CHAPTER XI

One Sunday the race for the Grand Prix de Paris was being run in the

Bois de Boulogne beneath skies rendered sultry by the first heats of

June. The sun that morning had risen amid a mist of dun-colored dust,

but toward eleven o’clock, just when the carriages were reaching the

Longchamps course, a southerly wind had swept away the clouds; long

streamers of gray vapor were disappearing across the sky, and gaps

showing an intense blue beyond were spreading from one end of the

horizon to the other. In the bright bursts of sunlight which alternated

with the clouds the whole scene shone again, from the field which was

gradually filling with a crowd of carriages, horsemen and pedestrians,

to the still-vacant course, where the judge’s box stood, together with

the posts and the masts for signaling numbers, and thence on to the

five symmetrical stands of brickwork and timber, rising gallery upon

gallery in the middle of the weighing enclosure opposite. Beyond these,

bathed in the light of noon, lay the vast level plain, bordered with

little trees and shut in to the westward by the wooded heights of

Saint-Cloud and the Suresnes, which, in their turn, were dominated by

the severe outlines of Mont-Valerien.

Nana, as excited as if the Grand Prix were going to make her fortune,

wanted to take up a position by the railing next the winning post. She

had arrived very early—she was, in fact, one of the first to come—in a

landau adorned with silver and drawn, à la Daumont, by four splendid

white horses. This landau was a present from Count Muffat. When she had

made her appearance at the entrance to the field with two postilions

jogging blithely on the near horses and two footmen perching motionless

behind the carriage, the people had rushed to look as though a queen

were passing. She sported the blue and white colors of the Vandeuvres

stable, and her dress was remarkable. It consisted of a little blue

silk bodice and tunic, which fitted closely to the body and bulged out

enormously behind her waist, thereby bringing her lower limbs into bold

relief in such a manner as to be extremely noticeable in that epoch of

voluminous skirts. Then there was a white satin dress with white satin

sleeves and a sash worn crosswise over the shoulders, the whole

ornamented with silver guipure which shone in the sun. In addition to

this, in order to be still more like a jockey, she had stuck a blue

toque with a white feather jauntily upon her chignon, the fair tresses

from which flowed down beyond her shoulders and resembled an enormous

russet pigtail.

Twelve struck. The public would have to wait more than three hours for

the Grand Prix to be run. When the landau had drawn up beside the

barriers Nana settled herself comfortably down as though she were in

her own house. A whim had prompted her to bring Bijou and Louiset with

her, and the dog crouched among her skirts, shivering with cold despite

the heat of the day, while amid a bedizenment of ribbons and laces the

child’s poor little face looked waxen and dumb and white in the open

air. Meanwhile the young woman, without troubling about the people near

her, talked at the top of her voice with Georges and Philippe Hugon,

who were seated opposite on the front seat among such a mountain of

bouquets of white roses and blue myosotis that they were buried up to

their shoulders.

“Well then,” she was saying, “as he bored me to death, I showed him the

door. And now it’s two days that he’s been sulking.”

She was talking of Muffat, but she took care not to confess to the

young men the real reason for this first quarrel, which was that one

evening he had found a man’s hat in her bedroom. She had indeed brought

home a passer-by out of sheer ennui—a silly infatuation.

“You have no idea how funny he is,” she continued, growing merry over

the particulars she was giving. “He’s a regular bigot at bottom, so he

says his prayers every evening. Yes, he does. He’s under the impression

I notice nothing because I go to bed first so as not to be in his way,

but I watch him out of the corner of my eye. Oh, he jaws away, and then

he crosses himself when he turns round to step over me and get to the

inside of the bed.”

“Jove, it’s sly,” muttered Philippe. “That’s what happens before, but

afterward, what then?”

She laughed merrily.

“Yes, just so, before and after! When I’m going to sleep I hear him

jawing away again. But the biggest bore of all is that we can’t argue

about anything now without his growing ‘pi.’ I’ve always been

religious. Yes, chaff as much as you like; that won’t prevent me

believing what I do believe! Only he’s too much of a nuisance: he

blubbers; he talks about remorse. The day before yesterday, for

instance, he had a regular fit of it after our usual row, and I wasn’t

the least bit reassured when all was over.”

But she broke off, crying out:

“Just look at the Mignons arriving. Dear me, they’ve brought the

children! Oh, how those little chaps are dressed up!”

The Mignons were in a landau of severe hue; there was something

substantially luxurious about their turnout, suggesting rich retired

tradespeople. Rose was in a gray silk gown trimmed with red knots and

with puffs; she was smiling happily at the joyous behavior of Henri and

Charles, who sat on the front seat, looking awkward in their

ill-fitting collegians’ tunics. But when the landau had drawn up by the

rails and she perceived Nana sitting in triumph among her bouquets,

with her four horses and her liveries, she pursed up her lips, sat bolt

upright and turned her head away. Mignon, on the other hand, looking

the picture of freshness and gaiety, waved her a salutation. He made it

a matter of principle to keep out of feminine disagreements.

“By the by,” Nana resumed, “d’you know a little old man who’s very

clean and neat and has bad teeth—a Monsieur Venot? He came to see me

this morning.”

“Monsieur Venot?” said Georges in great astonishment. “It’s impossible!

Why, the man’s a Jesuit!”

“Precisely; I spotted that. Oh, you have no idea what our conversation

was like! It was just funny! He spoke to me about the count, about his

divided house, and begged me to restore a family its happiness. He was

very polite and very smiling for the matter of that. Then I answered to

the effect that I wanted nothing better, and I undertook to reconcile

the count and his wife. You know it’s not humbug. I should be delighted

to see them all happy again, the poor things! Besides, it would be a

relief to me for there are days—yes, there are days—when he bores me to

death.”

The weariness of the last months escaped her in this heartfelt

outburst. Moreover, the count appeared to be in big money difficulties;

he was anxious and it seemed likely that the bill which Labordette had

put his name to would not be met.

“Dear me, the countess is down yonder,” said Georges, letting his gaze

wander over the stands.

“Where, where?” cried Nana. “What eyes that baby’s got! Hold my

sunshade, Philippe.”

But with a quick forward dart Georges had outstripped his brother. It

enchanted him to be holding the blue silk sunshade with its silver

fringe. Nana was scanning the scene through a huge pair of field

glasses.

“Ah yes! I see her,” she said at length. “In the right-hand stand, near

a pillar, eh? She’s in mauve, and her daughter in white by her side.

Dear me, there’s Daguenet going to bow to them.”

Thereupon Philippe talked of Daguenet’s approaching marriage with that

lath of an Estelle. It was a settled matter—the banns were being

published. At first the countess had opposed it, but the count, they

said, had insisted. Nana smiled.

“I know, I know,” she murmured. “So much the better for Paul. He’s a

nice boy—he deserves it.”

And leaning toward Louiset:

“You’re enjoying yourself, eh? What a grave face!”

The child never smiled. With a very old expression he was gazing at all

those crowds, as though the sight of them filled him with melancholy

reflections. Bijou, chased from the skirts of the young woman who was

moving about a great deal, had come to nestle, shivering, against the

little fellow.

Meanwhile the field was filling up. Carriages, a compact, interminable

file of them, were continually arriving through the Porte de la

Cascade. There were big omnibuses such as the Pauline, which had

started from the Boulevard des Italiens, freighted with its fifty

passengers, and was now going to draw up to the right of the stands.

Then there were dogcarts, victorias, landaus, all superbly well turned

out, mingled with lamentable cabs which jolted along behind sorry old

hacks, and four-in-hands, sending along their four horses, and mail

coaches, where the masters sat on the seats above and left the servants

to take care of the hampers of champagne inside, and “spiders,” the

immense wheels of which were a flash of glittering steel, and light

tandems, which looked as delicately formed as the works of a clock and

slipped along amid a peal of little bells. Every few seconds an

equestrian rode by, and a swarm of people on foot rushed in a scared

way among the carriages. On the green the far-off rolling sound which

issued from the avenues in the Bois died out suddenly in dull

rustlings, and now nothing was audible save the hubbub of the

ever-increasing crowds and cries and calls and the crackings of whips

in the open. When the sun, amid bursts of wind, reappeared at the edge

of a cloud, a long ray of golden light ran across the field, lit up the

harness and the varnished coach panels and touched the ladies’ dresses

with fire, while amid the dusty radiance the coachmen, high up on their

boxes, flamed beside their great whips.

Labordette was getting out of an open carriage where Gaga, Clarisse and

Blanche de Sivry had kept a place for him. As he was hurrying to cross

the course and enter the weighing enclosure Nana got Georges to call

him. Then when he came up:

“What’s the betting on me?” she asked laughingly.

She referred to the filly Nana, the Nana who had let herself be

shamefully beaten in the race for the Prix de Diane and had not even

been placed in April and May last when she ran for the Prix des Cars

and the Grande Poule des Produits, both of which had been gained by

Lusignan, the other horse in the Vandeuvres stable. Lusignan had all at

once become prime favorite, and since yesterday he had been currently

taken at two to one.

