I MAKE MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.
At ten o'clock on Monday evening, Dalrymple called for me, and by ten
o'clock, thanks to the great Michaud and other men of genius, I
presented a faultless exterior. My friend walked round me with a candle,
and then sat down and examined me critically.
"By Jove!" said he, "I don't believe I should have known you! You are a
living testimony to the science of tailoring. I shall call on Michaud,
to-morrow, and pay my tribute of admiration."
"I am very uncomfortable," said I, ruefully.
"Uncomfortable! nonsense--Michaud's customers don't know the meaning of
the word."
"But he has not made me a single pocket!"
"And what of that? Do you suppose the great Michaud would spoil the fit
of a masterpiece for your convenience?"
"What am I to do with my pocket-handkerchief?"
"Michaud's customers never need pocket-handkerchiefs."
"And then my trousers..."
"Unreasonable Juvenile, what of the trousers?"
"They are so tight that I dare not sit down in them."
"Barbarian! Michaud's customers never sit down in society."
"And my boots are so small that I can hardly endure them."
"Very becoming to the foot," said Dalyrmple, with exasperating
indifference.
"And my collar is so stiff that it almost cuts my throat."
"Makes you hold your head up," said Dalrymple, "and leaves you no
inducement to commit suicide."
I could not help laughing, despite my discomfort.
"Job himself never had such a comforter!" I exclaimed.
"It would be a downright pleasure to quarrel with you."
"Put on your hat instead, and let us delay no longer," replied my
friend. "My cab is waiting."
So we went down, and in another moment were driving through the lighted
streets. I should hardly have chosen to confess how my heart beat when,
on turning an angle of the Rue Trudon, our cab fell into the rear of
three or four other carriages, passed into a courtyard crowded with
arriving and departing vehicles, and drew up before an open door, whence
a broad stream of light flowed out to meet us. A couple of footmen
received us in a hall lighted by torches and decorated with stands of
antique armor. From the centre of this hall sprang a Gothic staircase,
so light, so richly sculptured, so full of niches and statues, slender
columns, foliated capitals, and delicate ornamentation of every kind,
that it looked a very blossoming of the stone. Following Dalrymple up
this superb staircase and through a vestibule of carved oak, I next
found myself in a room that might have been the scene of Plato's
symposium. Here were walls painted in classic fresco; windows curtained
with draperies of chocolate and amber; chairs and couches of ebony,
carved in antique fashion; Etruscan amphorae; vases and paterae of
terracotta; exquisite lamps, statuettes and candelabra in rare green
bronze; and curious parti-colored busts of philosophers and heroes, in
all kinds of variegated marbles. Powdered footmen serving modern coffee
seemed here like anachronisms in livery. In such a room one should have
been waited on by boys crowned with roses, and have partaken only of
classic dishes--of Venafran olives or oysters from the Lucrine lake,
washed down with Massic, or Chian, or honeyed Falernian.
Some half-dozen gentlemen, chatting over their coffee, bowed to
Dalrymple when we came in. They were talking of the war in Algiers, and
especially of the gallantry of a certain Vicomte de Caylus, in whose
deeds they seemed to take a more than ordinary interest.
"Rode single-handed right through the enemy's camp," said a bronzed,
elderly man, with a short, gray beard.
"And escaped without a scratch," added another, with a tiny red ribbon
at his button-hole.
"He comes of a gallant stock," said a third. "I remember his father at
Austerlitz--literally cut to pieces at the head of his squadron."
"You are speaking of de Caylus," said Dalrymple. "What news of him from
Algiers?"
"This--that having volunteered to carry some important despatches to
head-quarters, he preferred riding by night through Abd-el-Kader's camp,
to taking a _détour_ by the mountains," replied the first speaker.
"A wild piece of boyish daring," said Dalrymple, somewhat drily. "I
presume he did not return by the same road?"
"I should think not. It would have been certain death a second time!"
"And this happened how long since?"
"About a fortnight ago. But we shall soon know all particulars from
himself."
"From himself?"
"Yes, he has obtained leave of absence--is, perhaps, by this time in
Paris."
Dalrymple set down his cup untasted, and turned away.
"Come, Arbuthnot," he said, hastily, "I must introduce you to Madame
Rachel."
