LOUIS Flaubert was not satisfied with what nature had done for him.
It seemed to him that he was born to rival Torialli, and so far facts
had disagreed with him. Yet he was far cleverer than the famous singer
(who, after all, wasn’t singing any more); he could trick him and
hoodwink and bearlead him. Why, then, did all Paris turn its head to
look after one man and remain blindly unconscious of the other?
Flaubert could not answer this question, but he could at any rate defy
it; and he thought, as the frog thought in the fable, that a little
self-advertisement was all that he really needed. He would draw the eye
of Paris to him. And when Paris had looked he would trust to his own
wits to keep her attention. It was for this end alone that Flaubert was
prepared to fling a small fortune into the entertainment at which he
hoped that Salvi was to sing.
A fashionable Revue suggested itself to his mind as the most taking
thing for Paris. Paris is very fond of Revues--so many things can be
put in a Revue that sound quite harmless when they are sung, without
being nearly as harmless as they sound; and that is what Paris likes,
because half the charm of a bad thing would cease to exist if it could
not be made to resemble a good one. To appear to be what you are bores
Paris. She would always dress her peasants to look like kings and
queens, and her kings and queens to look like peasants.
To make the Revue a success Flaubert had obtained the consent of Prince
Ivan and Prince Rudolph to appear in it. They were delighted with the
idea, but they made several stipulations. They must have at least four
changes of costume each, and no fatigue, and Flaubert must invite all
the jolliest fellows to write them up. They did not wish to appear as
royalties; that rôle was a bore and only suitable for republicans and
rich _canaille_ of all sorts; but they did wish to be thought great
singers, and, of course, they knew as well as Flaubert did that a very
little voice will go a very great way--in a Prince.
The Revue was written by a man of fashion. This was necessary, because
nobody else would have understood how to construct each scene merely
from the point of view of the actors who were to take part in it.
Naturally, no one wanted the play to interfere with the necessity for
becoming attitudes or the costumes which suited them best. A critical
observer might have suggested that the dramatic situation had no direct
bearing upon the plot; but he would soon have been disarmed by the
discovery that a plot was considered wholly superfluous.
“Nobody,” as the author remarked, “writes a plot nowadays; they go in
for psychology and atmosphere.” It is true that the critical observer
might still have wished to know if doing what you felt like to an
irrelevant tune was psychology, and if “atmosphere” was most happily
expressed by ladies who were under the impression that a few veils
and half a dozen dancing lessons from a famous _danseuse_ fitted them
for the leading parts in a Russian ballet. But no doubt the critical
observer would not have been of sufficient importance to receive an
invitation.
The great artists were coming, but they weren’t coming to criticize,
they were coming so that to-morrow they might see their names on the
same page as the _grand monde_, and the _grand monde_ was coming
because it had to go somewhere and because it believed that it might
behave rather worse at an affair of that sort than if it was simply by
itself.
All Paris was coming; but they weren’t coming to consider Flaubert.
They would laugh at him, perhaps, if they noticed him at all, but they
would not even laugh for very long. And yet Flaubert believed that if
they could be made to look in his direction they would compare him to
his advantage with Torialli!
It is so difficult for some people to realize that very few people look
in their direction at all!
Flaubert had spared no expense to conquer his world; it had wrung his
heart, for he loved his money only less than himself; but he had built
a theatre in the garden--a vast affair with a stage and a dressing-room
at the back, and a tent to roof it over. The house was filled with
orchids in the shape of doves. They hung in festoons from the walls
of the dining-room downstairs, and lined the corridor, springing from
baskets of ferns as if they were brooding over fairy nests; on the way
that led to the garden cunningly arranged electric lamps shone on their
weird hoverings. They were like doves; but they were like doves which
had been long enough in Paris to lose their innocence.
The entrance hall was made as much as possible to equal Torialli’s.
Louis had placed various busts of his master there; he had hated to do
it, but he had not as yet seen his way to having his own bust taken.
He was careful, however, to give the best light to a small charcoal
drawing of himself playing the piano, and he had chosen one or two
busts of Torialli which emphasized the mark of the years. Flaubert
always spoke of Torialli as “Mon cher vieux maître” when Torialli
wasn’t there.
Madame Torialli looked lovelier than ever on the great night, and yet
she had worked all day long with Louis and Jean under a tension which
might have overwhelmed a stronger woman. To Gabrielle it had only lent
an air of extra softness and stillness. She wore a gown of the palest,
vaguest blue--a blue which seemed to have lost itself in a white cloud;
out of the cloud her bare neck and shoulders gleamed softly, as if
they were powdered with pearls; the heavy black shadows under her eyes
brought out afresh their startling azure innocence.