“Always fifty to one against,” replied Labordette.

“The deuce! I’m not worth much,” rejoined Nana, amused by the jest. “I

don’t back myself then; no, by jingo! I don’t put a single louis on

myself.”

Labordette went off again in a great hurry, but she recalled him. She

wanted some advice. Since he kept in touch with the world of trainers

and jockeys he had special information about various stables. His

prognostications had come true a score of times already, and people

called him the “King of Tipsters.”

“Let’s see, what horses ought I to choose?” said the young woman.

“What’s the betting on the Englishman?”

“Spirit? Three to one against. Valerio II, the same. As to the others,

they’re laying twenty-five to one against Cosinus, forty to one against

Hazard, thirty to one against Bourn, thirty-five to one against

Pichenette, ten to one against Frangipane.”

“No, I don’t bet on the Englishman, I don’t. I’m a patriot. Perhaps

Valerio II would do, eh? The Duc de Corbreuse was beaming a little

while ago. Well, no, after all! Fifty louis on Lusignan; what do you

say to that?”

Labordette looked at her with a singular expression. She leaned forward

and asked him questions in a low voice, for she was aware that

Vandeuvres commissioned him to arrange matters with the bookmakers so

as to be able to bet the more easily. Supposing him to have got to know

something, he might quite well tell it her. But without entering into

explanations Labordette persuaded her to trust to his sagacity. He

would put on her fifty louis for her as he might think best, and she

would not repent of his arrangement.

“All the horses you like!” she cried gaily, letting him take his

departure, “but no Nana; she’s a jade!”

There was a burst of uproarious laughter in the carriage. The young men

thought her sally very amusing, while Louiset in his ignorance lifted

his pale eyes to his mother’s face, for her loud exclamations surprised

him. However, there was no escape for Labordette as yet. Rose Mignon

had made a sign to him and was now giving him her commands while he

wrote figures in a notebook. Then Clarisse and Gaga called him back in

order to change their bets, for they had heard things said in the

crowd, and now they didn’t want to have anything more to do with

Valerio II and were choosing Lusignan. He wrote down their wishes with

an impassible expression and at length managed to escape. He could be

seen disappearing between two of the stands on the other side of the

course.

Carriages were still arriving. They were by this time drawn up five

rows deep, and a dense mass of them spread along the barriers,

checkered by the light coats of white horses. Beyond them other

carriages stood about in comparative isolation, looking as though they

had stuck fast in the grass. Wheels and harness were here, there and

everywhere, according as the conveyances to which they belonged were

side by side, at an angle, across and across or head to head. Over such

spaces of turf as still remained unoccupied cavaliers kept trotting,

and black groups of pedestrians moved continually. The scene resembled

the field where a fair is being held, and above it all, amid the

confused motley of the crowd, the drinking booths raised their gray

canvas roofs which gleamed white in the sunshine. But a veritable

tumult, a mob, an eddy of hats, surged round the several bookmakers,

who stood in open carriages gesticulating like itinerant dentists while

their odds were pasted up on tall boards beside them.

“All the same, it’s stupid not to know on what horse one’s betting,”

Nana was remarking. “I really must risk some louis in person.”

She had stood up to select a bookmaker with a decent expression of face

but forgot what she wanted on perceiving a perfect crowd of her

acquaintance. Besides the Mignons, besides Gaga, Clarisse and Blanche,

there were present, to the right and left, behind and in the middle of

the mass of carriages now hemming in her landau, the following ladies:

Tatan Nene and Maria Blond in a victoria, Caroline Hequet with her

mother and two gentlemen in an open carriage, Louise Violaine quite

alone, driving a little basket chaise decked with orange and green

ribbons, the colors of the Mechain stables, and finally, Léa de Horn on

the lofty seat of a mail coach, where a band of young men were making a

great din. Farther off, in a HUIT RESSORTS of aristocratic appearance,

Lucy Stewart, in a very simple black silk dress, sat, looking

distinguished beside a tall young man in the uniform of a naval cadet.

But what most astounded Nana was the arrival of Simonne in a tandem

which Steiner was driving, while a footman sat motionless, with folded

arms, behind them. She looked dazzling in white satin striped with

yellow and was covered with diamonds from waist to hat. The banker, on

his part, was handling a tremendous whip and sending along his two

horses, which were harnessed tandemwise, the leader being a little

warm-colored chestnut with a mouselike trot, the shaft horse a big

brown bay, a stepper, with a fine action.

“Deuce take it!” said Nana. “So that thief Steiner has cleared the

Bourse again, has he? I say, isn’t Simonne a swell! It’s too much of a

good thing; he’ll get into the clutches of the law!”

Nevertheless, she exchanged greetings at a distance. Indeed, she kept

waving her hand and smiling, turning round and forgetting no one in her

desire to be seen by everybody. At the same time she continued

chatting.

“It’s her son Lucy’s got in tow! He’s charming in his uniform. That’s

why she’s looking so grand, of course! You know she’s afraid of him and

that she passes herself off as an actress. Poor young man, I pity him

all the same! He seems quite unsuspicious.”

“Bah,” muttered Philippe, laughing, “she’ll be able to find him an

heiress in the country when she likes.”

Nana was silent, for she had just noticed the Tricon amid the thick of

the carriages. Having arrived in a cab, whence she could not see

anything, the Tricon had quietly mounted the coach box. And there,

straightening up her tall figure, with her noble face enshrined in its

long curls, she dominated the crowd as though enthroned amid her

feminine subjects. All the latter smiled discreetly at her while she,

in her superiority, pretended not to know them. She wasn’t there for

business purposes: she was watching the races for the love of the

thing, as became a frantic gambler with a passion for horseflesh.

“Dear me, there’s that idiot La Faloise!” said Georges suddenly.

It was a surprise to them all. Nana did not recognize her La Faloise,

for since he had come into his inheritance he had grown extraordinarily

up to date. He wore a low collar and was clad in a cloth of delicate

hue which fitted close to his meager shoulders. His hair was in little

bandeaux, and he affected a weary kind of swagger, a soft tone of voice

and slang words and phrases which he did not take the trouble to

finish.

“But he’s quite the thing!” declared Nana in perfect enchantment.

Gaga and Clarisse had called La Faloise and were throwing themselves at

him in their efforts to regain his allegiance, but he left them

immediately, rolling off in a chaffing, disdainful manner. Nana dazzled

him. He rushed up to her and stood on the carriage step, and when she

twitted him about Gaga he murmured:

“Oh dear, no! We’ve seen the last of the old lot! Mustn’t play her off

on me any more. And then, you know, it’s you now, Juliet mine!”

He had put his hand to his heart. Nana laughed a good deal at this

exceedingly sudden out-of-door declaration. She continued:

“I say, that’s not what I’m after. You’re making me forget that I want

to lay wagers. Georges, you see that bookmaker down there, a great

red-faced man with curly hair? He’s got a dirty blackguard expression

which I like. You’re to go and choose—Oh, I say, what can one choose?”

“I’m not a patriotic soul—oh dear, no!” La Faloise blurted out. “I’m

all for the Englishman. It will be ripping if the Englishman gains! The

French may go to Jericho!”

Nana was scandalized. Presently the merits of the several horses began

to be discussed, and La Faloise, wishing to be thought very much in the

swim, spoke of them all as sorry jades. Frangipane, Baron Verdier’s

horse, was by The Truth out of Lenore. A big bay horse he was, who

would certainly have stood a chance if they hadn’t let him get

foundered during training. As to Valerio II from the Corbreuse stable,

he wasn’t ready yet; he’d had the colic in April. Oh yes, they were

keeping that dark, but he was sure of it, on his honor! In the end he

advised Nana to choose Hazard, the most defective of the lot, a horse

nobody would have anything to do with. Hazard, by jingo—such superb

lines and such an action! That horse was going to astonish the people.

“No,” said Nana, “I’m going to put ten louis on Lusignan and five on

Boum.”

La Faloise burst forth at once:

“But, my dear girl, Boum’s all rot! Don’t choose him! Gasc himself is

chucking up backing his own horse. And your Lusignan—never! Why, it’s

all humbug! By Lamb and Princess—just think! By Lamb and Princess—no,

by Jove! All too short in the legs!”

He was choking. Philippe pointed out that, notwithstanding this,

Lusignan had won the Prix des Cars and the Grande Poule des Produits.

But the other ran on again. What did that prove? Nothing at all. On the

contrary, one ought to distrust him. And besides, Gresham rode

Lusignan; well then, let them jolly well dry up! Gresham had bad luck;

he would never get to the post.

And from one end of the field to the other the discussion raging in

Nana’s landau seemed to spread and increase. Voices were raised in a

scream; the passion for gambling filled the air, set faces glowing and

arms waving excitedly, while the bookmakers, perched on their

conveyances, shouted odds and jotted down amounts right furiously. Yet

these were only the small fry of the betting world; the big bets were

made in the weighing enclosure. Here, then, raged the keen contest of

people with light purses who risked their five-franc pieces and

displayed infinite covetousness for the sake of a possible gain of a

few louis. In a word, the battle would be between Spirit and Lusignan.