We passed through a small antechamber, and into a brilliant _salon_, the
very reverse of antique. Here all was light and color. Here were
hangings of flowered chintz; fantastic divans; lounge-chairs of every
conceivable shape and hue; great Indian jars; richly framed drawings;
stands of exotic plants; Chinese cages, filled with valuable birds from
distant climes; folios of engravings; and, above all, a large cabinet in
marqueterie, crowded with bronzes, Chinese carvings, pastille burners,
fans, medals, Dresden groups, Sévres vases, Venetian glass, Asiatic
idols, and all kinds of precious trifles in tortoise-shall, mother
o'-pearl, malachite, onyx, lapis lazuli, jasper, ivory, and mosaic. In
this room, sitting, standing, turning over engravings, or grouped here
and there on sofas and divans, were some twenty-five or thirty
gentlemen, all busily engaged in conversation. Saluting some of these by
a passing bow, my friend led the way straight through this _salon_ and
into a larger one immediately beyond it.
"This," he said, "is one of the most beautiful rooms in Paris. Look
round and tell me if you recognise, among all her votaries, the
divinity herself."
I looked round, bewildered.
"Recognise!" I echoed. "I should not recognise my own father at this
moment. I feel like Abou Hassan in the palace of the Caliph."
"Or like Christopher Sly, when he wakes in the nobleman's bedchamber,"
said Dalrymple; "though I should ask your pardon for the comparison. But
see what it is to be an actress with forty-two thousand francs of salary
per week. See these panels painted by Muller--this chandelier by
Deniére, of which no copy exists--this bust of Napoleon by Canova--these
hangings of purple and gold--this ceiling all carved and gilded, than
which Versailles contains nothing more elaborate. _Allons donc_! have
you nothing to say in admiration of so much splendor?"
I shook my head.
"What can I say? Is this the house of an actress, or the palace of a
prince? But stay--that pale woman yonder, all in white, with a plain
gold circlet on her head--who is she?"
"Phédre herself," replied Dalrymple. "Follow me, and be introduced."
She was sitting in a large fauteuil of purple velvet. One foot rested on
a stool richly carved and gilt; one arm rested negligently on a table
covered with curious foreign weapons. In her right hand she held a
singular poignard, the blade of which was damascened with gold, while
the handle, made of bronze and exquisitely modelled, represented a tiny
human skeleton. With this ghastly toy she kept playing as she spoke,
apparently unconscious of its grim significance. She was surrounded by
some ten or a dozen distinguished-looking men, most of whom were
profusely _décoré_. They made way courteously at our approach. Dalrymple
then presented me. I made my bow, was graciously received, and dropped
modestly into the rear.
"I began to think that Captain Dalrymple had forsworn Paris," said
Rachel, still toying with the skeleton dagger. "It is surely a year
since I last had this pleasure?"
"Nay, Madame, you flatter me," said Dalrymple. "I have been absent only
five months."
"Then, you see, I have measured your absence by my loss."
Dalrymple bowed profoundly.
Rachel turned to a young man behind her chair.
"Monsieur le Prince," said she, "do you know what is rumored in the
_foyer_ of the Francais? That you have offered me your hand!"
"I offer you both my hands, in applause, Madame, every night of your
performance," replied the gentleman so addressed.
She smiled and made a feint at him with the dagger.
"Excellent!" said she. "One is not enough for a tragedian But where is
Alphonse Karr?"
"I have been looking for him all the evening," said a tall man, with an
iron-gray beard. "He told me he was coming; but authors are capricious
beings--the slaves of the pen."
"True; he lives by his pen--others die by it," said Rachel bitterly. "By
the way, has any one seen Scribe's new Vaudeville?"
"I have," replied a bald little gentleman with a red and green ribbon in
his button-hole.
"And your verdict?"
"The plot is not ill-conceived; but Scribe is only godfather to the
piece. It is almost entirely written by Duverger, his _collaborateur_."
"The life of a _collaborateur_," said Rachel, "is one long act of
self-abnegation. Another takes all the honor--he all the labor. Thus
soldiers fall, and their generals reap the glory."
"A _collaborateur_," said a cynical-looking man who had not yet spoken,
"is a hackney vehicle which one hires on the road to fame, and dismisses
at the end of the journey."
