quantity of indispensable articles with exclamations of despair, and
finding them the next moment with cries of satisfaction. Eugénie, the
cook, compactly laced into a traveling dress of blue silk, stood at the
doorway to bid her master good-by, and was run into at each instant by
the cabman or the concierge or Monsieur Michel himself, each of whom
covered, at top speed, several kilometres of stair and hallway, in the
stupendous task of transferring a trunk, a valise, a hat-box, a
shawl-strap, and an umbrella from the apartment to the carriage below.
On the surface of this uproar, the presence of Arsène swam as serenely
as a swan on a maelstrom. He accompanied his master to the gare de Lyon,
and the last object which met the anxious eyes of Monsieur Michel,
peering out from one of the first-class carriages of the departing
express, was his new servant, standing upon the platform, as unmoved by
the events of the morning as if monsieur had been passing from the
dining room to take coffee in the salon instead of from Paris to take
breakfast in Marseille. The sight of him was intensely soothing to the
fevered spirit of Monsieur Michel, on whom the details of such a
departure produced much the same effect as do cakes of soap when tossed
into the mouth of an active geyser.
"He is calm," he said to himself, rubbing his hands. "He is very calm,
and he will not lose his head while I am gone. Ter-rès bien!"
But the calm of Arsène was the calm of thin ice over swiftly rushing
waters. As the polished buffers of the last carriage swung out of sight
around the curve with a curiously furtive effect, like the eyes of an
alarmed animal, slipping backward into its burrow, he clenched the
fingers of his right hand, and slipping his thumb nail under the edge of
his upper teeth, drew it forward with a sharp click. At the same time he
said something to his vanished master in the second person singular,
which is far from being the address of affection on the lips of a
valet-maître d'hôtel.
Wheeling suddenly after this singular manifestation, Monsieur Sigard
found himself the object of close and seemingly amused scrutiny on the
part of an individual standing directly behind him. There was something
so extremely disconcerting in this gentleman's unexpected proximity, and
in his very evident enjoyment of the situation, that Arsène was upon the
point of turning abruptly away, when the other addressed him, speaking
the colloquial French of their class, with the slightest possible hint
of foreign accent.
"Bah, vieux! Is it that I do not know what they are, the patrons? Oh,
lalà!"
"Avec ça! There are some who have it, an astounding audacity!" said
Arsène to the air over the stranger's head.
"Farceur!" replied the stranger, to the air over Arsène's. And then--
"There are two parrakeets that have need of plucking across the way," he
added, reflectively.
"There are two empty sacks here to put the feathers in," answered
Arsène, with alacrity; and ten minutes later, oblivious to the chill
damp of the March morning, Monsieur Sigard and his new-found
acquaintance, seated at a little table in front of a near-by wine-shop,
were preparing in company the smoky-green mixture of absinthe and water
which Paris slang has dubbed a parrakeet. On the part of Arsène the
operation was performed with elaborate solicitude, and as he poured a
tiny stream of water over the lump of sugar on the flat spoon balanced
deftly across the glass, he held his head tipped sidewise and his left
eye closed, in the manner of a contemplative fowl, and was oblivious to
all but the delectable business of the moment.
But his companion, while apparently deeply engaged in the preparation
of his own beverage, was far from being wholly preoccupied thereby. He
was a man shorter by an inch or two than Monsieur Michel's maître
d'hôtel, dressed in the most inconspicuous fashion, and with an air of
avoiding any emphasis of voice or gesture which would be apt to attract
more than casual attention to the circumstance of his existence. There
was something about him vaguely suggestive of a chameleon, an instant
harmonizing of his appearance and manner with any background whatsoever
against which he chanced to find himself placed, and a curious clouding
of his eyes when unexpectedly they were met by those of another, which
lent him an immediate air of profound stupidity. No doubt his long
practice in this habit of self-obliteration made him doubly appreciative
of Arsène's little outburst of ill-feeling on the platform of the gare
de Lyon. A man who would do that in public--well, he had much to learn!
