AN OLD LADY AND A LIMP
Nearly a week passed, with the utmost constraint, upon the little
family in the Rue de l’Echelle, except Fifi. Nothing could equal the
airy _insouciance_ of that young woman. She was no more the dumb,
docile creature whose soul and spirit seemed frozen, whose will was
benumbed, but Mademoiselle Fifi of the Imperial Theater. Fifi delighted
in acting--and she was now acting in her own drama, and with the most
exquisite enjoyment of the situation.
At intervals, during the week, Italians with monkeys appeared; but
Angéline adopted with these gentry a simple, but effective, method
of her own, which was secretly approved by Fifi. This was to appear
suddenly on the scene with a kettle of boiling water, which she
threatened to distribute impartially upon the monkeys and their owners.
This never failed to stampede the enemy. Fifi scolded and complained
bitterly of this, but Angéline took a firm stand against monkeys and
Italians--much to Fifi’s relief.
The subject of Fifi’s marriage to Louis was not touched upon by either
Madame Bourcet or Louis in that week, although Louis continued to spend
his evenings with his aunt and Fifi, and did not intermit the nightly
game of cribbage. If it was imprudent to marry Fifi, it was likewise
imprudent not to marry her--so reasoned the unhappy Louis, who, like
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, was of two minds at the same time, and
fairly distracted between them.
But, if the Bourcets let the marriage question remain discreetly in the
background, not so Fifi. Having discovered that Louis suffered acutely
from her manifestations of affection, Fifi proceeded to subject him to
a form of torture in high repute among the most bloodthirsty savages
of North America. This consists in smearing the victim’s body all over
with honey, and then letting him be slowly stung to death by gnats
and flies. Figuratively speaking, she smeared poor Louis with honey
from his head to his heels, and then had a delicious joy in seeing him
writhe under his agonies. And the innocence and simplicity with which
she did it fooled the unfortunate Louis completely.
One thing seemed clear to him: even if the Holy Father were willing to
give up so desirable a husband for his young relative, Fifi, herself,
would have to be reckoned with; and it all came, Louis thought, with
a rainbow of vanity athwart the gloom, of his being so dreadfully
handsome, fascinating and virtuous.
To Fifi this was the comedy part of the drama--and she played it for
all there was in it.
She reckoned the shopping episode as the first act of the play. That
was through, and there must be a second act. Fifi was too much of an
artist to repeat herself. She felt she had reached the limit of horrors
in shopping, and she still had nearly ninety thousand francs sewed up
in her mattress. Some new way must be devised for getting rid of it.
She thought of endowing beds in hospitals, of giving _dots_ to young
ladies, not so fortunate as herself in having a man like Cartouche, who
declined a fortune--and a thousand other schemes; but all involved some
vague and mysterious business transactions which frightened Fifi.
But, by a turn of fate, most unexpected, it was Cartouche who showed
her a way out of her difficulties, and it filled her with delight. It
was in a letter Cartouche wrote her in response to the two she had sent
him, one after the other. Cartouche’s letter was written in very black
ink, in a large, slovenly hand, on a big sheet of paper, and Fifi knew
perfectly well that he was in a rage when writing it.
“Fifi: What nonsense is this you write me, that as soon as you
promised to marry Louis Bourcet you determined not to marry him? What
have you been doing? Don’t you know if you squander your money neither
Louis Bourcet nor any man of his class will marry you? Four thousand
francs for your trousseau is outrageous; as for the blue-satin bed
the Empress could not buy, I can not trust myself to speak of it. If
you continue acting in this way, I will not come to your wedding, nor
let Toto come--that is, if Monsieur Bourcet or any other man will
marry you. You seem to be bitten with the desire to do everything the
Empress does, and a little more besides. You might follow the Empress’
example, and going in your coach and six, with outriders, to the
banking-house of Lafitte, make a little gift of a hundred thousand
francs to the fund for soldiers’ orphans. Fifi, you are a goose, and
there is no disguising it. I hope Monsieur Bourcet will use the strong
hand on you, for your own good. Cartouche.
“P. S. I could tell you many interesting things about Toto, but I am
so angry I can not write any more.”
Fifi read this letter over, with a serene smile. Of course Cartouche
was angry--but that was rather amusing.
She laid the letter down, and looked up at the patch of blue sky
visible from her bedroom window. She seemed to see in that blue patch
all her former life, so full of work, of makeshifts, of gaiety, of
vivid interest--and compared with it the dull and spiritless existence
before her--that is, which had lately been before her; because now
the determination to return to the old life was as strong as the soul
within her.