"Sometimes without paying the fare," added a gentleman who had till now
been examining, weapon by weapon, all the curious poignards and pistols
on the table. "But what is this singular ornament?"
And he held up what appeared to be a large bone, perforated in several
places.
The bald little man with the red and green ribbon uttered an exclamation
of surprise.
"It is a tibia!" said he, examining it through his double eye-glass.
"And what of that?" laughed Rachel. "Is it so wonderful to find one leg
in a collection of arms? However, not to puzzle you, I may as well
acknowledge that it was brought to me from Rome by a learned Italian,
and is a curious antique. The Romans made flutes of the leg-bones of
their enemies, and this is one of them."
"A melodious barbarism!" exclaimed one.
"Puts a 'stop,' at all events, to the enemy's flight!" said another.
"Almost as good as drinking out of his skull," added a third.
"Or as eating him, _tout de bon_," said Rachel.
"There must be a certain satisfaction in cannibalism," observed the
cynic who had spoken before. "There are people upon whom one would sup
willingly."
"As, for instance, critics, who are our natural enemies," said Rachel.
"_C'est à dire_, if critics were not too sour to be eaten."
"Nay, with the sweet sauce of vengeance!"
"You speak feelingly, Monsieur de Musset. I am almost sorry, for your
sake, that cannibalism is out of fashion!"
"It is one of the penalties of civilization," replied de Musset, with a
shrug. "Besides, one would not wish to be an epicure."
Dalrymple, who had been listening somewhat disdainfully to this skirmish
of words, here touched me on the arm and turned away.
"Don't you hate this sort of high-pressure talk?" he said, impatiently.
"I was just thinking it so brilliant."
"Pshaw!--conversational fireworks--every speaker bent on eclipsing every
other speaker. It's an artificial atmosphere, my dear Damon--a sort of
forcing-house for good things; and I hate forced witticisms, as I hate
forced peas. But have you had enough of it? Or has this feast of reason
taken away your appetite for simpler fare?"
"If you mean, am I ready to go with you to Madame de Courcelles'--yes."
"_A la bonne heure_!"
"But you are not going away without taking leave of Madame Rachel?"
"Unquestionably. Leave-taking is a custom more honored in the breach
than the observance."
"But isn't that very impolite?"
"_Ingénu!_ Do you know that society ignores everything disagreeable? A
leave-taker sets an unpleasant example, disturbs the harmony of things,
and reminds others of their watches. Besides, he suggests unwelcome
possibilities. Perhaps he finds the party dull; or, worse still, he may
be going to one that is pleasanter."
By this time we were again rattling along the Boulevard. The theatres
were ablaze with lights. The road was full of carriages. The _trottoir_
was almost as populous as at noon. The idlers outside the _cafés_ were
still eating their ices and sipping their _eau-sucré_ as though, instead
of being past eleven at night, it was scarcely eleven in the morning. In
a few minutes, we had once more turned aside out of the great
thoroughfare, and stopped at a private house in a quiet street. A
carriage driving off, a cab drawing up behind our own, open windows with
drawn blinds, upon which were profiled passing shadows of the guests
within, and the ringing tones of a soprano voice, accompanied by a
piano, gave sufficient indication of a party, and had served to attract
a little crowd of soldiers and _gamins_ about the doorway.
Having left our over-coats with a servant, we were ushered upstairs,
and, as the song was not yet ended, slipped in unannounced and stationed
ourselves just between two crowded drawing-rooms, where, sheltered by
the folds of a muslin curtain, we could see all that was going on in
both. I observed, at a glance, that I was now in a society altogether
unlike that which I had just left.
At Rachel's there were present only two ladies besides herself, and
those were members of her own family. Here I found at least an equal
proportion of both sexes. At Rachel's a princely magnificence reigned.
Here the rooms were elegant, but simple; the paintings choice but few;
the ornaments costly, but in no unnecessary profusion.
"It is just the difference between taste and display," said Dalrymple.
"Rachel is an actress, and Madame de Courcelles is a lady. Rachel
exhibits her riches as an Indian chief exhibits the scalps of his
victims--Madame de Courcelles adorns her house with no other view than
to make it attractive to her friends."