Englishmen, plainly recognizable as such, were strolling about among

the various groups. They were quite at home; their faces were fiery

with excitement; they were afready triumphant. Bramah, a horse

belonging to Lord Reading, had gained the Grand Prix the previous year,

and this had been a defeat over which hearts were still bleeding. This

year it would be terrible if France were beaten anew. Accordingly all

the ladies were wild with national pride. The Vandeuvres stable became

the rampart of their honor, and Lusignan was pushed and defended and

applauded exceedingly. Gaga, Blanche, Caroline and the rest betted on

Lusignan. Lucy Stewart abstained from this on account of her son, but

it was bruited abroad that Rose Mignon had commissioned Labordette to

risk two hundred louis for her. The Tricon, as she sat alone next her

driver, waited till the last moment. Very cool, indeed, amid all these

disputes, very far above the ever-increasing uproar in which horses’

names kept recurring and lively Parisian phrases mingled with guttural

English exclamations, she sat listening and taking notes majestically.

“And Nana?” said Georges. “Does no one want her?”

Indeed, nobody was asking for the filly; she was not even being

mentioned. The outsider of the Vandeuvres’s stud was swamped by

Lusignan’s popularity. But La Faloise flung his arms up, crying:

“I’ve an inspiration. I’ll bet a louis on Nana.”

“Bravo! I bet a couple,” said Georges.

“And I three,” added Philippe.

And they mounted up and up, bidding against one another good-humoredly

and naming prices as though they had been haggling over Nana at an

auction. La Faloise said he would cover her with gold. Besides,

everybody was to be made to back her; they would go and pick up

backers. But as the three young men were darting off to propagandize,

Nana shouted after them:

“You know I don’t want to have anything to do with her; I don’t for the

world! Georges, ten louis on Lusignan and five on Valerio II.”

Meanwhile they had started fairly off, and she watched them gaily as

they slipped between wheels, ducked under horses’ heads and scoured the

whole field. The moment they recognized anyone in a carriage they

rushed up and urged Nana’s claims. And there were great bursts of

laughter among the crowd when sometimes they turned back, triumphantly

signaling amounts with their fingers, while the young woman stood and

waved her sunshade. Nevertheless, they made poor enough work of it.

Some men let themselves be persuaded; Steiner, for instance, ventured

three louis, for the sight of Nana stirred him. But the women refused

point-blank. “Thanks,” they said; “to lose for a certainty!” Besides,

they were in no hurry to work for the benefit of a dirty wench who was

overwhelming them all with her four white horses, her postilions and

her outrageous assumption of side. Gaga and Clarisse looked exceedingly

prim and asked La Faloise whether he was jolly well making fun of them.

When Georges boldly presented himself before the Mignons’ carriage Rose

turned her head away in the most marked manner and did not answer him.

One must be a pretty foul sort to let one’s name be given to a horse!

Mignon, on the contrary, followed the young man’s movements with a look

of amusement and declared that the women always brought luck.

“Well?” queried Nana when the young men returned after a prolonged

visit to the bookmakers.

“The odds are forty to one against you,” said La Faloise.

“What’s that? Forty to one!” she cried, astounded. “They were fifty to

one against me. What’s happened?”

Labordette had just then reappeared. The course was being cleared, and

the pealing of a bell announced the first race. Amid the expectant

murmur of the bystanders she questioned him about this sudden rise in

her value. But he replied evasively; doubtless a demand for her had

arisen. She had to content herself with this explanation. Moreover,

Labordette announced with a preoccupied expression that Vandeuvres was

coming if he could get away.

The race was ending unnoticed; people were all waiting for the Grand

Prix to be run—when a storm burst over the Hippodrome. For some minutes

past the sun had disappeared, and a wan twilight had darkened over the

multitude. Then the wind rose, and there ensued a sudden deluge. Huge

drops, perfect sheets of water, fell. There was a momentary confusion,

and people shouted and joked and swore, while those on foot scampered

madly off to find refuge under the canvas of the drinking booths. In

the carriages the women did their best to shelter themselves, grasping

their sunshades with both hands, while the bewildered footmen ran to

the hoods. But the shower was already nearly over, and the sun began

shining brilliantly through escaping clouds of fine rain. A blue cleft

opened in the stormy mass, which was blown off over the Bois, and the

skies seemed to smile again and to set the women laughing in a

reassured manner, while amid the snorting of horses and the disarray

and agitation of the drenched multitude that was shaking itself dry a

broad flush of golden light lit up the field, still dripping and

glittering with crystal drops.

“Oh, that poor, dear Louiset!” said Nana. “Are you very drenched, my

darling?”

The little thing silently allowed his hands to be wiped. The young

woman had taken out her handkerchief. Then she dabbed it over Bijou,

who was trembling more violently than ever. It would not matter in the

least; there were a few drops on the white satin of her dress, but she

didn’t care a pin for them. The bouquets, refreshed by the rain, glowed

like snow, and she smelled one ecstatically, drenching her lips in it

as though it were wet with dew.

Meanwhile the burst of rain had suddenly filled the stands. Nana looked

at them through her field glasses. At that distance you could only

distinguish a compact, confused mass of people, heaped up, as it were,

on the ascending ranges of steps, a dark background relieved by light

dots which were human faces. The sunlight filtered in through openings

near the roof at each end of the stand and detached and illumined

portions of the seated multitude, where the ladies’ dresses seemed to

lose their distinguishing colors. But Nana was especially amused by the

ladies whom the shower had driven from the rows of chairs ranged on the

sand at the base of the stands. As courtesans were absolutely forbidden

to enter the enclosure, she began making exceedingly bitter remarks

about all the fashionable women therein assembled. She thought them

fearfully dressed up, and such guys!

There was a rumor that the empress was entering the little central

stand, a pavilion built like a chalet, with a wide balcony furnished

with red armchairs.

“Why, there he is!” said Georges. “I didn’t think he was on duty this

week.”

The stiff and solemn form of the Count Muffat had appeared behind the

empress. Thereupon the young men jested and were sorry that Satin

wasn’t there to go and dig him in the ribs. But Nana’s field glass

focused the head of the Prince of Scots in the imperial stand.

“Gracious, it’s Charles!” she cried.

She thought him stouter than formerly. In eighteen months he had

broadened, and with that she entered into particulars. Oh yes, he was a

big, solidly built fellow!

All round her in the ladies’ carriages they were whispering that the

count had given her up. It was quite a long story. Since he had been

making himself noticeable, the Tuileries had grown scandalized at the

chamberlain’s conduct. Whereupon, in order to retain his position, he

had recently broken it off with Nana. La Faloise bluntly reported this

account of matters to the young woman and, addressing her as his

Juliet, again offered himself. But she laughed merrily and remarked:

“It’s idiotic! You won’t know him; I’ve only to say, ‘Come here,’ for

him to chuck up everything.”

For some seconds past she had been examining the Countess Sabine and

Estelle. Daguenet was still at their side. Fauchery had just arrived

and was disturbing the people round him in his desire to make his bow

to them. He, too, stayed smilingly beside them. After that Nana pointed

with disdainful action at the stands and continued:

“Then, you know, those people don’t fetch me any longer now! I know ’em

too well. You should see ’em behind scenes. No more honor! It’s all up

with honor! Filth belowstairs, filth abovestairs, filth everywhere.

That’s why I won’t be bothered about ’em!”

And with a comprehensive gesture she took in everybody, from the grooms

leading the horses on to the course to the sovereign lady busy chatting

with with Charles, a prince and a dirty fellow to boot.

“Bravo, Nana! Awfully smart, Nana!” cried La Faloise enthusiastically.

The tolling of a bell was lost in the wind; the races continued. The

Prix d’Ispahan had just been run for and Berlingot, a horse belonging

to the Mechain stable, had won. Nana recalled Labordette in order to

obtain news of the hundred louis, but he burst out laughing and refused

to let her know the horses he had chosen for her, so as not to disturb

the luck, as he phrased it. Her money was well placed; she would see

that all in good time. And when she confessed her bets to him and told

him how she had put ten louis on Lusignan and five on Valerio II, he

shrugged his shoulders, as who should say that women did stupid things

whatever happened. His action surprised her; she was quite at sea.

Just then the field grew more animated than before. Open-air lunches

were arranged in the interval before the Grand Prix. There was much

eating and more drinking in all directions, on the grass, on the high

seats of the four-in-hands and mail coaches, in the victorias, the

broughams, the landaus. There was a universal spread of cold viands and

a fine disorderly display of champagne baskets which footmen kept

handing down out of the coach boots. Corks came out with feeble pops,

which the wind drowned. There was an interchange of jests, and the

sound of breaking glasses imparted a note of discord to the high-strung

gaiety of the scene. Gaga and Clarisse, together with Blanche, were

making a serious repast, for they were eating sandwiches on the

carriage rug with which they had been covering their knees. Louise

Violaine had got down from her basket carriage and had joined Caroline

Hequet. On the turf at their feet some gentlemen had instituted a

drinking bar, whither Tatan, Maria, Simonne and the rest came to

refresh themselves, while high in air and close at hand bottles were

being emptied on Léa de Horn’s mail coach, and, with infinite bravado

and gesticulation, a whole band were making themselves tipsy in the

sunshine, above the heads of the crowd. Soon, however, there was an

especially large crowd by Nana’s landau. She had risen to her feet and

had set herself to pour out glasses of champagne for the men who came

to pay her their respects. Francois, one of the footmen, was passing up

the bottles while La Faloise, trying hard to imitate a coster’s

accents, kept pattering away:

“’Ere y’re, given away, given away! There’s some for everybody!”

