TESTS OF FRIENDSHIP
Frowenfeld turned away from the closing door, caught his head between
his hands and tried to comprehend the new wildness of the tumult within.
Honoré Grandissime avowedly in love with one of them--_which one_?
Doctor Keene visibly in love with one of them--_which one_? And he! What
meant this bounding joy that, like one gorgeous moth among innumerable
bats, flashed to and fro among the wild distresses and dismays swarming
in and out of his distempered imagination? He did not answer the
question; he only knew the confusion in his brain was dreadful. Both
hands could not hold back the throbbing of his temples; the table did
not steady the trembling of his hands; his thoughts went hither and
thither, heedless of his call. Sit down as he might, rise up, pace the
room, stand, lean his forehead against the wall--nothing could quiet the
fearful disorder, until at length he recalled Honoré's neglected advice
and resolutely lay down and sought sleep; and, long before he had hoped
to secure it, it came.
In the distant Grandissime mansion, Agricola Fusilier was casting about
for ways and means to rid himself of the heaviest heart that ever had
throbbed in his bosom. He had risen at sunrise from slumber worse than
sleeplessness, in which his dreams had anticipated the duel of to-morrow
with Sylvestre. He was trying to get the unwonted quaking out of his
hands and the memory of the night's heart-dissolving phantasms from
before his inner vision. To do this he had resort to a very familiar, we
may say time-honored, prescription--rum. He did not use it after the
voudou fashion; the voudous pour it on the ground--Agricola was an
anti-voudou. It finally had its effect. By eleven o'clock he seemed,
outwardly at least, to be at peace with everything in Louisiana that he
considered Louisianian, properly so-called; as to all else he was ready
for war, as in peace one should be. While in this mood, and performing
at a sideboard the solemn rite of _las onze_, news incidentally reached
him, by the mouth of his busy second, Hippolyte, of Frowenfeld's
trouble, and despite 'Polyte's protestations against the principal in a
pending "affair" appearing on the street, he ordered the carriage and
hurried to the apothecary's.
* * * * *
When Frowenfeld awoke, the fingers of his clock were passing the
meridan. His fever was gone, his brain was calm, his strength in good
measure had returned. There had been dreams in his sleep, too; he had
seen Clotilde standing at the foot of his bed. He lay now, for a moment,
lost in retrospection.
"There can be no doubt about it," said he, as he rose up, looking back
mentally at something in the past.
The sound of carriage-wheels attracted his attention by ceasing before
his street door. A moment later the voice of Agricola was heard in the
shop greeting Raoul. As the old man lifted the head of his staff to tap
on the inner door, Frowenfeld opened it.
"Fusilier to the rescue!" said the great Louisianian, with a grasp of
the apothecary's hand and a gaze of brooding admiration.
Joseph gave him a chair, but with magnificent humility he insisted on
not taking it until "Professor Frowenfeld" had himself sat down.
The apothecary was very solemn. It seemed to him as if in this little
back room his dead good name was lying in state, and these visitors were
coming in to take their last look. From time to time he longed for more
light, wondering why the gravity of his misadventure should seem
so great.
"H-m-h-y dear Professor!" began the old man. Pages of print could not
comprise all the meanings of his smile and accent; benevolence,
affection, assumed knowledge of the facts, disdain of results,
remembrance of his own youth, charity for pranks, patronage--these were
but a few. He spoke very slowly and deeply and with this smile of a
hundred meanings. "Why did you not send for me, Joseph? Sir, whenever
you have occasion to make a list of the friends who will stand by you,
_right or wrong_--h-write the name of Citizen Agricola Fusilier at the
top! Write it large and repeat it at the bottom! You understand me,
Joseph?--and, mark me,--right or wrong!"
"Not wrong," said Frowenfeld, "at least not in defence of wrong; I could
not do that; but, I assure you, in this matter I have done--"
"No worse than any one else would have done under the circumstances, my
dear boy!--Nay, nay, do not interrupt me; I understand you, I understand
you. H-do you imagine there is anything strange to me in this--at
my age?"
"But I am--"
"--all right, sir! that is _what_ you are. And you are under the wing of
Agricola Fusilier, the old eagle; that is _where_ you are. And you are
one of my brood; that is _who_ you are. Professor, listen to your old
father. _The--man--makes--the--crime!_ The wisdom of mankind never
brought forth a maxim of more gigantic beauty. If the different grades
of race and society did not have corresponding moral and civil
liberties, varying in degree as they vary--h-why! _this_ community, at
least, would go to pieces! See here! Professor Frowenfeld is charged
with misdemeanor. Very well, who is he? Foreigner or native? Foreigner
by sentiment and intention, or only by accident of birth? Of our mental
fibre--our aspirations--our delights--our indignations? I answer for
you, Joseph, yes!--yes! What then? H-why, then the decision! Reached
how? By apologetic reasonings? By instinct, sir! h-h-that guide of the
nobly proud! And what is the decision? Not guilty. Professor Frowenfeld,
_absolvo te!_"
It was in vain that the apothecary repeatedly tried to interrupt this
speech. "Citizen Fusilier, do you know me no better?"--"Citizen
Fusilier, if you will but listen!"--such were the fragments of his
efforts to explain. The old man was not so confident as he pretended to
be that Frowenfeld was that complete proselyte which alone satisfies a
Creole; but he saw him in a predicament and cast to him this life-buoy,
which if a man should refuse, he would deserve to drown.
