Newman, on his return to Paris, had not resumed the study of French
conversation with M. Nioche; he found that he had too many other uses
for his time. M. Nioche, however, came to see him very promptly, having
learned his whereabouts by a mysterious process to which his patron
never obtained the key. The shrunken little capitalist repeated his
visit more than once. He seemed oppressed by a humiliating sense of
having been overpaid, and wished apparently to redeem his debt by the
offer of grammatical and statistical information in small installments.
He wore the same decently melancholy aspect as a few months before; a
few months more or less of brushing could make little difference in the
antique lustre of his coat and hat. But the poor old man’s spirit was a
trifle more threadbare; it seemed to have received some hard rubs
during the summer. Newman inquired with interest about Mademoiselle
Noémie; and M. Nioche, at first, for answer, simply looked at him in
lachrymose silence.
“Don’t ask me, sir,” he said at last. “I sit and watch her, but I can
do nothing.”
“Do you mean that she misconducts herself?”
“I don’t know, I am sure. I can’t follow her. I don’t understand her.
She has something in her head; I don’t know what she is trying to do.
She is too deep for me.”
“Does she continue to go to the Louvre? Has she made any of those
copies for me?”
“She goes to the Louvre, but I see nothing of the copies. She has
something on her easel; I suppose it is one of the pictures you
ordered. Such a magnificent order ought to give her fairy-fingers. But
she is not in earnest. I can’t say anything to her; I am afraid of her.
One evening, last summer, when I took her to walk in the Champs
Élysées, she said some things to me that frightened me.”
“What were they?”
“Excuse an unhappy father from telling you,” said M. Nioche, unfolding
his calico pocket-handkerchief.
Newman promised himself to pay Mademoiselle Noémie another visit at the
Louvre. He was curious about the progress of his copies, but it must be
added that he was still more curious about the progress of the young
lady herself. He went one afternoon to the great museum, and wandered
through several of the rooms in fruitless quest of her. He was bending
his steps to the long hall of the Italian masters, when suddenly he
found himself face to face with Valentin de Bellegarde. The young
Frenchman greeted him with ardor, and assured him that he was a
godsend. He himself was in the worst of humors and he wanted someone to
contradict.
“In a bad humor among all these beautiful things?” said Newman. “I
thought you were so fond of pictures, especially the old black ones.
There are two or three here that ought to keep you in spirits.”
“Oh, to-day,” answered Valentin, “I am not in a mood for pictures, and
the more beautiful they are the less I like them. Their great staring
eyes and fixed positions irritate me. I feel as if I were at some big,
dull party, in a room full of people I shouldn’t wish to speak to. What
should I care for their beauty? It’s a bore, and, worse still, it’s a
reproach. I have a great many _ennuis_; I feel vicious.”
“If the Louvre has so little comfort for you, why in the world did you
come here?” Newman asked.
“That is one of my _ennuis_. I came to meet my cousin—a dreadful
English cousin, a member of my mother’s family—who is in Paris for a
week for her husband, and who wishes me to point out the ‘principal
beauties.’ Imagine a woman who wears a green crape bonnet in December
and has straps sticking out of the ankles of her interminable boots! My
mother begged I would do something to oblige them. I have undertaken to
play _valet de place_ this afternoon. They were to have met me here at
two o’clock, and I have been waiting for them twenty minutes. Why
doesn’t she arrive? She has at least a pair of feet to carry her. I
don’t know whether to be furious at their playing me false, or
delighted to have escaped them.”
“I think in your place I would be furious,” said Newman, “because they
may arrive yet, and then your fury will still be of use to you. Whereas
if you were delighted and they were afterwards to turn up, you might
not know what to do with your delight.”
“You give me excellent advice, and I already feel better. I will be
furious; I will let them go to the deuce and I myself will go with
you—unless by chance you too have a rendezvous.”
“It is not exactly a rendezvous,” said Newman. “But I have in fact come
to see a person, not a picture.”
“A woman, presumably?”
“A young lady.”
“Well,” said Valentin, “I hope for you with all my heart that she is
not clothed in green tulle and that her feet are not too much out of
focus.”
“I don’t know much about her feet, but she has very pretty hands.”
Valentin gave a sigh. “And on that assurance I must part with you?”