“Do be still, dear boy,” Nana ended by saying. “We look like a set of

tumblers.”

She thought him very droll and was greatly entertained. At one moment

she conceived the idea of sending Georges with a glass of champagne to

Rose Mignon, who was affecting temperance. Henri and Charles were bored

to distraction; they would have been glad of some champagne, the poor

little fellows. But Georges drank the glassful, for he feared an

argument. Then Nana remembered Louiset, who was sitting forgotten

behind her. Maybe he was thirsty, and she forced him to take a drop or

two of wine, which made him cough dreadfully.

“’Ere y’are, ’ere y’are, gemmen!” La Faloise reiterated. “It don’t cost

two sous; it don’t cost one. We give it away.”

But Nana broke in with an exclamation:

“Gracious, there’s Bordenave down there! Call him. Oh, run, please,

please do!”

It was indeed Bordenave. He was strolling about with his hands behind

his back, wearing a hat that looked rusty in the sunlight and a greasy

frock coat that was glossy at the seams. It was Bordenave shattered by

bankruptcy, yet furious despite all reverses, a Bordenave who flaunted

his misery among all the fine folks with the hardihood becoming a man

ever ready to take Dame Fortune by storm.

“The deuce, how smart we are!” he said when Nana extended her hand to

him like the good-natured wench she was.

Presently, after emptying a glass of champagne, he gave vent to the

following profoundly regretful phrase:

“Ah, if only I were a woman! But, by God, that’s nothing! Would you

like to go on the stage again? I’ve a notion: I’ll hire the Gaîté, and

we’ll gobble up Paris between us. You certainly owe it me, eh?”

And he lingered, grumbling, beside her, though glad to see her again;

for, he said, that confounded Nana was balm to his feelings. Yes, it

was balm to them merely to exist in her presence! She was his daughter;

she was blood of his blood!

The circle increased, for now La Faloise was filling glasses, and

Georges and Philippe were picking up friends. A stealthy impulse was

gradually bringing in the whole field. Nana would fling everyone a

laughing smile or an amusing phrase. The groups of tipplers were

drawing near, and all the champagne scattered over the place was moving

in her direction. Soon there was only one noisy crowd, and that was

round her landau, where she queened it among outstretched glasses, her

yellow hair floating on the breeze and her snowy face bathed in the

sunshine. Then by way of a finishing touch and to make the other women,

who were mad at her triumph, simply perish of envy, she lifted a

brimming glass on high and assumed her old pose as Venus Victrix.

But somebody touched her shoulder, and she was surprised, on turning

round, to see Mignon on the seat. She vanished from view an instant and

sat herself down beside him, for he had come to communicate a matter of

importance. Mignon had everywhere declared that it was ridiculous of

his wife to bear Nana a grudge; he thought her attitude stupid and

useless.

“Look here, my dear,” he whispered. “Be careful: don’t madden Rose too

much. You understand, I think it best to warn you. Yes, she’s got a

weapon in store, and as she’s never forgiven you the Petite Duchesse

business—”

“A weapon,” said Nana; “what’s that blooming well got to do with me?”

“Just listen: it’s a letter she must have found in Fauchery’s pocket, a

letter written to that screw Fauchery by the Countess Muffat. And, by

Jove, it’s clear the whole story’s in it. Well then, Rose wants to send

the letter to the count so as to be revenged on him and on you.”

“What the deuce has that got to do with me?” Nana repeated. “It’s a

funny business. So the whole story about Fauchery’s in it! Very well,

so much the better; the woman has been exasperating me! We shall have a

good laugh!”

“No, I don’t wish it,” Mignon briskly rejoined. “There’ll be a pretty

scandal! Besides, we’ve got nothing to gain.”

He paused, fearing lest he should say too much, while she loudly

averred that she was most certainly not going to get a chaste woman

into trouble.

But when he still insisted on his refusal she looked steadily at him.

Doubtless he was afraid of seeing Fauchery again introduced into his

family in case he broke with the countess. While avenging her own

wrongs, Rose was anxious for that to happen, since she still felt a

kindness toward the journalist. And Nana waxed meditative and thought

of M. Venot’s call, and a plan began to take shape in her brain, while

Mignon was doing his best to talk her over.

“Let’s suppose that Rose sends the letter, eh? There’s food for

scandal: you’re mixed up in the business, and people say you’re the

cause of it all. Then to begin with, the count separates from his

wife.”

“Why should he?” she said. “On the contrary—”

She broke off, in her turn. There was no need for her to think aloud.

So in order to be rid of Mignon she looked as though she entered into

his view of the case, and when he advised her to give Rose some proof

of her submission—to pay her a short visit on the racecourse, for

instance, where everybody would see her—she replied that she would see

about it, that she would think the matter over.

A commotion caused her to stand up again. On the course the horses were

coming in amid a sudden blast of wind. The prize given by the city of

Paris had just been run for, and Cornemuse had gained it. Now the Grand

Prix was about to be run, and the fever of the crowd increased, and

they were tortured by anxiety and stamped and swayed as though they

wanted to make the minutes fly faster. At this ultimate moment the

betting world was surprised and startled by the continued shortening of

the odds against Nana, the outsider of the Vandeuvres stables.

Gentlemen kept returning every few moments with a new quotation: the

betting was thirty to one against Nana; it was twenty-five to one

against Nana, then twenty to one, then fifteen to one. No one could

understand it. A filly beaten on all the racecourses! A filly which

that same morning no single sportsman would take at fifty to one

against! What did this sudden madness betoken? Some laughed at it and

spoke of the pretty doing awaiting the duffers who were being taken in

by the joke. Others looked serious and uneasy and sniffed out something

ugly under it all. Perhaps there was a “deal” in the offing. Allusion

was made to well-known stories about the robberies which are winked at

on racecourses, but on this occasion the great name of Vandeuvres put a

stop to all such accusations, and the skeptics in the end prevailed

when they prophesied that Nana would come in last of all.

“Who’s riding Nana?” queried La Faloise.

Just then the real Nana reappeared, whereat the gentlemen lent his

question an indecent meaning and burst into an uproarious fit of

laughter. Nana bowed.

“Price is up,” she replied.

And with that the discussion began again. Price was an English

celebrity. Why had Vandeuvres got this jockey to come over, seeing that

Gresham ordinarily rode Nana? Besides, they were astonished to see him

confiding Lusignan to this man Gresham, who, according to La Faloise,

never got a place. But all these remarks were swallowed up in jokes,

contradictions and an extraordinarily noisy confusion of opinions. In

order to kill time the company once more set themselves to drain

bottles of champagne. Presently a whisper ran round, and the different

groups opened outward. It was Vandeuvres. Nana affected vexation.

“Dear me, you’re a nice fellow to come at this time of day! Why, I’m

burning to see the enclosure.”

“Well, come along then,” he said; “there’s still time. You’ll take a

stroll round with me. I just happen to have a permit for a lady about

me.”

And he led her off on his arm while she enjoyed the jealous glances

with which Lucy, Caroline and the others followed her. The young Hugons

and La Faloise remained in the landau behind her retreating figure and

continued to do the honors of her champagne. She shouted to them that

she would return immediately.

But Vandeuvres caught sight of Labordette and called him, and there was

an interchange of brief sentences.

“You’ve scraped everything up?”

“Yes.”

“To what amount?”

“Fifteen hundred louis—pretty well all over the place.”

As Nana was visibly listening, and that with much curiosity, they held

their tongues. Vandeuvres was very nervous, and he had those same clear

eyes, shot with little flames, which so frightened her the night he

spoke of burning himself and his horses together. As they crossed over

the course she spoke low and familiarly.

“I say, do explain this to me. Why are the odds on your filly

changing?”

He trembled, and this sentence escaped him:

“Ah, they’re talking, are they? What a set those betting men are! When

I’ve got the favorite they all throw themselves upon him, and there’s

no chance for me. After that, when an outsider’s asked for, they give

tongue and yell as though they were being skinned.”

“You ought to tell me what’s going to happen—I’ve made my bets,” she

rejoined. “Has Nana a chance?”

A sudden, unreasonable burst of anger overpowered him.

“Won’t you deuced well let me be, eh? Every horse has a chance. The

odds are shortening because, by Jove, people have taken the horse. Who,

I don’t know. I should prefer leaving you if you must needs badger me

with your idiotic questions.”