Frowenfeld tried again to begin.
"Mr. Fusilier--"
"Citizen Fusilier!"
"Citizen, candor demands that I undeceive--"
"Candor demands--h-my dear Professor, let me tell you exactly what she
demands. She demands that in here--within this apartment--we understand
each other. That demand is met."
"But--" Frowenfeld frowned impatiently.
"That demand, Joseph, is fully met! I understand the whole matter like
an eye-witness! Now there is another demand to be met, the demand of
friendship! In here, candor; outside, friendship; in here, one of our
brethren has been adventurous and unfortunate; outside"--the old man
smiled a smile of benevolent mendacity--"outside, nothing has happened."
Frowenfeld insisted savagely on speaking; but Agricola raised his voice,
and gray hairs prevailed.
"At least, what _has_ happened? The most ordinary thing in the world;
Professor Frowenfeld lost his footing on a slippery gunwale, fell, cut
his head upon a protruding spike, and went into the house of Palmyre to
bathe his wound; but finding it worse than he had at first supposed it,
immediately hurried out again and came to his store. He left his hat
where it had fallen, too muddy to be worth recovery. Hippolyte
Brahmin-Mandarin and others, passing at the time, thought he had met
with violence in the house of the hair-dresser, and drew some natural
inferences, but have since been better informed; and the public will
please understand that Professor Frowenfeld is a white man, a gentleman,
and a Louisianian, ready to vindicate his honor, and that Citizen
Agricola Fusilier is his friend!"
The old man looked around with the air of a bull on a hill-top.
Frowenfeld, vexed beyond degree, restrained himself only for the sake
of an object in view, and contented himself with repeating for the
fourth or fifth time,--
"I cannot accept any such deliverance."
"Professor Frowenfeld, friendship--society--demands it; our circle must
be protected in all its members. You have nothing to do with it. You
will leave it with me, Joseph."
"No, no," said Frowenfeld, "I thank you, but--"
"Ah! my dear boy, thank me not; I cannot help these impulses; I belong
to a warm-hearted race. But"--he drew back in his chair sidewise and
made great pretence of frowning--"you decline the offices of that
precious possession, a Creole friend?"
"I only decline to be shielded by a fiction."
"Ah-h!" said Agricola, further nettling his victim by a gaze of stagy
admiration. "'_Sans peur et sans reproche_'--and yet you disappoint me.
Is it for naught, that I have sallied forth from home, drawing the
curtains of my carriage to shield me from the gazing crowd? It was to
rescue my friend--my vicar--my coadjutor--my son--from the laughs and
finger-points of the vulgar mass. H-I might as well have stayed at
home--or better, for my peculiar position to-day rather requires me to
keep in--"
"No, citizen," said Frowenfeld, laying his hand upon Agricola's arm, "I
trust it is not in vain that you have come out. There _is_ a man in
trouble whom only you can deliver."
The old man began to swell with complacency.
"H-why, really--"
"_He_, Citizen, is truly of your kind--"
"He must be delivered, Professor Frowenfeld--"
"He is a native Louisianian, not only by accident of birth but by
sentiment and intention," said Frowenfeld.
The old man smiled a benign delight, but the apothecary now had the
upper hand, and would not hear him speak.
"His aspirations," continued the speaker, "his indignations--mount with
his people's. His pulse beats with yours, sir. He is a part of your
circle. He is one of your caste."
Agricola could not be silent.
"Ha-a-a-ah! Joseph, h-h-you make my blood tingle! Speak to the point;
who--"
"I believe him, moreover, Citizen Fusilier, innocent of the charge
laid--"
"H-innocent? H-of course he is innocent, sir! We will _make_ him inno--"
"Ah! Citizen, he is already under sentence of death!"
"_What?_ A Creole under sentence!" Agricola swore a heathen oath, set
his knees apart and grasped his staff by the middle. "Sir, we will
liberate him if we have to overturn the government!"
Frowenfeld shook his head.
"You have got to overturn something stronger than government."
"And pray what--"
"A conventionality," said Frowenfeld, holding the old man's eye.
"Ha, ha! my b-hoy, h-you are right. But we will overturn--eh?"
"I say I fear your engagements will prevent. I hear you take part
to-morrow morning in--"
Agricola suddenly stiffened.
"Professor Frowenfeld, it strikes me, sir, you are taking something of a
liberty."
