"I do not want to run into your debt more than I can help. If my voice
develops, if it be all you think it is, I shall be able to go on the
stage in a year, at latest in a year and a half from now. My mother was
paid three and four hundred a week. Unless I fail altogether, I shall
have no difficulty in paying you back the money you so generously lent
me."
"But why do you want to cost me nothing?"
"I don't know. Why shouldn't I pay you back? If I succeed I shall have
plenty of money; if I don't, I daresay you'll overlook the debt. Owen,
dear, how enchanting it is to be with you in Paris, to wear these
beautiful dresses, to drive in this carriage, to see those lovely
horses, and to wonder what the races will be like. You're not
disappointed in me? I'm as nice as you thought I'd be?"
"Yes; you're a great deal nicer. I was afraid at one time you might be a
bore; scruples of conscience aren't very interesting. But somehow in
your case they don't seem to matter."
"I do try to keep them to myself. There's no use in inflicting one's
personal worries on others. I am all one thing or all the other. When
I'm with you, I'm afraid I'm all the other."
He had always known that he could "make something of her," as he used to
put it to himself, but she exceeded his expectations; she certainly was
an admirable mistress. Her scruples did not bore him; they were, indeed,
a novelty and an excitement which he would not willingly be without.
Moreover, she was so intelligent he had not yet heard her make a stupid
remark. She had always been interested in the right things; and, excited
by her admiration of the wooden balconies--the metal lanterns hanging
from them, the vases standing on the steps leading to the porticoes, he
attempted a reading of these villas.
"How plain is this paganism," he said. "Seeing them, we cannot but think
of their deep feather beds, the savoury omelettes made of new-laid eggs
served at mid-day, and followed by juicy beefsteaks cooked in the best
butter. Those villas are not only typical of Passy, but of France; their
excellent life ascends from the peasant's cottage; they are the result
of agriculture, which is the original loveliness. All that springs from
agriculture must be beautiful, just as all that springs from commerce
must be vile. Manchester is the ugliest place on the earth, and the
money of every individual cotton spinner serves to multiply the
original ugliness--the house he builds, the pictures he buys. Isn't that
so?"
"I can't say, dear; I have never been to Manchester. But how can you
think of such things?"
"Don't you like those villas? I love them, and their comfort is secure;
its root is in the earth, the only thing we are sure of. There is more
pagan of life and sentiment in France than elsewhere. Would you not like
to have a Passy villa? Would you not like to live here?"
"One of these days I may buy one, then you shall come to breakfast, and
I'll give you an omelette and a beefsteak. For the present, I shall have
to put up with something less expensive. I must be near my music
lessons. Thanks all the same, dearest."
She sought a reason for the expression of thoughtfulness which had
suddenly come over his face.
"I don't know how it is, but I never see Paris without thinking of
Balzac. You don't know Balzac; one of these days you must read him. The
moment I begin to notice Paris, I think, feel, see and speak Balzac.
That dark woman yonder, with her scornful face, fills my mind with
Balzacian phrases--the celebrated courtesan, celebrated for her diamonds
and her vices, and so on. The little woman in the next carriage, the
Princess de Saxeville, would delight him. He would devote an entire page
to the description of her coat of arms--three azure panels, and so on.
And I should read it, for Balzac made all the world beautiful, even
snobbery. All interesting people are Balzacians. The moment I know that
a man is an admirer of Balzac, a sort of Freemasonry is established
between us, and I am interested in him, as I should be in a man who had
loved a woman whom I had loved."
"But I shouldn't like a woman because I knew that you had loved her."
"You are a woman; but men who have loved the same woman will seek each
other from the ends of the earth, and will take an intense pleasure in
their recollections. I don't know whether that aphorism is to be found
in Balzac; if not, it is an accident that prevented him from writing it,
for it is quite Balzacian--only he would give it a turn, an air of
philosophic distinction to which it would be useless for me to pretend."
"I wonder if I should like him. Tell me about him."
"You would be more likely than most women to appreciate him. Supposing
you put the matter to the test. You would not accept these horses, maybe
you will not refuse a humbler present--an edition of Balzac. There's a
very good one in fifty-two volumes."
"So many as that?"