“Why Gabrielle should manage to look as if she were going to her
first communion when she wears the lowest dress in the room, I cannot
understand!” said her sister-in-law enviously. “But no one could
suspect her of impropriety whatever she was doing--they would think she
was saying her prayers!”
As for Jean, he said to himself that night, as he had said to himself a
hundred times before in the long ten days which followed Salvi’s visit:
“I must have been mistaken, she is too beautiful--she cannot be false.”
Louis had been in such a frantic state all day that Jean was
astonished at his bounding vivacity to-night. At breakfast he had lost
a temper which Jean had never known him to possess, struck a terrified
servant, and filled the house with irritated nerves. At lunch he had
wept and only an hour before the first guest arrived Jean had been
forced to give him brandy, while Louis lay in a collapse on the sofa,
moaning and asking for a revolver.
Now, however, the hour had made the man. He received his guests with a
perfect mixture of respect and affability, and with careful shades of
manner which expressed to a nicety his reverential delight in receiving
his royal guests, his cordial appreciation of the presence of certain
members of the best French world (friends and relatives of Gabrielle),
his _camaraderie_ with men and women of talent, and the temporary vogue
of mere originality; and a patronizing pleasure at the appearance of
the less important pupils. Torialli stood a little behind him, and kept
as much in the background as his friends would let him. He was honestly
delighted to see his secretary receiving the big world, and he had set
his heart on Louis’ success. So apparently had Madame Torialli, for she
said so at intervals throughout the evening.
La Salvi came alarmingly early; she timed her arrival to take place
during the long dead time of the _soirée_, while the princes were
quarrelling in their dressing-rooms over their respective costumes,
and taking drinks to strengthen their nerves for the ordeal of the
Revue, which could not take place until the professional artists had
finished their evening’s work at the different theatres.
Louis hastened half way downstairs to greet her. Gabrielle Torialli
leaned over the top of the staircase, one slim ringless hand on
the banisters between. La Salvi shot a glance up at her, past her
obsequious host, out of her bright, malicious little eyes.
“Ah! my dear Monsieur Flaubert!” she said. “How early I am. You see,
I am so anxious to see you! But this isn’t a new house at all! It’s
a magician’s palace! Why, what an interior! I shall never forget it!
The truth is I am fatigued, I can hardly stand, and I said to myself,
‘If I don’t go early I shan’t have any time there at all!’ I’m like
Cinderella, I must run away before the clock strikes twelve!”
Louis Flaubert’s face was a study. If she was so tired, did she intend
to sing? He dared not ask her; Gabrielle had been so certain that she
would sing for him; but the crudity of a direct request appalled him.
It seemed as if all Paris was listening over the banisters to hear.
The royal princes in the garden, swearing bitterly over the enormous
difficulty of getting into black tights for their first scene--what
would they say if they did not hear La Salvi? Perhaps, if he got her
alone into the garden, he would dare to ask the boon. But no! La Salvi
would not go into the garden.
“I daren’t, my dear man!” she said, puffing relentlessly on up the
stairs. “I daren’t; there’s a feeling of damp in the air, and I think
it’s going to rain! Does one, I ask you, carry one’s only child
out into a storm? Do not then suggest that I should expose my one
offspring--my poor little changeling of a voice! Ah, my little angel
Gabrielle! so, there, you are all in blue and white, fresh from the
Madonna, as it were! What a pleasure again! And what a drawing-room,
Monsieur Flaubert! You don’t think it large enough to sing in? My good
man, don’t sing! One cannot play every part at once. You make a perfect
host! And those pink cakes over there; are they brought up on purpose
for me? What an imagination! Aladdin himself never managed better with
his lantern! Where do you keep your lantern, Monsieur Aladdin? Or do
the Toriallis keep it for you? It’s just the kind of thing, now, that
I see our dear Gabrielle collecting! Ah, here is the great Torialli
himself!”
Madame Salvi sat down by the pink cakes and motioned Torialli to the
seat next to her.
“Now I think,” he said with a good-natured smile, “that this is
really capital of Flaubert, dear old man! he has such a head on his
shoulders! I should never get on without him. Don’t you think he has
done all this very well? I assure you I can’t think how he manages
it--those flowers now--Gabrielle and I couldn’t run to orchids like
this! I don’t believe Paris held them all; they tell me he wired to
London; did you ever hear of such a man? You’ll sing for him to-night,
won’t you, Salvi?”
La Salvi ate another pink cake before she answered. Flaubert was
receiving Hester Lévi; for her, too, he went half way downstairs; she
was the richest woman in Paris.