Just now, however, this gentleman's eyes were very bright, though they
had dwindled to mere slits; and he followed every movement of the
unconscious Arsène with short, swift glances from beneath his drooping
lids, as, bit by bit, the lumps of sugar melted under the steady drip of
the trickling water, and the opalescent mixture mounted toward the
brims. He knew but two varieties of absinthe drinker, this observant
individual,--the one who progressed, under its influence, from cheerful
candor to shrewdest insight into the motives of others, and most skilful
evasion of their toils; the other whom, by easy stages, it led from
obstinate reserve to the extreme of careless garrulity. At this moment
he was on the alert for symptoms.
Arsène looked up suddenly as the last morsel of his sugar melted, and,
lifting his glass, dipped it before the eyes of his new friend.
"To your health,--Monsieur--?" he said, in courteous interrogation.
"Fresque," said the other.
"Bon! And I, Monsieur Fresque, am Sigard, Arsène Sigard, maître d'hôtel,
at your service, of the type who has just taken himself off, down
there."
And he indicated the imposing pile of the gare de Lyon with his thumb,
and then, closing his eyes, took a long sip of his absinthe, and
replacing the glass upon the table, plunged his hands into his pockets
and stared off gloomily toward the Seine.
"Poof!" he said, "but I am content that he is gone. What a filthiness, a
rich man--what?"
"Not to be denied," agreed Monsieur Fresque. "There is not a foreign
sou's worth of delicacy in the whole lot!"
"Mazette! I believe thee," answered the other, much pleased. Fresque's
thin lips relaxed the veriest trifle at the familiarity, and he lit a
cigarette and gazed vacantly into space.
"But what dost thou expect?" he observed, with calm philosophy.
It appeared that what Arsène expected was that honest folk should not
work from seven to ten, in an ignoble box of a pantry, on boots, and
silver, and what not, he demanded of him, name of a pipe! and dust, and
sweep, and serve at table, good heaven! and practice a species of
disgusting politeness to a type of old engraving like Monsieur Armand
Michel. And all, oh, mon Dieu! for the crushing sum of twenty dollars a
month, did he comprehend? while the animal in question was sowing his
yellow buttons by fistfuls. Mazette! Evidently, he himself was not an
eagle. He did not demand the Louvre to live in, for example, nor the
existence lalala of Emile Loubet--what? but it was not amusing, he
assured him, to be in the employ of the great revolting one in question.
Ah, non!
"Eiffelesque!" succinctly commented Monsieur Fresque.
But, said Arsène, there was another side to the question, and he
himself, it went without saying, was no waffle-iron, speaking of
stupidity. He had not been present the day fools were distributed. Oh,
far from that! In consequence, it was to become hump-backed with mirth,
that part of his life passed behind the back of the example of an old
Sophie whom he had the honor to serve. He had not forgotten how to
juggle since he traveled with a band of mountebanks. And there were the
patron's plates,--at one hundred francs the piece, good blood! Also he
smoked the ancient cantaloupe's cigarettes, and as for the
wines--tchutt! Arsène kissed his finger-tips and took a long sip of
absinthe.
"He is gone for long?" inquired Fresque.
Ah, that! Who knew? Six weeks at least. And meanwhile might not a brave
lad amuse himself in the empty apartment--eh? Oh, it would be life in a
gondola, name of a name of a name!
The conversation was prolonged for an hour, Arsène growing more and more
confidential under the seductive influence of his parrakeet, and his
companion showing himself so heartily in accord with his spirit of
license, that, by degrees, he captured completely the fancy of the
volatile valet, and was permitted to take his departure only on the
condition of presenting himself in the place Vendôme that evening for
the purpose of smoking the cantaloupe's cigarettes and seeing Arsène
juggle with the hundred-franc plates.
Monsieur Fresque was as good as his word. He put in an appearance
promptly at eight o'clock, hung his hat and coat, at his host's
invitation, on a Louis Quinze applique, and made himself comfortable in
a chaise longue which--on the guarantee of Duveen--had once belonged to
the Pompadour. Arsène outdid himself in juggling, and afterwards they
cracked a bottle of Château Laffitte and drank it with great
satisfaction out of Salviati glasses, topping off the entertainment with
Russian kümmel and two of Monsieur Michel's cigars. Arsène, in his
picturesque idiom, expressed himself as being tapped in the eye with his
new friend to the extent of being able to quit him no longer, and
forthwith Monsieur Hercule Fresque took up his quarters in the bedroom
of the cantaloupe, his host established himself in Monsieur Michel's
Empire guest chamber, and the "life in a gondola" went forward for five
weeks to the supreme contentment of both parties.