“I am not certain of finding my young lady,” said Newman, “and I am not
quite prepared to lose your company on the chance. It does not strike
me as particularly desirable to introduce you to her, and yet I should
rather like to have your opinion of her.”
“Is she pretty?”
“I guess you will think so.”
Bellegarde passed his arm into that of his companion. “Conduct me to
her on the instant! I should be ashamed to make a pretty woman wait for
my verdict.”
Newman suffered himself to be gently propelled in the direction in
which he had been walking, but his step was not rapid. He was turning
something over in his mind. The two men passed into the long gallery of
the Italian masters, and Newman, after having scanned for a moment its
brilliant vista, turned aside into the smaller apartment devoted to the
same school, on the left. It contained very few persons, but at the
farther end of it sat Mademoiselle Nioche, before her easel. She was
not at work; her palette and brushes had been laid down beside her, her
hands were folded in her lap, and she was leaning back in her chair and
looking intently at two ladies on the other side of the hall, who, with
their backs turned to her, had stopped before one of the pictures.
These ladies were apparently persons of high fashion; they were dressed
with great splendor, and their long silken trains and furbelows were
spread over the polished floor. It was at their dresses Mademoiselle
Noémie was looking, though what she was thinking of I am unable to say.
I hazard the supposition that she was saying to herself that to be able
to drag such a train over a polished floor was a felicity worth any
price. Her reflections, at any rate, were disturbed by the advent of
Newman and his companion. She glanced at them quickly, and then,
coloring a little, rose and stood before her easel.
“I came here on purpose to see you,” said Newman in his bad French,
offering to shake hands. And then, like a good American, he introduced
Valentin formally: “Allow me to make you acquainted with the Comte
Valentin de Bellegarde.”
Valentin made a bow which must have seemed to Mademoiselle Noémie quite
in harmony with the impressiveness of his title, but the graceful
brevity of her own response made no concession to underbred surprise.
She turned to Newman, putting up her hands to her hair and smoothing
its delicately-felt roughness. Then, rapidly, she turned the canvas
that was on her easel over upon its face. “You have not forgotten me?”
she asked.
“I shall never forget you,” said Newman. “You may be sure of that.”
“Oh,” said the young girl, “there are a great many different ways of
remembering a person.” And she looked straight at Valentin de
Bellegarde, who was looking at her as a gentleman may when a “verdict”
is expected of him.
“Have you painted anything for me?” said Newman. “Have you been
industrious?”
“No, I have done nothing.” And taking up her palette, she began to mix
her colors at hazard.
“But your father tells me you have come here constantly.”
“I have nowhere else to go! Here, all summer, it was cool, at least.”
“Being here, then,” said Newman, “you might have tried something.”
“I told you before,” she answered, softly, “that I don’t know how to
paint.”
“But you have something charming on your easel, now,” said Valentin,
“if you would only let me see it.”
She spread out her two hands, with the fingers expanded, over the back
of the canvas—those hands which Newman had called pretty, and which, in
spite of several paint-stains, Valentin could now admire. “My painting
is not charming,” she said.
“It is the only thing about you that is not, then, mademoiselle,” quoth
Valentin, gallantly.
She took up her little canvas and silently passed it to him. He looked
at it, and in a moment she said, “I am sure you are a judge.”
“Yes,” he answered, “I am.”
“You know, then, that that is very bad.”
“_Mon Dieu_,” said Valentin, shrugging his shoulders “let us
distinguish.”
“You know that I ought not to attempt to paint,” the young girl
continued.
“Frankly, then, mademoiselle, I think you ought not.”
She began to look at the dresses of the two splendid ladies again—a
point on which, having risked one conjecture, I think I may risk
another. While she was looking at the ladies she was seeing Valentin de
Bellegarde. He, at all events, was seeing her. He put down the
roughly-besmeared canvas and addressed a little click with his tongue,
accompanied by an elevation of the eyebrows, to Newman.
“Where have you been all these months?” asked Mademoiselle Noémie of
our hero. “You took those great journeys, you amused yourself well?”
“Oh, yes,” said Newman. “I amused myself well enough.”
“I am very glad,” said Mademoiselle Noémie with extreme gentleness, and
she began to dabble in her colors again. She was singularly pretty,
with the look of serious sympathy that she threw into her face.