She took Cartouche’s letter up and read it again, and a cry of joy came
from her lips. Give the money to the soldiers’ fund! She remembered
having heard Madame Bourcet and Louis speaking of this fund the night
before. The Empress had gone in state, as Cartouche said, to make her
splendid gift--and Lafitte’s banking-house was not fifteen minutes from
where she was in the Rue de l’Echelle.
In a flash, Fifi saw she could do it. She had her white wig and outside
of her door was the press in which Angéline kept her best black bonnet,
black shawl and gown, in which any woman could look a hundred years
old. Oh, it was the simplest thing in the world! The next day was
Thursday, the morning Madame Bourcet always went out, and Angéline
always stayed at home. It could be done within twenty-four hours!
Fifi danced about her room in rapture. It was now late in the
afternoon; she could scarcely wait until the next day. How precious was
her white wig to her then!
“Cartouche said I was silly to bring all these things with me,” she
said to herself gleefully; “and I had to do it secretly--but see, how
sensible I was! The fact is, I have a great deal of sense, and I know
what is good for me, much better than Cartouche does, or the Bourcets,
or the Emperor, or even the Holy Father. How do they know what is
going on inside of my head? Only I know perfectly well. And to think
that Cartouche should have suggested such a good way for me to get rid
of the hateful money! What an advertisement it will be! Mademoiselle
Chiaramonti, granddaughter of the Pope’s cousin, winner of the first
prize in the grand lottery, and giving ninety thousand francs to the
soldiers’ orphans! Mademoiselle Mars, at the Théâtre Française, never
had half such an advertisement. She has only her art to advertise her!
I shall be worth fifty francs the week to any manager in Paris. No
doubt the high-priced theaters will try to get me, and all the people
who think they know, like the Emperor and the Holy Father, would say
I should go to a theater on the other side of the river. But I do not
understand the style of acting at the high-priced theaters. I should
be hissed. No. The cheap theaters for me, and the kings and queens and
Roman consuls and things like that. Oh, Fifi, what a clever, clever
creature you are!”
The happier Fifi was the more she loved to torment Louis Bourcet, and
she was so very demonstrative that night, and made so many allusions to
the bliss she expected to enjoy with him, that both Louis and Madame
Bourcet were half distracted. But Fifi had such a lot of money--and was
the granddaughter of the Holy Father’s cousin!
Next morning, Madame Bourcet, as usual, made ready to go to the
lecture, at twelve o’clock. Fifi had never once proposed going out
alone, and was at that moment engaged in needlework in her own room.
Madame Bourcet, therefore, started off, without any misgivings, except
the general gloom produced by the thought of either having Fifi in the
family, or not having her.
Scarcely had Madame Bourcet’s respectable figure disappeared around
the corner, before another figure equally respectable, and apparently
a good deal older, emerged upon the street. It was Fifi, dressed in
Angéline’s clothes, and with a green barége veil falling over her face.
She knew how to limp as if she were seventy-five, instead of nineteen,
and cleverly concealed her mouthful of beautiful white teeth. On her
arm was a little covered basket which might have held eggs, but which
really held nearly ninety thousand francs in thousand-franc notes.
Fifi knew the way to the banking-house of Lafitte perfectly well. It
was then in a great gloomy building in the Rue St. Jacques. In less
than fifteen minutes she was mounting the steps, and soon found herself
in a large room, around which was an iron grating, and behind this
grating were innumerable clerks at work.
Fifi went to the window nearest the door, and asked of a very
alert-looking young clerk, at work at the desk:
“Will you be kind enough, Monsieur, to tell me where I can make a
contribution to the fund for the soldiers’ orphans?”
“Here, Madame,” replied the young clerk, eying superciliously the
little basket Fifi laid down on the ledge before him. People made all
sorts of contributions to this fund, and the spruce young clerk had
several times had his sensibilities outraged by offerings of old shoes,
of assignats, even of a live cock. The basket before him looked as if
it held a cat--probably one of the rare kind, which the old lady would
propose that he should sell, and give the proceeds to the fund. Out of
the basket the white-haired old lady with the green barége veil took a
parcel, and laying it down, said humbly:
“Monsieur, this gift comes from one who has no husband and no son to
give to the empire.”
“To whom shall I make out the receipt, and for how much, Madame?” asked
the clerk; but the old lady was already out of the room, and going down
the steps much faster than one would expect a person of her age to be
able to do.
Once outside Fifi stepped into a dark archway, from which she emerged,
a minute later, wearing her own bonnet and red cloak and her own skirt.
All of Angéline’s paraphernalia, together with the white wig, was
squeezed into a bundle which Fifi cleverly concealed under her cloak.