Now it is a peculiarity of life in a gondola, as is known to all who
have sampled its delights, that, while it lasts, consideration of past
and future alike becomes dulled, and one loses all sense of
responsibility in the lethal torpor of the present. So it was not until
Arsène received a letter from Monsieur Michel, announcing his return,
that he began to figure up the possible consequences of his experiment.
They were, as he gloomily announced to Hercule, stupefying to the extent
of dashing out one's brains against the wall. But one bottle of Château
Laffitte remained, and none whatever of Russian kümmel. Moreover, the
brocade of the chaise longue was hopelessly ruined by the boots of the
conspirators, and the enthusiasm of Arsène's juggling had reduced by
fifty per cent the set of Sèvres plates. What was to be done, bon Dieu,
what _was_ to be done?
Monsieur Fresque, having carefully perused a letter with an Italian
stamp, which had come by the evening mail, revolved the situation in his
mind, slowly smoking the last of the cantaloupe's cigars, and glancing
from time to time at the despondent figure of his host, with his eyes
narrowed to mere slits. Had the fish been sufficiently played? He reeled
in a foot or so of line by way of experiment.
"What, after all, is a situation?" he said. "Thou wilt be discharged,
yes. But afterwards? Pah! thou wilt find another. And thou hast thy
rigolade."
"Ah, that!" replied Arsène with a shrug. "I believe thee! But thinkest
thou my old melon will find himself in the way of glueing the ribbon of
the Légion on me for what I have done? I see myself from here, playing
the harp on the bars of La Maz!"
"La vie à Mazas, c'est pas la vie en gondole," observed Hercule
philosophically.
"Tu parles!"
Hercule appeared to take a sudden resolve. He swung his feet to the
floor, and bending forward in the chaise longue, began to speak rapidly
and with extreme earnestness.
"Voyons, donc, mon gars, thou hast been foolish, but one must not
despair. What is done in France is never known in Italy. And here thou
art surrounded by such treasures as the imbeciles of foreigners pay
fortunes for, below there. Take what thou hast need of,--a trunk of the
patron's, some silver, what thou canst lay hands on of gold and brass
and enamel, whatever will not break--and get away before he returns. In
Milan thou canst sell it all, and get another place. I have friends
there, and thou shalt have letters. Voilà!"
"But one must have money," replied Arsène, brightening, nevertheless.
"And that is lacking me."
Hercule seemed to ponder this objection deeply. Finally, with a sigh of
resignation, he spoke again.
"B'en, voilà! Thou hast been my friend, is it not so? Hercule Fresque
is not the man to be ungrateful. I am poor, and have need of my little
savings--But, there! it is for a friend--pas? Let us say no more!" And
he thrust a roll of banknotes into the hands of the stupefied Arsène.
The evening was spent in arranging the details of the flight. Arsène
produced a serviceable trunk from the storeroom, and in this the two men
placed a great variety of the treasures which Monsieur Michel had
accumulated during twenty years of patient search and exorbitant
purchase. Squares of priceless tapestry, jeweled watches and snuff
boxes, figurines of old Sèvres, ivories cunningly carved and yellow with
age, madonnas of box-wood, and wax, and ebony,--all were carefully
wrapped in newspapers and stowed away; and to these Arsène added a dozen
of his master's shirts, two suits of clothes, and a box of cigarettes.
But when all the available material had been appropriated there yet
remained an empty space below the tray. It would never do to have the
treasures knocking about on the way. Arsène proposed a blanket--or,
better yet, one of Monsieur Michel's overcoats. But Hercule, after
rearranging the trunk so as to make the empty space of different form,
turned suddenly to his companion, who was picking nervously at his
fingers and watching the so fruitful source of suggestion with a
pathetic air of entreaty, and clapped him gleefully upon the chest.
"A painting!" he exclaimed.
Complete demoralization seemed to have taken possession of Arsène. He
was very pale, and his eyes constantly sought the salon door as if he
expected the object of his ingenious epithets to burst in at any moment,
with the prefect and all his legions at his heels.
"A painting?" he repeated blankly; "but how, a painting?"