"Yes; and not one too many--each is a masterpiece. In this enormous
work there are something like two thousand characters, and these appear
in some books in principal, in other books in subordinate, parts. Balzac
speaks of them as we should of real people. A young lady is going to the
opera and to a ball afterwards, and he says--
"'It is easy to imagine her delight and expectation, for was she not
going to meet the delicious Duchesse de la Maufregneuse, and her friend
the celebrated Madame d'Espard, Coralis, Lucien de Rubempré and
Rastignac.'
"These people are only mentioned in the _Mémoires de deux jeunes
Mariées_. But they are heroes and heroines in other books, in _Les
Secrets de la Princesse de Cadignan, Le Père Goriot_, and _Les Illusions
Perdues_." Before you even begin to know Balzac, you must have read at
least twenty volumes. There is a vulgarity about those who don't know
Balzac; we, his worshippers, recognise in each other a refinement of
sense and a peculiar comprehension of life. We are beings apart; we are
branded with the seal of that great mind. You should hear us talk among
ourselves. Everyone knows that Popinot is the sublime hero of
_L'Interdiction_, but for the moment some feeble Balzacian does not
remember the other books he appears in, and is ashamed to ask.... But
I'm boring you."
"No, no; I love to listen. It is more interesting than any play."
Owen looked at her questioningly, as if he doubted the flattery, which,
at the bottom of his heart, he knew to be quite sincere.
"You cannot understand Paris until you have read Balzac. Balzac
discovered Paris; he created Paris. You remember just now what I said of
those villas? I was thinking at the moment of Balzac. For he begins one
story by a reading of the human characteristics to be perceived in its
streets. He says that there are mean streets, and streets that are
merely honest; there are young streets about whose morality the public
has not yet formed any opinion; there are murderous streets--streets
older than the oldest hags; streets that we may esteem--clean streets,
work-a-day streets and commercial streets. Some streets, he says, begin
well and end badly. The Rue Montmartre, for instance, has a fine head,
but it ends in the tail of a fish. How good that is. You don't know the
Rue Montmartre? I'll point it out next time we're that way. But you know
the Rue de la Paix?"
"Yes; what does that mean?"
"The Rue de la Paix, he says, is a large street, and a grand street, but
it certainly doesn't awaken the gracious and noble thoughts that the Rue
Royale suggests to every sensitive mind; nor has it the dignity of the
Place Vendôme. The Place de la Bourse, he says, is in the daytime babble
and prostitution, but at night it is beautiful. At two o'clock in the
morning, by moonlight, it is a dream of old Greece."
"I don't see much in that. What you said about the villas was quite as
good."
Fearing that the conversation lacked a familiar and personal interest,
he sought a transition, an idea by which he could connect it with Evelyn
herself. With this object he called her attention to two young men who,
he pretended, reminded him of Rastignac and Morny. That woman in the
mail phaeton was an incipient Madame Marneffe; that dark woman now
looking at them with ardent, amorous eyes might be an Esther.
"We're all creatures of Balzac's imagination. You," he said, turning a
little so that he might see her better, "are intensely Balzacian."
"Do I remind you of one of his characters?" Evelyn became more keenly
interested. "Which one?"
"You are more like a character he might have painted than anyone I can
think of in the Human Comedy. He certainly would have been interested in
your temperament. But I can't think which of his women is like you. You
are more like the adorable Lucien; that is to say, up to the present."
"Who was Lucien?"
"He was the young poet whom all Paris fell in love with. He came up to
Paris with a married woman; I think they came from Angouleme. I haven't
read _Lost Illusions_ for twenty years. She and he were the stars in the
society of some provincial town, but when they arrived in Paris each
thought the other very common and countrified. He compares her with
Madame d'Espard; she compares him with Rastignac; Balzac completes the
picture with a touch of pure genius--'They forgot that six months would
transform them both into exquisite Parisians.' How good that is, what
wonderful insight into life!"
"And do they become Parisians?"
"Yes, and then they both regret that they broke off--"
"Could they not begin it again?"
"No; it is rarely that a _liaison_ can be begun again--life is too
hurried. We may not go back; the past may never become the
present--ghosts come between."