“No,” said Salvi at length. “I have a cold in my head, I think, or the
bubonic plague, or perhaps the cholera; one never knows the beginning
of those things. Why should I sing? I am not a gramophone to be turned
on and off at everybody’s garden party! Why don’t you sing yourself,
then, if you want so to please him?”
“I? Oh well, you know, I’m an old man now,” said Torialli, rather
sadly. “When one has sung, as I have sung, one does not come up after
the resurrection. It is better to stay dead, my dear Salvi--it’s better
to stay dead!”
“Well, for my part,” said Salvi, taking up a green cake instead of a
pink one, “I think it better not to die, so I take things very easily
and in half an hour I go to bed. Is that the Duchesse de Richemont
talking to your wife; because, if it is, bring her over to me; she’s a
young woman, and she hasn’t eaten so many cakes, so she may as well do
the moving! Thank you, Torialli, you’re a good fellow!”
Torialli was a very good fellow, and he proved it in more ways than
one; when he had given his dear Salvi the young duchesse for her
companion he did his best to brighten up the waiting _soirée_.
Still there it was! It would wait. It was waiting to hear La Salvi,
and when the element of suspense has been introduced into pleasure the
pleasure recedes before it like the ebb of a relentless tide. In vain
Torialli moved everywhere with his friendly compliments to Flaubert and
his good-tempered laughter; in vain Madame Torialli, always tactful,
always serene, glided about among the guests, leaving behind her a wake
of gratified smiles and purring _amour propre_. The evening dragged
and people waited. The princes sent a message in from the theatre to
ask when La Salvi was coming out, or were they to come in to hear her?
because if they were, they would have to take off their tights, which
would be really too many kinds of a picturesque nuisance; but at any
rate something must be done promptly or they would be bored.
Flaubert took his courage in both hands and approached La Salvi. La
Salvi went on talking to the Duchesse de Richemont and did not appear
to see him coming. When he had reached her a hush came over the two
drawing-rooms. Madame Salvi looked up and smiled.
“What!” she said. “Has Aladdin a new surprise for us?”
“My dear Madame,” said poor Flaubert, “do not talk as if I could work
a miracle when I come to ask for one. You will take away the little
courage I have if you do that!”
“You have enough,” interrupted Salvi softly. “Rest assured, Monsieur
Flaubert, I think you have enough!”
“Madame, will you do me the infinite honour, will, you make me the
happiest of men, and sing for us to-night?” Flaubert persevered
waveringly, though he felt the conviction ebbing out of his voice. Ah!
he had said it at last; the perspiration broke out on his forehead, he
felt, as he afterwards expressed it, as if white ants were eating his
spine!
“But I am shocked! I am desolated!” cried Madame Salvi. “To disappoint
you is a horror to me! But was it what you expected, that I should sing
to-night?”
“I do not dare to say _expected_, Madame,” murmured the wretched
Flaubert. “But I had humbly hoped----”
“Ah well! if you did not expect it,” said Salvi. “So much the better!
Still I regret to have to take away your humble hopes. Wednesday, I
sing for our dear Torialli; I must preserve my poor little efforts till
then.”
“Ah, Madame!” pleaded Flaubert. “Just one song, your magnificent
organ----”
“My dear good Flaubert, impossible!” said Salvi, slowly rising. “I have
eaten six cakes, the duchesse is a witness, in the last ten minutes. I
never eat before I sing, only afterwards. Consider, then, that I have
sung. And now, my good friend, I must really go. My glass slipper has
begun to pinch in such a manner that I am sure in five minutes it will
be off. A thousand thanks for the entertainment of a life-time. I do
not readily forget such attentions as yours, my dear Flaubert. Tell our
good princes I would have given much to see their costumes and to hear
them sing, of course! Their parts must be ravishing! So clever of you
to have an entertainment in the garden.” And La Salvi was gone.
It was Madame Torialli who suggested to Louis that they should have
supper at once instead of waiting until after the Revue. Flaubert was
almost too crushed to accept the suggestion and to send out appropriate
excuses to the princes.
The guests rallied a little under the approach of food. The princes
came in rather sulkily, but as they found some particular friends in
the dining-room they recovered enough to behave a little worse than
anyone had quite expected, which was gratifying to Flaubert, for they
only behaved well when they were bored. A famous _danseuse_ who had
just arrived was quite shocked; she was accustomed to quieter manners.
Only Madame Torialli’s untroubled child-like blue eyes remained as
serene as ever. She took the boisterously pronounced attention of
Prince Ivan and his roars of laughter with an air of such perfect
blandness and self-possession as to rob his behaviour of half its
barbarism.