But Monsieur Fresque had already mounted nimbly on a chair and lifted
the cherished Titian of Monsieur Michel from its place against the
tapestry. There was no further need of persuasion. The moment had come
for action; and, seizing a hammer, he began to wrench off the frame,
talking rapidly between short gasps of exertion.
"But certainly, a painting. This one is small--ugh!--but who can say
how valuable? They sell readily down there, these black daubs. Ah! By
rolling, it will fill the empty space, seest thou, and later it may mean
a thousand francs. One does not do things by--umph!--by halves in such a
case. Sacred nails! One would say they had been driven in for eternity!
Oof! Thou art fortunate to have me to advise thee, great imbecile.
Mayhap this is worth all the rest. Pig of a frame, va! It is of iron.
Ugh! He will be furious, thy patron, but what of that? In Italy thou
wilt hear no more of it. Still one nail. Come away, then, type of a cow!
Enfin!"
With one final effort he tore off the last fragment of frame, peeled the
canvas from the back-board, and, rolling it carefully, tucked it into
the empty space, replaced the tray, and closed the trunk with a snap.
"Voilà!" he said, straightening himself and turning a red but triumphant
face to the astounded maître d'hôtel.
"Now for the letters," he added, seating himself at Monsieur Michel's
desk and beginning to scribble busily. "Do thou go for a cab, and at a
gallop. It has struck half past ten and the Bâle rapide leaves the gare
de l'Est at midnight."
Hardly had the door of the apartment closed upon the demoralized valet
when Monsieur Fresque hastily shoved to one side the note he had begun,
and, writing a sentence or two upon another slip of paper, wrapped the
latter about a two-sou piece, and went quietly to the salon window.
Opening this cautiously, he found a fine rain falling outside, and the
eastern half of the square deserted save for two figures,--one the
flying form of Arsène, cutting across a corner into the rue Castiglione
in search of a cab, and the other that of a man muffled in a heavy
overcoat and with a slouch hat pulled well over his eyes, who was
lounging against the railing of the Column, and who, as Fresque opened
the window, shook himself into activity and stepped nimbly out across
the wide driveway. Hercule placed the paper containing the two-sou piece
upon the window sill and with a sharp flick of his forefinger sent it
spinning down into the square. The man in the slouch hat stooped for an
instant in passing the spot where it lay, and Monsieur Fresque, softly
closing the window, stretched his arms upward into a semblance of a
gigantic letter Y, and indulged in a prodigious yawn.
"Ça y est!" said he.
Papa Briguette had long since climbed into his high bedstead, in the
loge de concierge, when, for the second time in fifteen minutes, he was
aroused by the voice of Arsène calling, "Cordon, s'il vous plaît!" in
the main hallway, and, reaching from under his feather coverlid, pressed
the bulb which unlocked the street-door.
"Quel coureur, que ce gars!" grumbled the worthy man to his fat spouse,
snoring complacently at his side. "I deceive myself if, when Monsieur
Michel returns, thou dost not hear a different story."
"Awr-r-r-r!" replied Maman Briguette.
On the way to the gare de l'Est Arsène recovered the better part of his
lost composure, and listened with something akin to cheerfulness to the
optimistic prognostications of his companion. By the time the precious
trunk was registered and he had secured his seat in a second-class
compartment of the Bâle rapide, he was once more in high feather and
profuse in expressions of gratitude, as he smoked a farewell cigarette
with Fresque while waiting for the train to start.
"Thou canst believe me, mon vieux," he protested. "It is not a little
thing that thou hast done, name of a name. Ah, non! It was the act of a
brave comrade, that I assure thee. Et voyons! When I have sold the
effects down there, thou shalt have back thy little paper mattress, word
of honor! Yes, and more--thy share of the gain, mon zig!"
He grasped the other's hand fervently as a passing guard threw them a
curt "En voiture, messieurs!" and seemed on the point of kissing him
farewell. There was some confusion attendant upon his entering the
compartment, owing to the excessive haste of a man muffled in a heavy
overcoat and with a slouch hat pulled well over his eyes, who arrived at
the last moment and persisted in scrambling in, at the very instant
chosen by Monsieur Sigard. The latter immediately reappeared at the
window, and, as the train began to move, shouted a few final
acknowledgments at his benefactor.
