the
_conseillère_, who sharply pinched him, crying:
"And are you such a wretch that you can laugh like a fool when you have
in your hand the proof that such a dissolute fellow perhaps intends to
crown his infernal triumphs by attacking the honor of your wife? . . ."
The councillor looked at his wife wonderingly, clasping his hands:
"Attack your honor; Martha! Ah, good heavens! Who thought of that?"
"Oh! what a man! what a man! Listen, then!"
And the _conseillère_ read the letter for the third time! . . .
"'Mons. de Létorière will have the honor of presenting himself to-day,
at noon, at the house of _Madame_ Flachsinfingen.'
"Do you comprehend that? At _Madame_'s house. Is not that clear? It is
not at the house of the councillor that he will present himself, but at
the house of the councillor's wife. Tis a kind of rendezvous which he
asks of me. He does not hide it; he attempts no subterfuge; he avows it
without shame; and you,--you do not trouble yourself, you stand there,
careless of the affront! Go along! go along, Flachsinfingen! you are not
worthy to have an honest wife! To ask a rendezvous of _me!_ The impudent
fellow!"
"How, Martha, do you really believe that the Marquis dreamed of it?
. . . Come, now, you are foolish and ridiculous!" cried the councillor.
"If he asks a rendezvous, it is to speak to you about his lawsuit; nothing
is more simple. He, like all the rest of the world, knows that I place
entire confidence in you; that is to say, you lead me by the nose. So,
in order to influence me, he very naturally wishes to act upon you,
Martha."
"To act upon me!! How to act upon me!! I will prevent it at the peril of
my life!" cried the _conseillère_, in heroic accents.
At this moment they heard a carriage stop at the door.
"Heavens! that is he," said the _conseillère_, leaning upon her
husband's chair. "I have not a drop of blood in my veins!
Flachsinfingen, do not quit me! In heaven's name defend me from this
audacious fellow!"
But the carriage continued on its way it was a false alarm.
Martha passed her hand over her forehead, saying with emotion:
"My heart failed me, I confess; but a woman cannot always control her
fears."
"Well, if you fear this Marquis, why the devil do you receive him? Why
do you face him?" innocently asked the councillor.
"Why? why?" repeated Martha, indignantly--and pointing towards her
husband with a gesture of sovereign contempt--"he asks me why! That is
the question of a soul shamefully abandoned to gluttony! Why? Why is the
warrior who basely flees before his enemy dishonored? Why is gold tried
by fire? Why is the just man who has valiantly fought, who has resisted,
superior to him who has never struggled? Why does the Scripture"--and
Martha pointed to her Bible, opened at the Book of Judges--"why does the
Scripture say: '_Ye who offered yourselves willingly to bless the Lord.
Speak ye that ride on white she-asses, ye that sit in judgment, and walk
without fear_--'"
"But," cried the councillor, interrupting his wife impatiently, "I tell
you again, you are a fool! Who thinks of fighting you on your she-ass?
of attacking you? of wrestling with you? of proving you by fire? At your
age, you . . . ah, bah! . . . be quiet, then. . . . You will make me say
something foolish, Martha!"
"Now add insult to vulgarity; nothing from you will astonish me."
"Well, once more, do not receive this Marquis,--do not receive him!"
cried the councillor, exasperated; "my mind is made up to sustain the
rights of the German princes, since you desire it! so whatever you may
say to this Nebuchadnezzar, this Pharaoh, this Tarquin, will change
nothing. Be quiet! I have no wish that he should attack you, as you say,
or that you should resist him in order to prove yourself the most
virtuous woman in all Germany. So don't think of it any more; close your
door, and let me go to peep into Lipper's ovens; my stomach warns me
that it is almost noon, and I depend so much on a certain baked pike,
with gooseberry jelly sauce, that I have dreamt of it all night."