Valentin took advantage of her downcast eyes to telegraph again to his
companion. He renewed his mysterious physiognomical play, making at the
same time a rapid tremulous movement in the air with his fingers. He
was evidently finding Mademoiselle Noémie extremely interesting; the
blue devils had departed, leaving the field clear.
“Tell me something about your travels,” murmured the young girl.
“Oh, I went to Switzerland,—to Geneva and Zermatt and Zürich and all
those places you know; and down to Venice, and all through Germany, and
down the Rhine, and into Holland and Belgium—the regular round. How do
you say that, in French—the regular round?” Newman asked of Valentin.
Mademoiselle Nioche fixed her eyes an instant on Bellegarde, and then
with a little smile, “I don’t understand monsieur,” she said, “when he
says so much at once. Would you be so good as to translate?”
“I would rather talk to you out of my own head,” Valentin declared.
“No,” said Newman, gravely, still in his bad French, “you must not talk
to Mademoiselle Nioche, because you say discouraging things. You ought
to tell her to work, to persevere.”
“And we French, mademoiselle,” said Valentin, “are accused of being
false flatterers!”
“I don’t want any flattery, I want only the truth. But I know the
truth.”
“All I say is that I suspect there are some things that you can do
better than paint,” said Valentin.
“I know the truth—I know the truth,” Mademoiselle Noémie repeated. And,
dipping a brush into a clot of red paint, she drew a great horizontal
daub across her unfinished picture.
“What is that?” asked Newman.
Without answering, she drew another long crimson daub, in a vertical
direction, down the middle of her canvas, and so, in a moment,
completed the rough indication of a cross. “It is the sign of the
truth,” she said at last.
The two men looked at each other, and Valentin indulged in another
flash of physiognomical eloquence. “You have spoiled your picture,”
said Newman.
“I know that very well. It was the only thing to do with it. I had sat
looking at it all day without touching it. I had begun to hate it. It
seemed to me something was going to happen.”
“I like it better that way than as it was before,” said Valentin. “Now
it is more interesting. It tells a story. Is it for sale?”
“Everything I have is for sale,” said Mademoiselle Noémie.
“How much is this thing?”
“Ten thousand francs,” said the young girl, without a smile.
“Everything that Mademoiselle Nioche may do at present is mine in
advance,” said Newman. “It makes part of an order I gave her some
months ago. So you can’t have this.”
“Monsieur will lose nothing by it,” said the young girl, looking at
Valentin. And she began to put up her utensils.
“I shall have gained a charming memory,” said Valentin. “You are going
away? your day is over?”
“My father is coming to fetch me,” said Mademoiselle Noémie.
She had hardly spoken when, through the door behind her, which opens on
one of the great white stone staircases of the Louvre, M. Nioche made
his appearance. He came in with his usual even, patient shuffle, and he
made a low salute to the two gentlemen who were standing before his
daughter’s easel. Newman shook his hands with muscular friendliness,
and Valentin returned his greeting with extreme deference. While the
old man stood waiting for Noémie to make a parcel of her implements, he
let his mild, oblique gaze hover toward Bellegarde, who was watching
Mademoiselle Noémie put on her bonnet and mantle. Valentin was at no
pains to disguise his scrutiny. He looked at a pretty girl as he would
have listened to a piece of music. Attention, in each case, was simple
good manners. M. Nioche at last took his daughter’s paint-box in one
hand and the bedaubed canvas, after giving it a solemn, puzzled stare,
in the other, and led the way to the door. Mademoiselle Noémie made the
young men the salute of a duchess, and followed her father.
“Well,” said Newman, “what do you think of her?”
“She is very remarkable. _Diable, diable, diable!_” repeated M. de
Bellegarde, reflectively; “she is very remarkable.”
“I am afraid she is a sad little adventuress,” said Newman.
“Not a little one—a great one. She has the material.” And Valentin
began to walk away slowly, looking vaguely at the pictures on the
walls, with a thoughtful illumination in his eye. Nothing could have
appealed to his imagination more than the possible adventures of a
young lady endowed with the “material” of Mademoiselle Nioche. “She is
very interesting,” he went on. “She is a beautiful type.”
“A beautiful type? What the deuce do you mean?” asked Newman.
“I mean from the artistic point of view. She is an artist,—outside of
her painting, which obviously is execrable.”