Such a tone was not germane either to his temperament or his habits,

and Nana was rather surprised than wounded. Besides, he was ashamed of

himself directly afterward, and when she begged him in a dry voice to

behave politely he apologized. For some time past he had suffered from

such sudden changes of temper. No one in the Paris of pleasure or of

society was ignorant of the fact that he was playing his last trump

card today. If his horses did not win, if, moreover, they lost him the

considerable sums wagered upon them, it would mean utter disaster and

collapse for him, and the bulwark of his credit and the lofty

appearance which, though undermined, he still kept up, would come

ruining noisily down. Moreover, no one was ignorant of the fact that

Nana was the devouring siren who had finished him off, who had been the

last to attack his crumbling fortunes and to sweep up what remained of

them. Stories were told of wild whims and fancies, of gold scattered to

the four winds, of a visit to Baden-Baden, where she had not left him

enough to pay the hotel bill, of a handful of diamonds cast on the fire

during an evening of drunkenness in order to see whether they would

burn like coal. Little by little her great limbs and her coarse,

plebeian way of laughing had gained complete mastery over this elegant,

degenerate son of an ancient race. At that time he was risking his all,

for he had been so utterly overpowered by his taste for ordure and

stupidity as to have even lost the vigor of his skepticism. A week

before Nana had made him promise her a château on the Norman coast

between Havre and Trouville, and now he was staking the very

foundations of his honor on the fulfillment of his word. Only she was

getting on his nerves, and he could have beaten her, so stupid did he

feel her to be.

The man at the gate, not daring to stop the woman hanging on the

count’s arm, had allowed them to enter the enclosure. Nana, greatly

puffed up at the thought that at last she was setting foot on the

forbidden ground, put on her best behavior and walked slowly by the

ladies seated at the foot of the stands. On ten rows of chairs the

toilets were densely massed, and in the blithe open air their bright

colors mingled harmoniously. Chairs were scattered about, and as people

met one another friendly circles were formed, just as though the

company had been sitting under the trees in a public garden. Children

had been allowed to go free and were running from group to group, while

over head the stands rose tier above crowded tier and the light-colored

dresses therein faded into the delicate shadows of the timberwork. Nana

stared at all these ladies. She stared steadily and markedly at the

Countess Sabine. After which, as she was passing in front of the

imperial stand, the sight of Muffat, looming in all his official

stiffness by the side of the empress, made her very merry.

“Oh, how silly he looks!” she said at the top of her voice to

Vandeuvres. She was anxious to pay everything a visit. This small

parklike region, with its green lawns and groups of trees, rather

charmed her than otherwise. A vendor of ices had set up a large buffet

near the entrance gates, and beneath a rustic thatched roof a dense

throng of people were shouting and gesticulating. This was the ring.

Close by were some empty stalls, and Nana was disappointed at

discovering only a gendarme’s horse there. Then there was the paddock,

a small course some hundred meters in circumference, where a stable

help was walking about Valerio II in his horsecloths. And, oh, what a

lot of men on the graveled sidewalks, all of them with their tickets

forming an orange-colored patch in their bottonholes! And what a

continual parade of people in the open galleries of the grandstands!

The scene interested her for a moment or two, but truly, it was not

worth while getting the spleen because they didn’t admit you inside

here.

Daguenet and Fauchery passed by and bowed to her. She made them a sign,

and they had to come up. Thereupon she made hay of the weighing-in

enclosure. But she broke off abruptly:

“Dear me, there’s the Marquis de Chouard! How old he’s growing! That

old man’s killing himself! Is he still as mad about it as ever?”

Thereupon Daguenet described the old man’s last brilliant stroke. The

story dated from the day before yesterday, and no one knew it as yet.

After dangling about for months he had bought her daughter Amelie from

Gaga for thirty thousand francs, they said.

“Good gracious! That’s a nice business!” cried Nana in disgust. “Go in

for the regular thing, please! But now that I come to think of it, that

must be Lili down there on the grass with a lady in a brougham. I

recognized the face. The old boy will have brought her out.”

Vandeuvres was not listening; he was impatient and longed to get rid of

her. But Fauchery having remarked at parting that if she had not seen

the bookmakers she had seen nothing, the count was obliged to take her

to them in spite of his obvious repugnance. And she was perfectly happy

at once; that truly was a curious sight, she said!

Amid lawns bordered by young horse-chestnut trees there was a round

open enclosure, where, forming a vast circle under the shadow of the

tender green leaves, a dense line of bookmakers was waiting for betting

men, as though they had been hucksters at a fair. In order to overtop

and command the surrounding crowd they had taken up positions on wooden

benches, and they were advertising their prices on the trees beside

them. They had an ever-vigilant glance, and they booked wagers in

answer to a single sign, a mere wink, so rapidly that certain curious

onlookers watched them openmouthed, without being able to understand it

all. Confusion reigned; prices were shouted, and any unexpected change

in a quotation was received with something like tumult. Occasionally

scouts entered the place at a run and redoubled the uproar as they

stopped at the entrance to the rotunda and, at the tops of their

voices, announced departures and arrivals. In this place, where the

gambling fever was pulsing in the sunshine, such announcements were

sure to raise a prolonged muttering sound.

“They ARE funny!” murmured Nana, greatly entertained.

“Their features look as if they had been put on the wrong way. Just you

see that big fellow there; I shouldn’t care to meet him all alone in

the middle of a wood.”

But Vandeuvres pointed her out a bookmaker, once a shopman in a fancy

repository, who had made three million francs in two years. He was

slight of build, delicate and fair, and people all round him treated

him with great respect. They smiled when they addressed him, while

others took up positions close by in order to catch a glimpse of him.

They were at length leaving the ring when Vandeuvres nodded slightly to

another bookmaker, who thereupon ventured to call him. It was one of

his former coachmen, an enormous fellow with the shoulders of an ox and

a high color. Now that he was trying his fortunes at race meetings on

the strength of some mysteriously obtained capital, the count was doing

his utmost to push him, confiding to him his secret bets and treating

him on all occasions as a servant to whom one shows one’s true

character. Yet despite this protection, the man had in rapid succession

lost very heavy sums, and today he, too, was playing his last card.

There was blood in his eyes; he looked fit to drop with apoplexy.

“Well, Marechal,” queried the count in the lowest of voices, “to what

amount have you laid odds?”

“To five thousand louis, Monsieur le Comte,” replied the bookmaker,

likewise lowering his voice. “A pretty job, eh? I’ll confess to you

that I’ve increased the odds; I’ve made it three to one.”

Vandeuvres looked very much put out.

“No, no, I don’t want you to do that. Put it at two to one again

directly. I shan’t tell you any more, Marechal.”

“Oh, how can it hurt, Monsieur le Comte, at this time o’ day?” rejoined

the other with the humble smile befitting an accomplice. “I had to

attract the people so as to lay your two thousand louis.”

At this Vandeuvres silenced him. But as he was going off Marechal

remembered something and was sorry he had not questioned him about the

shortening of the odds on the filly. It would be a nice business for

him if the filly stood a chance, seeing that he had just laid fifty to

one about her in two hundreds.

Nana, though she did not understand a word of what the count was

whispering, dared not, however, ask for new explanations. He seemed

more nervous than before and abruptly handed her over to Labordette,

whom they came upon in front of the weighing-in room.

“You’ll take her back,” he said. “I’ve got something on hand. Au

revoir!”

And he entered the room, which was narrow and low-pitched and half

filled with a great pair of scales. It was like a waiting room in a

suburban station, and Nana was again hugely disillusioned, for she had

been picturing to herself something on a very vast scale, a monumental

machine, in fact, for weighing horses. Dear me, they only weighed the

jockeys! Then it wasn’t worth while making such a fuss with their

weighing! In the scale a jockey with an idiotic expression was waiting,

harness on knee, till a stout man in a frock coat should have done

verifying his weight. At the door a stable help was holding a horse,

Cosinus, round which a silent and deeply interested throng was

clustering.

The course was about to be cleared. Labordette hurried Nana but

retraced his steps in order to show her a little man talking with

Vandeuvres at some distance from the rest.

“Dear me, there’s Price!” he said.

“Ah yes, the man who’s mounting me,” she murmured laughingly.

And she declared him to be exquisitely ugly. All jockeys struck her as

looking idiotic, doubtless, she said, because they were prevented from

growing bigger. This particular jockey was a man of forty, and with his

long, thin, deeply furrowed, hard, dead countenance, he looked like an

old shriveled-up child. His body was knotty and so reduced in size that

his blue jacket with its white sleeves looked as if it had been thrown

over a lay figure.

“No,” she resumed as she walked away, “he would never make me very

happy, you know.”

A mob of people were still crowding the course, the turf of which had

been wet and trampled on till it had grown black. In front of the two

telegraphs, which hung very high up on their cast-iron pillars, the

crowd were jostling together with upturned faces, uproariously greeting

the numbers of the different horses as an electric wire in connection

with the weighing room made them appear. Gentlemen were pointing at

programs: Pichenette had been scratched by his owner, and this caused

some noise. However, Nana did not do more than cross over the course on

Labordette’s arm. The bell hanging on the flagstaff was ringing

persistently to warn people to leave the course.

