WHO MASTER JACQUES WAS.
While the novice was covering the paper with his first attempts, the
old gentleman set to reading printer's proofs--long leaves blank on one
side like the paper of which was made the bean bags.
At nine Therese rushed in.
"Quick, quick!" she cried to Jacques, who raised his head. "Come out.
It is a prince who calls. Goodness me! when will this procession of
high-cockalorums cease? I hope this one will not take it into his head
to have breakfast with us, like the Duke of Chartres the other day."
"Which prince is this one?" asked Jacques in an undertone.
"His Highness the Prince of Conti."
Gilbert let a blob of ink fall on the paper much more resembling a blot
than a full note.
Jacques went out, smiling behind Therese, who shut the door after them.
"Princes here!" thought Gilbert. "Dukes calling on a copier of music!"
With his heart singularly beating, he went up to the door to listen.
"I want to take you with me," said a strange voice.
"For what purpose, prince?" inquired Jacques.
"To present you to the dauphiness. A new era opens for philosophers in
her coming reign."
"I am a thousand times thankful to your highness; but my infirmities
keep me indoors."
"And your misanthropy?"
"Suppose it were that? Is it so curious a thing that I should put
myself out for it?"
"Come, and I will spare you the grand reception at the celebration at
St. Denis, and take you on to Muette, where her royal highness will
pass the night in a couple of days."
"Does she get to St. Denis the day after to-morrow?"
"With her whole retinue. Come! the princess is a pupil of Gluck and an
excellent musician."
Gilbert did not listen to any more after hearing that the dauphiness'
retinue would be at St. Denis, only a few miles out, in a day or two.
He might soon be within view of Andrea. This idea dazzled him like a
flash from a looking-glass in his face. When he opened his eyes after
this giddiness they fell on a book which happened to be open on the
sideboard; it was Rousseau's _Confessions_, "adorned with a portrait of
the author."
"The very thing I was looking for. I had never seen what he was like."
He quickly turned over the tissue paper on the steel plate and as
he looked, the door opened and the living original of the portrait
returned. With extended hands, dropping the volume, and trembling all
over, he muttered:
"Oh! I am under the roof of Jean Jacques Rousseau!"
The old gentleman smiled with more happiness at this unstudied ovation
than at the thousand triumphs of his glorious life.
"Yes, my friend, you are in Rousseau's house."
"Pray forgive me for the nonsense I have talked," said the
hero-worshiper, clasping his hands and about to fall on his knees.
"Did it require a prince's call for you to recognize the persecuted
philosopher of Geneva? poor child--but lucky one--who is ignorant of
persecution."
"Oh, I am happy to see you, to know you, to dwell by you."
"Yes, yes, that is all very well; but we must earn our living. When
you shall have copied this piece--for you have practiced enough to
make a start--you will have earned your keep to-day. I charge nothing
for the lodging--only do not sit up late and burn up the candles, for
Therese will scold. What was left over from supper last night will be
our breakfast; but this will be the last meal we take together, unless
I invite you. In the street is a cheap dining-house for artisans,
where you will fare nicely. I recommend it. In the mean time, let us
breakfast."
Gilbert followed without a word, for he was conquered, for the first
time; but then this was a man superior to others.
After the first mouthfuls he left table; the shock had spoilt his
appetite. At eight in the evening he had copied a piece of music, not
artistically but legibly, and Rousseau paid him the six cents.
"We have plenty of bread," remarked Therese, on whom the young man's
gentleness, application and discretion had produced good effect.
"I shall never forget your kindness, madame," he said, about to excuse
himself, when he caught the host's eye and guessed that it would offend
him.
"I accept," he said.
He went up to his loft, with the bread and money.
"At last I am my own master," he said to himself, "or should be but for
this bread, which is from charity."
Although hungry, he placed it on the window sill and did not touch it
during the night, though famine made him remember it.
He woke up at daylight, but still he did not eat the bread. He took it
up, though, and at five o'clock, went down and outdoors.
From suspicion, or merely to study his guest, Rousseau was on the
lookout, and he followed the youth up the street.
A beggar coming up to Gilbert, he gave him the hunk of bread. Entering
the baker's, he bought another roll.
"He is going into the eating-house," thought the watcher, "where the
money will soon fly."
But Gilbert munched part of the roll while strolling; he washed down
the rest at the public fountain, washed his hands and sauntered home.
"By my faith, I believe that I am happier than Diogenes and have found
an honest man," thought Rousseau.
The day passed in uninterrupted labor. At even Gilbert had turned out
seven pages of copy--if not elegant, faultless. He tested in his hand
the money received for it with ardent satisfaction.
"You are my master," he said, "since I find work in your place and you
give me lodgings gratis. I should therefore lay myself open to be badly
thought of by you if I acted without consulting you."
"What," said Rousseau, frightened; "what are you going to do? Going off
elsewhere to work?"
"No, only I want a holiday, with your leave, to-morrow."
"To idle?"
"No, to go to St. Denis to see the dauphiness arrive."
"I thought you scorned the pomps of this worldly show," said Rousseau.
"I, though an obscure citizen, despised the invitation of these great
people to be of the reception party."
Gilbert nodded approval.
"I am not philosophic," said he, "but I am discreet."
This word struck the tutor, who saw there was some mystery in this
behavior, and he looked at the speaker with admiration.
"I am glad to see you have a motive."
"Yes, and one which does not resemble the curiosity of a man at a show."
"It is for the better, or for the worse, for your look is deep, young
man, and I seek in it in vain for youthful calm and candor."
"I told you I was unfortunate," returned Gilbert; "and such have no
youth."
"But at the hour when you are seeing all the pomps of society
glitter before you, I shall open one of my herbariums and review the
magnificence of nature."
"But would you not have turned your back on herbariums if you were
going to see your sweetheart--the one to whom you tossed a bunch of
cherries?"
"Quite true! And you are young. Go to the show, my boy. It is not
ambition in him, but love," he commented when Gilbert had gone out
gleefully.