“But she is not beautiful. I don’t even think her very pretty.”
“She is quite pretty enough for her purposes, and it is a face and
figure on which everything tells. If she were prettier she would be
less intelligent, and her intelligence is half of her charm.”
“In what way,” asked Newman, who was much amused at his companion’s
immediate philosophisation of Mademoiselle Nioche, “does her
intelligence strike you as so remarkable?”
“She has taken the measure of life, and she has determined to _be_
something—to succeed at any cost. Her painting, of course, is a mere
trick to gain time. She is waiting for her chance; she wishes to launch
herself, and to do it well. She knows her Paris. She is one of fifty
thousand, so far as the mere ambition goes; but I am very sure that in
the way of resolution and capacity she is a rarity. And in one
gift—perfect heartlessness—I will warrant she is unsurpassed. She has
not as much heart as will go on the point of a needle. That is an
immense virtue. Yes, she is one of the celebrities of the future.”
“Heaven help us!” said Newman, “how far the artistic point of view may
take a man! But in this case I must request that you don’t let it take
you too far. You have learned a wonderful deal about Mademoiselle
Noémie in a quarter of an hour. Let that suffice; don’t follow up your
researches.”
“My dear fellow,” cried Bellegarde with warmth, “I hope I have too good
manners to intrude.”
“You are not intruding. The girl is nothing to me. In fact, I rather
dislike her. But I like her poor old father, and for his sake I beg you
to abstain from any attempt to verify your theories.”
“For the sake of that seedy old gentleman who came to fetch her?”
demanded Valentin, stopping short. And on Newman’s assenting, “Ah no,
ah no,” he went on with a smile. “You are quite wrong, my dear fellow;
you needn’t mind him.”
“I verily believe that you are accusing the poor gentleman of being
capable of rejoicing in his daughter’s dishonor.”
“_Voyons!_” said Valentin; “who is he? what is he?”
“He is what he looks like: as poor as a rat, but very high-toned.”
“Exactly. I noticed him perfectly; be sure I do him justice. He has had
losses, _des malheurs_, as we say. He is very low-spirited, and his
daughter is too much for him. He is the pink of respectability, and he
has sixty years of honesty on his back. All this I perfectly
appreciate. But I know my fellow-men and my fellow-Parisians, and I
will make a bargain with you.” Newman gave ear to his bargain and he
went on. “He would rather his daughter were a good girl than a bad one,
but if the worst comes to the worst, the old man will not do what
Virginius did. Success justifies everything. If Mademoiselle Noémie
makes a figure, her papa will feel—well, we will call it relieved. And
she will make a figure. The old gentleman’s future is assured.”
“I don’t know what Virginius did, but M. Nioche will shoot Miss
Noémie,” said Newman. “After that, I suppose his future will be assured
in some snug prison.”
“I am not a cynic; I am simply an observer,” Valentin rejoined.
“Mademoiselle Noémie interests me; she is extremely remarkable. If
there is a good reason, in honor or decency, for dismissing her from my
thoughts forever, I am perfectly willing to do it. Your estimate of the
papa’s sensibilities is a good reason until it is invalidated. I
promise you not to look at the young girl again until you tell me that
you have changed your mind about the papa. When he has given distinct
proof of being a philosopher, you will raise your interdict. Do you
agree to that?”
“Do you mean to bribe him?”
“Oh, you admit, then, that he is bribable? No, he would ask too much,
and it would not be exactly fair. I mean simply to wait. You will
continue, I suppose, to see this interesting couple, and you will give
me the news yourself.”
“Well,” said Newman, “if the old man turns out a humbug, you may do
what you please. I wash my hands of the matter. For the girl herself,
you may be at rest. I don’t know what harm she may do to me, but I
certainly can’t hurt her. It seems to me,” said Newman, “that you are
very well matched. You are both hard cases, and M. Nioche and I, I
believe, are the only virtuous men to be found in Paris.”
Soon after this M. de Bellegarde, in punishment for his levity,
received a stern poke in the back from a pointed instrument. Turning
quickly round he found the weapon to be a parasol wielded by a lady in
green gauze bonnet. Valentin’s English cousins had been drifting about
unpiloted, and evidently deemed that they had a grievance. Newman left
him to their mercies, but with a boundless faith in his power to plead
his cause.