“Una and the Lion,” the Marquis de Trévaillant pointed out to Romain
D’Ucelles. Romain lifted his eyebrows and looked at Madame Torialli.
“Ah, my dear Marquis,” he said. “Did Una first incite the Lion before
she tamed him?”
“You see too much,” said his friend.
Romain laughed.
“That robs my speech of half its sting,” he murmured. “One need say so
little, you know, if one has been fortunate enough to see too much!”
Jean overheard his uncle and hated him. He felt that he must speak or
die.
“Madame Torialli is trying to save the situation, my uncle,” he said
stiffly. Romain laughed.
“Ah! Is that you, my dear Jean?” he said. “Surely it must be, one
cannot have two such ingenuous nephews! You must not think I underrate
your clever friend. She is one of those kind-hearted women who are
so fond of saving situations that they create them first. It is the
true instinct of the reformer! Our charming ancestress Eve, now, I
fancy, had the same motive in urging the fruit upon Adam. She had no
opportunity, you see, to raise his nature until after the fall! Think
of it! Eternity in a garden with a good man! What a horrible idea! It
is enough to intrigue any woman!”
“_Farceur!_” laughed the Marquis de Trévaillant. “And now we have
eaten, what happens next? It is another hour before the Revue can
begin. What a tedious affair! And these artists of yours, when do they
come, Monsieur D’Ucelles?”
“Flaubert has just sent a message to hurry them,” said Jean over his
shoulder, as he hastened away to where Flaubert was beckoning him.
“What can I do? What can I do?” moaned the distracted Louis. “You must
go and play, but I doubt if they will listen to you for an hour--if
only you could sing comic songs!”
Jean glanced round the decorated dining-room, the tables loaded with
delicate foods, the rich and exquisite dresses of the women, the
carefully valeted men with their well-cut evening clothes, and the
weary, hard, cruel faces! It seemed to him as if these over-civilized
and pampered creatures had reverted in heart to the lowest level of
nature, and as if their life had become the mere struggle of wild
beasts for temporary desires--creatures all teeth and claws for their
particular morsel of prey! Fortunately at this moment the artists were
announced and good-naturedly offered to postpone their own suppers
until after the Revue.
The Revue began in the most brilliant manner; everybody on the stage
was anxious, self-conscious, and jealous; every one in the audience
was amused. These were their best friends making themselves ridiculous
under the impression that they were appearing particularly attractive;
what more could an audience want? Prince Ivan and Prince Rudolph
fulfilled every one’s expectation of the absurd. Prince Ivan managed to
fall over a footstool which had been most carefully placed out of his
way as far as possible, and swore audibly in the middle of his song.
Prince Rudolph forgot his stage directions, and turned his back to the
audience so that his voice floated away into somebody else’s garden.
Still, considering they were royalty, they managed very well and were
immensely applauded.
The _femmes du monde_ danced beautifully; at least they wore
practically nothing and moved about the stage very gracefully while
some one was playing the piano.
The famous _danseuse_ was overheard remarking that as far as she could
see they might just as well have executed that kind of dance in the
bathroom to the noise of a hot-water tap; but that was put down to
professional jealousy.
The real artists went through their parts perfunctorily and tried to
flirt with the society ladies; only they became a little frightened
because the society ladies went so far.
Just as every one was beginning to warm to the work, and the author had
received his first call for saying something wholly disgraceful about
a thinly veiled identity whom everybody guessed, Salvi’s prophecy came
to pass. The gathered grey clouds came down with unequivocal ardour; no
light unmethodical showers which might be trusted to trickle through
the tent unobtrusively, but the unhurried obstinacy of a thorough
soak. It was in vain that Jean rushed madly to and fro with rugs and
waterproofs to cover the thin roofing. It was in vain that Flaubert
expostulated and implored. Every one was desolated, every one had been
charmed and delighted; but couldn’t under any circumstances stay and
risk a wetting.
Flaubert stood disconsolately in his grand new hall and the crowd
of his hastily departing guests swayed all around him. They passed
away with the relieved celerity of those who have borne enough. Their
perfunctory thin thanks hardly lasted till they reached the door. The
fable had ended. The poor frog had puffed his longest and his loudest.
Now he had burst, and nobody for a single moment had mistaken him for
the ox!
Jean was honestly distressed for Louis, and as for Madame Torialli, she
remained there to the very end with such grave and sympathetic eyes,
as to make Jean feel almost more sorry for her than for Flaubert. He
thought that she looked more than ever like an angel as she stood there
among the drooping flowers that looked so curiously like doves; and
he did not think that the angel--like the flowers, perhaps--had been
rather too long a time in Paris.