"For which I ask pardon," exclaimed Frowenfeld. "Then I may not
expect--"
The old man melted again.
"But who is this person in mortal peril?"
Frowenfeld hesitated.
"Citizen Fusilier," he said, looking first down at the floor and then up
into the inquirer's face, "on my assurance that he is not only a native
Creole, but a Grandissime--"
"It is not possible!" exclaimed Agricola.
"--a Grandissime of the purest blood, will you pledge me your aid to
liberate him from his danger, 'right or wrong'?"
"_Will_ I? H-why, certainly! Who is he?"
"Citizen--it is Sylves--"
Agricola sprang up with a thundering oath.
The apothecary put out a pacifying hand, but it was spurned.
"Let me go! How dare you, sir? How dare you, sir?" bellowed Agricola.
He started toward the door, cursing furiously and keeping his eye fixed
on Frowenfeld with a look of rage not unmixed with terror.
"Citizen Fusilier," said the apothecary, following him with one palm
uplifted, as if that would ward off his abuse, "don't go! I adjure you,
don't go! Remember your pledge, Citizen Fusilier!"
Agricola did not pause a moment; but when he had swung the door
violently open the way was still obstructed. The painter of "Louisiana
refusing to enter the Union" stood before him, his head elevated
loftily, one foot set forward and his arm extended like a tragedian's.
"Stan' bag-sah!"
"Let me pass! Let me pass, or I will kill you!"
Mr. Innerarity smote his bosom and tossed his hand aloft.
"Kill me-firse an' pass aftah!"
"Citizen Fusilier," said Frowenfeld, "I beg you to hear me."
"Go away! Go away!"
The old man drew back from the door and stood in the corner against the
book-shelves as if all the horrors of the last night's dreams had taken
bodily shape in the person of the apothecary. He trembled and stammered:
"Ke--keep off! Keep off! My God! Raoul, he has insulted me!" He made a
miserable show of drawing a weapon. "No man may insult me and live! If
you are a man, Professor Frowenfeld, you will defend yourself!"
Frowenfeld lost his temper, but his hasty reply was drowned by Raoul's
vehement speech.
"'Tis not de trute!" cried Raoul. "He try to save you from
hell-'n'-damnation w'en 'e h-ought to give you a good cuss'n!"--and in
the ecstasy of his anger burst into tears.
Frowenfeld, in an agony of annoyance, waved him away and he disappeared,
shutting the door.
Agricola, moved far more from within than from without, had sunk into a
chair under the shelves. His head was bowed, a heavy grizzled lock fell
down upon his dark, frowning brow, one hand clenched the top of his
staff, the other his knee, and both trembled violently. As Frowenfeld,
with every demonstration of beseeching kindness, began to speak, he
lifted his eyes and said, piteously:
"Stop! Stop!"
"Citizen Fusilier, it is you who must stop. Stop before God Almighty
stops you, I beg you. I do not presume to rebuke you. I _know_ you want
a clear record. I know it better to-day than I ever did before. Citizen
Fusilier, I honor your intentions--"
Agricola roused a little and looked up with a miserable attempt at his
habitual patronizing smile.
"H-my dear boy, I overlook"--but he met in
Frowenfeld's eyes a spirit so superior to his dissimulation that the
smile quite broke down and gave way to another of deprecatory and
apologetic distress. He reached up an arm.
"I could easily convince you, Professor, of your error"--his eyes
quailed and dropped to the floor--"but I--your arm, my dear Joseph; age
is creeping upon me." He rose to his feet. "I am feeling really
indisposed to-day--not at all bright; my solicitude for you, my
dear b--"
He took two or three steps forward, tottered, clung to the apothecary,
moved another step or two, and grasping the edge of the table stumbled
into a chair which Frowenfeld thrust under him. He folded his arms on
the edge of the board and rested his forehead on them, while Frowenfeld
sat down quickly on the opposite side, drew paper and pen across the
table and wrote.
"Are you writing something, Professor?" asked the old man, without
stirring. His staff tumbled to the floor. The apothecary's answer was a
low, preoccupied one. Two or three times over he wrote and rejected what
he had written.
Presently he pushed back his chair, came around the table, laid the
writing he had made before the bowed head, sat down again and waited.
After a long time the old man looked up, trying in vain to conceal his
anguish under a smile.
"I have a sad headache."
He cast his eyes over the table and took mechanically the pen which
Frowenfeld extended toward him.
"What can I do for you, Professor? Sign something? There is nothing I
would not do for Professor Frowenfeld. What have you written, eh?"
He felt helplessly for his spectacles.
Frowenfeld read:
"_Mr. Sylvestre Grandissime: I spoke in haste_."
He felt himself tremble as he read. Agricola fumbled with the pen,
lifted his eyes with one more effort at the old look, said, "My dear
boy, I do this purely to please you," and to Frowenfeld's delight and
astonishment wrote:
"_Your affectionate uncle, Agricola Fusilier_."