"As a Greek girl covers her head with sequins to show the amount of her
fortune, and an English girl puts a rose in her hair for grace and
beauty only," said I, fancying that I had made rather a clever
observation. I was therefore considerably disappointed when Dalrymple
merely said, "just so."
The lady in the larger room here finished her song and returned to her
seat, amid a shower of _bravas_.
"She sings exquisitely," said I, following her with my eyes.
"And so she ought," replied my friend. "She is the Countess Rossi, whom
you may have heard of as Mademoiselle Sontag."
"What! the celebrated Sontag?" I exclaimed.
"The same. And the gentleman to whom she is now speaking is no less
famous a person than the author of _Pelham_."
I was as much delighted as a rustic at a menagerie, and Dalrymple,
seeing this, continued to point out one celebrity after another till I
began no longer to remember which was which. Thus Lamartine, Horace
Vernet, Scribe, Baron Humboldt, Miss Bremer, Arago, Auber, and Sir Edwin
Landseer, were successively indicated, and I thought myself one of the
most fortunate fellows in Paris, only to be allowed to look upon them.
"I suppose the spirit of lion-hunting is an original instinct," I said,
presently. "Call it vulgar excitement, if you will; but I must confess
that to see these people, and to be able to write about them to my
father, is just the most delightful thing that has happened to me since
I left home."
"Call things by their right names, Damon," said Dalrymple,
good-naturedly. "If you were a _parvenu_ giving a party, and wanted all
these fine folks to be seen at your house, that would be lion-hunting;
but being whom and what you are, it is hero-worship--a disease peculiar
to the young; wholesome and inevitable, like the measles."
"What have I done," said a charming voice close by, "that Captain
Dalrymple will not even deign to look upon me?"
The charming voice proceeded from the still more charming lips of an
exceedingly pretty brunette in a dress of light green silk, fastened
here and there with bouquets of rosebuds. Plump, rosy, black-haired,
bright-eyed, bewilderingly coquettish, this lady might have been about
thirty years of age, and seemed by no means unconscious of her powers of
fascination.
"I implore a thousand pardons, Madame...." began my friend.
"_Comment_! A thousand pardons for a single offence!" exclaimed the
lady. "What an unreasonable culprit!"
To which she added, quite audibly, though behind the temporary shelter
of her fan:--
"Who is this _beau garçon_ whom you seem to have brought with you?"
I turned aside, affecting not to hear the question; but could not help
listening, nevertheless. Of Dalrymple's reply, however, I caught but
my own name.
"So much the better," observed the lady. "I delight in civilizing
handsome boys. Introduce him."
Dalrymple tapped me on the arm.
"Madame de Marignan permits me to introduce you, _mon ami_," said he.
"Mr. Basil Arbuthnot--Madame de Marignan."
I bowed profoundly--all the more profoundly because I felt myself
blushing to the eyes, and would not for the universe have been suspected
of overhearing the preceding conversation; nor was my timidity
alleviated when Dalrymple announced his intention of going in search of
Madame de Courcelles, and of leaving me in the care of Madame
de Marignan.
"Now, Damon, make the most of your opportunities," whispered he, as he
passed by. "_Vogue la galère_!"
_Vogue la galère_, indeed! As if I had anything to do with the _galère_,
except to sit down in it, the most helpless of galley-slaves, and
blindly submit to the gyves and chains of Madame de Marignan, who,
regarding me as the lawful captive of her bow and spear, carried me off
at once to a vacant _causeuse_ in a distant corner.
To send me in search of a footstool, to make me hold her fan, to
overwhelm me with questions and bewilder me with a thousand coquetries,
were the immediate proceedings of Madame de Marignan. A consummate
tactician, she succeeded, before a quarter of an hour had gone by, in
putting me at my ease, and in drawing from me everything that I had to
tell--all my past; all my prospects for the future; the name and
condition of my father; a description of Saxonholme, and the very date
of my birth. Then she criticized all the ladies in the room, which only
drew my attention more admiringly upon herself; and she quizzed all the
young men, whereby I felt indirectly flattered, without exactly knowing
why; and she praised Dalrymple in terms for which I could have embraced
her on the spot had she been ten times less pretty, and ten times less
fascinating.