The basket she had tossed down an open cellar under the archway.
She called a closed cab, and stuffing her bundle under the seat,
ordered the cabman to drive her in a direction which she knew would
take her past the bank. She had the exquisite pleasure of seeing half
a dozen clerks rush distractedly out, inquiring frantically if any one
had seen in the neighborhood an old lady with a limp, a green veil and
a basket. Fifi stopped her cab long enough to get a description of
herself from one of the wildest-looking of the clerks.
“But why, Monsieur, do you wish to find this old lady?” Fifi asked.
“Because, Mademoiselle, she has stolen ninety thousand francs from
this bank a moment ago or given ninety thousand francs to something
or other,” cried the clerk, who had entirely confounded the story of
Fifi’s adventure, which had been imparted to him in haste and confusion.
Fifi, nearly dying with laughter, rolled away in her cab. The last
glimpse she had of her late friend, the bank clerk, he had found the
basket in the archway, and was declaiming with disheveled hair and wild
gesticulations concerning the robbery, or the gift, he did not know
which.
Fifi was not away from home more than half an hour, and when Angéline,
about one o’clock, passed through the snuff-colored drawing-room, she
saw Fifi, through the open door, sitting at the writing-table in her
bedroom, and scribbling away for dear life. This is what she wrote:
“Cartouche: I have got your letter and I have followed your advice--I
will not say exactly how--but you will shortly see me, I think, in the
dear old street of the Black Cat. Fifi.”
Madame Bourcet returned punctually at two o’clock, and as the weather
had become bad, she and Fifi spent the afternoon together in the
snuff-colored drawing-room.
When eight o’clock in the evening arrived, Louis Bourcet, as usual,
appeared. He had news to communicate, and gave a fearful and wonderful
account of the proceedings at the banking-house, in which it was
represented that a mysterious old lady, with a basket and a limp, had
appeared, and had either stolen ninety thousand francs, or given ninety
thousand francs to the fund for the soldiers’ orphans, nobody outside
of the bank knew exactly which. The excitement in the neighborhood
of the bank had been tremendous, and such a crowd had collected that
the _gens d’armes_ had been compelled to charge in order to clear the
street. The basket had been found, but the limp, along with the old
lady, had vanished.
All sorts of stories were flying about concerning the affair, some
people declaring that the troops from the nearest barracks had been
ordered out, a cordon placed around the banking-house, and the
mysterious old lady was nothing less than a determined ruffian, who had
disguised himself as an old woman, and was the leader of a gang of
desperate robbers, determined on looting the bank. Louis Bourcet held
firmly to this opinion.
“It is my belief,” he said solemnly, “that it was a scheme which
involved not only robbery, but possibly assassination. The old woman
was no old woman, but a reckless criminal, who, by a clever disguise,
got into the bank, and was only prevented from carrying out some
dreadful design by the coolness and decision of the bank employees.
The basket, which is marked with the initials A. D., is held at the
bureau of the _arrondissement_, and at the investigation to-morrow
morning--mark my words, that basket will be the means of disclosing a
terrible plot against the banking-house of Lafitte.”
Madame Bourcet listened to these words of wisdom with the profoundest
respect--but Fifi uttered a convulsive sound which she smothered in her
handkerchief and which, she explained, was caused by her agitation at
the sensational story she had just heard.
Louis was so flattered by the tribute of attention to his powers of
seeing farther into a millstone than any one else, that he harangued
the whole evening upon this violent attempt on Lafitte’s banking-house
in particular and the dangers of robbery in general. He even forgot
the game of cribbage. When he rose to go, at ten o’clock, both Madame
Bourcet and Fifi protested that they expected to be murdered in their
beds by a gang of robbers before daylight. Louis promised to come to
the _déjeuner_ at eleven the next morning, to give them the latest
particulars of this nefarious attempt to rob the bank.
Fifi alone in her own room went into spasms of delight. Her freedom was
close at hand--and soon, soon, she could return to that happy life of
hard work and deep affection she had once known. When she slipped into
bed, the hard lump was not in her mattress.
“Think,” she said to herself, lying awake in the dark, “of the good
that hateful money will do now--of the poor children warmed and fed and
clothed. Giving it away like this is not half so difficult as spending
it on hats and gowns and monkeys, and I think I may reckon on getting
back to the dear street of the Black Cat soon--very soon.”
And so, she fell into a deep, sweet sleep, to dream of Cartouche, and
Toto and all the people at the Imperial Theater, including Julie
Campionet.
Next morning, Fifi awaited the _déjeuner_ with feelings of entrancing
pleasure. She loved to see Louis Bourcet make a fool of himself, and
longed to make a fool of him--this naughty Fifi.