"Then if I broke it off with you, or you broke it off with me, it would
be for ever?"
"Do not let us discuss such unpleasant possibilities;" and he continued
to search the _Human Comedy_ for a woman resembling Evelyn. "You are
essentially Balzacian--all interesting things are--but I cannot remember
any woman in the _Human Comedy_ like you--Honorine, perhaps."
"What does she do?"
"She's a married woman who has left her husband for a lover who very
soon deserts her. Her husband tries in vain to love other women, but
his wife holds his affections and he makes every effort to win her back.
The story is mainly an account of these efforts."
"Does he succeed?"
"Yes. Honorine goes back to her husband, but it cost her her life. She
cannot live with a man she doesn't love. That is the point of the
story."
"I wonder why that should remind you of me?"
"There is something delicate, rare, and mystical about you both. But I
can't say I place _Honorine_ very high among Balzac's works. There are
beautiful touches in it, but I think he failed to realise the type. You
are more virile, more real to me than Honorine. No; on the whole, Balzac
has not done you. He perceived you dimly. If he had lived it might, it
certainly would, have been otherwise. There is, of course, the Duchesse
Langeais. There is something of you in her; but she is no more than a
brilliant sketch, no better than Honorine. There is Eugene Grandet. But
no; Balzac never painted your portrait."
Like all good talkers, he knew how to delude his listeners into the
belief that they were taking an important part in the conversation. He
allowed them to speak, he solicited their opinions, and listened as if
they awakened the keenest interest in him; he developed what they had
vaguely suggested. He paused before their remarks, he tempted his
listener into personal appreciations and sudden revelations of
character. He addressed an intimate vanity and became the inspiration of
every choice, and in a mysterious reticulation of emotions, tastes and
ideas, life itself seemed to converge to his ultimate authority. And
having induced recognition of the wisdom of his wishes, he knew how to
make his yoke agreeable to bear; it never galled the back that bore it,
it lay upon it soft as a silken gown. Evelyn enjoyed the gentle
imposition of his will. Obedience became a delight, and in its
intellectual sloth life floated as in an opium dream without end,
dissolving as the sunset dissolves in various modulations. Obedience is
a divine sensualism; it is the sensualism of the saints; its lassitudes
are animated with deep pauses and thrills of love and worship. We lift
our eyes, and a great joy fills our hearts, and we sink away into
blisses of remote consciousness. The delights of obedience are the
highest felicities of love, and these Evelyn had begun to experience.
She had ascended already into this happy nowhere. She was aware of him,
and a little of the brilliant goal whither he was leading her. She was
the instrument, he was the hand that played upon it, and all that had
happened from hour to hour in their mutual existence revealed in some
new and unexpected way his mastery over life. She had seen great ladies
bowing to him, smiling upon him in a way that told their intention to
get him away from her. She had heard scraps of his conversation with the
French and English noblemen who had stopped to speak to him; and now,
as Owen was getting into the victoria, after a brief visit to some great
lady who had sent her footman to fetch him, a man, who looked to Evelyn
like a sort of superior groom, came breathless to their carriage. He had
only just heard that Owen was on the course. He was the great English
trainer from Chantilly, and had tried Armide II. to win with a stone
more on his back than he had to carry.
"That is the horse," and Owen pointed to a big chestnut. "The third
horse--orange and white sleeves, black cap ... they are going now for
the preliminary canter. We shall have just time to back him. There is a
Pari Mutuel a little way down the course; or shall we back the horse in
the ring? No, it is too late to get across the course. The Pari Mutuel
will do. Isn't the racecourse like an English lawn, like an overgrown
croquet ground? and the horses go round by these plantations."
It was not fashionable, he admitted, for a lady to leave her carriage,
but no one knew her. It did not matter, and the spectacle amused her.
But there was only time to catch a glimpse of beautiful toilettes,
actresses and princesses, and the young men standing on the steps of the
carriages. Owen whispered the names of the most celebrated, and told her
she should know them when she was on the stage. At present it would be
better for her to live quietly--unknown; her lessons would take all her
time. He talked as he hastened her towards where a crowd had collected.