“Ah, my little dears,” she said as she got up into her landau again,

“their enclosure’s all humbug!”

She was welcomed with acclamation; people around her clapped their

hands.

“Bravo, Nana! Nana’s ours again!”

What idiots they were, to be sure! Did they think she was the sort to

cut old friends? She had come back just at the auspicious moment. Now

then, ’tenshun! The race was beginning! And the champagne was

accordingly forgotten, and everyone left off drinking.

But Nana was astonished to find Gaga in her carriage, sitting with

Bijou and Louiset on her knees. Gaga had indeed decided on this course

of action in order to be near La Faloise, but she told Nana that she

had been anxious to kiss Baby. She adored children.

“By the by, what about Lili?” asked Nana. “That’s certainly she over

there in that old fellow’s brougham. They’ve just told me something

very nice!”

Gaga had adopted a lachrymose expression.

“My dear, it’s made me ill,” she said dolorously. “Yesterday I had to

keep my bed, I cried so, and today I didn’t think I should be able to

come. You know what my opinions were, don’t you? I didn’t desire that

kind of thing at all. I had her educated in a convent with a view to a

good marriage. And then to think of the strict advice she had and the

constant watching! Well, my dear, it was she who wished it. We had such

a scene—tears—disagreeable speeches! It even got to such a point that I

caught her a box on the ear. She was too much bored by existence, she

said; she wanted to get out of it. By and by, when she began to say,

‘’Tisn’t you, after all, who’ve got the right to prevent me,’ I said to

her: ‘you’re a miserable wretch; you’re bringing dishonor upon us.

Begone!’ And it was done. I consented to arrange about it. But my last

hope’s blooming well blasted, and, oh, I used to dream about such nice

things!”

The noise of a quarrel caused them to rise. It was Georges in the act

of defending Vandeuvres against certain vague rumors which were

circulating among the various groups.

“Why should you say that he’s laying off his own horse?” the young man

was exclaiming. “Yesterday in the Salon des Courses he took the odds on

Lusignan for a thousand louis.”

“Yes, I was there,” said Philippe in affirmation of this. “And he

didn’t put a single louis on Nana. If the betting’s ten to one against

Nana he’s got nothing to win there. It’s absurd to imagine people are

so calculating. Where would his interest come in?”

Labordette was listening with a quiet expression. Shrugging his

shoulders, he said:

“Oh, leave them alone; they must have their say. The count has again

laid at least as much as five hundred louis on Lusignan, and if he’s

wanted Nana to run to a hundred louis it’s because an owner ought

always to look as if he believes in his horses.”

“Oh, bosh! What the deuce does that matter to us?” shouted La Faloise

with a wave of his arms. “Spirit’s going to win! Down with

France—bravo, England!”

A long shiver ran through the crowd, while a fresh peal from the bell

announced the arrival of the horses upon the racecourse. At this Nana

got up and stood on one of the seats of her carriage so as to obtain a

better view, and in so doing she trampled the bouquets of roses and

myosotis underfoot. With a sweeping glance she took in the wide, vast

horizon. At this last feverish moment the course was empty and closed

by gray barriers, between the posts of which stood a line of policemen.

The strip of grass which lay muddy in front of her grew brighter as it

stretched away and turned into a tender green carpet in the distance.

In the middle landscape, as she lowered her eyes, she saw the field

swarming with vast numbers of people, some on tiptoe, others perched on

carriages, and all heaving and jostling in sudden passionate

excitement.

Horses were neighing; tent canvases flapped, while equestrians urged

their hacks forward amid a crowd of pedestrians rushing to get places

along the barriers. When Nana turned in the direction of the stands on

the other side the faces seemed diminished, and the dense masses of

heads were only a confused and motley array, filling gangways, steps

and terraces and looming in deep, dark, serried lines against the sky.

And beyond these again she over looked the plain surrounding the

course. Behind the ivy-clad mill to the right, meadows, dotted over

with great patches of umbrageous wood, stretched away into the

distance, while opposite to her, as far as the Seine flowing at the

foot of a hill, the avenues of the park intersected one another, filled

at that moment with long, motionless files of waiting carriages; and in

the direction of Boulogne, on the left, the landscape widened anew and

opened out toward the blue distances of Meudon through an avenue of

paulownias, whose rosy, leafless tops were one stain of brilliant lake

color. People were still arriving, and a long procession of human ants

kept coming along the narrow ribbon of road which crossed the distance,

while very far away, on the Paris side, the nonpaying public, herding

like sheep among the wood, loomed in a moving line of little dark spots

under the trees on the skirts of the Bois.

Suddenly a cheering influence warmed the hundred thousand souls who

covered this part of the plain like insects swarming madly under the

vast expanse of heaven. The sun, which had been hidden for about a

quarter of an hour, made his appearance again and shone out amid a

perfect sea of light. And everything flamed afresh: the women’s

sunshades turned into countless golden targets above the heads of the

crowd. The sun was applauded, saluted with bursts of laughter. And

people stretched their arms out as though to brush apart the clouds.

Meanwhile a solitary police officer advanced down the middle of the

deserted racecourse, while higher up, on the left, a man appeared with

a red flag in his hand.

“It’s the starter, the Baron de Mauriac,” said Labordette in reply to a

question from Nana. All round the young woman exclamations were

bursting from the men who were pressing to her very carriage step. They

kept up a disconnected conversation, jerking out phrases under the

immediate influence of passing impressions. Indeed, Philippe and

Georges, Bordenave and La Faloise, could not be quiet.

“Don’t shove! Let me see! Ah, the judge is getting into his box. D’you

say it’s Monsieur de Souvigny? You must have good eyesight—eh?—to be

able to tell what half a head is out of a fakement like that! Do hold

your tongue—the banner’s going up. Here they are—’tenshun! Cosinus is

the first!”

A red and yellow banner was flapping in mid-air at the top of a mast.

The horses came on the course one by one; they were led by stableboys,

and the jockeys were sitting idle-handed in the saddles, the sunlight

making them look like bright dabs of color. After Cosinus appeared

Hazard and Boum. Presently a murmur of approval greeted Spirit, a

magnificent big brown bay, the harsh citron color and black of whose

jockey were cheerlessly Britannic. Valerio II scored a success as he

came in; he was small and very lively, and his colors were soft green

bordered with pink. The two Vandeuvres horses were slow to make their

appearance, but at last, in Frangipane’s rear, the blue and white

showed themselves. But Lusignan, a very dark bay of irreproachable

shape, was almost forgotten amid the astonishment caused by Nana.

People had not seen her looking like this before, for now the sudden

sunlight was dyeing the chestnut filly the brilliant color of a girl’s

red-gold hair. She was shining in the light like a new gold coin; her

chest was deep; her head and neck tapered lightly from the delicate,

high-strung line of her long back.

“Gracious, she’s got my hair!” cried Nana in an ecstasy. “You bet you

know I’m proud of it!”

The men clambered up on the landau, and Bordenave narrowly escaped

putting his foot on Louiset, whom his mother had forgotten. He took him

up with an outburst of paternal grumbling and hoisted him on his

shoulder, muttering at the same time:

“The poor little brat, he must be in it too! Wait a bit, I’ll show you

Mamma. Eh? Look at Mummy out there.”

And as Bijou was scratching his legs, he took charge of him, too, while

Nana, rejoicing in the brute that bore her name, glanced round at the

other women to see how they took it. They were all raging madly. Just

then on the summit of her cab the Tricon, who had not moved till that

moment, began waving her hand and giving her bookmaker her orders above

the heads of the crowd. Her instinct had at last prompted her; she was

backing Nana.

La Faloise meanwhile was making an insufferable noise. He was getting

wild over Frangipane.

“I’ve an inspiration,” he kept shouting. “Just look at Frangipane. What

an action, eh? I back Frangipane at eight to one. Who’ll take me?”

“Do keep quiet now,” said Labordette at last. “You’ll be sorry for it

if you do.”

“Frangipane’s a screw,” Philippe declared. “He’s been utterly blown

upon already. You’ll see the canter.”

The horses had gone up to the right, and they now started for the

preliminary canter, passing in loose order before the stands. Thereupon

there was a passionate fresh burst of talk, and people all spoke at

once.

“Lusignan’s too long in the back, but he’s very fit. Not a cent, I tell

you, on Valerio II; he’s nervous—gallops with his head up—it’s a bad

sign. Jove! Burne’s riding Spirit. I tell you, he’s got no shoulders. A

well-made shoulder—that’s the whole secret. No, decidedly, Spirit’s too

quiet. Now listen, Nana, I saw her after the Grande Poule des Produits,

and she was dripping and draggled, and her sides were trembling like

one o’clock. I lay twenty louis she isn’t placed! Oh, shut up! He’s

boring us with his Frangipane. There’s no time to make a bet now;

there, they’re off!”