She was gratified, for at eleven o’clock, Louis appeared, looking, for
once, a little sheepish. The desperate robbery had been no robbery at
all, but a gift of ninety thousand francs to the fund for the soldiers’
orphans. Louis had bought several newspapers, and each contained the
official announcement of the banking-house of Lafitte, with a request
that the generous donor come forward and discover her identity.
Louis Bourcet, like a good many other people, could always construct
a new hypothesis to meet any new development in a case. He at once
declared that the donor must be a conscience-stricken woman, who had at
some time committed a crime and wished to atone for it. He harped on
this theme while Fifi was soberly drinking her chocolate and inwardly
quivering with delight. She waited until one of Louis’s long-winded
periods came to an end, when, the spirit of the actress within her,
and the piercing joy of making Louis Bourcet look like a guy, were too
much for her. Putting down her cup, therefore, and looking about her in
a way to command attention, Fifi said, in a soft, low voice:
“Madame Bourcet--and dear Louis--” here Louis shuddered--“I have
something to say to you, concerning that mysterious old woman with the
limp and the basket. First, let me say, that until yesterday, I kept
my fortune of nearly ninety thousand francs in my mattress, and my old
shoes I kept in the bank. For people are always losing their money in
banks, but I never heard of any one losing a franc that was sewed up in
a mattress.”
There was a pause. Louis Bourcet sat as if turned to stone, with his
chocolate raised to his lips, and his mouth wide open to receive it,
but he seemed to lose the power of moving his hand or shutting his
mouth. Madame Bourcet appeared to be paralyzed where she sat.
“Yes,” said Fifi, who felt as if she were once more on the beloved
boards of the Imperial Theater. “I kept my money where I knew it
would be safe. And then, seeing I had totally failed to captivate
the affections of my fiancé, I determined to perform an act of
splendid generosity, that would compel his admiration, and possibly,
his tenderness. So, yesterday, when you, Madame, were out, I dressed
myself up in Angéline’s Sunday clothes, took her small fruit basket,
and putting all my fortune in the basket, went to the bank, and handed
it all over, in notes of the Bank of France, to the fund for soldiers’
orphans.”
There was not a sound, except Madame Bourcet’s gasping for breath.
Louis Bourcet had turned of a sickly pallor, his mouth remaining wide
open, and his cup still suspended. This lasted for a full minute, when
the door suddenly opened, and Angéline appeared from the kitchen.
“Madame,” she cried excitedly, “there have been thieves here as well as
at the bank. My fruit basket is gone--I can swear I saw it yesterday
morning. It is marked with my initials, A. D., and I trust, by the
blessing of God, the thief will be found and sent to the galleys for
life.”
At this apparently trivial catastrophe, Madame Bourcet uttered a loud
shriek; Louis Bourcet dropped his cup, which crashed upon the table,
smashing the water carafe; Angéline, amazed at the result of her simple
remark, ran wildly about the room shrieking, “Thieves! thieves! Send
for the police!” Madame Bourcet continued to emit screams at short
intervals, while Louis Bourcet, his head in his hands, groaned in
anguish.
Fifi, alone, sat serene and smiling, and as soon as she could make
herself heard, cried to Louis:
“Dear Louis, tell me, I beg of you, if you approve of my course?”
“No!” bawled Louis, for once forgetting to be correct in manner and
deportment. Then, rising to his feet, and staggering to the door, he
said in a sepulchral voice: “Everything is over between us. If the Holy
Father takes measures to make me fulfil my compact to marry you, I
shall leave France--I shall flee my country. Mademoiselle, permit me to
say you are an impossible person. Adieu forever, I hope!” With this he
was gone.
Madame Bourcet at this recovered enough to scream to Angéline, in a
rapid crescendo:
“Get a van--_get a van_--GET A VAN!”
Fifi knew perfectly well what that meant, and was in ecstasies. She
flew to her room, huddled her belongings together, saying to herself:
“Cartouche, I shall see you! And, Cartouche, I love you! And,
Cartouche, I shall make you marry me--me, your own Fifi!”
In a little while the van was at the door and Fifi’s boxes were piled
in. She threw to Angéline the odious brown gown, with the green spots,
and a ten-franc piece besides--which somewhat mollified Angéline,
without changing her opinion that Fifi was a dangerous and explosive
person to have about. She promised to send for the blue satin bed. Then
Fifi, reverting to her old natural self, climbed into the van along
with her boxes, and jolted off, in the direction of the street of the
Black Cat, and was happier than she had yet been since she had left it.