She saw what looked like a small omnibus, with a man distributing
tickets. Owen took five louis out of her purse and handed them to the
man, who in return handed her a ticket. They would see the race better
from their carriage, but it was pleasanter to stroll about the warm
grass and admire the little woods which surrounded this elegant
pleasure-ground, the white painted stands with all their flags flying on
the blue summer air, the glitter of the carriages, the colour of the
parasols, the bright jackets and caps of the jockeys, the rhythmical
movement of the horses. Some sailed along with their heads low, others
bounded, their heads high in the air. While Owen watched Evelyn's
pleasure, his face expressed a cynical good humour. He was glad she was
pleased, and he was flattered that he was influencing her. No longer was
she wasting her life, the one life which she had to live. He was proud
of his disciple, and he delighted in her astonishment, when, having made
sure that Armide II. had won, he led her back to the Pari Mutuel, and,
bidding her hold out her hands, saw that forty louis were poured into
them.
Then Evelyn could not believe that she was in her waking senses, and it
took some time to explain to her how she had won so much money; and when
she asked why all the poor people did not come and do likewise, since it
was so easy, Owen said that he had had more sport seeing her win five
and thirty louis than he had when he won the gold cup at Ascot. It
almost inclined him to go in for racing again. Evelyn could not
understand the circumstance and, still explaining the odds, he told the
coachman that they would not wait for the last race. He had tied her
forty louis into her pocket-handkerchief, and feeling the weight of the
gold in her hand she leant back in the victoria, lost in the bright,
penetrating happiness of that summer evening. Paris, graceful and
indolent--Paris returning through a whirl of wheels, through
pleasure-grounds, green swards and long, shining roads--instilled a
fever of desire into the blood, and the soul cried that life should be
made wholly of such light distraction.
The wistful light seemed to breathe all vulgarity from the procession of
pleasure-seekers returning from the races. An aspect of vision stole
over the scene. Owen pointed to the group of pines by the lake's edge,
to the gondola-like boat moving through the pink stillness; and the
cloud in the water, he said, was more beautiful than the cloud in
heaven. He spoke of the tea-house on the island, of the shade of the
trees, of the lush grass, of the chatter of the nursemaids and ducks. He
proposed, and she accepted, that they should go there to-morrow. The
secret of their lips floated into their eyes, its echoes drifted through
their souls like a faint strain played on violins; and neither spoke for
fear of losing one of the faint vibrations. Evelyn settled her
embroidered gown over her feet as the carriage swept around the Arc de
Triomphe.
"That is our rose garden," he said, pointing to Paris, which lay below
them glittering in the evening light, "You remember that I used to read
you Omar?"
"Yes, I remember. Not three days ago, yet it seems far away."
"But you do not regret--you would not go back?"
"I could not if I would."
"It has been a charming day, hasn't it?"
"Yes."
"And it isn't over yet. I have ordered dinner at the Café des
Ambassadeurs. I've got a table on the balcony. The balcony overlooks the
garden, and the stage is at the end of the garden, so we shall see the
performance as we dine. The comic songs, the can-can dancers and the
acrobats will be a change after Wagner. I hope you'll like the dinner."
He took a card from his pocket and read the menu.
"There is no place in Paris where you get a better _petite marmite_ than
the Ambassadeurs. I have ordered, you see, _filets de volaille, pointes
d'asperges_. The _filets de volaille_ are the backs of the chickens, the
tit-bits; the rest--the legs and the wings--go to make the stock; that
is why the _marmite_ is so good. _Timbale de homard à l'Americaine_ is
served with a brown sauce garnished with rice. You ought to find it
excellent. If we were in autumn I should have ordered a pheasant
_Sauvaroff_. A bird being impossible, I allowed myself to be advised by
the head waiter. He assured me they have some very special legs of lamb;
they have just received them from Normandy; you will not recognise it as
the stringy, tasteless thing that in England we know as leg of lamb.
_Soufflé au paprike_--this _soufflé_ is seasoned not with red pepper,
which would produce an intolerable thirst, nor with ordinary pepper,
which would be arid and tasteless, but with an intermediate pepper which
will just give a zest to the last glass of champagne. There is a
_parfait_--that comes before the _soufflé_ of course. I don't think we
can do much better."