Almost in tears, La Faloise was struggling to find a bookmaker. He had

to be reasoned with. Everyone craned forward, but the first go-off was

bad, the starter, who looked in the distance like a slim dash of

blackness, not having lowered his flag. The horses came back to their

places after galloping a moment or two. There were two more false

starts. At length the starter got the horses together and sent them

away with such address as to elicit shouts of applause.

“Splendid! No, it was mere chance! Never mind—it’s done it!”

The outcries were smothered by the anxiety which tortured every breast.

The betting stopped now, and the game was being played on the vast

course itself. Silence reigned at the outset, as though everyone were

holding his breath. White faces and trembling forms were stretched

forward in all directions. At first Hazard and Cosinus made the running

at the head of the rest; Valerio II followed close by, and the field

came on in a confused mass behind. When they passed in front of the

stands, thundering over the ground in their course like a sudden

stormwind, the mass was already some fourteen lengths in extent.

Frangipane was last, and Nana was slightly behind Lusignan and Spirit.

“Egad!” muttered Labordette, “how the Englishman is pulling it off out

there!”

The whole carriageload again burst out with phrases and exclamations.

Everyone rose on tiptoe and followed the bright splashes of color which

were the jockeys as they rushed through the sunlight.

At the rise Valerio II took the lead, while Cosinus and Hazard lost

ground, and Lusignan and Spirit were running neck and neck with Nana

still behind them.

“By jingo, the Englishman’s gained! It’s palpable!” said Bordenave.

“Lusignan’s in difficulties, and Valerio II can’t stay.”

“Well, it will be a pretty biz if the Englishman wins!” cried Philippe

in an access of patriotic grief.

A feeling of anguish was beginning to choke all that crowded multitude.

Another defeat! And with that a strange ardent prayer, which was almost

religious, went up for Lusignan, while people heaped abuse on Spirit

and his dismal mute of a jockey. Among the crowd scattered over the

grass the wind of excitement put up whole groups of people and set

their boot soles flashing in air as they ran. Horsemen crossed the

green at a furious gallop. And Nana, who was slowly revolving on her

own axis, saw beneath her a surging waste of beasts and men, a sea of

heads swayed and stirred all round the course by the whirlwind of the

race, which clove the horizon with the bright lightning flash of the

jockeys. She had been following their movement from behind while the

cruppers sped away and the legs seemed to grow longer as they raced and

then diminished till they looked slender as strands of hair. Now the

horses were running at the end of the course, and she caught a side

view of them looking minute and delicate of outline against the green

distances of the Bois. Then suddenly they vanished behind a great clump

of trees growing in the middle of the Hippodrome.

“Don’t talk about it!” cried Georges, who was still full of hope. “It

isn’t over yet. The Englishman’s touched.”

But La Faloise was again seized with contempt for his country and grew

positively outrageous in his applause of Spirit. Bravo! That was right!

France needed it! Spirit first and Frangipane second—that would be a

nasty one for his native land! He exasperated Labordette, who

threatened seriously to throw him off the carriage.

“Let’s see how many minutes they’ll be about it,” said Bordenave

peaceably, for though holding up Louiset, he had taken out his watch.

One after the other the horses reappeared from behind the clump of

trees. There was stupefaction; a long murmur arose among the crowd.

Valerio II was still leading, but Spirit was gaining on him, and behind

him Lusignan had slackened while another horse was taking his place.

People could not make this out all at once; they were confused about

the colors. Then there was a burst of exclamations.

“But it’s Nana! Nana? Get along! I tell you Lusignan hasn’t budged.

Dear me, yes, it’s Nana. You can certainly recognize her by her golden

color. D’you see her now? She’s blazing away. Bravo, Nana! What a

ripper she is! Bah, it doesn’t matter a bit: she’s making the running

for Lusignan!”

For some seconds this was everybody’s opinion. But little by little the

filly kept gaining and gaining, spurting hard all the while. Thereupon

a vast wave of feeling passed over the crowd, and the tail of horses in

the rear ceased to interest. A supreme struggle was beginning between

Spirit, Nana, Lusignan and Valerio II. They were pointed out; people

estimated what ground they had gained or lost in disconnected, gasping

phrases. And Nana, who had mounted up on the coach box, as though some

power had lifted her thither, stood white and trembling and so deeply

moved as not to be able to speak. At her side Labordette smiled as of

old.

“The Englishman’s in trouble, eh?” said Philippe joyously. “He’s going

badly.”

“In any case, it’s all up with Lusignan,” shouted La Faloise. “Valerio

II is coming forward. Look, there they are all four together.”

The same phrase was in every mouth.

“What a rush, my dears! By God, what a rush!”

The squad of horses was now passing in front of them like a flash of

lightning. Their approach was perceptible—the breath of it was as a

distant muttering which increased at every second. The whole crowd had

thrown themselves impetuously against the barriers, and a deep clamor

issued from innumerable chests before the advance of the horses and

drew nearer and nearer like the sound of a foaming tide. It was the

last fierce outburst of colossal partisanship; a hundred thousand

spectators were possessed by a single passion, burning with the same

gambler’s lust, as they gazed after the beasts, whose galloping feet

were sweeping millions with them. The crowd pushed and crushed—fists

were clenched; people gaped, openmouthed; every man was fighting for

himself; every man with voice and gesture was madly speeding the horse

of his choice. And the cry of all this multitude, a wild beast’s cry

despite the garb of civilization, grew ever more distinct:

“Here they come! Here they come! Here they come!”

But Nana was still gaining ground, and now Valerio II was distanced,

and she was heading the race, with Spirit two or three necks behind.

The rolling thunder of voices had increased. They were coming in; a

storm of oaths greeted them from the landau.

“Gee up, Lusignan, you great coward! The Englishman’s stunning! Do it

again, old boy; do it again! Oh, that Valerio! It’s sickening! Oh, the

carcass! My ten louis damned well lost! Nana’s the only one! Bravo,

Nana! Bravo!”

And without being aware of it Nana, upon her seat, had begun jerking

her hips and waist as though she were racing herself. She kept striking

her side—she fancied it was a help to the filly. With each stroke she

sighed with fatigue and said in low, anguished tones:

“Go it, go it!”

Then a splendid sight was witnessed. Price, rising in his stirrups and

brandishing his whip, flogged Nana with an arm of iron. The old

shriveled-up child with his long, hard, dead face seemed to breath

flame. And in a fit of furious audacity and triumphant will he put his

heart into the filly, held her up, lifted her forward, drenched in

foam, with eyes of blood. The whole rush of horses passed with a roar

of thunder: it took away people’s breaths; it swept the air with it

while the judge sat frigidly waiting, his eye adjusted to its task.

Then there was an immense re-echoing burst of acclamation. With a

supreme effort Price had just flung Nana past the post, thus beating

Spirit by a head.

There was an uproar as of a rising tide. “Nana! Nana! Nana!” The cry

rolled up and swelled with the violence of a tempest, till little by

little it filled the distance, the depths of the Bois as far as Mont

Valerien, the meadows of Longchamps and the Plaine de Boulogne. In all

parts of the field the wildest enthusiasm declared itself. “Vive Nana!

Vive la France! Down with England!” The women waved their sunshades;

men leaped and spun round, vociferating as they did so, while others

with shouts of nervous laughter threw their hats in the air. And from

the other side of the course the enclosure made answer; the people on

the stands were stirred, though nothing was distinctly visible save a

tremulous motion of the air, as though an invisible flame were burning

in a brazier above the living mass of gesticulating arms and little

wildly moving faces, where the eyes and gaping mouths looked like black

dots. The noise did not cease but swelled up and recommenced in the

recesses of faraway avenues and among the people encamped under the

trees, till it spread on and on and attained its climax in the imperial

stand, where the empress herself had applauded. “Nana! Nana! Nana!” The

cry rose heavenward in the glorious sunlight, whose golden rain beat

fiercely on the dizzy heads of the multitude.

Then Nana, looming large on the seat of her landau, fancied that it was

she whom they were applauding. For a moment or two she had stood devoid

of motion, stupefied by her triumph, gazing at the course as it was

invaded by so dense a flood of people that the turf became invisible

beneath the sea of black hats. By and by, when this crowd had become

somewhat less disorderly and a lane had been formed as far as the exit

and Nana was again applauded as she went off with Price hanging

lifelessly and vacantly over her neck, she smacked her thigh

energetically, lost all self-possession, triumphed in crude phrases:

“Oh, by God, it’s me; it’s me. Oh, by God, what luck!”

And, scarce knowing how to give expression to her overwhelming joy, she

hugged and kissed Louiset, whom she now discovered high in the air on

Bordenave’s shoulder.

“Three minutes and fourteen seconds,” said the latter as he put his

watch back in his pocket.

Nana kept hearing her name; the whole plain was echoing it back to her.

Her people were applauding her while she towered above them in the

sunlight, in the splendor of her starry hair and white-and-sky-blue

dress. Labordette, as he made off, had just announced to her a gain of

two thousand louis, for he had put her fifty on Nana at forty to one.