"B'en, au r'voir, vieux! And I will write thee from below there, thou
knowest. A thousand thanks. Fear not for thy blue paper--what? Thou
shalt have it back, sou for sou, name of a name!"
He was almost out of hearing now, his face a cream-colored splotch
against the deep maroon of the railway carriage, and, drawing out a
gaudy handkerchief, he waved it several times in token of farewell.
"I shall never forget thee, never!" he cried, as a kind of afterthought
and valedictory in one.
"Ah, ça!" said Monsieur Fresque to himself, as Arsène's face went out of
sight, "_that_ I well believe!"
Yet, so inconstant is man, the promised letter from "below there" never
reached him. Another did, however, and it was this which he might have
been observed reading to a friend, with every evidence of the liveliest
satisfaction, one week later, at a rear table before the Taverne Royale.
One would hardly have recognized the plainly, almost shabbily dressed
comrade of Arsène, with his retiring manners and his furtive eyes, in
this extremely prosperous individual, in polished top hat, white
waistcoat and gaiters, and gloves of lemon yellow. His companion was
equally imposing in appearance, and it was apparent that he derived as
much amusement from listening to Monsieur Fresque's epistle as did the
latter from reading it aloud, which he did with the most elaborate
emphasis, calling the other's attention to certain sentences by tapping
him lightly upon the arm and repeating them more slowly.
The letter was in Italian, and ran as follows:--
MILAN, _April 20, 1901_.
MY GOOD ERCOLE,--I am leaving here today for Rome, where the case of
the government against the Marchese degli Abbraccioli is to come on
next week, but before I do so I must write you of the last act in
the little comedy of Arsène Sigard. I never lost sight of him from
the moment we left Paris, and when he found I was also on my way to
Italy, he became confidential, and, in exchange for certain
information which I was able to give him about Milan, etc., told me
a long story about himself and his affairs, which I found none the
less amusing for knowing it to be a tissue of lies. The time passed
readily enough, but I was relieved when we started over the St.
Gothard, because I knew then that the game was as good as played.
We arrived at Chiasso on time (two o'clock) and I found Sassevero on
the platform when I jumped out. He had come on from Rome the night
before, and was in a positive panic because Palmi, who had been
watching old Michel there, had lost him somehow and nobody knew
where he'd gone. He might have come through on any train, of course,
and Sassevero didn't even know him by sight.
Naturally, our little business with Sigard was soon done. Cagliacci
is still chief of customs at Chiasso, and he simply confiscated the
trunk and everything in it, though, of course, the government wasn't
after anything but the picture. There were two hours of argument
over the disposition of Sigard, but it seemed best to let him go and
nothing further said, which he was only too glad to do. The Old Man
is shy of diplomatic complications, it appears, and he had told
Sassevero to frighten the chap thoroughly and then let him slip off.
Here comes in the most remarkable part of all. Just as Sigard was
marching out of the room, in came the Lucerne express, and our
friend walks almost into the arms of an oldish gentleman who had
jumped out of a carriage and was hurrying into the customs room.
"Bon Dieu!" said this individual, "what does _this_ mean?"
"What does what mean?" put in Sassevero like a flash, and the other
was so taken by surprise that, before he had time to think what he
was saying, the secret was out.
"That's my valet de chambre!" he said.
"Really?" said Sassevero. "Bravo! Then you're the gentleman with the
Marchese degli Abbraccioli's second Titian in the false bottom of
his trunk!"
Could anything have been more exquisite? The old chap is out some
hundred thousand lire on the transaction, because, of course,
Cagliacci confiscated it like the other. It was a sight to
remember,--the two pictures side by side in his room, and Michel and
Sigard cursing each other above them! We all went on to Milan by the
next train, except Sigard, who did the prudent thing on the
appearance of his padrone, and disappeared, but Michel's appeal to
the French consulate was of no effect. The consul told him flat that
he was going directly against the law in trying to get old works of
art over the frontier, and that he couldn't plead ignorance after
the detail of the false bottom.
Sassevero says the Old Man is immensely pleased with the way you
handled your end of the affair. The funny part of it is that Sigard
apparently hadn't the most remote suspicion of your being in any way
involved in his catastrophe.
Your most devoted,
CAVALETTO.
[Illustration]
Little Tapin