I was an easy victim, after all, and scarcely worth the powder and shot
of an experienced _franc-tireur;_ but Madame de Marignan, according to
her own confession, had a taste for civilizing "handsome boys," and as I
may, perhaps, have come under that category a good many years ago, the
little victory amused her! By the time, at all events, that Dalrymple
returned to tell me it was past one o'clock in the morning, and I must
be introduced to the mistress of the house before leaving, my head was
as completely turned as that of old Time himself.
"Past one!" I exclaimed. "Impossible! We cannot have been here half-an
hour."
At which neither Dalrymple nor Madame de Marignan could forbear smiling.
"I hope our acquaintance is not to end here, monsieur," said Madame de
Marignan. "I live in the Rue Castellane, and am at home to my friends
every Wednesday evening."
I bowed almost to my boots.
"And to my intimates, every morning from twelve to two," she added very
softly, with a dimpled smile that went straight to my heart, and set it
beating like the paddle-wheels of a steamer.
I stammered some incoherent thanks, bowed again, nearly upset a servant
with a tray of ices, and, covered with confusion, followed Dalrymple
into the farther room. Here I was introduced to Madame de Courcelles, a
pale, aristocratic woman some few years younger than Madame de Marignan,
and received a gracious invitation to all her Monday receptions. But I
was much less interested in Madame de Courcelles than I should have been
a couple of hours before. I scarcely looked at her, and five minutes
after I was out of her presence, could not have told whether she was
fair or dark, if my life had depended on it!
"What say you to walking home?" said Dalrymple, as we went down stairs.
"It is a superb night, and the fresh air would be delightful after these
hot rooms."
I assented gladly; so we dismissed the cab, and went out, arm-in-arm,
along a labyrinth of quiet streets lighted by gas-lamps few and far
between, and traversed only by a few homeward-bound pedestrians.
Emerging presently at the back of the Madeleine, we paused for a moment
to admire the noble building by moonlight; then struck across the Marché
aux Fleurs and took our way along the Boulevard.
"Are you tired, Damon?" said Dalrymple presently.
"Not in the least," I replied, with my head full of Madame de Marignan.
"Would you like to look in at an artists' club close by here, where I
have the _entree?_--queer place enough, but amusing to a stranger."
"Yes, very much."
"Come along, then; but first button up your overcoat to the throat, and
tie this colored scarf round your neck. See, I do the same. Now take off
your gloves--that's it. And give your hat the least possible inclination
to the left ear. You may turn up the bottoms of your trousers, if you
like--anything to look a little slangy."
"Is that necessary?"
"Indispensable--at all events in the honorable society of _Les
Chicards."_
"_Les Chicards_!" I repeated. "What are they?"
"It is the name of the club, and means--Heaven only knows what! for
Greek or Latin root it has none, and record of it there exists not,
unless in the dictionary of Argôt. And yet if you were an old Parisian
and had matriculated for the last dozen years at the Bal de l'Opéra, you
would know the illustrious Chicard by sight as familiarly as Punch, or
Paul Pry, or Pierrot. He is a gravely comic personage with a bandage
over one eye, a battered hat considerably inclining to the back of his
head, a coat with a high collar and long tails, and a _tout ensemble_
indescribably seedy--something between a street preacher and a
travelling showman. But here we are. Take care how you come down, and
mind your head."
Having turned aside some few minutes before into the Rue St. Honoré, we
had thence diverged down a narrow street with a gutter running along the
middle and no foot-pavements on either side. The houses seemed to be
nearly all shops, some few of which, for the retailing of
_charbonnerie_, stale vegetables, uninviting cooked meats, and so forth,
were still open; but that before which we halted was closely shuttered
up, with only a private door open at the side, lighted by a single
oil-lamp. Following my friend for a couple of yards along the dim
passage within, I became aware of strange sounds, proceeding apparently
from the bowels of the earth, and found myself at the head of a steep
staircase, down which it was necessary to proceed with my body bent
almost double, in consequence of the close proximity of the ceiling and
the steps. At the foot of this staircase came another dim passage and
another oil-lamp over a low door, at which Dalrymple paused a moment
before entering. The sounds which I had heard above now resolved
themselves into their component parts, consisting of roars of laughter,
snatches of songs, clinkings of glasses, and thumpings of bottles upon
tables, to the accompaniment of a deep bass hum of conversation, all of
which prepared me to find a very merry company within.