Having suffered her husband to speak, Madame Flachsinfingen replied with
an air of calm and concentrated contempt: "I know, sir, that you think
of nothing but your beastly gormandizing, when the virtue of your wife
is in peril. . . . So it devolves on me to defend your honor and my own.
A new Judith, I will brave this Holofernes, and like her, I will say:"
'Give me, oh Lord, courage to scorn him and strength to destroy
him.'
"But notwithstanding my resolution," continued Martha, "as I am, after
all, but a weak woman, as this miscreant is capable of going to the most
frightful lengths . . . all that I ask of you is, to hold yourself well
armed, and ready to succor me, if my own efforts are unhappily vain!"
"But, Martha, reassure yourself . . . reassure yourself; one cannot
always judge one's self aright; and I swear to you that there is
something in you . . . a certain air . . . a certain 'I know not what'
. . . which would deter any impertinent fellow from showing a want of
respect to you. . . . So I shall have no need to arm myself in order to
. . ."
"Do you not know that if I set out to do a thing, I will do it?" said
the _conseillère_, interrupting her husband, and fixing on him a look
which seemed to fascinate him. "Although I am sorry to delay your
dinner-hour, you will nevertheless take a blunderbuss, and, concealed
under this table, will be present at this interview . . . ready to come
to my aid, if need be, when I cry, 'To me, Flachsinfingen!'"
"I hide myself under this table with a blunderbuss! And what for?
Heavens!"
"I tell you, sir, that this will be, and it will be!"
This scene took place in the councillor's library, where many arms of
the middle ages were hung up on the wainscot as objects of curiosity.
The lady selected a blunderbuss and a poniard, which she laid on the
table; she examined, also, a light Persian shield and a steel coat of
mail, and was on the point of investing herself with these defences in
order more surely to resist the expected attack of the Marquis; but,
deciding that she was sufficiently guarded by the poniard, she again
approached her husband.
"This poniard will do for me; this blunderbuss for you. Deborah was
armed with nothing but a nail; Judith, with a sword; Dalilah, with
scissors. . . . Martha will have a poniard."
"But, Martha, take care! this blunderbuss has been loaded ever since the
day I intended to try it. . . . Good heavens! what's the use of all
these implements?"
Again a carriage stopped at the gate. Once more, Martha felt a strong
emotion of terror, when the servant came to say to her:
"It is a French Marquis who asks for you, madame." . . .
"Good heavens! 'tis he . . . courage!" . . . said she, in a low voice;
and added: "when I ring the bell, Claire, you may introduce this
stranger."
The servant went out; the _conseillère_ solemnly embraced her husband,
and said to him in an agitated voice:
"Now, Flachsinfingen, the moment has come . . . take your blunderbuss;
and may God save me!" . . .
And she raised the cover, making a gesture to her husband to slip under
the table.
"But, my dear wife, I shall stifle under there. . . . How absurd!"
"Do you hear me?" said Martha, imperiously.
"But, 'tis useless . . ."
"Flachsinfingen, did you hear me?" cried the furious woman, seizing her
husband by the arm, and accentuating, so to speak, every word with a
sharp pinch.
"I must be, by Jupiter! as foolish and weak as you are mad, to lend
myself to this nonsense," said the councillor, rubbing his arm, and
painfully crawling under the table.
"Now, when I cry 'To me, Flachsinfingen!' come out, and fire without
mercy on this Philistine!" said his wife; then she drew down the cloth
which stifled the councillor's last murmurs.
Sure of this concealed auxilliary, Martha made scientific preparations
for defence. The table which sheltered the councillor was placed between
herself and the dreaded adversary. On her flanks she placed two chairs,
with another as a screen; and at her side she had a long Toledo poniard.
Then, with a beating heart, she rang her bell, and murmured in a low
voice: "Be ready, Flachsinfingen!" . . .
Some inarticulate sounds escaped from beneath the table-cloth; the door
was opened; Létorière entered, and the lady put her hand upon her
weapon.