But the money stirred her less than this unforeseen victory, the fame

of which made her queen of Paris. All the other ladies were losers.

With a raging movement Rose Mignon had snapped her sunshade, and

Caroline Hequet and Clarisse and Simonne—nay, Lucy Stewart herself,

despite the presence of her son—were swearing low in their exasperation

at that great wench’s luck, while the Tricon, who had made the sign of

the cross at both start and finish, straightened up her tall form above

them, went into an ecstasy over her intuition and damned Nana

admiringly as became an experienced matron.

Meanwhile round the landau the crush of men increased. The band of

Nana’s immediate followers had made a fierce uproar, and now Georges,

choking with emotion, continued shouting all by himself in breaking

tones. As the champagne had given out, Philippe, taking the footmen

with him, had run to the wine bars. Nana’s court was growing and

growing, and her present triumph caused many loiterers to join her.

Indeed, that movement which had made her carriage a center of

attraction to the whole field was now ending in an apotheosis, and

Queen Venus was enthroned amid suddenly maddened subjects. Bordenave,

behind her, was muttering oaths, for he yearned to her as a father.

Steiner himself had been reconquered—he had deserted Simonne and had

hoisted himself upon one of Nana’s carriage steps. When the champagne

had arrived, when she lifted her brimming glass, such applause burst

forth, and “Nana! Nana! Nana!” was so loudly repeated that the crowd

looked round in astonishment for the filly, nor could any tell whether

it was the horse or the woman that filled all hearts.

While this was going on Mignon came hastening up in defiance of Rose’s

terrible frown. That confounded girl simply maddened him, and he wanted

to kiss her. Then after imprinting a paternal salute on both her

cheeks:

“What bothers me,” he said, “is that now Rose is certainly going to

send the letter. She’s raging, too, fearfully.”

“So much the better! It’ll do my business for me!” Nana let slip.

But noting his utter astonishment, she hastily continued:

“No, no, what am I saying? Indeed, I don’t rightly know what I’m saying

now! I’m drunk.”

And drunk, indeed, drunk with joy, drunk with sunshine, she still

raised her glass on high and applauded herself.

“To Nana! To Nana!” she cried amid a redoubled uproar of laughter and

bravoes, which little by little overspread the whole Hippodrome.

The races were ending, and the Prix Vaublanc was run for. Carriages

began driving off one by one. Meanwhile, amid much disputing, the name

of Vandeuvres was again mentioned. It was quite evident now: for two

years past Vandeuvres had been preparing his final stroke and had

accordingly told Gresham to hold Nana in, while he had only brought

Lusignan forward in order to make play for the filly. The losers were

vexed; the winners shrugged their shoulders. After all, wasn’t the

thing permissible? An owner was free to run his stud in his own way.

Many others had done as he had! In fact, the majority thought

Vandeuvres had displayed great skill in raking in all he could get

about Nana through the agency of friends, a course of action which

explained the sudden shortening of the odds. People spoke of his having

laid two thousand louis on the horse, which, supposing the odds to be

thirty to one against, gave him twelve hundred thousand francs, an

amount so vast as to inspire respect and to excuse everything.

But other rumors of a very serious nature were being whispered about:

they issued in the first instance from the enclosure, and the men who

returned thence were full of exact particulars. Voices were raised; an

atrocious scandal began to be openly canvassed. That poor fellow

Vandeuvres was done for; he had spoiled his splendid hit with a piece

of flat stupidity, an idiotic robbery, for he had commissioned

Marechal, a shady bookmaker, to lay two thousand louis on his account

against Lusignan, in order thereby to get back his thousand and odd

openly wagered louis. It was a miserable business, and it proved to be

the last rift necessary to the utter breakup of his fortune. The

bookmaker being thus warned that the favorite would not win, had

realized some sixty thousand francs over the horse. Only Labordette,

for lack of exact and detailed instructions, had just then gone to him

to put two hundred louis on Nana, which the bookmaker, in his ignorance

of the stroke actually intended, was still quoting at fifty to one

against. Cleared of one hundred thousand francs over the filly and a

loser to the tune of forty thousand, Marechal, who felt the world

crumbling under his feet, had suddenly divined the situation when he

saw the count and Labordette talking together in front of the enclosure

just after the race was over. Furious, as became an ex-coachman of the

count’s, and brutally frank as only a cheated man can be, he had just

made a frightful scene in public, had told the whole story in atrocious

terms and had thrown everyone into angry excitement. It was further

stated that the stewards were about to meet.

Nana, whom Philippe and Georges were whisperingly putting in possession

of the facts, gave vent to a series of reflections and yet ceased not

to laugh and drink. After all, it was quite likely; she remembered such

things, and then that Marechal had a dirty, hangdog look. Nevertheless,

she was still rather doubtful when Labordette appeared. He was very

white.

“Well?” she asked in a low voice.

“Bloody well smashed up!” he replied simply.

And he shrugged his shoulders. That Vandeuvres was a mere child! She

made a bored little gesture.

That evening at the Bal Mabille Nana obtained a colossal success. When

toward ten o’clock she made her appearance, the uproar was afready

formidable. That classic night of madness had brought together all that

was young and pleasure loving, and now this smart world was wallowing

in the coarseness and imbecility of the servants’ hall. There was a

fierce crush under the festoons of gas lamps, and men in evening coats

and women in outrageous low-necked old toilets, which they did not mind

soiling, were howling and surging to and fro under the maddening

influence of a vast drunken fit. At a distance of thirty paces the

brass instruments of the orchestra were inaudible. Nobody was dancing.

Stupid witticisms, repeated no one knew why, were going the round of

the various groups. People were straining after wit without succeeding

in being funny. Seven women, imprisoned in the cloakroom, were crying

to be set free. A shallot had been found, put up to auction and knocked

down at two louis. Just then Nana arrived, still wearing her

blue-and-white racecourse costume, and amid a thunder of applause the

shallot was presented to her. People caught hold of her in her own

despite, and three gentlemen bore her triumphantly into the garden,

across ruined grassplots and ravaged masses of greenery. As the

bandstand presented an obstacle to her advance, it was taken by storm,

and chairs and music stands were smashed. A paternal police organized

the disorder.

It was only on Tuesday that Nana recovered from the excitements of

victory. That morning she was chatting with Mme Lerat, the old lady

having come in to bring her news of Louiset, whom the open air had

upset. A long story, which was occupying the attention of all Paris,

interested her beyond measure. Vandeuvres, after being warned off all

racecourses and posted at the Cercle Imperial on the very evening after

the disaster, had set fire to his stable on the morrow and had burned

himself and his horses to death.

“He certainly told me he was going to,” the young woman kept saying.

“That man was a regular maniac! Oh, how they did frighten me when they

told me about it yesterday evening! You see, he might easily have

murdered me some fine night. And besides, oughtn’t he to have given me

a hint about his horse? I should at any rate have made my fortune! He

said to Labordette that if I knew about the matter I would immediately

inform my hairdresser and a whole lot of other men. How polite, eh? Oh

dear, no, I certainly can’t grieve much for him.”

After some reflection she had grown very angry. Just then Labordette

came in; he had seen about her bets and was now the bearer of some

forty thousand francs. This only added to her bad temper, for she ought

to have gained a million. Labordette, who during the whole of this

episode had been pretending entire innocence, abandoned Vandeuvres in

decisive terms. Those old families, he opined, were worn out and apt to

make a stupid ending.

“Oh dear no!” said Nana. “It isn’t stupid to burn oneself in one’s

stable as he did. For my part, I think he made a dashing finish; but,

oh, you know, I’m not defending that story about him and Marechal. It’s

too silly. Just to think that Blanche has had the cheek to want to lay

the blame of it on me! I said to her: ‘Did I tell him to steal?’ Don’t

you think one can ask a man for money without urging him to commit

crime? If he had said to me, ‘I’ve got nothing left,’ I should have

said to him, ‘All right, let’s part.’ And the matter wouldn’t have gone

further.”

“Just so,” said the aunt gravely “When men are obstinate about a thing,

so much the worse for them!”

“But as to the merry little finish up, oh, that was awfully smart!”

continued Nana. “It appears to have been terrible enough to give you

the shudders! He sent everybody away and boxed himself up in the place

with a lot of petroleum. And it blazed! You should have seen it! Just

think, a great big affair, almost all made of wood and stuffed with hay

and straw! The flames simply towered up, and the finest part of the

business was that the horses didn’t want to be roasted. They could be

heard plunging, throwing themselves against the doors, crying aloud

just like human beings. Yes, people haven’t got rid of the horror of it

yet.”

Labordette let a low, incredulous whistle escape him. For his part, he

did not believe in the death of Vandeuvres. Somebody had sworn he had

seen him escaping through a window. He had set fire to his stable in a

fit of aberration, but when it had begun to grow too warm it must have

sobered him. A man so besotted about the women and so utterly worn out

could not possibly die so pluckily.

Nana listened in her disillusionment and could only remark:

“Oh, the poor wretch, it was so beautiful!”